Dead Man's Switch

by Sigmund Brouwer

  “One thing,” Johnson said. “I won’t lie. Just so you understand. If we get busted, I won’t lie. I’ll tell them about the iPhone. I mean, it’s killing me to hide it. We should have never bought it for Blake. We should have never—”

  “The door,” King said. “Listen. Did someone try to open it?”

  Johnson snapped his mouth shut and strained to hear.

  “That’s better,” King said. “Silence.”

  “Ha, ha. Come on. Get going.”

  King unlocked the phone again with 2855.

  “Here’s what I’m thinking,” King said. “Blake—if this really was Blake who set up the emails—was paranoid that somebody could track emails sent to me via my server. So he just sent the one original email and told me to trash it. Even if someone found that first email, they wouldn’t get the rest of the trail. That’s why he’s now using this iPhone to get us the rest of his emails. Anyone trying to trace his original stuff won’t know this new email account or that we have access to it.”

  “With you so far. But he only sent us one email. Blank.”

  “I want to forward that email to a computer that’s not mine or yours.” King thumbed on the keypad, putting in Johnson’s mom’s email address. “Then we read it and trash it. I can’t believe we need to be this paranoid, but I guess it won’t hurt.”

  “Unless my mom walks in and asks why we’re at her computer instead of mine.”

  “Locked door.”

  “Which, as I thought I made clear, is going to be awkward to explain if—”

  “Listen,” King said, holding up a hand. There it was—the woosh of an email sent by iPhone.

  Almost instantly, the computer in front of them pinged. One new message.

  “Open it,” King told Johnson.

  “I shouldn’t be in her emails,” Johnson said. “I hate this.”

  “Not as much as you’d hate the world learning something about this island that makes our dads look like criminals.”

  King wasn’t feeling so bad about this lie to Johnson. Is that what happened to people? You just got used to doing wrong things? Is that how Mack was led to whatever crime Blake had found?

  “Doing this means we half believe it’s true,” Johnson said. “I hate that too. It’s like we’re betraying our dads.”

  Johnson had read King’s thoughts. “Yeah. I’m with you on that. So don’t think about it. Open the email.”

  King tried not to think about how he was lying to Johnson about this. Johnson’s dad wasn’t involved. Only King’s dad. So King was betraying his dad and his best friend. But what choice did he have?

  Johnson clicked on the email King had forwarded from the iPhone. As expected, the content of the email was blank. Just as it had been on the iPhone.

  “Click on the contents,” King said. “Command-A.”

  “Select all?”

  “That’s a rhetorical question, right?” King said.

  “Like yours,” Johnson said. He clicked on the keyboard.

  “Now bring up font styles,” King said.

  Johnson did.

  King pointed at the monitor. “Ha!”

  “Ha?”

  “The font is white,” King said. “Sometimes you use a white font against a colored background. But against a white background...”

  Johnson whistled. “Like invisible ink.”

  Without waiting for King to say anything, Johnson selected black for font color. Words popped up on the screen.

  “Bingo,” King said.

  “No, trouble,” Johnson said. He glanced over King’s shoulder and out the window, and his eyes widened. “Here comes my mom back from her jog.”

  “Print it,” King said, tucking the iPhone in his back pocket. Calm on the outside, feeling not so calm interior. “I’ll get the door.”

  King took a step then stopped. “And delete the email!”

  King reached the door and unlocked it a full second before Johnson’s mom turned the knob. He had just enough time to get back to a chair and pretend he was relaxing.

  She opened the door. White cords dangled from her earbuds. Her face was flushed, her brown hair curled and wet at the edges. She was wearing a plain gray jogging suit.

  King waved.

  She pulled the earbuds loose.

  “Hello, Mrs. Johnson,” King felt the iPhone in his back pocket pressing against him, a reminder of all his deceit, beginning with buying the device for Blake Watt. “I hope you’re okay that I was thinking of raiding your cookie jar.”

  She smiled. “For the Lyon King? Sure.”

  It had never occurred to King before, but Lyon King sure sounded a lot like Lying King.

  CHAPTER 13

  “This really is insane,” Johnson told King as they stepped onto a small pier. McNeil Island had a reservoir in the center of it, shaped like a wedge of pie. It had been stocked with trout, and catch-and-release fishing was permitted. There were some monstrous fish.

  “Extremely insane,” King said. “But isn’t there a part of you that’s having fun?”

  Sun threw their shadows in front of them as they walked on the creaky weathered wood. Each carried fishing rods and small tackle boxes. The printed email Blake had sent told them to go fishing. And to keep the flashlight in the tackle box.

  “Now what?” Johnson said. King noticed that Johnson didn’t answer the question about whether this was fun.

  “Well, this is the only place Blake ever went fishing with us. Once.”

  “And squealed like a little girl when you told him he had to thread a worm on the hook. Remember? It freaked him out so bad he threw the worm as far as he could. Then he just watched us fish.”

  “He learned the squealing part from you,” King said.

  “It happens.” Johnson shrugged. “At least I was a good teacher.”

  “I think that’s the point,” King answered. “He set up a trail that only we can follow. If—and I’m just saying if—people really are trying to spy on our emails and learn what he’s telling us, there’s no way these clues would mean anything to them. I was able to figure out his invisible ink in the email because he had once played that joke on me. And if someone else had actually intercepted that email and then figured out the white font on the white background, how would they know exactly where to go fishing? Blake only went once with us. Here.”

  “He was a little girl,” Johnson sniffed. Johnson flexed a pitiful bicep. “Not manly like me.”

  “You do know what the word ‘delusional’ means, right?”

  “Sure I do—” Johnson stopped. “Hey, were you just calling me—”

  “Yes, Sherlock.”

  They’d reached the end of the dock. Where all three of them had sat on the one afternoon that Blake Watt went fishing with them. “Check it out.”

  A tiny arrow had been scratched into the wood. It pointed at the opposite side of the lake.

  “Something is waiting for us at the other side?” Johnson said.

  “Hmm.” King realized he was tapping his front tooth again. He stopped himself. It was like sending out a signal to other people. As a rule, he didn’t like showing others how he was feeling. In this case, of course, he felt puzzled.

  “How far across,” King said. “A half mile?”

  “Maybe.”

  “If the arrow was pointing across the lake and it was off by a couple of degrees, do you have any idea how much you could miss the target by?”

  “Nope,” Johnson said in the tone of voice that indicated he wasn’t going to strain his brain.

  “Think of it like you were standing here with a rifle and tried to shoot at an empty can half a mile away. You might miss by ten yards, even if there was only a slight wobble when you pulled the trigger. And that’s using a barrel a couple feet long to line up with a target. This arrow in the wood is only about an inch long. No way could Blake have meant that we needed to use it to align with something far away.”

  King dropped to his stomach and peered over the
edge.

  “Never gets old being right,” he grunted.

  He pushed himself up again. “There’s another line scratched into the wood. Vertical. The arrow up here points at that vertical line. So whatever we’re looking for is straight down.”

  “The water is ten feet deep here. And the note told us to go fishing, not diving.”

  King was already getting his fishing rod ready. A small lead weight was crimped to the end of the line. About four feet above the weight, a hook was attached to the main line with a shorter piece of line. And above that, a bobber. The method was to put a worm on the hook and let the lead weight take the line down so that the worm and the hook floated a couple feet above the lead weight. The plastic bobber—about the size of a golf ball—floated on the surface. If a trout took the bait, the movement of the bobber would show it.

  King dropped the hook down without baiting it.

  He made wide arcs back and forth.

  “We’re doing what?” Johnson asked.

  “Sweeping,” King said. “Trying to snag whatever he has floating down there for us to find.”

  “Does it get old being wrong?” Johnson asked. “Blake didn’t go to all this work just so someone who really went fishing here would find it by accident. We’re not the only ones to use this dock.”

  “All right, wise guy,” King said. “What’s your suggestion?”

  “Hand me your fishing rod.”

  King did.

  Johnson shoved King off the end of the dock.

  King came up sputtering and indignant. He treaded water facing the end of the dock. “That’s your idea? Shoving me into the water?”

  “Only part of it,” Johnson said. “From where you are, take a closer look at the line scratched into the wood.”

  “Death shall be thy reward,” King said. “You’re lucky the iPhone isn’t in my back pocket.” King had hidden it in the woods.

  “I thought of that,” Johnson said. “Really. Now tell me if the scratched line continues. You know, like maybe something is hidden under the pier.

  King wasn’t going to admit the water felt good. Or that Johnson had actually come up with a good idea.

  King peered at the vertical line. He noticed it continued to the bottom of the wood as if the scratched line was wrapping around and continuing.

  Was there something on the back of the strip of wood at the end of the pier?

  King paddled closer. He reached behind. His fingers touched something cool and smooth. It swayed.

  Swayed?

  King swam beneath the pier and looked up. The sunlight was striped, knifing through the gaps between the crossbeams of the pier.

  “Hey!”

  There was Johnson, directly above. The wood creaked as Johnson shifted weight.

  King ignored his friend. Hanging from a nail, at the end of a piece of fishing line, was a short, wide piece of metal. That’s why it had swayed. Like a pendulum.

  King clutched it and ducked into the water again to come out at the end of pier.

  Johnson squinted at him.

  “Something,” King said. Still treading water, he held up the piece of metal. It was a dull gunmetal gray.

  “Never gets old,” Johnson said. “Being right.”

  “Take it.” King reached up. “Put it in the tackle box so it’s safe.”

  King didn’t say the rest. Not only safe, but hidden.

  Johnson was careful. He took it in both hands.

  “Interesting,” Johnson said as King pulled himself onto the dock.

  “What?”

  Johnson lifted the piece of metal from the tackle box. Four fishing hooks clung to it.

  “Unless I’m delusional, it’s a magnet,” Johnson said. “A strong magnet. Those fishing hooks jumped right on it. Why would Blake give us a magnet?”

  CHAPTER 14

  “Got something!” Mike squealed like a little girl and raised the tip of his rod. He always sounded like this when he hooked a fish. Except this time, it wasn’t a fish.

  “No you don’t,” King answered. “Keep the rod down.”

  They were sitting now, both of them at the edge of the pier, bare feet dangling in the water. Both sets of shoes were on the dock behind them.

  “I’m telling you,” Mike said, “your theory was right.”

  It had been a simple theory. King had guessed the arrow scratched in the wood pointed not only to the magnet hidden under the dock but also to the purpose of the magnet. King had guessed that somewhere below was something for the magnet to catch.

  So King had replaced the lead weight at the end of his fishing line with the magnet, and Mike had started sweeping the magnet along the bottom.

  “And I’m telling you,” King said, “that Murdoch just drove out of the woods and turned onto the dirt road and is headed this way. Look now, but don’t make it obvious. And leave your line in the water.”

  Over their right shoulders, on a small road that led from the trees to the reservoir, a gleaming black Jeep TJ with an open top and shiny mag wheels headed toward the dock. Only one person drove that Jeep on the island because that one person wanted to keep it that way, and he had unquestioned authority on the island.

  Warden Murdoch was a tall man, and his body swayed slightly to the bouncing of the Jeep. Wind had been blowing away from King and MJ, and the noise of the Jeep finally reached them as it covered the last 200 yards to the edge of the water.

  From the Jeep, Murdoch smiled and waved. He dressed like a cowboy who liked his Stetson. It was common knowledge on the island that when he wanted to be the boss—to give orders or chew someone out—he wore the hat. So if he walked toward you wearing the Stetson, he was doing it to look even taller than he was and wanted to intimidate you. But if he wasn’t wearing the Stetson, he was in a good mood or just wanted to pretend to be one of the guys.

  He was wearing the hat behind the steering wheel.

  Not good, King thought.

  But when Murdoch stepped out of the Jeep, he removed it and set it on the passenger seat.

  Still not good, King thought.

  He and Johnson had a magnet at the end of a fishing line, and if Johnson was correct, something was on the end of the magnet, and if King was correct, that something had been planted there by Blake Watt, and if Blake Watt was correct, King and Johnson should be worried about the message that said TRUST NO AUTHORITIES because the most authoritative of authorities on the island was headed their way.

  The dock creaked as Warden Murdoch placed his weight on the first boards. Murdoch’s hair was slicked back. He wore a suit that King had heard cost $2000. He also wore shiny cowboy boots that were rumored to be as expensive as his suit. The bolo necktie—a cord with decorative metal tips and an ornamental clasp—that was supposed to be cowboy cool had some kind of polished Navajo blue turquoise set in polished silver.

  King winced at the thought of Johnson pushing Murdoch into the water. Both of them would probably be thrown into a cell deep in the prison and never be seen again. Murdoch was known not only for spending money on how he looked but also for losing it big time when he got mad.

  “Nice day for fishing?” Murdoch called out. He was good cop today. Other days, bad cop.

  “Nice day for sitting in the sun,” King said.

  Murdoch reached them.

  “Also a nice day to get outsmarted by fish,” King said to Murdoch. King elbowed Johnson. “Show him the hook.”

  MJ’s face went a shade white, but he caught on quickly. He raised the rod high enough to show the empty hook tied into the line about four feet above where King usually had a lead weight. MJ left the bottom part of the line in the water. King was glad the water wasn’t too clear. The magnet at the end of the line and whatever it might be holding remained out of sight.

  King took the rod from Johnson. He slid the rod under his elbow to bring the empty hook in closer without lifting the magnet any higher.

  “Hand me a worm,” he said to Johnson. It seemed important to rea
lly sell Murdoch on the fact that King and Johnson were actually fishing. To Murdoch, King said. “MJ hates worm guts. I always have to do this part for him.”

  Johnson dug into the tackle box for a jar with bait. King had prepared for the one-in-a-hundred chance that someone might show up while they were on the dock, and taking along live worms had been part of it. Never got old, being right.

  “Wanted to talk to you guys about Blake Watt,” Murdoch said. He remained standing, throwing both of them into a shadow.

  King held a worm that wriggled uselessly in the air. He jabbed the point of a hook in it and pushed the worm along the metal of the hook. He dropped the line back in the water and kept possession of the rod.

  “Did someone…um, find the body?” MJ asked.

  At the funeral, the casket had been empty. King and Johnson both knew that Blake’s parents were holding out hope that Blake had not drowned, but instead managed to survive the frigid water that no one else had ever survived, cross the dangerous currents of the sound, and run away. It was a terrible thing when parents could only cling to a hope that their son was wandering homeless in the streets of a city somewhere.

  “No,” Murdoch said. “I’m just wondering if either of you knew anything about Blake ever having access to the Internet. I thought maybe you’d speak honestly to me in case you had been afraid to tell his parents anything when they were on the island. Now that they’re gone, I promise if you help me with this, no one else will know.”

  “Sir?” King asked, instead of directly lying.

  Murdoch sighed. “What I’m going to talk to you guys about is strictly between the three of us. It’s unkind to speak ill of the dead.”

  CHAPTER 15

  “Blake wasn’t supposed to get Internet access for the same reason his parents moved to the island,” Murdoch began. “Back in Lincoln, Nebraska, Blake’s mom was a successful bank executive. His father was a psychology professor. Blake developed computer skills early. When he was 11, he hacked into computers at the university. He could go in and change students’ grades if he wanted. Six months ago, he hacked into the computers at his mom’s bank. He said he was doing it to protect the bank—to prove that if he could get into it, someone else could. It would have been a good argument, but he transferred some money from a big account to an account he owned. So his father applied for a position here at the prison to isolate Blake.”