by Jan Burke
“Okay, suppose you’re right. He doesn’t want a story to appear. That doesn’t mean he isn’t guilty.”
“No, but it doesn’t mean he is, either.”
“I don’t know, Lydia. I’m not in any shape to write anything up. Why would he be worried, when I’m not even back at the newspaper?”
“You said he knew about the warrant?”
“Yes. He has highly placed friends, all right.”
“Well, don’t you see? You’re already causing him to call in his markers, just to keep any possible link with these murder cases quiet. Even if he has nothing to hide, he probably can’t afford the notoriety an investigation would cause.”
I had lost interest in the pizza.
“Look, Irene, you could be right. But I’m just trying to get you to keep an open mind about it.”
“Maybe you’re right. If it’s not Gannet, I don’t have any idea of who else it might be. Maybe that’s why I was so anxious to have Frank pursue him — I don’t have anyone else in mind.”
“You don’t?”
Something about the way she said it caught my attention. “Am I missing something?”
She shrugged. “Ignoring someone, maybe.”
“Who?”
“Jack.”
“No way.”
She didn’t say anything, just went back to her pizza.
“Lydia, you can’t say something like that and then just go on eating. Jack saved my life, remember?”
“Did he? Or did he shut Paul up before he could tell you who put him up to killing his grandmother?”
“Jesus Christ, Lydia! That is an incredibly cruel thing to say.”
“Forget it,” she said, shoving her pizza away.
“Listen, I know he looks frightening, but he’s really a very gentle person. Every time I’ve felt down lately, Jack has been able to cheer me up. He’s smart and funny and—”
“Forget it!” she said again, much more sharply.
There was an awful silence. She started to stand up, but I reached over and took hold of her arm.
“No, wait — don’t go. I’m sorry, Lydia.” She sat back down. I shook my head. “Lately I seem to just steamroll over other people’s feelings without thinking. If it’s any comfort, you’re not the only one I’ve done this to. Ask Frank. He’s put up with a lot.”
“I’m sorry too. I forget that you haven’t really had time to deal with any of this yet. It’s only been a couple of weeks. I never should have said anything about Jack, even introduced a worry about him. You’re scared enough as it is. I’m certain Frank would never leave you here alone with someone who couldn’t be trusted.”
“Let’s forget the whole thing. You’re probably right about Gannet. And I’m sure that if you get to know Jack, you’ll like him as much as Frank and I do. There could be any number of other people interested in Mrs. Fremont’s land. I’m just not able to research that right now.”
We settled into safer topics, primarily newsroom gossip. Sitting at the City Desk at the Express, Lydia had the best seat in the house for gathering it. We then went on to Catholic school memories, which have provided an unfailing distraction for both of us in times of trouble over the years. There was, for example, our running disagreement on how many days suspension I served for barricading Sister Mary Elizabeth in the school library in eighth grade.
Frank got home at about nine o’clock, and Lydia left. He looked tired. He took off his shoes, loosened his tie, and plopped down on the couch. I mixed a scotch and water for him; he appreciated the effort. As he drank it, I showed him the knife, and explained that Devon and Raney had bought the other three.
“So that’s where the deer hair came from,” he said, studying it. “I’ll have to show it to Carlos. Of course, any number of these knives may be available at other places in town, but given what Zoe told you and what you heard Devon and Raney say, I’d assume we now have some idea of what the murder weapon looked like.”
“If we found Paul’s knife, could we prove anything against Gannet?”
“I don’t know. Carlos could run DNA tests on the blood on the knife to see if it matched Gannet’s. If it did, it would be up to the D.A. to decide if that would help make a case against him.”
“The same D.A. who apparently decided to tell Gannet you were seeking a search warrant?”
“We don’t know that it was the D.A.’s office that gave us away. To be perfectly honest, I doubt we could get more than an accessory charge out of any of this, and a good defense lawyer would be able to get him off without a lot of effort.” He paused, then said, “You’re scared of him, aren’t you?”
“He knows who we are and where we live; he knows our friends — he even knew Rachel spoke Italian. Just this morning you asked about getting a search warrant, and he must have learned about your request within minutes. He found me out on the streets of downtown Las Piernas, when only you and Rachel knew we were going shopping at all, and when I was the only one who knew what store we were going to, so someone must have been following us. Yes, I’m afraid.”
He was quiet.
“I’m afraid,” I went on, “but I also realize that if he’s putting that much effort into trying to make us back off, he’s more afraid than I am.”
“He’s also unpredictable. And very possibly arranged everything that happened to you.” Hearing the anger in his voice, I began to hope he never ran into Gannet on his own; if he did, he was the one who was going to need a good defense lawyer.
I HAD ANOTHER nightmare that night, a real screamer. I woke up to find Frank looking more concerned than usual.
“Jesus, Irene, are you all right?”
I nodded. “Just the strain of the day, I suppose.”
“I swear I’m going to get a restraining order put on Gannet. You haven’t had a nightmare this bad since you first came home.”
We settled back into bed, and he turned out the light.
“Frank?”
“Hmm.”
“Who’s coming over tomorrow, while you’re at work?”
“Jack. The guy’s been great. Don’t know what we’d do without him.” He felt me shiver. “Are you cold?”
“A little,” I said, snuggling closer. It wasn’t the truth, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell him who had been chasing me in my dreams.
JACK ARRIVED JUST after Pete stopped by to ride into work with Frank the next day. By light of day, the dream fears receded and had no hold on me. Jack was no monster, he was a concerned friend. I went back to bed and caught up on my sleep, not waking up again until the early afternoon. But once I was awake, I felt restless.
Jack was sitting on the couch, reading more verses of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. He looked up from it and assessed my mood in a moment. “Frank called to say he was working late again,” he said. “I told him I might take you sailing if you were still up for it. Maybe Lydia and Guy would like to come along, too. What do you say?”
“Sure,” I said, feeling certain that Lydia would refuse the last minute invitation; she probably wouldn’t want to be out on the ocean with a man she thought to be a murderer. But when I called her, she readily accepted the offer, saying that she’d meet us at the marina coffeeshop.
A few minutes later, she called back to say Guy could make it as well. I detected a note of relief in her voice when she made that announcement. I supposed the company of a former professional hockey defenseman made her feel safer. I began to wonder if she had decided to go along because she thought I might be in danger from Jack.
Later that afternoon, as he helped me put on a sweater and shoe in preparation for our outing, Jack said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you — Frank said Bredloe had approved surveillance of Malcolm Gannet.”
“What made Bredloe change his mind?”
“I asked Frank the same thing,” Jack said. “He told me it was a combination of things. Bredloe was angry that there was some kind of leak of information between his office and the D.A. He was also unhappy to hear about what
happened downtown yesterday. I guess that did it.”
Cody made a pain of himself by streaking past us when we went out the door. “Get back here!” I yelled after him, an utterly useless command to give the willful little bugger. He stood in the middle of the street, staring back at me and twitching his tail, as if to say, “Come on, Gimpy, just try to catch me.”
“Jack?” I pleaded.
Jack took one step toward him and he scurried beneath a cable TV van across the street. He crouched there, watching Jack. I could swear the cat was smirking.
“I can’t wait for Frank to get around to installing that cat door,” Jack said. “Are you sure you want Cody inside?”
“His dinner’s in there.”
Jack laughed. “He’ll be all right, then. It wouldn’t hurt Cody to miss a meal. But I’ll put a water dish out for him.”
The moment Jack opened the front door, of course, Cody hauled his gray buns back through it in a four-legged flash. No use starving if we weren’t up for playing hide-and-seek with him. He had achieved one of his standing goals, to make me late whenever possible. Jack took it all in stride. He locked the front door and helped me out to the car.
We traveled at a snail’s pace through late afternoon traffic until we made the turnoff down to the marina, which was virtually deserted. I looked for Lydia’s car but didn’t see it; Guy’s Mercedes wasn’t there either. “Don’t worry about it,” Jack said, reading my thoughts. “We’ll just have a cup of coffee while we wait for them.”
The moment we entered the small coffee shop, a large man I took to be the manager came out from behind the counter. “Hey, Jack! Long time no see! Got a message for you.”
“What’s up, Harry?” Jack asked.
Harry fumbled in the pocket of his shirt for a moment and then put on a pair of bifocals. “Let’s see. Lydia and Gee can’t make it.”
“Guy,” I said. “He’s French Canadian, so it rhymes with ‘key’.”
Harry scowled at me over the bifocals, then turned back to Jack. “I’ll let you get back to your date with the professor here.”
“Irene’s a reporter,” Jack said. Judging by Harry’s deepening scowl, being a reporter put me on a par with attorneys.
“We miss you around here, Jack,” Harry said, turning his back on us. “Drop by again sometime.”
Jack grinned at me and said, “Ignore him. Harry was born grumpy.”
“And never seen any reason to change my outlook,” Harry called out, as Jack held the door open for me.
“We’d better get going if we want to catch the sunset,” Jack said.
I tried not to make too much of “Gee” and Lydia’s cancellation, and followed Jack outside.
On board the Pandora, Jack had to do almost all of the work, but he didn’t seem to mind. He set the engine on idle, and I thought we would motor out, but we made our way out of the marina completely under sail. “Why did you start the engine if you weren’t going to use it?” I asked when he turned it off again.
“Oh, just a precaution. The wind or the current might have shifted while we were leaving the dock.”
A steady wind picked up off the starboard, and we managed to get out past the breakwater just as the sun was starting to set. The sunset was a glorious combination of colors and clouds and shafts of sunlight, making up what Lydia and I used to call “a religious sky” — a term I no doubt remembered as a result of our previous night’s discussion.
Thinking of Lydia, I began to wonder if I had let my love of the ocean overcome my common sense. Maybe this was just as stupid as going into the field that night. Maybe the message Harry the Grump gave us was as phony as the one at the hotel. Maybe Jack didn’t really have leukemia, and this was all a plan to—
“Irene? Is something troubling you?”
I looked up at him, startled right out of my maybes.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Do you want me to head back in?”
Concerned. Not threatening, concerned. Everything in his manner and his voice said so. I exhaled. “I’m fine, Jack. Just letting my imagination run wild.”
“You want to talk about it?”
I laughed. “Not this time, but thanks.”
He didn’t press me for more. He was looking out over the water, toward the horizon. With his scars, tattoos, and earring, he could have been a pirate. The pirate was suddenly grinning to himself.
“What’s so funny?” I asked.
“Oh, I was just thinking about Cody’s little stunt as we were leaving.”
I shook my head, picturing the imp crouched under the van. Suddenly, something tugged at my memory. “Jack? Remember when we left the house on Sunday, the first time we went sailing?”
“Yes, why?”
“That van was there. On a Sunday. As far as I know, General Systems Cable won’t come out on weekends, and they won’t come by after five. Frank had them install cable at his house at the beginning of October, so that I could watch the Kings’ games when we were there. It was a real hassle, because at the time, we were both working late. But this van was there after six o’clock yesterday, when Lydia arrived, and it was there again today.”
“I don’t remember seeing it there on Sunday. Are you sure you didn’t see it when you went out with Rachel?”
I hesitated. “I don’t know. Maybe I saw it both times.”
“Maybe one of our neighbors works for the cable company now. Or maybe the van arrived before five, but they were still working when she got there.”
“Maybe. But that must be one hellacious installation if they’re back today.”
“Mention it to Frank. He may remember about Sunday. In the meantime, he’s got a tail on Gannet. You’re out on the ocean, trying to enjoy a sunset. Relax.”
I took a deep breath and tried to do just that. We had been sailing for a little less than an hour, and I was just starting to enjoy myself. The wind picked up as the sky darkened. Jack prepared to come about and head back into the marina, beginning a port tack. I decided that I was being paranoid about the van.
Two seconds later, there was a sickening screech of metal. We both watched the aluminum mast fold at the lower shrouds, and topple to the starboard side.
36
THE TOP OF THE MAST, sails, and lines were swinging wildly around the deck. I barely managed to duck in time to keep my head from being hit by the boom. “Damn,” I heard Jack mutter, but otherwise he remained remarkably calm. He hurriedly secured the boom.
“Can we still use the engine to go back in?” I asked.
“Not yet,” he said. “I’ve got to secure all the lines first. Otherwise, we might wrap one in the propeller.”
I was reassured by the way he moved about the deck: calm, certain of his actions. When the lines were secured, he came back and tried the engine, but he couldn’t get it to start.
That earned another “damn,” but he quickly moved toward the mast. “Can you get below on your own?” he asked, as he made his way forward.
I nodded, trying not to panic.
“Do you know how to use a radio? How to call the Coast Guard? Call PAN-PAN. There are instructions near the radio if you don’t know how.”
“I know how,” I said, thinking through the sequence for a distress call. Calling PAN-PAN would signal an urgent but not life-threatening problem. One step below a Mayday.
“Good. I’ve got to try to get the mast secured before it tears the boat apart.” He attached a harness to himself, of the type that prevents a sailor from being lost overboard in a storm. Seeing my worried look, he added, “We’ll be okay.”
I clumsily made my way down the companionway steps, hearing Jack struggle with the mast. In the shadowy interior of the cabin, I found the radio and hit the power switch. It glowed to life. I switched to channel 16, the international distress and calling channel. I lifted the mike. Jack had printed the Pandora’s call sign on the instructions he kept near the radio. I pressed the mike button, saying “PAN-PAN,” and turned to read off our
identification. It was then that I realized that no other vessel would hear me. The mike cord had pulled away from the radio.
Above me, Jack cried, “Got it!”
“Jack,” I yelled up, “the radio’s broken.”
There was no immediate answer, but then I saw him making his way below. Even in the dimming light, I could see his face was set in a frown. “We dismasted because someone pulled the clevis pin on the upper shrouds on the port side and replaced it with a wooden dowel. It was only a matter of getting enough wind in the sails when we made the port tack.”
I didn’t really know enough about sailing to understand exactly what he was saying, but I managed to grasp the implication. “So it didn’t happen accidentally?”
“No. It’s part of the standing rigging. Someone intentionally changed it.”
“What the hell does he want with me?” I said frantically. There was no need to explain who I meant.
“I don’t know, Irene. To scare you, I suppose. So the only way we can beat this is to stay calm. We’re not in as much danger as it looks. If I can’t get the engine running, I’ll try to jury-rig the mast. Even if that doesn’t work, we’re not all that far off shore, and we’ll be seen. I’ve got flares and other ways to signal another boat.”
I nodded. “Let me know what I can do to help.” I put my good hand in my pocket and found my little stones. Anything to calm myself.
“You’re safest down here for now. I only have the one harness on board, and it’s getting dark. If we lurched and you went into the water with those casts, I’m not sure I could get you back on board without hurting you.” As he spoke, he reached for a flashlight and turned it on. I felt an inordinate sense of relief when it worked. “They forgot to steal my flashlight battery,” he said with a grin.
He tried to start the engine again. This time, it worked, but we didn’t seem to be moving much.
He came back down and turned the cabin lights on.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I’ll have to take a look. I can’t get it to do much more than idle,” he said, then made his way behind the ladder, near the engine. He moved the cover off the engine, flashing the beam of light over it. “They jammed the throttle linkage,” he said after a moment. He moved out from behind the ladder and over to a low compartment, kneeling to open it, and then pulled out a padlocked foot locker. He took a set of keys out of his pocket and used one to open the lock. “I learned a few things before I got kicked out of the Boy Scouts. I’ve got spares for almost everything — no spare mast, I’m afraid — I do have the tools and spares we’ll need to fix the engine.”
