“Coming?” I asked.
“You go ahead,” he said.
I reached the cabin and poked my head through the open door. Kathy was on the floor in a corner of the single room, sobbing, her arms wrapped around Wilimena. I wasn’t certain whether Willie was dead or alive, but then I saw her move.
“She’s alive,” Kathy managed. “She’s alive!”
I went to where they were huddled and looked down at Wilimena, who was wrapped in a heavy wool blanket. Kathy was right; her sister was, indeed, alive, but only barely so far as I could see. She was skin and bones. Her hair was a matted mess, her face smeared with dirt.
“We have to get her out of here,” I said. “I’ll send Bill back to get Mr. Borosky. We can carry her and—”
Willie mumbled something through parched lips that were swollen to twice their normal size.
“What?” Kathy asked.
Willie said it again, and this time both Kathy and I understood.
“I found it!”
“The gold?” Kathy said.
“Uh-huh. We’re rich, Kathy. We’re rich.”
Wilimena struggled free of her sister’s grasp and dragged a filthy canvas bag from behind her, where she’d had it wedged.
“That’s it?” Kathy said.
Willie managed a feeble nod.
I looked around the cabin in search of something that might be used to transport Willie to the plane. There was nothing. As the sisters continued to talk, I went to the rough-hewn cabinets and opened them. Inside were cans of food, mostly beans and vegetables. Open cans sat on a crude counter next to a can opener, along with the stun gun and canister of Mace that Willie’d purchased in Seattle. A plastic jug of water was half consumed; a full one was in a cabinet next to the canned goods. Thank God that food and water were there, I thought, left by previous occupants to help those who would follow. She couldn’t have survived without it. I also realized how fortunate she was that the open cans hadn’t attracted local wildlife, particularly bears or wolves.
I looked down and saw where a section of the floor had been removed, exposing a fairly large open space beneath it, probably where Wilimena had found the sack of gold.
I returned to them.
“Can you stand?” I asked Willie.
She shook her head. “My leg is broken. I fell the first day I was here.”
All I could visualize was what the bones in her leg must look like after weeks of not having been set. The pain must have been excruciating. Still, she’d managed to get around enough to open the cans of food. Amazing what we’re capable of doing when the chips are down.
“We’re taking you home, Willie,” I said. “You and Kathy stay here. I’ll be back with help in a few minutes.”
I turned to fetch Bill Henderson and Borosky to help move her. Bill was standing in the open doorway.
“She’s in bad shape,” I said. “She has a broken leg, and she’s wasting away. We have to get her to the plane and to a hospital.”
“Did she find the gold?” he asked.
“Yes. She—”
He walked past me, went to where Kathy and Wilimena were still wrapped around each other, and looked down.
“Hello, Willie,” Bill said.
She looked up, blinking as she tried to bring him into focus. When she succeeded, she gasped. “What are you doing here?”
Chapter Fifteen
Kathy and I looked at each other, then at Bill Henderson.
“You know her?” I asked.
He grinned and said, “Yeah, you might say that. I mean, I never really did get to know her, but then again, we weren’t married very long.”
This time when Kathy and I looked at each other, it was with our jaws hanging open.
“You and Willie were married?” Kathy managed.
“Right. You and I talked a while back when I called. That’s when you told me that Willie was missing and that you intended to take the same cruise and look for the gold.”
“You said you were Howard.”
“Right again. That’s me, former husband of your wacko sister.”
Wilimena struggled to get to her feet. She stood on her good leg and leaned against the wall. “How did you end up with them?” she asked, indicating Kathy and me.
“Took a little bit of ingenuity,” Bill—or Howard— said. “But I was never as dumb as you made me out to be, Willie. Let’s just say I decided to treat myself for putting up with you for a year.”
Kathy faced him, her face a mask of rage and hurt and every other conceivable emotion generated by the situation. “You lied to me,” she said, thrusting her jaw at him. “You told me you loved me. You said you wanted to marry me. You—you—you bastard!”
She swung at him, but he brushed her hand away.
“What did you think, Kathy?” he said. “That I’d fall for a dolt like you?” He guffawed. “If I had to hear one more time about how you love baking pies and taking hikes in the woods and—God, you are the most boring woman I’ve ever known.”
This time she attacked him with both hands, her fists pummeling the arms he held out in front of him. She started to cry, desperate sobs of the hurt he’d inflicted upon her, the betrayal, the lies, the callous manipulation. Finally, as though drained of all energy and emotion, she slumped to her knees, her arms wrapped about herself, and gasped for air.
“Enough of the theatrics,” Howard said, reaching beneath his jacket and pulling out a small handgun, which he pointed at me. “Everything worked out just fine,” he said. “You’re all alive, and I’ve got what I came for.” He picked up the canvas bag containing the gold and backed toward the door, the weapon still aimed squarely at me. I didn’t want him to leave. I leaned against the counter on which the stun gun and Mace rested, and slowly moved my hand to cover the gun.
“What’s your real last name?” I asked.
He laughed. “That’s no concern of yours.”
“You’re very smug,” I said, “and smooth. You had a lot of us fooled.”
“Thanks for the compliment.”
“It wasn’t meant as one. Actually, I had a few doubts about you.”
“Did you really?”
“Yes, I did. I wondered whether you actually did live in Seattle.”
“Oh?”
“You talked about it raining there every other day, but that isn’t true. Seattle has less rainfall than any East Coast city. And there was your mispronunciation of the restaurant, Canlis. Kathy called it Chanlis, and you did the same.”
“Maybe I didn’t want to hurt her feelings by correcting her.”
“I doubt if you care about anyone’s feelings,” I said. “I also wondered why we so quickly found the house in which Maurice Quarlé lived. You led us right to it, and didn’t hesitate to choose which of the four upstairs doors was his.”
“You’re a regular Sherlock Holmes, aren’t you, Mrs. Fletcher?”
I ignored his sarcasm and said, “So, here you are. You have the gold you came after, using Kathy to get to it. Now what will you do? Shoot us all?”
“Why would I do that? The three of you can enjoy a few days of solitude in this dump. By the time you get out of here, I’ll be long gone to a place where no one would ever think to look for me.”
“Where are you from?” I asked. “New York? You seemed to know a lot about New York steak houses.” I was still trying to prolong his exit to give me more time to think the situation through. I hoped the police plane that Trooper McQuesten had said he would dispatch would be arriving soon.
“Yup, the Big Apple. That’s where Little Mary Sunshine and I met and lived until I decided to dump her.”
“The man who went overboard was from New York, too,” I said. “A friend of yours?”
“A friend? That little creep? I figured I needed someone along with me, so I hired him. He was a punk I met in a bar. I dangled a free cruise in front of him and he salivated. My mistake for getting involved with him. He was a bumbler. When I realized that you wer
e traveling with Kathy, I grabbed one of your books off the ship’s library shelf and gave it to him so he’d know what you look like.” He guffawed. “He almost screwed up everything—and I sure as hell wasn’t about to let that happen.”
“So over the side he went,” I said.
Howard, aka Bill Henderson, said nothing.
“And what about Mr. Quarlé?” I asked, working to keep my voice steady. Up until that moment, I knew I was faced with a slick con man, a handsome guy whose morals and ethics were in the gutter. But I now knew that he’d pushed the little man in the blue shorts over the side of the Glacial Queen into Glacier Bay. He was more than a con man. He was a cold-blooded killer.
“You ask too damn many questions, Mrs. Fletcher,” he said. “Remember, curiosity killed the cat.”
“You weren’t with us the morning Quarlé was killed,” I said. “You told Kathy that you worked out in the gym. I think you got a different form of exercise that morning.” I had nothing to base that on, but it was a reasonable possibility.
His reply was nonresponsive. “Look,” he said, “let’s all be grown-ups about this. You and your buddy there on the floor got a nice cruise out of it. Her flaky sister is alive. All you’ve lost is a million bucks’ worth of gold. None of you need it, but I do. I’ll give a little to some charity, if that’ll make you feel better.”
I started to ask another question, but he cut me off.
“Hey, by the way, don’t hold your breath waiting for that dumb trooper to arrive. I didn’t talk to him on your phone. I talked to myself. Not bad, huh? Really had you fooled.”
No doubt about it—he certainly had fooled me. He’d fooled everyone. He was as effective a con man as he was a despicable human being.
“Howard!”
He turned his attention to Willie, who struggled to remain standing. Kathy was at her side, helping to prop her up.
“Howard, don’t do this to me,” Willie said, extending a hand in a gesture of pleading. “You can take half the gold. I won’t care. But leave some for me. Please.”
“Hey, Willie, you don’t need gold. There’ll always be some sap out there ready to marry an over-the-hill gimpy broad like you. Ciao, baby.”
He turned toward the door. As he did, Bobby suddenly appeared. “Thought I’d come see what was—” He spotted the handgun in Howard’s hand. “What the hell is goin’ on?”
“Get out of my way,” Howard told him.
“He’s a murderer,” Willie said. “He’s stealing my gold.”
“Move,” Howard commanded Borosky, and went to push past him. Borosky shoved his hand against Howard’s chest, causing him to stagger back a few feet. I, too, retreated. Kathy came from where she’d been comforting Willie and moved toward the countertop and cabinets.
The sound of the weapon being discharged reverberated throughout the small cabin, causing everyone to flinch. Borosky stood ramrod straight and stared at Howard as though nothing had happened. But then blood the color of cardinals seeped through the shirt at his right shoulder. The leather jacket, which he’d removed and carried in his left hand, slipped from his fingers and landed at his feet. His mouth opened as though to protest what he was feeling. His left hand went to his injured shoulder and blood oozed through his fingers, coming faster now and dripping to the floor. He tried to raise his right hand, but appeared unable to move it, and he groaned against the pain before sinking to his knees.
Kathy, Willie, and I could only gape at the scene playing out before us. Would Howard turn the gun on us now and eliminate us along with the pilot?
Willie was in no physical condition to do anything, and I felt as though my shoes were nailed to the floor. I decided to take a chance and try to disable him with the stun gun. But before I could act, Kathy picked up an unopened can from the counter and flung it at him. Her aim was true. It struck him on the side of the head and knocked him to the floor, the handgun flying from his fingers and coming to rest against a wall. Kathy was a woman possessed. She leapt on top of him, her fists flailing against his face and head, a string of four-letter words erupting from her mouth. She continued to beat him until her knuckles were bloodied and she’d run out of breath. Finally, she picked up the can she’d thrown at him and brought it down on his skull. His body jerked a few times, then became still.
I went to Borosky and knelt next to him. “You’ll be all right,” I said. “We’ll get you to a hospital.”
“You’d better get that madman tied up before he goes and shoots somebody else,” the pilot growled.
Various rope and leather straps hung from a peg on the wall. With Kathy’s help, I secured Howard’s hands behind his back and strapped his ankles tightly together. For good measure, Kathy wrapped a piece of rope around his neck and tied its other end to the restraint on his ankles. Confident that he would be immobile when he came to, she went to the fallen Borosky and used the overblouse she’d worn that day to stem the flow of blood from his shoulder.
“It’s broke,” he said. “I can’t move it.”
“You’ll be okay,” Kathy said. She stood and said to me, “Well, Jessica, what do we do now?”
“From what I’ve just seen, we can all pile on your back and you can swim us back to Ketchikan.”
“I was mad.”
“And for good reason. You heard what he said, that he didn’t call the police to send a plane. We’re going to have to figure out how to get out of here.”
“Can’t we just radio for help?” Kathy asked. “The plane has a radio.”
“Won’t work down here on the ground and in these canyons. You’ve got to have some altitude before you can use it.”
“Are you okay to fly?” Kathy asked Borosky, who’d managed to sit up.
He shook his head. “Not with this busted shoulder. No way.”
“But you can fly the plane, Jess,” Kathy said.
We turned to see Wilimena crawling across the floor in the direction of the bag of gold that Howard had dropped. I picked it up and handed it to her; she cradled it to her bosom.
“I’m not sure the gold was worth it, Wilimena,” I said.
“What about it?” Kathy asked me. “You can fly us back to Ketchikan.”
I turned to Borosky. “Are you well enough to ride in the right seat and tell me what to do?” My concern, of course, was that with his loss of blood, he’d lose consciousness once we were up in the air and leave me without his guidance.
“I think so,” he said, grimacing.
“Then that’s what we’ll do,” I said. “I hadn’t planned to learn to fly a floatplane so soon, but it looks like my lesson is about to begin.”
And our survival would depend upon it.
Chapter Sixteen
Before even thinking about my flying us back to Ketchikan, there was the problem of moving Willie, Howard, and Bob Borosky from the cabin to the plane. Howard had awoken from his can-of-beans-induced sleep and verbally assaulted everyone until Kathy shoved a rag into his mouth and told him that if he tried to say one word, he could count on another can coming his way.
Murder, She Wrote: Panning For Murder: Panning For Murder (Murder She Wrote) Page 23
