Beneath his notebook is hisBlack Orchid Passport Challengebook that his mom created as part of the schoolwork he’s supposed to complete on the trip. She’s assigned checkpoints on the ship that he has to find. Each checkpoint comes with a set of questions he needs to answer. They include all the big murals near the elevators that were inspired by Homer’sIliadandOdyssey, which are basically ancient poems about the Trojan War, and about Odysseus’s ten-year-long journey home from the war. Carter has been learning about Odysseus, along with Greek mythology. And when theBlack Orchiddocks in Crete, they’re going to visit an actual labyrinth to hunt for a pretend Minotaur. He’s super amped about that.
“Oh, look,” Gramps says suddenly. He points to a dark shape of land on the skyline. “That’s it, Carter—that’s the island.”
He lurches forward. “You mean the one with the terrible Alcatraz prison? The one the Bikini Killer escaped?”
His grandfather nods and says to Carter’s mom, “Mind if I take him up to the railing to get a good look as we sail by?”
“I’d rather he finished his dinner, but ... sure.” She smiles at them both. It’s a sort of resigned smile, Carter thinks. He’s pretty sure it’s because Mom wishes Gramps would find another way to bond with Carter other than talk of serial killers.
Carter goes to the railing with his grandfather, and the wind buffets them and tugs at their hair, and it feels exhilarating. The island looks like a black silhouette against the darkening horizon. A few lights twinkle on the mass of land. It seems ominous.
Carter’s mind returns to the crime board in Gramps’s study. He wants to ask Gramps directly if he’s still hunting for one of the Bikini Killer’s accomplices. Carter is dying to know how the crime board is connected to thisBlack Orchidtrip. But he senses forbidden territory. He knows instinctively he shouldn’t have seen the crime board at all. So he circles around the idea cautiously.
“How did Vincent escape from that island?”
“Well, he was a real schemer, a supremely talented con artist. And he was determined that no prison—nor place—would ever hold him. At least not for long. The Greeks arrested Vincent and his younger half brother, Jacques, in Athens for jewelry theft. But while in the van on their way to the Athens jail that we toured yesterday, Vincent managed to talk his half brother into swapping identities with him. He argued that Jacques didn’t have a criminal record like he did, and if Vincent posed as his brother, he’d be released sooner. And when he got out, he’d leave Greece, then from outside the country he’d inform the Greek authorities they had the wrong man in prison. The authorities would thus be forced to release the actual Jacques. Then they’d both be free.”
“That sounds so skeevy.”
“Right? But Vincent was such a powerful persuader that even while Jacques resisted the idea, he still ended up acquiescing. So, when the van arrived at the prison, Jacques gave his name as Vincent, and vice versa.
“However, when the scheme for early release didn’t work, the two brothers later tried to dig out of the prison. Again, they were foiled. The guards caught them, and the fake Jacques—a.k.a. Vincent—endedup being blamed for the escape plan. So as punishment they sent fake Jacques to that island out there, where it was literally impossible to dig a tunnel or escape.”
“So howdidhe escape?”
His grandfather studies the cold-looking blot of land in the distance, and says, “He starved himself until he was skeletal, and he found rocks and beat them against his belly until his torso was bruised purple. He claimed he was bleeding internally and very sick and dying. The guards ended up taking him by boat to Piraeus, then via a prison van to a hospital in Athens. The doctors, of course, did not find an illness. They were onto him. So it was back into the prison van for Vincent—”
“Who was still posing as Jacques.”
“Yes. The van was driven back to the Port of Piraeus. But while inside the van, Vincent asked another prisoner for a smoke, and to borrow a lighter. He lit a fire in the corner of the van with all the men locked inside. Chaos erupted. Men’s clothes caught on fire, they began to scream and bang desperately on the van walls. Smoke billowed out of the vents. The drivers jumped out and opened the doors, and the screaming, burning men tumbled out. Vincent among them. But he was ready. Immediately he ran. No one noticed during the commotion until he was well and gone.”
“He outfoxed the Greeks.”
“And they were furious. There were even witnesses who saw him run off, and they didn’t do anything, didn’t call out, didn’t even think to report it. As one witness said later, the whole thing was so bizarre she didn’t think it was real. She thought someone was filming a movie.”
“What happened to him then?”
“He vanished into the world beyond Greece’s borders.”
“And Jacques—the real Jacques?”
“Vincent left him there, in that Greek prison. Jacques panicked. He told the authorities he wasn’t really Vincent. He explained he was Jacques, the younger brother, and he had no record and there were no outstanding warrants for his arrest. The authorities didn’t buy it. Theyextradited him to Turkey, where there was an outstanding warrant for the real Vincent, for crimes he’d committed in Istanbul. Jacques was tried as Vincent and got an eighteen-year sentence for crimes his brother had done.”
“Wow. He—he’s awful.”
Gramps nods.
“And theBlack Orchidis going to stop in Turkey, too,” Carter says.
“That’s right. It’s why Vincent will feature in some of my talks on the ship. For some local color.”
The blot of island fades into the darkness. Carter stares at it until he can no longer see its twinkling lights in the blackness on the horizon.
Cautiously, still thinking about the crime board, he asks, “Did Vincent ever have accomplices, Gramps?”
His grandfather inhales deeply, and nods.
“What happened to them?”
