Deadly Shoals (30 page)

“Him? You mean Gomes?”

“Aye. The clerk.”

“He gave it to you—just like that?”

“My name was on it! It proved that the schooner is mine!”

“He didn't make any objection?”

Captain Stackpole said angrily, “Yes, he did object. He was bloody difficult about it, as it happens. I had to show him my fist. And now you're wondering if I stabbed him.”

Stackpole had certainly had the opportunity for murder, Wiki thought, remembering the time lapse before he had rejoined the gaucho party on the riverside path to the salt dunes. At the time, he hadn't paid much attention, because he had been watching Bernantio study the tracks.

He didn't have a chance to speak, however, because Stackpole carried on. “When I went back into the store my only intention was to buy that poncho, just the way I said I would after you told me that we were likely to be out all night. All the time, though, I was thinking about that bill of sale, because it proved that Adams really had purchased the
Grim Reaper
on my behalf—that I wasn't the fool you reckoned. So I thought I should have it, and told the clerk to give it to me. He argued, but he couldn't deny that my name was on it, and so he finally handed it over.”

“Why didn't you tell me this earlier?”

“Once I realized that schooner was well and truly gone, I didn't think the deed of sale was all that important. Then, when we found the corpse of the clerk, I kept my mouth shut because I knew damn well that you'd jump to conclusions and arrest me.”

“So that's why you didn't report to Captain Wilkes,” Wiki realized. At last, he thought, he had found a reason for Stackpole's strange evasiveness.

“Once he realized I'd had both motive and opportunity for murder, he would've clapped me in the brig, for sure,” Stackpole moodily confirmed.

“But it's obvious you didn't kill the clerk!”

Contrary as ever, the whaling master declined to look relieved. Instead, he blinked suspiciously, and demanded, “What makes you so sure?”

“Because the front door was locked and the key was in the clerk's pocket.” His listener looked blank, so Wiki explained, “Dead men don't get up to lock doors.”

Silence, broken only by the slow creak of the hull as the brigantine wallowed on the fog-swathed swell. Then Stackpole said with abrupt understanding, “So who locked the door after the clerk was dead?”

Wiki shrugged. “His killer, presumably.”

“And he couldn't have used the clerk's key and then put it back in his pocket, because he had to lock the door behind him after he let himself out.”

“Exactly.”

“So he had his own key.”

“Or had
found
a key. When we searched Adams's corpse, the pockets were empty, remember. It's logical that Adams had a key to the store, and the killer took it, along with everything else.”

Stackpole paused, thinking this over, and then said reluctantly, “Are you sure we did a proper search?”

Wiki had had the same doubts. At the time, dark had been falling, and they had been too spooked by the sudden detachment of the grinning skull to heave the corpse right out of the trench. Despite its apparent good state of preservation, it had been too easy to imagine the entire skeleton breaking up if they lifted the body too roughly, so instead they had felt through his clothes.

Nevertheless, Wiki said firmly, “I'm sure of it, just as I'm certain that the man who murdered him took away all the contents of his pockets—including his key, which he used to lock the door behind him after the clerk was killed.”

“So you reckon that whoever killed Adams killed the clerk, too?”

“It seems logical.”

Another long silence. Then Stackpole said slowly, “I agree that it seems likely that whoever killed Adams found the key in his clothes, and pocketed it for future use. But instead of getting clear of the Río Negro while he had the chance, he waited around for quite a few days before he got around to breaking into the store and committing the second murder, which sounds kinda bizarre to me. Why didn't he go with the
Grim Reaper
when she sailed? What's your explanation for that? And why did he kill the clerk at all?”

“I assume he wanted to get hold of the deed of sale.”

“Then I foiled him, didn't I,” said the whaleman sardonically.

“You certainly did. Just like everyone else, including me,” Wiki dryly returned, “he had no idea that you'd taken it off the clerk.”

Stackpole had the grace to look sheepish, but his tone was as assertive as ever as he demanded, “And what about that other door—the outside door to the surgery that Ducatel opened?”

“It seems much more likely that the killer used the key to the front door.”

“I meant, what if the killer had a key to the surgery already?”

Wiki was puzzled. “What are you trying to say?”

“That Ducatel looks like the prime suspect to me!”

Captain Stackpole's voice had risen, and Wiki touched his arm, noticing that Alf Seward had looked in their direction. More quietly, the whaling master went on, “We all know that Ducatel's on his beam ends, financially.”

“Is he? I thought he'd done rather well out of marrying the daughter of a landowner. He looked prosperous enough to me.”

“But he attended Captain Hallett at his deathbed, remember—and I reckon he was lying in his teeth when he said that Caleb Adams never came to the ranch. And I reckon that Adams was in on the plot, too.”

“What plot?” said Wiki, more confused than ever.

“To seize the schooner, and get away with my thousand dollars! But in order to cover up the crime that quack of a surgeon had to steal that deed, and so he headed for the store and killed the clerk when he wouldn't hand it over.”

“What about Adams? Surely you don't think Dr. Ducatel killed him?”

“Oh, Ducatel intended to double-cross him all along, and as you said, it's logical that the same man murdered both Adams and the clerk. Yup,” said the whaleman, patently happy with his conclusions. “He lied to us about Adams goin' to the ranch, and then Hallett died—Ducatel might have had a hand in that, too, by thunder! And so the money and the schooner fell into his hands, only the schooner was up at the salt dunes. He followed Caleb Adams to the schooner, but for some reason Adams had headed to the Gualichú tree, and so he killed him there. It must have been a shock to find that Adams didn't have the deed on him, as Ducatel needed it to make the ownership of the schooner look legal, but finally he worked out that it must be somewhere at the store, and that's how the clerk got killed.”

“But why kill the clerk at all?”

“What?”

“Ducatel had his own key to the store, and no one would have thought it curious if the doctor had been seen going into his surgery, even if he hadn't been there for a while. He could have easily searched for the deed when the clerk wasn't there—after dark, for instance.”

“Mebbe he just plain wanted to get rid of him.”

“Out of plain bad temper?” Wiki dryly queried.

“Why not?” The whaleman's tone was more aggressive than ever. “It sure looked to me as if someone hacked down the old man in a murderous rage.”

It had looked like that to Wiki, too. He said, “I'd like to know how you got the idea that Ducatel and Adams were together in a plot to rob you.”

“Of both my money and my schooner,” Stackpole confirmed, nodding energetically.

“But the deed proves that the sale really happened. Caleb Adams could have been acting honestly.”

“He was another innocent victim, you reckon?” The whaling master's tone was cynical.

“It's possible.”

“Because of the deed of sale?”

“Aye.” Wishing to end this pointless argument, Wiki said on a practical note, “Give it to me, and I'll get it to Captain Wilkes as soon as this fog lifts. It's lucky in a way that the wind died, as the
Vin
is still close by. You'll come with me?”

He expected Stackpole to shake his head, as without doubt he wouldn't be anxious to try to explain to the short-tempered expedition commodore why he had held the deed for so many days without telling anyone about it. Instead, however, the whaling master looked around, his expression back to being shifty.

Lowering his voice still further, he confided, “There's something very odd about that deed.”

“Odd?” echoed Wiki.

“That's why I was making for the
Swallow
when this goddamned fog came down.”

“The
Swallow
?”

“Aye. I wanted to see you, and consult. I took a while to notice it, and now, no matter how hard I think, I can't see an answer to the puzzle.”

“What do you mean?”

“Take a look for yourself.”

Glancing around again to make sure they weren't observed, the whaling master reached into the back pocket of his trousers, and pried out a folded document. He didn't bother to check it. Instead, he thrust it at Wiki.

It was the deed of sale. After he had unfolded it, Wiki looked at it for a long time. Adams's signature, like the script that filled the blank spaces on the form, was clear enough, but, just as remembered, the signature in the space for Hallett's name was a messy, indecipherable scrawl.

Losing patience, Stackpole prompted, “The date. And bear in mind that Captain Hallett passed away on Sunday, 13 January.”

Wiki read the date on the deed of sale. Unlike the signature, it was perfectly clear: January 14, 1839. He looked at Stackpole in astonishment, and the whaling master nodded sagely back.

When he was supposed to have signed his schooner away, Captain Hallett had been cold in his grave for twenty-four hours.

Fourteen

January 31, 1839

Most unusually, Wiki did not wake with the ringing of eight bells at midnight, though he had fully intended to go up to deck and join his father as he took over at the start of the middle watch. He felt it was important to have a talk and try to settle their differences, and naturally had chosen a time when Mr. Seward could be guaranteed to be heading off for his bunk, but because he overslept it never happened.

As Wiki ruefully meditated later, he had spent too many months as a civilian with the expedition fleet, where he had no deck responsibilities. The lack of noise and activity had played its part as well, because though the brigantine was still rolling steadily they were going nowhere, and there were no sounds of orders being given. When he finally ran up the companionway stairs to the deck, the bell was ringing seven times—he had slept in as late as three-thirty in the morning.

The fog was as thick as ever. Captain Coffin was standing on the weather side of the poop, and didn't notice Wiki's arrival. The sailor assigned to the post of lookout on the foredeck droned in the time-old fashion,
“Al-l-l's w-e-l-l,”
but it did not feel to Wiki as if all were well, at all. The mist hung in dense curtains, clinging close to the surface of the dark sea, which heaved and shimmered, beset by heavy currents.

Wiki shinnied up the foremast, and had to go as far as the topgallant crosstrees before he could look over the fog heads. Against the graying sky to the northwest he could just discern the tips of masts, and realized that the
Peacock
and
Vincennes
lay much closer to the brigantine than he had imagined. Because of the strong landward current, the
Osprey
had drifted farther toward the fleet.

The situation was fraught with danger. The brigantine was still to oceanward of the estuary, so was lying directly between the big expedition ships and the open sea. If the long-threatened
pampero
arrived, Captain Wilkes would signal the captains to slip their cables and clear the land under a press of sail, and there was an awful likelihood that the ships would blunder into the unseen
Osprey.
No one would be keeping a lookout for her, being under the impression that the brigantine had made her departure long since.

Yet it was impossible to sail out of danger. Heaped clouds were boiling over the landward horizon, but the air was utterly still. The
Osprey
had her jib out, and all square sail set on the foremast, while the massive fore-and-aft mainsail was set on the aftermast, too. None of it was working, however, because the canvas sagged like wet laundry on a line.

Then, all at once, there was a flutter in the weather leech of the foretopsail. Wiki skidded back to deck in a hurry, and approached the quarterdeck.

Captain Coffin had seen it. He snapped at the boatswain, “Call all hands, then get in the royal.”

Impelled by the boatswain's bellowed orders, seamen dashed out of the forecastle and ran to their stations. Halyards were slackened, and then the royal was hauled up to the yard with hearty pulling at clewlines and buntlines, until the canvas hung there in bags. Two of the cadets swung aloft to furl it by passing gaskets around it, tying it up tight to the spar.

Thunder rumbled, almost drowning out the sound of Mr. Seward's bootsteps as he hurriedly arrived on the afterdeck. Captain Coffin glanced at him, nodded, and said, “We'll get the t'gallant in, mister, and the tops'l after that.”

The mate's responsive shouts triggered still more commotion. Seamen clambered up the shrouds, and spread out on the topgallant yard. Then they were bent far over the spar, feet braced wide apart on the footropes, grappling with the canvas, hauling it up by sheer force. Before they could finish the job, however, the squall arrived in a mighty blast, screaming like a banshee from the totally unexpected
southwest,
directly ahead, roaring upon them to attack the ship full-face.

Within instants the jib was gone, blown to ribbons, while the men on the yard let go of the topgallant, grabbing frantically instead for a secure hold. The released canvas instantly tore to fragments that flickered away on the gale like panicked birds. The heavy forecourse and deep topsail, which were still fully set, remained intact, however—which made the situation worse. Instead of breaking up they slammed back against the masts, taking the whole weight of the wind on their forward surfaces, and putting a gigantic strain on the rigging. The
Osprey
lurched, caught aback. Another great gust, and the brig was abruptly pelted with hard spots of rain.