“You’re closing the case?”
“God damn it,” he said. “Do you really think that’s what I meant?”
“But are you?”
He took a deep breath, spoke more softly. “We don’t close unsolved murder cases, if that’s what this is, but there’s no way—”
“If that’s what this is?”
“You heard me.”
“Meaning you still think DuPree is guilty, that the tape is a fake?”
He didn’t answer, just gazed at her, foam reddening under his chin.
She pressed on. “How would that have been done? Is there any evidence to back it up? Have you had the tape analyzed?”
“Of course.”
“And?”
He turned back to the mirror, saw the blood. “Christ. Why didn’t you tell me I was bleeding?” He patted his chin with a towel.
“And?”
Clay put his hands on the edge of the sink, as though holding himself up. “According to the serial number on the cassette, it’s from a surveillance system that went out of business soon after the killing.”
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“So that’s that,” Nell said. “The tape is authentic.”
Clay didn’t answer, just stood there slumped, blood still seeping from his cut.
“What am I missing?” Nell said.
“I’ve tried to tell you but I can’t get through. If it’s true that DuPree is innocent—”
“If?”
He talked over her. “—then you—we—are probably going to have to live with never knowing. Cold cases are hard enough, but with no forensics, no DNA, the only way they get solved is if someone who knows comes forward. And if that hasn’t happened in all this time, what are the chances now?”
“That’s why it has to be me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m the witness,” Nell said. “The only one.”
Clay spoke, so softly she almost didn’t hear.
“What did you say?” she said, wanting to be sure.
“I said maybe you should see someone.”
Rock bottom. Nell walked out of the room.
She went onto
the dock. Vicki lay on a towel, wearing a thong, gleaming with sunblock, reading a magazine.
“Hey,” she said, rolling over. “I tried the beach, but those little bugs came.”
Nell sat down, dangled her feet. A needlefish swam by, just under the surface. She watched it, a beautiful creature that seemed at ease, and felt a little more at ease herself. “The water’s the same color as your ring,” she said.
“Huh?”
“Emerald.”
“Oh, right,” Vicki said. “Funny how the ocean, you know, changes.” She came over and sat beside Nell, dangling her feet, too.
They were short and square, the nails painted purple. The tide was high now, waves no longer breaking over the reef; just beyond it, a
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gull swooped down, splashed into the sea, came up with something silvery wriggling in its beak.
“Feel like lobster for dinner?” Nell said.
“My absolute fave,” Vicki said. “Did you bring some?”
Nell turned and smiled. She was starting to like Vicki. “I was thinking we’d take the Zodiac out to the reef and jook a few.”
“Jook?”
“That’s how you say spear in these parts.”
“Spear? You want to go spear actual lobsters?”
“There’s a ledge on the far side of the reef they like. I’ll do the diving. You handle the boat.”
“Me?” Vicki glanced around, a little wildly, saw Kirk walking on the beach, a beer in his hand. “Kirk! Kirk!” She waved, her pinkie pointed high.
Kirk drove the
Zodiac. Nell sat in the bow. They took masks, fins and snorkels, plus Hawaiian slings, spring steel spears and a big pail for the lobsters.
“Take it just past the cut,” Nell said, “on the north side.”
“Aye aye,” said Kirk. He wore sunglasses and a bathing suit, a big guy, bigger than his brother, but way past being in shape. He opened the throttle and the Zodiac roared across the water, curved through the narrow gap in the reef—Nell could see staghorn coral on both sides, a few feet below the surface. Kirk killed the engine and the Zodiac rose on its bow wave and stopped, then slid back in the swell.
“Here?” he said.
“Here.” She tossed the anchor over the side, the water so clear she could follow it all the way to the bottom. It settled on the sand.
The current started taking them south. Down below, the flukes of the anchor dug in and the line tightened. They rocked gently on the water.
“Didn’t mean to be all mysterious, swoopin’ in like this,” Kirk said. “Business.”
“No problem.”
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“Keep a secret?”
Nell nodded, dipping her mask in the water.
“We, meaning DK—my share’s in trust for as long as I’m in poli-tics—maybe got ourselves a buyer.”
“Someone wants to buy the company?”
“Keeping current management in place, plus a capital infusion.
Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
“This extra capital means we—Duke—will be needin’ some new people. Executive-type people. Think Clay’d be interested?”
“He’d have to retire from the force?”
“Oh, yeah—this would be full-time, but the compensation pack-age would be real good.”
Nell almost said:
No way he’s ready to leave the force.
But was that right? She no longer knew. “I’m not sure,” she said. “Why don’t you ask him?”
“Clay’s probably doing it as we speak,” Kirk said. “This is just another one of my feeble attempts to see the future before it happens.”
Nell laughed, surprised. She didn’t know Kirk well, had never heard him say anything like that. Kirk laughed, too, and then his face went serious.
“How’re you doin’ with all this?” he said. “Must be tough.”
“I’m okay,” Nell said.
He shook his head in an admiring way. “I believe it,” he said. “But if there’s ever anything I can do, just say the word.”
“Know any hypnotists?” The question just popped out.
“Matter of fact, I do,” Kirk said. “Guy cured tendonitis in my elbow in two sessions, got me back on the golf course. But I don’t think he performs.”
“Performs?”
“At parties. That what you want him for, set the guests to crawling around, barking like dogs and stuff?”
Nell laughed again. “I’m looking for help with my memory.”
“For remembering all the paintings?”
“No,” Nell said. “It’s more about the case.”
“The case?” Kirk said. “Where does a hypnotist come in?”
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“You know I was the eyewitness.”
“The only one?” Kirk said. “I’m a little hazy on the details.”
“The only one,” Nell said. “And the thing is, Kirk, I know I got a good look at the killer. I just can’t call it up. So I was thinking that maybe a hypnotist . . .”
“How good a look?” said Kirk.
Nell described the scene on the Parish Street Pier.
“The bandanna slipped?” Kirk said.
“Just for a second, and only partially. But if it’s true that the mind remembers everything somewhere, then—”
“Gotcha,” Kirk said. “I can set you up.”
Nell saw her grateful self reflected in Kirk’s sunglasses. “Thanks,”
she said.
“Don’t mention it,” said Kirk. “We all ready?”
“Yup.” Nell spat in her mask, swished it in the sea, put it on, slipped into her fins.
Kirk handed her a sling and spear. “What’s the depth?”
“About forty-five feet right at the bottom,” Nell said, sticking the snorkel mouthpiece between her teeth.
“Oh, boy,” said Kirk. He sighed, reached for his own mask. Nell flashed him the okay sign and rolled backward into the sea.
She swam along
the outside edge of the reef until she spotted a familiar coral head, a huge brain coral topped by a purple sea fan, then took three deep breaths, jackknifed into a smooth duck dive and kicked her way down, strong easy kicks, upper body still. Normally she noticed all kinds of things on the reef, but with a spear in her hand it was all a blur, her eyes on the lookout for just one sight, in this case the dark orange, knobby antennae of the spiny lobster.
Nell reached bottom. The anchor lay dug into the sand, just a few feet from the base of the reef, the line angling toward the surface. She glanced up, saw Kirk on his way, legs spread too wide, arms not at his sides, back bent, chest and gut sticking out: a perfect how-not-to demonstration. He came to a stop about ten feet above her, paddled his hands around for a moment, pale eyes bulging
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behind his mask, then shook his head and started back up.
Nell turned to the reef. A sharp ledge jutted out two or three feet from the bottom, with a dark crevice underneath, the kind of place lobsters liked to spend the daylight hours. Nell gave one little kick, careful not to stir up the bottom, and stuck her head in. For a moment or two, she could see nothing. Then her eyes adjusted to the dimness, and yes, deep in the crevice: two antennae, dark orange and knobby, already raised at a wary angle; huge, thick, maybe the biggest she’d ever seen. Nell already had the spear set in the wooden shaft and nocked. She held the shaft out front, drew back on the thick rubber tubing with her right hand as far as she could, then sighted and released.
The spear shot forward, pierced the carapace of the lobster with a cracking sound, very clear in the enclosed space. After that, a lot of commotion: stirred-up sand, clanging steel, the near end of the spear waving around; not a kill shot, but good enough as long as the barb had stuck. Nell swam in deeper, got one hand on the end of the spear and pulled. Nothing; meaning that the lobster had gotten into a hole somewhere. She felt a little pressure deep in her throat, first sign of the carbon dioxide buildup that would trigger the need to breathe.
The lobster wasn’t going anywhere; she could swim up for air, come back down. But first, one more yank on the spear, this time harder.
Nell yanked on the spear.
She heard another metallic clang, this one seeming to come from the core of the reef itself. Then came a dull, watery crash, and with it an enormous weight fell on the backs of her legs, pinning her to the bottom, and everything went dark. The roof had fallen in.
Nell squirmed around, her heart pounding so loud it might have been a separate object nearby, outside her body. Her legs were stuck.
She reached for a handhold, grabbed something rocky and sharp, tried again, this time digging her fingers into the sand. Nell twisted, pulled, tried with all her might to get loose, and then, with a tearing of skin she registered as pain but did not feel, her right leg slid out from under the rubble. Now she had more range, could double back on herself, use her hands to push aside all the debris. She heaved at the chunks of coral, massive and heavy, pressure building and building in
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her lungs. Her left leg came free. She rolled over, exploded off the bottom and into the light, kicking and kicking, not long, controlled kicks, but frantic, up toward the shining surface; and so slow with both fins gone. Then she could no longer hold in the air and it burst from her lungs; she saw nothing but flashes, black and gold.
“Nell? Nell?”
Black-and-gold flashes receded, dimmed, vanished. She floated in the warm water, facedown, breathing air—so fresh—through her snorkel.
“Nell? You all right?”
She turned her head, saw Kirk leaning toward her over the side of the Zodiac. Nell raised her hand, started coughing.
“Christ. You’re bleeding.” He helped her into the boat.
Everybody made a
big fuss—Vicki’s eyes so wide the whites showed all around her irises—but it was really nothing, just scrapes, cuts, a few sea-urchin needles. She didn’t even need stitches. While there was still enough daylight, Clay went out to the reef with scuba gear and had a look.
“Front part of the ledge just caved in,” he reported. He found Nell’s spear, the lobster, an eight-pounder, the biggest Nell had ever seen, still on it; and delicious under the stars that night. The anchor had come loose somewhere along the way. Clay brought that back, too, except for one of the flukes, broken off.
Am I disturbing you?”
Susannah. Yeah, kind of disturbing him. Pirate was standing at his window at the Ambassador Suites, watching a woman at a bus stop. She wore a tank top, had big breasts, mostly exposed from this angle. Pirate tried to imagine what they would feel like and couldn’t. That part of him had gone—what was the word?
like the bears?—dormant. But maybe it was starting to wake up. An important development, right? Springtime. So yes, Susannah was disturbing him. Still, Pirate wanted to be polite.
“Nah,” he said.
“I have some news,” she said.
“Yeah?” She didn’t sound the same as normal, not so warm and friendly, so Pirate got ready for something bad. But what could that be? Bad was over; he was free.
“It’s about the settlement,” Susannah said.
“The . . . uh, oh, yeah.”
“We’ve had an offer. It’s a good offer, and while there’s always the option of taking a hard-line stance and holding out for more, our impression is that they won’t go much higher, resulting in any extra payment merely being lost to legal fees.”
Pirate tried to follow all that but got lost along the way. “Settlement,” he said. A strange word—didn’t it mean a village or something,
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like an Indian settlement? The woman at the bus stop had a kind of dark reddish skin; maybe she was Indian, although her breasts seemed a little lighter. Were the breasts of Indian women lighter than the rest of them? There were lots of facts he didn’t know. The bus came and she climbed on and went away.
“Settlement?” Susannah was saying. “Is that what you just said?
Meaning you want to settle? Shouldn’t you hear the amount first?”
“Probably,” said Pirate.
“As I explained, we think this is a good offer, although no monetary compensation can ever be adequate in a case like yours. Understanding that should help to keep emotions in check. This is really about going forward in a practical way.”