My eyes stole over to the wharf, to see if Sandy had escaped, but there was no movement. “No, Mr. Dunn, it doesn’t do any good to look over there. They’re all dead. There’s just the two of us. The two of us and the jade.” He giggled and I estimated the distance between my hand and Ordaz’s pistol, lying on the deck.
“I wouldn’t,” Cobbett warned. “I only have two shots left but I couldn’t miss at this range.”
He was right. I held fast, feeling suddenly very weary, the wetness on my right arm sticking my clothes to my body. I fought the urge to sit down on the deck and watch from afar.
He was only a foot from the gunwale now, moving spread-legged, like a man who is unused to the sea.
“Cobbett,” I breathed. “All along, you …”
“Yes,” he beamed. “I was the flunky, the museum director that did other people’s work. I had to listen to all the praises for Thorpe, what a great archaeologist he was. I was the one who had to make up to the little old ladies, kiss their hands, gush over their hairdos and furs and jewels. And whenever Ordaz called, with some piece to be appraised, I had to jump for my pittance.” I took a halting step toward him and the tiny gun came up to center on my body. “But they were nothing compared to you!” he cried. “To be kidnapped, treated like some piece of dirt, tied up and threatened …”
“Cobbett, listen. The police know we’re here. They’re on their way right now …” The words sounded distant, as if they were echoing down a long tube.
“Then I’d better take the jade and go,” he said and, shifting the pistol to his left hand, reached for the artifact.
I took a deep breath and wished my head would stop spinning. He picked up the jade and held it up to the light. And that was when I made my move.
I shoved forward, raising my right arm to knock him off balance, but my arm refused to work and instead I stumbled against him, sending him against the side of the launch. The launch tipped slightly and he lost his balance. The gun discharged and something branded my leg. I slammed him with my shoulder and we fell against the rail together. He swore, tried to raise the pistol, and I brought my knee up into his groin. The breath gushed out of him and his right hand struck down against the gunwale. His fist opened involuntarily and I saw his mouth gape open as the tiny object fell onto the thin edge of wood. He uttered a strangled cry of protest, grabbed for it, and as the boat tipped, the artifact slid slowly off the edge and toppled into darkness.
“You!” he cried, as much in anguish as in rage. The diversion was all I needed: I rocked into him and, locked together, we went over the side.
The black waters closed over us and I felt his hands claw frantically at my body as we sank into the depths. For an agonizing eternity I lost my sense of direction and panic overwhelmed me. Then his grip came loose and I felt myself being carried away. I tried to reach out, to guide myself, but my arm refused to work and the realization suddenly came to me that I was about to die. For an instant it seemed a very logical outcome and a peace started to settle over me. Then something I’d last felt lying on a stretcher inside an evacuation chopper took over and I kicked out with my legs, hoping I was propelling myself upward and not toward the muddy bottom.
My lungs cried and I fought the urge to open my mouth, suck in the water. I gave a last, feeble flutter with my legs and then, as everything closed around me, my head shot to the surface.
I sucked in the hot night air and tried to get my bearings. Upstream was a burst of lights I couldn’t place and as I watched, one of them disengaged and came dancing across the surface toward me. I smiled. It was a spotlight. They were searching for me but they wouldn’t find me because I was hiding. The river would hide me. Already I was a quarter mile downstream, and before long I’d be in the big curve that formed one horn of the crescent that gave the city its nickname. By that time I’d be in midstream, of course, and prey to the barge traffic that came and went like cars on a busy highway. Unless the undertow took me first.
Maybe, I thought, that was what would happen. All at once it seemed a funny notion and I laughed to myself. “Cruising down the river,” I hummed, “on a Monday afternoon.” But no, it was night now. Well, on a Monday night, then. A wave washed over my head and I took in a mouthful of water. It tasted of mud and I choked. My God, what was happening? I was drowning, that’s what. Another wave surged over me and I realized my strength was ebbing and that I was at the mercy of the ugly tow.
The light played on the water, farther away now, and I tried to yell, to let them know I was here, but my words were drowned by the noise of engines.
Engines. My God, a ship was bearing down on me!
I twisted in the water. The hull loomed out of the night like a dark cloud, rushing toward me on wings of death.
My lips opened and I got out a scream, but the hull was only feet away now, plowing up a thin white spume of bubbles. A wave rocked me and I kicked to get away but something was drawing me toward the deadly prow.
I thrashed, trying to free myself of the inexorable pull, but I was moving toward it with a sudden, terrible acceleration. The prow passed in front of me then and I realized I was headed for the side of the hull, where I would be drawn under, to be mangled by the propellers. The hull was above me now and all at once, as I watched, the night turned to daylight and I slammed against the side.
But instead of going under, I was being lifted. Hands were grabbing me, hauling me up, and I dimly realized that what had drawn me forward was a rope, a rope that someone had tossed at something they had seen bobbing on the surface.
Lieutenant Mancuso was staring down at me as they lifted me onto the deck, shaking his head.
“Is he all right?” someone said and I recognized O’Rourke’s voice.
“He’s a little worse for the wear, but he’ll live,” Mancuso said. He stooped down, so that his head blotted the light. “Welcome home, yardbird,” he said.
21
They put me in Charity Hospital, in the prison ward, but by noon Tuesday I was moved to Touro, a private hospital in the Garden District. My right shoulder had been peppered by buckshot and my arm was in a sling. My right leg had taken a .22 short in the meaty part of the thigh. I was told I had a new scar on the cheek, where I had been grazed. The doctor at Charity looked at me as at just one more shooting, to get patched up with as few amenities as possible. The doctor at Touro was more congenial, but seemed at a loss for conversation, because few of his patients were admitted for gunshot wounds. And at least one of the nurses kept sticking her head into the room as if to verify that I was real.
I knew that the move was O’Rourke’s doing, and an hour after I got to my new room he came through the door, shaking his head, with Sandy behind him.
“You know, Micah, about the only way I got you out of the Hilton was by convincing them you couldn’t go anywhere. Mancuso’s captain is pretty hot about all the gunplay.”
“So am I,” I told him. “Hell, I’m the one that’s all shot up.”
“Well,” Sandy said demurely, “you may be simplifying things a little bit. There are five dead people, if you count Ordaz and Cobbett.”
“Yeah, but I only killed two of them,” I said. “Ordaz’s version of a one-man army shot his buddy by mistake. Cobbett shot Ordaz and then fell overboard. It’s not my fault he couldn’t swim.”
“Jesus,” O’Rourke muttered under his breath.
“And what about the man I hit on the head?” I said. “They didn’t let him get away?”
“No,” O’Rourke promised, “he’s singing like a bird. Seems like he heard Ordaz making plans, and some of his arrangements with Cobbett. Looks like Cobbett’s going to get you and Thorpe both off.”
“I’ll drink to that,” I said, “but how do they explain his being out of town when St. Romaine was killed?”
“He was at some conference in Dallas. But there’s every expectation that he hopped a return flight under some other name. They’re checking it out now.”
“Ummm,” I
grunted, trying to shift myself to a more comfortable position. “Has anybody talked to Cora Thorpe?”
“She’s flipped,” the lawyer said. “Gone completely catatonic. Just sits there staring.”
“The lady always did have a kind of animal cunning,” I said laconically.
“What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just that for some reason I’m not very surprised.”
“I still don’t understand about the jade,” Sandy said, “but since you went and lost it, I guess I never will.”
“Ummm,” I said again and closed my eyes. They took the signal and left. But I didn’t sleep, because I had some thinking to do.
At four-thirty the phone rang. I tried to move my right arm, but the sling held it fast, and I swore under my breath. The phone rang a second time and a third. I yelled in frustration and a nurse poked her head into the room.
“The phone,” I said angrily. “Could you please pick up the damned phone?”
She was young and redheaded and smiled sweetly. “Of course, Mr. Dunn.” She caught it on the sixth ring and brought the receiver to her ear.
“Mr. Dunn’s room.”
I heard an incomprehensible bellowing from the telephone and she jerked it down abruptly.
“There’s some crazy person that wants to talk to you,” she said archly.
I smiled in relief and felt some of the anxiety flood out of me. “Please,” I said. “Put it up to my ear. It’s just my father.”
She nestled the receiver against my shoulder and left with a flurry of skirts, unsure what kind of people the hospital was taking in these days.
“Hello, Captain,” I said.
“Hello, Captain? Is that all the hell you have to say after scaring me to death? Jesus Christ, son, I thought I was supposed to be the sick one, and the next thing I hear is your friend, that lawyer you hang around with, telling me you’ve been shot.”
“I’m fine,” I said. “But what about you? What about the tests?”
“Bullshit,” the Captain snorted. “Navy doctors are the Russians’ secret weapon. Tests were fine. They had me scared for a while, I’ve got to admit.”
“You’re telling me the truth?” I asked.
“Telling you the truth? On my word as a naval officer!” he swore. “All they said was to cut back on my alcohol a little.”
“Which I can tell you’re going to do starting tomorrow.”
“Or the next day. What do they know?” He cleared his throat and when he spoke again his voice was softer. “No getting around it, though: I’m slowing down. Have to cut back. I just can’t do it like I used to.”
“One of the crosses you’ll have to bear,” I said.
“Smart ass. look, you going to be able to come next month?”
“I wouldn’t miss it.”
“Good. There was a nurse I had while I was at their mercy, a cute little thing, too young for me, but I got kind of friendly with her, you know? And I kind of planted the idea that you might come up and I’d have her out and …”
“You really are well,” I said. We chatted a little more and then I pleaded fatigue and hung up.
For a long moment I lay staring at the wall, relieved that he was all right. There were times he would lie, but not on his word as an officer. No, things would be all right. In Charleston.
There was just the matter of New Orleans.
At four-thirty Katherine appeared, accompanied by Scott. She handed me a box of chocolates, and when I demonstrated my lack of agility, placed one in my mouth.
“You had us all worried,” she said. “They said they took ten buckshot out of you.”
“I was worried, too,” I said. “But I guess I’m too mean to go.”
“Well, I’m glad of that,” she said softly. “We all are.”
“Yeah,” Scott echoed. “But I guess now we’ll never know what the jade meant.”
“No?” I asked. “Hasn’t Thorpe figured it out yet?”
Katherine tried to smile and I sensed embarrassment. “He says it’s not clear,” she said. “He says he’d have to have the jade itself to make sure he read the glyphs correctly.”
“Sure,” Scott said sarcastically.
“Well,” I said, “in that case maybe we’d better give it to him.”
Two pairs of eyes stared at me. “What?” Katherine asked.
“The jade,” I said calmly. “Maybe we ought to give it to him.”
“Have they found it in the river, then?” Scott asked incredulously.
“No,” I said. “That would be a waste of time. The currents are too swift.”
“Then how …?” Katherine asked.
“Because,” I said, “the jade was never in the river. As a matter of fact, it was never on the boat. I never even brought it with me.”
Katherine frowned. “Are you serious?”
“Deadly, if you’ll pardon the pun. When I was alone at your house I did a little alchemy. Once in a while I’ve had to take key impressions, so I knew the routine. I made a wax mold and manufactured a replica. A little shoe polish and I managed to get it dark enough to fool somebody at a distance.”
Scott slapped his thigh with delight. “You mean what fell overboard, what Cobbett killed Ordaz for was a damned fake?”
“I’m afraid so,” I said. “And not a very good one. All I hoped for was that in the darkness I could fool them long enough to get Sandy out into the open. Then, with a little luck, while Ordaz was distracted looking at the supposed jade, I’d make my move. It wasn’t a very good plan, I’ll admit. It was just the best I could come up with.”
“Then the real jade …” Katherine began.
“Here,” I said. “Too many people have been killed over it for me to rest very easy with it somewhere else.”
Scott shook his head in wonder and Katherine ushered him from the room. She returned and stood looking down at me, her expression pensive.
“Katherine …”
She rose quickly. “I guess I’d better go. The exhibition is in chaos. I have to do whatever I can to help Gregory salvage what can be salvaged.”
I sighed and turned to the wall. I wanted it to be over but it wasn’t over. I wanted Katherine to tell Thorpe to go to hell, but she hadn’t done it. Most of all, I wanted things to be the way they had been a week ago, before Thorpe had called me and turned my world upside down.
Supper was a slice of meat loaf, peas, and potatoes, with some peach slices for desert. I toyed with it, not feeling hungry.
Why? I kept asking myself. What was it about Thorpe?
I yelled for the nurse, had her dial Sandy’s number, and got her on the second ring. When I told her what I wanted, she said I was crazy and hung up.
At five I tuned the television to the local news and got an update on the bloody battle at the Harmony Street wharf. Five people had died, including a Cuban attorney the police had long had an eye on for some unsavory business deals. The curator of a local museum had drowned and the police were still searching the river for his body. The best guess was that it was a dope deal gone sour, and the police were questioning a suspect. The other survivor was a local investigator who had escaped from the St. Tammany Parish jail. The Orleans Parish district attorney was reevaluating the evidence and the investigator had been moved to another location, presumably for his own protection.
It was typically garbled, but that didn’t bother me. For once I had other things on my mind. I tried to reach the call button to have my tray picked up and failed. I let out a particularly descriptive epithet as Sandy walked in, purse swinging jauntily from her arm.
“Well, Micah-man, you look like trouble’s in bed with you.”
She moved the tray and then stood over me with folded arms.
“Micah, I think you’re crazy.”
“Get in line,” I said. “Did you bring them?”
She sighed resignedly and handed me a manila envelope.
“Whatever. By the way, there’s a picture in here from
some guy in Florida. Another boat.”
“A yacht,” I corrected. “The Cate’s Cove II. Fifty-three feet long and …”
She yawned. “Well, if you’re sure you don’t want me to hang around …”
“No, thanks,” I said. “Go home. Or finish that vacation.”
“Sho’nuf. After I clean up what’s left of my place.”
She left and I opened the manila envelope, struggling with one hand to tear the seal and slip out the album and photographs. I worked for the next few minutes pasting in my new acquisition. When I had finished I admired it, and then turned back through the pages. I had a whole section for the ’84 Olympic yachting competition. But I always went back to the America’s Cup, because that was the one. I was staring fondly at my faded snapshot of the Ranger, taken before I was born, when I fell asleep.
I hadn’t meant to sleep at all, but the combination of fatigue and medicine had an involuntary effect, and when I awoke the windows showed darkness outside. I could feel the album resting lightly across my midsection, but that wasn’t what had awakened me. What had awakened me was a noise. The noise of someone inside the room.
I shifted slightly. “Nurse? Who’s there?”
The noise stopped and for a moment I thought I had imagined it. Then the shadows shifted at the edge of my vision. I tried to turn and the album slid off the bed and crashed onto the floor.
“Don’t move!” said the voice of the killer.
22
“I was wondering how long it would take you,” I said.
There was a hoarse exclamation. “You expected me?”
“Of course. That’s why I had the jade brought here. I knew it would bring you out.”
“You’re insane,” he whispered. “Now tell me where it is before I …”
“Before you what? Kill me like you did Gordon Leeds?”
“I didn’t kill Leeds. St. Romaine killed him, the fool. I just wanted the jade. It was St. Romaine that started this whole damned business.”
The Maya Stone Murders Page 20
