The Turquoise Shroud: A Seth Halliday Novel

by Bobby Underwood

  "He doesn't know anything either. He was sleeping one off when I found her."

  The guys with the stretcher had made it down the pathway and Sanchez waved them over. I'd told them she was buried when I'd called and they'd brought two shovels which they had strapped to the gurney.

  "I think we should let them dig your friend out of the sand now and do their job. I don't see you as a suspect, but more as someone who might want to, how do you say it? Cowboy it up?" He was playing the dumb Mexican now and it was transparent and he knew it. "I think I should remind you that however you may have felt for the girl, you are now in Mexico. As you said, you are no longer a cop, and even if you were, you have no jurisdiction here. Just let us do our job."

  I walked away knowing they'd never get to the bottom of it. It would be easier to write off as drunken college kids going too far. A tragic accident which didn't deter hundreds of tourists from enjoying Cozumel and spending their money. I walked away from Nancy's sandy coffin much faster than I'd approached it. Harry was down below when I made it back and there was no sign of the bike. There was no sign of Dream Girl, either, but the faint sound of Sergio Mendez's version of Slow Hot Wind could be heard playing on her boat. Another day I might have decided to push the envelope of my limitations and go introduce myself. Another day.

  I took the card out of my wallet and dialed Columbia. Someone picked up on the third ring. There was no hum this time.

  "Mr. Halliday, this is quite a surprise."

  "How'd you know it was me?"

  "This number was arranged only for the purpose of our original exchange. I kept it live in case you needed to use it again."

  "I do."

  "Are you in jail perhaps?"

  "No, nothing that simple." I explained the situation.

  "Quite terrible, for certain, and my condolences on the death of your friend, but how can I be of assistance?"

  "How far-reaching are the interests of Maria's family?"

  "Quite extensive."

  "Mexico?"

  A pause.

  "Certainly."

  "I may need it. I'm going to look into Nancy's death and I don't think Sanchez and Carillo will take too kindly to my poking around on their turf."

  "I see."

  I waited.

  "Can you wait to begin your investigation until tomorrow morning?"

  "Yes, what did you have in mind?"

  "Tomorrow, a cashier's check for five-thousand dollars will be delivered to you. A letter stating that you have been hired to look into the matter by Maria's family will accompany it. Also a private license to do so."

  "In Mexico?"

  "In America and Mexico." He had definitely spent some time in the States. Only people with a connection called it America. The rest of the world called it the United States. I was thinking and hadn't realized I'd left a silence.

  "Do you believe your investigation will expand beyond those borders, Mr. Halliday?"

  "No, those two countries should be fine. What about the five thousand?"

  "For cosmetic purposes, of course, but inconsequential. You may use it for the young girl's funeral perhaps. I can make it more if necessary."

  "No, it's fine, and I will."

  "I assume, since you are American, you have weapons? Do you need permits for them?"

  The man who thought of everything.

  "For Mexico, I do." I told him the makes and serial numbers, which I knew by heart.

  "They will be included, then."

  "You must be the world's most efficient attorney. I hope you're compensated well."

  "Thank you, and yes, I have all the comforts I desire in life. At least the ones which can be acquired by money."

  I thought about Nancy, backpacking it to Mexico, running from something which finally caught up with her. A bicycle she had never ridden would have been her comfort in life.

  And then I had one of those moments cops get, when they figure something out they should have known all along. It was something he'd said during the first call.

  "I will tell them, Mr. Halliday. I'm certain her mother will find some small comfort in your white lie."

  Not, "they" but rather, "her mother". Wouldn't the father also find comfort in the white lie? He couldn't, because I'd been speaking to him, and was speaking to him now, and he knew how his estranged daughter had died. He was keeping it from his wife. It was why the business card was so generic. He probably wasn't even an attorney. He was the one with the interests and influence, the power and money. But none of it had been able to save his daughter. But it could shield his wife from a truth she needn't be aware, a truth which would make her life unbearable. And it could be used to reach out to thank me for bringing about justice. Maybe he even understood what it had cost me.

  "Is there anything else, Mr. Halliday?"

  "No, just thanks. How is Maria's mother doing, if I may ask?"

  His tone became less formal. "She is very well, thank you. She is quite involved in charity work and has those who love her around her, I believe. It helps."

  "I'm sure it does." I considered carefully my next words. "I'm certain it's a comfort that the family attorney has been able to shield her from life's cruelties."

  A pause.

  "Thank you." And then the line went dead.

  Three

  It isn't supposed to be such a beautiful day when death comes calling. The least it could have done was cloud over and rain, even a warm tropical rain would have been some small acknowledgement from the world that something terrible had happened. Instead it was one of the prettiest days since we'd arrived, and the ones preceding it hadn't exactly been shabby. The world was continuing, even if Nancy couldn't.

  I sat looking out at paradise unable to enjoy it. Off in the distance big white cruise ships had pulled into port, glistening beneath the Mexican sun. Vacationers for whom murder was not on the itinerary. Throngs of young college kids on break, males and females looking to party and get laid without strings or consequence. They'd be wearing T-shirts with captions uttered by some inconsequential reality television personality, or worse, an Obama logo. They'd smoke as much cannabis as they could procure and maybe experiment with some stronger stuff. What happened in Mexico would stay in Mexico; literally for some, who would not be able to remember much of what they had done or let others do while in a stupor borne of tequila body-shots and Ecstasy. Old enough to vote, too stupid to realize the consequences.

  Older but no wiser were the secretaries and personal assistants screwing their married bosses. Each of them clung to the hope that this would be the moment he realized what a better deal they were offering than the ball-and-chain waiting back home. Their seared collective conscience and ambiguous sense of right and wrong would allow them to block out the image of his two children. The kids would live with their mother after the divorce anyway, wouldn't they? If all the hot sex and good times in Cozumel didn't bring the boss around, perhaps diamonds or emeralds would be some compensation before they moved on to the next bad choice.

  A world removed from both and arriving in clothes they'd purchased just for vacation were the housewives. Free of the kids back in Shreveport or Duluth who had finally gone off to college, they hoped being in paradise might rekindle their husbands' interest. Their hearts ached to remind their man that there existed a softer, lovelier place where they could bury their heads than ESPN. They waited on edge for some sign, some overture, and when it appeared would pounce like starving kittens on a warm bowl of milk.

  And lastly were the single women. They would run the gamut from somewhat pretty to somewhat plain, dreadful, incurable diseases that had relegated them to lives of obscurity and boredom. They were hardly unattractive, each having something special to offer, but their figures and faces were more real than the latest Hollywood celebrity gracing the magazine cover at their local supermarket checkout. Outcasts in a non-substantive culture which worshipped only facade, they were hoping for the romance found in the pages of the Harlequins an
d Harold Robbins novels they read in their bedrooms, a pint of ice cream at their side. Their bedroom was their sanctuary, a place where they could dream of being taken and loved, worshipped and lusted after. If they were lucky, they would take home from Cozumel a sweet memory they would make last a lifetime. Evidence that they had lived. If they were unlucky, they would cross paths with a swarthy local Lothario or worse, a butch cruising for the vulnerable. The unsafe mix of inexperience and loneliness would lead them to acts so shameful and degrading they would never be able to enjoy the innocence of another Harlequin.

  The morning sun danced on the aquamarine water as I watched them unload like tiny ants and pondered where to begin my search for Nancy's killer. I tried to remember anything Nancy might have said that would give me a starting point. We had talked a lot, but it had been easy, friendly talk, jokes and laughter. She had been careful not to talk about her past or where she'd come from, and Harry and I had been careful not to ask.

  Harry finally got tired of pretending to work below and came up to join me. He brought me a coke because I didn't really drink. I was surprised to see him with one. A coke, that is. If anything, I'd prepared myself for a long night playing nursemaid. "Figured I'd need to be at my best if we're gonna hunt down the bastard that killed Nancy," he said.

  Before I could respond I saw our pretty neighbor in the harbor out of the corner of my eye. She must have jumped off the stern of her boat and walked up alongside Stella. Her expression left no doubt that she'd heard Harry.

  "I'm sorry, I was just going to introduce myself. It sounds like I've come at an awful time."

  I'd missed her age by a few years. She was fresh and beautiful, and had that LeAnn Rimes thing going on for sure, but up close I saw tiny crinkles at the corners of her pretty blue eyes that only arrive in a woman's early thirties. It added character and warmth, and made her even more attractive. I stood and reached out my hand.

  "It's not your fault. Come aboard."

  She smiled and took my hand as she stepped onto Stella from the dock. I don't usually notice hands but hers were lovely. Her bright blonde hair hung loosely past her shoulders as if it had just been washed. It smelled like apricots.

  "Delana MacCrae."

  "Seth Halliday. This is Harry." She put out her hand to shake Harry's, and he wiped it self-consciously on his pant leg before taking it. Her kind of pretty demanded respect. She was dressed in bright-blue shorts and a tank-top with blue stripes against a white background. The outfit's contrast with her white skin and blonder-than-blonde hair made the effect stunning.

  "I couldn't help but overhear. I hope it wasn't the girl who…" She saw from Harry's wince that it was. "I'm so sorry. She always waved and smiled, and seemed so nice."

  "She was," I said. "The best. Someone murdered her last night."

  "What a terrible world. Was she related? I mean, a daughter or granddaughter maybe?"

  "No, just a good friend we met here in Cozumel. Have a seat, Delana."

  She sat with us and for a minute or two we were all quiet. It was a comfortable silence, as if she'd sat with us like that a hundred times before. I finally asked if she was on vacation. She frowned. "I guess you could call it that. I just needed to get away, so I left. But if vacation is traveling, then no. I live here."

  "With someone?"

  She turned and stared at me a moment, searching for my meaning. Her eyes really were very blue, and very beautiful. "What would make you think so?"

  "Maybe because I used to be a cop. It's been my experience that when people need to get away, it's usually from someone."

  Her face brightened and she began laughing, a full, throaty laugh, the kind that made you want to take her below deck and love all of her. It might have been calculated to, but it appeared genuine. She said, "Yes, I wanted to get away from him. We're through actually, he just doesn't know it yet."

  "If he has any sense he'll take it real hard," piped in Harry, making her laugh again. "Thank you, Harry."

  "You'll have to watch out for Harry," I said, "or you'll just end up another one of his many conquests on the island."

  "That ain't funny, Seth," he said. "She might just believe ya."

  "I haven't seen that pretty lady from the Golden Parrot around, Harry. Did you get bored with her already?" It was talk that dulled the pain, and kept us from thinking about Nancy's absence, which would last forever.

  "Why she's got four kids, Seth, two of 'em young-ins. I'm too old for that stuff now."

  "I bet you weren't too old to make her smile at what might have been though," Delana teased, unexpectedly. Harry grinned. "A gentleman never tells."

  "Then you shouldn't have any problem giving us all the details," I quipped, looking at Delana.

  "You beat all, Seth," he said. "I think I'll just go below and add some rum to this here Coke. And then I might just have another."

  "Alright, just don't drink up all the Coke."

  Harry knew I didn't mean the Coke and didn't answer. He just shuffled off. It was a good sign.

  "I really am sorry about Nancy. I can tell how much she meant to both of you." She took a breath. "I have a confession to make."

  I reached over and touched the nape of her neck with my forefinger. "Please don't say you were born a man." She snapped her fingers. "What gave me away?"

  "The ones that seem too good to be true, almost always are."

  She gave a little laugh, less throaty this time but no less pleasant. The smile always accompanied the laugh. "Thank you. But my confession isn't so dramatic. I noticed Harry pushing the bike out here this morning just after you left. He looked like a kid putting out presents at Christmas, arranging it just so. But when he put it back below there was such a forlorn expression on his face I knew something terrible had happened. I thought you two might need some company. And to be honest, I wanted to know what had happened."

  I took in a deep breath of sea-misted air and let it out slowly while I stared at her. "Thanks. I think we did."

  "What are you going to do about it?"

  "What makes you think I'm going to do anything?"

  "Because I've watched you and her from a distance. You can tell when people click. It sort of made me jealous, the obvious affection you had for each other."

  "We were just friends. Harry and I cared about her."

  She turned away from my gaze and stared into the distance, out where the sea sparkled beneath the sun's rays. "Maybe that's what I was jealous of, because I could use a friend like that right now."

  It was bad timing. She would be on the rebound.

  "Then you have one. Two if you include Harry in the deal."

  She smiled. "I do." She hesitated, then spat out what she'd been mulling over. "I know it's bad timing, well, horrible timing really, but maybe now that we're officially friends we could do something that would take your mind off of what happened for just a while."

  "What'd you have in mind?"

  She stood, those beautiful white legs only inches from me. "Follow me." She jumped down onto the dock and I followed her, wondering if friends meant something different in her world than it did in mine. If it did, I was willing to be flexible. We made the small jump onto the stern of her boat, the Dos Hijas. She opened the doors of a big storage locker. It held a vintage old Vespa scooter, a two-stroker like the one Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck had zipped around Rome in on their holiday. This one was a soft orange color. "Help me get it out, it's heavy." There was a little ramp behind the scooter and she pulled it out and rushed past me to place it between the stern and the dock. I rolled the Vespa down it and parked it.

  "Where'd you get this?"

  "It's not mine, it came with the boat." The wry grin made me think the boat belonged to whomever she was leaving. "I haven't been to San Miguel in a while, I thought it might be a good day for it, if you're up for it."

  The idea of having fun, enjoying a day on this tropical island with this pretty girl who needed a friend was tainted with survivor guilt, that
feeling that it somehow lessens how much the dead meant to us if we carry on. As a cop you see it all the time. It isn't often you experience it firsthand. There was no bringing back Nancy, there was only resolve that I would discover who had murdered her and mete out justice. It would never give her peace, it was too late for that, but it might ease my own emptiness.

  "Let me tell Harry."

  I heard the scooter come to life as my feet hit the deck. It wasn't a roar but a purr. I was on the second step when I heard not a purr but a roar, or something like it. Harry was snoring. I hung a note on the stairwell to tell him where we'd gone and crept back up. Delana was smiling, her eyes excited. They were even prettier excited, and so was she. "Hop on," she said. I straddled the seat behind her, feeling how soft her rear end was beneath those blue shorts, and I wrapped both arms around her waist, thinking it could become very addictive.

  Four

  Lying only about six miles from the mainland, Cozumel is the largest of Mexico's Caribbean islands. It is mostly flat, with lots of jungle, and just big enough at thirty miles long and ten miles wide to give tourists the illusion of paradise without end. The Maya, who named it Ah Cuzamil Peten -- the Island of Swallows -- left their footprints all over the island, but "progress" nearly wiped them all away before developers realized what a cash cow they could be. People would come to see the Mayan ruins and spend their money at hotels, resorts, restaurants and tacky gift shops like all good vacationers are supposed to do.

  San Gervasio at the heart of the island has the largest Mayan remains. Most of the island's inhabitants live in San Miguel, however, on the western shore. San Miguel is the hub for the Riviera Maya, offering ferry service to the mainland of Mexico, as well as Playa del Carmen.

  The big cruise ships arrive in San Miguel and the fun begins. Whether they've come to Cozumel to party, scuba dive, snorkel, go cave diving or just enjoy the seaside spas and shops and eateries, tourists eventually end up in San Miguel, pulled subconsciously toward its crowded streets like stray cows seeking the comfort of the herd. Since other people appeared to be having a good time eating and drinking to excess, wasting money on key chains that would break before they arrived back home and T-shirts they'd wear once or twice and then donate to the Salvation Army or Goodwill, then the slight queasiness they felt at not enjoying themselves as much as they'd hoped must just be a case of Montezuma's revenge taking hold.