North of Boston (26 page)

I'm shaking and pouring behind the polished rosewood bar, grabbing glasses and tossing maraschino cherries and lemon and lime wedges into whatever drink looks like it could use a little color. It's been a while since I did this, and I know I'm getting proportions wrong, but so far no one's complained.

After a while, Margot detaches herself from the group and comes over to perch on a bar stool. “It's nice to have another reasonably intelligent woman on this boat. You've no idea how bored I get. With Bob, it's business, business, business. Half the time I have no idea what he's talking about. We've been together a couple of years. All I do is travel and go to parties and events. And sleep, of course, when I can. I don't have any friends.”

I have no idea how to respond to this deluge, so I take refuge in the obvious. “Can I get you something to drink?”

“Champagne.”

She stares at the fizzing bubbles as I pour, touching the stem of the glass lightly with long plum-colored nails.

“How many of these voyages have you been on?” I ask.

“This is my third. I'm so glad we have decent accommodations finally. I was the one who convinced Bob to get this boat. I couldn't stand that other one.”

Again, I have the sense that I could ask Margot anything without rousing her suspicion. And that even if she did suspect me, it wouldn't make any difference to her.

“What do they do with the carcass—I mean, after they kill the whale?” I ask in a neutral tone.

“
The
carcass? There's more than one. Hundreds.”

“Hundreds? Really?” She's even ditzier than I thought.

Margot's eyes look vaguely affronted. “The bodies fall to the bottom and decay. Piles of them. A mass grave. What did you think?”

“I didn't know.”

She sips her champagne by childishly bringing her lips down to the rim of the glass where it sits on the bar. “Jorn is after you. You can tell by the way he's trying to ignore you.”

It's true. He hasn't looked at me all night. But the way he keeps his back to me, shows me his profile, stands in a dominant position over the others on the couch—all this seems to include me most particularly.

“Most people would say that was a contradiction, but I know what you mean.”

She smiles, accepting her due. “Do you like him?”

“He makes me uncomfortable.”

“Naturally. He makes all women uncomfortable. He's very handsome and insanely rich.”

“Speak of the devil.”

“Ladies,” Ekborg says cordially, taking the stool next to Margot, “are you ready to see my footage?” There's an appealing lilt in his Swedish accent. You think of brisk air and elderberries.

“I've seen it, Jorn. Isn't this the third time you've shown it?” Margot says.

“Don't be silly. I shared a bit of it last night with you and Bob, but the others want to see it now. Including our friend here.” He nods in my direction, still without looking at me.

“You mean this bartender?”

“Miss Kasparov.”

“I'm sure it will impress her. It's not every day one gets to see a lioness being slaughtered by machine-gun fire.”

Ekborg laughs indulgently. “Not a machine gun, Margot. Please. You make it sound so brutal. There's an art to it, like bullfighting.”

Margot cocks an eyebrow at me ironically. “Oh, toreador!” She slips off her stool and wobbles to Jaeger's side, carrying her champagne flute aloft like a torch.

“She's fragile,” Ekborg says to me confidentially. “Like his first wife, I hear.”

“I think he's still married to the first one.”

“Is he? I wouldn't know. And you—are you married?”

“I haven't had that pleasure.”

“A woman so lovely. I'm surprised.”

“What about you?”

“I tried it years ago. We weren't right for each other. I knew it at the time, but I lacked the courage to say no to her, to follow my heart. You look surprised. But knowing yourself, knowing how to love . . . these things take time.”

His face is so handsome that I can see how a woman might fall into helpless awe.

An order is shouted for several more drinks. I make them, put them on a tray. Ekborg serves them for me in a happy, connubial way.

“Let's see the film,” I say when he returns, just to get him to stop gaping at me with those limpid, marine-blue eyes.

Ekborg looks pleased by my request. He goes to the laptop, leans a shoulder against the wall, and clicks through a menu with a remote. A dry, brown land that is clearly Africa rises on the projection screen. Jiggling in the camera and the rumble of a noisy engine indicate that the person holding the camera is riding in a car. There are voices in the background; I think I hear some native accents among the hard English consonants. The camera sweeps lazily across a grassy plain dotted with clumps of brush and tall trees whose branches are etched against a searingly blue sky.

Ekborg provides the voice-over, mimicking a carnival man. “Here we are, ladies and gentlemen, on the lush wetlands of Botswana's Okavango Delta. That river you see in the distance is infested with crocodiles, and you will see in a minute—yes, there they are, you can just make them out—the lioness and two cubs swimming across it. One of the cubs is slower. Watch how she drags him out of the water and tosses him up the bank. They've just made their way back from Duba Island, where there's a herd of buffalo—fierce animals, those, with huge slashing horns—and now she'll have to take her chances against rival prides and, well”—Ekborg gives a modest chuckle—“with the likes of us.”

“Hurry up, my friend. Some of us were there with you. We don't need a science lesson!” Petrenko calls out.

Ekborg shoots me an apologetic grimace at the way the Russian is ruining the experience. “You can wait, Yevgeny. I want to set the stage.”

“What stage?” Petrenko calls back. “Look, there you are!”

Ekborg looks quickly back at the screen and says excitedly, “Yes, that's me. There I am.”

The jeep has come to a stop, and now the camera is being held rather still. Ekborg has appeared at the right of the frame, making his way toward the tall grass. He's wearing a green do-rag on his head, a grimy muscle shirt, and long khaki pants. He's tanned, perspiring heavily. He's got some kind of heavy gun slung over his shoulder, yet he moves with athletic grace and appears elated.

“The camera loses her here, but I know where she's slunk off to. She's still close to the river, making her way toward the plain. I know she'll smell me soon, and she is quick, so I'd better watch out! A quick cat. But I am quicker.” He laughs.

“Look at you! A Swedish fool,” Petrenko chortles.

Lawler and Jaeger ratify this with approving grunts.

The salon grows quiet. In the video Ekborg has stopped, frozen. He raises the rifle, puts it down, raises it again, takes a few more steps. You see a quivering along the top of the grasses. Then, slowly, the lioness grows visible among the stalks, like a hidden picture emerging. She's yellow, and steps onto the plain without hurry. A cub darts in front of her. The other tumbles after it.

A shot rings out, and she folds, dropping first onto a shoulder and then collapsing straight down. It's a shock to witness the finality with which another inch, another step, another breath has been denied her. How, in an instant, her body is transformed into an unmoving pile.

The cubs keep cavorting across the plain.

Ekborg stops the video. The whole thing has taken only a few minutes, but it feels much longer. There's a heaviness in the room, almost a numb satiety, as if something truly profound has happened. And it has. I begin to grasp a deep, ugly source of the hunter's joy: killing is eternal. It leaves a permanent mark.

—

The party goes on until midnight, then Ekborg, the last to leave, approaches the bar where I'm cleaning up, preparing to load glasses into a small dishwasher beside the sink. He left me alone after showing the video, perhaps to give me time to absorb the depth of his prowess.

He wastes no time. “You intrigue me, Miss Kasparov.”

In my hand is a nearly full glass of scotch and soda and melted ice, left by one of the others. Before I can stop myself, I toss the drink in his face.

Ekborg gasps, shakes his head, rubs his eyes with balled fists. With a napkin, he dries his cheeks and dabs at the front of his black cashmere sweater where the liquid is coursing down.

He tosses the napkin on the bar, stares at me coldly for a few seconds, doesn't speak. I am not worth anything to him now, not even words.

With a blasé attitude, he strolls out of the salon.

I
t rains for the next few days—sharp, fine drops that prick the surface of the ocean like millions of small pins. The windows of the
Galaxy
are so spattered and streaked that the effect is one of partial blindness. A torpor descends inside the yacht. Impossible to be this close to the weather and remain unaffected by its moods. Only the gulls outside are brash and noisy: swooping, scudding, keeping up a raucous cawing that can be heard in almost every location on board. When the rain stops, fog creeps in, spreading close across the surface of the water, distorting sound as well as sight. Time seems to have slowed down: the minutes feel unbearably long; the hands of clocks seem to barely move.

Jorn Ekborg pays me no more attention. I've not just slipped into disfavor; I've ceased to exist. Yevgeny Petrenko has no more words to spare for this American of Russian descent. While waiting table or bartending, I feel Dustin Hall's eyes on me, but he says nothing. Margot offers me inviting, conspiratorial smiles. In the evenings in the salon, she perches at the bar and happily bends my ear with her opinions and regrets. To the other guests I am as Zorina wished—invisible.

The crew is even more frosty to me. Conversation dies down when I approach. At one meal the strongman who took my stuff looks straight through me as he picks his teeth meticulously.

No doubt word of my confiscated items has spread. I tell myself that it's still possible they don't suspect me of anything. The items were removed from my cabin in a routine, casual way, as if they were no more than oversized bottles of shampoo at airport security. Checking a new crew member's stuff for contraband items may simply be routine. And I'm pretty sure there's nothing incriminating on the phone or computer. Before I came on board, I erased my search history, emptied the trash, and took Noah's photos off both devices. If questions are put to me, I can hide behind honest ignorance. John Oster never mentioned that cameras and electronic devices weren't allowed on board.

Still, nothing feels right. For one thing, Troy keeps popping up. At the end of a corridor, in the doorway of a salon. Appearing and disappearing like an apparition. It gets eerie, nerve-racking. With each successive vision he seems more and more like a black bird of impending doom, dredged from my own unconscious. At night in my cabin with the door closed and bolted, I feel the gentle depression of steps outside my door. Once, then again. Stalking. I suspect it's him. Under these circumstances, I don't dare try to get word to Parnell. I wouldn't know how to get through to him with the ship's radio, anyway.

—

We arrive in Makkovik, halfway up the Labrador coast, on a clear night. I must have my sea legs, because I can feel the calmer surface in the deepwater bay where the
Galaxy
drops anchor. The town is nothing more than a few sparse, yellow lights some distance off. From the talk in the salon, I know the population's about four hundred, mostly Inuit. It's got an airport and a little inn that, with advance warning, will serve a very good meal. There's a small museum, and to the north an American radar base that was dismantled in the sixties. That amount of information appears to exhaust the subject of Makkovik. Still, there's a sense of excitement among crew and guests at the chance to walk for a distance on firm ground, to be less coddled in luxury for a day. The bimbos will purchase something if it's humanly possible. And I intend to quietly make my way to the Makkovik community center, which, I overheard, offers phone and Internet service to the public.

In the morning the guests head to shore first, spiffed up and smiling, crowded onto a motored skiff the town sends out to welcome us. The crew will complete its work on board, then have a few hours on shore from late morning to late afternoon. Zorina tells me that now's the time to thoroughly clean the deserted staterooms. As I am walking down a corridor with my canvas bag of cleaning products, the two crew members who raided my cabin appear at the other end. They approach, stand very close to me—so close that I can smell the cold sea air emanating from their sweatshirts—and instruct me to come with them.

They lead me to the elevator—apparently, it's not off-limits now. We sink in gilded luxury to the ship's lowest level. The whole time I'm thinking that this was bound to happen. I shouldn't be surprised. They want to ask me a few questions about my cameras and so on. I breathe deeply, imagine myself giving clear, sane responses that show how completely innocent of any wrongdoing I am.

When the elevator doors open, I'm sandwiched between the men, one ahead and one behind. We make our way along the corridor to the hot, clanging, cavernous engine room. We cross to the far side and enter a smaller room filled with electric panels, a generator, and valves. In the center of the room there's a metal chair and metal table, empty but for four sets of handcuffs.

I turn heel and run. One of the men bars my way. Then the two of them pick me up under the arms and transport me, feet dangling, to the chair. In seconds, I am seated, and my hands are cuffed together behind my back.

Dustin Hall enters. He's got on the navy jacket with the logo of crossed golf clubs. It's zipped up tight to where his slender neck rises like a pale stalk to his tulip-shaped head. The two crewmen assume positions beside and slightly behind him, standing tall as columns.

“Pirio Kasparov,” Hall says musingly, as if my name were an interesting riddle. “I had you followed and hired a private investigator to look into your background. I've got a dossier on you the FBI would be proud of.”

“Yeah. I bet you know every book I ever bought at Amazon and the location of all my favorite ATMs.”

“Your mother, a famous fashion model, died when you were ten. Your father and his new wife sent you to boarding school, where you were a consistent underachiever and disciplinary problem. Apparently, you had a psychiatric condition, and possibly still do. You went to UMass Boston and are presently employed at your family's perfume company, which you're going to inherit someday.”

“Not bad. Can you see into the future? I'd like to know if I marry a prince.”

“I suppose it's possible. This is a pick-your-own-ending fairy tale. Here are your choices: One, you tell me what I want to know and carry on with your life. Or, two, you die today, and your body is never found.”

“Hmm. Don't think so. Those options are kind of dull, and way too obvious. A really good ending is the one you don't see coming. So we'll just have to wait and see.”

“You're awfully clever for a person wearing handcuffs.”

Hall glances at the crew member to his right—the big one with piggish eyes, pumped-up muscles, and tiny hands—and a very bad feeling comes over me. I watch in horror as the guy comes around the table and holds up his fist briefly, as if to examine it. Then he punches me in the stomach, hard. Before I can get my breath, he does it again. An experience that gives new meaning to the phrase
puking up your guts
.

“Really, Ms. Kasparov. Can you afford to be uncooperative? Look around. Think about where you are. You can't seriously believe you stand a chance.”

When I can wheeze audibly, I say, “I suppose you're right. It'll save time if you kill me now.” There's a loud ringing in my ears.

“First I want to know who you're working for and how much you know.”

“I'm working for you. Ned Rizzo told me what you were doing before he died, and I wanted to be a part of it. So I asked John Oster, and he hired me, or didn't he tell you that?”

“You really thought you were brought on board this boat as an employee?”

“Yeah. I was supposed to cook.”

Hall's eyes remain expressionless. “We know that you're working with a Mr. Wozniak, Larry Wozniak. How long have you known him?”

“Wozniak. Was that the guy at the funeral?”

“You made a call to someone named Russell Parnell after you arrived on board the
Galaxy
. What did you say?”

“I said . . .” Oh, God. I forgot that the cell phone would have shown Parnell's number. “I said,
Oops, wrong number
.
Sorry to trouble you.
”

“What was Larry Wozniak looking for when he broke into the Ocean Catch administrative offices?”

“I have no idea.”

“What information did you receive from Mrs. Smith?”

My heart nearly stops.
How does he know about Mrs. Smith?

“You look startled, Ms. Kasparov. I'm aware that you and Mrs. Smith talked on two occasions. At length. What were you talking about?”

“Dogs. Dog lovers never run out of things to say.”

“Do you own a dog?”

“No, but I always wanted a St. Bernard.”

“I'd hoped you'd be more cooperative.”

Hall comes around to the side of the table and perches on its edge. I have a mental image of his bony, flabby, naked haunch sporadically studded with bristling pink hairs. If this man has a wife, I don't see how she can bring herself to touch him.

“Hmm. Pirio Kasparov. A lonely woman with a lonely life. Friendless but for a drunken whore.”

“That's one more friend than you have.”

“What's your relationship to the United States Navy?”

Again, I'm startled. Did they follow me all the way to the doors of NEDU? “The Navy was wondering if I'm bionic. Turns out, I am. Cool, huh?”

“You have a vivid imagination, Ms. Kasparov.”

“Funny, that part is true. Exaggerated, I guess. But basically true.”

“I see. Are you sure you're not a government agent?”

“I'm very sure.”

“Is Mr. Wozniak working with the Navy, too?”

Suddenly, just like that, I run out of clever things to say. When did they start following me? Since the day I talked to Johnny in his garage? Or since Mrs. Smith's retirement party? Or was it even earlier than that—since the collision? I feel sick as the realization washes over me that I jeopardized Mrs. Smith and Parnell just by talking to them, being seen with them. I may have put Caridad Jaeger in danger, too. Hall has put the facts together, but he's overinterpreted them, decided that Parnell and I are government agents, tipped off by the company whistleblower, Mrs. Smith. He's not going to be talked out of this idea. It all fits together too perfectly in his mind. Tidy stories make the brain snap shut. I'm thinking I might be better off admitting to being a Navy spy. That way I could make him think I have more power than I do, which might provide some protection to my friends. It's possible that I could even pry apart Hall's loyalty to Jaeger, who blithely holds a little Boston fish company hostage to his entertainment needs. I could make a deal, promise Hall and his crew amnesty. But it's all coming at me too fast. I need time to think.

Before I can say anything, Hall rises from the table, nods to the strongman, calls him Brock. What a name. I try to steel myself, to blot out what's about to happen. Brock takes his time, seems intent on damaging every one of my internal organs with his fists.

Milosa once said that you can overcome pain through mental discipline—that is, unyielding focus on something other than the pain. So, as the blows fall, I bring every ounce of brainpower I have to the task of remembering the choice Russian swear words he taught me when I was just a little girl. When Brock is done, I've got a mouthful of pulpy blood, and my eyes don't focus right. But I've retrieved what I was looking for, and I can't help sharing it.

“Yob tvoyu mat.”

“What?” Brock says with some alarm.

I obligingly translate. “Fuck your mother.”

He whirls to Hall. “What language was that?”

Hall's eyes have narrowed. “Russian.”

“Careful. She could be with Petrenko,” says the stooped, shrewd-faced minion on the other side of Hall.

“No, I don't think so. Oster would have said something,” Hall mutters.

It's nice to see the faith he has in his employees.

I dimly make out Troy slipping into the room with a laptop tucked under his arm. He slithers down the wall, sits on the floor with hunched shoulders, like a tardy schoolboy hoping not to be noticed.

Hall glances at him sharply. “Did you get in touch with him?”

Troy nods.

“Is it done?”

Troy tips his head again.

Hall perches on the desk once more, leans over for an intimate chat with me. His demeanor is weirdly paternal.

“Libby Smith, our dear friend,” he says gently, “was found at dawn by a driver on the Jamaicaway. Victim of an apparent hit-and-run. Dressed in her bathrobe and slippers. She was most likely killed instantly, we were told. But there's no way of knowing that, is there?” He shifts his weight slightly, pulls on his earlobe. “It happened early this morning. Needless to say, people at the office are very upset. She'd been with us so long and was very well liked. But everyone knows that her dementia was progressing rapidly. She should probably have gone to a home. It's dangerous for people with dementia to live alone.”