Trouble in Paradise js-2

by Robert B. Parker

  In the van, Crow heard the helicopter first and glanced up through the van window. It wasn't in sight yet. As the van pulled up beside the restaurant, they all heard it.

  "Chopper," Fran said.

  Macklin looked up through the van window and watched the helicopter come in over the treetops and hover over them. Then he got out of the van and walked around to the back and opened the doors.

  "Everybody out," he said, and the six women climbed out and stood silently beside the van.

  The helicopter dropped down a little and Macklin fired four rounds from his handgun at it. The helicopter heeled sharply and soared in the same motion and was out of range almost at once.

  "Let 'em know we're here," Macklin said.

  "I think they know that," Crow said.

  "They're going to know it even more in a minute," Macklin said.

  "JD, gimme the cell phone."

  Five hundred yards offshore, holding the boat steady against the rough chop, Freddie Costa watched the helicopter fly back across the island, out of pistol range. The prow of the boat pounded steadily as the short waves pushed at it. He looked at his watch.

  Three and a half hours.

  Across the island, across Stiles Island gut, where the roiling water foamed over the wreckage of the bridge on the Paradise side, in the mobile operations command truck, a radio operator talked with the helicopter pilot. Ray Danforth stood listening. Suitcase Simpson was with him, looking a little uncomfortable among the State SWAT team cops with their black fatigues and their assault weapons and their funky gun belts.

  "I think the bandits are at the restaurant on the open ocean side of the island. We drew some small arms fire," the pilot said.

  "There's a power boat maybe four, five hundred yards offshore. From here, it doesn't look like he can get closer."

  "Okay," Danforth said to the radio operator.

  "Tell them to stay out of range but monitor."

  He turned to Suitcase.

  "When is high tide around here?"

  "Don't know," Suitcase said, "but I'll find out."

  "Do that," Danforth said.

  FIFTY-NINE.

  "Lemme call Carleton Jencks," Doc said.

  "Snapper's father?"

  "Yeah. He knows the harbor better than I do."

  The phone rang.

  "Okay. Have Molly call him from the switchboard," Jesse said and picked up the phone.

  "This is Harry Smith" the voice said Doc went out to the desk.

  "Or James Macklin," Jesse said.

  could have been Cromartie, but the voice didn't have that indefinable Indian overtone that Jesse remembered from his childhood.

  There was silence on the phone for a moment, and then Macklin went on.

  "I'm on the island. And I wanted to run couple things by you.

  First, the next helicopter I see anywhere around here, I shoot a hostage."

  "Uh-huh."

  "Second, any boats, anything, any attempt to land on the island, any interference with us as we go about our business, and I shoot hostages. I got a lot of them. I can shoot a bunch and have plenty left."

  "What business are you going about?" Jesse said.

  "Our business," Macklin said.

  "And when will you be through going about it?"

  "I'll let you know," Macklin said.

  "Remember what I told you.

  I see so much as a fucking sea scallop come ashore, and it'll be a blood bath."

  "We don't want that," Jesse said.

  "No you don't, and if I see you out here, I'll go shoot that broad you been fucking."

  "Which one?" Jesse said and winced silently as he heard the way it sounded.

  "Way to go, Stone," Macklin said.

  "Marcy, the real estate lady."

  "Uh-huh."

  "You fuck up, and she goes first."

  Jesse took in air silently and flexed his shoulders, forcing himself to relax.

  "I hear you," Jesse said.

  "Got anything to say?"

  "We'll cooperate," Jesse said.

  "You've got my word on it."

  "Well, isn't that good," Macklin said.

  He turned off the cell phone and put it on the bar in the empty restaurant where they were holding the hostages. Marcy sat on a bar stool at the other end of the bar looking at the floor.

  "Says he'll cooperate," Macklin said.

  "Guess he don't want you to get hurt, Marcy."

  Marcy didn't say anything.

  "I mentioned the woman he'd been fucking, and he asked me which one," Macklin said and put his head back and laughed. It was a loud laugh and long and, Marcy thought, somehow contrived, just as it was contrived the way he threw his head back. He was posturing.

  "Where's JD and Fran?" Macklin said to Crow.

  "Guard duty," Crow said, "I told them to go out and walk around the building, keep an eye out."

  "Good, serves a useful purpose and keeps them from whining at me. This thing is going like down so good there's not enough O's in smooth."

  Crow nodded and glanced out the window at the water that boiled through the offshore rocks as the tide came slowly in. Freddie was out of sight around the low headland to the right. Crow glanced at his watch.

  Carleton Jencks came into the office with Snapper.

  "I brought my son," Jencks said.

  "Can you get me ashore on Stiles?"

  Jencks nodded slowly.

  "Got to bring Snapper, though. He's the one knows."

  "Too dangerous to bring a kid."

  "He's got to show us," Jencks said.

  "He can tell us."

  Jencks shook his head.

  "Not enough margin for error," he said.

  "Place is about five feet wide."

  "You know how to get ashore on Stiles?" Jesse said to Snapper.

  "Yeah."

  "Answer right," Carleton Jencks said.

  "Yes," Snapper said.

  "Yes sir, I do."

  "Tell me."

  "It's on the harbor side, about halfway between the yacht club and the bridge. Me and some other guys used to go over there in my father's rowboat. Anchor it and swim ashore, watch what went on."

  Maybe steal a little something too, Jesse thought. But he had bigger things to worry about, and he dismissed the thought.

  "Can you tell me how to go in?"

  "Not really... sir... I got to show you. There's no real landmarks, you know?"

  Jesse sighed. He had no choice.

  "Okay," he said.

  "You and your father."

  He looked at Jencks.

  "You know how to use a gun?"

  "Yes."

  "You want one?"

  "Got one," Jencks said.

  Not the time to ask him for his permit, Jesse thought.

  "I got a shotgun on the boat," Doc said.

  "Okay," Jesse said, "here's the deal. Doc, you take us. Snapper tells us where. I'll go in alone."

  "Before me and my kid sign on here, we need to know what's going on."

  "You do," Jesse said and told them what he knew.

  "High tide will be in about three hours," Doc said to Jesse.

  "Okay," Jesse said.

  "I figure that's how long we got. Chopper pilot says there's a boat lingering on the ocean side of the island. My guess is it can get in close enough at high tide to take them off."

  "Near the restaurant?" Jencks said.

  "Yes. You think?"

  "Yeah. It gets to where you can get in about twenty yards offshore and it's shallow enough to wade out."

  "We let them get on the boat with the hostages, and we have a hairball," Jesse said.

  "Like you don't have one now?" Doc said.

  "Now we've got room to maneuver," Jesse said.

  "Bad guys and hostages on a small boat in the open sea... ?" Jesse shook his head.

  "You figure they're over on the other side, by the restaurant?"

  Jencks said.

  "Yes," J
esse said.

  "That's where they were when they fired on the chopper."

  "You don't want to go ashore there."

  "No."

  "Then we'll have to put you ashore where Snapper says."

  "Can you swim?" Jencks asked.

  "Yes."

  "Good?" Doc asked him.

  "Good enough."

  "I hope so," Doc said.

  SIXTY.

  Marcy knew all of the hostages. Stiles Island was small, and those who worked there had a silent mutual contempt for those who lived there. The young blond woman who had been crying was Patty Moore. She was twenty-two and worked as a teller in the bank. The gray-haired woman who had comforted her was Agnes Till, the assistant manager. Patty was single, lived with her divorced mother in Paradise. Agnes was married with three grown children. She commuted to Stiles Island every day from Danvers. Judy, Mary Lou, and Pam were all tellers, all young, all white. Judy and Pam were married and childless. Mary Lou was a lesbian, though most people, including the Paradise Bank, didn't know it. She had spoken of it to Marcy once last spring at this bar on a Friday night after three Long Island iced teas. There were no black people on Stiles Island, residents or workers.

  All of the women sat at two tables pushed together in the corner of the empty restaurant. They didn't talk. There was nothing to say. Patty Moore's eyes were still damp, but she had herself under enough control to be quiet. Marcy stared out the window and watched the early evening begin to darken the surface of the ocean.

  Macklin was behind the bar. He took a shaker from under the bar and made some martinis. He held the shaker up.

  "Crow?"

  Crow shook his head.

  "Ladies?"

  No one answered. Macklin shook his head.

  "Fine," he said.

  "More for me."

  He poured the martini through the spring strainer into a martini glass, rummaged under the bar, found a jar of olives, and added three to his drink. Then he raised it toward the group of women sitting close together and took a drink.

  "Ahhh,"he said.

  His movements were too quick, Marcy thought. And his jolliness was too forced, and there was something wrong with him. He'd been so calm when he'd come to the office and tied her up. He'd been-she thought about the right word-he'd been so contented when he'd arrived. Despite being his captive, or maybe because of it, she'd had a certain confidence in him to make this come out all right. Now he frightened her. She looked at Crow. He was unchanged. He was neither calm nor excited, not fast not slow, not kind not cruel. He seemed simply to be who he was.

  Crow met her look.

  "You're worried about Jimmy," he said.

  She didn't answer.

  "The fun part is over now for Jimmy," Crow said as if Macklin weren't there.

  "All the planning, putting together the crew, thinking about it, doing it! It's what Jimmy lives for."

  "What am I?" Macklin said.

  "A fucking Lally column?"

  "You know this is true, Jim," Crow said.

  "You get to this point, job's done. All you got to do now is get out with the dough. And they might still get you before you do."

  Crow turned his attention back to Marcy.

  "That's what keeps him from crashing."

  "Hey, Crow, maybe you could stop talking about me like I'm a fucking nut case? I know you're bad, but I'm sort of bad myself and you're starting to piss me off."

  Crow smiled at Marcy.

  "See?" he said.

  "He's a danger freak."

  Marcy didn't say anything. She didn't dare.

  "You think I'm afraid of you, Crow?" Macklin said.

  "This will go better, Jimmy," Crow said, "we don't get to shooting at each other."

  Macklin poured himself another martini.

  "You make-um heap good point," Macklin said and smiled widely at Marcy.

  "Smart Indian, huh Marce?"

  Marcy nodded very slightly, trying to be noncommittal.

  "You ladies sure you won't drink something? Loosen up. You got to be here awhile, no reason not to enjoy it."

  The frizzy-haired blond girl said, "I could have some white wine if you got some."

  "Sure thing, blondie," Macklin said.

  "Step right up here."

  Still behind the bar, Macklin reached down and got a wine glass and set it on the bar. He took a bottle of California Chardonnay from the refrigerator and pulled the cork and poured the glass three quarters full.

  "There you are, blondie."

  Marcy knew the girl wished she hadn't asked. She hadn't realized she'd have to walk up there and get it. Separation from the group seemed frightening. She would, Marcy knew, feel isolated at the bar.

  "I'll have a little wine," Marcy said.

  It was as if she was listening to someone else's voice.

  "That's the spirit, Marce," Macklin said.

  She and Patty stood and walked together to the bar and took their wine.

  "Stay here," Macklin said.

  For a moment, the false jollity was gone. It wasn't an invitation.

  It was an order. Which was how they understood it. Macklin raised his glass.

  "Success," he said.

  The two women raised theirs and drank. Marcy was grateful for the thrust of the wine. Even one sip made almost immediate contact with the electrical charge of her fear, and she felt it pulse through her. She took another quick drink. Macklin noticed. The bastard seemed to notice everything.

  "Hits the spot," Macklin said.

  "Happy hour," Crow said.

  "Feel free to join us," Macklin said.

  Crow shook his head.

  "I think I'll go check the perimeter," he said.

  "Nobody's gonna do squat while we got these women," Macklin said.

  "Hell, we got a hundred more back in town, we use these up."

  "Nice to have bench strength," Crow said.

  Macklin looked at his watch.

  "Getting on," he said.

  "Crow, I think it's time for you to go out and see JD and Fran."

  "There's a lot of stuff to be carried to the boat," Crow said.

  "Maybe better to wait."

  Macklin smiled.

  "These ladies will help us," he said.

  "Go ahead."

  Crow nodded and went.

  SIXTY-ONE.

  Jesse went into the water wearing a black neoprene wet suit and trailing a buoyant equipment bag. There was a Browning 9-mm in the bag and a.38 Smith & Wesson Chief's Special and a sunbelt. There was also a towel, a police radio, a four battery Maglite, and a change of clothes.

  He was a hundred yards offshore on the harbor side of the island, opposite the point on the ocean side where Macklin was holding the hostages. The water was cold, but the wet suit made it tolerable. The shore ahead of him was only a thicker darkness outlined against a paler sky. Above the dark silence of the powerless island, a crescent moon hung faint against the not yet fully gathered darkness. Doc had cut the engines and coasted in as close as he dared. Now he was letting the boat drift away before starting up the engines.

  The rising tide made it easy to swim toward shore. Jesse looked back. He couldn't see the boat. The water was rougher as he got closer to shore, and the waves began to toss him among the rocks.

  He maneuvered through them by pushing himself away from them. The rocks were slick with seaweed and rough with barnacles.

  He couldn't touch bottom yet. A clump of seaweed brushed his leg, and he felt the panic he'd always felt when he was over his head. It wasn't drowning. He was terrified of sharks or, even more namelessly, of whatever might be lurking down there in the unfathomable space below, rising slowly toward his disembodied legs dangling against the surface of the water like bait. He felt the frantic impulse for a moment to climb up onto one of the rocks and cling there in useless safety. He took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. In, he said to himself as he breathed, out. Be a nice headline.