"Why don't I give you all a lift to the town dock? You can get Liz settled back aboard Vengeance and meet us at the restaurant at noon, if that suits."
****
The waitress had taken their lunch order and was delivering their drinks. During the hiatus in their conversation, Liz took a sip of wine as she collected her thoughts before responding to Sandrine.
Sandrine, having just learned of Robert's death, had said, "How awful for you. After all you suffered with him, to have it end so abruptly again must be painful. How are you dealing with this?"
So much had happened so quickly that Liz realized she had not found time to reflect on her feelings. She was surprised at the way Sandrine had asked the question, too. Such a probing, thoughtful query seemed out of character for the woman.
Liz knew that she shouldn't judge Sandrine by her fractured, often humorous insistence on speaking colloquial American English, but it was hard not to think of her as flippant and funny. Before she could make an attempt to express her feelings about the death of her former lover, Phillip's cell phone rang.
Glancing at the caller i.d. screen as he raised the phone, he said, "Good afternoon, Chief Superintendent." He listened for a moment, the furrows in his brow deepening. "So she's in the clear, then?" He listened again. "I see. Yes, I'm sure she'll be relieved. We're having lunch right now, but how about if she calls Lt. Anderson in an hour or so?"
The others listened intently, but the soft murmurs coming from the phone were unintelligible to all but Phillip. He raised his eyebrows as he glanced around the table at the curious women who were staring at him as if they could read his thoughts. "Certainly. You have no objection if I share all of this with her?" The murmurs resumed briefly. "I'll do that, then. Thank you, my friend." Another pause. "No. No immediate plans to visit St. Vincent, but maybe on Sandrine's next holiday. I'll let you know." Phillip nodded as he listened again. "Good afternoon to you, too." He disconnected the phone and put it on the table beside the remnants of his lunch.
"Okay," he said. "Liz, you're no longer under any suspicion, but they would like to hear whatever you can tell them. They've interviewed the people on the nearby boats. Seems that you had some nosy neighbors. Two couples were having dinner in the cockpit of the boat anchored close off Isis's bow when you got back from the market."
"Yes, I remember seeing them; I was worried that they were anchored so close."
Phillip nodded. "They saw you come back, climb aboard with a shopping bag, and leave almost immediately with a duffel bag. They thought your behavior was strange because you were obviously in a hurry when you left. You threw your duffel bag in and scrambled down in a big rush with the dinghy painter in your hand, but then you deliberately let the dinghy drift for fifty yards or so before you started the outboard."
"I didn't want to attract Robert's attention. The porthole in the aft stateroom was open and the dinghy was tied right beside it."
Phillip nodded again. "When you left, they had just finished eating. Then they had another glass of wine while they watched the sunset, so that pegged the time fairly well."
"But…" Sandrine started to interrupt. Phillip held up a hand to silence her.
"There's more. They were still in the cockpit when a loud argument broke out on Isis. Their guess was about an hour after you left -- maybe a little less. It started with a woman screaming -- scared, rather than angry. Then there was silence for a few minutes, and two men started yelling at each other. They couldn't make out what was being said, but one man was cut off in mid-sentence. Then it got quiet, and the couples went ashore to take in the entertainment at one of the waterfront nightspots." Phillip took a sip of water before he resumed.
"There was another boat anchored on the starboard side, maybe 100 feet away. They were watching a DVD in their saloon when a speedboat roared up. The wake caused their drinks to slide off the table, so they paused the movie to clean up. The clock on their DVD player put the time at 10 p.m. They could hear people talking over the rumble of the engines, and the guy went up into their cockpit to see what was going on. He shined a flashlight on the go-fast boat; it was alongside Isis. He saw three men in the speedboat -- two black, one white -- and a woman with a lot of blond hair. One guy flipped him off and the other one pointed a gun at him, but the white guy knocked the gun aside, and our hero was smart enough to turn off the light and hit the deck. The boat roared away."
"So did he see Robert hanging from the mast then?" Liz asked.
"No. The police figure that Delorme was strung up before the go-fast boat got there. There wasn't enough time between the arrival and departure of the speedboat. They're estimating the time of death at sometime between the argument and nine o'clock, so he was probably up there, but who would shine a flashlight up at the masthead of a neighboring boat in all of the confusion?"
"So it's clear that Liz wasn't aboard when he was killed," Dani said.
"Not to mention that Mrs. Walker would give her an alibi," Connie contributed.
"You're both right. The other information is that Contreras and Dulzuras haven't left the country, at least not by any means that left a trace in the immigration records."
"Yeah, but do you believe that? I don't," Dani said. "They could be anywhere by now; probably using different identities, too. They're out of there."
"The police are circulating passport pictures of the two of them all through the islands -- airports, ferry terminals, hotels, customs and immigration offices," Phillip said.
"Good luck with that," Dani said. She looked at Liz. "Glad you left Isis when you did."
"Me, too," Liz agreed. "Let's settle up and get to Phillip's and Sandrine's. I want to call Lt. Anderson and put this all behind me."
Chapter 12
Liz sat alone in the cockpit, nursing a cup of coffee as she watched the dawn light creep over the mountains to the east. She had slept little last night; her friends had kept her occupied during the afternoon and evening, so she hadn't absorbed the reality of Robert's death.
She had recognized during their sail to Bequia that the spark of their romance was dead, and she had been quite annoyed with him, particularly after he had drawn her into the situation with Contreras and Dulzuras. She hadn't yet recovered from the shock of that when she learned that he was dead.
The police had at first classified his death as a homicide, but by the time she talked with Lt. Anderson yesterday afternoon, the coroner in Kingstown had ruled that it was suicide. She didn't believe that. Robert was far too self-absorbed to take his own life: she had said as much to Anderson.
"The coroner, he is political; he isn't one of us. Maybe he has some pressure. Who can know?" Anderson had responded.
"What kind of pressure?" Liz had asked.
"Possibly someone told him that a suicide wouldn't have an adverse effect on tourism, or it could be something else," Anderson hinted. "It is not for me to know; but our hands are tied, as the saying goes." Anderson had dutifully questioned Liz at length about Robert's history and her experiences aboard Isis. "One never knows. The coroner may change his verdict; it is best to have the records complete."
"What about his family?" she had asked, once Anderson had finished questioning her.
"You mean about notifying them of his death?"
"Yes. Has that been done?"
"Possibly. It is done through diplomatic channels in cases like this, so it may not have happened yet. Would you like for me to find out before you call them?"
"No, that's okay. I've never met them. I won't be calling. I just wondered about them, and about his wife, too," Liz said.
"What do you know about her?" Anderson had asked.
"Only what he told me on our sail from Martinique. When I knew him in Brussels, he led me to believe that he was single. I thought we were going to get married…"
"I see," Anderson had interrupted, embarrassed. "He said that he didn't know where she was when you were clearing in. Do you believe him?"
"I don't know what
to believe; he told me that she had left him; that she couldn't take living on the boat with no money and that her parents sent her a plane ticket. I guess she's back in England."
As Liz took a sip of her lukewarm coffee, Connie appeared in the cockpit, thermos in one hand and a steaming mug in the other. "Want a warm-up?" she asked.
Liz extended her mug and Connie topped it off. "Thanks. I didn't hear you making it; I thought I was the only one up."
"I was extra quiet; I thought you and Dani were still asleep."
"I didn't get much sleep," Liz said.
"You've had some real shocks over the last few days. Could keep you awake, I imagine."
Liz shook her head, frowning. "I don't know what to think…"
"Give it time," Connie said. "It will come clear after a little while. You can't really speed the grieving process."
"But I don't want to grieve for him; he was a complete jerk, right up until the end. He set me up in that disgusting situation on Isis; I'm angry enough to have killed him myself."
"I can understand that, but that just makes it worse. You were in love with him once, and you weren't over that when he reappeared. He used your old relationship to get you to go along with him, and then he did that to you. Of course you were furious when you left him. The fact that you were so angry with him when he died is bound to make the whole thing worse for you. I'm no shrink, but I've done my share of grieving for jerks."
"Ever had one die while you were angry with him, though?"
"Yes, as a matter of fact. The asshole that was murdered by Alfano about the time I moved to the Bahamas was a longtime lover. I had just split up with him, and I was pissed at him, but still…"
"How long did it take you to get over that?" Liz asked.
"I don't know. It's going on three years. It didn't take me too long to get over feeling guilty for his death, I guess, but I'm still disappointed with myself that I put up with him for so long. I still have a lot of…"
"I was dreaming that I smelled fresh coffee," Dani interrupted, climbing into the cockpit with a mug in her hand. "But I couldn't find any."
"Sorry if we woke you," Connie said, filling Dani's mug from the carafe on the cockpit table.
"No. You didn't. Phillip just sent a text to the sat phone. The chime from that woke me. About time, too. Can't believe I slept so late."
"What's up with him?" Liz asked.
"Sandrine's got the weekend off, and since we're stuck without an engine, they want to take us for a day-sail on Kayak Spirit."
"I'd like that," Connie said. "Vengeance is the only boat I've sailed; I like the looks of Kayak Spirit."
"She's a traditional island sloop, built by hand down in Carriacou by a man who used her to smuggle rum from Grenada to Martinique," Dani said. "There's a lot of island history tied up in that old boat. She may be as old as all of us put together, but she's still a lot of fun to sail."
"I'd better get breakfast going, then," Liz said, rising and filling her mug again before she went below.
****
Louis Godfrey sat at the table in his hotel room, the digital camera with its telephoto lens on a tripod where he could watch the screen as he finished his room-service breakfast. The camera was pointed through the window overlooking the anchorage at Ste. Anne, focused on the yacht called Vengeance. He studied the two young women; they were drinking coffee in the cockpit of the yacht. He chewed his toast idly as he watched and waited. The one with the blond hair had her back to him; he couldn't be sure, but she could well be his target. The brunette definitely was not the one who had left with Delorme on Isis. The dinghy that hung a foot above the water alongside Vengeance was the one the girl had been driving when she called on Delorme. He recognized the painted script identifying it as "Tender to Vengeance," but he needed to be sure before he took action. His client had demanded the utmost discretion, irritating Godfrey with the implication that he might give anything away.
The appearance of a third woman stepping into the cockpit took his mind off his irritation. She could also be the target; her build was right, she had short, blond hair, and she carried herself as if she spent a lot of time on yachts. That had struck him about the woman who had visited Delorme. The years he had spent as a police detective had conditioned him to notice subtle things about people. The woman who had called on Delorme had handled the dinghy with an easy familiarity, and she had scrambled up the side of Isis with practiced grace. Just a few seconds watching the new arrival in Vengeance's cockpit told him that she was perfectly at home there.
She slipped in beside the other blonde, sitting next to her at the table as the brunette poured coffee for her. He was momentarily distracted by the incredible resolution of the image on the camera's screen. He imagined that he could smell the coffee as he watched it splash into the woman's mug. He checked to make sure that he was recording video, and that there was plenty of time left on the memory card. Satisfied that he was indeed capturing the scene, he turned his attention back to the two blond women.
Sitting beside one another, they were facing away from him. They looked almost identical, but his trained eye picked up a slight difference in hair color. The new arrival had lighter hair; the one next to her had a just a trace of a reddish tint. Otherwise, they could be sisters -- almost twins. He couldn't tell which one had visited Delorme, but maybe the pictures he had of her in the dinghy would show her hair color, now that he had a basis for comparison. He clicked through the folders on his laptop until he found the one with the right date. He opened it and scanned the pictures, frustrated to see that she had been wearing a baseball cap in the dinghy.
He watched the women chat for a moment, and then the first blonde stood up. She stepped smoothly around the table as the yacht rocked in the wake of a passing tour boat: she was as much at home afloat as the other blond woman. She picked up her mug and went below.
Godfrey turned his attention back to his breakfast, confident that the camera would do its job. As he ate, he pondered the problem of the two blondes. Except for the client's demand for discretion, he could just deal with both of them, but that would increase his exposure significantly. He had already left a trail with the customs agent when he had asked about Isis's departure; it wouldn't do to keep expanding his contacts; the chances of blowing his cover increased exponentially with every contact. That reminded him that he should check with the customs agent again to make certain that Isis had not returned in the last few days. He should do that before he took any action.
He looked back at the display on the camera and saw that the cockpit was vacant. After a moment of surprise, he saw that the dinghy still hung alongside the yacht. He sighed with relief and kept his eyes on the screen as he finished his breakfast. His vigilance was rewarded when the women launched the dinghy. He watched as they locked Vengeance's companionway and climbed into the dinghy. They soon sped away in the direction of Cul-de-Sac Marin. Godfrey contemplated boarding the yacht while they were gone. He might be able to learn something useful. He would have to be careful, though, about boarding in broad daylight. He would watch for a while. If the women didn't return for lunch, he might take the chance. He reasoned that most of the neighboring boats would be unoccupied after lunch; he could watch and verify that before he committed himself.
****
Connie and Liz were stretched out on the foredeck, enjoying the sun and the occasional splash of warm seawater as Kayak Spirit charged along on a broad reach, her sails full and drawing as the waves rolled by under her port quarter. The gurgling of the water passing the hull and the crisp smell of the sea air were so hypnotic that neither wanted to break the spell by speaking.
Phillip had the tiller and Dani was trimming the sails as the wind oscillated through an angle of 10 to 15 degrees every 15 minutes. Sandrine was chattering away, telling them about her week at work in the customs office in Marin. Dani was only half listening, lost in the pure joy of a perfect sail. She was daydreaming as the long, gentle swells rolled under the
boat, imparting a soothing, rocking motion to the sturdy old vessel. She tuned in to Sandrine's comments when she picked up the word 'Isis.'
"What about Isis?"
"One of the agents, she is telling me this," Sandrine said. "Someone, a man -- he is one of these who asks the questions like the police but he is not the police. He is working for another person to ask his questions, like the ones who follow the wife to meet her lover so making the photos for the divorce, you know?"
"A private detective?" Dani offered.
"Eye," Sandrine said. "That is it. He is the eye who watches the private things."
"A private eye," Phillip said, "but that's not because he watches private things. It's…"
"Of course these are private things, between the wife and the lover," Sandrine scolded. "It would be the perversion -- how do you call it? -- we would say voyeurisme…"
"No," Phillip objected, "that's not…"
"Certainly it is. How you can think it is not perversion, this man who watches…"
"Sorry," Dani interrupted, "but this might be important. Sandrine, what about the private eye? He was asking about Isis?"
"Yes. He is wanting to know where Isis has gone, because he looks for these people who are sailing on her. He has the camera but the pictures he shows to the agent, they are just pictures of the boat. She has disappointment because of this; she is thinking maybe he is showing her…"
"When was this? What day?" Dani asked.
"Well, I cannot name the day, but it is the day after the day Liz and the jerk leave Marin. This is so important, Dani? Why?"
"Because Isis is the name of the jerk's boat," Dani said.
"Ah! It is silly moi…silly me. I do not know this, that Liz, she leaves on this boat called Isis. So it is perhaps this man with the camera who is killing the jerk? What name is he called, the jerk?"
"Robert Delorme," Phillip said. "How did the agent know this man was a private eye? He might have been the killer."
"I do not know this. We must ask the agent. I am only hearing this from the hand to mouth -- no, that is not…"
Bluewater Betrayal: The Fifth Novel in the Caribbean Mystery and Adventure Series (Bluewater Thrillers Book 5) Page 8