"It's a great place to hang out. Huge island, half a million people. It's part of France, so you find all kinds of stuff from the E.U., from groceries to designer clothes. Interesting history, nice museums. Great restaurants. Or you can avoid all of that and enjoy the same laid back, simple life that the other islands offer. You speak French, by any chance?"
"Not so you'd notice. Just a few phrases. I took it in high school. You?"
"A little. It's not necessary, but a lot of people there don't speak much English, which makes it fun. It's one of the places where yachties hang out for months at a time. The living is good, and it's easy. Easy to lose yourself there, too. There aren't that many Americans. That's another attraction, given our situation."
"How do you mean that?" she asked, frowning.
"O'Hanlon's thugs would stick out like whores at Sunday school."
She was quiet for several seconds, then she said, "I can't keep hiding for the rest of my life. At some point, I'll have to deal with those bastards."
"Yeah, that's what I figured. When you're ready, I'm here to help, but we need to regroup and figure out how you want to deal with them. Martinique's a good place to work our way through that."
"Why?"
"Partly because it's France. It has much tighter ties with Europe than with the U.S."
"Okay, but why does that matter? I mean, given my problems."
"The guy who brought your passport?"
"What about him?"
"He came from Martinique."
"You said you didn't know him."
"I don't. But I know that. His boat had French registration numbers, and the prefix was from Martinique. And your passport likely came from a U.S. embassy in Europe, based on my experience. In a diplomatic pouch on a direct flight."
"I see. Tell me more about that, would you?"
"I can't."
"Can't? Or won't?"
"Can't. I don't know details of how that works. In my line of work, everything's compartmentalized. Need to know. And I never needed to know that."
"In your line of work? But you said you were retired. From the Army."
"And that's true. I am retired from the Army."
"Finn?"
"Yes?"
"You've swept me right off my feet. I'll go wherever you take me. Sorry about all the questions, but your air of mystery is like catnip to me."
"Okay. Well, now that I've swept you off your feet, I'm going to take you to Martinique. Then we can figure out what the next step in solving your problem is."
"Thanks. If we're sailing overnight, I'll go sack out for a few hours. Might as well stand four-hour watches, huh?"
"Sure," I said. "Rest well."
She stood up and leaned down to give me a kiss before she went below. "Something to remember me by until we meet again," she said.
20
Taking my big, beat-up straw hat from the port cockpit locker, I pulled it down on my head. The sun was up now, and my skin didn't need more sun damage. I was already a poster child for skin cancer. I took a sip from my bottle of water and thought about what I was mixed up in.
I was besotted with Mary, and she as good as said she felt the same way about me. Neither of us used that four-letter word, though. Not yet. Me, because it always messed things up when they were otherwise going all right. I suspected her reasons were similar. At least I hoped so. I trusted my judgment of people most of the time, but I didn't have much recent experience with young women in love. We'd see how things played out.
I was glad she said she couldn't just keep running. She was keeping her feet planted in reality, no matter where her heart was. That was good. O'Hanlon's people went to a lot of trouble to find her in Bequia. I didn't buy her first story about Puerto Rico and crewing on Sisyphus, even before she changed it. It could have been true, but it was flawed enough to make me question it.
Big yachts were businesslike when it came to hiring crew. They would have passed on recruiting somebody with no more experience than she had. The story about the abuse by the male crew members wasn't far-fetched, though. She could have been a target of opportunity for a bunch of jerks without adult supervision. I was relieved when she told me it was all bullshit.
The latest version of her story, the one about being kidnapped by O'Hanlon, made a little more sense. But there were still holes in it. She said they snatched her in Miami and sailed to Fajardo. I wondered why they waited until they got to Fajardo to try forcing her to hand over the money and the files. It would have made more sense to work her over in mid-ocean, where they were less likely to get caught.
I didn't press her on that, but I didn't think she told me the whole story. I understood; given what she went through, it was tough to trust anybody. On top of that, she saw me do several suspicious things. She needed a little time to get used to the idea that I was on her side before I started asking hard questions.
The three men who'd tried to snatch her in Puerto Real could have been muscle for somebody like O'Hanlon. They fit the profile, and it would have been simple enough for them to track her to Puerto Rico, however she really got there.
My working assumption was that O'Hanlon did own Sisyphus. He might have even been aboard, waiting to have her brought to him. But the real questions were how Mary came to be in Puerto Rico, and what she'd been doing there.
It seemed more likely that she got there on her own, not that someone took her there against her will. If I were in O'Hanlon's position and I snatched her in Miami, I would have gotten her as far away from U.S. soil as I could. They would have gone right past all those uninhabited islands in the Bahamas to get to Puerto Rico. Anywhere would have made more sense for kidnappers with a victim aboard than Puerto Rico or the U.S.V.I.
There were other parts of her story that didn't quite ring true. This whole business with her brother, for example. The more she talked about him, the fuzzier the story became. For example, if he was her savior and protector, why wouldn't she have told him about stealing O'Hanlon's money and files? And then there was the story of the goons attacking him at his gym.
If he'd already killed two of their pals, they wouldn't have let him get the upper hand. And they would have picked somewhere private to question him. They wouldn't have tried to jump him in a place where the neighbors could overhear and call the cops.
I was curious about why he was estranged from their parents. He must have had some contact with them, otherwise, how would he have become close to Mary, given the difference in their ages?
I took another swallow from my water bottle and tried to rein in my thoughts. There were all kinds of reasons why Mary might not be telling me everything. After all, she went through at least two violent encounters at the hands of whoever was after her. She also noticed there were things about me that were a little off, as well. I could hardly blame her for keeping her guard up when I was doing the same thing. I just happened to have a little more practice at it.
Then there was the possibility that she didn't have a good handle on her situation. For all her self-assurance, she didn't have all that much experience to draw on. She was doubtless confused about certain aspects of her plight; anybody in her position would be.
All that aside, there was a strong and growing bond between us. I was alive because I was a shrewd judge of people. I might be a little out of date on courtship rituals, but I didn't doubt that our feelings for one another were the real thing. That was enough for me, at least for now. I learned long ago to take life minute by minute. She was enjoying my company, and I was enjoying hers. I would hang on to that and count my blessings.
The rest would work out, one way or another. No one could know what would happen to us, but I intended to make sure that whatever it was didn't happen at the hands of this O'Hanlon character. Once we got to Martinique, I would find the time to do a little background work on him.
My client kept track of who was who in the realm of organized crime. That kind of information came in handy in my line of work. People like O'Hanlon often beca
me either our targets or the scapegoats for some of the things we did.
While I was researching O'Hanlon, I would check up on Mary's parents and her brother, too. That reminded me; I should find out what her last name was before she took up the Mary Elizabeth O'Brien identity. I would have to find a way to ask her about that before we got to Martinique.
I would feel her out on what she planned to do about O'Hanlon, too. No doubt she was thinking about that. I knew what I would do in her situation. There was only one way I could think of to stop a guy like that.
When your only tool's a hammer, all problems look like nails. I was a hammer user from way back, and my experience over the years only reinforced the notion that, as Mary said the other day, "Some folks just need killin'." The world would be a better place without O'Hanlon, in my reckoning. I'm sure Mary shared that view.
There could be problems with that, though. Guys like O'Hanlon were hard to kill. They got to the top of the heap by being shrewd and ruthless. It was a safe bet that O'Hanlon wouldn't be a pushover. And sometimes people like him have partners who would want revenge — family, often as not.
Mary had O'Hanlon's business records, somewhere. I wondered if they were aboard. If they were and we could decipher them, we might discover whether somebody was watching O'Hanlon's back. Depending on how well-connected he was, the repercussions for executing him could be significant.
We might piss off some powerful people, not necessarily all in the drug business. O'Hanlon got his hands on the police reports of her parents' murders. According to Mary, that's how he ended up on her trail. His ability to get those records said something about his connections.
Thinking of records made me wonder again where she hid the ones she stole. She mentioned computer files, but her father might have had paper records, too. And what did she have in mind doing with them? Their value as leverage decreased over time.
There was a lot of turnover in the drug business; if the records were a few years out of date, they might be harmless. Given that Mary was sharp enough to have taken them, though, she probably knew that.
I wasn't doing well at reining in my thoughts. Needing a little distraction, I decided to go below and plot our position. Maybe throw together a peanut butter sandwich. I lashed the tiller and stood up, stretching the kinks out of my back.
By the time I got a GPS fix and marked the chart, Mary stuck her head over the lee-cloth. When she saw me, she climbed out of the makeshift berth that was also the starboard settee.
"What's up, Finn?"
"Just plotting a fix, for something to do."
"How's our progress?"
"Great. We're rocking along, averaging five and a half knots. You get a nap?"
"Slept like a baby. Time for a watch change?"
"It's only been three hours," I said.
"That's okay. I'm good, if you want to stretch out."
"Don't mind if I do. Thanks."
She squeezed past me and gave me a little kiss on her way to the companionway ladder.
"Take my hat," I said, handing it to her. "Sun's brutal out there."
She smiled as she grasped the brim. "Thanks. Get some rest."
She put the hat on the chart table and pulled her hair back into a ponytail, fastening it with a rubber band she took from around her wrist. Picking up the hat, she settled it on her head, gave me another smile, and disappeared up the ladder.
21
"That was a real treat, Finn," Mary said, as I rejoined her in the cockpit. We traded watches through the night, and I just finished cleaning up the galley after cooking and serving breakfast.
"Glad it hit the spot," I said, pouring us each mugs of coffee from the thermos. I handed her one and sat down beside her as she steered with her foot on the tiller.
"I didn't even know you could eat flying fish," she said.
"Nature's bounty. We sailed through a school of them last night, and I guess they were running from predators. They kept bouncing off the boat, anyhow. I picked up half a dozen nice ones off the deck, after the first one hit me in the face. I was almost asleep when the little rascal smacked me."
"Well, they were a great side dish with the eggs. Even better than bacon."
"Healthier, too, I'm told. I'm glad you enjoyed them."
Close-hauled on the starboard tack, Carib Princess put her shoulder into the chop. We watched the sun rise as we passed Diamond Rock; we were on course for Ste. Anne, Martinique. We would have the anchor down in a few hours. We planned to spend the afternoon recovering from our overnight sail. Taking the dinghy into Le Marin to check in with customs and immigration could wait until the next morning.
"I'm still amused by a comment you made the other day," I said, taking a sip of my coffee.
"What comment was that?"
"Calling people born in Ireland 'FBI.'" I chuckled. "Foreign-born Irish. It's so… I don't know… not quite bigoted. Provincial, maybe. The notion that Americans of Irish descent are the 'real' Irish is what fascinates me about it. People born in Ireland wouldn't consider themselves foreign-born; they'd think you were foreign-born. I don't quite have a word for that sort of twisted logic."
"So, you've never heard that before?"
"Not until you used it, no. Was it common where you grew up?"
"Yes, I guess. When I was little, we had a parish priest who came from Ireland. I heard my dad refer to him as FBI in a conversation with one of his friends. It had a derogatory tone to it, but I didn't pick that up at the time. I was old enough to know what the FBI was, so I thought that's what Dad meant."
"I can see why that would be. It confused me, and I'm not a little kid. How'd you figure it out?"
"Asked my mother. She said, 'Oh, it's those damned billy-goat Irish your father sprung from. Those Daileys, they're nothin' but potato Irish.'"
Bingo! I thought. Her family name is Dailey, and I didn't even have to ask. I wanted to be sure, though. "Dailey? That was your father's last name?"
"Francis X. Dailey," she said.
"X? For Xavier?" I asked.
"Of course, for Xavier." She laughed. "Finn?"
"What?"
"You weren't raised as an Irish Catholic, were you?"
"Nope. Methodist, and before you ask, I have no idea."
"No idea about what?"
"Where the name 'Finn' came from. I mean, how far back, how many generations. I know it's Irish, originally, but that didn't mean anything in my family. It was just a name, like Smith or Jones."
"Okay," she said. "Sorry I jumped to the wrong conclusion about you. It was just the way things were when I was growing up. Kind of us and them. You would have been one of them, for sure."
"No harm done. But you used two other terms I'm curious about."
"Which ones?"
"Billy-goat Irish and potato Irish. They're derogatory?"
"Yes. They're applied to the people who left Ireland during and after the famine, usually by people who consider themselves to be lace-curtain Irish."
"The lace-curtain Irish were better off?" I asked, with a laugh.
"Well, they thought of themselves as a better class of people. Not necessarily richer, but better educated, more refined. Richer was part of it, but my mother's family didn't approve of my father, even though he was a wealthy man by the time they married. 'Married down, your mother did,' my aunt told me, any time she got the chance."
I wanted to ask her what her mother's maiden name had been, but I decided not to press my luck. It would come out later. If not, I had enough background on her family to find it on my own, now. "Did that bother you? What your aunt said, I mean."
"No. I was just a kid. You know how stuff goes over your head when you're little."
"Yeah. Like a lot of the stuff that was drilled into me in Sunday school. When I was little, I just accepted it at face value. Then I got older, and I began to see that some of it didn't square with the way the church people acted."
"You still consider yourself Methodist?"
&n
bsp; "No, not really. I don't think about religion much. I just let everybody believe what they're comfortable with. How about you? You still a practicing Catholic?"
She chuckled and shook her head. "I'm not what the Church would call practicing. But when you're immersed in it from birth, like I was, that whole culture is part of you. There's not much you can do about it. It's something you're stuck with — like your eye color or something."
We drank our coffee and sailed along in silence for several minutes. That was one of the best things about her. She didn't feel compelled to fill the silence. We were both comfortable with it. I didn't know many people who were that way.
"Hey, Finn?"
"Yeah?"
"You said there was good shopping in Martinique."
"There is. Looking for something in particular?"
"I could use some clothes. In case you haven't noticed, my wardrobe's limited to a pair of ragged cutoffs and two T-shirts. And a bikini."
"Shouldn't be a problem. You can find basic stuff right in the marina near the customs and immigration office. Even a few upscale places. But you can get anything you want — designer labels from all over the world, in Fort-de-France."
"Basic stuff's what I had in mind. But I wouldn't mind seeing Fort-de-France. You said there were museums there. Is it far?"
"Not too far. There are buses. Or we can go anchor right in the heart of town, but that's in the midst of all the commercial shipping traffic. Not as quiet and pretty as where we're headed right now. We could move around there later, though, if you want."
"Let's play it by ear. Buses are okay. I cheated a little and looked at the guidebook in the chart table. I like the sound of Ste. Anne. I could stand a few days to just chill out, if it's okay with you."
"It's better than okay; it's why I live this way. Chilling out's what I do best. We'll square the boat away and head into the marina. You can scout the shops while I clear us in. Have you got a cellphone, by the way?"
"No, just the one I took away from the woman in Bequia. Why?"
"We should get you one, so we can stay in touch if we split up ashore. They're easy enough to come by. You still have the one you took from her or did you ditch it with the pistol?"
Assassins and Liars Page 9