Page 43 of A Sea Captain and A Stowaway (Gentleman Scholars #7)
T he Seraphim limped along the coastline, her timbers groaning with the strain of their desperate escape.
The near-collision with the rocks during their passage through the treacherous inlet had left its mark — not catastrophic damage, but enough to require immediate attention if they hoped to maintain their hard-won advantage over their pursuers.
Sidney had ordered repairs to begin at once, setting the crew to work patching the hull where it had scraped against stone, reinforcing weakened sections of the railing, and checking the integrity of the masts that had been strained by their rapid manoeuvres.
With most of the men occupied on deck or below in the hold, Docila found herself temporarily at loose ends.
She had offered her assistance, of course, but Fletcher had politely suggested that the repair work required specialized skills she did not possess.
In truth, she suspected the first mate was acting on Sidney’s instructions to keep her safely away from the more hazardous aspects of shipboard life, particularly after the danger they had just survived.
Her wandering path eventually led her to Sidney’s cabin, its door standing slightly ajar — unusual, as the captain typically kept his quarters secured, particularly given the valuable documents they contained.
Hesitating only briefly, Docila slipped inside, intending merely to ensure that nothing had been disturbed during their violent manoeuvring through the inlet.
The cabin was in disarray. Charts and papers had been deliberately spread across the desk and even onto the narrow bunk, as if Sidney had been searching through them in haste before being called away to attend to some urgent matter on deck.
The strongbox that typically held the most precious documents lay open, its contents partially removed and scattered among the other papers.
Docila knew she should leave, should close the door and return to the deck where her presence would not constitute an invasion of Sidney’s private domain.
Yet her gaze was drawn inexorably to the charts, to the tantalizing glimpses of information about the treasure that had driven him for so many years — the treasure that, somehow, her father had been connected to as well.
The mystery of that connection still haunted her.
What had William Archer known about El Dorado? Why had he never acted on that knowledge himself? And what did his involvement mean for Sidney’s quest — and by extension, for her own uncertain future?
Before she could reconsider, Docila found herself moving to the desk, drawn by a scholar’s curiosity as much as by personal interest. The maps were fascinating in their own right, marked with annotations in multiple hands, including her father’s distinctive script and what she now recognized as Sidney’s precise, economical notations.
Lines of investigation, possible routes, calculations of tides and currents — all meticulously recorded over what must have been years of research.
But it was a particular symbol, hastily sketched in the margin of one chart, that made Docila’s heart pound suddenly against her ribs.
Three concentric circles, intersected by a vertical line that extended beyond the outermost ring, with small marks at specific points along the innermost circle.
She had seen it before. Not on any map, but engraved on a medallion that had been among her father’s most prized possessions.
The medallion had been a constant presence throughout her childhood, worn on a chain around her father’s neck when at sea, kept carefully in a locked drawer of his desk when at home.
He had shown it to her once, letting her hold the heavy metal disc in her small hands while explaining that it was a “key to the future” he hoped to provide for her.
She had assumed it was merely a sentimental talisman, perhaps a gift from her mother or a memento of a particularly profitable voyage.
But here was the same symbol, carefully rendered on a chart that clearly related to the treasure Sidney sought. Not a personal charm at all, but something directly connected to El Dorado — perhaps, as her father had cryptically suggested, a key of some kind.
With trembling fingers, Docila traced the symbol, her mind racing as she tried to recall every detail of the medallion itself.
It had been lost along with so many of her father’s possessions after his death, sold by Uncle Hugo or simply discarded as worthless without the context that would have revealed its true significance.
But the image remained vivid in her memory — the cool weight of the metal, the precise engraving of the symbol, the strange markings around its edge that she had thought decorative but now suspected might be something more.
She began to search through the other papers on the desk, looking for any reference to the symbol, any explanation of its meaning or purpose.
Sidney’s shorthand was challenging to decipher — a personal system of abbreviations and notations that required familiarity to interpret — but she persisted, driven by the certainty that she had stumbled upon something crucial.
There — on a separate sheet, partially hidden beneath other documents — a more detailed rendering of the symbol, accompanied by notes in Sidney’s cramped handwriting.
Docila pulled it free carefully, scanning the annotations with growing excitement.
According to Sidney’s notes, the symbol was believed to represent a specific celestial alignment, one that occurred only at certain times of the year and was visible from a precise location near the coast of Florida.
The notes suggested that Alvarado, the Spanish captain who had intentionally grounded El Dorado and hidden its treasure, had been an amateur astronomer who had incorporated celestial navigation into his elaborate scheme to conceal the ship’s bounty.
The treasure could only be located when specific stars aligned with landmarks on the shore — an ingenious method of ensuring that only someone with both the symbol and the knowledge to interpret it correctly could ever find what had been hidden.
But there was a problem, evident in Sidney’s frustrated notations.
The exact location from which the alignment needed to be observed remained unclear, making the celestial key frustratingly useless without its geographic counterpart.
Sidney and his associates had been working with an incomplete understanding, piecing together fragments of information but missing a crucial element that would make the whole pattern clear.
Docila’s mind raced, connecting her memories of the medallion with what she now understood of its purpose.
There had been something else — not just the symbol itself, but markings around the edge of the disc, a series of notches and lines that her father had traced with his finger when showing it to her, though he had never explained their meaning.
Could those markings have been coordinates?
A numeric code indicating the precise spot from which the celestial alignment should be observed?
If so, the medallion wasn’t just a representation of the key — it was the key itself, the missing piece that would complete the puzzle Sidney had been struggling to solve.
Lost in her thoughts, focused entirely on the documents before her, Docila did not hear the approaching footsteps until it was too late.
The cabin door swung open fully, revealing Sidney standing on the threshold, his expression shifting from surprise to anger as he registered her presence at his desk, his private papers spread before her.
“What are you doing?” he demanded, his voice dangerously quiet as he stepped into the cabin, closing the door firmly behind him.
Docila straightened, guilt warring with the excitement of her discovery.
“I — I found the door open,” she began, the explanation sounding feeble even to her own ears. “I was concerned that your papers might have been disturbed during the manoeuvring through the inlet.”
“So, you took it upon yourself to examine them?” Sidney’s tone was glacial, a cold fury that was more intimidating than any shouted accusation might have been. “To pry into matters that I have not chosen to share with you, despite our recent conversations about trust and honesty?”
The rebuke stung all the more for its justice. She had invaded his privacy, examined his personal documents without permission, however noble her intentions might have been. Yet the importance of what she had discovered compelled her to press forward despite his evident anger.
“I recognize this symbol,” she said, tapping the diagram on the sheet before her. “It was engraved on a medallion my father kept — a medallion he once called a ‘key to the future.’ I think it may be the missing piece you’ve been searching for.”
Sidney’s expression remained hard, though a flicker of interest passed through his eyes at her words.
“This symbol is referenced in several historical accounts of Alvarado’s actions after intentionally grounding El Dorado,” he said stiffly. “It’s not unique to your father’s possession.”
“But the medallion itself might have been,” Docila insisted, undeterred by his cold response. “There were markings around its edge — notches and lines that I believe may be coordinates, indicating the precise location from which the celestial alignment must be observed.”
“And where is this medallion now?” Sidney asked, a hint of scepticism entering his voice. “Why have you never mentioned it before, if it’s so crucial to the quest I’ve spoken of?”
Docila’s excitement faltered in the face of his continued suspicion.