The Case of the Phantom Diver Ch. 06

"I'm telling you, I didn't miss a map last night!" Phineas insisted once they'd gotten back inside Jake's old sedan. "I fucking didn't!"

Jake raised his hands off the steering wheel as if to indicate that he hadn't said anything. Of course, he'd been about to until Phinn realized it. Still, the athletic detective mumbled his point.

"No, I didn't get rushed by the burglars. Red and Blue Mask showed up when I was leaving," the brainy half of the duo reminded.

"Hey, I'm not blaming you. You had to sneak inside the archives and search in the dark," Jake continued, implying that his partner had missed the map.

"Look, you and I both know that wasn't the first time I've snuck into the archive room. I can name at least two previous cases without checking our old records."

"But you snuck in while the historical society was open during the daytime. I'm sure it's harder to search by flashlight," Jake pointed out.

"No! I searched every single file in each cabinet for the Colonial Era and the Gilded Age. If a map about Thornbeard's treasure was in that room last night, then it was misfiled," Phineas insisted.

"Well, this sucks. A map was found, and we didn't even get a chance to look at it. I can't believe Mr. Gladden threatened to have me arrested for peeking over his shoulder," Jake commented, feeling hurt.

"Don't let it bother you. He hustled the map away from that girl pretty fast. He sure appeared shocked to see it. I wondered initially if he'd hidden it away on purpose," Phinn speculated. "But I doubt Stan has the acting skills to pull off that completely astonished expression. I almost believed him when he said he'd never seen it before in his life."

"The problem is that one guy managed to take pictures of the map before he ran out," Jake grumbled, pulling his car out of the parking spot and into the busy street traffic. "Now he has a lead in the search over all of us.

"You did recognize him, right?"

"The guy who took...Holy shit! He's the annoying guy from the beach. The one who kept asking super loud questions after we found the skeleton!" Jake exclaimed after putting two and two together.

"I don't know about that part as it was before I arrived. However, Sandy-Brown-Hair-With-Glasses tried to take a selfie with the body when we distracted Wishkoski," Phinn recounted.

"That's right! Sydney yelled at him, so he stopped." Jake remembered more because of how hot he thought his sister's friend looked at the moment.

"And when we visited the medical examiner, I had a nagging feeling that I missed something. It started when you carried me away from Vera. Now, I know what it was. It was that guy. He was sitting in one of the chairs with his face in his phone," Phinn relayed his aha moment from inside the historical society.

"Wait, so Sandy-Brown-Hair-With-Glasses is investigating Thornbeard's treasure, too?" Jake questioned while at the stop light. "Did he know about the treasure before we learned about it?"

"That's an important question," Phinn admitted. "Fuck, I hate being in the dark like this. We need to get ahead of everyone else."

"We won't with that guy having the only picture of the map," Jake complained, slamming his palm down on the steering wheel.

"Calm down. His advantage is limited and short-lived. We'll know what the map looks like and if it's correct soon enough."

"How? No! We can't break in again. Are you--"

"Relax. I'm not doing that again...for now. Look, Gladden has a problem. We saw how many people showed up today with only a whiff of a treasure hunt. What do you think is going to happen with a map appearing?" Phinn queried. "More people than us and the Mask Brothers will get desperate. If Stan doesn't release the map, he's going to have a string of break-ins."

"Whoa! You're right. The cops will have to station a squad car or two down there at night."

"Not unless Stan wises up or somebody orders him to. I suspect a copy of the map will be in tomorrow's edition of the Edgewater Dispatch, if not on the news channels by the late news," Phinn guessed.

"Don't get any ideas about a late-night adventure after the news airs for a second night in a row. I don't have a boat for us to take out onto the Atlantic," Jake stressed.

"I guess so," his partner replied with a shrug. Their families might not own a boat, but they knew plenty of people in Edgewater who did. But that was an issue for another day. "Hey, where are you driving to? We're going out by the highway. If we want to catch up, we need a copy of Cozart's book."

"I need to eat. It's already after two," Jake said, pointing at the sedan's dashboard. However, his car had no clock in that area or anywhere else. "I'm in the mood for Big Spot."

"First off, it's too hot to eat in the car. Second, I'm not eating greasy food while on a case. You know what happens," the teen with the touchy stomach said about stopping at the popular drive-in diner.

"Fine! We'll stop at a place with air conditioning. Uh, how about Baron Broil?" Jake asked, thinking of the burger chain, which had a location nearby.

"Fast food?"

"Yeah, yeah," Jake muttered, understanding the unmentioned remark about more greasy food. "Does that mean Count Chick-O's is out as well? How about El Monstruo? It's a local chain."

"Mexican? During an investigation? I'm not the one who had the incident during The Blind Duck Mystery," the brown-haired sleuth reminded.

"Hey, I made it in time."

"You went in the woods. And you're lucky I had a pack of Kleenex on me."

"Alright, let's not bring that up ever again," Jake instructed. "A sandwich? I can turn around and head back to Fielding's."

"Hmm, a sandwich would work, but I prefer not to backtrack," Phinn noted about the local deli.

"There is a sub shop out by the bookstore," Jake recalled, thinking about the strip mall where Page & Reade was located.

"I like the idea," Phinn said, holding up a finger. "But let's wait to eat at the sub stand in the food court at Bentworth."

"Wait? I can't wait any longer. I'm starving!"

"We're right by the highway. From here, it's barely another twenty minutes, if that," the skinny detective estimated.

"But we have to park and walk over to the food court."

"It's a college. Even in the summer, there will be girls on campus taking classes," Phinn pointed out."

"We're eating at Bentworth," Jake announced, suddenly able to last longer before succumbing to starvation.

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"Hi, Jake," a raven-haired coed greeted with a wave. She wore a pair of the shortest shorts Jake might have ever seen. The busty blonde accompanying her giggled as they walked past the table where two teen sleuths sat.

"Hey, what's up? Jake responded with a head nod. Once the girls were far enough away, he asked Phinn. "Who was that?"

"How would I know? She said hi to you," Phineas pointed out, barely looking up from the copy of X Never Marks the Spot: Lost Treasures of American History. Consumed with reading the section on Thornbead, Phinn barely pecked at his 6-inch sandwich. Meanwhile, Jake had already gone back for another foot-long.

The two investigators sat at a round four-person table in a somewhat secluded corner of the food court inside the Flanmore Studen Union. Phineas selected the spot because it gave them solid sightlines of the two main entrances and the staircase to the lower and upper levels. While not paranoid, Phinn preferred to avoid a run-in with his father. Professor Fraser Farris taught chemistry at Bentworth College, and Phinn's ties to the school meant he knew its layout and plenty of people who worked for or attended the college.

"Damn, I can't wait until college," Jake commented while watching a trio of attractive girls get in line. "No more sneaking around in cars. I'll have a dorm room to bring girls back to."

"Which is why I'll have a single to myself if we go to the same school," Phinn disclosed.

"If? Of course, we're going to the same college, and we'll be roommates," Jake insisted. Any other possibility didn't exist in his mind. "We'll get Dusty to join us, and the team will be back together."

"I thought you wanted to attend the same school as The Sassy Girls so we could form a superteam," Phineas recalled dryly.

"Ah, the Sasser sisters. We haven't seen them since last summer. I bet they got even hotter," Jake predicted. "Road trip?"

"We're busy," his partner declared before asking if he'd like to hear about what he read.

"Hold on. Let me get a refill," Jake said, grabbing his cup to get more soda.

"Okay, Thornbeard's real name is unknown," Phineas began once Jake returned. "Although he went by several names, they were viewed as nothing but aliases. Cozart mentions that those names have been traced back, with all ending in dead ends. So, we can skip the idea of finding his real identity with our limited knowledge."

"All I care about is finding his buried loot, arrr matey!"

"Please don't," Phinn begged, sighing at Jake's awful pirate impression.

"It might come in handy. What if I need to dress up as a ghost pirate and scare off our competition? Oh, that could be fun if The Factfinders show up," Jake suggested, warming up to his own idea.

"Moving on, it appears that Thornbeard died in 1719 in a naval confrontation between his Black Rose and Captain Hawkins' Hermes. The battle lasted nearly from sunrise to sundown. Ship logs from the Hermes vanished at some point afterward. Cozart reports this detail led to heavy speculation as to Thornbeard's missing spoils," Phinn surmised, skipping over some details for now. "Due to the missing logs, the exact location of the fight is unknown. However, some other accounts list land nearby that fits with the area around here."

"All that sounds similar to what he told Hollie during her interview," Jake recalled, having watched the video on Channel 9's website several times at Phinn's request.

"But we didn't get a good look at all this," the bespectacled sleuth said, turning the oversized book around for Jake to see. "Let's start with one of the necklaces. This is the Baddox Diamond. It was owned by a wealthy Englishman who was involved in the East India Company. Thornbeard took it during his time in the East Indies early in his career. Allegedly a prized possession, he reportedly refused to sell it. It became almost a good luck charm."

"Doesn't seem so lucky if he got killed," Jake remarked.

"The pirate life wasn't a safe profession. If these accounts about his known attacks are correct, Thornbeard escaped certain doom multiple times during his years in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. A superstitious man might think his nine lives came from an early score," Phinn speculated. "Okay, here's the second item that seems interesting."

"Damn, she's hot!"

"She's also been dead for roughly three hundred years, and that's a painting. It might not be fully representative of her actual appearance," Phinn explained. "What we're more concerned about is around her neck. That is the Robles Ruby."

"Yeah, whatever. Who's the babe?" Jake inquired, earning a head shake from his oldest friend.

"Fine. That's Adelina, the wife of the replacement Spanish governor mentioned in Cozart's news interview," the lead detective explained, aware that if he didn't, Jake would remain fixated on the attractive woman. "It's another item that was likely on the Black Rose or buried on land."

"How can anyone be sure?" Jake asked, moving his head around to study the painting. His partner rolled his eyes as he could tell Jake attempted to get a better look down the two-dimensional image's cleavage.

"Pirates during that time were about the same as men today. Some acted as gentlemen and showed respect to women. Others were sexual predators and took advantage of the lifestyle to take any kind of treasure they wanted, including women," Phinn explained, noticing Jake's face scrunch up as the word rape entered his mind. "Despite his sinister-sounding name, Thornbeard apparently acted as a gentleman when it came to Adelina. Although he murdered her husband, he dropped her and several servants off at a nearby port. The diversion is part of a timeframe that leaves little spare time before he's spotted several times until his death. Sure, it's possible he offloaded the recent spoils or kept them on the governor's ship, which his right-hand man assumed command of before separating, but it's unlikely."

"Is there any more of her?" Jake asked, flipping pages in search of another painting.

"No, there is not. That's the last you will see of the governor's wife," Phinn stated with certainty.

"You don't know that. What if her spirit resides in the necklace?" Jake suggested

"How? Thornbeard took the necklace with him."

"Look at that face and tits. No way does a pirate dump a gorgeous woman like her off in some port. Nah, he probably kept Adelina around to romance her. I know I would," Jake proclaimed. "And when her ghost pops up, I'm so going to find a way to--"

"Alright, enough of this strange fantasy," Phinn said, cutting off his horny partner. "Let's move to another item Adelina's husband gifted her: the music box."

"Aww, she's not holding it," Jake whined upon seeing only an illustration of the lost item.

"The Turma Music Box first appeared appropriately in the country of Turma," Phinn began.

"Where's that? I never heard of it."

"It's one of those tiny European city-states that eventually got gobbled up as nations consolidated their territory. Technically, it was a duchy presided over by a grand duke. Honestly, I had never heard of it either until I read about it here. But that's unsurprising, as numerous similar city-states existed over the centuries," Phineas admitted. "The music box belonged to one of the grand duke's noblemen's wives. Somewhat obviously, a scandal occurred when the nobleman discovered his wife was the grand duke's mistress. He murdered her before being slain himself.

"That's not romantic, Jake observed.

"No, it's not. It's also the start of the supposed curse, as the music box traveled around Europe for roughly the next hundred and fifty years. Each stop featured a husband or wife dying in a jealous rage."

"Why would anyone give a wife like her that thing?" Jake questioned, returning back to jab his finger at Adelina's portrait.

"I don't know. I guess the curse or history of the music box made it fascinating," Phinn said, packing the book in his book bag. "It doesn't matter much to us."

"A curse matters!"

"Look, all of this is mildly interesting and would matter if we find these items. However, our goal is to solve the mystery of the skeleton diver. If it leads to a pirate treasure, we have a potential case for ages; if not, so be it. For all we know, the skeleton could take us in a wholly different direction. We experienced such a dramatic shift in a case before. Either way, reading about a pirate's past exploits isn't going to help us take the next step."

"I want to find to find the treasure," Jake stated.

"Alright, then, we need to determine whether the search expedition existed and if our skeleton is from it. Our best chance to do so may be in the papers of past sea merchant families. So that's why we came here. The Blakely and Mormont collections are stored here and open to the public. The Tarr records will be trickier to obtain access to," Phinn explained, checking the time. "And we only have a couple of hours until the archive closes. So, let's go."

After leaving the student union, Phinn paused to scan for his father or any close faculty friends. Located roughly twenty miles south of Edgewater in the town of Green Grove, Bentworth College is a small, private liberal arts school. In addition to employing his father, the college played a key role in Phinn's life. His parents had met there almost twenty years ago. Due to the family connection, Phinn had spent numerous hours on the campus since he could walk, so he knew precisely where to head.

While they traveled the short distance to the university library, Jake asked about the sudden negative turn in his partner's attitude toward the case. With a sigh, Phinn admitted he wasn't sure about the mystery.

"When we first heard about the potential pirate tie and a lost treasure, it felt exciting. I thought we'd found a case, unlike our past ones. However, I'm starting to lose that excitement. With a possible map surfacing, we're about to have every fortune hunter within a day's drive getting in our way. What we encountered at the historical society was bad enough."

"Don't tell me you're worried about competition. You thrive on it," Jake reminded.

"I'd hope Cozart's book would help give us a direction to explore. However, I'm disappointed with what I read. It's mostly gossip and speculation masquerading as historical fact. I only performed a cursory search online for Oswald Cozart. I didn't find much. Based on his writing, I suspect he's an amateur historian rather than an academic employed by a university," Phinn continued until they reached the library.

Usually a bustling center of activity, the library felt like a summer ghost town when they entered through its main doors. Only a few students appeared to be on the first floor.

"Hi, Phinny!" a young dark-skinned library employee greeted upon spotting them walking past the main desk in the front of the building.

"Damn," Phineas mumbled under his breath. He'd hoped to avoid being seen by anyone he knew.

Jake muttered a similar swear, but for an entirely different reason. His gaze ran up and down the attractive, athletic coed. Aware of being checked out by the handsome, well-built young man, she smirked slightly at the attention.

"Hey, Shantel. How are you?" the usually anti-social teen inquired.

Before the desk clerk could respond, another young female library employee passed them by. Suddenly, she halted the cart full of books she'd been pushing after performing a doubletake. A petite girl with dirty blonde hair in a pixie cut, her eyes widened behind her glasses.

"Phinny!" the dirty blonde squealed, bouncing over to hug him.

"Hey, Emory," Phineas greeted, returning the hug until she broke it off and lightly punched his shoulder.

"Where have you been?"

"Yeah, we thought you were going to hang out with us this summer," Shantel added, leaning her upper body onto the desk.

Jake experienced a moment of déjà vu. The move reminded him of Zelda from this morning. Still, he couldn't help but check out the cleavage on display in front of him.

"The part-time summer job here fell through," Phinn informed the two coeds. He felt Jake rock back slightly at the news in surprise. He'd never told him about his mother's idea to get him out of the house more while blocking his chances to conduct investigations.

"That sucks," Shantel replied.

"It does. We looked forward to being entertained by tales of your mysteries," Emory admitted, pouting at the disappointment.

"What brings you here on this slow day?" Shantel inquired.

"Did you just stop in to say hi? Or are you on a case?" Emory rattled off, his eyes flashing excitement at the prospect.

"Wait, is it about the pirate thing over in Edgewater?" Shantel questioned.

"I can't say...but maybe," Phinn teased, surprising Jake further. "We need to check the archives about a possible lead."

"Oh, that's not good. I think Mr. Fuller left already," the pixie-cut coed revealed.

"I'm pretty that Chuck did leave. He mentioned having a dentist appointment. It is the summer semester," Shantel noted after spotting Phinn's disappointed expression.

"We can always double-check," Emory offered. "And you can tell us about this pirate."

"Uh, actually, I need to use the restroom," the bespectacled sleuth announced. An idea had popped into his head. "But Jake can fill you in. He was at the beach the other day when the skeleton was discovered."