“Maybe the answer is out there on Number 4.”
“Now you’re making a lot of assumptions, Hal. First you’re saying Platform Number 4 out there has something to hide. Next you indicate that it’s so secret that they will kill anyone who tries to find out about it, even a late-night swimmer around their platform. They would also have to use some kind of a security system that would warn them when any unauthorized boat or swimmer entered the protected zone around their tower. In the water that would have to be highly sophisticated. Then you’re saying that they have the killer or killers on the platform who could do the job. Those are a whole shitpot full of assumptions. Proving any or all of them is going to be one hell of a tough job.”
“Right, Sheriff, and that’s why you get the big bucks to do that work.”
Sheriff Kirkendol rubbed his chin a moment, then the back of his neck with his right hand. As soon as he realized he was doing it, he stopped. One of his women detectives had told him that the repeated gesture was a dead giveaway that he was worried, troubled, or stumped.
“So I take two men and go visit Platform Number 4.”
“You have jurisdiction?”
“Damn right. It’s in my front yard. So it’s wet. It’s still my own front yard. I’ve got a murder to solve and I’ll do what I have to and let the lawyers yell about it later. You want to come along?”
“Not a chance. I’ve got a rig to run. Besides, I don’t even want to talk to those guys. I might shoot off my mouth about my suspicions. You can do it with a much cooler touch.”
“Flattery…”
“Yeah, still works.”
Two hours later, Sheriff Kirkendol headed for Platform Number 4. He’d had a talk with the coroner, who’d put a rush on his cutting. He’d found two serious head wounds made by a blunt instrument. Neither severe enough to cause death. There was plenty of seawater in the dead man’s lungs, so technically he had drowned. But the man had had a lot of help.
“He must have been clubbed, then held underwater until he drowned. How he got back to his own drill rig is your job, Sheriff. I’m putting the death as a murder by person or persons unknown.”
“Don’t release that information yet,” the sheriff had said. “I have a courtesy call to make first.”
The sheriff had brought with him Nevin Irwin, a former SEAL who had been with him for almost two years handling all of the water-related problems including crimes on boats, drownings, and even one case of piracy. Irwin had blown out a knee on a heavily laden parachute jump somewhere over Europe, and had been eased out of the SEALs. If he couldn’t be in an action platoon, he didn’t want to stay in the service. He did another year on his enlistment in the support units at Coronado, then found his spot with the Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Department.
The third man was a longtime deputy who handled the boats for the department. The sheriff had radioed the tower indicating he needed to visit the platform for a routine safety inspection. He asked for the safety engineer to be on hand, and was invited to come out at his convenience.
That turned out to be slightly after eleven o’clock that morning. The twenty-four-footer eased up to the water-level dock at Rig Number 4 where a man in a white shirt and tie met it.
“Preston,” the man said, holding out his hand to the sheriff. “Good to see you. Safety around here is one of our primary concerns. So far we have a hundred and eighty-two days without a lost-time accident. We want to keep that record going. Any suggestions you can make will help.”
“Just routine, Preston. We’ll try not to trip over anything. This is Deputy Irwin, who will go with us.” He waved for the boat driver to stay on the boat, and the three men climbed the steel steps that took them to the first level.
“As you can see, we’re a small platform,” said Preston. “None of those giants you may have seen. We have five levels, with the driller’s cabin in the top level. We have basic steel-pipe tendons with direct tendon-pile connections on the bed of the strait. We do work twenty-four hours a day, and we are so far a test hole that we hope will produce. Many of our crewmen are foreigners. We try to get the best men we can regardless of their country of origin. Do you have any questions?”
The noise of the drilling and the various motors running on the level above them set up a clatter and roar that made talking a little hard.
“Do you ever have any security problems? Like boats stopping by, fishermen, paddleboard guys, maybe sea lions crawling up on your little water-level dock down there?” Irwin asked.
“Not a problem. The sea lions get frightened off by the motors and the vibrations before they get anywhere near the platform. Then we do have a fisherman stopping by now and then just out of curiosity. Usually they just want to stare up at the platform and ask a few questions. We don’t exactly give them a guided tour, if you know what I mean.”
Sheriff Kirkendol listened to the reply critically. He couldn’t detect any reluctance or any hint that it wasn’t the truth. The man didn’t seem to be hiding anything.
They took a quick look at levels two and three, and twenty minutes later they were back in the boat heading for shore.
Deputy Irwin looked at his boss and shook his head. “Didn’t play right for me, Chief. Sounded like the guy was trying to hide something. And why is he wearing a white shirt and a tie on a greasy, oily, smelly place like a drilling platform? I just don’t trust the guy.”
Sheriff Kirkendol frowned. “I didn’t get that feeling, Nevin. He was smooth, maybe like he had worked over what he was going to tell us. But he answered your question off the top of his head and I bought it.”
“Maybe I’m just suspicious. I have a hard time accepting that a scuba man, snorkeling instructor, and college swimmer is going to drown in an accident like that. What bugs me is that somebody went to a lot of work with that wire to make it look natural. Still, it held the man three feet underwater. Besides, the dead man complained to his boss about that other platform. He may have been the kind of guy who decided he’d swim out there and take a look for himself. Do it at night when they wouldn’t see him. Can’t be more than five hundred yards, a warm-up for him.”
The head man in the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department lifted his brows and shook his head. “Hell, right now your doubts are the only thing we have to go on. We’ve got a murdered man on our hands, and so far not a hope of finding out who did it. How many men on the 27 platform where the man worked?”
“I saw a report that said it had about thirty men,” Irwin said.
“Okay, tomorrow we’ll send out three of our detectives and they will interview every man. We might turn up somebody who had a grudge against Gifford strong enough to kill him. Whoever murdered Gifford must also have been a diver, or at least a good swimmer. Something to watch for.”
“I’d like to go along.”
“Negative, Irwin. Interviewing is not your strong suit. I have three men who are experts at it. They’ll go out tomorrow and do a good job.”
“So that leaves me to do what?”
“You watch for any signs of activity or problems in the water around that tower. Large boats coming there and anchoring. Next time one does that, we get the Coast Guard and we go out and inspect the ship on some pretext. You keep in touch with Pete Rumford, that platform boss on 27. Whenever he spots a freighter dropping anchor near that Platform 4, have him give you a ring.”
“Yes, sir,” Irwin said, reverting to his SEAL training. He could take orders even if he didn’t like them. He spent the rest of the day on routine calls, and just after dark, drove his two-year-old SUV to his favorite parking spot when he went diving. He put on his wet suit, cap, and boots and took out the new Draegr III. It was the latest underwater rebreathing device, and didn’t leave a string of bubbles. This one was programmed to mix the right amount of chemicals with the oxygen so a diver could go as deep as he wanted to and still get the right mix of air. It was the same type he had used in the SEALs. He locked the SUV, put the key in the small flap poc
ket on the wet suit, and walked into the water off Goleta Point.
Nevin swam toward the lighted oil-drilling rig. He figured it was about two miles, not even a warm-up. He went down ten feet and stroked toward the tower the way he used to in the SEALs. His blown-out knee had been replaced and worked fine in the water. It was the parachute drops hitting the ground at twenty-one feet per second with two hundred pounds of equipment and ammo that his new knee couldn’t take. He loved the water. Sometimes he felt more at home in the ocean than he did on land. He surfaced with just his face out of the water. He was dead on course. A small moon gave off its feeble light, but he didn’t need it. The required marine lights were on the tower, plus a few hundred more bulbs to make sure no wandering tanker or freighter crashed into the rig.
Nevin went back down to ten feet and stroked toward the tower. He had no idea what he would find once he got there. He had looked at the steel pipes that extended downward into the depths when he had been there that morning. He could see about ten feet, and nothing had looked unusual.
At least he could do a good scouting job, and if he did find anything out of the ordinary, he’d go back out with the sheriff and make a thorough inspection. What could you hide around an oil-drilling rig? It didn’t make a lot of sense. But then neither did the murder of a man who the platform boss on 27 thought had had suspicions about Oil Rig 4.
The next time Nevin surfaced, he was fifty feet from the tower. He dove then, working down to fifty feet and sensing change in the air/chemical mix that would keep his body functioning despite the added depth pressure. He came on the first tendon and touched it. He circled it and looked upward. No huge mass obstructed his view of the surface where the half-moon and the rig’s lightbulbs gave off a faint glow. He dove down, checking the pipe all the way to the bottom. Nevin had no idea how deep the water was here, but well beyond what the old Draegr would tolerate.
Nothing. He found nothing. That troubled him. There had to be something here or nearby. What in the hell was going on? He worked his way back up. At forty feet he saw a swimmer above him, moving slowly back and forth from one steel tendon to the next. Hunting him, or patrolling? Either way it was bad news and good news. It could mean they knew he was there. The good news was if they had a swimmer out at night, they did have something to hide.
He worked up cautiously, trying to stay away from the swimmer above, confident that the one on top could not see him in the gloom of the deeper water. Then the swimmer above turned and came directly toward him. Nevin’s hand flashed to the KA-BAR knife in its leg scabbard. He had it out and ready when some sixth sense made him turn his head and look behind him. Another swimmer was there within arm’s reach and Nevin saw the blade in his hand. Nevin tried to power away, but he was too late. He hadn’t watched his back the way every good SEAL always did. The thrust of the blade missed his back, but cut a slit across the wet suit’s side, letting in a surge of cold water.
Nevin spun around to face the fighter just as the second diver above reached him and drove his own knife into the Draegr, disabling it and ripping off the mouthpiece. Nevin kicked and powered for the surface. He figured he had about ninety seconds. That was as long as he could hold his breath, and he was getting no air from the torn-apart Draegr. The second diver followed him, slashing at his kicking feet. Then he was closer to Nevin and the knife went into his side, daggering through the tough wet suit and bringing a gush of water into his screaming mouth.
His beating legs slowed and then stopped. Nevin had never felt pain like that. It overwhelmed him. It burned in his side; it exploded in his brain. He mouth refused to close and more water surged in. He tried to find the attackers. They had pulled back and he could barely make them out. They had attacked. Now they rested and let the sea claim one of her own. His arms went limp. He had no control over them or his legs. The lights from above fuzzed out, came back, then went almost black. He didn’t know if he was floating upward or sinking. He hadn’t thought about dying since leaving the SEALs. Now the idea came into his fogged brain and he rejected it. Spewed it out with the water in his mouth and held his breath. Another few strokes and he would be on the surface and find plenty of air. But his arms wouldn’t work. His side hurt like fire. For a moment his whole body shook, and then a strange calm settled over him. He looked up at the lights, but they faded more and more to a dusty gray, and then to full black. He let out the last breath in his burning lungs and let the Pacific Ocean stream into his mouth and nose. He couldn’t fight it anymore. He felt his whole body relax, and he knew then that he was sinking. There was no light or dark, there was only the cool, serene waters of the ocean. Now at last he had returned to the ocean from which life had begun so many millions of years ago. He was one with the sea. Then a total, inescapable, deadly deep darkness engulfed him and he sank deeper and deeper into the Santa Barbara Channel.
4
NAVSPECWARGRUP-ONE
Coronado, California
Murdock stared at the news story in the San Diego Union-Tribune. It had made the front page. “Former Coronado SEAL Murdered in Santa Barbara.” He read the item quickly.
“Santa Barbara Deputy Sheriff Nevin Irwin…”
“Damn, it’s Irwin, he’s dead,” Murdock blurted out. Lieutenant Ed DeWitt looked up from the training chart he was writing. “Irwin? Nevin Irwin, who used to be in Team Five?”
“Yeah. I interviewed him a couple of times to come to our platoon. Then he blew out a knee. I knew he was up at Santa Barbara with the Sheriff’s Department.” He read the article aloud.
“The body of missing former Navy SEAL Nevin Irwin, a county deputy sheriff, washed up on Goleta Beach this morning. The county coroner said the body had been in the water for up to a week. Irwin had been reported missing at the Sheriff’s Department six days ago when he failed to report to work.
“His vehicle, a late-model SUV, was found near Goleta Point, where many surfers and divers often park. Irwin wore a full wet suit and an underwater breathing device. The coroner said death was due to a deep knife wound through the side that penetrated the wet suit. There was also seawater in the victim’s lungs.
“Irwin had been with the Sheriff’s Department for almost two years, had as his special assignment all water-related problems, and did whatever diving the sheriff needed doing.
“Sheriff Kirkendol expressed regrets at the death, and praised Irwin as an ideal deputy. He said Irwin had not been on any specific assignment involving the beach or the channel and that he did little recreational diving. Sheriff Kirkendol said the murder of the deputy would be investigated thoroughly and the perpetrator would be brought to justice.”
Murdock passed the paper to DeWitt, who read it and looked up. “Most SEALs don’t lose underwater knife fights.”
“Unless he was outnumbered three or four to one.” Murdock stared at the paper. A former SEAL killed in the water. That was unusual. Who would be skillful enough to do that? Another SEAL or some other highly trained diver. Who and from where? He looked at DeWitt. “You have the training sked worked out for the rest of the week?”
“Nearly done, Commander.”
“Good, you’ve got the con. I’m going to take three days leave and I’ll see you next Monday.”
Ed looked up, then nodded. “My guess is you’re going up to Santa Barbara.”
“Thought I might, but you don’t need to tell anyone. I’ll tell the master chief. He can reach me on my cell phone if we get an alert.”
Ed stood. “My guess is you’ll be needing your full wet suit and a Draegr.”
“Might just need them at that, Ed. Thanks. You take care of the store.”
Santa Barbara, California
Just after noon that same day, Blake Murdock sat across the desk from Sheriff Kirkendol. He wore civilian clothes and had just shown the sheriff his military ID and his SEAL Special Duty Card.
“Sheriff, I knew Nevin Irwin. He wasn’t in my platoon, but I had interviewed him twice. If he hadn’t blown out his knee he would h
ave been one of my men. It bothers me that a former SEAL was killed in a knife fight in the channel. Our men are highly trained in knife fighting in and out of the water. In the water there are few men in the world who can beat us.”
“We can’t say for sure he was killed in the water, Commander. He might have been drowned first, then stabbed, or the other way around.”
“Still, it would take an extremely skilled and trained man to do it to Irwin. If that’s so, you may be dealing here with something more than a shiv fight at a tavern.”
The sheriff shifted in his seat, took a sip of his coffee, and stared at Murdock over the rim of the cup.
“Commander, I don’t know just how much to tell you. Irwin wasn’t on a water assignment the night he was killed, but we had been talking about another water death of an oil-rig worker. The man had been snorkeling and became entangled in wire around one leg of his diving platform three feet underwater. He drowned. The wire hadn’t been there the day before.”
“You have any suspects?”
“Not for sure. The platform boss where the man died said the worker had been curious about another drilling platform. Said curious things were going on out there. Gifford, the drowned man, was a scuba instructor and led kids on free-diving tours. He was an expert in the water. The coroner’s report says he was clubbed on the head and then drowned.”
“So, Irwin wanted to check out that other oil platform?” Murdock asked.
“We did. Went on a safety inspection. Everything seemed normal. She was drilling, nothing out of order.”
“But Irwin wasn’t satisfied. You guess that he parked his car on the point and swam out to the other platform.”
The sheriff frowned. “I’m not sure of anything. But that is a strong possibility. Irwin wasn’t easy to get off a project once he got a sniff of something rotten. I’d bet my last twenty he swam out there the night he was killed.”
“What could they be doing illegal on that drilling rig?” Murdock asked. “It’s too small to store drugs on there that they took off some ship. They could be smuggling diamonds, but that would be a lot of extra trouble. What could be going on?”
Payback sts-17 Page 5
