There was no answer, though.
As she scrolled through the rest of Mathilda’s pictures, she heard a noise from the back. She frowned. Colleen had said that the museum was cleared out.
She walked to the hallway. “Anyone there?”
No answer.
She went room by room; no one seemed to be there.
She was uneasy; nervous, even. She tried to tell herself that she was being jumpy—too much had happened too quickly.
She ran her check again.
Finally, she went back to the front, trying to find some kind of logic in what had happened.
She now needed to do what she had told Colleen they would do; read everything she could about the Victoria Elizabeth.
* * *
Ewan Keegan wasn’t home; Brodie figured that he might be out on the Memory, since the Sea Life crew was exploring the wreck again.
They wanted to know what his boat had been doing out on the water the night Ferrer had been killed—and find out if he’d give them his permission to search his boat.
Ewan might also be at the Sea Life offices, and so, while the hour was growing late, they decided to try there.
“There should have been something more,” Brodie murmured, as they walked down the street heading for the Sea Life offices.
Someone, somewhere was warbling out a Journey song. Karaoke, in Key West, always seemed to be a fun thing for people to do—even if they never stood up to sing anywhere else.
Ewan’s sister-in-law had a karaoke place south on Duval—but it was a bit of the lower Duval party route, and O’Hara’s tended to draw more of a local crowd.
“Gotta love Journey,” Liam said dryly. “Actually, I do. I just wish the karaoke crowd would learn a few more numbers.” He grimaced.
“There was nothing,” Brodie said. “Nothing but that bit of chain. And I couldn’t find anyone who even knew anyone who had broken a necklace. Of course, even if we found one of the divers had lost one...there’s no guarantee that it arrived right along with the body of Arnold Ferrer.”
“You’re sure Ewan didn’t break such a chain? He’s the only one who regularly wears one while diving. Sorry to suggest it, I like the man myself.”
Brodie shook his head. “Ewan has always worn one chain. Just one. It’s still around his neck.”
“If he took his boat out, it had to have been late—really late.”
They reached the offices of Sea Life, and Ewan was there.
“Hey,” he said at first, opening the door for them. Then he groaned. “Okay, what did I do now? I know that I must be a ‘person of interest.’ That’s been established. But I told you where I was and when. I know that people can vouch for me.”
“People did vouch for you,” Liam said. “Until about midnight.”
“And what do you think I was doing after midnight? I’m not a twentysomething party guy, and I’ve lived down here far too long to play a drunken tourist.”
“Ewan,” Brodie said, “we have reason to believe your boat was out on the water—near the Victoria Elizabeth.”
Ewan frowned. “My boat is out there most of the time. I let the guys head over there sometimes, and I go over myself. I keep it out there on purpose.”
“But you weren’t on it.”
“If my boat was out there... Oh, I see. You think that I killed Ferrer, and just hailed a water cab to take me and the body out there?”
“Ewan, I know this is hard, but please don’t be defensive. You know as well as I do that we have to check out anything and everything and use that to eliminate potential suspects,” Brodie said.
“Yeah, sure. Dammit, Brodie, you know I didn’t do this,” Ewan said.
“You’re right. I don’t believe you could have done this. We have to check everything.”
Ewan walked around in a circle and then plopped down behind his desk. “My boat was out there. She’s a thirty-five-footer with a master’s cabin and a second bedroom—they’d be fore and aft. Oh, and the galley seats can stand as beds. Sometimes, when we’ve all been worn to hell, some of the divers have crashed there instead of going all the way back in.”
“And they use dinghies from the Memory, right?” Liam asked.
“Right. And sure, I could have motored myself in one of the dinghies from the Memory, and then taken it back to my boat, the Great Escape.”
“Conceivably, you could have,” Brodie said.
Ewan didn’t deny the words; he frowned more deeply.
“The guys would know if one of the dinghies was gone,” he said. Brodie thought that he wasn’t being defensive.
He was worried.
He shook his head. He leaned forward. “Unless you think Ferrer’s murder was perpetrated by my entire crew, that would be about impossible. Unless...”
“What?”
He shook his head.
“Dammit, Ewan, what?” Brodie pressed, leaning toward him on the desk.
Ewan sighed. “You can row a bit...and then turn on a motor. But I’m telling you, everyone on my crew was fascinated with Arnold Ferrer—they couldn’t wait to meet him. They didn’t want him hurt in anyway—he was making our discovery all the more significant.”
“Who else might know about how everyone functions on the Memory?” Ewan asked.
Liam answered for him. “Anyone. When the dive first started, a local journalist did a documentary report on the Memory, Sea Life, and even featured Ewan.”
“We’d like to search your boat,” Brodie said. “Without having to get a warrant. And, of course, the dinghies on the ship.”
“Go for it,” Ewan said. “I’ll sign anything you need.”
“Just need your permission,” Liam said.
Ewan lifted his hands. “You’ve got it. And you already know all of the men... Whatever you need. Do it.”
Liam and Brodie left the office.
“That was easy enough,” Liam said.
“Easy—and hard. Now, we have a whole new list of possibilities.”
“You still can’t rule Ewan out, you know.”
“I don’t—not in the way I work,” Brodie assured him. “But I have to say, I just don’t think it’s possible—and I don’t even believe we’re going in the right direction.”
“Because...”
“Because—I think I told you—Ewan Keegan is just about tone deaf. The man is truly a horrible singer, and he loves to sing the National Anthem. He can’t play an instrument.”
“The music connection. It just...”
“What?”
“This can’t be someone murdering guitarists. It just can’t be. You do know that I don’t think a single behavioral scientist—not just with the FBI, but anywhere—would believe that these murders could possibly be related, right?” Liam asked him.
Brodie nodded. “And you do know that even the very best of the best have never been able to completely solve the human mind or human nature?”
“So, three separate murders. Three separate methods of death. Two that might not have been murders at all, but rather, accidental deaths. Great. Let’s get to it. Let’s find Bill Worth.”
* * *
Senhor Gonzales,
I am delighted to assure you that all my expectations have been fulfilled; the cargo of men—between the years of sixteen and forty—is exceptional. All extremely healthy, and promising hours of work in the hottest sun...
Kody read the words and wondered how there had ever been a world in which people were so callous when it came to others.
She knew that slavery had existed throughout history. She’d attended a great lecture in college given by a visiting Moroccan professor; slavery went back to the times when the first hunter-gatherers had begun to form cities. Babylonia recorded the medical treatment of slaves, and there, too, slaves could own slaves. The first
well-recorded history of the process, according to her professor, had been in Ancient Greece.
War tended to be the greatest provider of slaves throughout history.
One tribe decimating another and making slaves of the survivors.
Modern-day slavery existed. It was now referred to as “trafficking in persons,” and her professor had taught them that it still happens around the world—in the free world, men and women of responsibility should watch for the signs and make sure that any suggestion of the trade be reported to the police. He taught them the signs to watch out for.
And still it was hard to imagine.
She read the reply to Senhor Ferrer.
...A dead slave is a worthless slave, as I am sure that you are aware. I will expect a guarantee for a nominal lifetime—a minimum of a decade’s work.
And that had been written by a man who was supposedly one of Bill Worth’s ancestors.
But then again, what had her own ancestors been doing? What had anyone’s ancestors been doing, and could any man, of free mind and will, be blamed for the sins of the past?
She stared at the computer. There was more. A diagram of the ship that showed how human beings were basically stuffed in the hold—like sardines in a can.
Thump!
Kody sat straight, desperately trying to figure if she had heard the sound, if it had come from the back of the museum—or, perhaps, been caused by somebody or something falling near the museum.
It sounded as if it had come from inside.
She stood up and peeked into the hallway. There was nothing there.
“Where the hell is one of my good old ghosts when I need one, huh?” she murmured aloud.
Get out, she told herself.
Whatever was going on, it was beginning to make her think that the strange deaths and occurrences were making her paranoid. She thought people had been in her house, and now she was thinking that people were in her museum.
Get out, idiot, just get out.
But who the hell would be in the museum? Or in her house? She had email that contained translations of documents—she didn’t have any of the artifacts, documents, letters—anything. The police had taken the information that Arnold Ferrer had been bringing. There wasn’t really anything to steal.
She found herself walking down the hallway. Great—she’d turned off most of the lights earlier. The auxiliary floor lights were on, but the rooms were in shadow.
She was an idiot.
She was also angry. Was someone coming in and out her bathroom window? She could swear that she locked the damn thing every day.
She began to stride toward the back; she’d worked really hard for the museum. She’d defend it.
She was just suddenly certain that someone had been breaking into her house and into the museum—and no one had been hurt.
As yet.
She suddenly stopped walking. There was something ahead of her. It was like a dark mist in the air, floating.
It wasn’t the captain. It wasn’t Cliff.
She stood still, swallowing.
The ghosts she had known had all been good...lost. Wanting to help, or to be helped.
And this...
“Get out, get out...”
It seemed that a voice sounded, like the wind, or a wave, gruff and rusty, echoing the thoughts she’d had earlier.
She turned and fled back to the front, not at all sure if the voice had been a warning—or a threat.
She ran the length of the hallway, out into the reception area. She tried to throw the door open, but it was locked. Without missing a beat she turned and grabbed her bag from beneath the counter, opened the door, and flew out into the street.
She flew so hard that she nearly knocked down the man standing there.
Bill Worth.
16
Brodie was at the end of the block when he saw Kody fly out the door from the museum—and smack right into a man.
He hurried forward, realizing as he did that the man was Bill Worth.
He quickened his footsteps.
Bill was smiling, Kody was apologizing.
“Hey, what happened?” Brodie asked, reaching the two.
“I guess I didn’t expect anyone, and I was hurrying,” Kody said. “Long day... I’m so sorry, Bill.”
“Not at all, Kody,” Bill said. “I saw that the lights were still on in your reception area there. I thought I’d stop by and see you...see how you’re doing.”
“I’m—fine,” Kody said.
She wasn’t fine. There was something bothering her.
“I’m...just supertired,” Kody said.
“Okay, kid, I won’t bug you. I’ll come by and see you tomorrow or the next day. I have some great pictures of Cliff—thought you might want them. I know you. I know that you’re going to give him a big spot in the museum. You need some help. You know I’m your man!”
“Of course, Bill, thank you.”
Bill eyed Brodie. “I guess you were coming to meet Kody.”
“I was,” Brodie said.
“I see,” Bill murmured, and smiled. “Well, see you guys later.”
He started down the street. Brodie looked at Kody. “What?”
She waited, watching until Bill was far down the street.
“Someone was in the museum.”
“You mean...”
“Right, sorry, lots of people come to the museum. But I closed...well, Colleen closed, and I was still in there. I was reading over the letters. On the computer. And I started hearing a noise, I went to the back... Brodie, something...someone...appeared. Like a black shadow. It—spoke. It said, ‘Get out!’ And I know I’m getting a little paranoid, but I don’t know if it was a warning—or a threat.”
“But you heard something?”
“I know. It sounds crazy.”
“No,” he told her firmly. “Let’s go see.”
He opened the door and went in, and then paused, looking back at her. She was certainly safe; there were still plenty of people on the street, walking to and from restaurants and bars.
But he wanted her with him.
“Stay behind me,” he said, catching her hand.
“Oh, you bet,” she promised.
They headed in, past the counter and entry, into the hallway. He was pretty damned sure that if someone had been in there, in the back, they were gone now. But he was curious. A black shape. And it spoke. Maybe the spirit of Arnold Ferrer had remained behind.
If so, he’d given Kody a warning and not a threat.
They went room by room; he turned on lights. No one was in any of the rooms. He hadn’t expected that they would be.
They reached the storeroom, and he made a thorough check, going behind every box, even looking beneath the work tables.
No one.
“Brodie...I swear...”
“I’m not doubting you.”
They checked the bathrooms. The windows were closed.
Neither window was locked.
“Did you check these today?”
She let out a breath. “No, not today. I did yesterday. Colleen locked up, but she always forgets the bathroom windows. I should put bars on them.”
“They lead to the back alley?”
She nodded. “Brodie, Bill could have been in there. He could have come out to the alley, and quickly veered around to the street.”
“He could have,” Brodie agreed. “And it could have been someone else, someone who headed on out to the opposite street.”
“How could anyone be doing all these things? Oh, Brodie...I don’t even know if anyone is doing anything. No one could be interested in what I have because I don’t have anything yet! Artifacts are still with Sea Life, and I don’t have any documents—the police still have them. This is insane!”
“It is insane,” he agreed. “But...” He hesitated, looking at her. “Kody, I think that whatever you saw—the shape, the mist, whatever—could have been Arnold Ferrer. He doesn’t seem to have the ability to show himself. But I do believe he’s helping.”
“So...it wasn’t anything evil?”
“No.”
She let out a sigh. “Let’s go,” she said. “Let’s please go home.”
“Right now.”
He carefully locked the windows, then they went back through the hallway, checking each room once again, turning off lights and heading out. Kody used her keys at the front, and secured the museum.
They started walking.
“I can’t believe this,” she said. “I can’t believe that Bill...”
“Kody, you don’t know that he did anything.”
“You told me about his ancestor. And I read about the man.”
“It still doesn’t mean he did anything.”
“You’re the one who brought him up as a suspect.”
“His association with the ship does make him a person of interest right now, but there are others who are of interest, as well,” he assured her.
“You’re saying that to make me feel better.”
“I’m saying that because it’s true.”
They reached her house. The captain didn’t seem to be there. Only Godzilla came up to them as they entered, rubbing against Kody’s leg.
“All right, my boy. Dinner,” Kody promised.
Brodie followed her into the kitchen. She fed the cat. Then she reached up into a cabinet and pulled out a bottle of whiskey.
“Want a drink?”
“No, I’m good.”
She poured herself an inch of the liquor and swallowed it down in a gulp. He walked over to her, set the glass down and took her into his arms. She seemed to melt into him, shivering.
“Let’s go to bed,” he suggested. “I like to think I’m a lot better than a shot of whiskey.”
She pulled back and smiled at last. “I just can’t feed your ego, you know. I will say that I’ll bet you’re incredible...and the shot of whiskey wasn’t bad. Feel free to follow me.”
She walked ahead of him. She was either very, very nervous, or the one shot of whiskey had made her playful. She stripped off her shirt and let it fall to the floor.
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