Swimming With the Dead (21 page)

I fumbled with his, always awkward when it came to removing men’s pants, afraid I’d damage something.  He laughed, did the unzipping for me, and threw the shorts on the floor.  He smelled of sunscreen and tasted like coconut.

“Hannah,” he said, “you are an amazingly gorgeous woman.  You don’t know how beautiful.” 

“You look good too, O’Brien.”

I hadn’t felt this way in bed since Jake.  It was more than just the sex.

O’Brien rolled over on me and we pressed together, chest thumping against chest, and got lost in each other.

I awoke once, aware that O’Brien was gone, the boat still rocking and splashing ahead.  Then it was light and the rich smell of coffee brought me back to consciousness.  I stretched and opened my eyes to find O’Brien standing beside me, a mug of coffee in hand.  Still naked, I sat up with the sheet wrapped around me and sipped the rich brew.

“We’re about an hour out of Marigot Harbor,” he said.  “How did you sleep?”

“Like being rocked in a cradle,” I said, the warmth of coffee and the heat of the night’s passion hitting me at the same time.

“Any regrets?” he asked.

“Are you kidding?” I smiled, pulling him toward me.  “You said an hour?”

He laughed, took my mug, climbed back in bed, and pulled the sheets over our heads.

Chapter 20

O’Brien dropped me off at the main dock in Marigot.  Louis gave me a knowing smile and wink as I threw him the line and helped them push off.  They were taking the boat to the marina at the east end of the island, to a harbor called Oyster Pond, where they would get her settled in the SeaSail fleet.  O’Brien planned to spend the day going over the operations and financial records with his base manager while Louis looked over the condition of the fleet.  We agreed to meet at a place called Enoch’s on the waterfront for dinner before taking one of the puddle jumpers back to Tortola.

I found Derrick Vanderpool sitting behind his desk at the port authority, smoking and fanning himself with a notebook.  He was at least fifty pounds overweight, and though it was only ten thirty, his shirt was already drenched with sweat and his hair stuck to his forehead.  I’d been right about the badge.  Once Vanderpool saw it, we were buddies.

“Please pull up a chair.  Coffee?” he asked, lighting a new cigarette off the end of the old one.  He gestured to a cracked vinyl chair that looked like it had been sitting there since 1952.

“No, thanks.”  I sat across from him and tried to avoid breathing in all the secondhand smoke that infused the small office. 

“When did Michael Duvall contact you?” I asked.  I wanted to get straight to the point and out of there before some renegade cell in my lungs started replicating itself.

“He was down here sometime around the end of the year asking a lot of questions about the
Chikuzen
.  I’ve only been in the job since June, but I knew a little about the ship.  An old Korean refrigeration vessel, used for storage, pulled out of port before Hurricane Henry hit, drifted up to the BVI.  Duvall wanted to know what was stored on her, whether there were records of use, who worked on the ship.  That kind of thing.  Said he was doing research, testing the water around the wreck.  Found a bunch of dead fish lying inside the hull.

“I pulled the old records for him.  The file on the
Chikuzen
was pretty thin.  Just the ship’s papers, a couple of inventory sheets, a diagram.” 

“Can I see the file?” I asked.

“Yeah, it’s in the back.  Don’t know why we need to keep the old stuff.  Got a whole file of records on ships no longer around.”  He came back and handed me the file labeled
Chikuzen
.  I thumbed through it.  No diagram.

“Damned, he must of taken it,” Vanderpool said.

“He?”

“Duvall.  He asked if anyone was still around who knew about the
Chikuzen
.  I’d told him he should talk with Bert Wilson, old guy was working down here when the ship was in port.  Then he came back later in the day asking to see that file again.”

“Did he say why?”

“Something about wantin’ to check the diagram and inventory again.  I left him standing at the counter in front and went back to answer the phone.  When I came out five minutes later, he was gone.  File lying there on the counter.  Never checked the contents.  I just put it back in the file drawer.”

“Could someone else have taken the material?” I asked.

“Naw, I haven’t pulled that file since the day he was here, and no one else has access to the back.”

Something that Michael had discovered after he left the port authority office had brought him back for the diagram.  But what?

“Can you tell me where I can find Bert Wilson?” I asked.

“Runs the little grocery over on Main Street—the Marigot Hamper.”

At the store, the clerk pointed to a set of stairs that led up to the Wilsons’ apartment.  Bert Wilson was a grizzled old gentleman who lived above the store with his wife, Rose.  The place was small and worn.  The kitchen was vintage sixties, with an old wooden table, a brown electric range, and red Formica countertops.  In the living room, two overstuffed chairs, the cushions indented and frayed, were situated for prime television viewing.  A drab green sofa and an imitation Queen Anne coffee table took up the remainder of the room.  Every available surface held photographs, the sagas of children growing up, marrying, having children of their own.

The Wilsons were the kind of people who loved company and loved to talk.  I told them I was a cop doing some checking about a man from the States, but you’d have thought I was their long-lost daughter or something.  Rose was just putting lunch on the table, a huge pile of fried chicken and mounds of mashed potatoes, corn bread, beans.  It reminded me of Sunday dinner on my aunt’s farm back in Illinois, rose china and all.  They insisted I join them.

“Sit yourself down, honey; you can use a bit a fat on them bones,” Rose said. “You an’ Bert can talk after we eat.”

It was a one-way conversation over lunch.  By the time we were finished, I knew how many kids and grandkids they had, about the son-in-law who had cheated on their daughter, and the grandson who was studying at MIT.

“You and Bert go on into the parlor,” Rose commanded.  “I’ll bring you some rhubarb pie and coffee.”

“Wait till you taste Rose’s pie,” he said.  “She’s famous all over the island for her pies, even sells ’em in the store.  Bought up the minute she puts ’em out.” 

The pie was delicious, crust so light and flaky I knew she’d used lard, straight animal fat, same as my mother.  I swear I could feel my arteries clogging.

“Mr. Wilson, did Michael Duvall come to see you a couple of months ago, sometime in December?” I asked.

“Well, let’s see, my memory ain’t too good.  Rose, you remember that boy come see us by the name of Michael a while back?  That in December?”

“Sure.  Sweet boy, he ate with us, stayed and talked a long time.  He was some kind of scientist, remember, testing ocean water or something, livin’ over on Tortola.”

“Oh, yeah.  He was askin’ about the
Chikuzen
—that old refrigeration ship.  Said he was doin’ some research out there, had been diving the wreck.  Don’t know why the cargo woulda been something he’d be interested in, but heck, that science is like a foreign language to me.  I worked down on the docks when the
Chikuzen
was tied up there.  Told the young fella that the ship was just an old hulk, only used for storage.”

“Was it possible that hazardous material was stored on her?” I asked.  “Michael mentioned finding dead fish in the hold.” 

“Wouldn’t be surprised,” he said.  “But most everything should have been offloaded before the ship was towed out to sea.  The foreman of that operation kept records of all the stuff on the ship and where it was stored.  That ship was a maze of companionways and compartments, all filled with something.  The foreman was the only one who knew what was on her or where anything was.” 

“Would he have kept records of any toxic material on board?” I asked.

“If he did, they wouldn’t have been for public viewing,” Wilson said.  “He wasn’t the most honorable guy.  For a price, he would take stuff off people’s hands that they couldn’t dispose of.  Seen that skull and crossbones on more than one can he’d carried on board.  Could have been other chemicals in there, maybe cleaning supplies and preservatives for fish.  The big refrigeration units were used to hold the catches brought in till they could be shipped to market.”

“I’d like to talk with the foreman,” I said.  “Is he still living on Saint Martin?”

“Hell, no.  He got himself killed by the police,” Wilson said.  “Robbed the big jewelry store over in the ritzy shopping district.  Rose, we still have those newspaper articles?” 

“I think so.”  Rose went to a desk and worked her way through a stack of junk, and finally retrieved a couple of yellowing papers.

“Here they are,” she said, triumphant, and handed them to me.

The first paper was dated August 2, the same date Michael had written in his diving guide next to the description of the
Chikuzen
.  The article described a robbery on the Rue de la Republique in Marigot, an area renowned for its precious stones and jewelry.  I remembered now seeing a reference to the robbery when I’d been at the library.

“Guess Demitri and Alvin Getz had it all planned out,” Bert said.  “Went into that store right around lunchtime.  Too hot to be out on the street.  Most folks staying cool inside.  The emporium had just gotten in a big shipment of precious gems—diamonds and emeralds, worth something like eleven million dollars.  Can you imagine that?  Demitri and ol’ Al forced their way into the store just when the manager was locking up for the noon break.  Guess he kept a gun behind the counter.  Nobody knows who fired the first shot, but that manager ended up dead.  I’d of never thought those two would do anything like that.  Police found the getaway car when a woman reported a man lying in a car in front of her house.

“They found Alvin in the front seat soaked in blood, dead.  A couple of hours later a police cruiser spotted Demitri boarding the ferry to Saint Barts.  They cornered him on the upper deck.  Damned if he didn’t start shooting at the police.  He tried to jump off the ferry onto the docks.  Got shot and ended up floating in the bay.  Police sent some divers in there to search the bottom for the jewels.” 

On the front page of the other paper that Rose had given me was a picture of a pile of debris on the dock, the caption, “Only treasures found so far—an old alligator shoe, a lobster trap, and a pair of women’s panties!”

“Did they ever recover anything?” I asked.

“Naw.  Divers looked for a couple of days.  The police questioned me and Rose, other folks that knew him and Alvin.  Don’t think anyone could tell them much.  We were all shocked.”

“So the foreman of the
Chikuzen
was Demitri Stepanopolis?”

“That’s right.”

“Who was this Alvin?”

“One of the dockhands that worked for Demitri, kind of a loner, no family.  Police say it was Demitri who killed him and left him bleeding in that car.”

“Did Michael know about the robbery?” I asked.

“Not till Rose got to gabbing.  That Michael was a nice boy.  Was helping Rose clean up the kitchen, wash the dishes.  Rose got to talking, like she does, goin’ on about people we knew back when the
Chikuzen
was in port.  Came up about the robbery.  Rose was pretty upset when it happened.  Men and their families that worked on the docks back then were tight, wives socialized, kids played together.”

“So the jewels never turned up?” I asked.

“Not that I heard,” he said.  “Hurricane moved in pretty soon after, and with all the scrambling to get ready for it and the bad damage after, people kind of lost interest in that robbery.  People figured those jewels got washed away in the storm.  High winds, waves three stories, not much that was in the water or around the shore survived too good.  Those jewels probably ended up in some fish’s belly.”

“I was shocked,” Rose interjected.  “Bert worked with Demitri.  We had them here for meals, our kids played together; me and Lorraine, Demitri’s wife, and some of the other wives used to play cards every Thursday night.”

“What kind of family were they?” I asked.

“Well, I don’t like to speak poorly of the dead, but Demitri was a hard man,” Rose said.  “Hard as he was, though, Lorraine ruled.  She said jump, he asked how high.  Same with the boy.  Strong-willed woman could be mean as nails if someone crossed her.” 

“Come on, Rose,” Bert said, “just because she took her cards seriously.”

“
Serious
is hardly the word,” Rose said.  “I still say you gets to know a person real well over a card game.  Lorraine did not like to lose.  She’d cheat.  Can you imagine?  Over a penny-ante game?  She was a woman thought the world owed her and hers.  Both of ’em unhappy about their lives down here, always talkin’ about makin’ good, getting’ rich.  We used to kid them about it.  How they goin’ to get rich on a dockhand’s pay?  Guess we found out after he robbed that store.”

“What happened to her?” I asked.

“Police questioned her a long time,” Bert said.  “If she knew anything, she never told them.  She stayed down here less than a year.  She worked as a waitress, other odd jobs.  Finally moved away.  Too many people knew what happened.  Too many questions.  No one could believe that she didn’t know what Demitri was up to.” 

“Probably put him up to it,” Rose said.  “She just up and left one day, never said boo, was just gone.”

“You said there was a son?” I asked.

“Yeah.  Junior.  He was already gone.  Away at college when all this was goin’ on,” Bert said.

“Did you talk about this with Michael?” I asked.

“Sure, he was real interested.  I mean, who wouldn’t be?  Huge bag of jewels never found.  Rose, get that photo album you showed Michael.”

Rose pulled out an album, opening it to the first page.  “Look at Bert there; can you believe he was ever that handsome?  That’s our oldest, Sam, eight then and June, five.  Oh, there’s our old house before we got the store.”