Dark Water Dive

by Kathy Brandt

  “I’ve never liked Guy,” she said. “He’s nothing like my father, and I don’t think my mother’s been happy with him at all.”

  “How long have they been married?”

  “Only a year. My father died six years ago. If you see my mother, please tell her that I am worried and that she needs to call me.”

  I tried to reassure her and hung up before she could query me further. Then I called the editor back. He said he was sure that no one from the publishing house was meeting Guy in Miami.

  Who was it on the Calypso if not Guy and Elizabeth Pembrook? What had happened to the real Pembrooks? Who were they supposed to meet in Miami? Had whoever was posing as the Pembrooks stolen the boat from them? They’d certainly taken their identity.

  And they’d lied about Robsen motoring away from the Calypso that night. Robsen had found out that Pembrook was not who he said he was. He’d probably seen the book when he was looking around the Calypso that night, torn out the photo on the book jacket, and stuffed it in his pocket without Guy ever knowing it. Then Robsen had been stupid enough to confront him about it and Guy had killed him to prevent exposure.

  But what about Ursala? Was Pembrook involved in her murder? How could she have been involved? Had Robsen said something to her that night? Had she seen something when she’d been out on the beach waiting for Robsen? If so, why hadn’t she gone to the police immediately instead of waiting and calling me. I remembered her encounter with Guy on her way out of the bar. Ursala had clearly been afraid. And he had been very interested in knowing what Ursala might have said to me. Had Pembrook threatened Ursala to keep her from talking until he could get to her and kill her?

  If Guy had stolen the boat, and run up the charge cards while sailing the boat to the BVI to sell, what the hell was he doing diving out at the caves instead of getting the boat sold, taking the money, and getting out of the islands, especially after killing Robsen?

  Dunn was not going to like it. I had been investigating behind his back. But damned. What else could I do? I was going to have to tell Dunn. As I headed to his office I realized that everyone in the department except Snyder had apparently left for lunch. I could see him in the back collecting a fax. I decided to head over to the Calypso. Someone needed to keep an eye on the Pembrooks in case they decided to pull up anchor.

  Snyder caught me as I was going out the door. “We got the results back from the dinghy. Lab guy, Dickson, didn’t find no trace of blood or nothing, but there were some fingerprints. Course Robsen’s were there. Lots of the rest couldn’t be matched—all dem folks working on the docks, maybe even some former charterers.”

  “Snyder, was there anything at all useful?” I wondered why the hell he was bothering to tell me all this.

  “Well, yeah. Dat’s what I was about to tell you. Dickson found a match. Set of prints on the bow of the dinghy, like someone pushing it off. Prints were in the data base. Dis man has a record.” He pulled out the report and handed it to me.

  The prints belonged to a guy named Curt Wold, the son of a wealthy family on the East Coast. A spoiled rich kid, living off his parents, he had been in trouble since high school. He’d wrecked his parents’ yacht when he took it out joy riding and ran it into a concrete pier when he was sixteen. Family was always bailing him out. Several drug charges. Time in a rehab hospital. More arrests for possession of heroin. By the time he was twenty-five, his parents had had enough. They threw him out and stopped supporting him.

  The last time he’d been arrested was for stealing a boat, which he’d decided to throw a big party on, providing cocaine for all his friends. Somehow he’d made bail and skipped. That had been five years ago. The police suspected that he’d vanished in the islands.

  The photo was a bad reproduction, passed along by fax.

  “Hey, Snyder, who does this look like to you?”

  “I know, that’s da fellow on the Calypso. Guess he found another way to live da life he be accustomed to.”

  “Yeah, nothing like having your own classic wooden sailboat with all the amenities for a month or two.”

  “How you think his prints got on dat dinghy?”

  “Could have been when he helped the Robsen’s tie up to the Calypso that night.”

  “Yeah, then again, maybe he be lettin’ it loose in da middle of da ocean after throwing Robsen’s body in the sea. Let’s be goin’ over to the Calypso.”

  “Snyder, you need to stay here.”

  The kid ignored me.

  ***

  As we pulled alongside the Calypso, I realized that the guy standing on deck was Jack Rodriguez talking with another guy, who was examining the rigging.

  “Ahoy,” he called, grabbing the line Snyder threw him. We climbed aboard and Rodriguez informed me that the Calypso was now his boat.

  “She’s a beauty, isn’t she? Always wanted a classic like this.”

  “Do you know where I can find Pembrook?” I asked.

  “He was talking about renting a motorboat for a few days. Seemed like he was kind of in a hurry. They were all packed and ready to get off the boat when I got here. We loaded the dinghy and I took them over to the marina.”

  “Do you mind if I have a look around the Calypso?” I asked. I hoped that whoever had been posing as Pembrook, and I was sure it was Wold, had left some clue about where he was headed or what he was up to.

  “Hey, be my guest. I’m just having the rigging and engine checked out before I take the boat up to the States. We plan to sail her up there next week.” I didn’t have the heart to tell Rodriguez that the guy who sold him the boat didn’t own it and had no legal right to sign the boat over to him.

  Snyder and I went below. I checked the bedroom. It was cleaned out. But when I pulled up the mattress, the journal was still there, right where the real Elizabeth Pembrook had kept it hidden. It told the entire story of the Pembrooks’ travels. This time, I thumbed to the last week of entries.

  February 6: Guy has invited another couple to accompany us from Venezuela up to Grenada, Suzie Tagan and Curt Wold. We met them on the docks in Port of Spain. They are experienced sailors looking for crew slots. They said they had just sold their boat and are working their way up through the islands to Puerto Rico, where they will catch a flight to the States. I don’t like it, but Guy wants to let them sail with us as far as Saint Vincent. Something about them makes me uncomfortable. Wold is too slick. And he must have money if he just sold a boat of his own. So why does he want to crew our boat? Why not just fly home from South America? Guy says I’m being foolish, and having a couple of extra hands for the long sail up will take a lot of strain off. He reminded me of the trip down. It was hard, and I know we can use the help during the long overnight hauls.

  February 8: We left Port of Spain in Trinidad this morning and are headed for Grenada. The day is typically Caribbean. By noon it is a clear and sunny eighty-five degrees with wind out of the southeast at fifteen knots.

  I’m finding myself afraid. I don’t know what’s gotten into Guy. He didn’t tell me what he’d done until we left port. All I knew was that while we were in Venezuela for that week, he was having the bottom worked on and the keel reinforced. I never thought a thing about it. Nothing I can say will change his mind. He’s intent on what he says is a fool proof way to improve our finances.

  This is the first I have heard of any financial difficulty. When I’d voiced concern about buying the Calypso, he’d just laughed and said we were fixed for life. Now it seems he lied. I thought I knew him when we married, but now...well, I wonder. He tells me this is the only possible way that we can continue to live the way we do, traveling and sailing the Calypso. His books don’t even begin to make the payments.

  I told him I’d be happy living in a little house in Iowa. He laughed. “No way I’m living in Des Moines with a bunch of your screaming grandkids.” When he realized how hurt I was, he apologized, but he is determined to go through with this. He told me he’d been approached by a friend of a friend when w
e in Miami picking up the Calypso. They assured him it was a safe way to make some easy money. Guy says it’s worth twenty-five million dollars, pure Colombian cocaine. No one will ever find it in the keel, he tells me. As if getting caught is the only issue. I want no part of any drugs on this boat. But what can I do now? I’m determined to leave him as soon as we make it back to Miami.

  Well, that was it. Cocaine being transported from Colombia into Venezuela and onto the Pembrook’s boat for smuggling to the United States.

  That was Elizabeth’s last entry. I presumed that the real Guy and Elizabeth Pembrook had been dumped at sea somewhere south of Grenada. Somehow Wold and Tagan had found out about the drugs.

  Snyder and I headed over to the marina to track down Wold-alias-Pembrook. We were about fifteen minutes late. Wold and Tagan had rented a fast boat and left. They had a good twenty to thirty minutes’ head start, but I knew he’d be heading back to the caves. Wold would never have sold the Calypso with those drugs still on board. That was what he’d been doing out at Norman Island yesterday—getting the drugs out of the keel and stashing them in one of the underwater caves, a good place to store them for a day or two, private, no prying eyes except mine.

  I wondered how many drug smugglers had redesigned keels to transport their contraband. The coast guard wouldn’t consider going into the water to search for drugs without good cause. Even then, if it were done right, there would be no indication that anything on the bottom of the boat was out of order. The real Pembrook would have had some expert help in Venezuela fitting the boat for his trek up to Miami. He’d have had a buyer on that end all set to meet him. It had been the buyer who had called Ellen when Pembrook didn’t show up as arranged.

  Now Wold was back out there diving in the caves. Once Wold had those drugs, he’d be disappearing somewhere in the islands. Snyder and I would be there in time to intercept him when he surfaced.

  Chapter 26

  I let Snyder take the wheel. He’d have us over there in fifteen minutes. A few misplaced vertebrae would be worth it. We headed out of Road Town Harbor and into the channel, then straight toward the Indians. Snyder never backed off the throttle. He raced past Pelican Island, then took a hard turn around the point to the other side of Norman Island and headed into the bay.

  There were two boats at anchor. Damned if one wasn’t the Manettis’. Melissa Manetti stood up top, waving. There was no one on Wold’s motorboat. He had to be diving. Where was Suzie? Diving with Wold? I didn’t see Don Manetti either. Something was off. But by the time I yelled at Snyder to pull away, he was already alongside the Manetti’s boat and throwing Melissa a line. Too late. Don Manetti appeared from below, and pointed a 9mm Glock dead center at Snyder’s head.

  The last piece. Damn, I’d missed it. I should have known. They’d been so inept with the boat. It should have been my first question. Why rent a boat when you can’t sail? Louis had said they get it all the time, and I’d left it at that. I’d been too involved looking elsewhere. Mack had found nothing at all suspicious about the Manettis because they were good, professionals.

  The Manettis had come down looking for the Pembrooks. They’d found Suzie Tagan and Curt Wold instead and hung back, watching them and waiting for the opportunity to get to Wold and the drugs. That’s why they were at the Indians the previous day, watching Wold with binoculars.

  “Down below,” Manetti ordered, pointing the 9mm toward the hold.

  Snyder started down. I followed. Manetti knew what he was doing. He never gave me an opening, standing back as we climbed down the stairs, Melissa following. Then she covered us as he stepped down. Suzie Tagan was sitting on the floor in the corner, hands tied.

  “So you’re the Miami connection,” I said. “Came looking for Pembrook when he didn’t make it to Florida.”

  “That’s right. We were supposed to meet Pembrook in Miami two weeks ago to get the cocaine. When they didn’t show, we called the daughter. She told us they were still in the BVI.

  “We figured they were planning on double-crossing us. No way we were letting twenty-five million worth of pure Colombian cocaine slip through our fingers. Should be five hundred pounds of it down there packed in water tight bags. Trouble is we don’t dive. We had no way to get at them.

  “We’ve been sitting in the harbor on this damned boat for days, keeping an eye on the Calypso and waiting for reinforcements to arrive from Miami before Wold could sell the boat and take off with the drugs. My guys are professionals—quiet and effective killers and expert divers. They’d have boarded the Calypso, taken care of Wold and little Suzie here, and pulled those drugs out of the keel. We’d have scuttled the Calypso out at sea, and been out of here by now.”

  “What happened to your guys? They run out on you?” I asked.

  “They’re in a Puerto Rican jail. Damned hot heads got in a fight at the San Juan airport while they were waiting for their connection down here. Seems a couple of the patrons took offense at their drunken attempts to pick up their wives. Now it’s up to Melissa and me to take care of things, huh, darlin’?” he said, smiling at his wife.

  “You’ll never get past the coast guard once you have those drugs on board.”

  “I was worried about that too. Now here you are with your police boat. No body gonna stop us in that. We’ll have those drugs out on the streets in Saint Thomas within a day and be on a plane back to Miami. No one will ever know the Manettis were involved. We stay clean.”

  “I told Curt we should just get out of here after he shot Robsen,” Suzie whined from the floor. She was scared shitless and rambling. “But no, he’s got to have it all, money from the Calypso and the drugs. And that damned Ursala, saw him put Robsen’s body in the dinghy. Curt said he scared her real good, but I knew he wouldn’t just let Ursala be. He’d kill her as soon as he got her alone. When I heard her calling the cops from the bar, I pleaded with him. But he was starting to like the killing.”

  “Just let me go. Take the drugs. I won’t tell anybody anything.” I knew she was wasting her time with Manetti. He probably didn’t like killing the way Wold did, but he was a businessman. He’d make a business decision when it came to Suzie—and to me and Snyder for that matter.

  “Sure, Suzie, just tell us where Wold and those drugs are.” Manetti managed to sound like a father soothing an upset child. I almost believed him myself.

  “He hid them in the underwater cave. He’s down there now. He’ll be up any minute. Please, let me go.”

  “First, there’s one thing I’m kind curious about, Suzie. How did you and Curt know about the cocaine?” Manetti would want to keep this kind of thing from happening the next time he smuggled millions in drugs out of South America.

  “Curt was a pro at breaking into the boat yards after dark, scoping out the nicest boats. He just happened to be there that night. He hid on a nearby boat and watched the whole thing—all that cocaine being sealed in the keel of the Calypso. He couldn’t believe his luck. He didn’t have any trouble convincing Guy Pembrook to hire us on as crew when they sailed out of Trinidad.”

  “Untie her, Melissa.”

  “Oh. God, you won’t regret it. I’ll never say a word. You’ll never see me again.”

  “That’s right, Suzie.” Manetti followed her up the ladder. Seconds later a gunshot echoed through the hold. Then a splash.

  Just business.

  After about fifteen minutes, it became pretty obvious that Wold wasn’t coming back. I mean, why would he? If he’d come out of the cave and seen two more boats on the surface, he would have known something was wrong. He’d either made it out and around to the other side of the island or run into trouble. Manetti had scanned the shoreline and the water with binoculars. Melissa had been watching the dive area for signs of a diver—nothing.

  “Okay, Detective Sampson. Get your gear on.” I knew there was a reason that Manetti hadn’t already dumped Snyder and me in after Suzie. This was it.

  “You don’t come back with Wold or those drugs, Sn
yder here will be joining you in the water. Only he’ll have a hole in him.”

  “Don’t be worried about me, Hannah. You just get in dat water.” I knew what Snyder was trying to tell me. So did Manetti.

  “Detective Sampson won’t run out on a colleague. I know her type. You can just relax. Get her gear out of your boat.”

  Snyder climbed into the Wahoo and handed me my wet suit, BC, and the tank. Manetti watched him carefully while Melissa stood on the bow still watching for Wold to surface.

  “I be gettin’ your weight belt,” he said, returning to the locker and kneeling to reach the belt on the bottom. Christ, I knew the dive knife was down there too. And I knew Snyder was just reckless enough to try for it.

  “Manetti,” I said, “you really think Wold isn’t already half way back to Road Town by now?”

  “Guess you’ll be finding out for me, won’t you?” He glanced at me just long enough. Damned if Snyder didn’t manage to slip the knife under his shirt into the waist of his shorts. The kid was slick.

  I took my time suiting up, hoping for an opportunity to catch the Manettis off guard. It didn’t come. They stayed back, weapons zeroed in, one on me, one on Snyder. All I could do was get in the water and hope that Snyder didn’t do anything stupid while I was gone.

  I swam on the surface until I got to the rock face. Then I released the air from my BC and started down. I watched my depth gauge, and at thirty feet, I stopped and swam along the rock wall. I found the entrance easily. It was just as O’Brien and Carmichael described. The sign was affixed in the rock with rebar: “Warning: Off-limits! Do Not Enter! Divers Have Died Here.” Heavy wire mesh covered the entrance, but a hole had been cut into it. No doubt by Wold.

  I switched on my light and started in, careful not to catch a hose or valve on the jagged wire. I shined my light ahead, the beam disappearing in the black. Inside, the tunnel was about four feet in diameter and seemed to go on forever, into the bowels of the earth. The blue-and-yellow line that Wold had purchased in the dive shop was tied onto a rock on the side of the tunnel wall. It disappeared into nothingness. It would be good insurance, a way to find the route back to the opening without getting lost forever in the maze of Satan’s Cellar and swimming blind through tunnel after tunnel until every molecule of air was depleted from the tank. I followed the rope into the void. The tunnel angled down. When I next checked my gauge, I was at sixty-five feet.