Black Tide

by Brendan DuBois

  For a bit we were both quiet, as over the radio Roger Clemens struck out his third Blue Jay batter in a row to end the seventh inning. Then Felix grinned and shook his head and said, "Damn, you are good, Lewis. Times like these, I wish you were working back at the Department of Defense. You'd be scaring people in other countries, that's how good you are."

  "Thanks for the compliment," I said. "I would guess that when you took me to the safe house, those were the real paintings, and that you switched them later. Why the fakes? An insurance policy?"

  Felix nodded, still smiling. “Absolutely. You know, those reproductions were so good that from across a room --- if you weren't an art professor or something --- you couldn't tell they were fakes. That's what I was counting on. The bad guys had the numbers, the guns and the money. A dangerous combination. I wanted to give up the address of the safe house, but then make it more difficult for the exchange to take place. Those fakes were just the bait, to get them to the house."

  “And the real ones, Felix, where are they?"

  He almost smirked at me, he looked so happy. "They're in a safe place."

  "Felix…"

  He shrugged. "Oh, all right. Lewis, they're in your house. Actually, your garage. And they've been there for weeks. You should learn to keep that garage door shut. It made me nervous."

  Felix looked quite pleased with himself, and I was sure it was for two reasons. First was the knowledge that he had saved the paintings from destruction, and second was no doubt the sweet feeling of seeing me so shocked that I couldn't say anything. But I was going to return the favor in about one minute, which I did. "My garage?"

  "Yep. Figured it was as good a place as any, and had easy access."

  I raised up my glass, finished my drink. "That's pretty good, Felix, and you know what? It makes sense to have them here."

  His grin was still there. "Why's that?"

  I winked at him. "Because I want them."

  No more grin.

  The discussion --- which sometimes slipped into arguing --- went on for a while until I killed it with this one reply. "Felix, those paintings are dangerous. Oh, they have a value ---- like a couple of pounds of plutonium ---- but they're too dangerous to keep. You try selling them to anybody out there on the fringe, and I might not be there again to save your tanned butt. Remember that. You owe me, and I want those paintings."

  "Lewis…"

  "Felix, you owe me. I know that Cameron Briggs's money found a happy home, right?"

  Then his face clouded over and he squinted his eyes. He stood up and stomped over to the railing of my deck, looking down at the tiny backyard and my private cove, and the waves that crashed in on their monotonous journey. One hand was on the railing and the other was holding his glass. He shook his head a couple of times. Then he swore and tossed the glass over the side and the sudden outburst startled me, especially when he turned around with a big smile on his face.

  "You know what, you miserable bastard?" he demanded.

  "What's that?"

  "You're absolutely right. I hate you for that, Lewis Cole, honest to God I do. If you had known me years earlier, I would have tossed you over the side, not that damn glass, for making such a demand."

  "If I had known you years earlier, you might have been a defense contractor."

  He laughed. "Could be, could be. Sounds like an intriguing job." He clapped his hands together and came back to his seat and sat down with a grunt. "So. They now belong to you. Are they going right back to the museum?"

  I shrugged. "Eventually."

  Felix looked surprised. "Eventually? What the hell do you mean by that?"

  I sat back in the chair, closed my eyes. "Eventually. And you owe me a drinking glass."

  He laughed again. "Why not. Today I seem to be giving you everything I own anyway."

  After the Red Sox lost it in the tenth inning to the Blue Jays and Felix left, I walked out to my garage, which is really a glorified shack built next to my house. At one time, I think, it stored equipment for the Lifeboat Station that had once been here. Inside was my Range Rover, which took up most of the space. The floor was dirt, and I made my way to the front, where I had accumulated a couple of shovels, a rake and other odds and ends that seem to end up in a garage rather than a basement. There were some cardboard boxes back there that I was keeping, in the extremely unlikely event that I would ever move again, and behind those boxes, leaning against the rear garage wall and resting on some stones, was a large package.

  The package was heavy and wrapped in twine and brown paper. I lugged it back to my house, bringing it into the living room. With a knife and scissors I carefully went to work, and in thirty minutes I had Fog Warning, Eight Bells and The Gulf Stream in my living room. I leaned the paintings against the cold and empty fireplace and stood there gingerly running my fingers across the paint and the old canvas. Tears came to my eyes.

  "Winslow, old man," I whispered. "You certainly were one talented son of a bitch." I went into the kitchen and returned with a glass of wine, finishing off the bottle that Felix had brought, and I sat on the floor for about an hour, just looking at the colors and the shapes, and appreciating how the changing light in my living room made them seem so alive.

  But as I watched, a little cold worm started digging its way through my skull. I found myself thinking about keeping the paintings in my living room and study. No one would know, and if I ever had visitors, the paintings could go back in the garage. Three priceless Winslow Homers, resting in my home, and only I would know…

  I finished off my wine and went outside. I tossed my wineglass in the general direction of the ocean, joining Felix's earlier contribution. I stood there until the clean salt air cleared out my head, then I went back inside and went to work.

  Early on Monday evening I was working on dessert at Diane Woods's condo, having joined her and her companion, Kara Miles. Dinner had been beef Stroganoff and they had kept me in the living room while they cooked. There had been a lot of giggling and shrieking as the meal finally came together. Dessert was coffee and Famous Newburyport Cheesecake, which we ate cross-legged on the floor, with the dishes on a clear-glass coffee table. Diane and Kara looked like sisters, with white tennis shorts and dark blue polo shirts, and when I asked if they consulted each other on clothing choices, Kara had winked at Diane and said, "Only if she's on the pillow next to me in the morning.”

  Diane had giggled and kicked Kara at that, and Kara had rubbed her hair. Diane's eyes were bright. It was nice to see her in a good mood, though I knew other things had contributed to that mood on this day.

  As I finished off the last of the cheesecake on my plate, I said, "So tell us again how you got the paintings."

  "Yeah, Diane," Kara demanded. "Talk to us. You bore me with everything that goes wrong every day, might as well tell me when something goes right."

  Diane still looked pleased. "Well, dispatch got a call from a male, at about 7 A.M. today. The message was for me and said that if I went to the St. Donna Cemetery on High Street and looked behind a gravestone at the intersection of 'D' and 'A’ lanes, I would find some stolen property."

  "What did it look like?" I said.

  "Big package, all done up in brown paper. Opened it up and saw those three paintings, and I knew we weren't talking your standard over-the-couch artwork. Next thing I knew, the place was crawling with news media, and then the State Police and the goddamn FBI showed up, and that's when I found out they were the Winslow Homers which were stolen from the Scribner Museum five years ago."

  Kara looked over at Diane, admiration in her eyes. "Why do you think the guy gave them up, Diane?"

  Diane looked right at me. "Guilt, maybe. Or maybe the guy got hold of the paintings and realized that they could never be fenced 'cause they were so hot." She shrugged. "Makes no difference to me," she added, smiling again. “All I know is that one Detective Diane Woods gets credit for recovering three of the most important paintings ever stolen in this country in this centur
y. Not a bad way to end the summer."

  "Not at all," I said. Kara leaned over and kissed Diane and said, "Damn, I'm proud of you, hon."

  Kara got up and started clearing the dishes. I looked up at her and said, "You've got four earrings in one ear, and three in the other. Aren't you running out of space?"

  Kara giggled. "Maybe so. I've wanted to get other body parts pierced, but Miss Straitlaced here won't let me."

  Diane kicked Kara's foot --- gently --- and said, "Stop gossiping, will you?"

  Kara just grinned in reply and went off to the kitchen, leaving Diane and me alone in the living room. I looked over at Diane and she gazed back at me.

  "Understand the chief is doing better," I said.

  She nodded. "He's in full remission, should be back in a month. About time the old man let on what was going on, but that's the way he is. And the heir apparent, Mr. Roger Krohn, has apparently left town for parts unknown, and based on what I read in the Globe, I don't think I'll miss him. But, Lewis?"

  "Yeah?"

  "I don't forget."

  "Forget what?"

  "I don't forget that you've been snooping around the Scribner Museum about that five-year-old theft. It seems too much of a coincidence that you would be doing that and a couple of weeks later those paintings get dumped in my lap. Then, to cap things off, five minutes after I'm at the cemetery, your buddy Paula Quinn from the Tyler Chronicle stops by and gets an exclusive. What do you think about that?"

  I was thinking of a joking reply, but the expression on her face gave me a better idea. "I think you're right. It's a hell of a coincidence.”

  "It was your job, right? Start to finish." There were a lot of things I could have said, but I decided the truth might just work. "Not from start, but to finish, yeah, it was my job."

  “Anything else going to happen, or is it done?" I thought about Roger Krohn and what had happened to him and Cameron Briggs. I closed my mouth and thought a bit more and said, "For you, Diane, it's done. I would just keep my press clippings and let the FBI and the Manchester cops sort everything else out."

  Diane slowly smiled. "Then I have another amazing coincidence to report, Lewis, because that's exactly what I was planning on doing."

  "Such a night for coincidences," I said.

  She reached out and squeezed my hand. "Thanks," she said, and Kara strolled back in and jokingly told me to leave her woman alone, which I did. But Diane kept on smiling at me the rest of the night.

  A few hours later I was on my back deck, resting on a mattress pad, happy that there was a warm female body snuggling up to me. Paula Quinn felt wonderful resting on my shoulder, and I breathed in her soft scent as we looked up at the stars. The ocean air this night was cool and there was a light blanket over us as we waited. Without the moon, the night sky was dark, the stars sharp and distinct. I could even make out the hazy swath of the Milky Way.

  "Tell me why they're called the Perseids," she whispered, her hair tickling my throat. I kept my own voice low. "Meteor showers that arrive each year are named for the place they seem to come from. These showers every August are named after the constellation Perseus, because they seem to radiate from that constellation."

  “And who was Perseus?"

  “A young warrior who saved the beautiful Andromeda from the sea monster Cetus. She had been chained to a sea cliff by the god Neptune."

  "Oh," she said, not sounding very impressed. "Thanks for clearing that up."

  "You're welcome." She moved again and I turned my head and we kissed for a few minutes, gently and with a quiet passion, just exploring and tasting the texture of our mouths against each other. Both of us were content with this little step, and didn't want to push it any further. She sighed and squeezed my side and broke away, saying, "So how come I haven't seen any of these meteors yet?"

  "Because we've been too busy."

  "Hah," and I thought she was going to say something else, but a long, glittering flash of light streaked across the sky. It almost went across our entire field of view, a tail that seemed thick and wondrously bright, and Paula said, "Holy God."

  "Not bad, right?"

  "Lewis," she said, awe in her voice. "I've seen meteors before, but nothing like this before. It was huge!"

  "Those are the Perseids," I said, “and this is probably the best night in years. Clear, no clouds and no moon."

  Three more meteors flashed across, and it was almost like watching a Fourth of July fireworks show, except that they were random and not controlled by anyone on the surface of the planet. The tails were always thick and bright, and it was hard to believe that tiny specks of dust and rock from a long-ago comet were causing such a show. We lay in silence and watched the meteors streak across. Once I saw a bright moving dot of light that signaled a satellite or space debris, safe in its orbit around our planet. What lay above me in the sky was something so unique and wonderful I could not say a word, for fear that it would ruin everything. A few minutes went by and from the increasing regularity of her breathing, I could tell that Paula was sleeping.

  Another half dozen meteors burned their way through the atmosphere before she yawned and said, "I dozed off there."

  "So you did."

  "Well, can you blame me?" she demanded. "I had a hell of a busy day. Up at dawn with a phone tip that those Winslow Homer paintings were at St. Donna's Cemetery, and my God, Lewis, when I got there it was just me and your cop buddy, Diane Woods. I got the particulars from everybody else who showed up and I got an exclusive, photos and everything else."

  "Congratulations," I said, glad that in the darkness she couldn't see what my face looked like.

  "Mmm," she said. "Not only that, but I got on the phone and started doing freelance, and I sold stringer stories to the Associated Press, the Boston Globe and a couple of radio stations. Even Channel 9 interviewed me."

  "I saw you. I was impressed. If you ever want a career as a meat puppet, you can have it."

  "Hunh," she said. "Not likely. Nope, I got bigger and better things ahead of me, Lewis. This afternoon I called up the head of security at the museum, some guy named Dix, and he was so happy to talk to me he was crying on the phone. I've got an interview set up with him tomorrow."

  "You do?" I said. "Then tell him I said hello."

  Paula squeezed me again. "You know him?"

  "Just a little, but he'll know me. Tell him hello, and that I'm glad everything worked out."

  "Hah," Paula said, nuzzling under my chin. “Anybody else at the museum I should say hi to?"

  I remembered a long-legged woman on this back deck in a skimpy bathing suit and the way she had looked at me, and how she had walked out, full of life and confidence. I smiled gently. "No one else, Paula. No one else."

  She giggled slightly. "You weren't making any phone calls to the Chronicle this morning, were you? Seems like the cops got the same call. So one call was for Diane and the other was for me. And you know the two of us and the museum director. Pretty cozy, Lewis."

  "Stop complaining," I said. "Just be glad you got called, and stop asking so many questions."

  "Hmmm," she murmured. “All right, you secret-keeper you. And you know who else I called today? Yankee magazine. I called their articles editor and pitched her a story about the painting recovery, and she's interested. Can you believe that? Me in a national magazine!"

  "Nice way to end up another boring summer at Tyler Beach," I said.

  “Absolutely.”

  "So you're doing better."

  "Yep."

  I gave her a squeeze. “And how are we doing?"

  "Hmmm," she said, gently kissing my neck. "I think we're doing better. We're starting over in a way, Lewis, and I think that's best."

  "No arguments here."

  "I'm glad." The meteors went on, each one seemingly brighter than the one before it, and Paula kissed me and whispered, "Lewis, I should be going. I'm falling asleep here."

  I thought about my response, and I carefully said, "You're welco
me to spend the night. On the couch, if need be, Paula."

  She kissed me again. "No, I should go home. And don't you get up --- you'll ruin your night vision or something. You stay here and enjoy the show."

  I squeezed her hand and there was the soft noise of the glass door sliding open. After a minute or two, she went out the front door and I could hear her walk up my dirt driveway. I waited until I caught the sound of her car engine starting and then heading away. Then I pulled the blanket up and lay back and stared up at the vastness of the evening sky, looking at my old constellation friends, running their names through my mind. Soon it seemed like with every passing minute meteor after meteor streaked across the sky, filling me with an ancient and wonderful joy, of being alive and breathing in such a huge and glorious universe. I took a deep breath and my side felt fine and I smelled the clean air of the ocean waves, and there was no scent of oil, rot or decay.

  The black tide was gone.

  # # #

  Afterword

  Thank you again, dear reader, for not only purchasing my second published novel, but also purchasing the second work in my Lewis Cole series, and an artifact from a time where computers and what they could do was just starting to make an impact in fiction.

  In re-formatting “Black Tide,” boy oh boy, was I tempted to edit it and tighten some scenes up. There were a number of scenes that in re-reading nearly twenty years (!) later, that I thought contained too much thinking and brooding. And my word, I winced every time one of my characters winked. Gad, was there an epidemic of eye blinking going on in my fictional universe back then? But in the end I decided to let it be, for better or for worse.

  But one thing I’m proud of is the plot behind “Black Tide,” concerning the theft of valuable paintings from a museum in Manchester, N.H. Obviously these thefts are based on the actual thefts that occurred at the Isabella Stewart Gardener museum in Boston that took place in 1990, five years before “Black Tide” was written. In coming up with my plot, I used the slim possibility that organized crime was involved.