The pilot circled the little motor yacht. “You want me to land?” he asked.
“Yeah, and taxi as close as you can to the boat,” Tommy said. “Do you have a dinghy?”
“No, just a life raft.”
“I’ll have to swim, I guess,” Tommy said, unbuttoning his shirt. Stone started getting out of his clothes, too. There wasn’t much wind, and the pilot maneuvered to within a few yards of the boat, which seemed deserted. Tommy and Stone jumped, naked, into the water and swam for the boat. Stone was there first and hauled himself aboard, then gave Tommy a hand.
The two stood, dripping wet, in the cockpit, looking through the locked doors to the cabin below.
“Tell you what,” Tommy said, “I’m worried that those kids are dead aboard, so I’m going to break in.”
“I agree,” Stone said.
Tommy found a boat hook and used it to pry the padlock hasp off the mahogany door. “They can send me a bill, if they’re alive,”
Tommy said, sniffing the air inside. “Nobody smells dead.” He started below, and Stone followed him.
Everything seemed to be in perfect order below, though it was hot. Tommy began opening the galley cabinets. “Let’s search the place, as long as we’re here.”
Stone pitched in, and the two of them searched the cabin thoroughly, taking care to leave it as neat as they found it. “Let’s take a look in the cockpit lockers,” Stone said, and they went back on deck.
Stone pointed at the stern locker, which was fastened with a combination padlock. “Odd,” he said. “The cabin door had an ordinary padlock, but this one has a combination.”
“Why is that odd?” Tommy asked.
“Maybe it’s so that someone who knew the combination could come aboard, leave something in the stern locker, then relock it and leave.”
“We’re going to need something more substantial than an aluminum boat hook to break into that,” Tommy said.
“There’s a tool kit below,” Stone said. He went down and came back with a large screwdriver. It took a couple of minutes to break into the locker. Stone opened the locker and stood back. It was packed with plastic bags, taped shut.
They were about to open one when there was a sudden blast from a boat’s horn. They looked up to find a small Coast Guard cutter standing a few yards off the port side.
“Ahoy, there,” a woman’s voice said on a loud hailer. “We’re boarding you.”
Stone looked at Tommy. “We’re not dressed for the occasion,” he called back.
“There are some towels below,” Tommy said, ducking into the cabin and returning with two skimpy bath towels. The cutter’s crew deployed fenders, and the female captain, who was petite and attractive, stepped aboard, wearing a handgun and a name tag that read “Tabor.” A crewman stood on the boat’s upper deck with an assault rifle at port arms.
“Is this your boat?” Tabor asked them.
“No, Captain Tabor,” Tommy said. “I’m Lieutenant Tommy Sculley, Key West PD.”
“I don’t see a badge,” she said, suppressing a smile.
“Right,” Tommy said. “It’s on our airplane.”
“What’s going on here?” she asked.
“We’re looking for the boat’s occupants,” Tommy said. “We got a report that the boat had been abandoned here, so we flew out for a look.”
She nodded toward the broken lock on the cabin door. “I suppose you have a search warrant?”
“No, we were concerned for the safety of the crew,” Tommy said, “so we had a look around.” He opened the stern locker. “All we found was this.”
Tabor looked into the locker and whistled. “Tell you what, lieutenant: why don’t you swim back to your airplane and bring me some I.D. And if you try to take off, that seaman over there with the M16 will shoot you down.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Tommy said, dropping his towel.
43
TOMMY SWAM BACK , holding his I.D. wallet out of the water, and handed it to the Coast Guard captain.
She looked at it suspiciously, then turned to Stone. “And who would you be?” she asked.
“My name is Stone Barrington,” he replied. “If you want to see me without the towel, I’ll swim back and get my I.D., too.”
Tabor blushed. “Okay,” she said, “don’t bother.”
“We’d like to leave now,” Stone said.
“We’re going to tow this boat back to our base in Key West and impound it,” she said. “How do I get in touch with you?”
“Call Lieutenant Sculley and Key West PD,” Stone said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.” He dropped the towel, hopped over the side and swam back to the airplane, followed by Tommy.
“Well,” Tommy said, “that was interesting. I guess she just wanted to see me naked.”
They flew back to Key West. Then, back at the hotel, Stone called Evan Keating’s cell phone number and got his voice mail. “This is Stone Barrington; please call me immediately, very urgent,” he said, then he hung up.
“Looks like he’s going to need legal representation again,” Dino said.
“Looks like,” Stone agreed.
STONE WAS HAVING a drink before dinner with Annika at Louie’s Backyard when his cell phone buzzed. “Hello?”
“I got your message,” a voice on the phone said.
“To whom am I speaking this time?” Stone asked. “Evan Keating or Charley Boggs?”
“Take your pick,” he replied.
“Where are you?”
“Why do you want to know?”
“Tell me something: When you were knifed, how did you pay your hospital bill?”
Silence.
“Was Charley Boggs using Evan Keating’s very exclusive credit card?”
“What’s your point?”
“I guess I’ll refer to you as Evan Keating from now on,” Stone said.
“Okay.”
“Once again, where are you?”
“I’m in Torrington, Connecticut.”
“Oh? Why?”
“Look, Stone, I don’t owe you any explanations.”
“Evan, it would be wise of you, in a legal sense, to answer my questions.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Where is your boat at this moment?”
“This is getting very strange,” Evan said.
“It’s even stranger that you’re in Connecticut.”
“My father is dead.”
“I know.”
“You know?”
“I know. How did you happen to fi nd out?”
“I spoke to my grandfather, and he told me.”
“When was that?”
“Early this morning.”
“Where were you at the time?”
“On my boat.”
“And where was the boat?”
“West of the Keys.”
“And how did you get back to Key West?”
“I didn’t go to Key West. I went by seaplane from the boat to Miami and got a plane there.”
“Your boat is no longer at Fort Jefferson,” Stone said.
“How do you know where it is?”
“Because I was aboard it this morning when the Coast Guard arrived, impounded it and towed it away.”
“What?”
“Do I have your attention now, Evan?”
“You do.”
“Someone saw your boat out there, unattended. I went out there with the police to find out if you were aboard, dead.”
“Why should I be dead?”
“Well, during the past week or ten days you’ve been knifed and shot. It’s not too great a leap.”
“But why did the Coast Guard impound the boat? It’s not illegal to be anchored out there.”
“Gee, Evan, I’m not sure. Do you think it could be because of the large amount of drugs in the stern locker?”