Page 206 of Hidden Tide
“He keeps the Mariner’s Crown inside it.”
Mom grips Nathan’s hand.
The ship still exists.
The vessel where Dad photographed the men responsible for Blackwater.
The ship that may have carried Simon the night Dad was murdered.
“Why hasn’t anyone seen it?” Keating asks.
“It doesn’t look the same,” Marcus answers. “Simon stripped the upper decks and changed the registration. On paper, it was destroyed in a fire twelve years ago.”
“What is it called now?”
“Argent Star.”
Keating enters the name into the Coast Guard database.
A photograph appears.
The Argent Star is a dark-hulled salvage vessel registered to a company in Panama. It entered San Francisco Bay four days ago carrying marine recovery equipment.
Four days.
Simon brought the Mariner’s Crown back to San Francisco before our investigation began.
“He knew we would find the prisms,” I say.
“He wanted you to,” Marcus replies.
“Why?”
“He has Willow’s frame, but he couldn’t read it.”
“It’s film,” Ivy says. “All he had to do was develop it.”
“The image is distorted. Daniel photographed it through one of James’s navigation lenses. Without the correct prism, it can’t be seen clearly.”
My compass.
The blue glass isn’t only protecting the frame.
It’s needed to read it.
“And Hazel’s trunk?” I ask.
“Simon believes it contains another lens.”
Thomas looks toward the security feed.
“The original navigation lens.”
The five blue prisms may have been cut from it, but enough remained to decode Dad’s film.
Simon has one frame.
We have the prism that can read it.
