Free The Treasure of Maria Mamoun by Michelle Chalfoun

Brutus on the beach and gazed at The Last Privateer , and wondered about it, too. What was it like inside? Did it still have things that used to belong to Mr. Ironwall, or was it empty? Could it still sail? What would that be like? Maria imagined sailing felt like flying. She pictured herself on the deck of a sailboat in a storm-tossed sea like the one in the painting over the mantelpiece.
    But though she climbed the dock every morning, she never found a way on board. Someone had tied the canvas tent tightly, and it stayed tied. It was frustrating, but she couldn’t complain to anyone. After all, she wasn’t supposed to snoop.
    But one morning she took Brutus on a slightly longer walk than usual. Though the wind was gusting and the sky looked a little dark, the air was so much warmer than it had been, and it smelled so good that Maria didn’t want to turn around at the dock as she usually did. She walked Brutus past the boat to a narrow neck of land beyond the estate. On one side lay a saltwater pond and on the other was the ocean. Vacation homes dotted the far shore of the pond. The bridge between the pond and ocean had hydraulics to lift it so that the yachts of summer people could make it out to open water, but Maria had never seen the bridge in action. The houses remained shuttered for the off-season. She wondered what it would be like come July. She wasn’t sure how she felt about the island filling up with summer people.
    When she turned back toward the Great House she noticed an ominous black cloud in front of her. And as they were walking back, the skies opened up.
    Brutus looked at Maria and whined.
    â€œYou are a big baby!” she told him. Then she pulled her sodden windbreaker over her head and they both ran, half-blind, down the beach.
    The nearest shelter was the dock. Maria hoped they could crawl underneath the wooden planks, but when she reached it she saw the tide was so high there was no space between the sand and the boards. In fact, there was very little beach left at all.
    She scrambled up onto the dock to get out of the waves, and raced to the floating dock at the end with Brutus pounding along the weathered boards behind her. Her glasses were useless, obscured by rain, so she felt blindly along the side of the boat for an opening between the canvas tent and the rail. There had never been one before, so she had no reason to expect there would be one now. But she was in something like a panic. Her heart raced and she repeated a nonsense prayer in her head: oh, please be open, oh please . She wondered if she would feel this way every time it rained. She told herself to calm down. After all, she was with Brutus and the estate was a safe place.
    Something white flapped near the stern.
    She inched herself toward the flapping white thing and touched it—it was a corner of the canvas tent. The wind must have blown it open.
    Now she found a gap where the rope lacing had come loose. She reached her hand in, then her arm up to her shoulder. She popped her head in, then her other shoulder … she could just squeeze herself through.
    She flopped onto the deck with a thud. It was very dark under the canvas and it took a moment for her eyes to adjust. She stood and dried her glasses on her undershirt. The canvas stretched over her head was high enough that she could stand and walk around the deck with ease, but she did not take the time to look around. Poor Brutus, left alone on the stormy dock, was whining pitifully.
    Maria stuck her head through the opening and called to him. He did an odd little dance on the dock and put one tentative paw in the space between the canvas and the rail. Then he poked his big snout in and sniffed.
    â€œCome on, boy, you can do it.” She grabbed his leash and tugged.
    He pulled against it.
    â€œPlease, Brutus, just come. Come. Brutus!” She tried to sound firm, but he sat down and whimpered. Finally she clambered back out and pushed his big wet