by David DeLee
He slugged down the last of his coffee.
“Anyway, Stu took him to the Keel Haul to get his wife. Riggi’s gonna take her home. Told me I could reach them there if we needed anything more from them.”
McMurphy throttled down to neutral and spun the big boat’s wheel until they were facing north then eased the throttle forward.
“The ME’s taken possession of the body,” Singleton said, continuing. “The State investigators are combing the beach for evidence. My guys, with the help of the Sheriff’s Department and a few uniforms from Rye, are canvassing the hotels and taking statements from any potential witnesses they dig up. I’ve put in for warrants to search Palmer’s and Riggi’s apartments. Until they come through there’s not much else for me to do but cool my heels.”
He swirled the cup, took a last swallow and tossed the cup in the trash. He pulled a pair of sunglasses from his jacket pocket and slipped them on.
“Figured I’d do that here and see what you two can come up with for me. Maybe learn this city boy a thing or two.”
McMurphy called out from the wheelhouse. “We can teach you how tedious and boring a search and salvage operation can be.”
As Skyjack’s Folly picked up speed, water spray caused Bannon to shiver. He considered asking McMurphy if he had a spare sweatshirt on board, but didn’t. Even though he was equal to the big man in height, anything that fit McMurphy’s wide frame would look like a potato sack on Bannon’s lean physique.
He crossed the deck and leaned against the open wheelhouse door. Over the roar of the motors, he asked, “Any thoughts on where to start our search?”
McMurphy grinned around his cigar. “Actually, we’ve got a really good idea where the boat will be, if there’s a boat to find.”
“Do tell.”
Singleton crossed the deck, joining them.
“Based on body temp, condition of the body, water temperature, and other environmental conditions, like nibbling fish,” the big cop shivered, “the ME and state investigators were able to determine how long Riggi’s body was in the water.”
“I contacted NOAA to determine last night’s tide levels, water currents, drift patterns, and other impossibly detailed minutia,” McMurphy said, prattling on so as to impress the cop. “I painstaking calculated, using math,” he added proudly, “because I’m awesome that way, and all the variable variables to determine…what we are looking for will be directly below us…here.”
McMurphy slammed the throttle to stop and cut the engines.
Bannon looked back to shore and estimated they were a little more than a mile out from the craggy peninsula known locally as the Wall, a popular surfing spot for those familiar with the seacoast.
“Hate to burst your bubble, smart guy,” Bannon said. “But the variables the investigators used to determine TOD and body conditions could be off by as much as an hour or more.”
“Au contraire, my good friend,” McMurphy grinned. “There was one more secret element in our calculations.”
Chief Singleton spoke up. “Riggi was wearing a watch. It was broken, revealing the time of death to be precisely 11:17 last night. Right in line with all the other estimates we received.”
“So,” McMurphy added, pleased with himself. “Unless our victim made it a habit to wear a watch with a smashed crystal that no longer told time, I stand by my prediction. What we’re looking for is right down there.” He pointed at the deck, then shrugged. “Give or take.”
“Give or take how much?” Bannon teased him with a look of being unconvinced. The truth was, his confidence in McMurphy’s work was unchallenged. The man was that good and seldom disappointed.
“I’d say a search area of no more than a thousand feet in any direction.” He stepped from the wheelhouse and dropped the forward anchor.
“Willing to bet your tab at the Keel Haul on it?” Bannon asked.
“What? No. My tab’s gotta be like ginormous.” McMurphy looked horrified. “Wait. You’re keeping a tab?”
Singleton couldn’t help but laugh. “From what I’ve seen, you could retire on what he guzzles down alone, Brice. Why on Earth do you let him drink for free?”
“All the times this man’s saved my life,” Bannon said. “It’s the least I can do.”
“I’d like to hear about them. Over a few beers, of course.”
“Some day,” Bannon said.
“Like when the statute of limitations runs out, McMurphy added.
He turned on the sonar equipment he had on board, along with the depth gauge, and other search equipment. He spun the captain’s seat around and leaned against the back of it as he worked adjusting dials and filtering out sub-surface noises.
“How long does something like this usually take?” Singleton asked.
Bannon shrugged. “Hours. Days. Maybe never. We don’t even know for sure there’s a boat down there.”
“Got it,” McMurphy cried out.
Bannon’s jaw dropped. “You’re kidding?”
McMurphy squinted one eye closed against the puff of blue smoke he exhaled. “When you’re good, you’re good. Five clicks off our port side. Less than ten meters deep.”
“For us landlubbers,” Singleton said. “What’s ten meters?”
Bannon didn’t bother to explain the metric system wasn’t exclusively nautical. “Thirty-two point eight feet.”
“Is that deep?”
“For a dive, naw.” McMurphy raised the red dive flag with its white stripe so it fluttered high over the wheelhouse. An indicated to any boaters in the area there were divers in the water.
From storage compartments he pulled out two 5mm neoprene wetsuits, BCU vests, regulators, weight belts, hoods, fins, and full-face masks. Bannon sat on the bench and tugged the legs of his suit on, grateful for the chance to put layers on over his running shorts and T-shirt. His suit was black with electric blue accents on his shoulders, along his upper arms, and down his thighs. McMurphy’s suit had charcoal gray accents.
McMurphy pulled two SCUBA tanks from the rack and checked their pressure. Once he had everything checked to his satisfaction, he stripped down to a T-shirt and swim trunks.
Singleton noticed the tattoo on McMurphy’s arm. “Nice ink. What is it?”
“Naval Aviator Insignia,” McMurphy said of the tattoo. “No big deal.”
It consisted of a single fouled anchor, overlaid by a shield with thirteen stripes, centered on a pair of wings. No one could put themselves down faster than McMurphy, and there was no less likely to indulge in self-praise either.
When he didn’t elaborate, Bannon said, “It means he’s a qualified pilot in three U.S. military branches: Navy; the Marine Corps; and the Coast Guard.”
“That sounds like a big deal,” Singleton said, sounding properly impressed.
“It is,” Bannon confirmed.
Skyjack’s Folly bobbed gently. If not for the grim nature of the mission, it would have been a beautiful day for a dive.
“Sure you don’t want to join us, Singleton?”
The former New York City cop scoffed. “A black man born and raised in the Bronx? Anything deeper than my bathtub and I’m out.”
“Imagine the sights you’re missing,” Bannon said. “The fish.”
“The sharks,” Singleton countered. “I’ve seen Jaws enough to know I’m staying above the water. As for the fish? They’re best dangling from my fishing line and frying up in my pan. No need for me to be swimming with ’em. Thank you very much.”
Suited up, Bannon smiled. “You don’t know what you’re missing.”
He and McMurphy did a final check of each other’s equipment.
“I’ll settle for taking your word for it. You two’ve done this a lot?”
McMurphy ground out his cigar in a cut open soda can he used as an ashtray and laughed. “Probably spent more time underwater than above it.” He added, “Back in the day.”
McMurphy rummaged through a big steel equipment chest until he came out with two large
, yellow underwater lights. He handed one to Bannon and kept the second one for himself.
Bannon tied a nylon grab bag to his weight belt and the two of them crossed over to the port side dive door. McMurphy opened it.
“Anything I can do from up here?” Singleton asked.
“Keep any boaters away that ignore the flag,” Bannon said. “Other than that, hold down the fort.”
McMurphy lowered his face mask and gave Bannon a final communications check. The masks were equipped with ultrasonic 2-way radio communication with push to talk activated microphones.
Bannon friend’s voice boomed in his earpiece. “Coming in loud and clear.”
McMurphy held his hand to his facemask to keep it in place and leaped through the open dive door with a giant stride. He splashed in the water.
Bannon followed quickly after with a large stride of his own.
CHAPTER FIVE
Bannon splashed into the dark ocean water, a brisk sixty degrees at that time of year, but the neoprene wetsuit was up to the task of keeping them comfortable. Besides, if McMurphy’s calculations were correct, they wouldn’t be down very long.
A startled school of minnows darted past his face, quickly changing direction.
He listened to the sound of his own breathing and the regulator that gurgled air bubbles, sending them cascading to the surface. At a depth of just ten feet the water was a beautiful sea green.
Bannon spotted McMurphy below him, a few feet to his right. He gave his friend a quick thumbs up. McMurphy returned the gesture before his voice, filtered through the high-quality microphone, resounded crystal-clear in Bannon’s ears. “We can talk to each other, remember?”
“Old habits,” Bannon said. “Lead on, oh great finder of lost boats.”
McMurphy snapped on his underwater light. It threw out a powerful shaft of bluish light scattering more schools of minnows. He twisted and dove deeper. As his friend descended to darker depths, Bannon released air from his BCU and did the same, keeping McMurphy ahead and to his right, following his trail of air bubbles into the murkiness below.
A dive to a depth of thirty-two feet didn’t take them long.
Before long the stern of a boat appeared in the penumbra of McMurphy dive light.
From the stern, McMurphy read, “The Bottom Line.”
Bannon kicked harder, catching up. “That’s the name Meredith gave me. This is it.”
“Guess it’s more the end of the line now.”
McMurphy swam over the top of the boat as Bannon angled along the starboard side.
“Sweet ride,” McMurphy said and he was right.
Bannon was familiar with the Yamaha Limited S series, having considered buying one himself. A watersport boat it had a length of twenty-one feet with an eight foot beam. It came standard with twin inboard 1.8-liter Yamaha Marine engines capable of putting out five hundred and fifty foot-pounds of torque.
He panned his light over the boat’s flank and ran his gloved hands over the rips in the fiberglass gunwale. “There’s damage along the aft side. Deep scraps.”
McMurphy swam around the bow. The windshield was cracked. McMurphy looked closer at the glass then swam to the midsection over the dashboard. “Keys are still in the ignition.”
Bannon used the back of the upholstered co-pilot’s seat to pull himself to the glove box on the passenger side dashboard. “I’ve got bullet holes in the gunwale.”
He stuck his finger in one.
“You bring pliers?” he asked.
McMurphy handed him a pair from the tool pouch he carried. “What’ve you got?”
Bannon dug at the hole. “Bullet. If I can get it out, maybe Singleton’s forensics team can match it to the slug they take out of Alex’s body.”
“Careful you don’t damage it getting it out.”
Bannon used the pliers not to pull the slug free but to carefully peel back the splintered pieces of fiberglass around it until the bullet tumbled out of the hole and dropped into his gloved hand.
He held it up, pinched between his thumb and finger. “Ta-da.”
They spent the next ten minutes swimming over and around the sunken boat, giving it as good a once over as they could under the circumstances.
Done, McMurphy said, “What now?”
“Since you did such a great job finding the boat.” Bannon consulted his Tag Heuer Aquaracer dive watch and quickly calculated their allowable bottom time in his head. “We’ve got plenty of time. Let’s start a spiral search for a body.”
“Fun times,” McMurphy said, sounding morose.
Bannon opened the glove compartment and scooped the contents out and into his grab bag without wasting time looking through it. They could do that at their leisure back on Skyjack’s Folly. He gave the Bottom Line a final once over before moving out when something caught his eye. He swam closer to the deck, confirming what he thought he saw.
The boat’s drain plugs had been removed. Who would do that? And why?
He joined McMurphy and together they swam in a slow, careful circle, spiraling outward from the boat. They moved higher off the ocean floor to minimize disturbing the sand and silt. They enlarged the circumference of their swim with each completed circle, using their flashlights to examine the ocean floor.
The saw lots of interesting things but found no bodies.
With less than fifteen minutes bottom time left, Bannon said, “Let’s head up.”
“With pleasure,” McMurphy said. “Is it too early for a cocktail?”
“It’s five o’clock somewhere.”
Together they swan for the surface.
The sun was high in the sky as Bannon pulled his facemask off, shook off water, and took in a deep lungful of fresh, chilly seacoast air. McMurphy surfaced a second later and did the same. Their search had taken them a good distance away from Skyjack’s Folly.
Bannon stared at it in the distance, tired. “You don’t suppose Singleton could pilot her over here, do you?”
“Doubtful. And wouldn’t let him even if he could.”
“Then I guess me waiting here while you go fetch her is out of the question, too?”
“If you want to be left out here all by yourself, sure.” McMurphy took off swimming.
Bannon sighed and swam after him.
Ten minutes later, they clung to the fold down ladder leading up to the open dive door. Singleton reached down and grabbed their fins as they slapped them onto the deck.
“Jesus Christ,” he said. “You two were down there a long time. I started to think you’d drowned or—”
“You did notice the big air tanks we took with us, didn’t ya, Chief?” McMurphy asked.
“Attacked by sea monsters or something,” Singleton finished.
“No worries. Not a Kraken in sight either,” Bannon said.
“Wiseasses.” He reached a hand down to Bannon and pulled him into the boat. Then did the same for McMurphy. “I had no idea how long you’d be down there. Felt like forever.”
They shrugged off their scuba tanks. They hit the deck with hallow metallic clangs.
“Well? What’d you find? What took so long down there?”
Bannon dropped his weight belt onto the fishing fillet table behind the wheelhouse. The men stripped to their shorts and T-shirts. McMurphy grabbed a couple of large towels and sweat pants and sweatshirts from a chest in the wheelhouse. Bannon accepted the towel and clothes without concern about how baggy they’d be. It was too chilly a day to stand around in just his wet T-shirt and shorts.
“We found Palmer’s boat,” Bannon said. “It’s riddled with bullets and there’s deep scraps along its starboard flank. I’m guess it ran into something.”
“Or something ran into it,” McMurphy said.
“The bottom line is, no pun intended,” Bannon said. “The Bottom Line was attacked.”
“By whom? Why?”
“That’s your department, Chief,” Bannon said. “We spent the rest of the time conducting a search, looking
for a body. We didn’t find one, but that—”
“Doesn’t mean one’s not down there,” Singleton said.
“We only got about, what,” Bannon looked to McMurphy for confirmation, “a hundred yards out?”
“Yeah, I’d say that. At least.”
“This Palmer guy could’ve been thrown from the boat before she went down. The currents could have taken him who knows how far away.”
“Or the sea life could have got ’im,” McMurphy added grimly.
“Or maybe he was never on the boat in the first place,” Singleton suggested.
Bannon nodded. “All possibilities, along with a thousand others at this point.”
“Looks like I’m gonna need Fish and Game down here after all,” Singleton said. “But at least thanks to you two, I know I’m not bringing them down on a wild goose chase.”
“Sorry we couldn’t have been more help, Chief,” Bannon said.
Once they had dry clothes over their wet shorts and T-shirts and their equipment stowed, McMurphy came out of the wheelhouse a final time with three cold cans of beer. He handed Bannon one, kept one for himself, and held one out to Singleton. “You not going to give me that, I’m on duty spiel, are you?”
Singleton grabbed the beer. “Hell, no.”
They drank.
“Any more thoughts, gentlemen?” Singleton asked.
“There’s one more thing,” Bannon said. “The boat’s drain plugs were missing.”
“Boats have drain plugs?” Singleton asked.
“To drain the water that inevitably splashes in,” Bannon explained. “If they’re in place while the boat’s in the water…”
“The boat remains floating,” Singleton guessed. “If they’re gone…”
“The boat was intentionally scuttled,” McMurphy said, cutting to the chase.
Singleton took in the information and processed it over a couple of sips of beer. “Based on what you saw, how likely is it Riggi and Palmer had some sort of falling out. Palmer killed Riggi and…”
“Doubtful,” Bannon said. “Doesn’t account for the damage to the boat’s flank.”
“Or scuttling the boat,” McMurphy said.
“Guess that keeps me at square one,” Singleton complained.