Crimson Shore

by Douglas Preston

  Constance went out and found another interviewee seated in a chair in the hallway, face red, little white hairs on his neck standing out in irritation. He rose. “I hope this isn’t going to take up a lot of time,” he said, looking her up and down with faded but alert blue eyes. He was about seventy, in a lumberjack shirt, suspenders, and blue work pants. A faint odor of the marshes clung to him.

  “This way,” she said.

  He pushed through the door aggressively and refused to take the proffered chair. Pendergast once again fiddled with the equipment.

  “Well?” the man asked impatiently. “I ain’t gonna answer any questions, if that’s what this is about.”

  “Just a moment, so sorry, just trying to get the equipment in order. Mr. George Washington Boyle, is it?”

  “That’s Benjamin Franklin Boyle,” the man said. “Nice start there, Mr. Detective.”

  “Endless apologies.” More fussing. “You are here, Mr. Boyle, in a completely voluntary capacity. So you wish to decline answering questions?”

  “And if I do? You gonna get a warrant or something, make me come back?”

  “No, no. I’m conducting a private investigation. I have no subpoena power. You are free to go. No hard feelings.”

  A grunt. “Well, as long as I’m here…” He sat down.

  Constance could see that Boyle was a man of higher intelligence than his looks warranted, and that Pendergast, in feigning incompetency and giving Boyle a feeling of superiority, had managed to put the man in the right frame of mind for answering questions. A clever ploy—and in stark contrast to her own sadly underdeveloped skills with people. She recalled the long list of potential interviewees and wondered if perhaps it wouldn’t have been better for her to stay back at Riverside Drive.

  “Mr. Boyle, on the weekend of the wine theft, you were, I presume, clamming on the Exmouth mudflats?”

  “I went out on Saturday afternoon for a few hours.”

  “Whereabouts?”

  “An area they call the Channel Flats.”

  “Can you show me on the map?” He unrolled a map of the area and placed it in front of Boyle.

  “Right here.” A dirty finger thumped the location.

  “Ah. I see you had no view of the lighthouse at all.”

  “That’s right. That’s two miles from the light and behind the Exmouth bluffs. You can’t see over the marsh grass and cattails, anyway, seeing is how they’s five, six feet high in most places.”

  “I was hoping you might have seen something, perhaps coming or going.”

  “Nothing but mud and clams.”

  Pendergast began rolling up the map. “You must know those marshes quite well.”

  “Better than just about anyone.”

  “I imagine they have their own peculiar beauty.”

  “They do.” Boyle said it with conviction, but also in a tone that meant he had no interest in exploring that subject further.

  “And a history?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “But I don’t suppose you have much interest in history, being a clammer.”

  Now the man bristled. “I was captain on a dragger, Mr. Pendergast, for forty years. I’m a seafaring man, and seafaring men have always had an interest in history.”

  Pendergast raised his eyebrows. “I see. But what sort of history could an uninhabited marsh have?”

  “More than you might think.” Boyle laughed. He was enjoying having an audience, especially someone as dim-witted as Pendergast. “All kinds of history. Stories, too. Of witches. And the Gray Reaper.”

  “The Gray Reaper?”

  “Sometimes at night, you see a light out there in the marshes, moving around, bobbing this way and that. That’s the Gray Reaper. Couple hundred years ago, they say, there was a man named Jack, and he was the meanest son of a bitch between Casco Bay and Gloucester. When he died, the devil came and got him, hauled him down to hell. But Jack was so ornery that after a while the devil couldn’t stand it anymore. He tossed Jack a glowing coal and said, “You’re too mean for my hell, so you take that coal and go start a hell of your own!” He roared with laughter. “He’s there in the marshes, covered in the gray-black mud. That’s where he got the name. Blends in, like so you can’t see him. Save for the coal, of course. When you see that light bobbing out there, that’s the Gray Reaper wandering around, coal in hand, looking to reap some souls and start a hell of his own.”

  Pendergast seemed considerably irritated by this diversion. “And the witches?”

  Boyle waved his hand. “There’s a story, goes back to the days of Salem. When things got hot and they started hanging the witches down there, a group of them hightailed it out of Salem in the dead of night and came north, where they settled on one of those salt marsh islands, out of the reach of civilization. Men and women both, mind you.”

  “Are you saying there were real witches?”

  “I’m saying no such thing. The legend is those old Puritans hanged a lot of innocent people while the real witches got away.”

  “Where in the marshes did they settle?”

  “Nobody knows. Inland a bit somewhere, according to the story. But things didn’t go well. A bad winter, starvation, and Indian attacks wiped them out. Later on, they say, from time to time a traveler would get lost in the marshes and come across the ruins of that witch settlement, wooden houses all rotten and collapsed. They say in the middle of this crazy settlement was a circle of flat stones with carvings on them and, in the center of that, a piece of slate with a one-word message.”

  “Which was?”

  “T-Y-B-A-N-E.”

  Pendergast and Constance exchanged glances.

  “What does it mean?”

  “No one’s ever figured it out.” A knowing leer. “Until now, maybe.”

  “So you’ve heard that whoever killed the historian, McCool, carved that word on his body.”

  Boyle shrugged. “Can’t keep no secrets in a town as small as Exmouth.”

  “Any speculations as to why someone would do that?”

  “It’s some kids, probably, tweakers from Dill Town getting their kicks, playing at raising the devil. They robbed the man to buy drugs and are dumb enough to think they’ll get the cops to think witches did it.”

  “Why Dill Town?”

  “Dill Town’s got a lot of history of troubles. Crime, drinking. That sort of thing.”

  “Have you seen any sign of people in the salt marshes?”

  “As a matter of fact, I have. I think there’s a homeless guy living out there. Seen some footprints in the mud, trails through the grass. Never seen him in the flesh, but a few times I’ve smelled his campfire.” He laughed. “Maybe he’s the guy swiped Lake’s wine collection. Now there’s a wino’s dream. Maybe he’s even the Gray Reaper in person. You might want to look into that, Mr. Detective.”

  “I will,” Pendergast said, rising. “Thank you, Mr. Boyle, for your time.” He glanced at Constance. “I think we can dispense with the rest of the interviews—for now, at any rate.”

  Boyle got up. Then he leaned forward and asked, in a confidential tone: “How much does a guy get paid in your line of work?”

  16

  This was going to be interesting. More than interesting. Bradley Gavin slipped under the yellow police tape that blocked off the end of the second-floor hall at the Inn. He turned and lifted it for Constance Greene. She followed him to the closed door of Morris McCool’s room. He opened the door and pushed it wide.

  Agent Pendergast had made it clear that every professional courtesy was to be extended to Constance, which explained why she was being allowed once again into what was, effectively, a crime scene. He was more curious about her than about what they might find in the room, which, he suspected, was precious little. The word intriguing hardly began to describe this strange and beautiful woman. And this was his first chance to speak to her alone.

  He turned and held out his hand. “After you, Ms. Greene,” he said.

 
“Miss Greene, if you please. I find Mizz a disagreeable neologism.”

  “Oops. Sorry.” Gavin watched her out of the corner of his eye as she entered, an ethereal figure in a long dress. This woman was as remote as the glaciers, and maybe that was part of what appealed to him—that, and a kind of mysterious self-possession. Gavin rather liked the old-fashioned “Miss” part. He was starting to view this Miss Greene as a challenge. He knew he was attractive to women; and he suspected that, as she got to know him better, he just might prove to be her type.

  He followed her into the historian’s room. It was done up in period furniture, like the rest of the Inn, and he took in its charming yet shabby contents: the big heavy bed in dark wood, the lace curtains, the braided rugs that were a little too worn, and the bathroom peeking through an open door, which had last seen a renovation so long ago that the tiling had come back in style and then gone out again.

  “The agreement was eyes only, Miss Greene,” he said. “But if you want to handle something, I don’t see a problem as long as you ask me first.”

  “Thank you.”

  The SOC team had already been through the room with a fine-tooth comb, and their tags and flags could be seen festooning just about everything. They’d been looking for forensic evidence—latents, hairs, fibers, DNA, blood. He and the lady were looking for papers—specifically, evidence on what the historian might have been working on. Not that he expected that would lead to anything; he had already more or less satisfied himself that this murder was just a robbery-homicide, albeit one with some uniquely disturbing aspects.

  He did a quick mental inventory. A short stack of books and papers on a rolltop desk. No computer. The maid had fixed up the room after the historian had gone downstairs for dinner, a few hours before his murder. That was too bad. Everything was very neat, but whether this was a reflection of the maid or the historian’s personality was hard to say.

  He walked over to the small desk where the historian had stacked the books and papers. He took out his notebook and glanced over at Constance. She was looking around the room, her violet eyes taking everything in.

  He examined the books: Storms and Shipwrecks of New England, by Edward Rowe Snow; a photocopied document called “Registry of Missing Ships 1850–1900,” from the Lloyd’s archives. There were several bookmarks in each publication. As he was jotting down the titles, he heard a soft rustle and Greene materialized behind him.

  “May I pick up the registry, Sergeant?”

  “Sure, go ahead.”

  She opened it to where the bookmark was, turning from his field of view. Gavin began looking around for wallet, watch, or money. Nothing had been found with the body. He then took a closer look at the Snow book, turning to a bookmarked chapter titled, “The Mysterious Disappearance of the S.S. Pembroke Castle.”

  “May I direct your attention to this?” Constance said, handing him the registry. It, too, had a marker at a page about the Pembroke Castle. Gavin was vaguely familiar with the story—but he read the entry with interest anyway.

  S.S. Pembroke Castle, 1884. In February 1884, enroute from London to Boston, lost in a storm along the New England coast between Cape Elizabeth (Maine) and Cape Ann (Massachusetts).

  The S.S. Pembroke Castle was a 300-foot (100 m) oak-hulled steamship built by Barclay Curle & Co in Whiteinch, Glasgow, Scotland, as a passenger and cargo vessel. She was launched on 12 September 1876. On 16 January 1884 the Pembroke Castle began her final voyage from London, England, with 140 passengers, under charter by Lady Elizabeth Hurwell of Hurwell Ossory, Warwickshire. On 18 January the ship was passed by the liner Wessex and noted in that vessel’s log. On 2 February 1884, the Pembroke Castle was sighted at sunset by the F/V Monckton from Portland, Maine, laboring through heavy seas near Halfway Rock in outer Casco Bay. Signals were exchanged by lamp. This was the last known sighting of the ship. A northeastern storm was bearing down the coast and continued for three days. When the ship failed to reach Boston at the scheduled time, on 5 February, the U.S. Coast Guard deployed several cruisers, joined later by two Navy ships, in an unsuccessful search for survivors or debris. The ship was presumed lost in the storm somewhere along the coast between Cape Elizabeth and Cape Ann; had the ship rounded the latter cape, it would have been seen by the keeper of the Eastern Point Lighthouse, and would have been able to take refuge in Gloucester Harbor. No trace of the ship or its crew was ever found, nor has confirmed debris from the wreckage ever been identified. The insurance claim was settled by Lloyd’s for £16,500 on 23 March 1885, paid to the London and Bristol Steamship Company, owner of the Pembroke Castle, with an additional sum of £9,500 paid 6 April 1886 to Lady Hurwell for loss of cargo.

  “This must be what our historian was looking into,” he said, closing the document and laying it back on the desk.

  “Yes,” said Greene. She had been standing close to him, reading the entry over his shoulder. There was something oddly thrilling in her proximity.

  She stepped back. “Do you find it strange that no money seems to have been paid for the loss of the passengers?”

  “I hadn’t thought about it.”

  “And this ‘loss of cargo’—I wonder what that was, why it was so valuable, and why it took over two years to get reimbursed for it?”

  Gavin shrugged.

  “Why would an English noblewoman charter a ship to begin with? And why wasn’t she on the ship?”

  Gavin looked into her face. She was really very young, no more than twenty-two or twenty-three. But there was an unusual depth in those violet eyes. He felt a most unprofessional stirring. “Well,” he said, “those are interesting questions, but I doubt they’re relevant.”

  “Why not?”

  He swallowed, stung by her sharp tone. “Because I’m pretty sure some crankhead from Dill Town killed our guy for money and kicks.”

  “Crankhead? What’s that?”

  She seemed almost to be from another world—at least, a world far from Exmouth. That, too, was appealing. “Meth addict. You know, methamphetamine? Breaking Bad?”

  A silence. “Are there many addicts in Dill Town?”

  “A few years ago we busted a lab over there, and we think there might be another one operating, maybe out in the marshes.”

  “Why is there an addiction problem?”

  “‘Addiction problem’ may be too strong. It’s just…you know, poverty, lack of education, no opportunities… Fishing’s been in decline for decades. And fishermen, well, they’re a rough bunch.” He paused. “Just saying.”

  “I see. Thank you for that observation, Sergeant. What was found with the body?”

  This segue was so unexpected it took Gavin a moment to parse it. “Um, nothing. Well, a wristwatch. The rest of the body had been stripped.” She’d been there; why was she asking him this question?

  “If the motive of the ‘crankhead’ was money, why didn’t he take the watch?”

  Gavin shrugged. “It was a crappy brand.” He hesitated. “So what does Pendergast think?”

  “About what?”

  “Those markings. A red herring—or something else?”

  “He hasn’t said.”

  “And you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  There was a silence as they looked at each other. Gavin finally spoke. “I’ve been doing police work for a long time, and I’ve made one bedrock observation about crime.”

  “Which is?”

  “That most crimes are banal. Moronic. The obvious explanation is almost always the right one. And in this case, robbery is the simplest explanation, with those crazy markings the work of drug addicts.”

  “If most crimes are banal and moronic, it’s because most people are.”

  Gavin was surprised by her answer. “That’s your view of human nature? That people are basically stupid?”

  “Yes. There’s the exception to the rule. Some people defy simple explanations. And so do some crimes. This is one of those crimes.”

  “Some people defy s
imple explanations,” Gavin repeated. “What do you mean by that?”

  “I mean that a few exceptional people stand above the common lot. For them, the rules are different. Their crimes are also different. There was nothing banal or stupid about this murder—or the criminal who committed it.”

  Gavin had never met a woman quite like this. He looked at her curiously, and then—most uncharacteristically—decided to take a step into the unknown. “I’m quite sure that you, Miss Greene, are one of those exceptional people.”

  He awaited her denial, a flare-up of anger, but it didn’t come. Encouraged, he ventured further, his voice dropping just a little. “And for that reason, I would like to get to know you better.”

  She continued looking at him, her face unreadable. Then she said, “Are we done here?”

  “We’re done here.”

  He watched her elegant lips curve upward in a faint smile at what appeared to be some private amusement. “After you, Sergeant.”

  17

  Soft late-afternoon light was filtering through the lace curtains of the would-be interview room. Motes drifted in the air. Constance watched as the FBI agent paced softly back and forth, his black-clad figure moving in and out of the light. He moved so lightly, he seemed more wraithlike than human. He’d been this way since she’d descended from McCool’s room with her report. He was inscrutable, sphinxlike. His very lack of predictability was what made him so…intriguing.

  “It makes no sense,” he murmured.

  She waited, knowing he was not speaking to her. He continued pacing.

  “The ship,” he went on, “was seen beating through heavy seas near Half Way Rock in Casco Bay at sunset, which on February second, 1884, was approximately four fifty PM. It was moving at ten knots, according to the log of the F/V Monckton. It must have rounded Cape Elizabeth around five thirty PM. High tide was at eleven twenty-five PM, and because of the nor’easter there would have been a storm surge. If the ship had sunk prior to eleven twenty-five PM, the wreckage and bodies would have been carried to shore on the surge and found. But they were not. Therefore, the ship sank after the tide reversed, bearing the wreckage and victims out to sea. Assuming a steady rate of speed of ten knots—likely, given this was a steamship and would have been traveling at that speed for stability—the Pembroke Castle would have rounded Cape Ann at eleven forty-five PM and reached the safety of Gloucester Harbor shortly thereafter.”