Thin Blood Thick Water (Clueless Resolutions Book 2)

by W B Garalt

  Within ten minutes the heater was giving off some much-needed warmth inside the small enclosure, some of their clothes were drying, hung across the windows, concealing the glow of candle light to avoid detection. The wine bottle was opened with great difficulty which resulted in some splashed wine and the cork floating inside. Taking alternate hits on the wine bottle while savoring the oyster crackers, they tried to invent a way to leave, somewhere on the boat, information on how they could be contacted. They had no identification on them since Max’s wallet and Maggie’s shoulder bag had been confiscated by their abductors. The answer came when Max, as he was drying his shirt, noticed a soaked, but still legible business card in the breast pocket, which he had been prepared to present at the laboratory, if asked. As dire as their straights were, the two fugitives were sensitive to the phantom fisherman’s inevitable dismay upon discovering the ravaged provisions cache.

  Maggie found a crumpled-up, waterlogged, American twenty-dollar bill in her slacks pocket. Once the port wine bottle had been relieved of its well-appreciated contents, the twenty dollar bill, curled up in the coiled business card was stuffed into the bottle top. The bottle was returned to its hiding place.

  With most of their clothing damp-dried, and with the butane heater and the candle extinguished, the beleaguered fugitives took turns outside of the cabin to relieve themselves. Maggie first, using a metal bait-bucket which she then rinsed over the side. Max was able to bypass the bucket. Once he was back in the cabin they cuddled together in the moonbeams under the light-weight tarpaulin and fell into a much needed slumber.

  Wednesday morning the activity started early at the mouth of Forty Five Mile River in New Brunswick. Maggie and Max were awakened at dawn by bright sunlight streaming through a scum-coated cabin window. Maggie threw back the tarp and, shielding her eyes by her swollen, blackened hand, reached over and shook Max. He broke through his grogginess and, rubbing his eyes he blurted “Shit!” “Maggie, we should have gotten out of here before daylight!” With that, off-balance, he rolled over on top of Maggie.

  “What the hell!” Maggie exclaimed. “Why is everything crooked?”

  The boat was tilted to one side on a 45 degree angle and was not moving. The sleepy-eyed inhabitants looked out of the higher side window and saw nothing but blue sky and circling sea gulls. The opposite side window was showing only wet sand.

  “Did we break loose and drift onto land?” Maggie asked rhetorically.

  “I think we are in a very low tide,” Max replied. “We’re still tied up to the floating dock and it’s sitting on sand, right next to us.” The fishing boat and several others were lying tilted at varying angles on the sand, about twelve feet below the surface of the ferry port docking/staging area. The fugitives stepped out onto the sand and broken seashell fragments, and trotted along the stone seawall, away from the port dock. Around fifty yards along the wall they came upon a seawall ladder. Max climbed it first and, with only his head above the wall, quickly scanned the surrounding seashore. Auto traffic was moving slowly along a cobblestone street which paralleled the shoreline, approximately one hundred and fifty feet inland. Weather-beaten structures of various bleached colors were scattered along the street, some having rear waterside docks, or decks. Most buildings were one story with corrugated metal roofs and wood shake shingle siding. Other than the drivers and a lone bicyclist, no other human presence was in view.

  Max stepped down and, following the plan decided upon during their harrowing arrival the previous night, they set out to locate the nearest authority. Up on the street level seashore, Max and Maggie strolled between two street-side structures and glanced up and down the narrow street of, what they could see by window signs, was Alma Village. Their hopes of quickly locating safe refuge sagged a bit when no police signs or patrol cars came into view. They consulted each other on which way to search, or whether they should split up to decrease their profile in case anyone was on the watch for them as a couple. Maggie was okay with going separately with a planned meeting place within a short time span. Max, on the other hand, was not able to overcome his protective instinct for the love of his life and wanted to stay together. Just then shouting broke the quiet scene, coming from the direction of their previous point of refuge, the fishing boat on the sand near the ferry dock. Running footsteps could be heard thumping in the sand below the seawall and coming toward them.

  “Somebody must have found the boat!” Maggie exclaimed, with dread evident in her tone. “Yeah, and they’re probably following our foot prints,” Max responded. “Let’s get up the street and duck in somewhere,” he added with urgency. They noticed a vendor setting out his wares on a sidewalk cart outside of a small shop one block away, on the opposite side of the street. Ducking traffic, they crossed the street and strode to what turned out to be a Native-Indian souvenir shop.

  With a fake smile from Maggie they stepped into the shop. Glancing back through the shop display window, Max saw five or six men emerge onto the street around the point they had just left. Acting nonchalantly while looking at some souvenirs on a rack, he noticed the group scanning up and down the street, then splitting up to walk up and down on both sides to systematically inspect every building and alleyway. Maggie was pretending to inspect some beaded neckwear as a woman came from a room behind a counter and asked if she had any questions.

  “What is the price?” Maggie asked, holding the item up for the woman to see. She was an elderly-looking Native Canadian with braided pigtails, a buckskin apron and few, if any, teeth. The women held up both hands with open fingers indicating ten, assumedly Canadian, dollars. Max was trying on a raccoon-skin cap, looking in a mirror with his back to the shop doorway.

  Just then, one of the ‘search party’ strolled by. He stopped to speak with the shop man outside briefly then glanced inside. Unnoticed by Maggie, he gave her the once-over, and didn’t seem to notice Max at all. Max watched in the mirror as the searcher, bronze-skinned and barely more than teen-aged, walked away. He moved over to Maggie with the bushy fur cap on his head and asked her how it looked. Under stress, she uncharacteristically frowned and simply shook her head indicating ‘no-way’.

  After another minute of browsing, they left the shop and walked back along the part of the street which had just been inspected, hoping to find signs of a police presence. Finally, they saw an Alma Parish Police cruiser parked at the curb in front of a small coffee shop. They hurried to the spot and entered. The patrolman, who turned out to be a patrol-woman, was paying for coffee and bagels at the counter with her back to the entrance. The cashier made a muted comment to the payee and the policewoman whirled and with her service pistol drawn and pointing at Max, issued a loud command. “Down on your knees, hands over your heads!” Startled, Max started to explain. “I said down on the floor right now!” the officer commanded. Maggie and Max knelt on the floor with hands aloft. The officer stepped deftly behind them and, standing with her feet between the four lower legs, pulled Max’s right hand down and snapped on a wrist restraint. Then she took Maggie’s left arm down and restrained her wrist to Max’s. She then stepped around to the side. A pair of locking handcuffs was applied to each of the other wrists, connecting those in front of them. Maggie had winced when her damaged hand was touched and the officer relaxed the tension somewhat.

  “Okay, on your feet,” was the officer’s next direction. Maggie and Max struggled awkwardly to their feet. At that point, two of the four men that had been searching along the street came up to the doorway. The policewoman turned the stunned, manacled couple around to face the entrance. Max didn’t recognize either of them but Maggie let out a slight gasp. One of the two pursuers was a young lad with a bruised swollen lip and tape bandage across the bridge of his nose.

  “That’s them,” stated the young lad as the other two pursuers arrived on the scene.

  All of the captors bore the features of Native Canadian-Indians, including the local policewoman. The shop cashier also had physical signs of the lineage.
Max was confused, since he didn’t recognize any of the gathering group, as to why the policewoman had instantly arrested him and Maggie. “Had the authorities been notified that fugitives from justice were in the vicinity? If so, who would have notified them, and why?” he wondered. His mind was spinning trying to rationalize the situation. Maggie as well was stunned. To be in custody based on the word of one of her abductors was beyond reason. Seeing the youthful, bruised and bitten, attempted rapist pointing her out to the authorities was preposterous, to say the least, and for a police officer to act on it was absurd. She didn’t understand why the policewoman wouldn’t listen to her, or to Max’s objection, or explanation. At that point the delivery van from which Maggie had escaped on the ferry voyage, pulled up at the curb behind the police cruiser. To the shackled couple’s amazement, the group of captors pulled and pushed Max and Maggie through the open sliding door on the side of the van, and onto the floor. Two of the abductors climbed in after them and the door was rolled shut.

  Chapter 19

  Previously on Tuesday evening, Chip had been trying to locate his four investigative assignees while waiting at the Bickford Lab guest house. He and Brad were awaiting the arrival of Danyel in the float plane and they were keeping an eye on the boat house exterior by watching the night-vision video monitor. Chip knew that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were considered the supreme command above the Parish and County police forces and had trained most of the members. He had gotten in touch with his contact in the RCMP to get any information available on whom to check with on the local police force. Chip was explaining the politics of the Canadian police authority when Brad interrupted him.

  “Here she is,” Brad exclaimed excitedly as the taxi lights of the Cessna Caravan float plane obliterated the night vision picture. He switched the monitor to the boathouse interior. Chip couldn’t tell if Brad was more exhilarated by Danyel’s arrival or by watching his re-vamped Cessna entering the encoded automatic sensor-operated entry system of the boat-house doors as they opened and closed perfectly. Either way they both watched, fascinated, as the large, high-winged floatplane drifted through the boathouse opening with its propeller spinning at idle in a non-propelling, neutral position. As the pontoon floats reached the stop pads the doors closed behind the tail of the aircraft and the prop spun down to a stop. Even on the unsophisticated black-and-white video depiction, Danyel’s sumptuous, lithe physique was poetry-in motion to the two male oglers in the house as she disembarked and tied down the floatplane.

  Knowing that they were expecting her and awaiting her arrival in this dismal, dark, scenario, Danyel thought to herself, “Loathe to imagine that they, or even one of them, could have been on hand to help with securing the plane and helping with any cargo!” Being aware of the video monitoring system, she waved a sarcastic ‘hello, I know you’re watching’ to the boathouse interior camera and proceeded to the entry pad to tap in her PID code.

  A loud “Bravo, great landing!” and a clapping of hands was the greeting Danyel received from her audience of two, when she opened the entry foyer door to the kitchen-eating area of the laboratory guesthouse.

  “Well, thank you very much men, I’ll drop the ‘gentle’ part for now. I could have used a hand with the mooring and off-loading,” she responded with a smile, but dead serious as she dropped her 45 lb. equipment bag at her feet.

  “Let me get that for you,” Brad said as he jumped off his counter stool. He had always ‘had the hots’ for Danyel but he felt that, realistically, she was out of his league as far as intimate relations were concerned. Yet, in Brad’s mind, since he was as an exceptionally intelligent, innovative and valuable member of the Partnership, there was always a possibility. That thought was his comfort.

  “Where do you want me to put the bag?” Brad asked. Danyel was not in the best of moods having dropped everything to get to Halifax, and having wrestled with the below-minimums weather conditions without an Instrument Landing System to guide her to a safe landing. She had a perfect opening to snap the perfect quip to the question from Brad, but she simply stated in her always perfectly controlled manner, “Would you take it into the waterfront bedroom please? Thanks Brad.”

  Chip got right down to business as to the question of what happened with the group that was assigned to research the Bickford acquisition. He explained to Danyel that he had dropped them in Halifax and proceeded to Montreal on other business. Coming back into Halifax one day earlier than planned, he was at a loss as to why he could not contact any of the Partners. Danyel suggested that the hotel where they all were staying, and the Lab where they were supposed to have last been, would be the places to start tracing their whereabouts. She suggested further that time was of the essence.

  “Should we go now and talk with the hotel manager?” Danyel asked. “If we can look through their rooms, we might get some hint as to where they are,” she offered. Brad had returned from delivering Danyel’s luggage. He and Chip agreed with the hotel inquiry.

  Within fifteen minutes they were driving the service rental into the city to meet with the hotel manager or whoever was in charge there.

  The coastal storm had eased and a chilly northwest breeze had heralded the chill that usually accompanied the eastern Canada fall season. They arrived at the ‘Herald Hotel and Restaurant’ and approached the registry desk walk-up counter. Chip showed the clerk his USAP business ID and inquired to the manager or person in charge. That resulted in the desk clerk stepping through an open door behind the counter to speak with someone. An oversized digital clock on the wall behind the counter read 9:40 PM.

  “We paid big bucks for this place based on the on-line ratings. In person it doesn’t appear to measure-up,” Chip said as an aside to his cohorts. While they awaited the hotel manager, he nodded toward a cubby-hole array of room keys behind the counter, as opposed to modern electro-magnetic door cards.

  The manager was an older man with time-tested distinctive mannerisms, which contradicted his position at this out-of-the-main-stream, C-class hotel.

  “Welcome, I’m Clive Wadsworth, Manager. It’s a pleasure to meet you Mr. Chaplain,” the manager announced in a resonating, ‘Majordomo-style’, baritone voice. His large, out-stretched hand seemed to be positioned in a secret handshake position. As the two men shook hands, the manager was moving his handshake up, down, and side-to-side. Receiving no detectible response to the ‘special’ handshake, the manager, obviously having had his after-dinner cocktails, down-toned his demeanor slightly. Seemingly disappointed at the lack of recognition, he asked, flatly, as to what assistance he might be.

  The talk with the hotel manager resulted in the USAP trio being allowed to enter the three rooms occupied by their fellow Partners in order to gain some perspective as to their whereabouts.

  Max was sharing his connecting-room suite with Maggie and one of the rooms had a sofa-bed, which was in the folded position. Their passports were on a dresser there, and their cell-phone chargers were in each room. Their luggage was left open on the stands. In a general sense, the indication was that they were expecting to return fairly soon after they had left.

  “Look, this is Maggie’s, I think,” Danyel said, holding up a cell phone. They all looked at the phone in a state of wonder and indecision. Danyel activated the phone and noticed a missed call from 10:10 AM. “Should we check the missed call? It might give us a clue to where she is, and Max wouldn’t be far away,” she added, seemingly bothered at the thought. Chip gave Danyel a long, curious stare.

  “Hey, nothing against her, but Max is a Partner for Christ’s sake!” she retorted sharply, regarding Chip’s look of whatever-it-was. Brad made himself seem busy looking for clues in this unusually brusque encounter between the other two. He wasn’t accustomed to discord among his fellow Partners, and he didn’t like it.

  “Something is very wrong here,” Brad commented. “If we can get any information as to why our contingent is out of contact, and possibly missing, we had better go for it,” he stated
with an unusual air of authority. At that, Danyel entered the reply mode and called the caller’s number under the name ‘Marshall R.E.Serv’.

  “Hello, Maggie?” was the almost instant, live reply. “Is that you? This is Jessie,” spoke a very anxious female voice. Chip, listening to the response, put his hand over the phone microphone and put a finger to his lips signaling Danyel not to respond. Chip took the phone from Danyel and ended the call.

  “That’s her office, probably forwarding a message or something. We don’t want to be involved in her personal or business affairs,” he said with finality. There was no objection.

  Upon inspection, the same was true of Mario’s room, producing no further clues. Lamar’s room was mysteriously untouched and showed no signs of having been used. A double check with the front desk confirmed that it was the room correctly assigned to him.

  “Maybe he knows somebody here and slept-in somewhere else,” Danyel quipped, making imaginary quote marks in the air with her fingers. Chip nodded in agreement, but with a puzzled frown on his brow.

  Brad was totally blank-looking, as if he was absolutely clueless. The trio left the room keys at the desk, waving a ‘thank you’ to the manager as they exited the hotel.

  Chip’s cell phone rang and he hesitated as he scanned for the calling number. Brad and Danyel proceeded to the service car while Chip, walking hesitantly, listened to the call. With the phone pressed to his ear, Chip stopped abruptly, looked around and turned back to the hotel. He re-entered and, after ten seconds he came trotting out to the car and got into the rear seat. Brad turned in the driver’s seat as Danyel looked back at Chip from the passenger side.

  “I just heard back from my contact in the RCMP,” Chip announced. “There was something strange going on over on the New Brunswick side as the Halifax Ferry off-loaded. It seems like there was a search going on for one or two people, thought to be fare-dodgers, but according to my source it was more intense than warranted. It’s more like they were fugitives and the activity attracted a lot of attention.”