Fic: "The Lost City" (2/5)
Title: The Lost City (2/5)
Author: cassyl
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Jack Sparrow/James Norrington
Summary: Jack’s search for a fabled map leads him on an adventure that may mean more than he ever bargained for.
Warnings: This is AU like whoa. I also want to point out that, although many locations in this story are based on real places, they are all fictionalized versions of themselves. Furthermore, no copyright infringement is intended.
I want to apologize for the deluge of postings, but I leave the country tomorrow, so I have to finish this up quickly.
THE LOST CITY
“There is a tide in the affairs of men Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life Is bound in shallows and in miseries . . .”
-- Shakespeare, Julius Caesar
CHAPTER TWO
The room Norrington led him to could only be the man’s own bedroom. It was as spare as the study downstairs, the bed hung with a pale white canopy of netting. Besides the wardrobe, a much larger sibling to the one downstairs, there was a washstand bearing a small, tarnished mirror and several stacks of books piled up by the bed. Another rich Persian rug covered most of the floor.
Norrington had come to a stop in the middle of the room. His posture was a little stooped, and Jack thought he looked tired.
“Well?” Jack said.
“I’ll need your help to move the bed.”
Jack sheathed his sword and, with a brief warning of, “Nothing clever, now,” set to pushing the bed aside. This they did without incident, revealing a small trap door in the floor. Jack retrieved the geographer’s pistol from his belt and aimed it directly at Norrington.
The man needed no further prompting. He knelt carefully on the floor, half his attention on Jack and the pistol. Drawing a key from the pocket of his robe, he unlocked the trap door and lifted it up to reveal a small cubbyhole. From Jack’s vantage point, he could only see some papers and, to his delight, a glimmer of gold.
Norrington drew out a gilded box and set it on the floor between then. It wasn’t especially large, the size of a modest Bible, and made of old, deeply polished wood. The lid was heavily inlaid with gold, the central image being a powerful trident similar to the one inscribed on the coin Jack had stolen from the Moor. “I assume you have no interest in the coins.”
“Just the map.”
“Very well.” Norrington opened the box, revealing a pile of coins just like the one in Jack’s pocket. But this was nothing compared to the case lying amongst the coins. It was pure gold, a cylinder about the length of Jack’s hand with handsome caps on both ends, and every inch of it encrusted with emeralds and sapphires. In and of itself, the case would have been an excellent prize. But Jack knew, with more certainty than ever, that it was what was inside the case that would prove to be truly valuable.
Standing, Norrington handed the relic to Jack. A little shock of excitement went through him as he handled the thing. Only a thin casement of gold separated him from the knowledge he’d been seeking, and from there, it was only a matter of following the directions. He started to pull impatiently at one of the gold caps, but Norrington’s cool voice interrupted him.
“I wouldn’t recommend that.”
“Wouldn’t you?” Jack asked, looking up.
“Trust me,” he said.
“Not much good, having a map you’re not allowed to look at, Jim. I’ve gone to quite a bit of trouble to get my hands on this little pretty, so you can understand if I’m a bit eager to lift her skirts, so to say.”
“Be that as it may, if you ever want to see what’s inside that case, you won’t want to be too hasty about opening it.”
“Look, mate, if you’ve got something to say, go ahead and say it. I’ve got plans that are aching to be made, and not a lot of inclination to listen to your cryptic warnings, savvy?”
“All right,” Norrington said, his lips twisting into a small, inscrutable smile. “That case is no ordinary one. It’s an ancient mechanism, designed to safeguard sensitive documents. If you look closer, you’ll see that the cylinder is made up of eight separate segments. Each of those segments has four faces, bearing a different arrangement of jewels. When the faces are aligned correctly, the device will open to reveal its contents. If not, if the device is forced open, a capsule bearing an acid solution is broken, and will dissolve whatever is inside.”
“And let me guess,” Jack sighed. “You’re the only one who knows what the correct alignment is.” That strange smile of Norrington’s now made perfect sense. It was the look of a clever man smugly acknowledging his own cleverness. There was no reason why he shouldn’t give Jack the case, if he knew very well that Jack wouldn’t be able to open it himself.
“Precisely.”
“Have you taken into consideration the knowledge that I am something of a reckless agent and prone to rash action? That I might have methods for discovering information other than asking nicely?”
“Don’t misunderstand me,” Norrington replied. “I’m perfectly happy to open the case for you, but I’m concerned about what I get out of the equation.”
“Full use of all your appendages?” Jack suggested pleasantly.
“Generous though that is, I’d like something else on top of that,” Norrington said, meeting Jack’s eye. For someone who had no apparent martial training, his calm and self-possession rivaled that of the best generals.
“In that case, mate, name your terms.”
“I will give you use of my map, and I will finance the trip, on the condition that you allow me to accompany you to the Lost City.”
Jack had to admit he was a bit surprised by this request. To give himself time to think he asked, “Who’s to say I’m going to use the map myself? I might be planning on selling it to the highest bidder.”
“I highly doubt it.”
As he considered Norrington’s proposition, he took a good look at the man. He was tall and looked hardy enough, if a bit skinny. It was true, he didn’t know how to handle a pistol, but so far he’d proved that he wasn’t altogether foolhardy. And then there was the old mystic’s description of him-someone who had goodness in his heart. Goodness wasn’t precisely Jack’s favorite quality in a man, but if a body were cagey about betrayal it couldn’t hurt to take as a partner someone who was essentially honorable. And, after all, it wasn’t as if Jack would need to keep him around forever. “All right, Jim, m’lad. We have an accord. In exchange for your map and your kind patronage, I shall take you with me.”
Smiling broadly, Jack extended his hand, which Norrington took in a firm grip, looking quietly pleased.
“Well,” Jack said, “excellent. No sense in wasting time. Pop this lovely open and let’s have a look.” He held the golden case out to Norrington.
The man took the case, but paused, considering the object in his hands for a long moment before lifting his head and meeting Jack’s eye again. “Before we go any further,” he said, “I’d be much obliged if you’d answer one question for me.”
“You can ask.”
“I don’t pretend that I have much business enquiring into your motives here, or what you intend to do with the spoils if we find them. Nor do I have the right to ask you about your history. But I would like to know: What is your true name?”
Jack considered lying. It would be exceptionally easy to do so, and, in fact, might have been advantageous, since half of Istanbul still had its eyes peeled for him. And yet, he couldn’t help thinking of the piercing gaze the old sage had given him back in Tripoli, which had seemed to cut right to the core of him. On balance, Jack thought, there was no harm in a little bit of honesty once in a while. “Captain Jack Sparrow at your service,” he said with a ludicrous bow.
“Ah,” Norrington said, and Jack was surprised to see a flicker of recognition in the geographer’s eyes.
“You’ve heard of me, I take it.”
“Your exploits with the East India Trading Company didn’t go unremarked in these parts. You’re spoken of as something of a minor Robin Hood.”
Jack chuckled. “Always nice to hear you’re well thought of in a place.” Then he caught Norrington’s eye and added, “And you have no reservations about making a deal with a pirate.”
“In my experience, acknowledging its limitations, I’ve found that there are pirates, and then there are pirates. Besides, even if I didn’t know you for a pirate, it isn’t as if I was innocent of what I was getting myself into. Reputable members of society seldom threaten one in one’s own home.”
“Can’t argue with that. Now that’s settled, shall we get on with it?”
“Yes,” Norrington said, and walked over to the bed, where he lowered himself onto the mattress with an appearance of great fatigue. Jack stepped closer, and stood by the bed as Norrington carefully aligned the eight segments of the map case. Sure enough, each one bore four different gemstone designs. One was two emeralds, another an emerald and three sapphires, a third a single sapphire. Norrington arranged them all and checked their positions one last time before he pulled firmly on the end caps. The device opened with a metallic click, and one of the caps pulled back, allowing Norrington to shake the case’s contents out into his hand.
The geographer handed Jack a delicate roll of old cloth. It didn’t escape Jack’s notice that his great prize, the elusive map to Atlantis, was essentially a handkerchief. He sat down on the bed and laid the cloth out on his thighs. The map was embroidered on the cloth in small, dark stitches.
“Ingenious, really,” Norrington put in. “Unlike an ink drawing on paper, this won’t run or smudge when it gets wet.”
Jack would appreciate the logic of this. As far as maps went, this one was fairly simple. It outlined the skeletal shapes of two islands and detailed several small cays. A sturdy X marked the location of the Lost City, just off the western shore of the northern island. There was a short phrase stitched below the map. It said only, “Atlantis rests at Bimini.”
“Bimini . . .” Jack murmured, fingers caressing the soft cloth map. “Where have I heard that name before?”
“I’m sure I haven’t the slightest idea,” the geographer replied. “But this is nothing more than a scrap of cloth until you know where it is.”
“Bimini . . .”
“I doubt repeating the word will do you any good.”
“Suit yourself,” Jack said, folding the map and tucking it into his breast pocket. “Perhaps a drink would refresh my memory. I don’t suppose you have any more of that wine?”
Norrington smiled ruefully. “I’m afraid that was the last of the Xynomavro. But I’ve got some passable Burgundy that ought to do the trick.”
“Nothing a bit stiffer?” Jack asked hopefully.
“I’m afraid not,” Norrington replied, although his expression seemed to suggest that he wasn’t the sort of man to keep anything too stiff around, anyway.
“Well, it’ll have to do, then.”
“If I leave, are you likely to go snooping through the rest of my possessions?”
“Only if you’re a long time in returning,” Jack said.
While Norrington was gone, Jack picked up the wooden chest that had held the map. He reached in, sifting through the worn coins. They were each identical to the one Jack had lifted from the Moor in Istanbul: the impression of a trident on one side and a figure bearing a spear, no doubt Poseidon, on the other.
Jack couldn’t help second-guessing himself. It wasn’t a practice he was overly given to, but perhaps it was the sudden silence that descended over his room that got Jack thinking. Surely there must be ways of securing funds that didn’t involve mythical subaquatic civilizations. There was always plain, old-fashioned theft, or extortion, there was nothing wrong with extortion. After all, he hadn’t had the best luck with mythic treasure in the past. And the ease with which he’d convinced Norrington to give him the map worried him. Something that easy had to be trouble.
“They’re undoubtedly quite old.”
Jack startled a little despite himself, and looked up to see Norrington standing in the doorway, holding two glasses and another bottle of wine.
“You do have a way of sneaking up on a fellow, don’t you,” Jack said. Norrington’s smile seemed to suggest that he was pleased, but too reserved to say so. “Well, then . . . How about that drink?”
Norrington put the glasses down on the bedside table while he worked open the cork, then poured them both a generous portion of wine. Jack took his and swallowed gratefully. “Passable at least, Norrington.”
The geographer took a small sip from his own glass before saying, “I should hope that, if we’re to be partners in this endeavor, you’ll do the service of calling me by my given name.”
“Very well,” Jack said with an indulgent smile. “James.”
Norrington-James lifted his cup. “To a great adventure.”
Lifting his own cup, Jack said, “To Atlantis.”
It wasn’t long before they’d filled their cups again. James seemed satisfied to drink in companionable silence, which suited Jack just fine. He still had some thinking to do, if they ever wanted to find this island where the Lost City lay. Stroking his moustache, Jack murmured that all-too-familiar name. “Bimini . . . Bimini . . .”
James sighed. “It doesn’t sound like any language I know of.”
“That’s it!” Jack interrupted. “Of course. I don’t know how I could’ve forgotten. Stupid of me, really.”
“What is?”
“Have you got a map of the Caribbean, mate?”
“Of course,” James said, perplexed, “downstairs.”
“Hop to it, then, son!” Jack cried.
And so it was that they tramped back downstairs, glasses still in hand, and Jack stood by while James retrieved one of the maps from his cabinet. Clearing his desk, he unrolled the parchment, and they stood side by side, poring over it.
“Bimini,” Jack said slowly, savoring his triumph. He traced his fingers over the map. “Here, not fifty miles from La Florida, discovered by that lamentable conquistador, Juan Ponce de Leon, who believed it to be the location of the fabled Fountain of Youth.” He took the cloth map from his pocket and lay it down atop James’ map. The shape of the two islands was identical.
“Funny that those two myths should intersect,” James mused.
“Indeed.” But Jack was not thinking of myths. He was thinking of the treasure, gold enough to support an entire city, all his for the taking. “From here it’s an easy enough journey. All we need is a ship and enough men to crew it, and before long we’ll be greeting the great spires of the Lost City.”
“Incredible,” James murmured, looking down at the map with quiet admiration.
“Jim, m’lad,” Jack said, clapping the man on the shoulder, “I think another toast is in order.”
“To Bimini?” James guessed, raising his glass.
Jack smiled. “To the geographer, and his excellent maps.”
NOTES:
So, clearly, the map’s case is a cryptex, a device invented by Dan Brown in The Da Vinci Code. Yeah, I hate that book, but James needed some leverage over Jack and the cryptex served my purposes perfectly.
Bimini is a real place-Technically, North and South Bimini. The story Jack tells is true as far as I know: Ponce de Leon went looking for land in the Caribbean and was told of ‘Beemeenee’ where the Fountain of Youth supposedly existed. My premise that “Atlantis rests at Bimini” is based on the so-called ‘Bimini Road,’ an arrangement of ancient limestone blocks submerged off North Bimini Island, which some people (the psychic Edgar Cayce prominent among them) claim are the remnants of Atlantis. This website has two very nice maps of the Bimini Islands. However, I should add that the Bimini in this story is purely fictional. Mainly, this is so because I’m pretty sure that most people in the 18th century Caribbean, especially pirates, would probably have known where the real Bimini Islands were right off the top of their heads.
On to Chapter Three
Back to Chapter One
Author: cassyl
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Jack Sparrow/James Norrington
Summary: Jack’s search for a fabled map leads him on an adventure that may mean more than he ever bargained for.
Warnings: This is AU like whoa. I also want to point out that, although many locations in this story are based on real places, they are all fictionalized versions of themselves. Furthermore, no copyright infringement is intended.
I want to apologize for the deluge of postings, but I leave the country tomorrow, so I have to finish this up quickly.
THE LOST CITY
“There is a tide in the affairs of men Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life Is bound in shallows and in miseries . . .”
-- Shakespeare, Julius Caesar
CHAPTER TWO
The room Norrington led him to could only be the man’s own bedroom. It was as spare as the study downstairs, the bed hung with a pale white canopy of netting. Besides the wardrobe, a much larger sibling to the one downstairs, there was a washstand bearing a small, tarnished mirror and several stacks of books piled up by the bed. Another rich Persian rug covered most of the floor.
Norrington had come to a stop in the middle of the room. His posture was a little stooped, and Jack thought he looked tired.
“Well?” Jack said.
“I’ll need your help to move the bed.”
Jack sheathed his sword and, with a brief warning of, “Nothing clever, now,” set to pushing the bed aside. This they did without incident, revealing a small trap door in the floor. Jack retrieved the geographer’s pistol from his belt and aimed it directly at Norrington.
The man needed no further prompting. He knelt carefully on the floor, half his attention on Jack and the pistol. Drawing a key from the pocket of his robe, he unlocked the trap door and lifted it up to reveal a small cubbyhole. From Jack’s vantage point, he could only see some papers and, to his delight, a glimmer of gold.
Norrington drew out a gilded box and set it on the floor between then. It wasn’t especially large, the size of a modest Bible, and made of old, deeply polished wood. The lid was heavily inlaid with gold, the central image being a powerful trident similar to the one inscribed on the coin Jack had stolen from the Moor. “I assume you have no interest in the coins.”
“Just the map.”
“Very well.” Norrington opened the box, revealing a pile of coins just like the one in Jack’s pocket. But this was nothing compared to the case lying amongst the coins. It was pure gold, a cylinder about the length of Jack’s hand with handsome caps on both ends, and every inch of it encrusted with emeralds and sapphires. In and of itself, the case would have been an excellent prize. But Jack knew, with more certainty than ever, that it was what was inside the case that would prove to be truly valuable.
Standing, Norrington handed the relic to Jack. A little shock of excitement went through him as he handled the thing. Only a thin casement of gold separated him from the knowledge he’d been seeking, and from there, it was only a matter of following the directions. He started to pull impatiently at one of the gold caps, but Norrington’s cool voice interrupted him.
“I wouldn’t recommend that.”
“Wouldn’t you?” Jack asked, looking up.
“Trust me,” he said.
“Not much good, having a map you’re not allowed to look at, Jim. I’ve gone to quite a bit of trouble to get my hands on this little pretty, so you can understand if I’m a bit eager to lift her skirts, so to say.”
“Be that as it may, if you ever want to see what’s inside that case, you won’t want to be too hasty about opening it.”
“Look, mate, if you’ve got something to say, go ahead and say it. I’ve got plans that are aching to be made, and not a lot of inclination to listen to your cryptic warnings, savvy?”
“All right,” Norrington said, his lips twisting into a small, inscrutable smile. “That case is no ordinary one. It’s an ancient mechanism, designed to safeguard sensitive documents. If you look closer, you’ll see that the cylinder is made up of eight separate segments. Each of those segments has four faces, bearing a different arrangement of jewels. When the faces are aligned correctly, the device will open to reveal its contents. If not, if the device is forced open, a capsule bearing an acid solution is broken, and will dissolve whatever is inside.”
“And let me guess,” Jack sighed. “You’re the only one who knows what the correct alignment is.” That strange smile of Norrington’s now made perfect sense. It was the look of a clever man smugly acknowledging his own cleverness. There was no reason why he shouldn’t give Jack the case, if he knew very well that Jack wouldn’t be able to open it himself.
“Precisely.”
“Have you taken into consideration the knowledge that I am something of a reckless agent and prone to rash action? That I might have methods for discovering information other than asking nicely?”
“Don’t misunderstand me,” Norrington replied. “I’m perfectly happy to open the case for you, but I’m concerned about what I get out of the equation.”
“Full use of all your appendages?” Jack suggested pleasantly.
“Generous though that is, I’d like something else on top of that,” Norrington said, meeting Jack’s eye. For someone who had no apparent martial training, his calm and self-possession rivaled that of the best generals.
“In that case, mate, name your terms.”
“I will give you use of my map, and I will finance the trip, on the condition that you allow me to accompany you to the Lost City.”
Jack had to admit he was a bit surprised by this request. To give himself time to think he asked, “Who’s to say I’m going to use the map myself? I might be planning on selling it to the highest bidder.”
“I highly doubt it.”
As he considered Norrington’s proposition, he took a good look at the man. He was tall and looked hardy enough, if a bit skinny. It was true, he didn’t know how to handle a pistol, but so far he’d proved that he wasn’t altogether foolhardy. And then there was the old mystic’s description of him-someone who had goodness in his heart. Goodness wasn’t precisely Jack’s favorite quality in a man, but if a body were cagey about betrayal it couldn’t hurt to take as a partner someone who was essentially honorable. And, after all, it wasn’t as if Jack would need to keep him around forever. “All right, Jim, m’lad. We have an accord. In exchange for your map and your kind patronage, I shall take you with me.”
Smiling broadly, Jack extended his hand, which Norrington took in a firm grip, looking quietly pleased.
“Well,” Jack said, “excellent. No sense in wasting time. Pop this lovely open and let’s have a look.” He held the golden case out to Norrington.
The man took the case, but paused, considering the object in his hands for a long moment before lifting his head and meeting Jack’s eye again. “Before we go any further,” he said, “I’d be much obliged if you’d answer one question for me.”
“You can ask.”
“I don’t pretend that I have much business enquiring into your motives here, or what you intend to do with the spoils if we find them. Nor do I have the right to ask you about your history. But I would like to know: What is your true name?”
Jack considered lying. It would be exceptionally easy to do so, and, in fact, might have been advantageous, since half of Istanbul still had its eyes peeled for him. And yet, he couldn’t help thinking of the piercing gaze the old sage had given him back in Tripoli, which had seemed to cut right to the core of him. On balance, Jack thought, there was no harm in a little bit of honesty once in a while. “Captain Jack Sparrow at your service,” he said with a ludicrous bow.
“Ah,” Norrington said, and Jack was surprised to see a flicker of recognition in the geographer’s eyes.
“You’ve heard of me, I take it.”
“Your exploits with the East India Trading Company didn’t go unremarked in these parts. You’re spoken of as something of a minor Robin Hood.”
Jack chuckled. “Always nice to hear you’re well thought of in a place.” Then he caught Norrington’s eye and added, “And you have no reservations about making a deal with a pirate.”
“In my experience, acknowledging its limitations, I’ve found that there are pirates, and then there are pirates. Besides, even if I didn’t know you for a pirate, it isn’t as if I was innocent of what I was getting myself into. Reputable members of society seldom threaten one in one’s own home.”
“Can’t argue with that. Now that’s settled, shall we get on with it?”
“Yes,” Norrington said, and walked over to the bed, where he lowered himself onto the mattress with an appearance of great fatigue. Jack stepped closer, and stood by the bed as Norrington carefully aligned the eight segments of the map case. Sure enough, each one bore four different gemstone designs. One was two emeralds, another an emerald and three sapphires, a third a single sapphire. Norrington arranged them all and checked their positions one last time before he pulled firmly on the end caps. The device opened with a metallic click, and one of the caps pulled back, allowing Norrington to shake the case’s contents out into his hand.
The geographer handed Jack a delicate roll of old cloth. It didn’t escape Jack’s notice that his great prize, the elusive map to Atlantis, was essentially a handkerchief. He sat down on the bed and laid the cloth out on his thighs. The map was embroidered on the cloth in small, dark stitches.
“Ingenious, really,” Norrington put in. “Unlike an ink drawing on paper, this won’t run or smudge when it gets wet.”
Jack would appreciate the logic of this. As far as maps went, this one was fairly simple. It outlined the skeletal shapes of two islands and detailed several small cays. A sturdy X marked the location of the Lost City, just off the western shore of the northern island. There was a short phrase stitched below the map. It said only, “Atlantis rests at Bimini.”
“Bimini . . .” Jack murmured, fingers caressing the soft cloth map. “Where have I heard that name before?”
“I’m sure I haven’t the slightest idea,” the geographer replied. “But this is nothing more than a scrap of cloth until you know where it is.”
“Bimini . . .”
“I doubt repeating the word will do you any good.”
“Suit yourself,” Jack said, folding the map and tucking it into his breast pocket. “Perhaps a drink would refresh my memory. I don’t suppose you have any more of that wine?”
Norrington smiled ruefully. “I’m afraid that was the last of the Xynomavro. But I’ve got some passable Burgundy that ought to do the trick.”
“Nothing a bit stiffer?” Jack asked hopefully.
“I’m afraid not,” Norrington replied, although his expression seemed to suggest that he wasn’t the sort of man to keep anything too stiff around, anyway.
“Well, it’ll have to do, then.”
“If I leave, are you likely to go snooping through the rest of my possessions?”
“Only if you’re a long time in returning,” Jack said.
While Norrington was gone, Jack picked up the wooden chest that had held the map. He reached in, sifting through the worn coins. They were each identical to the one Jack had lifted from the Moor in Istanbul: the impression of a trident on one side and a figure bearing a spear, no doubt Poseidon, on the other.
Jack couldn’t help second-guessing himself. It wasn’t a practice he was overly given to, but perhaps it was the sudden silence that descended over his room that got Jack thinking. Surely there must be ways of securing funds that didn’t involve mythical subaquatic civilizations. There was always plain, old-fashioned theft, or extortion, there was nothing wrong with extortion. After all, he hadn’t had the best luck with mythic treasure in the past. And the ease with which he’d convinced Norrington to give him the map worried him. Something that easy had to be trouble.
“They’re undoubtedly quite old.”
Jack startled a little despite himself, and looked up to see Norrington standing in the doorway, holding two glasses and another bottle of wine.
“You do have a way of sneaking up on a fellow, don’t you,” Jack said. Norrington’s smile seemed to suggest that he was pleased, but too reserved to say so. “Well, then . . . How about that drink?”
Norrington put the glasses down on the bedside table while he worked open the cork, then poured them both a generous portion of wine. Jack took his and swallowed gratefully. “Passable at least, Norrington.”
The geographer took a small sip from his own glass before saying, “I should hope that, if we’re to be partners in this endeavor, you’ll do the service of calling me by my given name.”
“Very well,” Jack said with an indulgent smile. “James.”
Norrington-James lifted his cup. “To a great adventure.”
Lifting his own cup, Jack said, “To Atlantis.”
It wasn’t long before they’d filled their cups again. James seemed satisfied to drink in companionable silence, which suited Jack just fine. He still had some thinking to do, if they ever wanted to find this island where the Lost City lay. Stroking his moustache, Jack murmured that all-too-familiar name. “Bimini . . . Bimini . . .”
James sighed. “It doesn’t sound like any language I know of.”
“That’s it!” Jack interrupted. “Of course. I don’t know how I could’ve forgotten. Stupid of me, really.”
“What is?”
“Have you got a map of the Caribbean, mate?”
“Of course,” James said, perplexed, “downstairs.”
“Hop to it, then, son!” Jack cried.
And so it was that they tramped back downstairs, glasses still in hand, and Jack stood by while James retrieved one of the maps from his cabinet. Clearing his desk, he unrolled the parchment, and they stood side by side, poring over it.
“Bimini,” Jack said slowly, savoring his triumph. He traced his fingers over the map. “Here, not fifty miles from La Florida, discovered by that lamentable conquistador, Juan Ponce de Leon, who believed it to be the location of the fabled Fountain of Youth.” He took the cloth map from his pocket and lay it down atop James’ map. The shape of the two islands was identical.
“Funny that those two myths should intersect,” James mused.
“Indeed.” But Jack was not thinking of myths. He was thinking of the treasure, gold enough to support an entire city, all his for the taking. “From here it’s an easy enough journey. All we need is a ship and enough men to crew it, and before long we’ll be greeting the great spires of the Lost City.”
“Incredible,” James murmured, looking down at the map with quiet admiration.
“Jim, m’lad,” Jack said, clapping the man on the shoulder, “I think another toast is in order.”
“To Bimini?” James guessed, raising his glass.
Jack smiled. “To the geographer, and his excellent maps.”
NOTES:
So, clearly, the map’s case is a cryptex, a device invented by Dan Brown in The Da Vinci Code. Yeah, I hate that book, but James needed some leverage over Jack and the cryptex served my purposes perfectly.
Bimini is a real place-Technically, North and South Bimini. The story Jack tells is true as far as I know: Ponce de Leon went looking for land in the Caribbean and was told of ‘Beemeenee’ where the Fountain of Youth supposedly existed. My premise that “Atlantis rests at Bimini” is based on the so-called ‘Bimini Road,’ an arrangement of ancient limestone blocks submerged off North Bimini Island, which some people (the psychic Edgar Cayce prominent among them) claim are the remnants of Atlantis. This website has two very nice maps of the Bimini Islands. However, I should add that the Bimini in this story is purely fictional. Mainly, this is so because I’m pretty sure that most people in the 18th century Caribbean, especially pirates, would probably have known where the real Bimini Islands were right off the top of their heads.
On to Chapter Three
Back to Chapter One