Precipice

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Precipice Page 8

by Tom Savage

Lisa followed her gaze. “Oh, that. Daddy built it a long time ago, when we first moved here. He had a boat he used to keep down here, and that”—she jerked a thumb at the structure—“was for storing stuff. It hasn’t been used in years. Mommy sometimes talks about tearing it down, but I think she likes it. I heard her tell Aunt Trish once that she and Daddy used to play there. I think she was talking about sex. Maybe that’s why she’s never gotten rid of it.”

  The woman stared at her a moment, smiling at the sudden, inexplicable wisdom of children. Then she stepped forward through the trees. She crossed the short distance to the small, slightly crooked door. There was a hinged bar next to the rusty knob, but the padlock hanging from it was open. She removed the lock, pushed open the door, and went inside. Lisa and Jumbi remained on the beach.

  It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the gloom. The single window high up on one wall had been boarded shut, and the only light filtered through the irregular crevices between the badly aligned planks that formed the walls. A table on one side had been fashioned from a sheet of plywood resting on two sawhorses: it had obviously served Fred Belden as a workspace. Dark patches marred its surface, evidence of long-ago oil spills from some now-defunct outboard motor, no doubt. A lone blondwood oar rested along one wall near a metal folding chair and in a corner stood two red plastic containers for gasoline. Even now the tiny, airless room smelled faintly of diesel.

  She was about to turn around and leave the shed when she noticed something in the opposite corner, something that didn’t quite fit with the other objects in the place. There, spread out along the wall, were two large white blankets. At one end, against the wall, rested a long, uncased pillow. She stared a moment: something wasn’t right. . . .

  She knelt beside the makeshift bed and lifted the corner of one white blanket—too white for long disuse. She sniffed. Fabric softener.

  The act of pulling away the blanket revealed something else, in the corner next to the pillow. An empty wine bottle and two clear plastic glasses. Next to these was a tiny can that had once contained Starkist tuna. It now housed the remains of several cigarettes. She picked one up and examined it. The elegant green lettering at the base of the filter was singed but unmistakable.

  Virginia Slims.

  The snapping of twigs outside the door told her that Lisa was approaching the shack. She threw the blanket back over the objects in the corner and rose quickly to her feet. She was just about to turn around when the voice from the doorway arrested all motion.

  “You really shouldn’t be in here, Diana,” Kay Prescott said. “It isn’t safe.”

  The younger woman took a deep breath and turned around to face her. “I was just—”

  Kay pointed over at the far wall, just under the window. “See those tracks? Termites. One good breeze and the whole thing will probably come crashing down. You could be seriously injured. I don’t have any insurance for that.” She smiled, but her tone was firm. “I’d rather you didn’t come in here again.”

  With that, she turned and went out to join her daughter on the beach.

  After a moment, the other woman followed her.

  There is a place in every ocean, a certain distance from land, where the water beneath the turbulent surface is deep and freezing cold. It is dark there: the sunlight can penetrate only so far before its power is defeated by the shadows. Men rarely venture into it, knowing as they do that the silence and the stillness are deceptive. There, as everywhere else, a thousand different forms of life have made their home. Most of them are small, peaceful, inconsequential; some are invisible to the human eye. It is not of these that men are afraid, but of the larger ones, the ones that travel in groups, roaming the depths in constant search of sustenance. Their food is at a premium, and when it is found it is attacked and fought over and violently eliminated. The presence of these denizens ensures the secrecy of the place: its mysteries remain its own.

  Fourteen minutes.

  He cut the engine and sat back, smiling at the girl. She lounged on the forward bench, gazing dreamily around at the expanse of water and the hazy, faraway strip of green that was St. Thomas. She had kicked off her sandals and removed the blouse and the earrings, which lay on top of the straw bag at her feet.

  “Alone at last!” she gushed, coloring slightly as she became aware of the intensity of his stare. “But why are we stopping here?”

  “I have a surprise for you.”

  She regarded him with amused skepticism and raised a penciled eyebrow. “Here?! What sort of surprise?”

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “It’s not what you think. The boat’s too small, and the water’s too choppy.”

  They both laughed.

  “I should say so!” she agreed, lowering her tone to a gravelly purr. “Besides, I think it may rain soon. Imagine getting caught in a storm all the way out here! Did you ever see Key Largo?”

  “Sure.” And you’re Lauren Bacall, he thought.

  She lowered her eyelids. “So, what’s the surprise?”

  He leaned forward. “See that tarp behind you? Look under it and you’ll find a bottle of wine and two glasses.”

  A slow smile came to her lips. She cocked her head to one side and rested a hand on her bosom. Lauren Bacall, Mitzi Gaynor, Deborah Kerr: she was every magnificent woman she’d ever read about and dreamed of becoming.

  “Why, you marvelous, romantic man! You’ve thought of everything!”

  Yes, he thought. I have.

  “I want this to be perfect,” he whispered.

  “Oh, it is!” she insisted. “Its wonderful! I’m having the loveliest time. And now, my lord, lie back while I furnish thee with libations.”

  She turned around then. She knelt in the bobbing craft, her back to him, and reached down to pull the dark-blue oilskin away from the marvelous, romantic wine.

  He reached forward with his right hand, whipped the white scarf from her head, and dropped it onto her other clothes. He grabbed a handful of the mousy brown hair and whirled her around to face him. He had to see her eyes.

  “Hey!” she cried, but her voice had the sound of laughter in it. “What are you unnnnn—”

  The knife plunged into her throat, through her esophagus, and out the back of her neck.

  “—nnngghhhhh. . . .”

  Adam gripped the handle and yanked the blade backward, out of her. He tossed it away. He pushed her backward, so her head and the wound were over the side. For one long, exquisite moment he stared into the wild, pained, uncomprehending eyes, until just before they clouded over. Then he leaned back, grasping the edge of the bench for support, and raised his leg. Planting his foot squarely in the center of her stomach, he shoved her over the side. The body pitched backward and down into the water, twisting once as it fell.

  She floated for a while, facedown, bobbing gently in the waves. As he watched, fascinated, her left arm straightened rigidly out beside her and the hand balled into a tight fist. Then, ever so slowly, the fingers loosened and opened slightly, and the arm relaxed. The body moved away from the boat, rising on a sudden crest and dropping into the trough behind it. There was one last glimpse of the mousy hair, the bathing suit, the chubby white legs, and then the sea accepted her. Only in those final seconds before she sank had she become aware of what had happened, realized that she was dying. And after that there was nothing, oblivion, and the long descent.

  He filled his lungs with fresh sea air, held it for a moment, and slowly exhaled. He raised his face to the sun, allowing the warmth to penetrate and soothe. He relaxed his body, one muscle at a time. The rage evaporated as the first tingling wave of ecstasy washed over him. The reviving wind swept through his platinum hair. He was alone on the surface of the ocean, where only he was God.

  Then he opened his eyes and lowered his gaze to the bow of the craft, where she had been kneeling. He had moved swiftly: there was not a drop of blood in the boat.

  Excellent.

  It was all in the water. It would seep from the
wound in her throat and spread outward in every direction. A homing device calling attention to his precious gift, his generous donation to those other gods, the ones that waited below.

  He consulted his watch: seventeen minutes and counting.

  Excellent.

  The engine roared to life. In just under five minutes he was back at the remote cove where he had picked her up. He floated in to shore, grabbed the bag and the clothes, and leapt into the shallows. Her car would be parked around here somewhere. No time to move it, he thought, so improvise. He ran up onto the beach and dropped her belongings a safe distance above the highest tide line.

  The straw bag fell over sideways, spilling its contents onto the sand. He bent quickly to retrieve everything and stuff it back inside: compact; atomizer; comb and brush; a pack of Juicy Fruit gum; a fastened manila envelope bulging with something, probably clippings of movie stars; six or seven magazines. People, Us, Modern Screen, Premiere. Jesus. . . .

  He scanned the palm grove that concealed the beach from the road beyond it: yes, there was her old, battered Jeep, parked in the shadows among the trees.

  Excellent.

  Six minutes later he was back at the club, tying the Whaler to the stern of the Kay. Kyle, he noticed, had finished repairing the sail and was not reattaching it. He was hunched over his task, the inevitable cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, oblivious of the outside world. He would not have noticed if Adam had been drenched with gore.

  Excellent.

  Twenty-nine minutes, eight seconds, from start to finish.

  Perfect.

  The young man looked up from his chore as Adam climbed aboard. “That was fast. Is she seaworthy?”

  Adam grinned.

  “And then some,” he said.

  The sharp cry of a seagull caused him to look up. There was a flock, perhaps a hundred of them, soaring through the clear sky above the boat. Flying off, catching the wind, wherever they wanted to go. Absolute freedom.

  God.

  He smiled, remembering something from long ago: the birds outside his bedroom window.

  SIX

  FRIDAY, AUGUST 16

  “I DON’T KNOW, Miss Barclay. I’m beginning to think I’m wasting your time and money. Maybe I should just—”

  “It’s my time, Mr. Trask,” came the imperious reply, “and my money. I’ve just been explaining that to your employer in New York, Mr.—oh, dear, I’m terrible with Japanese names. I can’t for the life of me pronounce this—”

  “Yakimadoro,” Robin said, smiling into the receiver. “You have to say it a few times.”

  “At least. He said that if it’s all right with you, it’s all right with him. He also said to tell you that casting calls don’t really begin for another month or so, and then he emitted a sound I interpreted as laughter. I infer from that remark that you’re an actor, and I don’t think Mr. whatever-his-name-is takes your career very seriously. I’m willing to raise your fee to twelve hundred a week. Are you amenable to that?”

  He gazed down from his balcony at two pretty, bikini-clad women who sat at the poolside bar, laughing as they sipped tall, fruity drinks. The chair next to them was unoccupied. Twelve hundred, he thought. I’ve died and gone to heaven. . . .

  “I’m amenable,” he said. “I’m very amenable, Miss Barclay.” Hell, for twelve hundred per, I’m the most amenable out-of-work actor this side of the Rockies.

  “Good. Now, Mr. Trask, do you have anything? Any leads?”

  Oh, boy. He squeezed his eyes shut, his mind racing. She was pinning a lot of hopes on him, and now she was asking if he had any leads. He didn’t have any leads; he didn’t have anything that might even lead to leads. He. had dick, and they both knew that, though the rich lady from Glen Cove would not have expressed it in quite that way. Thank God his boss, the Sarcastic Samurai, and Johnny “Call-Me-James-Bond” Russo weren’t here to see him squirming.

  Stall, he thought. Buy some time. You’ll come up with something. You’re an actor, for chrissakes! If you can’t be a detective, you can at least act like one.

  “As a matter of fact,” he suddenly heard himself saying, “I’m following up on a lead right now. I’m expecting a phone call from a guy—a source. Yeah. I should have something for you, um, soon. Can I reach you at this number all afternoon?”

  “Of course, Mr. Trask,” she said. “I hope it’s good news. Otherwise—”

  “Hey,” he interjected, trying to sound like he was wearing a rumpled trenchcoat, “let’s not think about otherwise. Just stay put till you hear from me, okay? And please call me Robin. We’re in this together, ya know.”

  Wow. Humphrey Bogart, please write.

  “Very well, Robin. Please find her for me. I can’t help thinking something may happen to her. Something terrible. She’s a very—she’s made mistakes in the past. Stupid, destructive things. When you have a child you love—” There was a pause on the other end of the line. Then she said, “I’ve buried everyone else in my family, Robin. I don’t want history to repeat itself.”

  Robin Trask, actor and detective, was silent. There was nothing he could think of to say.

  He looked out at the beach. A young woman in a pink bathing suit stood in the shallows, holding a little boy above the surface as he made his first, fumbling attempt at swimming. He paddled successfully for several feet before his head disappeared momentarily beneath a breaking wave. She pulled the grinning, sputtering child from the water and held him up, wet and gleaming, to the sun. Their triumphant laughter floated up to the balcony.

  Long Island Sound. His dad had tossed him in and fished him out and held him to his chest. Laughing.

  “I’ll find her,” he said, and he hung up the phone.

  He carried the instrument back into the room and placed it on the night table next to the manila folder. Then he picked up the file and left the room.

  Wandering out onto the beach, he noticed that the two young women he’d seen at the bar were gone. Just as well: he had some thinking to do. He dropped the folder in the sand, shed his shirt, and placed it on top of it. He waded out into the water, dived, surfaced, and rolled over onto his back. He floated in the warm, clear Caribbean, eyes closed, remembering. . . .

  Until this, nothing really unusual had ever happened to him. He’d grown up with nice parents in a nice house in Merrick, Long Island. He’d majored in drama at Columbia because it seemed like an interesting, colorful thing to do. He hadn’t even fallen in love with it, been “bitten by the bug,” until he was actually onstage, in front of people who laughed and applauded. Then, of course, the way was clear. After graduation he’d remained in the city, against the wishes of Dad the accountant and Mom the real estate broker, moving to the fifth-floor walkup on Sullivan Street that he’d shared with two classmates.

  In the next three years, he’d been in one off-off-Broadway play, two Equity showcases, and one non-Equity summer stock company in New Jersey that he hoped the union had never found out about. He’d also been—between endless auditions—a waiter, a bartender, a cabdriver, a singing delivery man, a telemarketer, Chucky the Clown in a parade, Chucky the Clown at a child’s birthday party, Chucky the Clown handing out pamphlets on Madison Avenue, a shoe salesman, and—for one memorable evening with one of the roommates and another guy he’d met in the Equity lounge—a stripper at Chippendales.

  De Niro, he’d decided, had not started this way.

  He saw Mr. Yakimadoro’s ad in Backstage (“Between Engagements? Make Good Money While Putting Your Acting Skills to Good Use . . .”). A private investigator: it sounded romantic, and it beat hell out of Chucky the Clown.

  So, Yakimadoro Investigations. It was just the three of them—the boss, Robin, and Johnny Russo—and the secretary, Mrs. White, a black grandmother from Harlem. They worked out of a shabby storefront office next to a Korean fruit and vegetable market on lower Eighth Avenue, one short block from the meat-packing district.

  In the next eighteen months, he’d made good
money while putting his acting skills to good use. He’d found two missing husbands, one missing wife, one missing bookie (his first and only dead body), and two and a half insurance swindlers (the half-swindler actually had the broken leg he’d claimed though not the amnesia). And all without ever once leaving the tri-state area; it seemed to him, in fact, that he’d spent most of his time in Brooklyn.

  The romantic world of private investigation.

  He’d saved every dime he could. He was tired of the overcrowded walkup on Sullivan. He’d fallen in love with a reasonably priced, recently vacated condo on West Seventieth that he’d discovered in the line of duty (Missing Husband Number Two). He wanted his own place. He wanted a dog, or at least a cat. He wanted a girlfriend. He wanted an acting career.

  He wanted a life.

  Then, three weeks ago, two extraordinary things had happened. Missing Husband Number Two, back with his wife and desperate to sell, had accepted his offer of a (low) down payment. Robin had paid the man, signed the papers, and moved his meager belongings to his new home. He was just beginning to wonder where the second payment would come from when his boss had called him into his office and handed him the Margaret Barclay case.

  Miss Barclay and Mr. Yakimadoro had a mutual acquaintance who had put her in touch with him. She needed someone to tail her niece, who was apparently going to take off any minute for parts unknown. Miss Barclay wanted the parts to be known. He, Robin, was to be ready to leave at a moment’s notice, follow the girl wherever, and report back to Miss Barclay.

  Then he’d read the dossier. His assignment was a very mixed-up young lady, a spoiled rich girl with a self-destructive streak—not surprising, considering that business when she was little. Oh, well, for a thousand a week he could handle her.

  The moment he first saw her, coming out of the Glen Cove house with the two suitcases and getting in the cab, he knew she was not like any woman he’d ever met. She was beautiful, almost as beautiful as her photograph in the file. Her hair in the picture was nicer than her current red shade, but even so, she was still prettier than most. And there was something about her, immediately apparent, even in that short walk to the cab: an attitude; an energy level; an aura of excitement, of sexuality. Something. She was the sort of woman who could change his life.

 

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