Black Tide Rising

by R. J. McMillen

  “Thanks. That would be great.”

  He looked back at Jens. The man was obviously distraught.

  “Have you checked the cove?” Dan asked. “Are there trails she likes to take—or maybe a boat she could have taken out …”

  “She hates boats!” The man’s raw cry tore through the air as he covered his head with his hands and leaned his forehead down onto the table. “She hates boats,” he repeated softly. “I should never have brought her here.”

  Dan shot a glance at Gene. Was there more going on here than simply a missing woman?

  “Jens and Margrethe only arrived here a couple of months ago,” Gene said, reading the question in Dan’s glance. “Jens was the lightkeeper at the Point Atkinson light over in West Vancouver, but they automated it and put him out of a job. He applied for the assistant job here when old Walter retired.”

  Hmmm, thought Dan. Point Atkinson was on the mainland, at the outer, western edge of Vancouver Harbour. Jens and Margrethe would have lived right in the city—and in the high-rent district at that. Shops. Cars. Restaurants. Movies. Wouldn’t have needed a boat there. So maybe Margrethe liked the bright lights—but there weren’t any bright lights around here. There was only one other house in the cove.

  “Does she like living here?” Dan asked.

  There was no answer, and Dan looked over at Mary, who was standing by the stove. She shrugged and glanced at Gene, who simply spread his hands. No answers there either.

  “She says she does.” Jens’s voice, when he finally answered, was still soft. Remote. Unsure. Whatever else might be going on, Dan figured the man was genuinely worried.

  Mary brought the coffee over and sat down again. “Drink your coffee, Jens. Then we’ll go down to your house. Maybe she’s come home and is wondering where you are.”

  She pushed a cup toward him, and when he didn’t respond, she took his hands and wrapped them around it, urging him to drink. He gave her a wan smile, but didn’t look any happier.

  They didn’t have far to walk. The assistant’s house was just steps away, across a cement pad that connected both houses to the light itself. The whole place looked like a postcard. The square wooden houses, both painted white below red metal roofs. The matching light tower, topped by a red housing for the constantly turning lens. The blue ocean beyond, stretching out to the distant horizon, and, to the east, the perfect curve of the cove itself, with its fringe of golden sand.

  It looked idyllic, but Dan figured the reality would undoubtedly be something different. Living on a remote island on the edge of the Pacific would not be for everyone. Maybe Margrethe had simply decided she couldn’t take the isolation anymore. But she couldn’t simply walk away. She would have needed a boat—and Jens said she hated boats.

  The inside of the house was much like the one they had just left: simple but functional. There were only five rooms including the bathroom, each with minimal furniture, but clean and neat and obviously cared for. It took the four of them less than a minute to determine that Margrethe had not returned, but that was long enough for Dan to take in the disturbed bed, the clothes hanging neatly in the closet, the hairbrush and makeup bag sitting on the vanity, and the cups that had been rinsed and placed beside the sink to drain. If Jens’s wife had decided to walk away, she might have left her clothes—probably would have—and she might even have rinsed out the cups before she left, but Dan didn’t know any woman who would leave her hairbrush and makeup behind.

  “Is there anything missing, Jens? A jacket, maybe? Boots?”

  Jens looked at him for a moment, a kaleidoscope of emotions flashing across his face, and then he turned, walked back to the doorway, and opened a closet. He stared into it for a minute, then turned back.

  “Yes. Both.”

  So it looked like Margrethe had left the house voluntarily sometime in the early morning, but had planned to return.

  “When did you notice she was gone?”

  Dan realized he had taken over all the questioning, and it seemed Gene and Mary were happy to let him do it. Maybe he still wore that cop persona people talked about, even after a couple of years away. Something to think about. He didn’t know if he liked the idea. He didn’t feel like a cop anymore, although there were still times when he missed the job.

  “I was working down in the generator shed most of the night,” Jens replied. “I came up here around seven this morning and made myself a cup of tea. I don’t know what time I went to the bedroom. Maybe seven thirty, maybe eight. But she wasn’t there.”

  Jens’s voice wavered. He was near tears, maybe near collapse. Mary went over to him and put her arm around his shoulders.

  “Come on, Jens. We’ll find her. Come on back up to the house and I’ll make you some breakfast. Gene and Dan can go down to the cove and see if she’s there.”

  She cast a meaningful look at Dan and Gene as she nudged the distraught man past them. They were almost out the door when Dan thought of another question.

  “Did you pull the bedding down, or was it like that when you went in this morning?”

  Jens turned and stared at him. “I didn’t touch it. I guess it was like that.” He frowned. “I never thought about it.”

  “That’s okay. Go on with Mary. Gene and I will take a look around.”

  • THREE •

  The lazy sweep of the cove spread out in front of the two men as they crossed the walkway, a peaceful scene with no sign of movement anywhere.

  “You want to take the church?” Gene asked. “I know the family over at the house pretty well. Probably better if I go talk to them.”

  Dan nodded. He was an outsider. He didn’t want to have to explain what was happening or what he was doing here. It would take too long and bring up memories and issues he didn’t want to deal with.

  “Sounds good. I’ll call you if I find anything. Otherwise I’ll meet you down at that shed over there.” He nodded toward the beach.

  “It’s not a shed, it’s a studio,” Gene said. “Sanford does his carving there. You’ll see some of it up in the church. House posts and crests mostly. It’s amazing stuff.”

  Dan nodded and the two men headed off in separate directions, Gene to the house and Dan to the church.

  Like Jens’s house, the church was empty—if you could call a space filled with exquisitely carved poles and figures empty. All the religious paraphernalia had been removed and the building was now occupied by a host of stylized and mythological creatures: a thunderbird over the door, an owl, perhaps a wolf, certainly a bear on the house posts. Killer whales arched over what might have once served as an altar and, twining everywhere, were the coils of a snake. Dan didn’t have time to take a close look, but he saw enough to know he wanted to come back and check it out. His hobby was—or had been, because he hadn’t done any lately—wood carving. The hold of his boat was full of gnarled and twisted driftwood waiting for him to pick up his tools and bring the shapes held within the wood to life. He didn’t have a rich cultural heritage to draw from, but the wood spoke to him nonetheless. He would like to be able to share his passion with someone as creative and adept as this carver obviously was.

  But that was for later. Now he had a more urgent task, and it didn’t take long for him to see that there was no sign of the woman. No sign of anyone, in fact. The place was silent and lifeless, except for the carved figures standing as sentries, and those seemed to have a life of their own.

  Dan walked back out into the sunshine and met Gene coming up the path from the house.

  “No one home,” Gene said. “I think they must have gone over to Gold River. Probably won’t be back for a couple of days.” He shrugged. “The house is locked but I looked in the windows. No sign of anyone or anything there.”

  That left the studio on the beach where the figures that occupied the church had been created. Gene said the carver, Sanford, was the son of the family that lived in the house.

  They headed down toward the water, eyes scanning the ground for any sig
ns that might show them where Margrethe had gone, but there was nothing. Like the house, the studio was locked and empty, the wide windows that formed the major part of every wall providing a clear view of a partially carved log laid out across two stumps. It was beginning to look as if Jens’s wife had simply walked out of the house and vanished.

  “Any ideas?” Dan asked.

  “Nope. Doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Maybe she went out and slipped on the rocks. Fell into the water.”

  Gene shook his head. “She was damn near as scared of the water as she was of boats. Maybe more. Never saw her outside on the beach unless she was with Jens. Can’t figure out why they ever came here.”

  “Did Jens ever talk about it?”

  “Jens? Hell no. Jens isn’t much of a talker. He’s kind of like me—spent most of his life on the lights, but in his case they were all close to the city. Don’t think either one of them really thought about whether they liked boats or how they would handle being out here in the middle of nowhere.”

  “Think Margrethe might have just walked away? Got tired of it all?”

  Again, Gene shook his head. “Where would she walk to? And in the dark? Alone?”

  Dan nodded. He had asked himself the same questions. “So how about Jens? How is he handling the isolation? Think he might have reached breaking point?”

  “Jens?” Gene looked at him in amazement. “Not a chance. He loves it. He’s a weather guy. Studied meteorology at university before he went on the lights. Margrethe might have some issues with living out here, but the two of them are real good together. She’s as quiet as he is, although in her case it’s probably because she’s got a bit of a hearing problem. She’s not deaf, mind you, but she doesn’t hear all that well, so she keeps pretty much to herself. She cooks half the day. Sends bags of cookies and bread and buns and stuff up for Mary and me—not that I need it.” He glanced down at his stomach. “Anyway. Rest of the time she reads or weaves. Got some kind of loom thing over there. Makes all kinds of shit—scarves and towels and stuff. We’ve got a bunch of those up at the house too. And Jens putters. He fixes things and makes stuff down in the workshop. Spends hours there. They’re happy together.”

  The two men stood together looking out over the cove, trying to come up with something that would make sense. The woman had to be somewhere. She couldn’t have vanished into thin air.

  “What’s that over there?” Dan noticed the gap first. Not really a gap. More of a space in the wide stretch of seagrass that formed a barrier between the beach and the shallow bowl of the cove and rustled in the breeze.

  “Where?” Gene followed his gaze. “Hey, that’s odd. That’s about where the old totem is. Been there for years. But I’ve never seen the grass laid down like that. Looks like it’s been trampled or something.”

  “Maybe you had better wait here a minute, Gene,” Dan said. “I’ll go check it out.”

  “Sure,” said Gene, a note of wariness creeping into his voice as he realized the reason for Dan’s caution. “No problem.”

  It wasn’t just a gap. It was more like an open wound, the grass flattened in a wide swath and a deep gouge in the sand where the ancient pole had been dragged from its resting place. The eyes of an eagle still stared sightlessly up at him from the grayed cedar, but its beak had been ripped away, one wing was broken off, and the snout of the bear had been hacked open to expose a core of new wood. Below that, the striped coils of a lightning snake the bear had once held in its jaws were slashed in two places and lay off to one side.

  The damage was recent, the exposed wood still a bright and glowing yellow. Dan stared at it in puzzlement. He had stopped believing in coincidence a long time ago. This had to be linked with the woman’s disappearance, but how? He looked back at Gene and beckoned him down.

  “What the hell!” Gene was stunned. “Who would do this? And why? Doesn’t make any sense.” He shook his head. “This is going to upset a lot of people.”

  Dan looked at him. “You think there’s any way Margrethe could have done it?”

  “Margrethe?” Gene looked at him in horror. “Hell no. She loves it! Loves all the stuff Sanford does. Even asked him if she could use his designs in her weaving. I’ll show you some of the stuff she’s done. It’s good.”

  Dan looked back down at the exposed wood. “When was the last time you saw this?”

  “Me? Damned if I know. A while, I guess. I don’t come down here that often, but Mary walks the beach almost every day. You can ask her.” Gene started to leave, then turned back. “You should ask Sanford too. He comes over here all the time. It was one of his family that carved it way back. Can’t remember the year, but it was a long time ago. It’s been part of his heritage ever since he was born.” He shook his head. “Sure going to be pissed off.”

  The two men looked down toward the water, silently scanning the beach for any sign of footprints, but the tide was coming in and the driftwood made it difficult. Behind them, up on the hill, a ray of sunlight lit the steeple of the church like the finger of God pointing the way home.

  “Damn,” said Dan. “We sure could use Walker here.”

  “Who the hell is Walker?” asked Gene.

  “What? Oh, sorry. Didn’t mean to talk out loud. Walker’s just a guy I know. Lives up north around Hakai Pass somewhere. He helped me out last year when Claire and I ran into some trouble. He’s the best tracker I ever met, and he knows the tides and currents like—well, like a fish!”

  Dan noticed Gene staring at him intently. “What?” he asked.

  “He Native, this Walker guy?”

  “Uh, yeah. He is. Why?”

  “Big guy?”

  “Yeah. Guess so.”

  “His legs all banged up? Can’t walk well?”

  “You know him?” Dan couldn’t believe it. Gene couldn’t possibly know Walker. Walker was almost a recluse, living his life in the traditional way of his people at least a couple of hundred miles away. Probably more. Even Dan didn’t know exactly where his home was or how to find him. He had run into him purely by chance the previous year when he had tied up at a floating store in Dawson Inlet to take on supplies. A man had hobbled across the float in front of him and Dan had recognized him from his days as a detective. Back then, Walker had been a punk kid living in the city and Dan had been part of a response team that had chased Walker and his friends across a roof after a bank robbery had been called in. Walker had tripped and fallen to the street below, breaking his pelvis and both legs. Dan had spent a good deal of time questioning him while he was in the hospital and had come to believe that, given a chance, this was a kid who might be able to turn his life around. It turned out he had been right. The man he had met the previous year was no punk. He was quiet and confident, spending most of his time on the water, where his damaged legs were not a handicap.

  “Can’t be the same guy,” he told Gene.

  “Sure sounds like the same guy,” Gene answered. “Paddles a canoe?”

  Dan stared at him. “Yeah,” he said. “He does. But how the hell do you know him?”

  “Well, if it is the same guy, he comes here every once in a while,” Gene answered. “His family’s related to Sanford’s somehow. I think his sister married Sanford’s cousin or something. The sister and her husband live over in Gold River, but I guess Walker goes to visit them occasionally. Don’t know how he gets there, but he always comes here by canoe.”

  It was unreal. When Dan had run into Walker the previous year, it had been a coincidence—a very fortunate one, as it turned out, because it had been Walker’s knowledge and skills that had helped prevent a major disaster. To have him turn up again here would be simply unbelievable.

  But it was Walker they were talking about, and as Dan had been forced to acknowledge, strange things happened when Walker was involved. Things Dan still could not fully explain even though he had experienced them himself.

  “I don’t suppose he’s there now?” Dan felt foolish even asking the que
stion.

  “I don’t know. I don’t think so, but then again it looks like the whole family’s probably heading over to Gold River, so if it’s a big gathering he might have come in. Guess we’ll find out in a few days.”

  “Yeah. Well, that’s going to be too late to help us figure out what’s happened to Margrethe. We’d better head back and see if Mary and Jens have come up with anything yet, and if they haven’t, you’d better call the police.”

  Gene nodded glumly. “Guess so,” he said. “Although it sure is going to be a mess. The cops are going to call the coast guard, and those guys’ll be swarming all over here like ants at a picnic.”

  Dan looked at him. “Don’t you work for the coast guard?”

  “Yeah, I guess I do—but the coast guard we usually see are the boys on the supply boats, and we only see them every six months—although once in a while it’s a whole lot longer than that. On the real remote lights, you have to depend on them for food and clothing, even water, and I’ll tell you something. You spend a whole winter waiting for a supply boat that doesn’t arrive and you start to get a little disenchanted with ’em.” Gene laughed. “Happened to us a few years back when we were up at Quatsino. Now every time I see one of those damn boats I start remembering a whole winter of eating nothing but Spam and canned peas. Kind of hard to feel a whole bunch of brotherly love after that.”

  Dan laughed. “I guess I can understand that. Never could stand Spam myself.” He braced himself against the top of a log as he worked his way past a mound of driftwood.

  Gene snorted. “Yep. Never eaten the stuff since.” He glanced back at Dan. “What?”

  Dan had stopped and was standing absolutely still, staring at his hand. Slowly he lifted it up and turned it toward Gene. A patch of dark red glistened on his palm.

  “Ah, Jesus! That what I think it is?”

  Dan raised his hand to his face and sniffed. The coppery smell of blood was unmistakable. “Yeah. It is.”