Days later, Gus and Chase are rummaging through the family's attic. It's crammed with an assemblage of things Nick had salvaged from a lifetime of 'digs'. Gus is mumbling to himself while discarding carton-after-carton while Chase sits near the only window. He's huddled over a wood crate packed with coffee cans. Uncovering the deepest, it's filled with old coins - some rare. Included is a folded brown paper. He unfolds, ... it's a crude pencil drawing of 3-letters, R C H, rendered on what seems to be a plank of wood. Intrigued, he shows it to Gus who only shrugs? Nonetheless, the professor is enthralled by the sketch ...

Being summer, with no classes, Chase persuades himself to visit the City Archives. There to research he meets, Beth, the department's Assistant Manager. After an awkward explanation for his visit, Beth is also lured into the source of the letters? Curiosity wins over as they team up. Together they stumble upon similar initials identifying a ship, Da Urchin, as one dating back to the mid-17th century and Peter Stuyvesant's arrival in New Amsterdam.

The next day, on her own, Beth finds the ship's manifest. Listed is a chest of gold bullion and minted coins requisitioned by Stuyvesant to replenish the colony's horrid, and squalid conditions inherited. With further digging through microfilms she discovers a record of notes from the Urchin's 'ship log': ... fighting a storm upon entry to the harbor, an act of sabotage scuttles the Urchin. The chest is lost? . . . She then expels a WOW!
(Historical fiction - 292 pages)