Boote lived on the mainland across from St. Magdalena on the edge of a brine marsh. His house was a little dingy yellow shack amid a row of similar shacks that looked like they should have blown away a long time ago. As Lindsay and John approached the paint-worn door, it burst open and a man in a ski mask came running at them, pushing John backward and knocking Lindsay to the ground before either of them could react.
"What the ... Lindsay, are you all right?" He helped her to her feet.
"I'm fine."
John turned to give chase, but the man was already in his car and speeding down the one-lane road.
"Boote!" Lindsay exclaimed. She raced into the house.
The front room had been trashed. It had a strong smell of cinnamon, or peaches, or flowers; she couldn't tell. Lindsay called out for Boote. They heard crashing about and grumbling in the kitchen. Boote was in the middle of the kitchen floor next to an overturned chair.
"Crazy son of a ... who're you?"
"I'm John West, old man. You remember me?"
"The Indian. Yeah, I know you. What are you doing here?"
"Are you all right, Mr. Teal?" Lindsay asked.
"Mr. Teal? Who the hell are you?" With John's help, he stood on shaky legs, squinting at Lindsay. He smelled like alcohol and had about five days' worth of beard on his wrinkled face.
"Do we need to take you to a doctor? Did that man hurt you?"
"Pissed me off. Kept asking me where it is. Wouldn't tell me what he's looking for. What kind of stupid thing is that? How'm I gonna tell 'im where it's at if I don't know what it is? Stupid bastard."
"We need to call the police," said John.
"No, we don't. Don't want no police around. They can't do nothin'. That's what they've been telling me for days now. I reckon I believe 'em."
"Do you know who he was?" asked Lindsay.
"No, he had his face covered. Didn't ya' see 'im?"
"Did you recognize his voice?"
"No, I didn't, and who are you anyway, lady?"
"This is Dr. Chamberlain," said John. "She was with Bobbie and Harper when they got stranded in the ocean after their motorboat quit working."
"Oh. You here about that?" Boote lowered his head. "Look, I didn't mean-"
"I'm not here about that, Mr. Teal."
"Call me Boote, missy."
"Boote, I wanted to say I'm very sorry about your son."
"Why? You didn't do it, did you?"
"No, Boote, I was expressing my sympathy. But I'd like to find out who did do it."
"I'll tell you who. One of them people you work with on the island, or that man-made island in the ocean."
"Why do you say that?" Lindsay asked.
"Let's go out on the porch. That damn woman next door thinks smells cure everything. You know, she sneaks over here when I'm gone and leaves bowls with smelly wood shavings and dried plants." He nodded. "She does. Says it has healing powers. Calls it roaming therapy. She wants me to marry her and thinks that'll work. Crazy, ain't she?"
"I'd say so," said John.
They went out on the concrete porch, etched with years of cracks that looked like drawings of dead trees. Boote sat on the steps made from cement blocks. Lindsay and John stood on the sandy walkway.
Lindsay saw a few pieces of mail scattered on the lawn and she picked them up.
"I'd like to find out what happened to your son," she said, handing the papers to Boote. She glanced at a post card. There was something familiar about it.
"Keith sent that to me last year," said Boote.
Lindsay turned it over and looked at the picture of Daytona Beach. What, she wondered, was it? "Can I keep this a while?" she asked. "I'll give it back."
"Go ahead, if you think it'll help." Boote put his head in his hands. "I know what happened to him. Somebody killed him."
"Did the police tell you how he died?"
"No. Police don't know nothin'. They can't go to the island anyway. Said I have to talk to the FBI. Some foreign fellow. I didn't know they had foreigners in the FBI."
"Agent Ramirez."
"Yes. That's the one. Ramirez."
"Did he tell you anything?"
"Said somebody stabbed my boy Keith and dumped him in quicksand. They weighted him down with a chain. Hey, you one of the girls that found him, ain't you?"
"Yes," Lindsay replied.
"Least I can bury him. He won't be coming over on Sundays no more. I always looked forward to that."
"Do you know if he knew Hardy Denton?" asked Lindsay.
"Who? Hardy Denton? No. Never heard of him."
"How about Eva Jones?" Lindsay asked.
"Now that sounds familiar. Eva Jones. He said something about her once. Talked about her and her expensive equipment. He said you don't need expensive equipment."
"Equipment for what?" asked Lindsay.
"I don't remember. I don't think he ever said."
"Do you know if your son was ever threatened?"
"Keith? Who'd threaten him? He got along with everybody."
Not everybody, thought Lindsay. "Did he ever talk about anyone who was mad at him?"
"No. He didn't tell me his business much."
"Did Keith have a best friend? Or someone he dated a lot?"
"Keith stayed in Savannah a lot. He knew a lot of guys at the bars there. He liked to talk to the sailors from different countries."
"Do you know which bars he liked?" asked Lindsay.
Boote shook his head. "I'm not much of a social drinker myself."
"How about a girlfriend?"
"There's a girl in Atlanta he liked a lot. I don't know her name."
"Did he have any friends here?"
"Sure, everybody liked Keith, I told you."
"Do you have a name?"
"Sure, missy, I told you my name is Boote."
Lindsay took a deep breath. "Can you name one of Keith's friends?"
"No. He didn't bring his friends around much."
"Do you have any idea what that man was looking for?"
"No. I ain't got nothin' much."
Lindsay couldn't think of anything else to ask. The trip was probably a waste of time.
"Are you sure we can't take you to the doctor?" she asked.
"He just shoved me around and made me mad. I'm okay. He ran when he looked out the kitchen window and saw you two coming."
"You need to call the police. He might be back," said John.
"He comes back, I'll be ready for him."
Boote rose to go inside. When he opened the door, Lindsay noticed something she hadn't seen when they first went in. A mason jar filled with quarters had spilled out onto the floor. She went in with Boote and picked up several. All of them had holes drilled in the middle.
"Boote, what are these?" Lindsay asked.
"Those? They belonged to Keith."
"Why did he put holes in them?"
"I don't know. He's been punching holes in quarters since he was in his twenties and working on a fishing boat. He says that some fish like shiny things. But-" He shrugged his thin shoulders.
"He used them for bait?" asked John.
"I reckon. I ain't never heard of it, but then I'm not much of a fisherman, neither."
Lindsay put the coins in the jar and said goodbye to Boote.
Lindsay climbed in the boat and put on her life jacket. "Well, I suppose that was a waste of time," she said, sticking the postcard in her notebook next to Dr. Rosen's list of bone diseases. She tucked the notebook in the backpack she had stored in the boat locker. "I hardly learned a thing."
John waited to start the engine. "Lindsay, you aren't going to canvass the bars on Savannah's waterfront. The kind of places Keith would frequent are not the kind of places for you to be asking questions. I'm sure this is not what Lewis had in mind for you to do. He meant for you to just use your brain. I'll go to Lewis; I'll lock you up in my barge if I have to."
"Are you finished?"
"Yes."
"I have no i
ntention of going to bars or interrogating sailors, as romantic as that sounds."
"Good. You want to go get something to eat?"
"Sure. You pick the restaurant," said Lindsay.
He took her to a small, quiet restaurant with French cuisine on St. Simons Island. Lindsay had a cheese souffle and John a bacheofe, and they both had a glass of a cabernet sauvignon.
"Nice," said Lindsay. "I like this."
John nodded. "I've eaten pretty well on this job since you got here." He took a sip of wine. "Why did Lewis ask you to investigate Keith?"
"He didn't. He asked me to investigate Hardy Denton."
"Then what were we doing at Boote's?"
"I believe the two deaths are related. And if I can discover how they're related, I'll have made some significant progress."
"What makes you think one has something to do with the other? There's nothing that connects them."
"Yes, there is. Both were found dead on St. Magdalena. Just what do you think the murder rate is on that island?"
John made a face and shrugged. "I imagine it used to be zero."
"I assume so. And we have two bodies found just days apart. I don't believe in coincidences of that kind." John was silent. Lindsay took that to mean that he'd like to disagree, but couldn't. "Another thing. Hardy Denton was working with Eva Jonesshe's a treasure hunter. We know that Keith had more than a passing interest in finding shipwrecks-he found at least three several years ago."
"And you think they are both interested in your ship?" This time Lindsay was silent.
"Is there something you aren't telling me?" he asked.
"Yes, and I can't tell you now. But I think you should know since you provide security for the dam, and I'm going to ask Trey to tell you when we return."
"Am I going to like this?"
"Probably not."
"Does it involve you?"
"Not in the least. No more so than anyone else on the dig."
John smiled. "Thank heaven for that. This place has a great caramel custard for dessert."
Lindsay lay in her bunk trying to think of where she could get information about Hardy Denton. Ramirez would interview all the pertinent people. What she needed was for Ramirez to confide in her. She'd have to work on that. There was Isaac. She could ask him if he found anything unusual around his work area. There's the security guard that guarded both the lab and the warehouseshe could speak with him. She knew Ramirez was asking questions of the people staying at the lab. She could find out what questions he was asking-she might find a clue there.
Lindsay turned over on her stomach, hypnotized by the wafting of the barge. Her eyelids grew heavy as sleep approached. What she really needed to do was the work she was hired for: analyze the skeletal remains and excavate the ship. Lewis could solve his own mystery. John would like that. John liked her a lot. How did she feel about that? Good. She felt very good about John. That was her last thought before she succumbed to sleep.
Lindsay worked at the dam in the morning, helping Gina and Juliana finish their burial. She had missed getting down in the sandy mud, even missed the sound of the waves against the bulkhead. Darn Lewis and his political machinations. Agent Ramirez was perfectly capable of solving this without her help.
She had lunch on top of the dam with Gina and Juliana. The catered brown bag held a banana, a package of peanuts, an apple turnover, and the two sandwiches of the day-egg salad. She hated egg salad. Lewis could provide a little extra for at least two choices for sandwiches, she thought. She took a few bites and folded it back up in the plastic wrap. She peeled the paper off an apple turnover and took a bite.
"Who do you think killed that guy?" asked Gina.
"Which guy?" asked Juliana. "The Spanish sailor or that Denton person?"
"Denton. What about it, Lindsay?" asked Gina. "Scuttlebutt has it that you're investigating."
"By the way, the night crew found it last night," said Juliana.
"Found what?" asked Lindsay and Gina together.
"The scuttlebutt. It was in the same section as the brass bell discovered yesterday."
"And that is what?" asked Lindsay. They looked at her over their sandwiches. "Sorry. I don't know all the parts of a ship yet."
"It's a water barrel where the sailors got a drink when they were thirsty."
"Ah," said Lindsay, "that makes sense."
"What?"
"Watercooler, scuttlebutt, gossip ..."
"Oh, yeah," said Gina. "Interesting. Some things don't change."
"I'm surprised it wasn't lost in the storm," said Juliana. "Wasn't it on the top deck usually?"
Gina nodded. "Forecastle, I think. Maybe it got wedged between something, like the belfry. But getting back to the topicare you investigating?"
"I'm asking some questions. Lewis naturally wants to know what's going on."
"Well, what is going on?"
"I really don't know. 1haven't been able to find out much."
"Well, I heard that the guy was killed in the warehouse," Juliana commented.
"It doesn't look like you guys need any information from me," Lindsay said. "By the way, has Ramirez talked to you?"
"Just asked us if we knew the guy," said Gina. Juliana nodded.
"Did you?"
"Is this an interrogation?" Gina grinned over her apple turnover.
"Sure," said Lindsay.
"I didn't know him," said Gina.
"Me neither," agreed Juliana. "But I think Sarah's avoiding Ramirez. I saw her about to come into the lab yesterday and duck out when she saw Ramirez in there."
"Why would she do that?" asked Lindsay.
"I assume it's because she didn't want to talk to him," Juliana answered, stuffing her food wrappings back into the paper sack and taking a bite out of her apple.
"How about you and West?" asked Gina.
"He was really upset when you and the others went missing," Juliana said.
"We're doing okay. John's a good guy."
"Tell me," asked Gina. "What's Harper like? She has Trey's head turned."
"She's funny," said Lindsay, "and very smart."
"She'd have to be, to do those translations," said Juliana.
"You know, I've been on a lot of digs," Gina said. "But I've never had something like this diary. It's strange to read about this ship, then come work on it, creepy sometimes. Like that pomander I found. When I read that in the diary, it sent chills up my spine. It was his, and he was the last person to touch it and I held it in my hand, the next person to touch it."
"Why don't you do a paper on just that artifact?" asked Lindsay. "What it is, how it was made, who used them. You can connect the spices in the pomander with their role in exploration. Then you can add the personal vignette-like a short case study of its use."
"That's a great idea," Gina said.
"I'll bet you can get it published, too," Juliana said. "Lewis is going to see to it that everything out of this site gets published."
"I'm as impressed as the next person with Lewis's ability to get things done, but he can't do everything. Journals are juried by people not unlike Lewis. He won't be able to control what is accepted for publication. But if you write a good article, it will likely get published."
"What if you get Lewis or somebody to be coauthor?" Juliana asked.
Lindsay had to concede that point. She could see that the number of articles Lewis would get from this dig would be what her aunt called a gracious plenty.
"Do you think the diarist ... you know, we need to give him a name. I don't know why he couldn't have just signed the thing," said Gina. "Anyway, do you think he will mention the murder?"
"I would think so," Lindsay replied. "It probably was a pretty big deal. Then again, it happened right around the time of the storm. The diary may just end abruptly."
"Oh, I hope not," said Juliana. She peeled the banana. "You know, Jeff complains about these lunches, but I think they're pretty good."
After lunch, Lindsay got a ride
from one of John's crew over to St. Magdalena. He was the young man who checked her in when she arrived.
"Thanks for the ride-Luke, isn't it?"
"Luke Youngdeer."
He had a heartbreaker smile, and the way his shoulder-length black hair blew in the breeze of the speeding boat, Lindsay guessed he had several of the female crew charmed.
"Luke, I understand you helped search for us. I thank you for it."
"Glad to do it."
"How do you like it out here in the water?" she asked.
"I love it. I wish this job would last forever. Is Bobbie working at the dam today, do you know?"
"No. She's diving today," Lindsay told him.
Luke Youngdeer maneuvered the boat into a slot at the dock. "Here you are, safe and sound."
"Thanks." Lindsay climbed out and tied the boat to the dock. Luke hopped out after her to secure the aft end.
"If you need to come back before the barge comes for the day, here's my beeper number." He searched all of his pockets before he found a dog-eared business card with his name and number on it.
"Thank you, Luke. I appreciate it."
They walked down the dock together. "Do you know where Bobbie's crew is diving today? How deep they planned to go?"
"No, sorry," said Lindsay, wondering why he wanted to know the depth. Then she realized. Luke was probably a diver, too. Knowing the depth, he could get an idea of how long they'd stay down, and how long they'd have to wait between dives. In other words, how long Bobbie would be gone.
Luke waved as he disappeared toward the lab. Lindsay stopped at the warehouse. Isaac was at his post sorting the carbon fraction from dirt samples. Lindsay hadn't seen him at the dam. She wondered if he got to do anything else. Briefly, almost in passing, she wondered if he could have killed Denton. But why? What motive would he have had? She realized that, although she had been telling everyone that the murderer was probably no one at the site, she really didn't know. She didn't know very many people here. She really didn't know them at all.
Chapter 21
ISAAC JONES STOOD at the sink dressed in cutoffs and a rubber apron. He reminded Lindsay of a grandaddy longlegs-all skinny arms, legs, elbows, and knees.
"Hi," she greeted him, looking over the racks of bits of drying pieces of carbon.
Isaac stepped away from the sink, wiping some sweat from his brow. He grabbed a Coke he had sitting on a table and took a long swallow.
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