The Gray and Guilty Sea

by Scott William Carter

  Martin shrugged and started dealing the cards. Hamlin laughed nervously, like a pastor's wife whose children were cursing in front of the tea club. He looked at Gage.

  "The game is seven card stud, deuces wild," he said. "We play something different every week. I assume you're good for a thousand dollars? That's the stack we start with and we play until someone's got all the chips or we're too tired to play further—which often happens."

  "Or until Marty gets mad and turns the table over," Chuck said.

  Martin sighed. "I only did that once."

  "Well, it made quite an impression," Chuck said.

  "Now, now," Hamlin said, "we all have piques of anger now and then. I seem to recall you having a few fits yourself over the years."

  "I never turned any tables over," Chuck said. "But then, I'm not an artist like Martin. Artists are bound to be emotional."

  Martin sighed. Gage doubted there was any real bad blood between them. He'd seen this kind of thing all the time, when one player was trying to get into the head of another. The comment made Gage remember the plaque he'd seen at the Northwest Artist Colony, the one that bore the names of both Martin Jaybee and Sapphire Holdings.

  "Artist, huh?" Gage said, reaching for his wallet. "Do you paint?"

  "Sculpture," Martin said. His dour expression brightened considerably. "Mostly with metals, though I do some ceramic now and then."

  "He's quite good," Hamlin said. "The hotel has a number of his pieces."

  Gage reached for some cash—he'd stopped by the bank earlier in the day—but Hamlin put out his hand.

  "Oh, no, we don't exchange any currency here," he said. "Of course, this is a purely social game. The numbers are all entirely imaginary."

  Chuck laughed. "Unless you end up in the hole. Then you get a nice little bill at the Inn at Sapphire Head that's not imaginary at all."

  "Well," Hamlin said, "that bill would be for staying at this fine establishment, of course. An entirely different matter."

  Chuck snorted. "Right . . . Can't even tell you how many times I've stayed here over the years." He made the sign for quotation marks around the words stayed here. "I live just down on the beach a block away, but hell, I just love sleeping in these comfy beds."

  "And the Inn does pay some nice consulting fees, of course, should the need arise," Hamlin said. "You've gotten a number of those checks in the mail, Chuck, I seem to recall."

  "Not that many."

  "If you do get a bill," Hamlin said, "you just pay on your way out. I make the call at the end of the game, telling the front desk the appropriate room charges. All major credit cards are accepted, of course."

  This got them all to laugh. The cards were dealt. The first hand, there was a pair of jacks on the board but junk in his hand. Gage decided to play it out and lose some money, spending his energy watching the others. His mind was clicking the pieces around, trying to make sense of why these particular people were here. Jimmy Lourdenback had called them the movers and shakers, the people with connections, and Gage could see that. Even Percy Quinn fit that description, though Gage had been surprised to find him there.

  "I'll see your twenty and raise you fifty," Gage said on the turn. He still just had junk. "You know, I'm guessing there's a number of art lovers here. I was down at the Northwest Artist Colony a few days ago and I saw a couple of your names on the donor's board."

  Martin, who'd already folded, glanced at Gage. It wasn't so much surprise Gage saw but curiosity. Chuck glowered at his cards, and as far as Gage could tell, Hamlin hadn't even glanced at his hole cards. He sat with his hands folded, slightly hunched, grinning at Gage.

  "You're quite a perceptive fellow," he said. "I'll have to remember that. Yes, I do have a soft spot for the arts. Well, in a way it's secondhand. My wife, bless her soul, was a great lover of art. I'm just trying to carry on her memory."

  "I'm sorry," Gage said.

  "Oh, don't be. She died over twenty years ago, when my son was just a toddler. A terrible car accident that also left me in this wheelchair. That was a rough time. But it still makes me happy to write checks to causes she believed in. I'll see your one-fifty and raise you a hundred." He pushed in his chips.

  Groaning, Chuck tossed in his cards. "Not this time. But watch out, I'm going to bluff you next time and win."

  "You always say that," Martin said.

  "And when I do, don't I always win?"

  "I don't remember." Martin was still looking at Gage. "I give a little money to NAC, too. It's a nice place to go when I want to be around other artists."

  "That's pronounced artistes," Chuck said.

  Gage and Hamlin had a showdown, and of course Gage lost just like he predicted, but not by much. Hamlin only had a pair of kings.

  "Thank you," Hamlin said, sweeping in his chips.

  "For what?" Gage said.

  "For letting me have that one. You weren't going to bet at all, but you wanted to show your appreciation for us letting you be here. It's duly noted."

  "It pays to be nice to your hosts," Gage said without missing a beat.

  It was at that point that Gage knew he was playing against a formidable player. In fact, the other two were great players too—even Chuck, despite the woe-is-me act. Gage didn't care if he won any money. In fact, he thought it'd be better if he lost a little. The key word was little. He didn't want to lose his shirt. But he was really going to have to stay on his toes or that was exactly what would happen.

  It was Quinn's turn to deal the cards, and while he did he said, "So, Gage, how's that case coming? You solve it yet?" He smiled wolfishly.

  "You'll be the first to know," Gage said. Then he decided to throw a hand grenade into the conversation and see what happened. "Actually, Carmen's going to run a hell of an article about Abigail Heddle. A real nice piece about her life."

  "What?"

  "I figured it was time to shake things up a little," Gage said.

  "You could have told me."

  "I am telling you."

  "You could have told me before you decided to let her all the way in on this."

  Gage shrugged. He was watching all of them, judging their reactions. They were studying their cards. Of course, these were top players. They may be coming across as angry, irritated, or bored, but the truth was, they could show any emotion at any time based on what they were trying to accomplish. All top poker players could. He didn't know if they were all at that level, but he had to assume they were.

  Quinn, for his part, looked about to explode, then it went away and he shrugged. "Well," he said, "I guess the genie had to get out of the bottle eventually."

  "It really was terrible what happened to that girl," Hamlin said. "I think we can all agree on that. Just terrible. Have they found her parents, then?"

  "They're in town," Quinn said. "I guess now that it's going to be in the paper, it's okay to talk about it. She was adopted. A real screwed-up kid. Ran away from home real young, who knows what she got mixed up in. Still no real leads." He shot Gage a glance.

  "Adopted, eh?" Hamlin said. "Well, it doesn't matter. A parent's love is a parent's love. I imagine they were quite heartbroken. Do you have children, Garrison?"

  "No," Gage said.

  "A pity. You strike me as a man who would have been a great father."

  Gage laughed. "You've known me, what, twenty minutes, and you can already say that?"

  "I have a way of reading people. There are lots of people who shouldn't have been parents. And others who should be. You fall into the latter category. It has to do with a sense of responsibility and empathy that you're either born with or you're not. Myself, my son is one of the best things to happen to me. If it wasn't for him, well, after Beatrice died, I don't know what I would have done. Focusing on him was the only thing that kept me going."

  Chuck took a cigar out of his jacket and bit off the end, spitting it on the floor. "You still spoil that kid rotten, Ham."

  "Oh, I know," Hamlin said. "I just can't bear t
o deny him anything. Not after what he's been through." He looked at Gage. "I think you understand what I mean. From what Percy told me, you know what it's like to lose someone. How that changes you."

  Gage said nothing. That wasn't a place he was willing to go. Not now. Not with them. They played a few hands. He won some and he lost some. They made small talk and Gage got a better sense of who they were. They seemed like good guys. Of course, people said the same thing about Ted Bundy. Some monsters were just better at hiding it than others.

  Over the next two hours, Gage lost about half his stack, but he was determined not to end the evening more than a hundred in the hole. At some point, Jimmy Lourdenback drifted out, but nobody really noticed. So much for his grand exit. Later, someone needed to make a phone call and another person wanted to hit the head, so they decided to take a break. Gage ended up following Hamlin out onto the deck, helping the old man by pushing the wheelchair over the metal threshold.

  A strong breeze hit them full in the face, but it was an oddly humid breeze for winter. No rain. The lantern-shaped porch light illuminated white plastic lawn chairs, a glass table, and an iron railing. The night sky and the ocean below it stretched across the horizon like a curtain over a dark stage. "Thank you, sir," Hamlin said. "I'm not so proud that I refuse the kindness of others. But I'll have you know, I wasn't always this way. I was once a strapping young lad like yourself."

  "I'm not all that young, sir," Gage said.

  "Well, you seem young to me. And I seem old. I guess that's what I mean." He gazed out at the ocean, the point of his beard blown back against his neck. "There's something about the sea, isn't there?"

  "What do you mean?"

  Hamlin contemplated the darkness. Down at his height, he could barely look over the bars. "It draws people from all over. Some people come to remember. Other people to forget. Still others come to start over. For some people—maybe for most people—it's a little bit of all three. It has that power."

  Gage thought about himself. Had he come to forget Janet? To remember her? Or was it to start a new life? He thought of Carmen and her own issues. How many other people did he know who came to Barnacle Bluffs for at least one of those reasons? Alex? Mattie? It was true that the sea had power. There was no denying it.

  He was about to say something about this when the door slid open and a tall, lanky young man with long black hair and bad acne leaned outside. His tinted orange glasses reminded Gage of John Lennon. His goatee was so light that at first glance it just looked like a smudge of dirt, though it had been shaved and trimmed to perfection.

  "Hey, Pop."

  The old man wheeled around, his face brightening. "Nathan! Gage, this is my son, Nathan. What are you up to, son?"

  The kid didn't even look at Gage. He was sucking on something—something that smelled of strawberries. "Got any cash on you? I was thinking of going to the movies."

  "Oh. Sure. Let me see." He fumbled in his jacket for his wallet and pulled out a twenty. "Will this do?"

  Nathan frowned. "Can you make it forty? I'm thinking of taking a date."

  "Oh. Yes. Of course."

  Hamlin gave him another twenty, and without even a word of thanks, the kid retreated. When he was gone, Hamlin leaned forward in his chair, straining so far that Gage was sure he was going to fall on his face. At first Gage had no idea what he was doing, but then he saw it: a candy wrapper on the concrete. Gage picked it up—careful not to put too much weight on the bad knee—and handed it to Hamlin. It was from a Jolly Rancher candy.

  "Oh thank you," Hamlin said. He tucked it into his pocket. "Nathan is terribly addicted to these little things. Harmless enough, I guess. What are you addicted to, Garrison?"

  It was such an unexpected question that for a moment Gage simply stared at him, trying to understand if he meant something else.

  "Excuse me?"

  "Addicted. What's your addiction?"

  "I don't have one."

  Hamlin smiled. "In my experience, we're all addicted to something. Percy's addicted to his job as police chief. Chuck's addicted to food. Martin's addicted to his art. Maybe for you it's misery. Who knows. Shall we go back inside? There's a bit more playing to be done."

  Chapter 17

  There was indeed more playing left to be done, and after another two hours Gage finished two hundred in the hole. He had to work not to go any deeper. He probably would have lost all of it, too, if Hamlin—who had the biggest stack—hadn't finally yawned and said he was ready to call it a night. If Gage was really interested in getting back into poker, he'd definitely want to play with them—not to try to beat them so much as to learn. When you reached a certain level, it was hard to find players who could challenge you and keep you sharp.

  Of course, he had no interest in playing poker for poker's sake—or at least he had no interest until Percy Quinn caught up with him in the lobby.

  "Gage," the police chief called.

  He was just walking through the outside doors, parking slip in hand. He slowed, turning to greet the chief, but didn't stop. None of the others were with him. The night felt thick and warm, more like a June night than a December one, the breeze whispering through the Douglas firs crowding the back of the parking lot.

  "Chief," Gage said, handing his slip to the valet.

  "Say, I just wanted to tell you," Quinn said, "you're quite a player. I don't say that about everybody."

  Quinn wore a navy blue trench coat over his Hawaiian shirt, and Gage could see the bulge of the man's revolver.

  "Thank you."

  "I mean that. And, well, I was wondering if you were planning on coming back?"

  Gage felt groggy and tired, and he really he just wanted to go home, but there was something in Quinn's voice that got Gage's hackles up. "Maybe," he said. "Depends on my schedule, I guess. I'm a busy man."

  "Okay," Quinn said. "I deserve that. But listen, unless you're really here to play poker, this isn't the place for you. I just say that in case you're here fishing for information. These guys, they trust me. We trust each other. If you're wanting to be part of that, maybe it might work for you. But if you're here for other reasons . . ." He trailed off.

  Gage met his eyes. There was something there—a challenge, a hidden menace, a predator waiting for the prey to cross his path. Maybe none of that. Maybe Quinn was an honest man with a mean streak. Maybe he was a mean bastard who was good at coming across as a nice guy. Whatever he was, he wasn't simple, and they were engaged in some kind of contest Gage didn't yet fully understand. It may have had nothing to do with Abigail Heddle. It may have been as stupid as a pissing contest, but whatever it was, Gage wasn't going to back down.

  This wasn't the time, though. The time would come soon enough.

  "I just wanted to play some cards," Gage said, and then turned and waited for the van.

  * * *

  It was a still night, and hotter than it should have been for December. The inside of Gage's house felt stuffy and confining; he had the sense he was in the cabin of an old fisherman's boat moored at a marina. He wanted to stay up, maybe do some thinking about the case, try to fit Quinn into the puzzle, but he hadn't been home two minutes when an extreme fatigue overwhelmed him.

  His eyelids felt like lead. He'd had a beer during poker, so that made him a little fuzzy, but it was more than that. He figured it was because he'd been going all-out on the case and he wasn't used to it any more. Or maybe he was just getting old. His collar was damp with sweat. Why was it so damn hot? Shuffling to bed, he cracked open his bathroom window to circulate some coastal air across the hall to the bedroom. This turned out to be a stroke of luck.

  If that window hadn't been cracked, then he might not have woken to the sound of murmuring voices.

  As it was, he still struggled to swim up out of unconsciousness. He was sure that the voices were his parents disusing how Garrison was getting into fights at school again, how the school was going to suspend him if he bloodied just one more lip, and it was only the faint
click of the front door opening that cleared away just enough of the fog for the warning bells to start ringing in his head.

  Someone was breaking into his house.

  More than one someone. Two someones.

  Even so, getting himself to actually move was another matter. He felt as if someone had taped his eyes shut and chained his body to his mattress; every movement took enormous effort. He was rolling a boulder up a hill. He was pushing a freight train.

  There were footsteps in the hall—they were coming.

  Finally, he managed to pry his eyes open—just in time to see the shapes of two men appear in his doorway. With the only light coming from the kitchen, that was all he could make out, though he could see that one was much bulkier than the other. The thinner one was taller. Lanky.

  They stood motionless for a long time, watching. It could have been a dream, except the acid taste in Gage's mouth and his heart pounding in his ears were both so real. He kept willing himself to lunge for his Beretta, but he couldn't do more than wiggle his fingers. The Beretta was on the nightstand. Only inches away. His felt a tingling up his arm. The power to move was coming back.

  "It's over there," one of them whispered.

  A hoarse voice. It sounded familiar, though Gage couldn't say who. He was having a hard time even keeping his will intact. He wanted to fall back into the comfort of sleep. Give up, go away, die a peaceful death. The thinner of the two moved into the room, heading for the nightstand where his Beretta was perched on a stack of New Yorker's. He saw that the man was wearing a mask. They were both wearing ski masks.

  Gage's arm moved ever so slightly. Or had it? He couldn't tell.

  Then the thinner of the two, the one who hadn't spoken, had the gun in his hand. The bigger one leaned over Gage, his breath smelling of beer and pretzels. Gage closed his eyes.

  "You awake, pal?" the guy said.

  Gage knew his only chance was to play dead. No movement of any kind.

  "Hey," the man said, and slapped Gage hard on the face with a gloved hand.

  The blow stung like hell, but Gage managed to remain silent. Not react. The pain wasn't such a bad thing; it got some blood flowing, gave him another jolt of tingles in his fingertips.