A Death on The Horizon

by Mark Ellis

  7/3/08. Our distinguished Captain Squier is a well-known conservative. He seems nice and is actually quite handsome. But this is the kind of guy who turned Reagan’s union busting into a proud legacy. In Vietnam he provided our imperialist forces with high-tech firepower. Like some Kennedy-esque PT 109 rewrite, Squier achieved distinction patrolling the shoreline of the Communist north, shredding any resistance fighters who came into his sights. In these precincts, that makes you a hero.

  Soon enough they’ll be selling the candidacy of Captain Radley Squier, a traditionalist neocon who is guaranteed to deregulate, clamp down on the southern border, free up the markets, and beat the drums of war.

  Stuff he’s said: “What is not in dispute is that George W. Bush kept us safe. We all had the same intelligence when we went into Iraq. We have to fight them there so we don’t have to fight them here.”

  Such total bullshit used to be able to get you elected. Racist at its core and much of it at the behest of Israel’s “Chosen People.” My shipmates identify with a Zionist narrative of persecution, endurance, and justification for the subjugation of peoples. When the terrorists come, and they will come, given the human cost Bush policies have exacted in the Middle East, it will be because we have identified exclusively with the Israelis and written off a great swarm of human suffering.

  Hacks like Squier will never get it. They’ll beat the 9/11 drum to their graves and never once try an approach that might quench the enduring vow of revenge and outrage which understandably poisons the fringes of the Islamic faith.

  My thesis is coalescing around the insane realities of this right-wing circus. There’s no smoking gun here, no Achilles’ heel. What is here is a radicalized Republican party. John McCain and his centrist ilk are like grandparents at a teenage wedding. As bad as the old guard is, it’s this floating Tea Party (and the women! good grief) I’m worried about.

  Incidentally, these people all know I’m a lefty; they’re not stupid, most of them. They’re chilly at best. That’s OK—I’ve got my story of a hard-right, fringe GOP.

  We arrive in Wrangell tomorrow, and I’m looking forward to getting off this boat, back on land where there are some reasonable people, for God’s sake. I want to kiss the first liberal I see. There’s an internet café on the wharf that looks interesting.

  It isn’t all bad. For the sake of anyone who may read this journal someday, I want to say something nice about the people who work on the ship. They have been wonderful, warm, and attentive to a fault. I’ve seen absolutely no evidence that my affiliation with Imbroglio has negatively affected my experience from the standpoint of the staff and crew. I don’t think there are many necessary parallels to be drawn between the crew and the Rainier Repugs, except for our good captain, of course.

  Just yesterday I took the most glorious sauna, my first since boarding the ship. It is customary to find rose petals strewn, and I did. Halfway through, I had to visit the ladies’ room, and when I got back, someone had tossed a second sprinkling of rose petals—nice touch.

  Melissa watched the debarkation ramps thrust toward the ship’s hull at Wrangell, and she kept watching until the stream of passengers trickled to nothing. Unless she’d missed something, Barb Stamen had not left the ship. Finally, needing to feel solid ground under her feet, she gave up surveillance, holstered her Glock, and joined her shipmates in the tourist core.

  A short block off the strip, she found a café that reminded her of the kind of place you’d find in the small towns she’d often tarried in on her way from Port Rachel to Washington’s Pacific coast. She went in and grabbed a booth.

  A middle-aged and obviously married couple was seated a few booths down. While Melissa waited, their order came, what looked like breaded whitefish with cubed potatoes. The wife seemed a bit sour, perhaps a native Canadian less than enamored of all the Republicans in town. He wore a Calgary Stampede cap, she a shawl stitched with the motifs of Alaska Native art, and they looked as if they had shared that booth, that meal, countless times.

  It was the Meltdown—what they were now calling the Great Recession—that first inspired Melissa to look up from her monitor in the Charon offices and seriously consider finding a man to share her life.

  For all the emotional turbulence they’d generated, her love interests had always been playthings, eroticized experiments, and foils when she channeled her inner drama queen. She’d successfully convinced herself that as Bush’s second term wound down, she was too busy for a serious relationship. It wasn’t till she watched the Lehman Brothers guy nearly drown in his own flop sweat that she began worrying that it wasn’t going to get any easier for a professional woman over thirty to find a mate, let alone have children. Shauna and Randy seemed casual, monogamously, of course, but Melissa would not be surprised should they announce an engagement. Every time a thirty-something friend announced that, she felt pangs that worsened with each uptick in the national debt.

  Her fresh-scrubbed waitress could have been any one of Sarah Palin’s daughters. Melissa ordered the salmon salad with bread.

  All she and her shipmates had seen of yesterday’s oil spill had been four environmental activists who Jet-Skied past them in search of media coverage. She’d read online that due to timely alerts and favorable conditions, the spill never made landfall. Though she loved nature and the outdoors, and she wanted to preserve the environment, Melissa felt little solidarity with what Rush Limbaugh called “environmentalist wackos.” For one thing, the northern Eden around them was virtually indistinguishable from how it had looked when saber-toothed tigers roamed the earth.

  Melissa’s salad was delicious, even more fresh and tasty than the top-notch shipboard fare. She ate with one eye cocked on the street for the possible appearance of Barb Stamen. The time was coming when she would have to go with her gut, all the way to Scrimshaw. It was a big risk, alone on a ship whose history was murder. The Old Turtle was a busy man, not one to bother with unsubstantial reports. Agents were expected not to trouble the skipper unless they had information as reliable as an anchor.

  She would bide her time, despite the risk. If Melissa’s theory held and she was successful in solving the Svenko case and apprehending the perpetrator, her decision to go it alone would look like genius. If she failed, either in judgment or execution, the end could come in many different ways, all of them bad.

  The forever-marrieds laid twenty Canadian dollars on the café table and began shuffling toward the door. There was some acting out for Melissa’s benefit, as if the husband guessed she might be a possible refugee from Rainier’s floating think tank. Unbelievably, he winked. She gave him a smile, big and girlish enough to vanquish midlife delusions. The Mrs. was on his heels anyway. The door never quite shut behind them.

  A hand was on the knob, and then a pastel shirtsleeve appeared. Like a tepid Seattle wind blown up the Passage and into the chowder-scented café came Investigator Jeff Griffin. He looked to be on a rest-and-recreation break like hers, looking to escape the strictures of an undefined shipboard identity Melissa could only guess at. It was only a matter of seconds until he noticed her, but in that time she was struck with a suddenly obvious question: what the hell was he doing here?

  In the context of the Charon offices, he’d been intimidating but right as rain. Here, on a counter seat in this tourist-abandoned stick-house tavern, everything that was wrong about him gathered into vague pathos. They were not to talk, not even nod a greeting. They were to behave as complete strangers in every conceivable circumstance, so that later, if asked, the Palin-esque waitress would swear there’d been no sign of recognition—that two people, a man and a woman, had chanced into the café one hour before the Northstar was to depart Wrangell.

  Whatever the depths of his soul, or the dregs of his career, Griffin played it perfectly. He glanced her way as any man might, not one second longer and no more tellingly. He looked at her like an American man would, as if he might pursue her or leave her to the dogs. As if there were only one job waiti
ng back at Charon’s glass-and-girders stack across from the Space Needle. He plopped on a counter stool and ordered a Black Forest ham Panini to go.

  Melissa dropped ten American on her table and made it to the door just in time to see the waitress attach Griffin’s order to a metal wheel that revolved backward into the kitchen. Melissa got her share of second looks from men, and Griffin would be no exception. Once outside, she could see him through the window, detached and handsome, professional, as if he had already forgotten her presence in the café.

  With dusk complete on the western horizon, an unwelcome wrinkle complicated her return to the ship: her access card would not unlock her stateroom door. The hallway was deserted; many of the older conservatives napped after ports of call. After three fruitless swipes, Melissa reached for the backup room key in her purse. She hadn’t tried the key since obtaining it from flagship embarkation on the first day of the cruise, and it didn’t work.

  She got a case of nerves standing there, the fact that she could not get into her stateroom suggesting to her that someone else had. The doorway across the hall opened suddenly, shocking her. Her heart pounding, she felt silly in front of the woman who came out into the hallway.

  “Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you,” said her neighbor, a busty shipmate with a Rudy button whose rumpled strands suggested she might have skipped Wrangell for a shipboard quickie.

  “No, that’s OK,” said Melissa. “I’m apparently locked out of my room.”

  “Hmm. There was a deck runner or something in the hall earlier. Did you call it in?”

  “Not yet, I’m just coming aboard from Wrangell.”

  “Well, I guess it happens, you know, the door codes and all.”

  “You say there was a deck runner in the hall?”

  “Someone in uniform, female.” The woman nodded. She was one of those vanilla extracts who ruled themselves out of all suspicion with a wink and the swing of a tennis racket.

  “I better get down to embarkation and figure this out.”

  “Good luck.”

  “Access card isn’t working?”

  The redhead, Tammy, behind the flagship embarkation counter was capable, pretty, and heavier than most of the Trans Oceanic crew. One might even say overweight. Melissa, though slender, was liable to pick up a few quick pounds if she didn’t make time for the condo complex pool. It was the metabolism, had to keep the metabolism up.

  Tammy ran the card. “Hmm, doesn’t look like there’s anything wrong on this end.” She clicked her mouse and spoke into her headset. “I’m going to have a deck runner escort you back, see what’s going on. We have a large presentation just ending, so it may be a few minutes. Can I get you anything while you wait?”

  Melissa felt like quipping, “A cot.” The run-in with Griffin and the walk back from Wrangell’s waterfront had tired her. She envisioned herself napping through the dinner hour and ordering late room service from the Victoria Station Café, if she could only get back in her room.

  Flagship embarkation was grand. The floor was a vast mosaic of green-toned marble. Eight walk-up counter stations were lit with hanging lanterns copied from the best designs in British maritime history. Behind the counter, smoke-tinted cubicles were staffed with professionals working to iron out every conceivable cruise ship snag. Melissa found a comfortable algae-pastel chair. She hadn’t been sitting long when Grant Sharpe flourished into the foyer, trailed by an entourage.

  Melissa overheard Sharpe’s resonate radio voice. “Make no mistake. This is not ineptitude. They know exactly what they’re doing.”

  Apparently Sharpe was taking questions. Melissa couldn’t hear what the woman with the Palin button—You Betcha! —asked, but she heard Sharpe’s answer loud and clear. “You can profitably blame your predecessor for about one year,” he boomed. “I think the clock is definitely ticking on Obama’s ‘inheritance shtick.’”

  Melissa listened with a vague uneasiness for being momentarily homeless. She had to hand it to Sharpe. Whether speaking to millions through his silver microphone or waxing polemical for nine lucky Rainier Policy Institute ticket holders, the talk star stayed remarkably on message. He made eye contact with Melissa and, as if responding to some ingrained studio cue, started walking toward her. They all followed. Melissa was surrounded, too tired to get up.

  “Ms. Ross, I wonder if I might use the opportunity of meeting you here to offer some observations about the Fourth Estate.”

  Melissa stifled a laugh, so formal was his address, but played along. “Well, I work for a college newspaper—”

  “No, no, no,” interrupted Sharpe. “I’ve seen Sue Ross in action, and she’s a credit to her profession.” Melissa smiled again, firmly in his charm-lock.

  Sharpe’s tone notched down, like the AM superstar was suddenly on the FM radio band. “What is commonly referred to as the mainstream press is guilty of extreme prejudice, boldfaced duplicity, and fundamental complicity in the election of Barack Obama and the implementation of his ruinous policies.”

  A cyber-nerdy twenty-something raised his hand like a schoolboy. “The reporter who died on this cruise would be in the category of the propagandist left, right?”

  Sharpe reared a bit at the question’s unnecessary context. “Look, I don’t want to be overly symbolic here, but yes, the poor soul who lost her life on last year’s cruise was as liberal as they come, especially when they come from a foreign country to America—in this case the former Soviet Union. There will always be a place for leftist ideologues, but the thing you have to understand is that the alternative media, Fox News, talk shows like The Rush Limbaugh Show and mine, and conservative websites, have seriously eroded their broadcast hegemony. I predict that one of the many negative results of Obama’s presidency will be that left-wing bias will reach hitherto unknown levels.”

  “They squawk about how Fox caters to conservatives. What did they expect? It was out of sociological necessity that the alternative conservative media arose.”

  A young man wearing a Glenn Beck T-shirt stepped up. “Can you give us an example of a positive Obama result?” he asked, possibly looking to trip the talker up. Fat chance—Sharpe didn’t miss a beat. “Once America gets a dose of the undiluted Democrat agenda, they’ll be done for a generation.”

  A handsome deck runner appeared from the counter queue, deferentially sidling through the Sharpe coterie. “Ms. Ross, I’m Dan, and I’ll be helping with your room access.”

  Melissa rose and turned to Sharpe. “Rescued again.”

  “Thank you, madam, for helping me illustrate that there is still hope for journalism in this country. My friends, if you’ll follow me, there’s a legal immigrant I’d like you to meet.”

  All the deck runners sported short pants on this warmer-than-usual cruise, and Melissa couldn’t help noticing Dan’s killer calves. She also noticed the surname on his nametag, Waldenburg. A rounded comb of hair rose like an ash-blond wave over a pair of attentive blue eyes. His nose was prominent, like something you’d see on Rushmore, and tawny sideburns reached down to a square but not austere jaw.

  Walking back to her room with Dan, Melissa felt a vibe of odd togetherness, and glanced toward the One World Pool plaza window, where Wrangell’s waterfront lights speckled nightfall like glowworms. She could smell the conifers.

  Back in the hallway Dan ran her card once, twice, and a third time, getting no result. “Let’s try the master key,” he said. The key went in but would not turn.

  “That’s funny,” he said.

  Things were just as she’d left them, thank God, and there was no evidence anyone had gotten into her room. But Melissa’s relief was eroded soon enough by the knowledge that according to the locksmith deck runner Dan Waldenburg had called to the scene, someone had definitely tampered with her lock.

  “Somebody jimmied it up,” said the old-timer after he’d worked his magic on the door.

  “Is stateroom theft an issue?” Melissa blurted to the gray-templed tradesman in
a dark-blue maintenance jumpsuit. He glanced at Dan, as if unsure about the company line.

  “It’s very rare we get breaking and entering on the ship,” Dan affirmed. “Sometimes the

  teenagers have a go. We had one case a few years back where a family was asked to leave the ship at Juneau.”

  “What about crew members?”

  “Even less likely,” he said. “Trans Oceanic does an excellent job of vetting staff and crew. I’ve been deck running for one year now and never once has an employee been implicated in a theft, or crime of any kind, for that matter.”

  Melissa thought of Stamen, and her tampered-with lock.

  After Dan excused himself to retrieve Melissa’s new access card from flagship embarkation, she plopped down on her stateroom couch while the locksmith installed a new lock. His miniature hand drill firmly seated the screws.

  “Do members of the crew have master keys or access cards?”

  It might have been dawning on the locksmith that his lockout victim was a member of the press. “Yes, the crew members have card or key access to their own departments and other general areas, but they are never given access to individual staterooms unless cleaning services have been requested, and the supervision is quite proactive.”

  Melissa had declined the cleaning service, preferring when on assignment to keep her own space. The locksmith left after trying the new lock, which worked fine. A minute later Dan returned with a new access card, promising to file a full report.

  “Thank you, Dan,” she said, offering her best Pike’s Market smile.

  “Just curious…” She moved closer as he stood at the door. “Are you onboard with the Rainier Policy Institute game plan?”

  Dan smiled back. “We’re not supposed to discuss politics with the passengers, Ms. Ross.”