“I didn’t realize that owning marinas could be so lucrative.”
“It isn’t, I assure you,” Zuberan replied with a gentle laugh.
“That is why I have not owned a marina for many years. I am in financial services now.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”
“No, no. It would be unnatural if you were not curious. Money is a fascinating thing. No matter how much we have, we all seem to want more. I have been a very lucky man. Is that seat comfortable for you?”
“Yes, it’s fine, thanks,” said Emma. Her iron chair had a thick seat cushion and was surprisingly comfortable.
“So, tell me, my dear,” said Zuberan, studying her face carefully, almost like a boxer sizing up an opponent. “You have been in San Marcos long?”
“No, only a few days.”
“And you are staying at the Casimente?”
“Yes. How did you know?”
“Just a guess. Many Americans stay at the Casimente. Do you like it there?”
“Yes, it’s very nice.”
Zuberan nodded.
“Obviously you are a resourceful young woman. You have been in San Marcos for only a brief time and yet you have found your way down here to this remote place. As I said, we don’t get many tourists in Migelina these days.”
“I’m not a tourist. I’m looking for information. It’s very important to me. It may be the key to two murders.”
“Indeed?” said Zuberan, raising an eyebrow. “Who was murdered?”
“My grandfather and another man,” said Emma. “I think their deaths might be somehow tied to a boat that was once in your marina.”
“The Kaito Spirit,” said Zuberan slowly.
“Do you remember it?”
“Yes, I remember the Kaito Spirit.”
“You do?” asked Emma, almost afraid to believe her ears.
“Yes, but frankly, Miss Passant, I do not see what possible connection there could between the Kaito Spirit and these murders of which you speak. This boat was destroyed twenty years ago in the hurricane. You must have been just a little girl.”
“My grandfather used to own the Kaito Spirit,” said Emma, almost bursting with excitement.
“I’m afraid that is impossible.”
“What do you mean? Why is it impossible?”
“It was I who owned the Kaito Spirit.”
“Then my grandfather must have owned it before you did,” stammered Emma.
“When was this? What was his name?”
“His name was Jacques Passant. And it was more than thirty years ago. I don’t know exactly. Sometime before I was born.”
“No,” Zuberan declared. “It cannot be.”
“It’s true. I promise you my grandfather owned the Kaito Spirit, Señor Zuberan. A model of it disappeared from his dresser in his room after he was killed. In his will, he said that the Kaito Spirit was my legacy.”
Zuberan’s face had gone pale. When he spoke again, his voice quavered.
“What did he look like, this Jacques Passant?”
“He was short and a bit round,” said Emma, suddenly feeling frightened herself, though she could think of no reason why. “With high cheekbones and sandy hair. He was French and spoke English with an accent. He had a peculiar manner of speech, I don’t know exactly how to describe it …
“Someone who might call a boat he owned ‘the hole in the water into which I pour money’?”
“Yes, that’s exactly like something my grandfather would have said. You did know him!”
“Yes,” said Zuberan in a voice so small it was almost inaudible. “I knew him. But not by the name of Jacques Passant.
“What do you mean? That was his name!”
“Maybe at some later date it was. But the little Frenchman who owned the Kaito Spirit and who spoke in the peculiar manner that you describe was not called Jacques Passant when he lived here in Migelina. His name was Etienne Lalou.”
14
But why would my grandfather have changed his name?” said Emma, feeling as if she had been slapped across the face.
“To hide, perhaps,” said Zuberan.
“Hide? Hide from whom? From what?”
“Obviously he had something to be frightened of. Do you know who killed him?”
Emma shook her head helplessly. She felt none of the relief or excitement she had expected after all the dead ends. Instead she felt terrified, as though she had already learned too much. It made no sense. She had come all this way precisely to find out about the Kaito Spirit, to tie it somehow to her grandfather’s murder. Suddenly, however, she wanted to run away and not hear another word.
“Why, you must be Marie’s daughter,” said Zuberan, his face lighting up with surprise.
“You knew my mother, too?”
“Of course. Now I see the resemblance. But she was just a little girl then. It was so long ago. Tell me how she is. Did she grow up tall and lovely like you? It is impossible for me to think of her as an adult.”
“I’m sorry, Señor Zuberan. I’m afraid my mother died when I was born.”
“No!” shouted Zuberan, banging the table with the flat of his palm, his smile collapsing. “Don’t tell me this!”
Emma froze at the violence of his outburst, not knowing what to do. The men at the side of the house suddenly had guns in their hands. They began moving toward the table, but had taken only a few steps when Zuberan recovered his composure and waved them back to their places.
“Forgive me, my dear,” her host whispered. “It is horrible to hear this sad news all at once. Somehow, I always thought I would see them again. Etienne. Marie. Both dead.”
Zuberan put his hands to his temple and lowered his head. Emma waited in uncertainty and anticipation until he finally looked up again, his expression seemingly calm, his face unreadable.
“I know my reaction must seem very odd to you, Emma,” he said in a hoarse voice.
“I …”
“No, please. I know I am a stranger to you. It is you who have suffered the loss. Your grandfather. Your mother. But I assure you, my dear, we share a common bond. The man I knew as Etienne Lalou was like a father to me. Everything I have today I owe to him. Whoever killed him must be brought to justice.”
“That’s why I’ve come here,” said Emma, searching for words, still shaken by the bodyguards’ armed response. “The police think it was just a random killing.”
“But you don’t.”
“No.”
“What can I do to help?” Zuberan said, his face suddenly hard, his gray eyes blazing.
“You can tell me about the Kaito Spirit.”
“Of course. But where to start? I sailed on the Kaito Spirit with Etienne—with your grandfather—for almost ten years.”
Emma blinked her eyes. The Kaito Spirit had been the little model on Pépé’s dresser to her. Suddenly it was no longer that symbol, but the real thing. Real people had sailed on her across a sea of time as well as water. Whatever secrets the boat concealed would be four-dimensional, too. Asking for information about the Kaito Spirit was like asking about the Supreme Court or about Chicago—the answer would depend on what point in time you wanted to know about. Where along the Kaito Spirit’s time-line did the strand of destiny that had led to Jacques Passant’s murder cross? Where had this all begun?
“My grandfather once told me that he had stolen the most precious treasure of the sea and could never go back,” said Emma, remembering the day on the San Francisco Bay so many years ago. “Do you know what he could have meant?”
Zuberan bit his lip. An odd expression crossed his face.
“I may,” he said after a moment. “Did you say that the model of the Kaito Spirit had been stolen?”
“I can’t be sure,” said Emma, “but I think so.”
“The other man who was murdered—who was he?”
“I didn’t know him, really. His name was Caraignac. He was a New York antique dealer.”
“An a
ntique dealer … that would fit.” Zuberan nodded. “Yes, I may know what this is about, Emma. I may know why Etienne was killed.”
“What is it? What happened?”
Zuberan stared out across the ocean and didn’t speak for a long time.
“It is a long story,” he said finally. “One I have never told anyone. It started on the Kaito Spirit, many years ago, before you were born. Apparently it has not yet ended.”
“I want to know everything,” said Emma. “Please tell me everything.”
“I will,” said Zuberan, reaching across the table and gently patting her hand. “We are all bound together, Emma, like a family —you, me, Etienne, Marie … the Kaito Spirit binds us all.”
“Was it some kind of yacht?”
“Dios, no.” Zuberan laughed, the gentleness having fully returning to his face, his voice. “The Kaito Spirit was a working boat. An old wreck, really. She must have been twenty years old already the first time I saw her, but even then I loved her. We took tourists out for sightseeing and fishing excursions.”
“You sailed from the harbor here?”
“Those were the days when Migelina was an important place,” said Zuberan, sitting back in his chair. A faraway smile crossed his lips, as if he were reviewing a pleasant memory. “It is impossible to see it now, but thirty years ago this area was one of the most lovely resorts in the Caribbean. People from all over the world came to Migelina. The best people. Etienne took me aboard when I was not much older than your friend Timoteo. He taught me everything. My family had nothing. My father was dead. My mother took in wash in Migelina. Because of Etienne we were able to eat. I worked hard for my wages, of course, but I received more than just money. Etienne taught me to read, taught me to think. He was a wonderful man.”
“Yes, I know,” whispered Emma.
“The incident that this may all go back to,” said Zuberan, “happened after I had grown from a boy into a man. Some tourists came to us and rented out the Kaito Spirit and our services for two full weeks. You have to understand how unusual this was. There were many boats for hire in Migelina. Often we went for weeks without even a day charter. Our work was mostly two-hour sight-seeing trips up and down the coast. These tourists, however, were very rich. Etienne asked them for a preposterous amount of money for the Kaito Spirit, ready to be bargained down, but the man just opened his wallet and paid the full amount in advance.”
Zuberan stopped speaking and smiled.
“What is it?” asked Emma.
“These people—I do not remember their names, of course, it was so long ago—but all these years I have remembered them as being so rich. Now I realize that it was we who were so poor. The two-week charter Etienne received for the Kaito Spirit probably would not have paid for a single night in their hotel, and yet to us it was a king’s ransom. As I said before, Emma, money is a fascinating thing. Even now with all that I own, I still cannot imagine being as rich as those tourists who could charter the Kaito Spirit for two full weeks.”
Zuberan fell silent and stared out over the ocean. Emma didn’t speak. Finally he resumed his story.
“Some days our tourists did not even use the Kaito Spirit, taking the time to go inland and see the sights. We had been paid nevertheless and were ready on call. We took them fishing for tuna and marlin. We sailed up the coast for picnics in secret inlets and coves. We arranged for diving gear and waited while they explored coral reefs and underwater caves. Do you dive, my dear?”
“No,” said Emma.
“You really should try it sometime. Of course, skin diving wasn’t the popular sport thirty years ago that it is now. I was just learning to dive then myself, though today there are few things that I enjoy more. It is a wondrous, quiet world down below the waters. A world full of beauty and color and life. A world that no man can ever really know. I love it. It was down there in that quiet, magical world that we found the dragon.”
“The dragon?” said Emma.
“That is what I have always called it,” said Zuberan, “though I am not sure if a dragon is what it really was. Perhaps there is some other name for the creature. Some name out of science books or mythology. I do not know. All I know is that it was unearthly and ferocious and beautiful. And it was made of gold.”
“I’m sorry, Señor Zuberan. I think you’ve lost me. You found some kind of sea monster?”
“No, it is I who must apologize. I am telling the story very badly. It is just that the dragon is a living thing to me. It still appears to me in my dreams, these many years later—its eyes bulging, its flesh scaly, the sharpened fins that ridge its spine cutting the water like a sword. But of course it was not a real creature that we found in the sand. It was an artifact.”
“An artifact?”
“An ornament. A fantastic dragonlike creature more than three inches long, crafted of rich gold and suspended from a long golden chain. The workmanship of it was wondrous. Each link of the chain was a work of art. Each scale of the dragon was separate and distinct. The creature was hollow, and if you opened its jaws and blew through it, it made a shrill sound—like a whistle.”
“But what was it?”
“This I do not know. I know where it came from, however. It was Spanish treasure. Gold from the conquistadors.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No, I assure you, my dear, I am not kidding. They were all over these islands. Their galleons set out from here back to Madrid with holds filled with the stolen wealth of the Incas. Many such treasure ships were sunk in hurricanes and tropical storms. Millions of dollars’ worth of gold and silver bullion have been recovered over the years.”
Emma couldn’t speak. She was breathing shallowly and could feel her heart beating like a bird’s. Sunken treasure! Found by the Kaito Spirit. This had to be it. This had to have something to do with why her grandfather had been killed.
“It was Marie, your mother, who actually found the dragon,” said Zuberan, interrupting Emma’s racing thoughts. “She was just a girl then, a pretty little thing, maybe fourteen years old. Etienne would sometimes take her out with us when the clients weren’t the usual crude boors and didn’t mind. One of the tourists on this trip took a shine to Marie and showed her how to use the scuba gear. Etienne wasn’t happy about it, but he finally let her go down. When she surfaced from her first dive, she was holding the dragon in her little fist. She had seen it sparkle in the sand. Gold is incorruptible, Emma. Eternal. The dragon and its thick, intricate chain—it must have been four feet long—had lain there on the ocean floor for hundreds of years, but both were in perfect condition, as though they had been made yesterday.”
“She must have been very excited,” said Emma.
“Of course she was. She was dancing all over the deck, laughing, shrieking the way young girls do. I can still see her in my mind’s eye. I was certain the tourists would claim the dragon for themselves, since they had chartered the boat and paid for the diving equipment, but to my surprise they did not. They couldn’t have been nicer, more gracious. They congratulated Marie, telling her how well she had done. They were so rich, they didn’t care. Even though they must have understood its value, it was still just a trinket to them. Just a trinket.”
“What happened? Did you sell it?”
“Etienne certainly would have liked to,” said Zuberan, “and that, of course, was the problem. The authorities would have confiscated the dragon the instant they learned about it. There are still strict government laws about recovery of sunken treasure, but in those days Peguero was the government, and Peguero was more interested in lining his pockets than in preservation of historical artifacts. The only way for Etienne to sell the dragon was to get it out of San Marcos, but this was risky. The police were keeping a close eye on us.”
“The police?” said Emma, surprised. “Why?”
“Because we had been arrested a few months before this.”
“Arrested?”
“Yes, arrested,” said Zuberan, his lips curled int
o a frown. “The charge was gunrunning. I have told you, my dear, that I revered Etienne like a father. I had always believed him to be a fine man, honest and upstanding. It therefore came as a terrible shock to me when the police boarded the Kaito Spirit and dragged us away in handcuffs, fingerprinted us like common criminals, threw us into jail. It turned out that—unbeknownst to me—Etienne had been engaged in all manner of criminal activities to supplement his income from the boat.”
Emma sat stunned, unable to speak. Zuberan glanced at the house, then continued.
“Smuggling guns was an extremely serious offense in those days, but somehow Etienne managed to find the right official to bribe. We were in jail for only a few weeks. My mother came and stayed with Marie the whole time. Things were strained between Etienne and me from then on, however. I felt humiliated, betrayed. I was a young man, just starting out. I was grateful that Etienne had taken me out of the gutter, but now, thanks to him, I would have a criminal record for the rest of my life. That is why I have never talked about this to anyone. I was ashamed. I am still ashamed.”
Emma started to speak, but fell silent as the white-haired houseboy appeared from the house carrying a silver tray with her coffee. The man walked briskly to the table, placed elegant blue-and-white porcelain cups in front of them, and from a silver pot with a looping ivory handle poured coffee that smelled as if it had been brewed for a god.
“Thank you,” whispered Emma as the servant finished his task and retreated back to the house.
Up to this point Zuberan’s story had been excitement itself. It was wonderful to imagine that Etienne Lalou, the mysterious Frenchman who had owned the Kaito Spirit, was really her dear grandfather, Jacques Passant, and that he had found some kind of sunken treasure. Now, however, Emma felt sick. If Zuberan was telling the truth, it meant that her sweet little Pépé had been a criminal when he was young.
Not that smuggling was such a terrible crime, Emma rationalized—especially if you were very poor and living in a place like Peguero’s San Marcos. Emma was certain that Pépé must have had very good reasons to do what he did.
The Girl Who Remembered the Snow Page 18