Bluewater Bullion: The Seventh Novel in the Caribbean Mystery and Adventure Series (Bluewater Thrillers Book 7)

by Charles Dougherty

  "Good evening, Samuel," she said after listening for a moment.

  Liz leaned in close, trying to hear, but it was hopeless, given how soft-spoken the man was. She sat back and refilled their wineglasses, watching Dani's face as she focused on the quiet voice in her ear. When Dani disconnected, Liz asked, "Did he have anything?"

  "Yes. His brother works at the big marina in Falmouth Harbour. Pisces of Atë's anchored over there. She came into the marina and filled up with diesel and water this afternoon. His brother wasn't paying any special attention at that point because Samuel hadn't talked to him yet, but he said they had an awful lot of SCUBA tanks in racks in the cockpit. Not just one or two, like you might see in a typical sport-fishing boat."

  "There's not really anything to connect them with Yates, though," Liz said.

  "No, that's true, but there's still Thompson and their former relationship. Thompson could be feeding Bond information."

  "Speaking of Nick and Bond, Elaine's info about Bond's investor was interesting," Liz said. Dani had taken a call from Elaine while Liz was busy cooking their dinner.

  "Yes, but not especially enlightening," Dani said.

  "But it does help rule out coincidence as an explanation for Bond's presence," Liz said. "Her friend didn't know any more about the investor?"

  "No. Just that it was somebody who had tipped Bond to the location of a wreck off Antigua that might have been carrying gold during the Civil War," Dani said. "Meanwhile, that's not all Samuel had."

  "What else, then?"

  "Well, Yates is having dinner this evening with that Muir woman at the Inn."

  "That's hardly news, Dani. They've become a regular item, haven't they?"

  "Yes, but that wasn't the interesting news. Remember the cell-phone picture of our faux DEA agent?" Dani had called Julian Wray a few minutes after he and their visitor left to find out what Julian knew about the man. Julian had snapped a picture of him while he was engaged in his debate with Dani and Liz. He had sent it to them after he and Dani spoke.

  "Yes. What about it?"

  "I sent it to Samuel when I called him earlier."

  "You told me. Did he see the guy or something?"

  "Yes. Our visitor's having dinner at the Inn as well, keeping an eye on Yates. Samuel said he showed up right after Yates did, like he was following him."

  "How does he see all that from where he hangs out?"

  "He doesn't. Remember my telling you about his cousin Josie, the bartender?"

  "Yes."

  "Josie has two sisters and a brother who work at the hotel — desk clerks and the maître d'."

  "It's easy to forget what a small place an island can be," Liz said, smiling.

  "It is. Samuel also said the man's been keeping company with a couple who've been hanging out in Nelson's Dockyard for the last few days."

  "Are they staying at the Inn?"

  "No, at one of the beach hotels across the harbor."

  "Let me guess. Samuel has another cousin."

  "No. He's got an older sister; she's the general manager."

  Liz laughed. "Glad we're not trying to hide. Are you paying Samuel?"

  "No, but he's going to do our varnish at the end of the season. It's been three years — time to take it down to bare wood and start over. That's a big enough job to keep him interested."

  "I'm surprised you trust him to do that the first time out."

  "Turns out he's the one that did the varnish on Vengeance before we bought her; we're one of his showpieces. He's been using Vengeance as a reference when people asked to see his work; he figures he owes us."

  Liz chuckled and shook her head. "What about Julian? You said he called while I was taking a shower; I forgot about that."

  "Me, too. He dropped our visitor off at the dinghy dock after we sent him away, but he was curious to see where he went from there."

  "He followed the guy?"

  "He didn't follow him; he just rode around in the harbor until he saw the guy let himself into one of the villas. It's straight across the fairway from the one Yates is renting."

  "You know, the more we learn, the scarier this gets, Dani."

  "Why do you say that?"

  "There has to be something big at stake here; that kind of surveillance can't be inexpensive. That's five people that we know about so far watching Yates, not to mention renting a villa and hotel rooms. What do you think's going on?"

  "I don't know. Julian's going to check with the office tomorrow and find out who's renting the villa. That may give us something to work with, at least."

  ****

  Gerald Yates settled into the back seat of the taxi as the driver pulled out of the parking lot behind the Admiral's Inn.

  "Where are you going, sir?" the driver asked.

  "Jolly Harbour. Just go to the office in the shopping center; I'll give you directions from there."

  "Yes, sir.

  The scent of Marilyn's perfume lingered on Gerald's shirt, evoking memories of the evening. He was surprised at the speed with which their relationship had progressed. The woman was voracious in bed, but she was also good company. He wasn't accustomed to stimulating conversation with his bedmates. She wasn't just well-read; she was an opera lover and an accomplished professional photographer with several photographic essays for travel magazines to her credit.

  He'd been describing the beauty of the early morning light playing on the sails when she'd shown him some of her sunrise shots taken from the beach. He had been unable to refuse when she'd asked to join him on tomorrow's sail. Now that he was out from under her spell, he was a bit worried. He knew Thompson wouldn't like it, but he reminded himself that Thompson was hired help; he didn't need Nick's approval to take her sailing with them.

  Besides, what harm could come of it? She wouldn't learn anything about their search from riding along and shooting pictures; there was nothing important to see except the readouts on Nick's instruments, and who could make any sense of all those squiggly lines on the computer screen?

  Thinking about the search reminded him of his earlier call to Jackson; he'd had a perplexing conversation with the bookie from one of the private phone booths in the hotel lobby. He made the call to plead for time, hoping that he could negotiate for another week or two to pay. He'd deliberately gotten to the hotel a little early for his date so that he could make the call without Nick listening. He knew Nick well enough to avoid sharing much of his personal business with him.

  Jackson had been surprised to hear from him; that had been obvious from the man's disjointed conversation. Yates had been prepared for a tirade about the upcoming payment, which was due in two days and which he had no hope of making on time. He'd been in touch with his agent; negotiations were proceeding apace. The publisher's reaction was positive, but there wouldn't be any money coming in the next few days.

  Yates had been surprised that Jackson hadn't even mentioned his debt; he had thought Yates was calling to place a bet.

  "But I'm cut off, Marc," Yates had protested.

  "Let's not dwell on our past differences. Your credit's good with me any time. How's your work down there coming, anyway?"

  "Um, okay, I guess. Nothing exciting yet, but I'm making progress."

  "Good, good. Glad to hear it. Rigo and Chen are down there, but I haven't heard from them. I tried to call 'em the other day, let 'em know things between you and me had, ah, ... changed for the better, but I haven't been able to get an answer. Guess you haven't seen 'em have you?"

  Yates suppressed his panic, swallowing hard before he stammered, "N-no. Haven't seen them," as visions of Dani blowing out Rigo's knee flashed before his eyes.

  "Well, if you run into them, tell 'em I said to call before they do something we might all regret, okay?"

  "Uh-huh, sure, M-Marc."

  "Well, good luck with the hunt, Gerald. Nice chatting with you. Call me if you get a hot line on a game, okay?"

  ****

  Yates wasn't alone in being confused by his
conversation with Marc Jackson. Immediately upon disconnecting from Yates, Jackson had begun trying to reach Mickey. Mickey had been scheduled to reach Antigua in the middle of the afternoon, but Jackson learned that his flight had been delayed. They had finally connected a couple of hours ago.

  Mickey was staying in a hotel at the beach near Jolly Harbour where Rigo and Chen had been registered. He had wasted no time jimmying the simple locks on their doors to discover that their belongings were still in their rooms. In Rigo's case, his cast-off, dirty clothes were mingled with everything else in his suitcase; Mickey wasn't surprised. He knew the guy was a slob. Chen's belongings were neatly organized, and Mickey surmised that neither room had been disturbed since the maid's last visit. He went back to his room and called Jackson.

  "What does that mean?" Jackson asked, after listening to Mickey's report. "When were they last there?"

  "I won't know until I'm able to talk with the housekeeping people — probably sometime tomorrow. Looks like they have their wallets and passports with them, wherever they are. Do you know if Rigo had a gun?"

  "Rigo always has a gun. Why?"

  "Curious. There's no sign of any weapons in either room; no secret compartments in their bags or anything like that. Any idea how Rigo got his gun past security?"

  "No, but Rigo knows how to get stuff like that almost everywhere. Maybe he bought one when he got there."

  "Some of his dad's contacts, you think?" Mickey asked.

  "Could be. I don't ask questions like that; it's not healthy. You know that."

  "Yeah, but Jesus, Marc, he's your sister's husband."

  "Was her husband; now he just sends her money."

  "Do you at least know whether he has dealings here? I have to start somewhere."

  "He's got dealings everywhere down there; drugs are all over that part of the world, but be careful, Mickey."

  "Yeah, I will. You check Rigo's credit card today?"

  "We did. No activity in the last 24 hours."

  "Hang on, Marc. Somebody's at the door. I'll call right back."

  Mickey hung up the phone and opened his door to find a pretty young maid smiling at him, a wicker basket of wrapped chocolate mints dangling from her left arm.

  "Excuse me, sir. May I turn down your bed?"

  "Sure. Thanks," Mickey said, stepping back and opening the door for her.

  "Welcome to Antigua," she said, bustling around the bed. "Your first visit?"

  "Yes, thanks, it is."

  "I hope you enjoy our beautiful island."

  "I'm sure I will; I'm meeting two friends who're already here."

  "Here at the resort, you mean?"

  "Yes. I went by their rooms, but they weren't there. I wonder if you might have noticed whether they were in their rooms last night?"

  "Which rooms, sir? I might have."

  "Twenty-four and twenty-six, just down the way."

  "Oh, Mr. Rodriguez and Mr. Lee. They are ver' nice men. Polite, like you. Mr. Rodriguez, he always want extra mints."

  "Right. Rigo has a sweet tooth," Mickey said, smiling.

  "They didn't stay in their rooms last night."

  "You sure? Maybe they were just out late."

  "No, sir. My sister, she is the chamber maid for this hall. I turned down their beds last night and left extra mints for Mr. Rodriguez, but she say this morning, the beds, they were not used. Maybe they find some ladies at one of the villas."

  "The villas?"

  "They asked Annie — my sister — 'bout the villas at Jolly Harbour. Mos'ly 'bout whether they could hang out there without causin' trouble. She don't know how to answer, 'cause we don' know much 'bout the villas."

  "I see. Well, maybe they did find some ladies; I'll have to check that out. Thanks for your help."

  "No problem, sir. You like some extra mints?"

  Mickey smiled. "No, thanks. Have a good evening."

  "You, too, sir. I hope you res' well."

  ****

  Pisces of Atë rocked in the gentle waves in Falmouth Harbour. Below deck, Merrill Bond sat at the chart table studying a file from one of his well-paid researchers. It documented an attempt by Christopher Memminger, the Secretary of the Treasury for the Confederacy, to deliver a shipment of gold to Nassau. The gold was to be used for the purchase of arms for the Confederate army. It had been collected from numerous sources in the South, including the U.S. Mint in New Orleans, which was taken over by the Confederate government when Louisiana seceded from the Union.

  According to the research, a number of gold shipments had been consolidated at the Yates family's plantation in Barbuda. The accumulated gold had left Barbuda destined for Nassau, but it never arrived. At about that time, Phaedra had departed from Barbuda in foul weather and had sunk a few miles offshore. Two crewmen survived by clinging to wreckage and were found and returned to the plantation. The range and bearing from Codrington to the location where the men had been found was recorded in the plantation's records and was included in the file. The coincidence of timing favored the idea that Phaedra carried the gold when she went down.

  Bond's investor had claimed to have independent knowledge of the wreck. He would normally have been skeptical of such a claim, but the position wasn't too different from the one Thompson had picked up from Yates. Both locations were within a few miles of the one in the file.

  Bond knew that an experienced captain who anticipated a storm would have run to the west before the trade winds to gain as much sea room as he could. The captain would have been well aware of what was coming as he watched his barometer plummet. Bond drew a course line on a chart; his projection of the wreck's location was well to the west of the area that Vengeance had been searching recently.

  He brought up Thompson's files for the first few days and superimposed the positions of the wrecks he had spotted on the chart display. One large magnetic anomaly caught his eye. It was close to his own estimate of where Phaedra would have been lost. It was also within a quarter of a mile of the location his investor had provided.

  Bond grinned and took another sip of his drink, reflecting on the benefits of his years of experience looking for wrecks. He would check that spot tomorrow. Vengeance would be working several miles closer to shore; he might find the wreck and salvage it while they frittered away their time chasing ghosts.

  Chapter 16

  "There's somebody on the dock with them," Liz said, as Dani steered Vengeance into the fairway leading to Yates's villa. She picked up the binoculars from the rack beside the helm. "It's the woman from the pictures."

  A few minutes later, Dani brought Vengeance alongside the dock. Liz stepped ashore with a midship spring line and dropped it over one of the pilings. Dani opened the throttle a bit with the transmission in forward, using the thrust of the engine working against the spring line to hold the boat steady while Liz helped their guests aboard.

  Once the three people stood on the side deck with Liz, Dani throttled back and took the transmission out of gear. Liz retrieved the spring line, and Vengeance drifted away from the dock, propelled by a gentle offshore breeze. By the time Liz and their passengers had come back to the cockpit, Dani had turned the boat around and was headed for the harbor entrance.

  "Marilyn, meet Dani Berger and Liz Chirac," Yates said, gesturing as he spoke. "Ladies, this is my friend, Marilyn Muir."

  "Ms. Muir," Dani said with a nod.

  "Welcome aboard Vengeance, Ms. Muir," Liz said. "If I can do anything to make you more comfortable, just let me know."

  "Well, I'd be a lot more comfortable if you'd both drop the Ms. Muir and call me Marilyn. I absolutely love your yacht. I was admiring her when she was at English Harbour, before I'd even met Ger. She's beautiful."

  That brought a smile to Dani's face. "Thanks, Marilyn. Are you a sailor?"

  "No, but I've always dreamed about it. I was so excited when I found out that Ger had chartered Vengeance; I was hoping I'd get the chance for a sail. How long have you been doing this?"

&nbs
p; "You mean running charters? Or sailing?"

  "Either one, I guess."

  "I've sailed all my life; my father always had a few charter yachts in the Mediterranean. I started crewing on them in the summers when I was in my teens," Dani said.

  "How about you, Liz?"

  "My father was an avid sailor, but he never owned a boat. He took me with him every chance he got, though. Sailing's always been part of my life."

  "Wow. How lucky for you both. How'd you come to own Vengeance?"

  "That's a long story," Dani said. "After university, I worked in investment banking for a while, but I didn't like it. I'd bailed out of that and was working as pick-up crew down here in the islands while I figured out what I wanted to do. I bumped into Liz here in Antigua a few years ago and we hit it off."

  "Lucky," Marilyn said, a dreamy look on her face. "How about you, Liz?"

  "I was on a sabbatical; I was hanging out in the islands, getting back into painting when I met Dani. We found Vengeance for sale, and things just fell into place."

  "You're an artist?" Marilyn asked. "How lucky for you to live in such beautiful surroundings."

  "She's good," Dani added. "All the miniatures hanging on the bulkheads below are her work."

  "I want to see," Marilyn said.

  "You'll have plenty of time, Marilyn," Gerald said. "Marilyn's a talented photographer. She's done a bunch of travel spreads for magazines. She was hoping to get some shots of Vengeance under sail today."

  "That's great; maybe we could use some of them on our website," Liz said. "Come on, Marilyn. I'll show you the accommodations below before it's time for me to make sail."

  Once they were below, Gerald moved closer to Dani. "Sorry to surprise you with another guest, but I couldn't figure out a way to say no."

  "No apologies are necessary. She's a nice lady, and anyway Vengeance is yours for the next few weeks."

  "Well, that's kind of you, Dani, but I wouldn't normally spring a guest on you without a heads-up."

  ****

  The man who called himself Jones listened to a recording of last night's conversation between Yates and Jackson. He had not anticipated that Yates might initiate such a call; his assumption had been that Yates would want to avoid Jackson. He was relieved that neither of the men had mentioned the payoff of Yates's debt; that would have been awkward.