Authors: Wayne Batson
G put on hot water for his vast selection of gourmet teas. Surely Sir Drystan would find one to his liking. Perhaps Glengettie or Murroughs, specialty teas that G had imported from Wales. G smiled and rubbed his hands together.
Yes,
he thought,
today will be a day to remember
.
G booted up his office computer. Then he stiffened. He’d just caught a meandering wisp of something unpleasant.
No,
he thought.
Not today.
He raced into the restrooms and looked around. Nothing had backed up. Nothing had been left…unflushed. The smell of the room was sterile if not fragrant. Back in his office, he sniffed around, but did not detect the odor again.
Thus, G continued his usual bustle around the showroom. He flicked on all the hanging lights and polished anything that looked the least bit smudged or dusty. By the time his lordship Sir Drystan appeared, the diamond of G’s showroom had been polished to the epitome of luster and class.
When his lordship’s chauffeur opened the showroom door, G was waiting. But Sir Drystan did not enter alone. A ravishing young woman stood at his elbow. She was raven-haired and had large dark eyes, dark enough to get lost in for a very long time…if one were so inclined. G was definitely so inclined.
Had he been a cartoon character, his tongue would have rolled out of his mouth, over his chin, and half way across the showroom floor. This woman wore a stark, royal blue dress with a wide pearlescent belt. She was curvy but not tawdry. In every way, she seemed poised, mannered and wise beyond her apparent years.
“Ah, Mister Vasquez,” Sir Drystan Pembroke said, extending his hand. “So good to finally meet you.”
G shook his eyes off the woman and shook the master yachtsman’s hand. “Sir Drystan, you are kind to grace Spinnaker Sales with your presence.” He paused and nodded graciously at the woman. “Is this your wife?”
“Ah, you old letch,” Sir Drystan said, reddening. “This is my daughter, Cambriard.”
G took her offered hand and bowed over it. “My pleasure, Ms. Pembroke.”
“All mine,” she replied. She turned to Sir Drystan. “Daddy, you never said he was so debonair.”
“Tut, Cambie,” he replied. “We’re here for boats not boys.”
“You’re here for boats,” she murmured.
“I’m afraid we’re in a bit of a time crunch,” said Pembroke with a sideways glance at his daughter. “I wonder if we couldn’t see the models we discussed?”
“Of course,” G said. “You won’t find a more complete selection anywhere in the world.”
“Very good,” he replied. “If your inventory is as complete as you indicated in our previous discussions, this shouldn’t take long at all.”
G led his lordship on a flourishing tour of the best racing yachts Spinnaker Sales had to offer. He knew he’d impressed father—and daughter—with his voluminous knowledge of each boat’s details: draft, keel, fuel capacity, overall beam, water displacement, etc. Facts and figures, delivered with shark cunning, and a few devastating winks for Cambie—G thought sure he’d made the sale.
Ha,
he laughed to himself.
Made the sale. I’m charming without even trying.
But at the edge of his senses, every now and then, an odd, unpleasant odor made itself known. Neither Sir Pembroke nor his gorgeous daughter seemed to notice it, but G did. He wondered if perhaps a gull had found its way into the building’s ventilation system and summarily died.
Most unsavory,
he thought.
And bound to get more unsavory.
Still, Sir Pembroke and his daughter were all smiles as they boarded boat after boat. “I must admit, Mr. Vasquez, I didn’t really expect your selection to live up to your rather glowing description.” Pembroke paused a beat. “But honestly, I have never seen anything like this. So much quality at my fingertips. I should like to flood your showroom and take each and every hull out for a spin.”
“Thank you, Sir Drystan,” G said. “There are still more to see, if you wish?”
“I believe we’ve seen more than enough to close the deal. I’m going to add four additional hulls to my order,” Pembroke said, giddy with the purchase and the assets he had which allowed the purchase. “And Mr. Vasquez, I am very good friends with New Zealand’s captain, Charles Draper. I plan to recommend your establishment—wait a moment.” Pembroke stared behind G. “That’s a Jeanneau frame if I’ve ever seen one.”
“Ah,” G said, “the 42DS.”
“Is that the one, Daddy?” Cambie clutched her hands together and bounced.
“I believe it is,” Pembroke replied. He leaned conspiratorially towards G and whispered, “I promised Cambie I’d get her a 42 if you had it in the showroom. Well done, Mr. Vasquez.”
“Would you like to go aboard?” G asked, winking at Pembroke and taking Cambie’s hand.
“Yes, oh, yes I would,” she said.
They covered forty yards of showroom floor in an instant. “Watch your step,” G said, giving the shapely daughter a hand up. He let Sir Drystan board next and then clambered up after them. The moment he set foot on deck, G knew something was wrong.
The odor was there, like a wall. From the sour look on Sir Drystan’s face, it was clear his lordship had scented it as well.
Apparently, Cambie wasn’t too worried about it. “I’m going to go below,” she said.
“No, wait,” G called after her. “Let me…” But she was already down the stairs.
G let out a dreadful sigh. He was greatly fearful that she’d find a dead seagull. When he heard her scream, he felt sure she’d found something worse.
Lord Pembroke ran to the below-deck stair just in time to catch his daughter as she leaped and tripped over the hatch. Her eyes bulged and she could barely breathe. “Blood,” she gasped.
“What in the world?” Sir Drystan exclaimed as she dragged him to exit the deck. “What did you see?”
“Wait!’ G cried. “I’m sure there’s a misunderstanding. Wait for me at the front desk. I’ll see to this!” G bounded down the steps and saw nothing at first. He looked in the bedroom behind the stairs and found nothing. There was nothing amiss anywhere in the main cabin. The smell was another matter. Each breath was like being hit with a sickly sweet, scented hammer.
G knew where it was. The fore cabin, the master bedroom. G stepped around the small dining table, passed the galley, and stumbled into the room. Sprawled across the king bed was a very bloody corpse.
It was a man, someone G had seen before in the company of one of his “private” clients. But this man’s skin was seven shades of vile. Blood had pooled on the bed beneath his skull. And his arms and legs were spread as if he had died while making a snow angel.
G doubled over and heaved on the floor. He clambered out of the room, vomiting as he lunged toward the stairs. He needed to get containment on this, but he had no idea how he could. Pembroke and his daughter had seen the body. What would they tell the authorities? Maybe, just maybe, G thought, he could put a spin on the whole thing and persuade his Welsh visitors not to go to the police. Let G handle it, he would say. After all, it would be a Spinnaker Sales affair.
But worse than that task was the circumstances around the body itself: how it had gotten there, why it had been left there, and who could have so thoroughly dispatched such a capable…employee. As he descended the ladder to the showroom floor, G cringed inwardly. He thought of the big guy with the silver case.
Spector.
His stomach already roiling, G found no one at the front desk. Pembroke and his sexy kitten of a daughter…had gone. Things were spinning out of control. It was a vortex, and G felt he was caught in its relentless pull. He stared at the phone. He had a call to make, but he knew very well it could be his last call. His employer didn’t like loose ends.
He punched in the number but hesitated to hit send. In the span of just a few minutes the vision of his mega-commission party had vanished. Pembroke’s car was long gone. He took a deep breath and hit send. Losing a commission paled in comparison to other things he might lose.
Chapter 14
The fake brunette and the fake blonde charge nurses sang a different song when I entered the Cardiology wing this time.
“Dr. Shepherd’s procedure is running a little long,” said Nurse Pelagris, the blond. “But please wait in his office.”
“Can I get you a coffee…soft drink?” Nurse Brandywine asked. She wore her lustrous brunette hair in a decidedly grandmotherish bob.
“Yes, thank you,” I replied. “A Dr. Pepper, if you have it.”
I was barely in Shepherd’s office five minutes before Nurse Brandywine showed up with a large cup of ice and a tall Dr. Pepper.
“Here ya’ go, officer,” she said. Technically, I’m not an officer of anything. Not in the sense she was using the word. But I was okay with her flawed assumption.
I was also okay with her change in attitude. There wasn’t a hint of resentment in her manner, but I knew she had to be feeling it. Doc Shepherd must have had a few more words with his charge nurses after I left the last time. I hadn’t known the good doctor for very long, but what I’d learned of him so far, I liked.
I sipped my soda and scanned the quilt of awards and diplomas on the office walls. I noticed that the dates on most of them were current, this year even. I considered all the recognition, all the awards, etc. I felt sure it wasn’t ego-stroking. Not for Doc Shepherd. The guy seemed about as humble as can be. Old school humble.
I laughed to myself. I should have figured it out sooner. After all, I was sitting in the office of a heart surgeon. Those diplomas, certificates, and awards weren’t for Doc Shepherd at all. They were decorations of comfort for his patients. If someone was going to have a doctor cut into his heart, it would be more than a little peace of mind to have a surgeon as qualified as Doc Shepherd. Each one of those framed pieces of paper was a security blanket.
The office door opened. “Ah, Officer Spector!” Doc Shepherd shook my hand. His bow tie was bright red today. He wore a traditional white lab coat, and his mustache was waxed into a gleeful curl. “I’m dreadfully sorry about the delay.”
“Complications?”
“Not with the procedure,” he said. “Laser angioplasty is fairly routine. The problem was the Westing excimer laser was not the one I requested. Those Westing catheters are unwieldy as heck. I much prefer the Irwin implement and had to wait close to thirty minutes for its delivery.” He instantly realized he’d gone over my head and smiled. “All jargon,” he said. He closed the office door and waddled over to his seat behind the desk.
He folded his hands on the blotter and stared thoughtfully. “I must confess I was a bit worried about you,” he said. “All that ruckus on the phone and then the abrupt disconnect…I almost called the police. Of course that would be redundant, wouldn’t it? And you look none the worse for wear.”
“Unexpected visitor is all,” I said. “He thought it would be funny to jump out and surprise me. Joke’s on him, I guess.”
He twirled his mustache. “Quite.”
“The blade,” I said, wanting to divert his keen eyes and keener mind. “You know something about it?”
He blinked. “Yes, yes I do. More than I ever wanted to know, in fact.”
I leaned forward, rested my forearms on his desk.
“I didn’t waste my time with database queries,” he said. “Coming from a long line of surgeons, I had much better primary sources, my Uncle Timothy being the best. I sent him a scanned image, and he called me straight along. Surgical steel, he confirmed, as I suspected he would. Somewhat inferior grade cutting steel of its day, but nonetheless effective given its use.”
“What kind of instrument is it?” I asked. “What’s it for?”
“Well, it’s the length of the instrument that gives it away…that and the retractable blade. It was used mainly in the late 1800’s and is probably one of a very few still in existence. My uncle recognized it from a particularly gruesome assortment called the Grisham Collection. It is called Cain’s Dagger, and it was used for abortion.”
Abortion.
The word sat hard in the pit of my stomach. I swallowed down bile and drifted back in my chair. For the moment, all association with the Smiling Jack case disintegrated.
Beyond all sunrises and sunsets…beyond all magnificent storms and the myriad intricacies of life in the natural world, there was nothing so beautiful and precious as a child. I had held a newborn once, a baby girl. I cradled her protectively in my arms and stared down at her in awe. Barely a handful and yet, a person. A thinking, feeling person. One who would work and play, hope and dream, love and weep.
And not just priceless for what she might become but for what she already was. From the most minute cells and their organelles to the major body systems, respiration, circulation, even the spectacular nervous system…all designed to work synergistically—she was a miracle of life. And yet, how many like her had been carelessly destroyed? Public and private industry measurements make the number at approximately 42 million children slain worldwide through abortion.
But my sources were more accurate, and I knew the number was higher. Much higher.
I squeezed my eyes shut and felt the rage surge begin to bubble up inside me. I can abide all manner of ignorance, but not this kind…and not with so much at stake. Those who would scream to heaven for justice if someone broke into the Louvre and slashed paintings or took a hammer to the sculptures—those very same—would smugly affirm that murdering an unborn child was some kind of right.
How I longed to visit wrath on any who commit such crimes. Maybe, someday I could. And yet, I knew that behind this scourge was a foe beyond my means. One who, perhaps more than any other, deserved the hand of judgment, and yet I had not the power or authority to render the due sentence.