Ghost Ship

by Roger Weston

  She thought about one of Jake’s former students who had taken his Shipwrecks of the Northwest class a few years back. Ashley often taught the class as a sub for Jake. This particular student was also a private investigator. The question was whether she’d stayed in Seattle or left the area. Ashley checked the phone book, and sure enough, there was a listing for Donna Wallis Skip Tracing. Donna had a street address in Bellevue. Ashley called and got a machine. Suddenly she had a desire go over to the East Side and swing by Donna’s office.

  Bellevue was located across the floating bridge from Seattle past Mercer Island. The offices for Wallis Skip Tracing were in a tiny one-story home located behind a 7-11 convenience store on a busy street. Ashley wasn’t sure whether or not she would actually knock. To some degree, she still felt like a bit of a nutcase with more suspicions than evidence, but when she saw the Open sign in the window, she decided to go ahead.

  She tried the door but found it locked. She was turning to leave when a voice came over the intercom. “Can I help you?”

  “Hi, this is Ashley Higgins. I’m looking for Donna Wallis.”

  Ashley heard a buzzer, so she pushed the door open.

  Donna’s operation was a one-person show. The living room was an office with a large desk in the middle. Dark art with scenes of the underworld covered the walls. Donna, with her long, sleek black hair sat at a desk, holding a phone to her ear. She smiled and sat up straighter when she saw Ashley, humor showing in her eyes. She pointed at a chair across from her desk.

  Ashley took a seat and spent a few minutes listening to half of a conversation regarding a fugitive, a man hunter, an angry lawyer and something about violation of rights.

  Donna hung up the phone. They spent a few minutes in small talk, catching up on which dive sights Donna had visited that they’d covered in the class. Then she came to the point. “So, Professor Higgins, what are you doing here?”

  “I’ve got a situation I need help with.”

  “Okay, let’s have it.” Donna smiled, crinkling her black eye liner.

  “I need you to find out everything you can about the new owner of the Queen Mary.”

  “This could only come from Professor Sands.” Donna was still grinning. “That’s what I love about this job. Unpredictable. Kind of like Sands.”

  Ashley frowned. “I’m afraid this is quite serious.” She told Donna about their concerns.

  Donna wasn’t smiling anymore. “I’ll get right on it.”

  “Thanks. Anything you can find out would help.”

  “Unless this cat has ties to the underworld, I can nail him quickly. Check back this afternoon. I’ll let you know if I find anything.”

  CHAPTER 21

  Santa Barbara, California

  Tom Koch arrived at the Richter estate in Santa Barbara at noon. This was the first time that the great man had invited him over to his residence, but Koch wasn’t entirely surprised because the meeting was related to the Sands mess. Arriving at the estate was like entering another world. It was said that the main house was eighteen thousand square feet, and with its soaring rooflines and sprawling wings, he didn’t doubt it. The guest house alone was at least a quarter of the size of the main house and could have held its own in Beverly Hills. Koch caught a glimpse of a pool hidden behind a line of eucalyptus trees. The thought of it made him shiver. He hurried past a fountain, tennis courts, and a huge outbuilding. He entered the monstrous structure and was amazed to find a riding arena and observation lounge inside. Richter was sitting at a table near a window that divided the lounge from the arena. Without saying a word of greeting, he gestured for Koch to sit in a hardwood chair.

  “Nice place,” Koch said.

  Richter nodded impatiently as if he was irritated at such a trifle. “Yes, I suppose it is. Imagine the terror.”

  “What?” Koch narrowed his eyes at Richter.

  “Imagine the terror. It begins with torpedoes slamming into the ship. The passengers know that the boat is going to sink very quickly. Panic runs rampant. Women and children running, anyone who stumbles is trampled to death. The lucky ones who make it on deck find that there are few lifeboats, and those are full of snow, their lines frozen solid. If they get too close to a lifeboat, they are attacked by fellow passengers and beaten, some to death. Children cry. Many are separated from their mothers. Women scream hysterically. As the ship keels over, hundreds slip into the ocean where the water is so cold it feels like being burned by a hot iron. Imagine the terror.”

  Koch shifted in his chair.

  “As the ship goes under, her sirens scream fiercely. They wail just as a beast does in her desperate last moments. There are people everywhere in life jackets, treading water, counting the minutes that they have left to live as they freeze to death in agony. Some swim to overloaded lifeboats and grab hold of the boat’s rails, but are clubbed and beaten by fellow passengers until they submerge into the inky depths of the sea. Imagine it. The boats are your only hope to live, and you’re beaten back by your fellow passengers. Frozen bodies of children drift past, held buoyant by life jackets. The bodies rise and fall in the waves. A raft floats by and you climb on, knowing that you will soon freeze to death anyway. The lifeboats are spread out now, far and wide, but still the corpses are all around bobbing like corks. There are so many. In the distance, a ship picks up survivors, but you are too weak and the boat is too far away. It soon leaves.”

  Charles was silent for a moment, hatred on his face, murder in his eyes.

  He continued talking again, slowly at first. “Imagine…the terror of a woman … in a lifeboat. She huddles in shock and does not even realize that the lump she is sitting on is a dead child. When she does realize it, she is surprised, but not moved. She has seen so much death over the past twenty minutes that the little bundle causes no emotion. Nothing can shock shock itself. She guesses how long it will take her and her own child to freeze.” Richter’s voice surged. “Imagine the terror! Imagine all the ways there are to die—getting onto the deck, arriving on deck, slipping down the deck into the water, approaching a lifeboat, not getting a place on a lifeboat, swimming into the jaws of death, getting clubbed for trying to survive, freezing to death if you are lucky enough to get into a lifeboat.”

  Koch squirmed on the hard chair.

  “One of the last boats on the scene, a naval dispatch boat, spots a lifeboat with people huddled together. When a sailor jumps down into the lifeboat, he finds that the people are all frozen corpses. But underneath one of the bodies, he finds a little boy blue from the cold, but wrapped in a wool blanket and holding a satchel. He was the last survivor of the Wilhelm Gustloff. Can you imagine that?”

  “I can picture a scene of chaos and terror and death.” Koch wanted to smile, but his judgment inhibited the impulse.

  “Good. Remember that.”

  Koch’s eyebrows rose as he wondered what kind of nutcase he’d joined forces with. Well, it didn’t matter. His payday was not long off.

  “The voyage is about to begin,” Richter said. “Every detail must be considered—every pitfall and every contingency. I’m doing this in honor of my father. What the father began, the son will finish.”

  Koch just stared at Richter.

  “In eleven days you will leave. Don’t screw this up. My men at the science facility will handle all the details. Your job is to ensure that they load the cargo safely. Make sure the Weissenburger is at the rendezvous point on January 29th and don’t forget to bring me my satchel.”

  CHAPTER 22

  University of Washington

  December 31

  Ashley still hadn’t heard back from Donna and couldn’t get a hold of her. To keep her mind off of her anxiety, she stayed in the office and did more online research. She was trying to learn more specifics about the scientist who left a satchel behind when he died on the Wilhlem Gustloff during World War Two. After two hours of tedious sifting through electronic documents, she still hadn’t got a hit. She decided to get a fresh perspecti
ve.

  She waded through pouring rain and lake-size puddles to get to a local coffee shop, where she skimmed a stack of wet magazines she’d checked out at the city library before it closed for the New Year’s holiday. She swam in a flood of the same stories, over and over again, so she went online and found more of the same.

  When her phone rang, she was relieved. It was Donna Wallis, P.I. Finally.

  “What have you got?” Ashley said.

  “Richter has no criminal record, but he was questioned on several occasions about the death of an activist with a historical society in Florida. The guy was making a lot of noise about a new Richter hotel project in Miami. He left a brief and vague suicide note on his kitchen table. The autopsy showed that the man had taken a lot of sleeping pills before jumping, but the police were skeptical of the suicide motive. Richter was a person of interest in the case but never arrested. That was a few years ago. Similar situation last week when a reporter died in Los Angeles.” Donna paused. “Richter scares me.”

  Ashley stared out the coffee house window through the curtain of rain. As people walked by with umbrellas, she watched to see if they glanced in at her. She studied a man across the street that was standing under an awning by a bus stop. Was he really waiting for the bus, or was he watching her?

  Donna went on: “Look, I’m just getting started. I touched base with a colleague in Long Beach who followed our boy. They listened in on a conversation with a parabolic microphone. I don’t know if this means anything to you, but Richter told Koch to go down to Tierra del Fuego—something about picking up cargo?”

  “Did he give any details?”

  “No, but he told Koch to go to his ranch in Chile first to pick up a satchel. He also told him to enjoy a day at the horse races. Said it was some kind of reward for doing a good job. It might be nothing. He mentioned the name Diego Petri. Said he’ll be there too. I’ve got a lot more to do, but I just wanted to let you know. Richter gave him a plane ticket. I checked passenger lists, and he’s scheduled to fly out of LAX in two weeks. He’ll be arriving in Santiago, Chile the following day. I called a colleague in South America. They are familiar with Charles and his ranch. Apparently it is more like a compound. It’s highly guarded. Richter holds private races there under tight security. Wealthy owners bring their horses from all around the world to race. By invitation only, of course.”

  Ashley was watching the man across the street when her view was cut off by a bus.

  “Are you still there?” Donna said.

  “Yes, I am. Sorry...I just got distracted for a moment. Thanks for the update.”

  CHAPTER 23

  Bellevue, Washington

  New Year’s Eve

  Donna was working late, and it had become a habit. New Years Eve was no exception because she was behind on all her work and she had goals that drove her. For three years, she’d been slaving sixteen-hour days for peanuts. She’d been working out of her office, sleeping in the back room, and negotiating with creditors for extensions on her student loans. Finally, her income was picking up. Presently, she was sitting at her desk, reviewing a skip-tracing report. Skip-tracing was a lucrative sideline to supplement her investigations, and it helped her to meet her goal of multiple streams of income. She also did employee background checks, security consulting, infidelity investigations, workers comp investigations, witness interviews, and tenant screening. She was starting to realize that she was a workaholic, but she didn’t mind because it kept her out of trouble. At least she would eventually meet her goal of buying a condo after her wedding in the spring.

  At 8:05 p.m., she slipped her Kel-Tec P-11 auto pistol into her purse and looked out the back door of the office. She looked for any strange cars or vans because she’d been threatened by a couple of nutcases last year. Everything looked normal, so she locked up the office.

  The parking lot was exceptionally dark because the city still hadn’t fixed the dead streetlight. It had been six months, and she had only called in about it four times. In the parking lot, she froze when she heard a noise on the side of the building. Someone had moved and kicked a can, just slightly. Donna removed her Kel-Tec 9mm auto pistol and edged toward the corner of the building. She heard another sound like someone fooling with exterior wiring.

  Donna’s heart thundered in her chest, probably louder than the dirtbag who was trying to cut her power. As Donna stepped around the corner, she switched on her mini flashlight.

  A raccoon in her trash can looked at her for a moment, then hopped down onto the pavement and casually wandered into the bushes that lined the parking lot.

  Donna let out huge sigh of relief. She put away her gun and flashlight and hurried to her car. She got in and started up the engine. When she flipped open her beauty mirror, the battery-powered light flicked on. She put on some lipstick because she would now drop by a pub to interview a bartender as part of a criminal defense investigation.

  A vigorous movement in the back seat startled her as a Samoan man wrapped a garrote around her neck and pulled viciously. Donna dropped her beauty mirror on reflex and tried to grab at the garrote, but it was too tight.

  “You shouldn’t be asking questions about dead reporters,” the Samoan said. “Big mistake.”

  Donna reached for her purse and handgun, but instead knocked the purse onto the floor of the passenger’s seat.

  The Samoan pulled the garrote so hard that Donna realized it was all over.

  ***

  At Jake’s university office, Ashley worked until almost 10 p.m., which she didn’t like doing given that there was no security in the building after 5 p.m. She became so engrossed in her research that she didn’t realize that Donna hadn’t called back. Ashley had plenty of her own work to do. Researching a ship’s narrative often entailed reading various log or journal accounts and finding both consistencies and inconsistencies in fact patterns. These patterns or problems practically begged further investigation and suggested topics for articles in historical magazines and scholarly journals. The key was to bring a fresh voice to the conversation and a new angle on the topic. She took the same approach in conducting her research on Charles Richter. Compared to most ship narratives, however, Richter had been the object of a flood of media attention. In the business and gossip worlds, he’d become not just an icon, but also a staple of the periodicals covering those areas. He evidently provided a continuing source of fascination for readers because they were either intrigued or repulsed by his business success and flamboyant personal life. He limited his interviews and turned the ones he did give into publicity coups for his latest sporting event or new hotel.

  Ashley left the building after dark and walked to her car. Not only was it late, but it was pouring rain again, and she’d forgotten her umbrella. She gripped her keys tightly in her fingers just as she would in any weather at night…and sometimes even during the day. More than once she looked over her shoulder, but nobody was there. As she approached the parking lot, however, she noticed the black outline of a person following her.

  Ashley walked faster and made a couple of blocks. Making a mental note to lodge a complaint with the university over the lack of parking near her office, she looked back. But the black figure was gone.

  She arrived at her car and fumbled with the key.

  “Why doesn’t the city repair the streetlights?” she said in frustration, rain drops bursting all over the roof of her car.

  A sound. Grunting with fear, she spun around. Nobody in sight.

  She turned back to the car door and felt around for the keyhole. Within moments, she was safely inside with the doors locked. She got on the freeway and headed for Mercer Island. The one thing she loved about her neighborhood was that it was safer than the U-District.

  Ashley parked in the driveway of her rental unit and took a deep breath. She was home. It was only 10:30, so she figured she had time to do a little more research on Richter. She hadn’t even gotten around to the smaller publications serving the areas where he owne
d hotels or race tracks. For that matter, she hadn’t perused any racing journals either.

  She jumped out of her car and ran for the door.

  CHAPTER 24

  Seattle

  January 1, 2013

  Jake met Ashley on Alki Beach the next morning. Ashley’s eyes were moist and almost red enough to match her hair.

  “Why’d you want to meet me here?” Jake said.

  “I’m scared, Jake. Donna Wallis is dead.”

  Jake stared at the waves crashing onto the shore.

  “She was strangled outside her building last night.” Ashley sniffed and brushed her sleeve across her eyes.

  “She probably had a long list of enemies,” Jake said. “She was a private investigator after all.”

  “She’d been researching the dead reporter in Los Angeles. There’s a pattern here, Jake. People who investigate Richter or make trouble for him have a habit of getting killed. I guess we’re members of that club.”

  Jake was quiet.

  “We’re playing with fire here, Jake. You broke onto the Queen Mary. I’m asking a lot of questions and stirring up the mud.”

  “You need to be careful.”