Bermuda Schwartz

by Bob Morris

  “At least you’ll go out with a bang,” he says.

  Frazer aims the flare gun, fires. A small thud as the ball of sparks hits Miss Peg’s transom. And then a frightening whoosh as the gas ignites.

  I feel the heat. The fire sizzles and feeds off itself. This is not going to take nearly as long as Frazer thought.

  And sensing the same thing, Frazer guns the engines, throwing up a rooster-tail of water as his boat speeds away.

  I turn, look at Fiona. I see terror in her eyes, the same terror I’m sure she sees in mine.

  The heat grows more intense and I can see flames reflected by the windshield in front of me, a deadly orange dance that seems to have already consumed Miss Peg’s rear quarter. The air is heavy with the sickening smell of molten fiberglass.

  I struggle against the duct tape and can see that Fiona is doing the same thing. But every move unleashes a new wave of pain from my thigh. I think: Maybe as the flames move closer they will catch the duct tape around my feet on fire and I can kick free …

  Then I think: You’ll be a crispy critter by the time that happens.

  I look at Fiona. She struggles against her bindings, in full panic mode now. And just as I am ready to yield myself to the inevitable, the boat lists to port and I see Boggy pulling himself aboard near the bow.

  He runs our way, one arm limp at his side, a bloody wound in the shoulder. And then he’s beside us, yanking out drawers, finding a knife.

  He cuts Fiona free first, shouts: “Grab the bench cushions. Jump!”

  She leaps up and darts away.

  As Boggy moves toward me, there’s a new blast of heat from the rear of the boat. Above me, the cockpit roof begins to smolder. Along the gunwales, the stanchion lines are aflame.

  The knife is dull. It catches and snags. Boggy throws it aside, ripping at the tape around my legs, pulling me free of the chair. My torso is still wrapped in tape as he lifts me onto his good shoulder and stumbles to the side of the boat.

  The flames are everywhere, the heat so intense that it burns my eyes. We fall overboard. Boggy kicks us away from the boat, speaks to me: “It’s OK, Zachary. Hold on. It’s OK.”

  I begin to lose consciousness. Just as I give in to the blackness, there comes a final violent roar, and Miss Peg is no more.

  84

  Voices draw me out of the deep. Fiona: “It’s bleeding again. I can’t seem to stop it.”

  Boggy:“Zachary is strong. He has much blood in him.”

  Fiona:“What about you?”

  Boggy:“I am OK.”

  Fiona:“Here, let me see your shoulder.”

  Boggy:“It is OK, I am telling you.”

  Fiona:“Let me see.”

  I open my eyes. I am lying on a boat cushion atop a piece of Mis. transom. I can see the lettering under my arm. Boggy and Fiona the water, holding on.

  I try to sit up.

  “Easy,” Fiona says. “Lie back down.”

  I lie down.

  I say, “How long?”

  “How long were you out?”

  I nod.

  “I don’t know. Fifteen minutes maybe. Not long.”

  I turn my head. The sea is swallowing the last sliver of sun. The tinged with streaks of red and purple.

  “Oh, boy,” I say. “Maybe we’ll see the flash of green.”

  “No such thing,” Fiona says.

  “Like hell there’s not,” I say. “I’ve seen it twice. Once in Grenada, once in Boca Grande. You were there both times, Boggy. You saw it. Tell her.”

  “Yes, Zachary. I saw it.”

  “It’s real,” I say. “Lights up the sky. When you see it, you know it.”

  We watch the sun. It disappears. We wait. No flash of green.

  “Maybe another day,” I say.

  “I’ll settle for that,” Fiona says.

  I shiver.

  “It’s cold,” I say. “Really cold.”

  I catch the look between Boggy and Fiona.

  “You think I’m dying,” I say. “Don’t you?”

  “No, Guamikeni, you are not dying.”

  “You bet your ass I’m not.”

  I reach out for Boggy. He offers his hand.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  He nods, says nothing.

  “But let me ask you one thing.” Boggy looks at me. “What the hell took you so long?”

  Boggy starts to speak, but I cut him off.

  “I mean, you could have done something sooner. Like right after Frazer pulled the gun. You could have done something then. He’d already revealed himself. We had him.”

  “But, Zachary, I thought he would shoot you.”

  “He did shoot me, dammit! And then, when we were getting on Miss Peg, before he wrapped us up in that goddamn duct tape, that would have been a perfectly good time to come barreling out of the cabin. Between the three of us, we could have taken him.”

  “His gun, it was aimed at Fiona. I thought maybe …”

  “But no, you waited.”

  “I got shot, too, Zachary.”

  “I got shot worse,” I say.

  Fiona slams a hand on the float.

  “Stop it, the two of you!” she says. “I think I see a boat.”

  Sure enough, there is a light to the west, moving across the water. Still far away, too far away to give any real hope.

  We wait. I’m getting colder. I try not to shiver.

  Fiona looks at me, says: “How did you know?”

  “You mean about Frazer?” She nods. I say, “He was the point where all the lines came together. He knew Peach. He knew your brother. I figure he ambushed Ned while he was diving here. Frazer had spoken to him enough to know what Ned might find at Sock ’Em Dog, even if Ned didn’t know that himself. But what cinched it was the soul-saver.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Polly was wearing it the day she and Ned went to Frazer’s office to get the papers. I called her this afternoon and she told me about it. Said Frazer noticed the soul-saver, commented on it, and Polly told him that Ned had found it and given it to her. That’s all Frazer really needed to know to give him an idea what Ned had found.”

  The boat is getting closer, still on course for us. We all watch it, none of us say anything. Might jinx it.

  Fiona says, “And Frazer broke into Ned’s house afterward?”

  “Yeah. He tried to make it look like a burglary. Took all kinds of other things, but he was after the papers. Ned had filled them out, put the coordinates down. Frazer couldn’t risk the papers falling into anyone else’s hands, especially not until he’d had a chance to dive the site himself.”

  “He did a pretty good job of setting up Teddy Schwartz.”

  “And the Sangrento Mao, too. It was a double setup, really. Even if Teddy was able to clear himself, the police could still point a finger at Papi Ferreira and his bunch,” I say. “Frazer thought he was well removed from any suspicion.”

  “So that day, when you came by the Oxford House, when Frazer and I were on our way to lunch, and we started talking about everything in front of him …”

  “Saying that I didn’t think Teddy did it. Or Ferreira either.”

  “Frazer panicked. Figured he had to make a move.”

  “That’s what I’m thinking.”

  Fiona shakes her head.

  “When he came by to get me this afternoon to go out in his boat, I told him we needed to call you, that you should go out with us. But he said he’d already called, said you were busy getting ready for that party.”

  “I never spoke to him.”

  “No kidding,” Fiona says. “I was stupid, so stupid.”

  We are quiet for a moment. I am cold, really cold.

  Boggy says, “The boat, it is coming.”

  A Q-beam sweeps the water, lights up the floating remains of Miss Peg. Boggy and Fiona wave and holler. The beam sweeps our way, locks on us, and holds.

  The boat closes in. On the bow, I can see Bill Belleville holding the light.
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  “We’re heading out for a night dive at Fish Rock …”

  I can hear Belleville shouting orders to others on his boat. He kneels on the bow, shines the light on us.

  “Shit, man,” he says. “What happened to you?”

  85

  The next forty-eight hours are an opiate fog, voices drifting in and out, people coming and going, my mind unable to grasp what is real and what is not. It’s a hazy netherworld, a crazy composite of flotsam and jetsam, random bits and pieces.

  I dream that I am on a ship, a ship from long-gone days, with two tall masts and great billowy sails, a ship like the Santa Helena. Brewster Trimmingham is at the helm. He’s dressed in full admiral’s regalia—blue waistcoat, a sword in its sheath, the ridiculous sideways hat, and everything. Papi Ferreira is at his side, scanning the waters ahead with a spyglass. I’m on the bridge, too, and I keep telling them that we are on the wrong course, that we are headed straight to Sock ’Em Dog. They laugh me off, tell me to leave the navigation to them.

  I go looking for Barbara. And suddenly I am on a fancy cruise ship and I need to find Barbara so I can get her off the ship before we crash into Sock ’Em Dog. I unfasten a lifeboat, lower it to the water. Aunt Trula and Polly, wearing white terrycloth robes, watch me from teak deck chairs. I tell them to get into the lifeboat. Aunt Trula looks at her watch.

  “Not quite yet,” she says. “Almost time for tea.”

  I run through the ship, looking for Barbara. Worley and Teddy Schwartz play blackjack in the casino. They are winning big. Fiona McHugh wears a glittery showgirl costume and is dancing on a stage. Janeen Hill applauds from her seat in the audience.

  I head to my cabin, hoping to find Barbara there. Instead, there’s a man sitting on our bed, a man with long gray hair and a scraggly beard. I cannot see his face, but in his hands he holds the Reliquarium de Fratres Crucis, shining and unblemished. He lifts it up and as he does I see that the man has no eyes.

  “In Lisbon,” he says. “I once was a goldsmith.”

  I leave the cabin, and there is Barbara watching me from the end of a long hall. She waves to me, calls out. I run to her. But no matter how fast I run, I cannot reach her. I yell to her: “Get to the lifeboat! Get to the lifeboat!”

  And she is calling to me, calling to me …

  “Zack. It’s OK, Zack. I’m here.”

  I open my eyes. And Barbara is there. This is real. This is all so sweet and real.

  She gives me water. I drink it.

  “Just rest,” she says. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  I drift off again. I sleep a deep and dreamless sleep. And when I wake up, Barbara is sitting in a chair by the hospital bed, a hand on my arm. Her eyes are closed.

  I say, “Hey, baby.”

  She opens her eyes, blinks.

  “Hey,” she says. She squeezes my arm, then kisses my forehead. “Good to see you again.”

  I look out the window. It’s dark outside.

  “How long?”

  “Two days,” Barbara says. “You lost a lot of blood, Zack. An hour longer and you wouldn’t have made it.”

  I try to sit up, reach for my leg. It’s a mound of gauze with plastic tubes hooked up to it.

  “Don’t,” Barbara says, easing me back. “It’s going to be OK. They think they’ve stopped the infection.”

  “What about Boggy?”

  Barbara smiles.

  “They released him this afternoon. He’s back at Aunt Trula’s. He’s fine.”

  I lay there, trying to reassemble the pieces, moving backward: Belleville’s boat, floating in the water, Miss Peg going down in flames …

  I say, “What about Michael Frazer?”

  Barbara shakes her head.

  “The police have yet to find him,” she says. “Inspector Worley has been calling, wanting to see you. I told him maybe tomorrow.”

  “Yes,” I say. “Maybe tomorrow.”

  And then I’m asleep again.

  86

  “We’re baffled, totally baffled. We don’t know where Frazer is.” Inspector Worley sits by my bed. Barbara is in the room with us. I’m feeling pretty good. There are fewer tubes running in and out of my leg.

  I say, “Did you find his boat?”

  “Oh yeah, we found it. Tied up at the marina he uses. His car was still parked in the parking lot. It’s like he just vanished.”

  “Could he have flown out of here before you threw out the net for him?”

  Worley shakes his head.

  “Not a chance. By the time he reached shore, it would have been seven P.M. at the earliest. There wasn’t another flight until ten P.M. and we had everything locked down by then. We’ve checked the private carriers. Nothing there, either.”

  “Boats?”

  “We thought maybe he could have snuck onto one of the cruise ships, but there wasn’t a departure until yesterday and he definitely wasn’t on it. We swept it, had every passenger out on the deck,” Worley says. “Checked the commercial ships, too. Nothing.”

  “Think he might have someone helping him? Someone who’s hiding him here in Bermuda?”

  “That’s what we’re working on at this point. His face is all over the newspapers, on TV. There’s a hundred-thousand-dollar reward for information leading to his arrest. If he’s still here, we’ll shake him loose,” Worley says. “We’ve questioned everyone he’s known to have associated with, including his coworkers.”

  I tell Worley about the young man I’d seen on Frazer’s boat, the one who followed Boggy and me in the blue Toyota.

  “We talked to him,” Worley says. “Nestor Ferreira. He came up clean.”

  Worley sees the look on my face.

  “Yeah, as in Papi Ferreira,” Worley says. “Nestor is Papi’s grandson. Antoni Ferreira, Papi’s only child, that was Nestor’s dad.”

  I don’t say anything.

  Worley says, “You say it was Nestor Ferreira who was following you?”

  “I think so. Sure looked like him.”

  Worley makes a note on a pad.

  “We’ll talk to him again. See what he has to say about that.” Worley studies me. “By the way, that business you had with Papi Ferreira, you never told me what it was.”

  I look at Barbara.

  I say, “Aunt Trula’s party the other night—how did it turn out?”

  Barbara looks at Worley, then back to me. She knows I’m dodging his question.

  “Why, it turned out just fine, Zack, everything considered. I mean, I was a perfect mess, not knowing where you were. But the food, the music, the company—everything was splendid. And the palm trees looked magnificent. Everyone commented on them. It went on and on and on, with people standing up and offering toasts to Titi. And then when Sir Teddy showed up …”

  “Teddy made it to the party?”

  “Why, yes,” Barbara says. “He arrived there shortly before midnight.”

  She cuts her eyes at Worley.

  Worley says, “The only reason he made it there was because I drove him there. Fiona McHugh called the moment she got ashore, told me what had happened. And I had Sir Teddy released then and there. He was insistent upon going to that party. So I drove him.”

  Worley looks at me.

  He says, “It was a nice party, Chasteen. Avery nice party. I even drank some champagne. I never drink champagne.” He stops. “What’s your business with Ferreira, Chasteen?”

  “It’s got nothing to do with Frazer.”

  “You sure of that?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  “This business, you done with it?”

  “Almost,” I say. “Still some loose ends to wrap up.”

  “You plan on wrapping them up pretty damn soon?”

  I nod.

  “I could use your help,” I say.

  “Oh, really? You want me to help you with some business, only you won’t tell me what that business is? And it involves Papi Ferreira and we all know what business he is in.”

 
“Yeah, that’s pretty much it,” I say.

  “And I should do this, why?” says Worley.

  “Because that’s just the kind of guy you are. Helpful.”

  “Fuck you,” says Worley. He looks at Barbara. “Excuse me.”

  She waves it off.

  I say, “I need you to help me find someone.”

  “Who would that be?” says Worley.

  “A guy named Brewster Trimmingham.”

  87

  By the next day, I’m able to maneuver to the bathroom all on my own. The day after that, I’m navigating the halls of King Edward Hospital, making a complete nuisance of myself. And the day after that, they set me free.

  Back at Cutfoot Estate, Aunt Trula instructs her staff that my every wish is their command. After almost a week in the hospital, I’m fairly ravenous. Still, I try not to take advantage of Aunt Trula’s hospitality. I limit myself to four meals a day. No cocktails until five.

  People come to see me. And, considering the alternative, it’s nice to be seen.

  Fiona McHugh drops by on the morning she is to fly home to Australia. She has spent the previous few days being interviewed by Janeen Hill.

  “She’s going forward with the book?”

  “So it appears,” Fiona says. “Her agent is even more keen on it now than before. He says that with Michael Frazer still missing and an international search for him now under way, it gives the story legs.”

  “Legs, huh?”

  “Janeen’s words, not mine,” says Fiona. “Where do you think Frazer is, Zack?”

  I don’t say anything. She looks at me, says: “Do you know something you aren’t telling me?”

  “Not yet,” I say.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means, if I find out something, then you will know it, too.”

  “Fair enough,” she says.

  She gives me a kiss and says good-bye.

  Aunt Trula and Teddy Schwartz join me for lunch. I’ve asked the kitchen staff to re-create the Onion’s version of fish stew. They manage to do it even better.

  “I’m sorry about Miss Peg,” I tell Teddy. “I know how much she meant to you.”