Read Atlantis Stolen (Sam Reilly Book 3) Online
Authors: Christopher Cartwright
Atlantis Stolen (Sam Reilly Book 3)
Atlantis
Stolen
By
Christopher
Cartwright
Copyright
2015 by Christopher Cartwright
This
book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any
reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is
prohibited. This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands,
media and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are
used fictitiously. All rights reserved.
Thanks
very much to Cheryl my editor, and Kris, my beta-reader!
Dutch Trading
Post, 1638.
The barren winter
landscape was desolate in its beauty. While the sun approached its zenith, it did
little to stop the cold stinging his weather-worn face while he worked. Albert
Olsen filled his bucket with another shovel of sludge and then turned to climb
the slippery crest of the muddy bank. Once on the ridge, he didn’t have far to
walk before he could dump its contents down the other side.
From there, Olsen
saw the other islands.
A strange mixture
of mud and ice stood surrounded by a river whose partially frozen mouth looked as
wide as an ocean when it thawed. Not that he paid much attention to any of it
as he returned to fill yet another bucket.
It was strenuous
and tediously boring work, but it needed to be done so the boats could survive.
And if they didn’t, the little outcrop certainly wouldn’t.
So the sea canals
needed to be built.
They had begun as
small ditches used to drain the marshland so basic farming could meet the needs
of the settlement. But protecting the ships had warranted the effort to widen
and deepen them to accommodate small boats, or ships at high tide.
Wrapped in a pair
of thick animal hides, fur hat, and boots, even a day’s shoveling did little to
allay his cold. The sort of cold that sunk into your bones and didn’t come out
again long into the spring. Not that it bothered him much. He’d spent the last four
winters working at the post, laboring for the master engineer. In another year,
he would have repaid his obligation and would be allowed to return home.
He dumped another
bucket over the ridge.
He’d seen that
view for the past four years. He would leave after completing his obligatory
service to his master, Hank Worthington, who’d been hired to build large
amounts of the government’s sea structures and buildings. At the age of 22,
Olsen had earned enough money that he could now afford to return home and marry
Frajia Clausen, the girl from his childhood dreams – that was, if she’d kept
her promise.
If they let me
leave.
Young laborers
were hard to come by, and the council of traders would offer tremendous rewards
to those who would stay on. If not, they would threaten tremendous suffering if
one refused.
Olsen returned
down the steep slope of the soon to be complete canal, sliding on its damp dark
sides. Sticking his shovel back into the wet soil, he continued as he’d been
doing for the past few weeks. He worked with a team of thirty other men –
although how it could be called a team, he didn’t know, as there was little
order to the process. Each man dug, hauled, and dumped the soil by himself.
Next to him,
Felix Brandt worked.
Although, again,
he wondered if that were the right word. An older man, whom he’d guessed
couldn’t be any younger than 50, worked so slowly that Olsen sometimes wondered
whether the man even wanted the project complete.
Olsen continued
this process of filling his bucket, carrying it up the slippery edge of the
canal, and then dumping it until he’d lost count of the trips he’d performed
that morning. With irritation, he noticed he could easily count two or
sometimes even three trips, for every one that Felix achieved.
He’d never liked
the man.
It didn’t make
sense, why someone his age would want to come to such a place for work. Not
that he’d ever given much thought about what sort of work an old man like Felix
would be well suited to. After his last bucket, Olsen paused his efforts, just
long enough to walk down the dike to the edge of the river bank, so that he
could fill his cup with the icy cold water.
When the main
river thawed, the attacks would begin again.
That’s what this
was all about. Hastily building, preparing, and guarding the trading post so
that it could beat their attackers again, as it had done last summer, and the
summer before that. The wall had been strengthened earlier in the winter, and
the canals now lengthened to protect the boats. And the settlement would
continue to beat them, until they lost, or someone finally discovered what he’d
learned the first day he came to the island – that it’s a muddy swamp, in the
middle of nowhere, of little value.
The naiveté made
him want to laugh. Not that it was his problem. He would be leaving soon
enough. He took another drink of the water. It was so cold it stung at his
throat while he drank, making him cough.
“You’re slowing
down, Albert.” Felix dropped his bucket and climbed down to meet him at the
river’s edge. “Are you wearying in your old age?”
“No, just waiting
for you to catch up,” he replied.
“You may have to
wait all day and tomorrow most likely. I’m more than twice your age, you know.”
And Albert did
know, too.
Felix slowly
filled his leather bota bag. Even that, Olsen noticed, seemed to take an
unusually long time. The man was slow in every task he performed. Not because
he was stupid, or incompetent, but as though he simply couldn’t see the point
of any urgency in what he was doing.
The man seemed to
be biding his time and merely waiting.
But for what?
Albert wondered
why Brandt, for a man who was still laboring at his age, hadn’t felt more
urgency to achieve something, anything, before he was incapable of sustaining
himself.
“They tell me
you’re leaving soon,” Felix said as he sat down by the river’s edge to drink
his water.
“Yes, when the
river thaws, I will look for the next passage home.”
“It will be
difficult with our current arrangement to obtain passage on a ship. After all,
no one seems to be playing very well with others currently.”
Albert smiled,
unsure if he was being reprimanded for the way he’d avoided the man. “I’m
patient. I’ll find my way home.”
“Why do you want
to return so soon?”
“Soon? I’ve been
here five winters already. Why wouldn’t I want to leave it?”
“It seems like a
nice enough island as any. Is there something waiting for you back home,
though?”
Albert found
himself answering before he even considered why the strange old man was
interested. “There’s a girl. Frajia Clausen, more perfect than anyone or
anything I’ve ever seen. And she promised to wait for me.”
“That’s very
nice. That’s a worthy reason to leave this place.” Felix smiled, a nearly
condescending one, and then said, “But have you seen all that this world has to
offer? There are some things, I dare say, far more beautiful than that girl of
yours…”
Albert picked up
his bucket, ready to return to the canal before he lost his ability to refrain
from striking Felix. “If you’d ever met a girl like this, you too, would be
quite certain there was no need to see every precious thing this land has to
offer before determining that she was the most precious.”
Felix smiled.
There was something unctuous and slimy about it. “Of course, of course… I’m an
old man, and foolish at such matters as love. I’ll tell you what I will do for
you…”
Albert paused at
the top of the dike. “What you will do for me?”
“I own a ship, and
I have to return to Amsterdam next year
. S
he’s in the north canal. In the summer I too have to return home.
You may come with me.”
Albert stared at
the old, worthless man, suddenly realizing his mistake. Brandt wasn’t a slow
working laborer. Instead, he was a wealthy landowner, who had paid for the
building of the canals. He was too stunned to speak.
“Would you like
that?” Felix asked.
“Yes sir, thank
you very much sir. That’s very kind.”
“Good. Now, shall
we finish this canal?”
Albert nodded and
returned to the canal, ready to continue. Despite commencing work several
weeks ago, today it would finally be flooded. At its bottom, a small trickle of
water, no more than a few inches high could be seen, having seeped into the
otherwise dry canal.
Albert continued
digging with his new-found friend, Felix Brandt. Ensuring the boats that would
soon call the canal home had enough water below their keels, an engineer
carefully measured the depth.
The master
engineer, Hank Worthington, then inspected the depth of the canal and informed
them the canal would have to be dug a further foot deeper, before it could be
successfully flooded.
With slow,
purposeful movement of his shovel, Albert deepened the center of the canal.
Water filled the spot where he dug as fast as he removed the wet soil. He continued,
working harder now he knew who his slow and unwanted companion really was.
It was there that
he found it.
A strange sound,
like metal striking metal. It could have been another hard rock, but the sound
didn’t quite match up. Albert kept digging, more out of curiosity than out of any
desire to get somewhere.
His shovel struck
it again.
That was when he
first spotted its sparkle. Below the water, half a foot under the soil, Albert
saw what had made the sound. It appeared like a strange mixture of red and
orange metal, but brighter, almost like gold. He worked the small device with
the tip of his shovel until it came free from the earth’s clasp. Pulling it
out, he quickly washed it in the muddy water. It glowed red like a strange type
of gold. He quickly examined his finding.
Built like a
solid rod, it was nearly half a foot in length and no more than three inches
thick. At the head of the device appeared something that resembled a telescope.
Only there were no pieces of glass to be seen. Instead, its sharp rectangular
angles rotated so that light reflected for no apparent purpose. Strange markings,
completely foreign to him, covered the sides, making it appear old. At the
base, he noticed something rotate. It had twelve different positions, and each
one slightly changed the angle of the reflective metal at its head.
Olsen grinned as
he shuffled the artifact in his hands.
It felt heavy.
More like the weight of a large axe than an ornate looking glass. It was the
first time he realized it was a strange red color, ruining his hope that it was
gold.
All the same, it
begged the question…
Where did it
come from?
Albert bent down
to wash it again. Over the hill, Felix approached, slow as ever. Terrified that
someone might take it from him, Albert slid his finding inside his large jacket
pocket, and continued to dig, if only a little hopeful of another such
discovery. But he was not so rewarded. In the high tide of that afternoon the
canal was opened to the ocean. Water flooded in, and with it, all hopes he held
of finding more unique riches.
That night he
visited his master, who was aboard Felix Brandt’s ship, preparing to return to
Amsterdam in the spring.
The Delfland’s
rigging had been stripped for winter. Even without it, Albert could see it was
a grand sailing ship, befitting a very rich landowner. Hank met him on the
upper deck.
“Hello Olsen. What
can I help you with?”
“I’m sorry to
interrupt you, sir.” He looked sheepish as he asked, “Can I come inside and
talk privately?”
“Of course, young
man. Come downstairs and tell me what’s on your mind.”
Olsen followed
his master deep into the ship. Locked away since it had been stowed for the
winter, the Defland still appeared fit for the King of Holland. Inside, the
cold interior was expansive, more like a palace than a boat, which often
required the use of every inch of her room. He was taken aft, where the
master’s cabin rested.
Reassured that
his master was the only person aboard the ship, Albert quickly told his master
of the discovery and his worry that someone might steal it from him. When he
was done, Hank lit a large candle. Then he smiled and said, “May I examine it?”
“Of course.”
Albert took it out of his pocket and handed it to him.
Bringing the
light of the candle over the metal device, Hank took a cloth covered in strong
liquor and began cleaning the orange metal. It reflected the light as powerfully
as any gold that either of them had ever seen. Hank polished the device until
it became reflective like a mirror. On the side of the rod a strange marking
could be seen.
Albert had never
seen the shapes written anywhere. Hank looked at it, mesmerized, and gasped as
he saw the writings.
“Have you seen it
before?”
“No, never,” Hank
answered, still polishing it reverently.
“Then what made
you gasp when you saw the markings at its center?”
“It just looks
very similar to something an old friend of mine once showed me from Africa.
They were sketches of course, and clearly can have nothing to do with this…
even so, the markings bear frightful similarities.”
“What was so
interesting about your friend’s sketches?”
Hank looked torn.
As though he were deciding how much to tell. Then replied, “My friend returned
for a second expedition to Africa, but neither he nor any other member of his
22-man team returned.”