The Case of the Arctic Anomaly

(September-December 2012)

10-Home Are the Sailors

They missed Hanukkah (December 8-16) that year, owing to still waiting for the dockyard to test and certify the mended hull of the Stan O'War II as seaworthy. On the first night, they sat in the restaurant that had come to be their go-to place for dinner at least once a week and reminisced. "Remember, Dad was always so keen on lighting the menorah and all," Stan said.

"But not so keen on the eight nights of gifts," Ford chuckled. "We got half a dreidel each!"

"Yeah, and we had to play the dreidel game with Pop for gelt. Ya ever get to eat one piece of chocolate?"

"I don't think so," Ford said. "It's hard to remember."

"'Cause in the dreidel game Dad won it all off us! I figured it out years later—he was playing with a loaded dreidel!" So many pieces of gold-wrapped chocolate coins, so few memories of actually getting to enjoy them.

On the other hand—"Mom used to make the best latkes."

"Yeah," Stan said. "I can taste 'em now. And the apricot rugelach! We only had 'em once a year, but they were worth the wait." And speaking of that, Stan stopped the waiter, who was passing their table. "Hey, Jimmy," he said. "My brother and me were wondering—do you happen to have any Mogen David? Concord grape or blackberry, either one."

"I will check," Jimmy, a kid of about twenty, said.

"Really?" Ford asked with a grin.

"Yeah, I remember we first got a taste of wine at one seder. Up to then, grape juice. And at Chanukkah, always Mogen David with at least one meal. Reminds me—lemon Zengoula!"

"I haven't celebrated either Pesach or Hanukkah since . . . I left home," Ford said. "Just sort of drifted away from all that."

"Yeah, I'm non-observant, too," Stan said. "Mabel told me once that in her family they do both Chanukkah and Christmas, 'cause of her dad and mom bein' different faiths."

"We have one bottle of blackberry Mogen David!" said Jimmy, coming up and bearing the dark-purple wine, along with two glasses.

"First rate! You earned yourself a special tip tonight, Jimmy!"

"Thank you, Mr. Pines," Jimmy replied as he uncorked, or rather unscrewed, and poured the sweet dark wine. As he finished, he surprised Stan by adding, "Chag Urim Sameach!"

"And a happy Festival of Lights to you!" Ford said, raising his glass.

"Ahh," Stan said, having tasted his wine. "Takes me back. Tell you what, Poindexter, one holiday season we gotta celebrate Chanukkah with Mabel and Dipper."

"Only if you pronounce it properly," Ford said. "Hanukkah, Stanley!"

"Eh, you say potato, I say latkes." They toasted.

As the captain and crew waited for the Kalanautis to be made ready for sea, Mr. Hands reported that he had finally discovered how to open the internal containers they had found in the wooden chest.

The one Omen held in his hand had a label with a picture of a strange gray-haired man. And above and below the image were the words BARON NUMNUM'S HIGH FLYIN' BEANS. He knew the letters but the words did not make sense. The label might as well have read Oneba Ahzahz'f Uvtu Sylva' Ornaf. He looked at the contents. He sniffed the contents. "Mate, taste this and tell me what you think," he said. One did not get to be captain and survive as long as Omen had without proper delegation of tasks.

The first mate took a spoonful in his mouth and chewed thoughtfully. In the ship's conlang he said, "Kes egust sel valboji."

Or as Stan might say in English, "This tastes like beans."

After a couple of hours passed with the mate showing no ill effects, the captain had the contents of the metal container heated and he ate some himself. "Beans," he murmured. "Not bad. Not a treasure, but not bad. Or is this a treasure? The strangers spoke of canned food. Is this canned food? I perceive that, sealed in an airtight metal container, food, when properly sterilized beforehand, may have a greatly extended span of usefulness."

It really was a pity that he and Stanford did not have much time together. They tended to think alike.

Anyway, the captain began to ponder the benefits of examining the so-called "can" more closely and to have the scientists at his hidden island base replicate its technology.

Beans or meat, there was money to be made here.

Come to think about it, Omen and Stan also might have had a few things in common….

For Stan and Ford there in Juneau, the rest of Hanukkah passed, and Christmas day (they ate in a Chinese place), and then, finally, the Stan O'War II passed its seaworthiness tests, they spent a whole day ferrying the stuff they had taken off the sloop back onto the sloop, and on the morning of December 26, after a night of wind that finally dropped to a reasonable calm, they boarded the Stan O'War II and crept out of the frigidly cold harbor.

The high that day was sixteen degrees Fahrenheit.

And they had only about six hours of sun to make the first stage of their thousand-odd-mile trip to Vancouver.

They navigated through some floating ice and along Stephens Passage to a sheltered though very cold bay on Kuiu Island, resumed their trip at first light, passed Port Alexander and so reached the open sea, having covered about 175 miles in fourteen hours of sailing. They increased their speed then, turned south by southeast, and ran off about three hundred miles that day. They took watch and watch again, had slower days and faster days, celebrated New Year's Day (a Tuesday) as they approached Puget Sound, and finally docked the next day in Vancouver.

"Been a long haul," Stan said. "And speaking of that—"

They rented a roomy panel truck from an agency that also had offices in the USA, drove to the border where a Customs officer gave their stacks of supplies and equipment a quick look, and then he waved them through with a "Welcome home, guys."

The next afternoon they arrived at the Shack, which was closed for the season—expected—and cold—understandable—and empty, which was a surprise. "Where's Soos?" Stan asked.

Ah. They found the answer inside. That came when they discovered two rubber-banded stacks of mail set aside in a box especially for the twins. One item was an ad for a tax-preparation service. Stan said. "I forgot about taxes. I gotta get a CPA, I guess. My days of tax fraud are behind me."

"What?" asked a startled Ford.

"I say the ways of text frogs are benign tea," Stan said. "Old Chinese saying. Means how come the place is locked up and so cold."

"I've found a note from Mr. Ramirez," Ford said. He read it aloud:

Dear Mr. and Mr. Dr. Pines, If you get back home when we are away I will leave this for you. Dawgs, I'll leave it even if you don't. So Abuelita hates cold weather, right? And so she's gone back home to Mexico until like April when we open back up again. Melody and I never had like a real honeymoon, because of me becoming Mr. Mystery and getting so busy running the Shack, which I did when Mr. Pines retired. You know that, though, right? OK, anyway Melody and I are leaving today, which is December 27, and we are going to spend ten days in sunny Mexico. Did you know it's pronounced Meh-he-co? True word! So we will be back on January 7 or maybe the next day or some deal. Hope you both had a wonderful trip and Happy New Year. Yours truly, Soos (Mr. Mystery)

They agreed that for the night Ford would take his old room, now the guest room, and Stan said he'd occupy the attic bedroom. "Let's lug in the junk," Stan said in the afternoon.

"Let it wait until tomorrow," Ford suggested.

"Nah, once a thing is half begun, keep at it until it's done," Stan said. "Shakespeare."

"Ease off," Ford advised. "You were already on shaky ground with your Chinese proverb."

"Meh, maybe it was a fortune cookie. Let's haul in our junk, Ford."

So they made trip after trip. During a rest break Ford telephoned Fiddleford McGucket and the two had a half-hour-long conversation. When he hung up and the twins returned to emptying the rental truck—one of them would have to drive to Portland the next day to return it, and the other, who would be Stan, would drive over in Stan's car so they could make the return trip to the Falls. They were down to heavy cardboard cartons now, and at last they finished.

"Whew!" Stan said as Ford put a third provisions box on a stack of two. "Reminder to us: Next time don't overpack. What did Old Man McGucket talk about?"

"Fiddleford is lonely," Ford said. "I was going to discuss this with you later, but he's offered to put us up in his mansion."

"The old Northwest place?" Stan asked. "Huh. Ritzy!"

"Of course we could stay here instead," Ford pointed out.

"Nah, let's consider it. Soos and Melody are newlyweds. They deserve some time on their lonesome. And we could come and visit often. I think after that long sea trip I'd kinda like to sample the rich life. If it's OK with McGucket, it's Jake with me."

"You talk like an old Humphrey Bogart movie."

"Yeah, and you talk like a college professor!" Stan stretched. "We'll get back to Old Man McGucket later. Right now, let's make sure the heat's on a comfortable setting and then we can go into town for some grub. Greasy's? Los Hermanos Brothers? I want some Gravity Falls soul food."

Ford was dusting his hands. "Either is fine with me."

Stan plopped the last cardboard box down on the dinner table. "Or," he said, "an' I'm just throwin' this out, mind you, we could finish off a couple of cans of beans and this tasty brown meat."

"I suggest we throw that out instead," Ford said. "If I never see another can of brown meat, I won't be disappointed."

"Aw, waste not, want not," Stan said, using his pocketknife to zip through the tape on the box lid. He opened the flaps. "Whatta we got?" He started to take out cans. "Pork and beans, yummy! An' chili beans, an' a sapphire tiara, an' brown meat, and whoops, a leather bag of what looks like gold coins—"

Ford sat up straight. "Stanley!"

With a broad grin, Stan said, "I figured out that the burnt-on double-headed chicken on top of the treasure box could be pushed down a quarter inch and then turned until a disk around it started to unscrew. It finally came all the way out, and then I could reach in and pull the whole lid off. So I gave Captain Omen some brown meat and beans, and I replaced most of the ones in this cardboard box with jewels and gold. There's diamond bracelets, fancy antique necklaces, French and Russian money, some kind of crazy Easter egg made out of gold and rubies and stuff—"

"It can't be a Fabergé egg!" Ford exclaimed. "The first one was made in 1885—"

"Cool your jets, Ford. This one's engraved on the bottom ring. I think it's French."

"Hmm. Smaller than an actual Fabergé." Ford squinted. "Biennais Orfèvre de leurs Majestés Impériales, anno 1802."

"And that means?"

"Biennais is the name of the goldsmith. This was created for Napoleon in 1802!"

Stan nodded, looking not at all nonplussed. In fact he looked thoroughly and smugly plussed. "An' somehow a Russian renegade glommed onto it and took it with all the rest of this stuff when he made a run for it. And that renegade was our ancestor, and left directions to the stash to his descendants, who are us. Come on, Ford—share and share alike!"

"Stanley," Ford said, looking through the trove, "all this—this is priceless!"

Stan carefully placed the tiara on his twin's head. "Looks good on ya. And as I always say—priceless is better than worthless."

Ford looked trapped between exultation and irritation. "In other words, Omen got cans of meat and beans—"

"And we got the goods." Stan held a set of pearl-and-diamond earrings up to his big jug ears. "Naw, don't suit me. Hey, Poindexter, ya think selling this stuff off would pay for our trip?"

Ford examined some of the coins. "These are gold, and this one was minted in 1723! Stanley, selling just this one coin would probably pay for the trip five times over!"

"Nah, once was enough for me. OK, Ford, this loot's ours. But you're gonna have to be patient."

"You were the one who received Semyon's printed account from Mom, Stanley. I really don't need to share—wait, what? Patient?"

"I do need to share, and when I said patient, I mean like seven years patient. OK?"

"Seven—"

Stan carefully replaced the coins, jewels, and objets d'art in the box. "Not as heavy without the wood wrapping. There's a loose board in the gift shop that oughta keep these safe while we go out for a bite. Hungry?"

"I—my word, I don't know if I am or not," Ford said. "Seven years patient?"

Stan tossed Ford his knitted watch cap. "Cold outside, and Mabel knitted this just for you. Seven years, Stanford. Statute of limitations," he said. "Like you told me, brother. Statute of limitations. Meanwhile, let's make the restaurant the Club. For some reason or other, I feel like splurging."

And they went out, double-checked to make sure the door was locked, triple-checked (Ford's doing), got in the old reliable Stanleymobile and set off for dinner, laughing and even singing, harmonizing on an old song:

Fifteen men on a dead man's chest,

Yo ho ho, and a bottle of rum—

The End