“Anyway,” he continued, “We decided we would try to make a go of it, and we were married by a Justice of the Peace in Chicago. Not long after that I talked her into relocating to the West Coast, and here we are.”
“Did you give up your teaching position?” I said, looking at the pretty young Mexican girl.
“Yes.” Ariel answered. “I came from Los Angeles, and I missed the good weather. I think Joe felt the same. He was happier here than when he was in Chicago.” She looked at Joe. “A lot will depend on if my husband can find work here. I know I’ll be able to get a teaching job, hopefully at our children’s school.”
Rachel liked when she used the word “our”. I could tell. She smiled knowingly at Ariel. I found myself hoping they would settle near us. I thought Rachel and Ariel could become close friends, and my wife might give up her idea of going back to work. Joe and I were pretty compatible too. That was surprising, given how we met.
He was a panhandler on Harbor Drive in downtown San Diego, battling amnesia, when I stopped to give him a hand up. All that has changed now, and I think he’s on his way to becoming a model citizen.
“Hey I’ve got an idea. Joe you can be my gardener and handyman. I’ll give you lunch, but you have to buy your own dinner.”
He knew I was kidding, but he went along with it. “How do I know you can cook?”
Rachel stood, realizing it really was close to lunch time. “We’ll give you a sample. Ariel would you like to help?” She started toward the kitchen. Ariel rose to follow, and Jessica chimed in, “can I help too?”
“Sure. Follow us.” And the three of them marched to the kitchen.
I thought once again about my big idea, but I didn’t want to spring it on Rachel in front of company. What if she said no?
Chapter Seven
He awoke as a sliver of light passed across his face. The full moon had briefly appeared from behind the clouds, illuminating the lifeboat for just a brief second before disappearing. The sea was calm, and Jeb had the strange feeling he was alone in the world, or dead.
He was disoriented. Where was he? He’d been trying to get to Charlie when everything went blank. He reached down, feeling damp wood beneath him. He was on some kind of boat, that was clear, but how did he get there? He remembered nothing about being in the water.
There was movement at the other end of the vessel. Jeb could make out a silhouette. It appeared to be a man, maybe another sailor.
“What happened?” he said, a little louder than he had intended.
“Our ship blew up.” A weak voice answered from maybe fifteen feet away.
Jeb crawled over the wooden planks to where the voice had seemed to come from. He encountered no one else so apparently there were only the two of them.
“How did I get in the boat?” The last thing Jeb could remember was trying to make his way toward the bow of the destroyer.
“I pulled you in. You’ve been unconscious for about eight hours.” Whoever was talking, his voice was so soft Jeb could hardly hear the words.
“Where’s the rest of the crew?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t heard anything since I found the boat adrift. I was lucky to be able to pull myself aboard”
They were in and out of light, as the moon danced around the clouds, and Jeb could gradually make out more about his new companion. The man was either an officer or a chief. He was wearing khakis, instead of the blue dungarees of a shipboard enlisted man. His shirt was tattered, and the visible skin revealed a large red area around his belly. It had to be blood, and not just dried blood either. “You’re hurt.” Jeb said, stating the obvious. “Can I help?”
“Unless you’re a doctor I don’t think there’s anything you can do. I took a piece of shrapnel when the ship split apart. I think it’s still in there somewhere.”
“No. I’m not even a hospital corpsman, but I can look at the wound and see if I can maybe see what’s in there.”
“No. I’m sure I’m stuck with it, pardon the pun.”
Jeb couldn’t believe his boat-mate could have a sense of humor under the circumstances. “Do you know what happened? I was below deck until the ship began to list.”
The other man winced, obviously in pain, before speaking in almost a whisper. “The Japs dive-bombed us. A shell must have made a direct hit on an ammo storage compartment, because the ship split in two. I doubt anyone deep below decks got out, we sank so fast. I waited as long as I could before going overboard. I think the other survivors must have rowed their lifeboats or rafts away so they wouldn’t get sucked under.” When he finished he coughed, blood trickling from his mouth.
“What do we do now sir?” Jeb figured if he used the term sir, he would at least know if his companion was an officer. If he was a chief, he would surely correct his subordinate.
“I don’t think we can go anywhere.” He answered, ignoring the sir remark. “There aren’t any oars aboard.” So he is an officer. “We’ll just have to wait, and hope we’re picked up by one of our ships.” He coughed again, accompanied by more blood.
This man had saved his life, yet there was nothing Jeb could do to reciprocate. There was no first aid kit available, obviously, and there was no rescue vessel in sight, either friendly or belligerent. Maybe with the dawn help would come.
Jeb didn’t sleep that night. His companion’s coughing ended before the Sun rose, and daylight confirmed that he had died. The smoke and the smell of gunpowder had drifted away and it became evident he was alone. There were no ships as far out as he could see on the horizon in any direction.
Chapter Eight
It was going to work out for Joe and Ariel to stay with us for a week or so, God knows we had the room. We’d just have to put up with the inconvenience. The only time Rachel and I were alone together was when we had retired for the evening, and we were in bed.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed their company and I wanted to help them any way I could. It’s just that when I get something in my head I have to get it out or it will eat me up. It’s like a song that plays over and over when you should be using your brain-power for something else. Like at night when sleep won’t come because of that stupid song. Lately it’s been “The Bells of St. Mary’s.” Maybe I’d get a regular doorbell.
“I think we should renew our wedding vows!” There I said it. Now she could laugh or dismiss it as one of my schemes that is way beyond reality.
“Why would you want to do that?” It was a reasonable question.
“I don’t know. I just got the idea when we were at Thomas’s ceremony. You never got to have that, all the trimmings, and I know every young girl dreams about the day of her wedding and the church and the white dress.”
“Not me,” she said simply.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. I won’t say I didn’t dream about my wedding day, but it was about what kind of man would want me, and if it would be the beginning of the best part of my life.”
“So what do you think?” I said it because I couldn’t think of anything else to say at that point.
“About the husband or the idea?” She was grinning.
“Cute. Maybe I want to marry you again because I faked the first one. The Justice of the Peace was really a sausage maker from down the street.”
She ignored my confession. “I’ll make a deal with you. We can have a big party here, just not another wedding. One was perfectly fine with me.” And she added, “My Maid of Honor was Snow White.”
Forgetting the banter I was disappointed. I had imagined Rachel in a long flowing white gown with her dark hair in contrast, and a large cathedral-like church filled with admiring spectators, who could envy me my beautiful bride. It wasn’t completely selfish.
Our conversation was interrupted by the sound of music. It was ‘The Bells of St. Mary’s.’ It took a second for me to realize it was the doorbell.
I verbalized my thoughts, “Who the hell would be calling at this hour?” I considered that it might by Joe.
Maybe he’d stepped outside and the door had locked behind him. At any rate I couldn’t just let it go.
The music started up again. I threw on my robe and trudged downstairs bare-footed, because I couldn’t find my slippers.
I opened the left side of the double-doors and I was shocked to see my neighbor, the one who had driven me to the hospital when Rachel was hurt, lying on the porch with his right hand on the other door handle. I thought he had passed out at first, but it didn’t take long to realize he had been shot. He probably died right after pushing the doorbell-or the killer pushed it for him, though that didn’t seem likely.
Chapter Nine
It was Jeb Lee’s thirtieth birthday on May twelfth, 1942, and he was spending it alone in a wooden lifeboat above the relatively warm sea somewhere between Australia and Japan that would soon be his grave, if he wasn’t rescued soon.
He’d used the shoe of his fallen shipmate to hold some rainwater, so he wasn’t as thirsty as he could have been. There’d been no food however, and Jeb was losing weight and strength rapidly. There was nothing in the boat he could use to fish, even though he noticed a shark stalking the boat.
There’d been no sight of land in the three days since he’d woken up on the boat, and no ships either. The sea had calmed, the smoke disappeared, and it was as if there had been no furious battle at all.
He was sure he would be counted among the dead when the statistics of the fight were tallied. That might be true shortly anyway.
He would miss his son Matthew, but not so much his wife Margaret. He felt guilty about that but that’s the way it was. He didn’t love her and he never did. The closest he ever came to real love was with the beautiful, tall, dark-haired girl from the wrong side of town, Rachel Embree. He had a lot of time to think of her in that lifeboat. He never would have left her on that fateful day were it not for the fact he had just seen his father killed, and he himself had caused the death of the killer while grappling for the gun.
His thoughts also went to Charlie Redbird the Indian who had been his friend, until the explosion that surely had taken his life and should have ended his own.
Of the one hundred and ninety some souls aboard the Sims when it steamed out of Pearl Harbor, he was sure only a few handfuls had survived-if they were picked up by the other vessels in the battle.
He would soon have to dispose of the body occupying the lifeboat with him. The corpse was beginning to smell like decaying skin. He had delayed the necessary chore until now, because truthfully, he knew he would feel more alone after the burial at sea.
He performed three tasks before the actual act of pushing the body overboard; He unclasped the dogtags from around the neck of the remains, stuffing them in the dead officer’s pocket. He stripped off all the clothes including the remaining shoe, and he recited the Lord’s Prayer. It was only when he had looked at the name on the dogtags that he realized his dead shipmate had been the executive officer of the Sims.
That night the sky was exceptionally clear and thousands of stars dotted the black panorama above him. He’d tried to sleep but for a while it was useless. Becoming more and more sure it was the end for him he became philosophical. If there really was a God he thought, the ending of life would come peacefully. Why make anyone suffer? What would that accomplish? If there was a supreme being then maybe, since he had to die alone he would be granted one wish. Perhaps he would be transported to a star to spend eternity. He hoped a female had the same wish. If he made it through this ordeal he would just take his pleasure where he found it, not worrying about tomorrow as long as he didn’t hurt anyone in the process. Wait a minute! Wasn’t that what he had been doing? Look where it landed him. No, that wasn’t right. He joined up because of Charlie. Forget about the loveless marriage he’d gotten himself into. It was Charlie’s fault he would die here and go to that star.
He rambled on for a while before finally lapsing into a dreamless sleep, with the unresolved question of whether he would wake up the next morning. But he did awaken, and he was surprisingly lucid.
Another plan had begun forming in his mind before he disposed of the man who had saved his life. There was a good chance he would be picked up by the enemy, and if they didn’t shoot him he would fare much better in prison camp as an officer.
So he would become Lieutenant- Commander James Priestley, USN, an officer and a gentleman. He didn’t dare do it if picked up by his own people, so he didn’t put on the clothes he had retrieved right away. They would only be used should he fall into the hands of the enemy. Hell they would probably shoot him anyway.
On the fourth day afloat he ate some seaweed. At that point it was like a gourmet meal. The fifth day it rained again, so he prolonged his life a little more. The sixth day the shark, if it was the same one, got a little too close and Jeb tried to hit it with his fist. He nearly fell overboard, as the predator swam harmlessly away.
On his sixth day of drifting aimlessly he began to hallucinate. He was sitting on a comfortable sofa, his wife Rachel beside him. It was on Christmas day and they were waiting for their four grown children to come so they could open presents. Rachel threw another log on the fire before returning to the couch to cuddle. She looked exactly the same as she had when she was seventeen, they both did.
Finally the doorbell rang. Phillip went to the door. When he opened it he saw a huge bear. He tried to close the door but the animal was too strong. He yelled to his wife to run, and he himself eluded the bear in time to retrieve his rifle. Suddenly he was trodding through shallow water. He dropped the gun which had become a pistol, and he dove down into the water, which had suddenly become much deeper, to hide from the bear. He hoped Rachel had gotten away. Underwater he found the front entrance to their home and swam out into what was a huge river. The current was carrying him toward rapids that ended abruptly in a waterfall. He peeked out of the water searching back where he had come from for the bear. All he saw was his big white house, and it was floating down the river too. He searched for a bank where he could escape the churning water that was inexorably carrying him closer to the waterfall and sure death. He saw a tree branch hanging over him. He grabbed it and pulled himself up, then he watched in horror as his lifeboat, which had suddenly appeared, drifted away.
It was the seventh day before a ship finally appeared on the horizon. It was steaming directly toward him.
Chapter Ten
Andrew Dark wasn’t sure if he should do anything about the new information he’d received. He didn’t like to meddle. But the ex-police sergeant also felt a duty. He liked Rachel and Ivan Dunn, and maybe what he had learned was important. Rachel had shown an interest in the whereabouts of one Harold Lambright before.
He almost didn’t hear about it. He’d gone down to his old precinct in Richmond, mainly to shoot the breeze. He’d been feeling lonely the last few days. Living alone had its drawbacks. His wife had been gone for quite a few years now, and he thought he’d finally adjusted to his solitary existence. But in 1956 there wasn’t much to hold his interest on the television, and his old associates at the station didn’t drop by as often anymore.
Anyway, when he checked in at the desk the sergeant on duty was an ex-partner of his, and he knew the story of the relationship between the Lambright guy and Rachel Embree. So he was quick to spill the news he’d heard just the day before. It seems the Lambright scumbag was missing. Yeah, he missed his last two appointments with his parole officer, and an APB had been issued for him. His landlady in that fleabag space he was renting hadn’t seen him for over a week, and a check of his room showed he’d cleaned it out.
After considering what to do, he picked up his phone and dialed the number Rachel Dunn had given him. It rang about ten times and Dark was about to hang up when a male voice answered, “Hello.”
“Is this Ivan?” He was slightly confused. The voice sounded a little off to him. It had been quite a while since he and the erstwhile investigator had spoken, but the voice on the other end of the line was nothing
like he remembered. It was deeper.
“No. Ivan’s not here. Can I take a message?”
“Who am I speaking with?” He didn’t want to share what he’d learned with just anyone. Before the man on the other end of the line could answer he continued, “Is Rachel there?”
Again the answer was no. “They both went down to the police station. Probably won’t be home for a while.”
“Who are you?” The older man from Richmond was becoming impatient.
“My name is Joe Ellison, I’m a friend of the family.”
That name didn’t immediately ring a bell with Andrew Dark, so he was hesitant to share the information he had learned. “I’ll just call back later.” Then as an afterthought he added, “What are they doing at the police station?”
“There’s been a murder.”
Dark was taken back. “Not anyone in the family was it?”
“No. It was a neighbor. It’s too early to know much else. Look, can I have Ivan or Rachel call you? They know a lot more than I do.”
After reciting his call-back number, Andrew hung up. What the hell was going on out there? If he didn’t hear back soon, he would follow up with another call. His interest was definitely piqued.
He returned to his favorite chair, turned the television back on, and then realized he wasn’t interested in anything the old set could furnish in the way of entertainment. His cop’s mentality was in the way. The thought even occurred to him to jump on a plane and head out west, to help solve what obviously was a mystery.
Return from the Shadows-Ivan Dunn the Final Chapter Page 4