Cold Smoked

by K. K. Beck

  He had his tray table down and was slamming away on a laptop computer. She studied his face in profile. It was really a very interesting face—like some Renaissance portrait, with a strong nose and chin and a curved flat plane beneath the high cheekbone. He had fine dark hair and an intense look about him. He was definitely European, but probably not British. She wasn’t sure why she knew this. It had something to do with tailoring, she imagined.

  She ordered a large Scotch, sat up and ran a hand through her hair. In the seat next to her, a man in a tweed sports jacket with fake suede elbow patches ordered the same and said to her with an American twang: “What the heck are you going to Shetland for?” He gave her a big, complacent smile, settling in for what he evidently assumed would be a long, friendly conversation. He seemed amiable enough—a bald, florid-looking man with a large diamond ring—but Jane wasn’t in the mood to chat. No one but an American would demand to know her business like that, she thought. In the States, she wouldn’t have minded so much; it went with the territory. But in Europe it seemed an imposition. She supposed he felt he could chum up to her because they were both Americans surrounded by cold, unfriendly Europeans. His question did, however, remind her that she had to come up with some story to explain her presence in Shetland.

  “Just visiting a friend,” she said, feeling a bit of a traitor to her country by giving him a squelching little frosty look. She rummaged around in one of her plastic bags and came up with the only reading material she could use as a screen. It was a large brochure with facts and figures about Norwegian fish exports.

  “I’m in the oil business myself,” he said.

  “Oh,” said Jane, frowning in concentration over a picture of a salmon lying in state in a Styrofoam box full of ice.

  “Ever been to Shetland before?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “I thought Aberdeen was the end of the road, but Shetland is just about the ends of the earth,” he went on. “I guess you know they have a big oil terminal up there at Sullom Voe.”

  “Mmm,” she said.

  He looked over her shoulder. “Looks like you’re in the fish business,” he said in his loud, cheery voice, rattling ice cubes.

  “That’s right,” she said, putting the brochure on her knees and leaning over to look for earphones. That and closed eyes might be her only defense. There didn’t seem to be any earphones, and the brochure slid from her lap into the aisle.

  She unbuckled her seat belt and reached for it, but a long brown hand beat her to it. The man across the aisle handed the brochure back to her.

  “Thank you,” she said, looking into his intelligent gray-blue eyes.

  “You are welcome,” he said without a discernible accent, but with a little nod that confirmed her suspicion he was continental. It was the kind of nod that might have been accompanied by a Teutonic click of the heels.

  “Remember the Exxon Valdez?” her seatmate was saying now.

  “That oil spill in Alaska?” said Jane, who had decided she was irrevocably trapped.

  “They’ve renamed her the SeaRiver Mediterranean. She’s up there now, taking on a hundred and ninety-four thousand tons of crude for delivery to the U.S.”

  “Really?” said Jane. Maybe she should tell Magnus she was singing in Britain somewhere and had come up for the weekend to get away from it all. It seemed a little lame. She imagined herself in some rowdy pub in Blackpool, singing “The White Cliffs of Dover” while football hooligans scuffled in the corners. She had to say she was a singer, though. After all, that’s how he’d met her.

  The American cleared his throat and launched into his monologue again. “That’s metric tons, of course. Interesting, the way the salmon up there in Alaska were smart enough just to swim around all that oil, but I guess you know all about that, being in the fish business.”

  “Yes,” said Jane. Maybe she could say she was on her way to Norway and took a side trip through Shetland. That had the advantage of being partly true. Or could she risk telling Magnus the truth? If it got back to Seafood Now, she could be in trouble. But so what? She’d got what she wanted from them, the trip to Norway. However, Magnus and Trygve Knutsen knew each other. What if she told him what she was doing and he tipped off Knutsen?”

  “I don’t eat much fish myself,” the man said. “Just a little catfish once in a while. Fried up real nice.”

  She wondered how small a place Shetland was and had a hideous vision of this garrulous American running into her somewhere with Anderson and asking her in a loud voice how things were in the fish business. She took a sip of her Scotch and decided she was getting paranoid. What she needed was a good night’s sleep. She’d call Anderson tomorrow, and by then she’d have a convincing explanation for her presence. All she had to do was worm out of him what he knew about Knutsen, fly back to Bergen and see what she could get out of the Norwegian himself.

  Jane’s seatmate was still hovering at her side as they filed off. She’d managed to deflect his questions about her, which hadn’t been too tough, as he had lots of his own material he wanted to share. His stories about his adventures in the oil business went back several generations (“My granddaddy, he was a wildcatter . . .”) and covered his international adventures, or lack thereof (“I never saw a woman the whole time I was in Saudi. They’re all wrapped up from head to toe. Doesn’t seem natural. Hey, I’m a normal, red-blooded American man, you know?”), as well as his stateside experiences (“Those people up in Alaska, they’re a tough bunch of sourdoughs, let me tell you. Seems like every tough son of a bitch who doesn’t end up in Texas ends up there!”).

  The last thing she expected was to see Magnus Anderson meeting her plane. But there he was, in a big flapping raincoat, smiling and scanning the arriving passengers. Surely he wasn’t meeting her. There were a score of flights a day from Aberdeen, and she hadn’t told him which one she’d be on.

  She had to ditch her new friend, who might blather on about fish in front of Magnus. She ducked behind a group of men in bright red jumpsuits who looked as if they were on some paramilitary mission. “These boys are heading straight for the choppers that’ll take ’em out to the derricks,” the American informed her.

  “Is that where you’re going, too?” she asked hopefully.

  “No, I’ll be checking into the hotel in Lerwick and heading up to Sullom Voe in the morning,” he said. “Maybe we could get together for a drink. You could tell me about the fish business. I’ve really enjoyed talking to you.”

  Magnus had caught her eye and was waving at her, looking surprised.

  She had to get rid of the oil man immediately. “I cannot have a drink with you,” she said sternly. “I don’t hold with drinking. And I’m not in the fish business. I’m here on a religious mission to convert Shetland to a bible-based Christian fellowship. I am,” she said, suddenly inspired by one of the Putnam brothers, “a fisher of men.”

  “But you had a Scotch on the plane,” he said.

  “Strictly medicinal purposes,” she said. “I’m terrified of flying.”

  “Yeah?” he said doubtfully. “Well, ma’am, your secret is safe with me.” He gestured over to Magnus. “Is that one of the brothers? Maybe you should have a tic tac or something.”

  They had arrived at the baggage claim area. Jane watched gratefully as the oil man sidled away into the knot of men in red jumpsuits. She looked around and saw Magnus shaking hands with the tall, dark man who had sat across from her on the plane.

  Magnus excused himself and came over to her. “I got your message,” he said. “It’s great to see you. I’m a bit tied up with business just now, as you can see. . . .” He indicated the dark man, who was now yanking an aluminum suitcase off the baggage belt. “Maybe we can meet tomorrow. Actually, I’m having some folk to tea. Can you join us?”

  “That would be lovely,” said Jane. “When’s teatime?”

  Magnus smiled. “When we say tea it’s what you probably call dinner,” he said. “Round about seven? Will you sing for us?”

/>   “I’ll sing if you want me to.”

  “Brilliant. And where are you stopping? I can put you up at my house.”

  His soft voice seemed even quieter than it had been in Seattle. She realized it sounded as if she were shouting at him. She lowered it a decibel or two. “That’s very kind, but I’m all set at the Shetland Hotel,” she said.

  “I’m driving Gunther over there now,” he said. “Come along with us.”

  He tried to take her plastic bag, which she realized with horror bore the logo of the Norwegian fish agency.

  “Oh, look, there’s my suitcase,” she said, pointing to the arriving baggage. Magnus dutifully went after it and came back with it and Gunther, whom he introduced. His last name was Kessler.

  Herr Kessler offered her a dry, cool hand, staring unsmiling into her face, and Magnus said to him: “Jane’s visiting from Seattle. We’re giving her a lift to the hotel.” To Jane he added, “Gunther’s giving us a hand with a little problem.”

  “A problem?” she said sympathetically. “With your salmon?”

  “I’m in refrigeration,” said Kessler. He turned to Magnus. “If it’s all the same to you, I shall hire a car. Perhaps we can meet at the hotel.” He nodded to them both and went over to the one car rental counter.

  Jane watched him take out his wallet and passport. It was red with a little cross. Gunther Kessler was Swiss.

  “What brings you here, then?” said Magnus as they had settled themselves in his small Japanese car.

  “Well,” she said gaily, “I’m going to Bergen on Monday, and I noticed how close you were, and I thought why not spend a weekend in Shetland. I’ve always heard how lovely it is. As lovely as your salmon, by the way, which I enjoyed very much.”

  “We get very few visitors this time of year,” he said.

  “I understand the bird life is fascinating,” she said rather desperately. She had noticed a large poster of a puffin in the airport.

  “Birds!” he said eagerly. “Are you interested in ornithology, then?”

  “Well, a little,” she said. She knew less about birds than she did about fish. She was fond of Robert Benchley’s remark about birds being all right in profile, but “did you ever see one of the sons of bitches head on?”

  “People come from all over the world to see our birds,” he said proudly. “If you’ve time, I can show you a cliff full of them. It’s on the way.”

  They drove up a winding road through grassy, hilly fields divided by dry-stone walls and dotted with stone cottages and strange-looking sheep with narrow, goatlike faces. Fifteen minutes later they reached a parking place on top of a bluff.

  Outside of the car, the wind practically knocked Jane flat. Magnus strode purposefully in front of her up a little path, his hair streaming back from his face, his raincoat flapping, until they reached the top of a towering cliff with a view of the white-capped sea and an adjacent huge, irregular rock wall. It was teeming with birds of various kinds. More birds swooped in front of the rock face, letting out cries, bleats and squawks barely audible against the wind and the crash of surf below.

  Magnus beamed happily at the cliff. “This rock is home to gannets, guillemots, kittiwakes and puffins. And we’ve great colonies of auks. Of course, we have our own names for the birds. In Shetland we call a puffin a tammie norie. The terns are called tirricks, and the arctic skuas are skootie alans.”

  Jane nodded as if she were committing all this to memory.

  “Many of the seabirds have no need of land except to nest, you know,” he said. “There aren’t a great many now. The time to come is May and June.”

  “The sky is wonderful,” said Jane, looking out to sea after a suitably polite pause to appreciate the bird life. It was a huge sky, soft gray with dark, bluish clouds touched at the edges with peach and gold. The sun was obscured except for a fan of pale lemon–colored rays slanting down to the sea like a symbol of the divine presence in an old painting.

  “Very fine crepuscular rays,” Magnus commented approvingly. “Of course, they’re very common here.” He was one of those rare individuals who seemed to be completely enchanted with his home turf. Jane wasn’t sure whether she was charmed or slightly irritated by his Chamber of Commerce take.

  Back in the car on the way to her hotel, she reminded herself why she was here and managed to find a way to get to topic A.

  “Birds are fascinating,” she said. “But I can only admire them from afar. I can’t imagine letting them sit on me like funny old people in parks covered with pigeons.” She paused. “Or wanting to talk to them, like St. Anthony. Maybe I mean St. Francis. They always show him with a bird or two on him, don’t they?”

  Magnus said that keeping your distance was fine and that it was very important for people to stay away from nesting birds. “The Victorians spent a great deal of time collecting eggs,” he said, shaking his head at their bad behavior.

  Jane wrenched things back to her own agenda. “Terrible,” she said. “You know, St. Francis reminds me of that young woman who died at the seafood show. Her name was Marcia St. Francis. Did you know about that?”

  “Yes, I heard.” Magnus shook his head sadly. “And we’d been told that Seattle is a safe place. But with all those guns about, I suppose no one is safe in America. How many people do you know who’ve been shot?” he said. “I imagine it’s pretty common.”

  Jane couldn’t think of anyone she knew who’d been shot, and said so. “The police still don’t know who did it,” she added. “Or much about the woman. But I ran into the other girl who was dressed up in those awful Scottish outfits. She said Marcia had come back from some kind of a date with one of the salmon people. That Norwegian.”

  “Old Trygve,” said Magnus with a smile. “I can tell you, he was horrified. Went straight back to Norway and swore he’d never set foot in America again.”

  Jane wondered how the hell she’d get Magnus to tell her what his remark about kinky gear had meant. It would have been easier, perhaps, if Magnus hadn’t heard the girl had been killed.

  She decided to let him think that she already knew. “Yes,” she said. “I heard something about it. Some jokes about kinky gear or something, but I can’t remember exactly. . . .”

  Magnus startled Jane by blushing. She’d seen him turn red once before, when Carla had been grilling him. “Trygve left with her drunk and came back sober and ashamed looking. I ran into him in the elevator. He tried to put his hand in his pocket—” He broke off as if embarrassed and said, “Poor old Trygve.”

  Jane remembered Knutsen with his hand in the pocket of his bathrobe. If she hadn’t been focusing on the fact that he wore one slipper, she might have noticed that his hand in the pocket looked a little too studiously casual, considering the circumstances.

  Magnus slowed down to let a trio of sheep cross the road safely. “He told me American lasses were daft.”

  Suddenly he looked over at her, apparently flustered by his own remark. “Nothing pairsonal, mind you. That’s just what old Trygve said.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Her window at the Shetland Hotel was dirty. Everything else in the place was perfectly clean and nice, so she supposed the fierce winds on these islands made it impossible to keep windows clean. The room overlooked a working port, a large expanse with cranes and shipping containers, and a terminal where a massive blue-and-white ferry lolled. A few desolate-looking pedestrians in anoraks and jeans walked along the road in front in a sort of resigned way. Jane felt vaguely sad herself.

  After a room service dinner she went to bed early, listening to BBC Radio Two in bed. She slept in very late the next morning.

  What woke her was the telephone. For a moment she thought she was back in Norway and this was her early morning wake-up call for a visit to a fish plant or a cod trawler.

  Instead it was Magnus, who said that he was spending the morning taking Gunther Kessler to some salmon pens. For a moment Jane feared he’d ask her along. More fish in the company of that lugu
brious Swiss sounded grim.

  Magnus apologized again for not being able to get away. “It’s part of my duties as liaison with the International Salmon Exporters Association,” he said with a sigh. He told her he would come by in the late afternoon and then take her up to his place for tea.

  “The other guests are coming later,” he said, “but I need to get back and see if I have any faxes and prepare things. You don’t mind, do you?”

  “You’re sure it’s no trouble?” she said, pleased. The more time she had with him, the better chance she had to pump him about Knutsen.

  She ate a hearty breakfast in the hotel dining room, served by some sweet, translucent-skinned Shetlanders with soft voices—a nice high-cholesterol meal of bacon and eggs with Earl Grey tea. The meal was marred only by the fake-American Muzak reminding her of the boom box that had busted up her last act.

  After breakfast she consulted a map she found in her room and set out in search of a bookstore, bucking wind and a light rain that reminded her of Seattle. She wasn’t going to be caught with nothing but fish brochures again.

  Lerwick was a little gray-stone town of peak-roofed houses with small windows overlooking a harbor. Squatting in the middle of it all was sturdy, pugnacious Fort Charlotte and an old hotel flying the Union Jack. Lerwick looked as though it could have belonged to any of the past five or six centuries.

  The street names spoke of Scandinavia—King Haakon Street, King Erik Street, and strange saints whom she imagined taming Vikings—St. Olaf, St. Sunniva, St. Magnus. Along the water’s edge were stone houses coming straight out of the water, as if the town had spilled into the harbor. Behind the fort she found what she guessed was the old part of the town, interlaced as it was by cobbled lanes too narrow for anything more than a wheelbarrow.

  She found the Market Cross and Commercial Street, a stone-paved plaza surrounded by small shops, and eventually a bookstore, where she bought some paperback novels and a history of Shetland. She had halfway hoped to find a shop that could sell her Britain’s famed WonderBra but didn’t find one. She’d have to wait until this alleged technical marvel crossed the Atlantic.