Chapter 22
The handwriting inside the journal is an elegant, flowing script. Pressed on the inside of the journal is an old flower. It slides out on a swatch of tartan. Wow! Charlotte Campbell from Scotland lived on St. Nicholas Island in 1803.
I turn the pages slowly, my fingers encased in the plastic gloves. My heart thumps in my chest loudly in anticipation of what I’ll find here.
Dark blots and smudges fill the first few pages as if the writer was getting used to her ink pen and new book.
My eyes travel down the long lines of flowery script. Ms. Charlotte had plenty to say. At least to her diary. I try reading a few pages. It’s tedious. The words may be English but in an archaic style that is not easy to translate. Kind of like Shakespeare.
Trying to decipher it will take a long time at least for me.
I turn the pages one by one, skimming the text for any other names or dates, to determine who Ms. Charlotte Campbell was and how she fit into St. Nicholas’s life.
The diary appears to give a glimpse into her daily life. Her walks in the garden, observations of birds on the trees, and tiny drawings of a coconut tree leaning over the sea. Then, as I flip to the end of the diary, a name catches my eye. It more than catches my eye; it rips the air right out of my lungs.
I place a hand on my chest to calm myself down. I forget the sun in the sky. The waves caressing the shore, the parrots and donkey, and most of all I forget myself.
I’m transported to 1803.
I’m sitting on a porch, on an island in the Caribbean, but hundreds of years ago. I feel the same balmy air Charlotte Campbell wrote about. I hear the same birds. I taste the same tangy salt in the air.
I am Charlotte Campbell.
The hairs on my arms stand up. A tingle zings up my spine. My poor throat croaks with dryness.
Across the page near the end of the diary, written in clear, precise handwriting, different than the flowery script from earlier, are the words,
“MyKipson.” Written three times.
I can barely stop my hands from shaking as I read aloud:
Upon this day, it is my expectation that my Kipson shall make his arrival. In anticipation, I shall patiently abide at that precise confluence where the river doth embrace the vast sea. It is there, where the trio of stones are so meticulously arranged as to resemble the gaping maw of a fearsome dragon, and the copse of trees beyond stand as the very likeness of its coiled tail, that I shall eagerly await his presence.
My eyes race ahead, past how she plans to traverse the rutted roads, which gown she will don, how she will arrange her hair.
God, she’s worse than me. My breath catches at the next sentence:
His bounty, secure in its repose, remains steadfastly where he, with great secrecy, hath consigned it. There, amidst the whispers of the untamed wilderness, it shall reside in perpetuity, undisturbed and enduring as the very sands of time.
My eyes bulge. What bounty? A secret consignment? In the wild?
I scan the pages quickly as my heart gallops along. Could this be a hoax? Then, my eyes alight on prized words.
“Prized?” Ha! I sound like Charlotte in my head. Or whoever this 19th-century woman was that wrote about Mr. Kipson.
I read her words as if I were a woman from that time.
I would sooner embrace the cold kiss of death itself than betray the sanctity of that most clandestine spot, the resting place of a pirate’s treasure of old.
I place the old journal carefully on the table and scream into my hands. “Ahhhhh!”
Trixie leaps up with a, “What!” expression in her dark, expressive eyes.
I leap into the air, hopping on one foot and then the other. I spin, I do a crazy dance. I cover my mouth with both hands again and scream to the parrots flying above.
“We’re going to find pirate treasure. We’re going to be rich. I can quit my job. I can move here. I can . . . .”
I look at Trixie who is staring intently at my mad antics.
“Marry Keston and have a family,” I end with a whisper because that is my dream. Even if I don’t give voice to it often.
I’ve had a career as a lawyer. I’ve just found my daughter given up for adoption at birth, or she found me, and we’re going to be reunited.
All I want now is my own little family. And to know my birth child. Is that too much to ask?
I eye the Universe and cringe. “Maybe also a truck with big tires to drive down the dirt roads?”
Trixie hee-haws and wanders off. Which is a sign for me to calm down.
The beach in front of me looks like an untamed wilderness today. Imagine in the 1800s. It must have been a wild wild west but with the missionaries, pirates, and colonizers fighting over land and people, their gold and souls. Not necessarily in that order.
I drum my pen against the paper and tap my foot to the same rhythm.
Scattered clouds float against a cobalt blue sky. A tropical breeze caresses the wild grass and blossoms that pop up everywhere. A shower of purple bougainvillea intertwines with sun-yellow daffodils, creating their own natural bouquet.
I shake my head in wonder. Paradise is unnerving in its endless beauty.
Like this mystery. It’s so huge and intense, I feel unequal to the task. I don’t know how Charlotte kept the secret of the island’s bounty a secret. Or did she?
I can’t wait to tell Kesotn.
Based on how he reacted last night when I brought up pirate treasure, it’s not going to be the best news! I can’t blame Keston for wanting to dodge another potential treasure-hunting bullet.
Trixie and I will have to break it to him gently.
Because I have a gut feeling that the treasure is still out there.
Everybody wants the good. Not the bad or the ugly.
Although all three are usually wrapped up together.
“Trixie, dear, I thought you were the bad and the ugly. But guess what? You’re the good.”
“Hee-haw,” my new donkey friend brays loudly. I laugh at her. Tangles of fuchsia bougainvillea wrap around her ears and trail down to her chin.
“How’d you do that?” I ask admiringly. “I can barely keep one hibiscus flower tucked behind my ear.”
Trixie lets out an ungodly fart.
Damn, girl.
That’s life for you. Just when you think you’ve got it figured out, it shows up in a different way.