Ricci dropped an urchin into the tote, pried at another with his knife. Okay, he and Pete had Cobbs’s number, but what exactly did that have to do with the sparkle of light on the beach? If he assumed Cobbs was out to take him down, that one was obvious. As shellfish warden, Cobbs was authorized to carry firearms, and had access to a speedboat for patrolling the bay compliments of Hancock County. He also knew where Ricci did his diving. He could pull the boat aground or moor it on the far side of the island, then conceal himself in the brush until he was ready for whatever move he intended to make.
In the water, Ricci was a highly vulnerable target. Cobbs could wait until he was surfacing, then zoom up in his motorboat and clip him like a duck in a shooting gallery. Or if he were good enough with a rifle and had a high-powered scope, he might be able to do it from shore, without ever having to break cover. And Ricci would simply disappear into the vast waters of the Penobscot. Urchin diving was filled with inherent hazards that had claimed several lives in recent years, with the diver’s body having gone unrecovered in two or three of those instances. Between the circulating currents, profuse eelgrass, and marine scavengers, it was a rough environment in which to dredge for a corpse.
After four days and nights of mulling all this over, Ricci had grown convinced Cobbs would be looking to come at him when he was out on a dive. If not this time, then certainly the next. Which had left him to determine where Dex might fit into the picture. Ricci could see how his partner might have gotten drawn into an attempt to scam him out of his percentage of the catch money, and, in fact, had been left with no doubts about Dex’s guilt on that score when the subject of his supposed baby-sitting was raised on the boat. It had been evident in all of his mannerisms — the way he’d nervously rattled on about how lousy he felt because of what happened to Ricci in his absence, expressing a bit too much regret and dismay, fidgeting around and tugging at his beard while never looking him in the eye.
These were textbook signs of deception Ricci had recognized from the countless suspect interrogations he’d conducted during his years as a detective. But there were betrayals, and then again there were betrayals. Ricci didn’t believe Dex had it in him to take an active hand in helping Cobbs settle his grudge. Unless, of course, he didn’t know Cobbs had anything too drastic in mind. Or felt pressed into it. Dex led a difficult, hand-to-mouth existence, and Cobbs and his buddies in badly soiled blue could make it even more difficult for him if they wanted to. Whether suckered or squeezed, Dex could be persuaded to stay mum about anything he witnessed.
At last, Ricci had seen only two options — he could either back away from the situation, or hang tough and go back to his usual routine, keeping his eyes as wide open as possible. He had opted for the latter, and was still confident he’d made the right decision. If it proved absolutely conclusive that Dex had turned on him, was perhaps even willing to let Cobbs get away with killing him, his motivations were ultimately of little consequence. Ricci’s ingrained sense of accountability demanded that there would have to be a reckoning for his breach of trust. And as for Cobbs…
Cobbs would have to be dealt with too. Dealt with very severely.
Now Ricci heard the throb of a motor somewhere above him, and paused for a second to listen. It seemed diffuse, coming from all sides at once — which was how the human ear perceived most lower-frequency sounds underwater — but was recognizable to him as the skiff’s engine being cranked. Nothing out of the ordinary, he thought. Depending on the windage up top, Dex would occasionally open the throttle to keep apace with his drift.
Ricci glanced at his instruments again, noted that he had plenty of air left in his cylinder, and went back to filling the tote, in no particular hurry to get done.
He’d chosen to play a game of Wait and See, and intended to stick it out. Whatever the hell that meant for him.
Dex had planned to wait until Ricci’s exhaust stopped bubbling at the surface before turning the skiff hard about — no more bubbles equaling no more breathing and a dead man underwater. But it had got to where the tenseness in him was making his stomach hurt as if he’d swallowed a handful of thumbtacks, and he just couldn’t stand there watching anymore.
Besides, what did it matter? he thought. He’d fixed the needle of Ricci’s air gauge to read like his tank was filled higher than it really was — higher by more’n a thousand psi, a quarter of its total hold — then figured the outside time Ricci could stay at the bottom an’ make it back up alive, bein’ generous about the amount of air he’d have used by now under the best dive conditions, which was anythin’ but what the water was offerin’ today, given them funnels an’ crosscurrents Dex had been seein’ from the get-go. Takin’ things combined, Ricci didn’t stand a chance. Was pitiful thinkin’ how he was gonna check out, his insides goin’ all to jelly. Goddamn pitiful. But there was nothin’ to do about it, an’ Dex guessed that by havin’ kept from gettin’ the shakes, he could count himself as holdin’ together okay. Better than okay, under the circumstances. That standin’ an’ watchin’, though. The waitin’ for no more bubbles on the top… Jesus, that was too much.
His hand clenched tightly around the stick, his long hair whipping back from under his knit cap, Dex kept on at full throttle, as if by doing so he could leave his guilt behind him, washed away in the white wake of foam trailing the skiff as it planed upwind toward his meeting point with Cobbs.
His binoculars raised to his eyes, Cobbs squatted in the weeds and bushes behind the strand and watched the skiff approach from his right, northward, Dex driving the little boat so hard that it almost seemed it would take off into the air like a rocket.
He took a deep breath of ocean-and-pine-scented air, wanting to remember the moment in detail, to impress its every sight and sound upon his brain so that he could call them up at whim even when he was old and feebleminded and unable to recall his own name. For several minutes before the skiff had appeared, Cobbs had heard the loud revving of its engine from out on the water, but had tried to curb his expectation until he’d actually spotted it through his lenses. And when he did, when he’d seen Dex was alone, well, Cobbs had felt almost like he was going to lift off into the stratosphere himself. Only at that moment, when the suspense had finally ended, had he realized the true fervor with which he’d hated Ricci. Only then too had he learned the whole of his capacity for murder without remorse or fear of punishment, without anything in his heart but gleeful satisfaction.
Now the skiff veered to starboard and came on dead ahead toward shore, its bow riding up high over the chop, the roar of its engine reaching a crescendo that appropriately matched the joy swelling up inside Cobbs as he imagined how Tom Ricci must have suffered in his last, struggling moments of life.
Within seconds after Ricci got his first hint that something might be wrong with his air supply, it became apparent that he had a serious problem. Before a full minute had passed, that problem escalated to a full-blown crisis.
The breath that triggered the warning seemed slightly harder to draw from his regulator than normal, and while it could have been attributable to minor overexertion — he’d been working steadily against strong currents for over an hour — a skeptical voice in his head dispelled that idea outright. He was an experienced diver, and pacing himself underwater was second nature.