Dangerous Depths (8 page)

“What’s the problem?” the captain asked. He
was obviously put out by our intrusion into their vacation.

“You may not drop your anchor here,” I
said.

“Why the hell not? There’s plenty of room.”
By now, the guy who had been standing on the bow had worked his way
to the cockpit.

“You be knowin’ what is underneath your
boat?” Snyder asked.

“Sure. Bunch of rocks and fish.”

“Dem things you be callin’ rocks are living
coral. You drop your anchor here, you be killing ‘em.”

“Jeez, what’s a few coral?”

“A few coral?” I said. “If every boat that
came in here did what you’re planning to do, there would be no
coral left. You want to get in the water and see the wonder, then
you’d better be protecting it. You see those elkhorn down there?”
The water was so shallow and clear, I could make out several big
ones, probably three or four feet tall, their tan “horns” golden in
shafts of sunlight. He could see them too.

“Your damned anchor and anchor chain will
break and crush them.” I was getting really angry and sounding more
like Elyse every day. But I figured someone needed to fill in for
her. I knew plenty of others who would too because they believed in
what Elyse was doing. But there would be some who would be glad she
wasn’t around to harass them or their customers.

“I would like you to either find a place to
anchor in sand or find a mooring ball,” I said.

Snyder and I watched him as he made his way
back out into the channel. It looked like he was going to the Baths
on the southernmost end of Virgin Gorda. Fine. Hopefully, he would
pick up a mooring over there.

Fifteen minutes later, we were bringing the
Wahoo
into North Sound. It was a big area of water,
protected all the way around by Virgin Gorda and two smaller
islands—Mosquito Island and Prickly Pear. Just around the bend was
Flower Island, Neville and Sylvia Freeman’s little piece of
paradise.

North Sound had a playground feel to it,
especially during the height of the season. Several small resorts
nestled against the hillsides. A couple of wind surfers zipped
across the water, their sails brilliantly colored triangles against
the sky. Up near the Bitter End, a tangle of kids in little day
sailers managed to veer off just in time to miss ramming others.
Their teacher was in the middle of it, shouting directions from his
own boat. A seaplane was landing over at Leverick Bay. Nothing like
the secluded islands.

In spite of all the activity, the Sound
retained its beauty. Flowers bloomed on hillsides and the turquoise
reefs of Eustatia Sound, too shallow for anything but a dinghy,
were well protected and preserved. Saba Rock was perched at the
opening. When I’d first been up to Virgin Gorda, a rickety wooden
bar was practically falling off into the water on the rock. Now, a
new restaurant with a few ritzy overnight accommodations had been
squeezed on the tiny rock.

Snyder and I tied the
Wahoo
to the
dock and went in to the bar. I let Snyder take the lead. He had a
rapport with people, especially the locals. If he didn’t know them
personally, he knew someone who knew someone who was a relative. I
wasn’t disappointed.

“Hey dar, Jimmy. What you be doin’ way over
here in da Sound?”

“Hey, Mr. Chitton. Didn’t know you be workin’
over dis way.”

“Been working here about two months now. Kind
of a second job till Cora can get back at work. She don hurt her
back trying to move one of dos damn mattresses at the resort. Tole
her dat wasn’t her job. She suppose to clean rooms, not move
furniture.”

“Dis be Detective Sampson,” Jimmy said.
“Hannah, dis is my second cousin’s husband’s brother.”

Hum, that would make him related? Maybe.
Chitton was an older man, around sixty, bloodshot brown eyes, loose
puffy skin sagging underneath.

“Hey dar, Detective. Nice to be meetin’ you,”
he said. “What can I be helpin’ you with?”

“You be workin’ couple nights back when dos
boat got broken into?” Jimmy asked.

“Yeah, I be here. Busy night. Lotsa boats
moored in the harbor. People on shore eating here, over at da
Bitter End, down at Biras Creek. Lotsa empty boats. Heard about dem
robberies next morning.”

“Did you see anyone around who seemed out of
place, suspicious that night?” I asked.

“Dat be a hard question. I was real busy,
makin’ drinks, talkin’ to folks at da bar. Some real nice folks in
here, wantin’ to know all about life on des islands. You know,
askin’ what it be like for da people who live here. How dey live,
schools, dat kinda thing. Nice when folks be really
interested.”

Yeah, I thought. It had taken me a while to
begin to understand the islanders. I’d learned some things the hard
way, like the fact that failure to greet another when you pass is
considered an insult. It wasn’t till O’Brien made this clear that
I’d understood why I was being shunned. But jeez, in the States, if
you said hello to everyone you passed, you’d be considered a freak.
It had been a real lesson in how cultural differences can cause
misunderstanding. I was still a long way from getting things
right.

“Da place was real noisy dat night,” Chitton
was saying. “Some kids running around on da docks, a few small
boats moving around in da dark water, people going back and forth
to shore. Any one of dem coulda been checkin’ for empty boats or
watchin’ for people to leave and boarding them. Dey would need to
keep a careful eye out, but it could be done if dey be gettin’ on
and off real quick like.”

“If you had to guess, who do you think?”
Snyder asked. “You be livin’ here ‘bouts.”

“Well, I sure don’t think it be any tourist.
Got to be local. Maybe kids. Dar be a few wild ones around, dem dat
da parents aren’t takin’ care with, watchin’ and givin’ a whippin’
now and again.”

“Maybe,” Jimmy said. “The thing is these
robberies be happening back over by Tortola—at Cane Garden Bay and
da like. Were a couple jus’ last night. That be a long way for kids
to be going. Be needin’ a decent boat.”

“Well, dat be a fact.”

“Would you give us a call, if you think of
anything else?” I asked.

“I sure will be doin’ dat.”

“Hope you wife gets better real soon,” I
said, shaking his hand.

“Oh, she be up and around in no time. No
worry. Da good Lord be providin’.”

This was another thing I’d learned about the
islanders. They seemed to trust in things working out. “No worry.
No problem.” These were the phrases of every day conversation,
whether it be in response to drought or to the fact that you’d just
splattered a jar of tomato sauce all over the supermarket floor.
But I could see the worry and fatigue creasing the bartender’s
face.

Snyder steered the boat the short distance to
the docks at the Bitter End. It wasn’t even noon. Things were
fairly quiet on shore, the restaurant empty. A clerk at the front
desk couldn’t tell us anything.

We walked down the sidewalk past rows of wind
surfers tipped on their sides in the sand and stopped at the
sailing school office. We talked to several of the instructors,
hoping that they might have noticed someone who seemed out of place
on the water paddling around near the boats.

“Hell, Saturday in the harbor. We’re just
trying to keep our students from crashing into the docks or
colliding with a windsurfer. Lots of activity in the Sound. Nothing
out of the ordinary.”

We made one more stop down at the grocery
store. A couple of sailors were inside, trying to figure out what
they would need to get them to the next grocery store. They were
going to Cooper Island and then around Peter and Norman.

“Won’t be findin’ no groceries in dos
places,” the clerk said. “Ice if you’re lucky. Less’n the
Libation
be comin’ by.”

“What’s the
Libation
?” one of the
sailors asked.

“Dat be da floating supply boat just started
da business. Young folks with a real good idea ya ask me. Usually
have bread, some fruit, rum. You best be gettin’ what you need
here.”

After they grabbed a cart and started down
the aisle, we stepped up to the counter.

“Hey dar, ma’am, I be Deputy Snyder over by
Road Town. Dis here be Detective Sampson.”

“Sure, I’m Karie Brown. I be livin’ next to
your uncle over by Spanish Town. He be talkin’ about you. How you
be gettin’ hurt. You lookin’ good.”

“That be Uncle George. How he be doin’? I got
to get over to see dat man,” Snyder said. Pleasantries tended to,
he got down to business. “We be checkin’ about dos break-ins on da
boats two nights ago. That woulda been Saturday night.”

“Yeah, everybody in da harbor be talkin’
about it.”

“You remember who was around on Saturday?” I
asked.

“Same’s mos’ every day. Sailors in for
supplies, kids coming in for ice cream. Chef at da restaurant
always comin’ in here in a panic on Saturdays. Running outta one
thing or da other on Friday and gotta have more for da Saturday
crowd. Dis last Saturday, it was eggs, cheese, and vermouth. Wanted
me to sell him the eggs I had on reserve for da
Libation
.

Dat man was angry. Told him I wasn’t going to
sell him da eggs. Dos folks on dat supply boat already got a weekly
order in. Nice young couple. They depend on picking up da eggs
‘long with da other stuff dey order—da bread, fresh baked
goods.

Dey comes in every Saturday late to pick da
stuff up. Spend da night, den motor from boat to boat in da harbor
on Sunday morning. Then dey head down to do a circuit round da
Baths, Cooper, the Bight next morning. Dey say da fresh croissants
be one big hit on Sunday morning in da Sound for folks lounging on
dar boats. Guess I be rambling, but anyways, I tole da chef he’d
have to be makin’ his sauce without dem eggs.”

“’How the hell I supposed to make hollandaise
without da eggs?’ dat chef be tellin’ me. I tells him dat why dey
call him chef ain’t it?” When Karie laughed, her whole body
shook.

“You be givin’ my greeting to my uncle,”
Snyder said as we headed out the door.

Snyder and I made the rounds in the harbor,
talking to the skippers of the boats that had been robbed. All of
them told the same story. They’d been ashore eating dinner and
dancing. One of the local steel drum bands had played long into the
early morning hours.

None had noticed that things were missing
until the next morning. One guy had lost an underwater camera setup
worth thousands. Others reported missing binoculars, watches, GPS
units, computers. One woman said she had rings, earrings, and
necklaces taken, expensive stuff—diamonds, emeralds, fourteen-karat
gold. Why she needed that kind of jewelry on a boat was beyond
me.

Snyder and I raced a storm back to Road Town
and made it into the dock right before the sky opened up with a
hard soaking downpour, water coming down in sheets. We ran for
shelter under an awning at the dock and watched the ocean turn gun
metal and seething.

Amos Porter was a big guy in work boots and
new Levis. He was standing in the middle of the gravel pit, wearing
a hard hat, leaning on a shovel. He didn’t look like he’d been
using it though. His shirt was pressed and spotless, not a speck of
perspiration on his face. But I could tell Porter was used to hard
work. He was brawny, the creases of his hands permanently embedded
with dirt and oil.

I’d heard that he was a shrewd businessman,
self-made and determined. He’d worked hard to get where he was. He
supplied gravel to just about everyone on the island, had the
contract for the roads and the new airport construction, and worked
with most of the developers. Two back hoes were parked behind a
modular unit and another was lifting huge chunks of earth into a
dump truck. Another one waited behind the first, exhaust wafting
from its stack. This was a major operation, with hundreds of
thousands of dollars invested in equipment.

I’d left Snyder back at the office and told
him to tell Dunn that I was going for a late lunch and then to have
Hall check out the burns on my shoulder. I’d be back in the
morning. All lies, but not Jimmy’s lies. He would simply be passing
on what I told him.

The gravel pit was just around the point, a
huge scar in the landscape above Simpson’s Bay. The sun was already
back out, but I could see the effects of the heavy rain. Gullies of
water were running through the pit and washing sediment into the
bay. A stream of brown was spreading over the turquoise water in an
increasingly large arc. It looked even worse than what Elyse had
described in her report.

As I walked up, Porter asked, “What can I be
doin’ for you, ma’am?” confused about what someone who didn’t look
like she drove a back hoe was doing at his gravel pit.

“I’m Hannah Sampson, Tortola police,” I said,
offering a hand. He wiped his palms on his jeans, a habit he’d
clearly developed and refined over the years. His grasp was
firm.

“Police? One of my guys be in trouble?”

“No, nothing like that.” I was surprised that
was his first thought and wondered what kind of trouble his guys
got into.

“Dey be a kinda a misbehaving bunch sometime,
down at da Doubloon,” he explained.

I wasn’t at all sure how to begin a
conversation about Elyse. Dunn had made it painfully clear that I
was not to pursue any investigation into the explosion on her boat.
And I didn’t know whether Elyse had ever confronted Porter about
the runoff. Only one way to find out. I decided on the direct
approach.

“Do you know Elyse Henry?”

“Sure, I know her.” His voice hardened and he
dropped his light-hearted island slang. “She was down here last
week. She said she was writing up a report about the effects of the
gravel pit on the bay. If she thinks she can shut down my
operation, she’s mistaken. I’ve worked hard to get where I am. I’m
not going to give it up because she’s worried about a few fish and
coral in the harbor. What’s this got to do with the police?”