Slack Tide

by George Harmon Coxe

  He did know that a week prior to Kingsley’s arrival all the windows in the house had been shuttered. A Filipino couple took care of the house and during that week MacLaren had seen the man take the shutters down one by one, all except that corner room. Once he had used a pair of binoculars to bring the window into sharper focus, and at the time he wondered if he had seen something move behind those shutters.

  Now, stepping to the end of the porch and looking up at the small cottage which stood slightly above and behind the house, his common sense told him that this was none of his business. Part of his mind told him that the basis of his curiosity was his very real antipathy for Oliver Kingsley, but having started, he crossed the back yard, slipped through a gap in the hedge, and came presently to stand beneath a second-floor window which stood partly open.

  “Sam,” he called. “You up there?”

  “Hell, yes, I’m up here. Where’d you think I’d be?”

  The front door gave directly onto the living-room and, when MacLaren had wiped his feet, he went across this to a narrow stairway which led to the floor above. The room he entered was cluttered and untidy. Its lone occupant sat in an easy chair by the window, his right leg supported by another chair. There was a small cast on that foot, not the heavy one the doctor had applied when Sam tangled with a roller box some weeks earlier and snapped his ankle, but a lighter and more comfortable cast.

  “When are you going to stop malingering and get back to work?” MacLaren asked.

  Sam Willis glared at him, a thing he did very well and with no effort because he had a disposition to match. Although he was not yet sixty, he was the oldest employee in the yard, a spare-framed, gaunt-faced man with a long nose, watery blue eyes, and not much hair. He was dogmatic, irascible, opinionated, and argumentative. He was also grasping and tight-fisted; a notoriously shrewd man with a dollar or an idea, who gave nothing away, not even words if he could help it. For all of this he was a craftsman who could handle any job in the yard. He could fill in as a rigger, fitter, carpenter, painter, or mechanic, and, perhaps because he was a confirmed bachelor, he had taken time to give bits and pieces of this knowledge to MacLaren, a process of indoctrination which had started when MacLaren was a very small boy.

  More recently, an outsider listening to the two of them talk could not have known that beneath the caustic comments there was an odd bond of affection. They understood each other, and because of past favors MacLaren had always leaned over backward to be fair. In this instance, Willis had been drawing compensation since the accident, but from the very first day MacLaren had made up the difference between this compensation and the man’s normal salary. It was this to which he referred when he said:

  “I made a mistake.”

  “You’ve made plenty of mistakes.”

  “If I’d let you sweat this out on compensation payments you’d have been back to work long ago.”

  “Yah,” said Willis derisively, “what about my pain and suffering? I should have had full salary plus compensation.”

  MacLaren’s gaze had been moving as he spoke, noting the .22 rifle which stood against the wall within Willis’s reach, the crutch, the table on the other side of the chair which was littered with magazines and paper-backed novels. There were two binoculars, one of which was a Zeiss 7 × 50 that Willis had bought cheaply after the war from a Navy reservist. There was also a box of snuff, a habit Willis had acquired over the years because smoking had been prohibited in many parts of the yard. A wire-mesh wastebasket contained three empty beer cans, and the Scotch cooler on the floor provided a receptacle for the cans which were cold but as yet unopened.

  MacLaren, who had moved beyond the foot of the bed to the window at the side of the room, looked down at the island from an angle. Seeing it from this perspective, he was reminded of the fact that there was a time when the island was not an island. The original builder of the house which Kingsley now occupied had made a causeway perhaps thirty or forty feet long which connected the island to the mainland. Over the years the action of the water and weather had washed away all but the largest of the rocks which made the causeway’s foundation. Mud had coated them and filled the crevices, but it was still possible to make the crossing for a period of an hour or two at low tide provided one didn’t mind getting a bit of mud on his shoes. At the moment there was no sign that such a causeway had ever existed and, turning back to Willis, MacLaren approached the subject that had brought him here.

  “Did you see Kingsley’s cruiser when it came up from New York, Sam?”

  “I saw it. I also saw those two idiots who came in this morning,” he said by way of digression.

  “What two idiots?”

  “The two that brought that black scow in. Annabelle III, wasn’t she? Must have been forty years old if she’s a day. Fools like that shouldn’t be allowed afloat,” he added, warming to his subject. “Ain’t a week goes by you don’t read about the Coast Guard towing in a half dozen of them—if they don’t founder and drown themselves.”

  MacLaren agreed that this was true but at the moment he was not interested in Willis’s views on such subjects as the Annabelle III and her odd crew. He told Sam not to change the subject. He said they had been talking about Kingsley’s cruiser.

  “How many were aboard when she came in?”

  “How would I know how many were aboard? Danaher docked her at night.”

  MacLaren picked up the Zeiss binoculars and turned them over in his hand. “This is a pretty nice pair of glasses.”

  “Damned right they’re good glasses.”

  “Wonderful for night work. Plenty good enough to see that boat turn in from the river and dock.”

  “That don’t mean I can see faces.”

  “But you could tell how many were aboard.”

  The tight withdrawn expression on Sam Willis’s gaunt face was familiar to MacLaren. Willis liked to argue but he did not like to be pushed. He hated to admit he was wrong but this time he surprised MacLaren. With a faint shrug he said: “Four. At least that’s all I saw.”

  “Men or women?”

  “Two of each.”

  “You said you saw Danaher.”

  “No such thing,” Willis snapped. “But Danaher’s the captain, ain’t he? Whoever docked her knew how it should be done. Anyhow, what difference does it make?”

  “Danaher and another man,” MacLaren said idly, ignoring the question, “and two women. One of them must have been Carla Lewis. I wonder who the other was.” He put the binoculars down and said, more to himself than Willis: “Neil Ackerman drove the Mercedes up the next day and Earl Harwell got here about a half hour later in the station wagon.”

  “Harwell? Is he the one who’s out there on the island painting pictures every day?”

  “Yes,” MacLaren said. “And who else have you seen over there?”

  “Lots of people,” Willis said. “Kingsley’s had a half dozen guests the last couple weeks.”

  MacLaren, knowing this was true, digressed. “Did you ever wonder about that corner room? The one with the shutters on it?”

  “Some.”

  “What do you make of it?”

  “Don’t make nothin’. I got other things to do.”

  “Nuts,” said MacLaren. “You sit here every day from eight in the morning until ten at night. Maybe later. You have two binoculars and you use them. I’ll bet there isn’t a thing that goes on within a half mile of here that you don’t know about.”

  This statement brought a sly grin. “That could be, but that don’t mean I can see through them shutters. Why are you so all-fired interested anyway?”

  “I don’t know,” MacLaren said and realized that this was the truth. “Just curious, I guess,” he said, and changed the subject.

  Sam Willis lived with a widowed sister who served as his housekeeper in her spare time. Right now she was working as a waitress at the Surrey Inn during lunch and the dinner hour, which usually lasted until nearly ten o’clock. Now, to give Willis one more
needle before he left, MacLaren said:

  “Why don’t you keep Esther here to take care of you instead of putting her to work at the Inn?”

  “Who puts her to work?” Willis said indignantly.

  “You do,” said MacLaren, trying to hold back a grin.

  Willis, who seemed about ready to give forth with an explosive answer, apparently changed his mind. A sly look came again, and he half closed one eye as he looked around at MacLaren.

  “If you paid me what was rightly mine,” he said, “she wouldn’t have to work.”

  “All right,” MacLaren said, letting his grin come. “You win, Sam.”

  When he got back to the boatyard, he told Larry Keats he could shove off, and said he would see him tomorrow afternoon. There was no one else around so he entered the building, locking the door behind him, crossed the showroom, and climbed the stairs to the apartment above.

  This consisted of a good-sized living-room that overlooked the inlet, a bedroom and bath with a view of the river, and a modern kitchen that faced the parking-lot. This was MacLaren’s second home and he occupied it much of the time from May 1 to September 15. For the most part the furnishings were comfortably masculine, but there were feminine touches here and there, particularly in the bedroom, and there was a good reason for this.

  For the remodeling had been done with an eye on possible income, and the tenant from September 15 to May 1 was a schoolteacher whose home was in another city, and who had only recently moved to the Inn for the remaining weeks of school. The kitchen had been designed with a woman in mind. Also, there was an outside stairway that led to the parking-lot, so that the tenant could have her own entrance and the privacy this entailed.

  Now, as MacLaren shed his clothes, he moved to the kitchen and made a very strong Old Fashioned which was his own formula and held no fruit but the peel of a lemon. Taking this to the bedroom, he swallowed a mouthful and put the glass aside while he took a shower. A half hour later, revived and dressed in slacks and a blue flannel jacket, he rinsed the glass and started for the Surrey Inn which stood on the opposite side of the town’s main street perhaps an eighth of a mile away.

  3

  DON MACLAREN saw the girl shortly before nine o’clock, but he did not know she was a girl at first because it was dark at the time. All he knew was that this was someone from Kingsley’s island.

  It had been about eight thirty when he returned from the Inn, and he substituted a sweater for his jacket before walking to the dock and taking his accustomed seat on the bench that was backed up to the front of the building. Light from a single bulb in the showroom filtered faintly across the dock but he did not bother to turn on the floodlights as he would have done had the season started. He took his time filling his pipe and, when it had been lighted to his satisfaction, he kept it burning slowly to enjoy the taste and fragrance of the tobacco.

  On his right, the line of cruisers was dark—the owners would begin to arrive on Friday—with the exception of the black-hulled Annabelle III—and the night was quiet enough for him to hear something of what was being said by the occupants. Paying little attention at first, he gradually became aware of certain words as the voices rose, and it was a flat and unequivocal statement that finally tuned him in.

  “I don’t give a damn whether you come or not.” It was the hoarse, grating voice of the little man. “I’m going fishing.”

  “Go on then,” said Nick. “Drown yourself. See if I care.”

  “I won’t drown.”

  “You won’t catch any fish either.”

  “So nurse that cut finger of yours and keep sucking at the whisky and shut up.”

  The brief silence was followed by the sound of footsteps on the deck. Presently there was the hollow sound of wood knocking against wood and MacLaren could visualize the fisherman stepping down into the dinghy. The cabin lights moved with the shifting of weight and there was a clatter of oars in the rowlocks. Finally Nick stepped out and his silhouette moved forward. This time his tone was more interested than dogmatic.

  “Do you really think you’ll catch anything, Lew?”

  “Probably not, but I’m going to give it a whirl,” said Lew.

  “But if you don’t think—”

  “Oh, knock it off. A guy that likes to fish don’t have to catch something every time he goes out. I like to fish, see? Like you like dames. So just keep out of trouble until I get back, will you? Probably won’t be more than an hour.”

  The sound of the oars came to MacLaren again, settling now into a rhythm that gradually grew less distinct. Just how long after that it was before he heard the voice from the island, he was never sure. He had finished his pipe and knocked out the dottle, and the warm bowl was still in his palm when he heard the sound of splashing in the inlet. He stood up at once and the thought that came first was that the man named Lew had fallen out of the dinghy. There was no other sound, no cry for help. But he was moving then and when he reached the edge of the dock he saw someone swim out of the darkness.

  He stared in growing wonderment as he leaned forward to get a better look. He sensed that the swimmer was in no trouble so he stayed where he was, and the only thought that came to him before his astonishment became complete was that while the past couple of days had been unseasonably warm for May, the water was much too cold for anything but emergency swimming.

  He heard her before he saw her, for though the night was clear and starlit, the moon had not yet risen. The unseen splashing, at first faint, grew quickly louder and then, a moment later as he leaned forward in his bewilderment, he could make out the swimmer.

  The long hair told him it was a girl. She swam expertly and the current gave her no trouble. For the tide, which had recently been slack, was now moving in from the river and the only thing that hampered her was the garment she wore, not a bathing suit but something that looked more like a dress.

  In spite of this she made steady progress, and with no time for further speculation, MacLaren yelled at her, pointing to the floating dock, trying to tell her to swim that way so that she could climb out more easily. When she continued straight ahead, he knelt down, a partial answer occurring to him as he recalled the blonde girl who had arrived late that afternoon.

  He saw the face looking up at him through the darkness, the streaming hair. Cold hands clutched his as he leaned out across the stringpiece, and he pulled, getting up from one knee and then the other, lifting hard now, and high, as the girl swung inward and got her feet on the planking. Then, as he stepped close to get a better look at her, he got another shock.

  His personal relations with Oliver Kingsley had not been particularly happy, and over a period of time his dislike of the man had become gradually more acute. He knew something about Kingsley’s reputation. It had been suggested by some that he had kept out of jail only because of his ability to buy his way out of trouble and, understanding this background, a half-formed explanation had been mushrooming in MacLaren’s mind. By jumping at conclusions he had assumed that the blonde of the afternoon, finding things too hot to handle on the island, had fled in panic or hysteria. Now he realized his mistake.

  For this was not the girl. She was blonde, and she was slender, but she was not so tall, and the angles of her face were different. This was a girl he had never seen before, and he stared at her in new amazement, still holding her arms.

  “Thank you.” The words came between gasps for breath, and now he felt her try to pull away.

  “Wait a minute,” he said. “What happened? Did you fall overboard or—”

  “I—I have to go,” she said, not letting him finish.

  “Go?” he said. “Where?”

  “Please.”

  Again she tried to wrench away, and now some bit of reflected light from the showroom window touched her face. He could see the hysteria there, the sudden terror which replaced it as her head cocked, and they both heard the sudden throb of a small motor come to life from the direction of the island. As it grew swiftly mor
e distinct, she struggled again in her desperation.

  “Hey!” MacLaren pulled her to a stop.

  “Oh, please—”

  “But look,” he said, his voice gentle. “You can’t go running around like that at night. You’ll get pneumonia.”

  He reached for her again and felt the shudder run through her as she struggled against him. His hands were so tight on her arms now that he knew he must be hurting her and he felt ashamed, yet somehow he was afraid to let her go. He could see the twisted whiteness of her face, the wet, straight hair which framed it; the sodden garment which clung to her slimly rounded body was not a dress as he had first thought but a high-necked nightgown, and her feet were bare, so that the moment would have seemed fantastic had it not been so real and her terror so apparent.

  “I’m not going back,” she said, sobbing now.

  “Okay. Just take it easy.”

  He watched as the dinghy swung alongside and the motor was cut. With that, Oliver Kingsley vaulted to the dock, hesitating only long enough to toss a line over a bollard before he came striding forward.

  “Ah,” he said. “Thanks for holding her, MacLaren.” He reached for the girl’s hand and she jerked away. “Come along, Ruth.”

  “No.”

  “Now let’s not be childish. You shouldn’t have slugged Harry, you know. Even if you had given me the slip where could you have gone? Let’s be sensible about it.”

  The girl had drawn back against MacLaren, her body braced. “I’m not going back,” she sobbed.

  “Oh, yes you are.”

  “No.”

  “Wait a minute!” MacLaren said, when Kingsley grabbed her arm.

  “Stay out of it,” Kingsley said, his tone ominous.

  “Why?” said MacLaren. “Why should she go with you if she doesn’t want to?”

  “Because she’s my wife.”

  MacLaren didn’t believe it. He thought it was a trick. He thought he knew everyone on the island and he had read somewhere that Mrs. Kingsley had gone to Reno for a divorce.