Vulgar Boatman

by William G. Tapply

  He sighed. “Absolutely right. But then she put that soft little hand into my lap and rubbed her soft little body against me and said, ‘Come on, Gil,’ like that. Hey. What could I do? I gave her some crack.” He paused. Then he laughed quietly. “She was extremely grateful to me, Mr. Coyne. And she had some marvelously unique ways of expressing her gratitude.”

  “I bet.”

  “Yes. Marvelous.”

  “So why did you kill her?”

  “Slow down. There’s a little driveway coming up on the left. There. By that birch tree.”

  “You want me to turn into that driveway?”

  “Godammit, yes, I want you to turn into that driveway. Why’d you think I pointed it out to you? You think this is some kind of sightseeing tour? I killed her because she had started to become demanding as hell, and even a lovely piece of ass like her was beginning to get on my nerves. Crack does that. She was hooked bad. She was no longer reliable. I was pretty sure she had told Buddy Baron what was going on. I couldn’t take the chance she’d tell others as well.”

  “But you screwed her that night before you killed her.” I eased into the driveway. It turned out to be several hundred yards long, just a pair of ruts winding through a grove of pine trees. Ahead I could see some light.

  “Pull up here,” said Speer.

  I stopped the car, turned off the ignition, and doused the lights. “Now what?” I said.

  Speer just sat there. “Sure. Sure I screwed her. She had to screw for her hit of crack. That was our deal. Hell, I couldn’t keep up with her. She would’ve banged me ten times a day. That’s how bad she was hooked. The lass was insatiable. For the crack and for the cock. Want to hear something funny?”

  “Right about now it would be welcome,” I said.

  “She had already screwed somebody else that night. I wasn’t the first one.”

  “That was Buddy,” I said.

  “I was pretty sure it was. Anyway, we did it in the car, and afterwards I lit a pipe for her, and I waited for the rush to hit her, and when she was flying on that dope I strangled her. Believe me, it was painless for her.”

  “Considerate of you,” I muttered.

  “Oh, she was the best piece of ass I’ll ever have.”

  “Explain to me now about Buddy Baron.”

  “God, was she good.” Speer cleared his throat. “Baron? He knew. Alice let that slip. And then he got ahold of some evidence. Until today, I wasn’t sure what the evidence was. I thought it was more than just that report card. I kept records, of course. We computer types, you know. Compulsive that way. I could’ve been careless, or Buddy might’ve been a better hacker than I thought. If anyone got their hands on my records… Shit. All he had was that damn report card. Thing was, though, Buddy knew what it meant. Alice told him enough for him to figure it out. Kid was too smart for his own good.”

  “So you sent those two goons to my house.”

  “I don’t tell those goons what to do, Mr. Coyne. I’m just a peon.”

  “They work for the guy who supplies you with dope, right?”

  Speer turned to me in the darkened car and nodded. “Yes.”

  “Who is it? Where are you getting this stuff?”

  He laughed quickly through his nose. “I’m going to take you to meet him right now.” He opened his door and slid out of the car. He crouched by the open door, his gun on me. “Okay. Slowly, now, Mr. Coyne. Open the door and get out. Be very careful. From here I might miss your knee and hit you in the balls or something.”

  I got out very carefully. Then I stood beside the car. Speer came around to my side. “Okay. We’re going up to the cottage now.”

  The cottage, I saw by the bright moonlight when we got a little closer, stood on the edge of a saltwater creek. It appeared to be very isolated. There was a dark sedan parked in the shadows close to the little building. I couldn’t tell the make or model. Behind the cottage stretched the marsh, and beyond the marsh, judging by the flat horizon, lay the Atlantic Ocean.

  Beside the cottage the path descended to the riverbank, where a long dock jutted out. It stood on tall pilings with the tide at low ebb. Moored by the dock was a big ocean-going sportfishing boat. It was, I guessed, a thirty-six or thirty-eight footer. Not as big as the boat that had been stolen from Frank Paradise, but a substantial seaworthy craft, nonetheless.

  The cottage was no more than that—a single-story shingled structure with a low wooden deck that appeared to encircle it on all four sides.

  As we approached the door, I could hear the murmur of voices inside. It took me an instant to realize that the voices came from a television set.

  Speer went to the screen door. The inside door was open. I stood beside him while Speer pushed his face against the screen and rapped on the wooden frame.

  “Hey, it’s me,” he yelled over the sound of the television.

  From inside a man’s voice shouted, “That you, Speer?”

  “Right,” he said. “It’s me, and—”

  The blast from the shotgun lifted Gil Speer off his feet and slammed him backwards onto the ground beyond the deck.

  The hole in the screen door was about the size and shape of a basketball. It would have been chest high on Gil Speer.

  I may have stood rooted there for five seconds. No more than that. But during that brief time several thoughts presented themselves for my consideration.

  I could crouch there and hide.

  I could leap into the boat and speed away to safety.

  I could pound on the door, present myself indignantly, and make a citizen’s arrest.

  I did the one other thing that occurred to me.

  I started to run like hell.

  I jumped off the edge of the wood deck and stumbled to my knees as I landed awkwardly in the dark. I stared frantically around. I had an open area to cross, about the size of a baseball infield, and then I’d reach the tree-lined driveway. Adrenaline pumped. My mind focused only on escape. I pushed myself to my feet. My right knee protested. The old football injury. I could ignore it. I began to run.

  The sudden blinding light stopped me in my tracks. I turned and squinted back at the cottage. From under the eaves shone half a dozen floodlights. I made out the silhouette of a figure standing on the deck. He was training a gun on me.

  “Mr. Coyne, sir,” called a voice I recognized. It belonged to the fat man who called himself Mr. Curry. “Mr. Coyne, do come and join us inside.”

  I quickly weighed my options. At twenty yards, the shotgun Mr. Curry had trained on me would not miss, no matter how cleverly I might feint and dart toward the protection of the darkened forest. It might not kill me. I took no solace from that.

  I shrugged and limped up the steps. Mr. Curry said, “What a pleasant surprise, sir.”

  I pulled open the mangled screen door. Mr. Curry followed me in.

  I stopped abruptly and stared at the man who was sitting on the sofa, his legs crossed, a half-apologetic smile playing on his lips.

  “Good evening, Mr. Coyne,” said Harry Cusick, the Windsor Harbor police chief.

  “I feel kind of stupid,” I said.

  “Oh, don’t feel stupid,” said Mr. Curry. “It’s better if me’n Harry, here, feel smart. Right, Harry?”

  “Sure. Absolutely, You’re right as usual, Ralph.” Cusick waggled his revolver at me. “Have a seat, Mr. Coyne.”

  “That’s okay,” I said. “I’ve been sitting all day.”

  “Sit!” said Cusick.

  I sat. Cusick sat beside the other man on the sofa, facing me.

  “Good,” said the fat man. “We can try it again.” He moved the barrel of his shotgun in little circles, crudely outlining my lung area.

  “What’s he talking about?” I said to Cusick.

  Cusick shrugged. “You two know each other, I believe.”

  “The list,” said Mr. Curry.

  “Who are you, anyway?” I said to him.

  He glanced at Harry Cusick. Cusick shrugged. “Tell
him. It doesn’t matter.”

  I decided I didn’t like the sound of that.

  “O’Keefe,” he said. “Ralph O’Keefe.”

  “Never heard of you,” I said. “No offense, of course.”

  He smiled broadly. “No offense taken,” he said. “Now, sir, I’ll give you another opportunity to tell me where the list is.”

  Cusick snorted. “There’s no list, Ralph. That was Speer’s hangup. All there was was a report card that Speer changed the grade on, for crissake. Maybe enough to bother Speer. Not enough to tie us in. We should have disposed of Speer a long time ago. Then we’d be clear right now, and poor Mr. Coyne here would be home sleeping in his bed.”

  O’Keefe smiled. “I figure we’re clear anyhow.”

  Cusick looked at me. “I agree,” he said. To O’Keefe he said, “You about ready?”

  O’Keefe stood up. He still held the shotgun on me. “Let’s go for a boat ride, Mr. Coyne. A beautiful night for it. Lovely moon, tide just turning—”

  “Can it, Ralph,” said Cusick wearily.

  “Can I ask a question?” I said to Cusick.

  “Why not?”

  “Why Speer? I mean, the man’s obviously a genius at what he does. How does a guy like that end up passing crack to teenagers and then getting his chest blown away by a shotgun?”

  Cusick hunched his shoulders as if his neck was stiff, or he was bored by the subject. “I guess he was a genius. I don’t know much about that. He had to’ve been pretty clever to put together the papers he did.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Speer, of course, wasn’t his real name. MIT wasn’t the place he spent his college days, either. The guy learned computers at an institution in Illinois where they don’t have proms and you have to spend spring weekends in your room. And Gil Speer knew a hell of a lot about hooking kids on drugs long before I figured out who he was. He served his time, a model prisoner, and then went to work on a computer, putting together a nice new identity for himself. If he was as clever as me, of course, he’d probably still be doing what he wanted to do, which was to fart around with computers and screw high school girls.”

  “But you blackmailed him.”

  Cusick stifled a yawn. “Call it what you want. I persuaded him to join us in our fledgling little enterprise.”

  “You are a bastard,” I said, shaking my head slowly.

  He smiled. “Thank you very much.”

  “One more question,” I said. “Why you, Cusick?”

  He arched his eyebrows and grinned. “Why not?” was his answer.

  “Come on, Harry,” said O’Keefe. “Let’s can the conversation.”

  Cusick nodded. “Right. You and Mr. Coyne, here, take Speer down to the boat.”

  O’Keefe started to protest and then, glancing at Cusick, changed his mind. We went out onto the deck. Speer lay sprawled on his back. The entire front of him, from throat to crotch, was stained dark. The blood that drenched his shirt and puddled on the wood planks glistened in the bright floodlights.

  O’Keefe handed the shotgun to Cusick. Then he reached down and grabbed Speer by his armpits. “Get his legs,” said Cusick to me. I bent and gripped Speer under his knees. Slowly, awkwardly, we lugged the limp, dead-weight body of Gil Speer down a rough path to the dock where the boat was moored.

  Her name was painted on the transom. Gretel. Newburyport. A local boat.

  We laid Speer on the dock while O’Keefe climbed aboard. Then he reached over and we heaved and shoved the corpse over the side. It fell into the bottom of the boat with a muffled thump.

  Harry Cusick, who had followed us down the path, was standing on the dock behind me, the shotgun cradled casually under his arm. I thought of disarming him with a deft feint and jab and judo throw, grabbing the shotgun, and getting the drop on O’Keefe, just like on television.

  What I actually did was nothing, just like in real life.

  O’Keefe jumped back onto the dock and took the shotgun from Cusick, who then climbed aboard and ducked into the cabin. He started up the engines. They purred and burbled powerfully. Then he came out of the cabin. He held a revolver, which he was pointing at me. “Okay, Mr. Coyne. Come aboard. Step down. Mind the corpse, now. Be careful. Don’t slip and fall on the blood.”

  I stepped into the boat. Gil Speer’s body lay on its stomach. If it weren’t for the impossibly awkward way one of his arms was twisted behind him, he could have been sleeping.

  Cusick told me to go down below. There were three or four short steps. I had to duck my head. Below deck there was a small room with berths lined on either side. The boat would sleep six hunchbacked midgets in comfort. There was a door leading to what I assumed was the head.

  “Sit,” said Cusick.

  I sat on one of the berths. Cusick remained standing, holding his revolver on me, until O’Keefe came below. “I undid the ropes,” he said.

  “Lines,” said Cusick.

  “Excuse me, sir?”

  “Not ropes. Don’t call them ropes. They’re lines.”

  “Whatever. I undid them. Let’s get going. Tally ho, or whatever you’re supposed to say.”

  “Anchors aweigh,” sang Cusick. He went topside. O’Keefe sat on the berth across from me, one fat leg crossed over the other, his shotgun resting on it, pointing at me.

  “A sea cruise,” I said. “Goody.”

  “You’ve got some sense of humor, Mr. Coyne.”

  I shrugged. “I just like boats. Can’t help it.”

  “You ought to really like this trip.”

  “So who was your friend?”

  “Which friend?”

  “The dead guy. In my apartment.”

  “You mean Rat? Rat Benetti. You probably never heard of him.”

  “Never heard of you, for that matter. Which of you was the clever one who tortured Buddy Baron?”

  “Oh, that was Rat. He was always creative at that sort of thing. The toaster was his idea. The kid died real fast.”

  “So you figured he had given me the report card.”

  “We actually thought he had Speer’s list.”

  “Well, he didn’t. And when you dropped in on me, I didn’t have it, either.”

  O’Keefe yawned. “The sea air. Always makes me sleepy.”

  “It tends to make me sick,” I said.

  We had been moving for eight or ten minutes. Through the small porthole I could see coastal lights blinking in the distance. We seemed to be moving parallel to the coast, heading north.

  It was what they call a medium sea. The boat bucked and rolled in the swells.

  O’Keefe yawned again. He stood up, went to a cabinet, and pulled out a bag of potato chips. Then he sat down again. He rummaged in the bag and brought out a big handful of chips. He began to eat them. He ate delicately, taking little nips out of each chip.

  He noticed me watching him. “You hungry? Want some chips?”

  “Jesus, no,” I said.

  He cocked his head at me. “You all right?”

  “Not really.”

  “You don’t look that great, sir.”

  I swallowed hard and slumped back onto the berth.

  “Listen,” said O’Keefe. “You better the hell not puke.”

  “No promises,” I mumbled.

  “Aw, shit,” he said. I felt his hands on me. “Hey. Come on. Get up. Let’s go up there and get some air.”

  “Just leave me alone.”

  “Nossir, by Jesus, you ain’t gonna stink up this boat. Not while I’ve got to ride in it.” He grabbed my shoulder and yanked on it. “Get your ass up.”

  “Please be gentle,” I moaned.

  “Okay, okay. I’m gentle. Stand up.”

  I pushed myself to a standing position and remained there, swaying precariously with the motion of the boat. O’Keefe jabbed my back with the bore of his shotgun. “Go on. Up the stairs.”

  I pulled myself slowly up the steps. Topside, the fresh salt air tasted good. Cusick was in the cabin, steeri
ng. He swiveled his head around. “Hey, what the hell are you doing?” he yelled at O’Keefe over the roar of the engines.

  “This bastard’s threatening to blow lunch down there.”

  “Let him.”

  “Sure. Fine for you. You can stay up here and run the damn boat.”

  Cusick shrugged and turned his attention back to his navigation.

  “Feel any better now?” said O’Keefe.

  “No. Worse.”

  “Be easier if I just killed you right now.”

  “Do it,” I said. “Please.”

  I made a gagging noise and stumbled for the side of the boat. Land appeared to be close, but I knew how deceiving distances can be over water. We were probably a couple miles out, still roughly paralleling the coastline.

  I hung my head over the side. They were going to take me and Gil Speer’s dead body out there someplace and dump us where the currents would carry us to Africa. Then they’d head back in and for them it would be business as usual. The disappearances of Gil Speer, computer specialist at a small North Shore high school, and Brady L. Coyne, mild-mannered Boston barrister, would be mysteries. Harry Cusick, the local police chief, would investigate thoroughly. He would give statements to the press. He would track down leads. He would discover that Coyne had been in town the evening he disappeared, that he had, in fact, had an appointment with Speer. The trail would end at Computer City, where Coyne was last seen alive.

  Our bodies would never be found, at least not by human beings.

  The sharks and other seagoing scavengers would undoubtedly find us.

  I braced my hands against the side of the boat, tensed my legs, and pushed. I tumbled over the side into the dark, shockingly cold water.

  Seventeen

  I WOULDN’T GLORIFY THE tumble from boat to sea by calling it a dive, but it did the trick. I landed on my right shoulder, and in the same motion I aimed for the briny deep and kicked as hard as I could. I heard the muffled thrumming of the twin propellers pass overhead.

  I stayed under until my lungs burned and lights began to flicker alarmingly in my head. It took an enormous effort of will to ease myself slowly to the surface and let just my face emerge. Air never tasted so sweet.