Second Sight

by Philip R. Craig

  The cop went over and knelt beside him. He put a finger under his chin, then pressed his ear to the Simon Peter’s chest. Then he looked up at us and shook his head. “He’s been shot. He’s dead.”

  “I did that,” I said. “He came at me with a gun.” I looked at the ranger. “I used your revolver. You’ll find it inside the sound truck.”

  “You’ve got a lot of explaining to do,” said Spitz.

  “I know,” I said. “First, let’s take a look at one of those speakers.”

  “Speakers?” He narrowed his eyes at me for a moment. Then I saw realization spread over his face. “Oh, Jesus,” he whispered.

  I nodded. I still had hold of Christa’s hand. “Christa, here, might be able to help explain some things. And if you guys wouldn’t mind, would you put your weapons away?”

  Spitz shrugged and tucked his automatic into his shoulder holster. The policeman hesitated, then holstered his revolver.

  “You guys carry on,” said Spitz to the cop and the ranger. “Get an ambulance for that body and check out the sound truck. I’ll take care of the rest of it from here.” He turned to me. “Let’s take a look at one of those speakers.”

  I followed Spitz over to a boxed loudspeaker on the very end of the stage. Spitz climbed up. I followed him. Christa waited below.

  The performers filled the stage beside us. They still had their arms around one another’s waists, and they were swaying back and forth, singing yet another verse of “America the Beautiful.” Overhead the fireworks exploded in bursts of green and red and blue. The crowd was singing and swaying, too.

  The speaker itself was about five feet tall by three feet wide. Its front was covered by some kind of fabric. “Got a blade?” I said.

  Spitz nodded, reached into his pocket, and handed me a folding knife. I opened it, slit the speaker fabric along two sides, and pulled it off.

  Spitz peered in. “Holy shit,” he whispered.

  I looked. Nestled on the bottom of the box was an olive-colored object, roughly rectangular, about the size of a thick, hardcover book. It appeared to be made from plastic.

  “Is that what I think it is?” I said.

  Spitz let out a long breath. “Claymore,” he said. “Antipersonnel mine. We used claymores in Vietnam for perimeter defense. Set up a couple dozen in a circle, aim ’em at ground level, wire ’em up, detonate all of them with the flick of a switch. Nasty suckers.” He pointed to the back of the mine. Two wires ran from it and out the back of the speaker box.

  “Those wires go to a central cable in the sound truck,” I said. “How many speakers are set up here?”

  “I don’t know. Couple dozen, at least. I bet they’re all armed with claymores aimed down at the audience, just like this one.”

  “They’re disarmed now,” I said. “I shot the plug off the master cable. Frank Dyer had it set up so a single switch would detonate all of them. It was supposed to happen right after the finale, at the beginning of the fireworks. That girl”—I pointed at Christa, who was looking up at us with a sweet smile on her face—“she was supposed to throw the switch.”

  “Goddamn terrorists,” Spitz muttered. “It was our worst fear.”

  “Maybe not,” I said. “Maybe it was just one terrorist. Maybe it was just Dyer.”

  “I fervently hope you’re right.” He peered at me. “But why?”

  I shrugged. “He wanted to kill a lot of people in front of a worldwide television audience.”

  “Sure. Of course. But why would he want to do that?”

  I shook my head. “Could there possibly be a rational answer to a question like that?”

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  J.W.

  The following Monday, after I put Brady and Christa on an early-morning boat, Zee and I were having a late breakfast and sharing the Boston Globe, which was still carrying Celebration stories. I had the sports page and was reading an analysis of the Red Sox’s latest loss.

  “I see here,” said Zee, “that as the result of close cooperation among federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies, a plot to kidnap the child of an unnamed celebrity was thwarted during the Celebration for Humanity.”

  “That’s sort of true, at least,” I said. “Any mention of a hundred antipersonnel mines set to blow up a significant number of our nation’s most famous politicians and entertainers, to say nothing of a few thousand ardent fans?”

  Zee shook her head. “Not a word. Only official praise for the high level of security during the event.”

  “That’s probably wise. No need to scare people after the fact. Besides, it would be bad for the island’s image if people found out that all really awful things don’t happen on the mainland side of Vineyard Sound. Any remarks about the five dead people?”

  “Yes, indeed. Let’s see if they all get a mention here. It says that Dyer and Sullivan, the guy Brady nailed, were two of the kidnappers. Dyer was shot by an FBI man to be named later, maybe—that’s you—and ballistics tests have revealed that Sullivan was killed by the gun of a local police officer who was working in close cooperation with the FBI. Drummand died heroically in a confrontation with the kidnappers, and Ogden Warner was killed by the kidnappers before he could interfere with their plot. Poor Princess Ishewa died in an ironic accident; a seer who didn’t see her own death.”

  “Spitz told me that the latest theory is that Dyer killed Warner because he was afraid Warner would get him fired.” I looked at my watch. “Brady and Christa should be on the road to New Hampshire by now. I hope things work out for the girl and her parents.”

  The previous afternoon Zee and I and the kids had gone off to the beach, leaving Brady snoozing on the couch and Christa conked out in the guest room. Before loading the last of our beach gear into the Land Cruiser, I’d said, “Do you think I should go in there and invite Brady to join us? Maybe I could tell him that the fish are running. That’ll get him up in a hurry.”

  “You leave him alone,” said Zee. “He and Christa were explaining things to the cops until almost eight this morning. They both need their beauty sleep.”

  True enough. After the Celebration, and after hours of questioning, a policeman had finally brought Brady and Christa to our place and both of them had collapsed and stayed collapsed.

  I’d had some sleepless hours myself. A few minutes after I shot Dyer, the West Tisbury police, alerted by a passing motorist who had understandably ignored my frantic efforts to wave him down, had arrived at the crash site. They took Janie and me to their little police station by the mill pond. There, after they grilled me, looked skeptically at my FBI ID card, and exchanged telephone and radio calls with security people at the Celebration, I learned that there had been no explosion and Evangeline learned that Janie was safe with me.

  The highways had been so jammed with cars exiting the Celebration site that the eastern sky was brightening before a West Tisbury cop managed to drive Janie and me home to our families.

  At the Skyes’ farm, Evangeline, Janie, and I had shared embraces and the wet eyes that sometimes come after a close shave. At my house a few minutes later, Zee and I had done the same.

  It had been a morning for tears, but I’d shed not a one for Dyer.

  The Sunday skies had been filled with departing planes bearing the rich and famous back from whence they’d come. One of these was Evangeline’s chartered jet carrying her and Janie home to Scotland.

  On the way to the airport, she’d stopped to say a whispered good-bye so as not to waken Brady, to leave us her photo inscribed with thanks and words of affection, and to invite us to come and visit her and Janie at their castle. Diana, in particular, thought the last was a splendid idea since she had a high opinion of princesses living in castles. Zee and I had limited our replies to thanks and good wishes.

  “By the way,” Evangeline had said, “I talked with my people at Cragmoor about an hour ago, and they tell me that the strangers who’ve been asking questions about me in the village have all disappeared. T
hey evaporated after news of the successful Celebration and the thwarted kidnapping got to Britain. Bad news, from their point of view, at least, travels fast.”

  Now, Zee put her paper aside and found my hands with hers. “I’m so glad we got through this. It could have been horrible! I get goose bumps when I think of what almost happened.”

  “Millions of TV watchers would have seen a live massacre, if there is such a thing, bloody enough to gladden the heart of every America-hater on the globe, but thanks to Brady, it didn’t happen.”

  “John and Mattie feel just terrible about letting Dyer go off with Janie.”

  “How were they to know what he was up to? He knocks on the door and says hi to Janie. She says hi back because she’s met him already. He says her mom wants her onstage for the grand finale and tells John and Mattie to go around front so they can see it. All three of them believe him. Dyer was pretty slick. He fooled a lot of people, including Duval.”

  “And you think he planned to get ransom money from Duval.”

  “Who else? Duval is her father, he’s rich, and he would be alive and well in California, whereas Evangeline would be very dead on Martha’s Vineyard. Dyer wasn’t going to get any money from her. The way I see it, the kidnapping idea probably came first. That accounts for the strangers scouting in Cragmoor village. I figure Dyer saw it as a way to finance his political activities.”

  “Kidnapping for ransom is a popular fund-raiser for revolutionaries in parts of South America, I understand.”

  “Then the Celebration was announced and Dyer saw an even better way to advance the cause.”

  “But he didn’t see any reason to cancel the kidnapping. A double hit on the corrupt West.”

  I nodded. “That’s my take on it. Of course, Dyer isn’t going to be making any statements about his plans.”

  “Because you and Brady stopped him, and you saved Janie.”

  “Yes. Just barely.”

  “How do you feel about what happened?”

  “You mean about shooting Dyer?”

  “Yes.”

  I had given that some thought. “I don’t feel much except gratitude that I killed him before he could kill me. I was lucky. If he hadn’t been dazed from the crash, I don’t think he’d have missed me. It was like a duel in a telephone booth.”

  She squeezed my hands. “I’m so glad you were lucky. And I’m glad you don’t feel bad. Dyer was a horrible person.”

  I looked into her deep, dark eyes. “I think he probably thought of himself as a good person. He was going to rid his decadent country of some of its most unethical people, then he was going to extract money for himself and for his private army of Simon Peters, from another rich, corrupt person who didn’t deserve his wealth. I think most terrorists feel very moral.”

  “You’re the one who should feel moral. You and Brady.”

  “You’re my morality,” I said. “You and the kids. You make me feel good. That’s morality enough for me.”

  She grinned. “If Brady was here, he’d be saying, ‘Spare me from this sentimentality.’”

  I could hear him saying that.

  When we’d come back from the beach, Brady was coming out of our outdoor shower wrapped in a large towel.

  “Your couch has lumps in it,” he said.

  “The kids offered you the tree house,” said Zee.

  “The shower compensates for the couch. I love outdoor showers. I’m going to try to figure out a way to build one at my place.”

  He went into the living room to dress, and while he was gone, the rest of us took turns in the shower. We all loved our outdoor shower. It was big and airy and you never had to clean it. Brady was right to want one in Boston.

  “Pa.”

  “What, Josh?”

  “How much longer before school starts?”

  “It won’t be long now. Are you ready to go back?”

  “Yes. I was glad when summer vacation came, but now I want to see my friends at school.”

  I could remember feeling the same way when I was a kid. “You’re right,” I said, pleased that some things never change in the ever-changing world. “It’s good to go back to school in the fall.”

  “Pa.”

  “What, Diana.”

  “Do we have anything to eat?”

  “I imagine we do.” I went to the kitchen counter and got leftover breakfast bran muffins from the cooling rack on the kitchen counter. I always make a lot of muffins.

  Their mother and I watched our children eat. I was happy.

  The next morning, early, I had driven Brady and Christa to the boat. Brady and I shook hands.

  “Try to make it down for the derby,” I said.

  “I can probably manage that,” he said.

  “Not a working vacation, just fishing.”

  “You got it.”

  I watched them go up the gangplank and into the ferry.

  Above me the sky was a blue dome. There was a light wind from the southwest. The sea was dark blue, the beaches were pale yellow, and the trees were green. The island was an emerald surrounded by a golden band, lying on a bed of rippling sapphire-colored silk. It was a microcosm of the larger universe, totally beautiful and totally indifferent and meaningless.

  I drove home feeling blessed.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Brady

  Monday morning Christa and I exchanged hugs and good-byes with Zee and the Jackson kids. Then we climbed into J.W.’s old Land Cruiser, and he drove us to the landing in Oak Bluffs, where we boarded the ferry.

  We were going home. For Christa, it was the last leg of a long journey.

  I was looking forward to seeing Evie. I’d called her Sunday night. She said she missed me. That was nice. She’d be waiting at Woods Hole for us. She’d drive us to my place in Boston, where Christa and I would get into my car, and I’d drive her to New Hampshire.

  When the ferry pulled away from the slip, we found some space at the railing up front on the top deck. We leaned there side by side and gazed at the mainland of America.

  I found I had no desire to look back at the green mound of the Vineyard as it receded behind us, and I guessed Christa felt the same way. It had turned out to be a place where evil walked, and for me, at least, it would take a while before I’d be able to see J.W.’s blessed isle any other way.

  Maybe in a month or so, when the annual bluefish and striped bass fishing derby began. J.W. and I had a date for that.

  “You doing okay?” I said to Christa.

  She looked up at me, smiled quickly, nodded, then returned her gaze to the water and the sky and the distant mainland. I let it go. She hadn’t done much talking since I’d found her in the sound truck on Saturday night. I couldn’t imagine what she was thinking. She hadn’t seen her parents for over two years.

  I had a lot of questions I wanted to ask her, but I figured I could live without knowing the answers. She’d share what she wanted to share with whomever she wanted to share it. It was more important that she talk with Mike and Neddie than with me anyway.

  Saturday night, after Spitz and I found the claymore mines that Frank Dyer had rigged in the speakers, Christa and I were taken in separate cruisers to the state police headquarters in Oak Bluffs, where we were deposited in separate rooms. Jake Spitz, Olive Otero, another state cop, and two other Feds whose names and affiliations I didn’t catch took turns asking me questions. I assumed that my interrogators were moving back and forth between me and Christa, checking to see that we were telling our own versions of the same story.

  They fed me coffee and I talked into a tape recorder. I never sensed that they intended to charge me with a crime, although I had killed a man that night.

  One of the Feds told me about the minefield that Frank Dyer had laid out at the site of the Celebration. It was a lethal design. Dyer had set up the speakers so that they surrounded the area where the audience was sitting. Each speaker was armed with claymores, and each claymore was armed with seven hundred steel b
alls, a pound and a half of C-4 explosive, and a blasting cap.

  The caps were wired to the fat cable that snaked into the sound truck, the cable that Christa was supposed to plug in at the beginning of the fireworks display. When she pulled the lever, the mines would explode simultaneously, each one spewing its charge of steel balls over a sixty-degree arc waist-high on a standing adult. It would’ve been the equivalent of a thousand machine guns firing at once.

  Those mines, the Fed told me, have a killing range of about a hundred meters. Hundreds of people in the Celebration audience would have been killed, including all of the special guests and celebrities in the front few rows. Thousands more would have been maimed and wounded.

  The Fed explained to me that claymores—and machine guns and rocket launchers and just about anything else you might need if you wanted to kill a lot of people—are readily available on the international black market if you can pay the price. Sooner or later they’d figure out where Frank Dyer bought them and how he smuggled them onto the Vineyard. There were, after all, only two ways: by air or by sea. Thousands of boats prowled the Vineyard waters in the summertime. A smuggler would have little challenge.

  They finished interrogating us several hours after sunrise on Sunday. Spitz drove us to the Jackson house. I sat beside him in the front seat. Christa rode in back.

  Zee was standing in the driveway waiting for us. She opened the back door of Spitz’s car, and Christa stepped out. Zee put her arm around the girl’s shoulders and led her into the house.

  I turned to Spitz. “I’ve got a question.”

  “Only one?”

  “Several, actually,” I said. “Princess Ishewa. I feel responsible for her death.”

  He shrugged.

  “Can you tell me what happened?”

  “I don’t see why not,” he said. “We rounded up those Simon Peters. They were pretty talkative.” He hesitated. “This is strictly between us, right?”