The Corpse Without a Country

by Louis Trimble

As I eased in toward the beach, there was no sound but that of my own motor. Then I heard the high buzzing of that other outboard, only closer to me now. I slowed a little more, wondering again if Tom might be in the other boat.

  Then I saw him. The light lay a white finger on his body, tossed on the sand. His legs were lapped by the tide; his head was pointed toward the timber. I didn’t need any closer look to recognize Tom Harbin.

  Nor did I need a closer look to know that even with the cold sea water crawling up his legs, he wasn’t moving.

  III

  I BROUGHT THE CRUISER in until I could feel the brush of sand against the keel. Then I leaped ashore and tied up to a projection on a piece of driftwood lying at tideline. I went to where Tom lay. He was on his stomach, his cheek resting on one arm. I could see that he had crawled this far onto the beach and then collapsed of exhaustion, or had died if it. I could see no sign of breathing. I turned him gently onto his back. Fresh blood was oozing from a deep slash that ran from just above his right eye and angled over to his right ear. He had taken a terrific blow from something.

  I wondered where his boat was. My mind formed a picture of his striking a rock or being capsized by a wake, of hitting his head on a projection on the boat, and then swimming until he reached here.

  Only Tom was one of the best sailors I knew. He could handle a boat like this fiberglass job in almost any kind of weather we might get on the Sound. And he knew how to take care of himself in case of an emergency.

  I stared down at the sluggishly flowing blood. And then the realization hit me—if he was bleeding, he was still alive. I ran my hand beneath his jacket and shirt and laid my fingers next to his skin. He was cold, wet, and clammy, but beneath my fingers the slow throb of life was there. And I could keep that life throbbing, I thought, if I could get him to a doctor before shock or exposure or loss of blood finally did him in.

  I looked toward my boat and debated the best way to get him aboard. I was still working on the problem when I heard that outboard again. And this time I saw it. Running lights aglow, it came sweeping around Boundary Rock and into the bay.

  Light stabbed at me from a powerful spot, pinning me ruthlessly to the beach. Then it was gone, swinging seaward again. For a brief instant the backwash of that strong light let me see into the cockpit. I had a glimpse of a woman at the wheel, her tall body straining against the wind her motion created. I saw long blonde hair, caught with a ribbon, and a strong, finely-drawn profile. And then she and the boat were gone, sweeping out past the south headland. The roar of the motor became a distant, fading whine.

  I could have sworn I had seen a man beside the blonde—a man with mustard-colored skin and straight dark hair and thin, knifelike features. A very small man whose head came barely to the point of her shoulder.

  Or had the night shadows dreamed him up for me?

  At the moment I couldn’t take the time to be concerned. Tom was my problem. I had to get him into the boat without injuring him even more. He was a good-sized man, taller than I but not quite so heavy through the shoulders and chest. Still he weighed a good one-ninety, ten pounds more than I did. Getting him into my arms and pushing myself erect took most of the strength I had.

  With his head laid open, I had to hold him as a woman would a child. I began a slow march into the water. To reach the cockpit where I could lay him down, I had to walk fifteen feet into the bay.

  And I didn’t know where the shallows ended and the bottom began its sharp downward slope. The water crept past my knees and up to my waist. Soon it was pushing against Tom’s back, taking some of his weight from my arms. I could feel myself sweating despite the icy water and the chill air. With each step there was the threat of the bottom dropping out beneath me and throwing us both into a treacherous hole.

  When I reached the side of the cockpit, I found I had been holding my breath. The water was up to my armpits. I let out stale air and took in fresh and then, gently, lifted Tom high enough to clear the gunwale. My hands were numb and I could feel him beginning to slip. I dug my fingers into his clothes, straining to let him down easy.

  I got him on the deck and for a moment I could only cling to the rail and suck in deep breaths of the cold air. Finally I was able to pull myself aboard and take care of Tom. I made a pillow of my coat, although it was as wet as his. I got out the flashlight and examined him again. His face was twisted with pain and exhaustion. Anxiously, I felt for his heartbeat again. It was still there, a slow and steady rhythm.

  I thought I saw his eyelids flicker under the bright light. I bent down. “Tom? It’s Peter Durham. Come on, boy. Wake up!”

  His lips moved. I said again, “Tom?”

  His voice came out in a faint breath. Just one word. One single, crazy word. And then he went lax, as if the effort had drained his last reserve of strength.

  He said, “Zwahili.”

  I was sure that was the word he spoke. I thought about it as I got underway. I opened the throttle wide. Cold air rushed into the cockpit, plastering my wet clothes to my skin. Icy spray whipped over the bow into my face. I shivered and thought about the word some more. It had been “Zwahili.”

  It made no sense at all.

  The night was clear, and I could see the glow of cities against the dark sky. All of them seemed an incredibly long way off: Vancouver far to the northeast, Victoria south and west, Bellingham almost due east, but cut off by islands.

  The outboard simply didn’t have the power to get me to any of them as quickly as I needed.

  And then I saw the light on Corning Island as I swung around its northeast tip. I swung in toward the bay, thinking that the owner of the house there might have a way of communicating with the mainland and that I could call for the Coast Guard helicopter.

  And then it didn’t matter whether there was communication here or not. Because in the bay was a sleek, fast-looking cruiser tied to a small dock.

  I had spent too many years in diesel-powered fishing boats to think highly of most of the streamlined, bechromed lake cruisers that many people took onto salt water at the risk of their necks. But I had to admit that many of them had the virtue of speed. And this one was bound to have more speed and more stability than the cockleshell I was bouncing Tom about in.

  I swung toward the dock, letting off a blast from the airhorn. The light I had seen as a pinprick of yellow against the blackness grew larger, showing me the squarish outline of a cabin window. By the time I had tied up, a larger light appeared as someone opened a door.

  I yelled through cupped hands up toward the cabin, “Emergency down here!”

  A floodlight came on, drowning me and the dock in harsh brilliance. I could hear two persons running through the darkness toward me. I went back to the boat and looked down at Tom.

  He was breathing about as before. His bleeding had slowed, and his skin had a pasty, corpselike color beneath its natural olive tint. I was afraid he didn’t have much time left.

  I feared pneumonia as much as anything else. I had no way of knowing how long he had lain on that beach, half in and half out of water that could not have been over fifty degrees warm.

  Heavy footsteps pounded on the dock. I looked up. When I saw who was coming, I almost cast off and started away. I would have, only Tom’s life was more important than my feelings.

  Coming toward me was Reese Fuller, and his arrogance showed through as he stared at me. He’d been running but he wasn’t breathing hard. Not a hair of one of his handsome black curls, shot with just enough gray at the temples, was out of place. He was a tall, solid man and in fine physical condition.

  For my money, he was also one of the world’s prime bastards.

  He said to someone behind him, “It’s Durham!” as if the tide had cast something dead up on the dock.

  I pushed down the craving to massage those chiseled features with my fist. I said, “Tom Harbin’s in here, badly hurt. I want to get him to a doctor—fast. Your cruiser will make better time than this job.”


  I had managed to ask him for help without gagging, but it had been an effort.

  A quick patter of light footsteps came down the dock and Jodi Rasmussen appeared alongside Reese Fuller. I hadn’t expected to find her here. But since I had, seeing Jodi was no surprise, because I remembered she owned this cabin on Corning. Three years ago she had taken off for Europe. I was only surprised I hadn’t heard she was back.

  Now I remembered Arne telling me that she and Fuller, his right hand man, had run into one another in Europe and become engaged. Arne hadn’t broken out the aquavit at the news.

  She said, “Peter!” as if she might be glad to see me again. And then, “Did I hear you say Tom Harbin?”

  I pointed to the cockpit. “He’s badly hurt. I found him on the beach at Boundary Island. He needs a doctor in a hurry.”

  Reese Fuller still hadn’t said anything about helping. In fact, he hadn’t said anything. He didn’t like me. He didn’t like Tom. He didn’t like Tom’s father, the man Tom and I worked for.

  Jodi didn’t share his feelings. She did what I expected Arne’s daughter to do. She said, “Help me get him in the cruiser, Reese. I’ll start the motors.”

  “He can do well enough in that tub,” Reese said. His voice was flat and nasty.

  I cocked my fist. “You take the tub, then. I’m borrowing your boat.” I bent and got Tom in my arms. “Move aside.” I stepped onto the dock and almost into Reese Fuller.

  He held his position. Jodi spoke up, her voice having a whiplash in it. She reminded me of her father dressing-down a clumsy seaman—me.

  “Help him, Reese!”

  He helped. He said in a surly voice, “I’ll take his legs.”

  I looked at his dungarees, faded to the correct shade of blue, and at the yachting jacket with the Puget City Yacht Club emblem blazoned on the breast in gold. I said, “You’ll get your clothes dirty.”

  Jodi said, “Stop that, both of you!”

  She had a way with her. We stopped. Fuller took Tom’s legs and I held him under the arms. We managed to get him into a bunk in the forward cabin of the cruiser without jarring him. He lay without moving, his breathing slow and a little ragged now.

  Reese Fuller went into the pilot house. Jodi had started the motors, and I heard him tell her brusquely to move aside, that he would take the wheel. In a few moments she appeared in the forward cabin, carrying a basin of hot water and some clean cloths. She began to wash Tom’s cut, not taking the time to say anything to me.

  I was too chilled and bushed to chat anyway. I propped myself against the door to the head and watched her work. I hadn’t seen her for three years, and except for a brief glimpse, not for years before then. When I had really known Jodi Rasmussen, she had been thirteen, a scrawny-legged brat who hung around her father’s fishboats.

  But now she was twenty-five or -six and she was no brat, and certainly not scrawny-legged. She was all woman, though small and dark, taking after her mother rather than Arne. Still there was a hint of him in the set of her jaw, in her startling gray eyes, and in the fine, warm cut of her mouth.

  She was wearing a yellow play suit affair with a halter that molded to her breasts, and shorts, cut very short. Over them she wore a yellow button-down-the-front skirt, open from the waist. She was something to watch, all right.

  Jodi fixed a bandage carefully over the cut on Tom’s head. “That is a nasty one!” she murmured. She had a bright voice, like a clear bell. She looked at me, her head cocked slightly to one side. “But you look almost as done in, Peter.”

  I said awkwardly, “I’m fine. It’s good to see you. I didn’t know you were home, but I’m glad.” I was trying to thank her for helping with Tom, but as usual I was gauche. I always felt that way around women, especially small, attractive ones. I had the idea they were fragile and that I might fall over them and break something.

  She gave me a wicked glance from those large gray eyes. “Glad to see or because I can help Tom?”

  I could feel myself flushing. I said, “How is his breathing?”

  “Not too bad. He should be all right. We can make the Island hospital in less than an hour.”

  The Island hospital was in the San Juans, due south of our present position. I never could have made the run that fast in the outboard, but from the feel of the deck beneath my feet, Reese wasn’t going to have any trouble. Unless, I thought gloomily, the twin screws sucked in a log and knocked themselves cockeyed.

  I stood and shivered with chill and tried not to think about hitting a log. Jodi went to the galley. I could hear her making coffee there. I climbed to the wheelhouse and watched Fuller. Whatever I might think of him as a person, I had to admit he could handle a boat. I told him so.

  He said grudgingly, “There’s a shower in the forward head, Durham, and some dry clothes in my locker.”

  It galled me to accept more of his hospitality, but I was too cold to turn it down. I took the shower and got into the clothes. By the time I was dressed, Jodi had coffee well slugged with bourbon ready for me. She took her coffee and sat on the top step of the three leading to the wheelhouse. I parked on the edge of the bunk, near Tom. We sipped coffee and looked at one another.

  Jodi said, “Whatever happened?”

  “I wish I knew,” I said. I explained briefly about Tom coming up to investigate the fire, taking out a charter boat, and not coming back. I looked at my watch. It was past nine o’clock. I went on, “So I hustled out and found him. Then I came to you for help.”

  Reese Fuller called down nastily, “Why would he go out to Boundary? Did he think the Rock set the fires?”

  I ignored that. I said, “Speaking of fires, Arne wants you to do something about the Flyer.”

  “A tug’s already on its way,” he said. “And what’s Arne doing up here? This is my end of the business.”

  I had been wondering the same thing about Arne, but I wasn’t going to give Fuller any satisfaction by agreeing with him. Instead I started asking questions.

  But I didn’t get many answers. Although Corning Island is close to Boundary and Jodi’s place was on the northeast corner, neither of them had heard or seen anything unusual. They hadn’t even heard the high-powered outboard that had buzzed me. And the blonde who was driving it was news to both of them. I gave up and asked for more coffee.

  When we neared the Island hospital, Fuller radioed to have an ambulance waiting. It was there at the dock when we arrived. A pair of stretcher bearers came aboard and took Tom off. I told them what I’d do if they didn’t handle him carefully. They treated him as if he might be a crate of antique china.

  I rode with them to the hospital and followed as Tom was wheeled into the emergency ward. A competent-looking young doctor was on duty. He uncovered the cut, took a long look, and whistled softly.

  “What does the other guy look like?” he asked.

  “The other guy,” I said, “was a twenty foot boat.”

  He shook his head. “Not unless it swung a pistol barrel at him it wasn’t. See that groove? It was made by a gunsight.”

  IV

  I WATCHED THE BOSS drop the phone gently into its cradle. He looked at me and shook his head. “No change,” he said. “Tom’s still in a coma.”

  I felt sorry for him. Tom Harbin was my friend, but he was this man’s son. He was all Oscar Harbin had.

  I stabbed a finger at a bulky manila envelope lying on the desk. I said, “Isn’t there anything in Tom’s report to help at all?”

  Harbin pushed back a lock of graying hair that had fallen over his forehead. He looked thoroughly beat. “I’ve read the damned thing backwards and forwards and I can’t find a thing. Pure routine. Nothing else.”

  It was nearly twenty-four hours since I had ridden in the ambulance to the Island hospital. I had called the boss, and he flew up, and we spent the night waiting with Tom. He had arrived at the hospital in a coma, and when we left he was still in the coma. His condition tonight hadn’t changed.

  I was tired. After f
lying home with the boss, I had gone to my apartment for some sleep, but I had lain awake more than I had slept. My eyes were grainy and my head felt heavy, yet I was probably in top condition compared to the boss.

  I said, “Why don’t you give it up for a while. Let me take the report. Maybe I can find something you missed.” I shifted in my chair and fumbled for cigarettes. The boss pushed the box he reserved for clients toward me. He even held out his desk lighter. I only got this red carpet treatment when he was too upset to think clearly.

  I dragged deeply on the English cigarette he had provided. “I talked to Arne and I saw the setup, so there might be something that has meaning for me.”

  He handed me the envelope. I laid it in my lap. I said, “The thing that bothers me most is Tom’s not reporting in before he rented that charter boat. That isn’t like him.”

  The boss said, “He did report. He called in at two-thirty in the morning and again at eight.”

  I said, “Hell, when you called me in Anchorage, you said …”

  The boss made a sour face and jerked his thumb toward the outer office where Emily Calvin, our secretary, was giving the electric typewriter a workout. “She told me tonight—before you got here. I can’t blame her, I guess; she’s still pretty new. But when she came in yesterday morning, the answering service called and said they were sending over a taped message. She fouled up putting it on the playback so she could type it and wiped the wire clean.”

  We made use of one of those automatic answering services that records confidential messages on wire. It was a very handy device, since Tom and I often reported in at odd hours. But right now I was wishing for a little less electronics and a little more human power.

  I said, “If he called at two-thirty, it was probably to tell you why he was going out. And if he called again at eight, that must have been a report on something he’d found out.”

  “My guess,” the boss agreed. “The two-thirty call was from Bellingham. The eight o’clock call was from the San Juans.”

  “So we know that at eight he was still going strong. He must have gone back to Boundary after that.”