Precious Cargo

by Clyde W. Ford

  “Sounds like being with her might stretch you a little.”

  “You taking her side?”

  I held up the microbrew. “As far as you stepping up from Bud to microbrew I am. I like this beer.”

  Ben smiled. “Hate to admit it, but I like it too. Hell, the guys at the station razz me a little because of Janet. The latest thing she’s into is a group that wants to stop development along Chuckanut Drive. Some rich Texan bought a tract of land and wants to put in 800 homes . . . 800 homes. A mix of high-rise apartments and single-family dwellings.”

  “To which you say what? ‘Go for it buddy. The more the merrier?’”

  “Like hell I do. Truth is, I’m glad people like Janet are fighting to preserve this town.”

  “You ever tell her that?”

  “And spoil the basis for a good argument?”

  “Lemme guess. The sex is great when you two make up.”

  Ben winked and pointed the microbrew at me. “Now tell me how it’s going between you and Kate.”

  I took another sip of beer, then expounded on the virtues of re-learning a piece of music while beginning a new relationship. Ben screwed up his face. Maybe I’d waxed too philosophic for a Bud guy. He pointed his beer bottle across the harbor toward Gate Nine. “As long as you do the relationship with Kate better than that guy plays his bagpipe.”

  “You can hear him all the way over here?”

  “Like an off-key foghorn.”

  three

  I smiled the entire walk back to Gate Nine. Behind his gruff exterior, Ben seemed pretty happy that I’d set him up with Janet Paulsen. Hey, maybe matchmaking could be a backup career option in case marine private investigation didn’t work out.

  Walking down the dock toward the Noble Lady, I noticed that the boarding gate was partially open and the large zipper on the plastic enclosure pulled up. A sweet lavender smell met me as I stepped aboard, which meant I’d find Kate inside. I opened the door. Kate sat behind the galley table. She raised her head from a book and smiled. My body responded with a rush of blood to my loins.

  “You’re out of uniform and you look relaxed,” I said.

  “I should be. I just came from my first hot yoga class.”

  “And would that be hot as in heat . . . or hot as in sexy?”

  “We did yoga in a 105-degree room.”

  “That would be hot as in sweaty.”

  She laughed. “Don’t worry, I took a shower after class.”

  A bulging, black, soft-sided suitcase sat at the top of the steps leading down to the stateroom. Kate turned to look at it. “I thought I’d start bringing over my gear today. We still haven’t made a list of groceries and we’re leaving the day after tomorrow. We need to get busy.”

  My body stiffened. I took a deep breath. “I’ve got some bad news.”

  Kate sat up straight. Her dark blue eyes flashed wide open. “What?”

  I didn’t have my speech prepared. I hadn’t expected to see her so soon. I searched for words, but not fast enough.

  “You don’t want to go,” Kate said.

  “No. I do. But I took a job that might delay our departure for a few days.”

  “You don’t want to go.”

  “I do.”

  “Then why’d you take a job?”

  “I couldn’t refuse.”

  She dropped both hands on the galley table. “You don’t want to go.”

  “I do.”

  “What job?”

  “A couple brought up the body of a young woman from the bottom of Eagle Harbor on their anchor.”

  “Yes. I know about it. But that’s a law-enforcement investigation, maybe involving us at Station Bellingham.” Kate pointed at me. “Why are you involved?”

  “The couple asked me to investigate.”

  “And you said yes?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Are you afraid?”

  “No. . . . I mean . . . of what? Am I afraid of what?”

  “Afraid of going on vacation with me.”

  “No.”

  “Then why’d you take a job when you knew we were supposed to leave?”

  I explained what happened, and why Marvin and Angela Baynes needed to find out about this young woman.

  Kate jabbed her finger at me. “Did you tell them we were going on vacation?”

  “No.”

  She jabbed at me again. “Did you tell them you had to check with your partner first to see how taking their case might impact our plans?”

  “No.”

  “You’re scared, Charlie. You’re scared of being alone with me for two weeks on the Noble Lady, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not scared,” I said. But I could feel my conviction lagging.

  Kate held up her hands. “Take a deep breath, look me straight in the eyes, and then tell me you’re not scared.”

  I closed my eyes. I took a deep breath and held it. When I opened my eyes, Kate’s penetrating stare demanded the truth.

  “Okay, I have some fear. But I didn’t take the job to avoid going away with you.”

  “Thanks for being honest. But you didn’t think about me either when you took the job.”

  “I felt trapped. Marvin and Angela stood here”—I pointed down—“obviously in pain. There seemed to be something I could do to help them, even though I knew it meant interfering with our plans.”

  “We’re in a relationship. That means what each of us does affects the other. I need to feel that you’ll take me into account when you make decisions that affect us. I don’t feel that right now. I feel like you just thought about yourself.” Tears pooled at the corners of Kate’s eyes. “I don’t want to take Sharon’s place. I couldn’t even if I did want to. I know that I’ll never fill the place inside you that she did.” She tapped her chest then pointed to me. “I want to carve out my own place inside you, and fill it with me. Are you ready for that? Or did our relationship happen too soon?”

  “I think I’m ready.”

  Kate stood up before I could say anything more. “When you know for sure, give me a call,” she said.

  Kate snatched her bag from the floor. Her long dark hair whipped around her shoulders. She swept her hair back and brushed past me on her way toward the door. She yanked the cabin door open and ducked her tall frame under the doorway, then slammed the door closed behind her. The Noble Lady shuddered as she stepped off.

  My sigh must have sounded like a foghorn. I slumped into the seat that Kate had left. Her lavender scent lingered. I parted the window blinds in time to see her car zoom away from the marina. I tried calling her on her cell phone, but she didn’t answer. I lowered my head and massaged my brow. Damn. Sometimes being in a relationship felt like navigating through fog—without radar.

  I putzed around the boat for the rest of the afternoon, tightening hose clamps that didn’t need tightening, replacing a heater switch that didn’t need replacing. Between tasks, I called Kate. She still refused to answer. I went over my plans for tomorrow. I intended to hire a diver to scour the bottom of Eagle Harbor. I also rehearsed my apology. “I’m sorry. Yes, I was wrong. I should have spoken to you before I took the case. It’s hard starting a new relationship, when I’d planned on the previous one lasting a lifetime. And, no, I don’t expect you to fill Sharon’s place. I love you for who you are.” Wine and flowers might sweeten my mea culpa.

  After dinner I tried several supermarkets, but none had our special wine, Red Mountain Reserve. So I settled on a nice bouquet of flowers. The dashboard clock read 9:30 when I pulled into the marina parking lot. Down at the Noble Lady, a soft light illuminated horizontal lines from the slats of the blinds on the large galley window. Lavender scented the rear deck. Inside, atop the galley table, a candle flickered next to a bottle of Red Mountain Reserve. But I didn’t see Kate.

  “I’m in here.” Her voice came from the stateroom.

  I held the flowers out in front and stepped down into the stateroom, where another candle burned. Kate sat in bed with
her back propped against the wall, reading. Only now she wore the black lace negligee I’d given her for Christmas. She slapped the book closed and reached for my hand, drawing me down on the bed beside her. I handed her the flowers. She sniffed them, then set the bouquet on the nightstand.

  “I was wrong—”

  “Don’t,” Kate said. “I pushed you and I didn’t need to. I’m sorry. I’m scared too. Scared that you won’t give me the chance to be in this relationship. Scared that you’ll find a reason to push me away. Because I’m twelve years younger than you; because you’re African American and I’m not; because you’re afraid that you’re not ready for a new relationship.”

  “So what do we do if we’re both scared?” I asked.

  “What we do is hold each other.”

  Kate slid down in bed and pulled me down with her. Then she guided my head toward her and we kissed deeply, passionately. When we came up for air, she said, “You know that’s one of the reasons I love you?”

  “What reason?”

  “Because you care about people like the Bayneses and you’re willing to go out of your way to help them.”

  “And all this time I thought you loved me because I was tall, dark, and handsome.”

  “That too.”

  She pulled my head toward her again, and we kissed. This time when we came up for air, she said, “And you love me because?”

  “Are you fishin’?”

  “Without shame.”

  “Because you’re tall, light, and gorgeous. . . . And because you’re sensitive, caring, loving. . . . I could go on.”

  “And at some other time you will.”

  Kate pulled me in for another kiss, then she abruptly pushed my head back. “I’m not too beamy? My stern’s not too wide?”

  “A beamy boat’s more comfortable when the seas get rockin’ ’n’ rollin’. And as for your stern,” I slipped my hand under the covers. “My hands-on inspection concludes that it’s rounded in perfect proportion to your beam.”

  “Just like the Noble Lady’s.”

  “Most women would not appreciate being compared to a boat,” I said.

  “Most women don’t love boats as much as I do.”

  “Which is another reason I love you,” I said.

  Kate wrapped her hands around my neck and guided me down for another long kiss. When we came up for air this time, she said, “You know I was going to ask if we could postpone leaving anyway.”

  “What?” I raised my head and looked at her.

  Kate’s eyes sparkled in the candlelight. The flames set shadows dancing softly over her face. “Two new crews are in from Cape May for training. The station CO asked if there was any way I could delay my vacation to assist. I’d be out on the Sea Eagle for a week to ten days.”

  “As a lieutenant looking to become a lieutenant commander, this would be good for your career.”

  “Yes, Commander, it would be.”

  Kate stroked the back of my neck, sending tingles down my spine. “Are you sorry you never reached captain?” she asked.

  “God knows I had the years and the experience for that promotion.”

  “And your former CO offered to reinstate you after you uncovered the reasons why Admiral Ritchie wanted your report falsified.”

  I sighed. “I couldn’t go back. You come to a point in your life where you have to let go of the past in order to grab hold of the future, even if you don’t know what that future will bring.”

  Kate raised her head for a quick kiss. “That’s another reason I love you,” she said. “You’re willing to risk the safety of what you know for the challenge of an adventure. The good news is the CO said if I stayed for this training cruise, he’d give me a three-week leave afterward but write it up as two. That’d mean we could have three weeks of adventure together.”

  “That’s great,” I said. I thought about asking why this important bit of information concerning her CO hadn’t surfaced earlier. But one look at Kate, shimmering in candlelight, lavender, and lace, convinced me that not all my questions needed answers. Kate pulled me down to her and we kissed again.

  “Do you think it’s time we got the seas rockin’ ’n’ rollin’?” she asked. “And test out your theory about the comfort of my beam?”

  “I do.”

  “So do I.”

  We kissed once more. Only this time, I slipped off my clothes and we didn’t surface for air.

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING, I awoke to an empty pillow. Kate had left at 0500 to report for duty. For breakfast, I made a smoothie with orange juice and a protein powder that Kate had found at the local food co-op. Despite her cajoling, I hadn’t tried it yet. The label read, “No dairy. No wheat. No soy. No eggs. No animal or fish products.” Which left me scratching my head about where the protein came from. So I spun the can around and read further. Rice, and more than fifty other herbs, enzymes, and extracts. What the heck. If Ben could switch from Bud to microbrew, I could switch from coffee and toast to something healthful like this shake for breakfast. I took a sip. Vanilla with a pleasant, sweet taste. Not bad when you consider the label also read, “No added sugar.”

  After breakfast, I set out to hire a diving partner. Every diver learns never to go down alone. It only takes one search-and-recovery operation pulling up the body of some guy who thought he could beat the odds to drive the point home. In over twenty years in the Guard I’d pulled up more than two dozen. I’d heard of a fellow named Dan, who owned Raven Diving and Salvage located here in the harbor.

  I took the marina walkway again and caught a glimpse of Big Ben as I passed by Gate Six. The path followed the shoreline out to Zuanich Point Park. There, a tall granite statue of a weathered fisherman in rain gear and a cap faced north, in the direction of so many tragic fishing accidents. He stood ready to heave the rescue line coiled in his hands to the souls of his brethren who had never made it back to port.

  On the other side of the monument, a woman stood, holding a child’s hand. She ran a finger down the list of fishermen lost at sea, stopping at the names etched under the year 1999.

  Beyond the statue, the masts of the tallest fishing boats came into view, peeking over the breakwater at Gate Five. Interspersed between the fishing fleet, the white hulls of large yachts gleamed in the sunlight. Many harbors separate their fishing fleet from their pleasure craft. But here at Squalicum Harbor they were mixed.

  At the bottom of the Gate Five ramp, two men wrestled a large net peppered with tiny white floats onto the back end of the Pacific Master, a fishing boat over one hundred feet long. One man stood on deck, barking orders to a second man, who stumbled several times before finally feeding the last of the net aboard. I walked over to the Pacific Master.

  “Excuse me,” I said to the man on the dock.

  When he turned around, I caught a strong whiff of alcohol mixed with tobacco and rotten fish. The man had bloodshot eyes. He looked me up and down and said nothing.

  “I’m looking for Raven Diving and Salvage,” I said. “Do you know where I can find it?”

  He smiled, exposing a row of yellowed teeth. “Need a bottom job?”

  “No. But I do need to find Raven Diving and Salvage.”

  “Well, that’s what he does, don’t he? BJs for you fucking fancy yachties.” He turned to the man aboard the Pacific Master and yelled, “Guy’s lookin’ for a fuckin’ BJ.”

  “Gary,” the man aboard the ship said. “Fuck with ’im. Let’s get back to work so we can get outta here sometime soon.”

  A line of concrete berths to my right held mainly larger fishing vessels. I looked left, past the Pacific Master. Gary pulled a smaller net from a cart on the dock. He backed up to toss it to the man aboard. He may have been hung over, because he stumbled as he walked, backing up at an angle into me. I caught him with my hands and gently pushed him forward. He dropped the net and swung around.

  “What the fuck you doing, yachtie?” He pushed me back, hard.

  I tried to explain what just happ
ened, but comprehension didn’t seem like Gary’s strong suit. “Maybe you should just go back to work,” I said.

  “Maybe you should stay outta a working man’s way.” He pushed me again.

  He must have been too drunk to realize that I hadn’t even moved from his puny shove. I wasn’t looking for a fight, so I turned to walk away. But a moment later, an arm clapped my shoulder. I spun around to Gary’s fist heading toward me. I didn’t even bother to block it. I threw my weight onto my left foot and leaned to that side. Gary’s fist and his body flew past me, headed for the water. I grabbed him by his shoulder. By this time, his friend had hopped down from the fishing boat. I pulled Gary back from the edge of the dock, spun him around, and threw him over to his partner.

  “Sorry. He had a little too much to drink last night, eh?” the other man said.

  “He’s going to get himself hurt throwing a punch like that again.”

  The other man cuffed Gary by the collar and bundled him away. Gary mumbled, “Fucking yachtie.”

  I think this is why many harbors separate their fishing fleet from their pleasure craft.

  A gauntlet of bows lay ahead of me. Guys like Gary aside, I love walking docks filled with older fishing boats. I passed the Sea Maiden, an old wooden trawler about sixty feet long. She had to have been built before World War II. Paint peeled off her hull. Rot ate away at her planks. Rust stains oozed from her bronze portholes.

  I stopped and stepped back to admire the old gal, looking beyond her sad decline to the heritage of my Noble Lady. She had a pilothouse set well back, away from the area where green water would come crashing over the foredeck. A rounded stern to split following seas. Stabilizer poles to dampen her roll. Some yacht owners might turn up their noses at the Sea Maiden. But I’d moor my boat next to her in a heartbeat. Then the Noble Lady would be close to the roots of her own family tree.

  A gray-haired man, dressed in slacks and an open-collar white shirt, stepped off a sleek fifty-seven-foot Bayliner across from the Sea Maiden. He called out to me. “She’s for sale.”