The Shadow Box

by Luanne Rice

  “What have you found?” Tom asked.

  “Gas leaked into the bilge,” Matt said. “The minute they started the engine, the boat became a ticking time bomb. Either the spark came from the engine or someone turned on the stove. And the boat blew.”

  “How did the engine look in general?” Tom asked.

  “It’s clear the owner kept the boat well maintained—the marina faxed over the service records. The engine was serviced a week before departure to get ready for the trip. Pistons and valves are all in good condition. I’m looking at the mechanic’s checklist, and I don’t see the fuel feed.”

  “Running time from their slip to the explosion site was about thirty minutes,” Tom said. “Wouldn’t the boat have exploded within a shorter time period?”

  “Unclear,” Matthew said. He opened a file on his computer, turned the screen so Tom could view the images.

  “This is the starboard bypass fuel feed. And here’s the port,” Matthew said, and Tom examined a clear photo. “When Benson turned the key, gas flowed through the manifold to the port engine. But see this gap here? The starboard feed was left open—the line is disconnected from the carburetor.”

  “And fuel dripped into the bilge,” Tom said.

  “Right. From that point on, the voyage was doomed.”

  “One spark,” Tom said.

  “That’s all it took.”

  “So if the engine was in good condition, the boat seaworthy, how did this happen?”

  “That’s up for grabs,” Matthew said.

  “Could it be sabotage?” Tom asked.

  “Possibly, but it could also be an accident. Since the boat was just serviced, it’s possible the mechanic forgot to reconnect the line.”

  “That would be a pretty significant mistake,” Tom said. “West Wind is a good marina. I can’t see any of their mechanics being that careless.”

  “It happens,” Matt said.

  Tom knew he was right. Not paying attention was one of the most common causes of boating tragedies. But according to Conor, there had been trouble in the Benson marriage.

  “When Gauthier first questioned Benson, she said he was barely conscious, slurring his words, but he told her ‘they got her.’ My brother, Conor, is a detective with the Major Crime Squad, and he wonders if he’d actually said ‘I got her.’”

  “And what? He blew up his boat and risked the kids just to kill his wife?”

  “That would be crazy,” Tom said. “But some people are.”

  “So your brother’s working this case? I thought it was Detective Miano.”

  “They work together,” Tom said. “Conor’s on another case that might overlap with ours.”

  “Which one?”

  “Missing woman. Claire Beaudry Chase. She knew Sallie, and Conor thinks it’s a pretty big coincidence, both of them harmed on the same day.”

  “That is pretty weird,” Matt said. “Glad the cops are taking the human side. I’ve got the technical part. I’m going to head over to West Wind and talk to Eli Dean and his yard guys, find out if they screwed up. I’m leaning in the direction of it being an accident. If the boatyard is responsible, Benson will have a nice lawsuit on his hands.”

  “Let me know,” Tom said. He thanked Matt, asked him to keep him in the loop. He got into his car and headed toward Shoreline General. When he got to the nursing station on Gwen’s floor, he was glad to see that Mariana Russo was on duty.

  “How is she?” Tom asked.

  “She’s making progress,” Mariana said. “But then she has setbacks.”

  “Is she talking?” he asked.

  “Very little,” she said. “The first she spoke was when you brought her dog to see her. Since then, a few words here and there. Mostly ‘yes,’ ‘no,’ simple replies when we ask her if she’s hungry, sleepy, things like that. Nothing to do with the accident.”

  “What about the setback?” Tom asked.

  “Seeing her father,” Mariana said. “Gwen became almost hysterical the last time he visited, almost as bad as before. And she didn’t speak for hours afterward.”

  The nurse led him down the hall to the sunroom, where they found Gwen sitting in a chair, intently writing in a journal.

  “Hello, Gwen,” he said.

  At the sound of his voice, she looked up and smiled. The thought that crossed Tom’s mind was that she looked hopeful.

  “I wanted to visit you,” he said. “To see how you’re doing and tell you Maggie misses you. She’s having lots of adventures at our house—we take her down to the beach, and for such a small dog, she’s a real champ at jumping driftwood logs.”

  “She likes to swim,” Gwen said in an almost inaudible voice.

  “She does? Well, now that I know that, we’ll take her swimming,” Tom said. He gestured at the chair beside her. “Is it okay if I sit down?”

  She nodded.

  “I thought you might like to see some pictures of her,” Tom said. He pulled out his phone, scrolled through to a series he had taken of Maggie: out in the garden with Jackie, playing ball, running on the beach, curled up on an armchair in the living room. “She’s really cute, and we’re making her at home, but I can tell she can’t wait to see you.”

  “How?” Gwen asked.

  “It’s just a look dogs get. Same as people. You know how dogs smile? Their tongues hang out, and their eyes look extra-extra-bright? Well, Maggie does smile, but her eyes are only extra-bright, not extra-extra. But they will be when you get home and you can be together.”

  “Together,” Gwen said. “Me and Maggie and Charlie.”

  Tom’s heart stopped. Had she still not been told about her brother? He stared at her, at her smile getting wider and wider, and he couldn’t speak.

  “You’ll be with your dad,” he said.

  “And Maggie and Charlie,” she said. “And Aunt Lydia sometimes.”

  “Gwen,” he began. It wasn’t his place to tell her about the search, that they hadn’t found him, that Charlie wouldn’t be going home.

  “You’ll rescue him,” Gwen said. “Just like you rescued me.”

  “Gwen, I wish I could, more than anything,” he said.

  “You will,” she said. “He’s alive.”

  Okay, Tom thought. It was a fantasy, and she needed it to keep getting better. It was a survival mechanism. Her psyche was playing a trick to cajole her into recovery.

  “You don’t believe me?” she asked.

  “I didn’t say that,” Tom said.

  “The boat picked him up.”

  “What boat?”

  “A merman was driving it. Like a mermaid but a man. Part fish, with black scales. He took Charlie to a sea castle, to be safe with King Neptune and the Sea Queen.”

  “When did the merman take him?” Tom asked, playing along with the imaginary scenario she had created.

  “In the dark of the night and the dawn of the day,” she said. She pushed her journal toward Tom. “See? I drew it. My mom always said to draw things you never want to forget.”

  Tom studied the open book. There were eight panels of intricate and surprisingly sophisticated drawings laid out like a comic book.

  “You’re talented,” he said.

  “My mom taught me. She was a designer, and she liked to draw.”

  Tom examined the panels. They depicted a cabin cruiser like the Sallie B at the dock, a family of four having a meal down below—a dog like Maggie sitting under the table. Then panels of the boat on fire, a girl in the yellow raft, a small boat with two people in it, a boy floundering in the water, and the boy in the stern of a motorboat, waving at the yellow raft. The final frame showed an opulent castle with the boy standing on a balcony and a blackbird perched on the peak of the castle’s turret.

  “That’s Charlie,” Gwen said, pointing at the boy. “I wish the merman took me to the sea castle too.”

  “Why do you say it’s a sea castle?” Tom asked.

  “Because I saw some pictures of it,” she said dreamily. “T
here were big stone bird statues at the gate and on the roof.”

  “Okay,” Tom said, realizing how fragile she must be to have created such an elaborate rescue scenario for Charlie.

  “I called for Charlie to swim to me, so I could get him back in,” Gwen said. “He and I were in the little yellow boat together when the explosion came. All of a sudden—fire everywhere and wind began to blow. It blew our yellow raft off the deck—we flew like a plane and landed in the water. We both fell overboard, but I was holding on to the yellow boat. Charlie was farther away.”

  “You saw him in the water?” Tom asked.

  “Oh yes.”

  Tom tried to find the words to ask if he had been burned or otherwise injured, but Gwen continued.

  “He was trying to swim to me, but the raft was drifting, moving over the waves out to sea.” Her chin wobbled. “The water was moving so fast. I kept trying to get into the raft, so I could paddle back to him.”

  “I’m sure you tried hard,” Tom said.

  “Yes,” she said. “I was kicking hard. My arms were tired. That’s when I saw Charlie get rescued. The merman was calling my name. He was looking for me, but he couldn’t see me because I was in the water. I yelled to him, but he didn’t hear. And when I got back onto the raft, I looked for Charlie again. He was in that boat, and it was driving away.”

  “What boat?” Tom asked.

  “The blackbird boat.”

  “Why do you call it that?” he asked.

  “Because that’s what it is.”

  Tom took a deep breath. Her story was getting wilder. Did she need to invent a boat that could fly?

  “It’s the one that was following us,” she said.

  “When was it following you?” he asked.

  “The whole way from the marina,” she said.

  “Did anyone else see it?” Tom asked.

  “Just Charlie.”

  Tom was silent for a moment. She seemed to really believe what she was saying.

  “Why did you say a merman was driving the boat?” he asked.

  “Don’t you know what a merman is?” she asked, sounding surprised. “Like a mermaid, only a man. He has magic. He saves people that fall into the sea. He follows boats that might be in trouble.” She looked straight at Tom. “Like ours was. He has powers that told him we would need him. Only a magical merman would know it.”

  “I see,” Tom said, and now he was sure: she was escaping into a fantasy world to avoid knowing her brother had drowned, inventing mermen and a flying blackbird boat.

  “I want Charlie to come home,” she said, two big tears running down her cheeks. “Even if he’s happy in the sea castle, he would miss me as much as I miss him. I want my brother. I want my brother. I want him home.” She lowered her head and began to weep.

  As the sound of her sobs got louder, Tom stepped to the door, called down the hall for Mariana. She and another nurse came running.

  “Gwen,” he said, taking her hand. “Get well, okay? Maggie needs you.”

  “And Charlie,” she said, sobbing. “He needs me too. Now it’s time for you to find Charlie in the castle, like you found me in the raft, and bring him home. He needs to come home.”

  Tom exchanged a glance with Mariana, who nodded to him—she had heard what Gwen was saying, and he was sure she’d tell the doctor. He gazed at Gwen—so slight and seemingly frail but with the strength to survive overnight on a raft in the cold ocean—and wondered if she would ever truly come back from the experience, whether the trauma would lock her in a world of unreality forever.

  It was hard for him to leave her, but he knew she was in good hands. He walked out of the hospital, took deep breaths of fresh air, prayed the best he could for Gwen to be okay, for her to survive this the way she had survived the boat explosion and that long night alone at sea.

  32

  CLAIRE

  My father used to say I could do anything. I could run as fast as the boys at Hubbard’s Point, hit a baseball farther, swim out to the big rock without even breathing hard. My parents never tried to urge me into any field of study; when other working-class parents like mine wanted their kids to get practical jobs with regular hours, steady income, and health insurance, my parents wanted me to follow my dreams. That was all they ever asked of me.

  I am doing it right now—following my dreams: of life, safety, and escape. It all began with a reverie of truth, that once I learned what happened twenty-five years ago, I knew I couldn’t keep my husband’s secret anymore.

  On the seventh night, I left the cabin. I still felt weak, and I knew I needed to get more food than I’d been able to forage. The moon was out, which made it both easier to find my way and treacherous in terms of who might see me. A warm wind blew up from the cove, rustling the branches overhead.

  My sanctuary was about midway between Hubbard’s Point and Catamount Bluff, and my heart was pulling me home to the Point—I wanted to see Jackie, have her shelter me. But I wasn’t at all sure that I could trust the men in her family, Tom and Conor. Instead, I went the opposite way, toward the Bluff. Griffin would never expect it.

  I cut through the woods, along a narrow track. The leaves had popped in the last few days, and the moon cast dappled light on the ground. I heard a distant cry—the big cat? It sounded like a child sobbing, but then it dissipated, and I chalked it up to wind whistling through the trees. A pair of barred owls called in the distance. I wondered if the golden eyes of the mountain lion were tracking me. The thought made me hurry along.

  All the houses on Catamount Bluff were dark. I hid in the marsh grass, watching. I thought I saw someone move behind a curtain at the Lockwoods’ imposing house, but there were no lights on. It must have been the breeze through the open window. I stared at it for a long time, remembering the venom I’d heard in Leonora’s voice the last time we talked.

  Other than that rippling curtain, there was no movement, but I knew the security guard would be doing his twice-hourly patrols. I waited for the first pass—a slow cruise up the road from the gate to our house. I tried to see who was driving, but the car was too far away. It circled our turnaround and returned in the direction of the guard shack at the main road.

  That gave me half an hour before the car came back.

  I skirted our house, staying behind the boulders that dotted our yard from the woods to the beach. My heart was pounding when I drew parallel to my studio. This was the most dangerous part—I’d have to run about twenty yards across the moonlit lawn. Without my watch or cell phone, I could only estimate the time, and I guessed it was nearly midnight. Griffin usually went to bed early and slept soundly; the boys were night owls, but the lights in their old bedrooms were off, and in any case, I couldn’t imagine why they would be staying at our house.

  I took a deep breath and more limped than ran across the wide expanse, slipping behind my studio on the seaward side. I had left the house without my keys, but I kept one hidden under a stone angel in the herb garden. My hand shook as I slipped the key into the lock.

  As soon as I stepped inside, my shoulders dropped with relief. Every inch of this building was me. I smelled paint, solvent, wood glue, seaweed, channeled whelk and mussel shells, driftwood covered with barnacles. The large north windows did not face the moon, but the ambient cool-blue moonlight was enough for me to see.

  First thing, I went over to the bookcase. The shelves were full of art books, beautiful editions by American, French, Italian, and German publishers. My collection of nature volumes took up half the space—lots of old books by favorites such as Louis Agassiz Fuertes, William Hamilton Gibson, and Henry David Thoreau. I took down a volume I had hollowed out—a law book, irony intended—and was relieved to see the packet of materials was still there.

  I grabbed my satchel, stuffed it with fruit and cheese from the small refrigerator, a can of walnuts, a box of wheat crackers, and a jar of almond butter. I went to the medicine cabinet in the bathroom, grabbed some first-aid supplies. And I wrapped the packet
of the journal and letters in a soft cloth and put them into the bag along with a pen and a fresh notebook.

  I thought of my phone, in the cup holder of my car in the garage. I wondered if the police had impounded the car as evidence, part of the crime scene. I had a landline—it was an old wall phone, right next to the cabinet that held my supplies. But who would I call? Calling 911 would defeat the purpose—town cops would come, possibly Ben Markham, certainly officers on Griffin’s side.

  Almost ready to leave, I walked over to my worktable and gazed at my work in progress. I had built the frame, cut sections of thin, fine balsa wood to create the beginnings of the great house. Because it was a commissioned work, I had never intended to display it in my show. I checked between the back of the frame and the false bottom, made sure that the letter was still there. It was.

  My laptop was fully charged. I stared at it for a few moments. It could be my lifeline—I could email Jackie or Sloane or Nate. Depending on their response, I could decide whether I could put my life in their hands. At least I could scan the news, find out where the search for me—or my body—was focused.

  I opened my laptop, googled the local paper, and saw my face on the front page. I started to read the article, but something else caught my attention: Sallie Benson had been killed in a boating explosion. I felt complete shock and sadness. I had seen her just a day before my attack. I quickly hit print, then did the same for the article about my disappearance. There were links to previous articles; I printed them as well.

  One story mentioned that several Facebook pages dedicated to my case had sprung up. I quickly logged on to my account, glanced at my wall full of hundreds of messages. I searched for the pages mentioned in the news story and saw that there were many—all devoted to finding out what had happened to me, emblazoned with photos of me. I opened the first page, then a second and third—saw photos of me and countless comments. I printed as much of the content as I could.

  I debated taking the letter with me, but I decided to leave it. If Griffin or his cops caught me and searched my belongings, they would destroy the letter, and the friend who wrote it might be in danger. Better to leave it here for Jackie or Nate—someone who cared about me—to find if I never returned. They would realize it was evidence of what happened to me.