And that's the best-case scenario.
I press the heel of my hand against the two throttles, try to nudge the levers a little higher in their slots even though I know it's physically impossible. I glance down at the digital speedometer. Thirty-one knots and climbing. Lady Fran must be reading my mind.
“What heading should I make for?” I ask, figuring it's time we decided in which part of the haystack known as the Atlantic Ocean we're going to go search for our needle named Rita.
“Fire up the radar, Danny,” says Gus. He points to another instrument box. “Gave that gizmo to myself for Chanukah. It displays close-and long-range views. The more metal in a boat, the bigger the ping.”
I push the appropriate buttons. Another split image. I watch the green arm circle around, pick up dots and blots. I feel like I should do the five-day forecast.
“See anything?”
“There's a line of boats heading out to the ridge,” I say.
Gus nods. “Night fishing for blues. The commercial guys go out even farther, off the continental shelf, for the scallops … stay out all night.” He taps the long-range screen. “Most of the captains head out this way.”
“What if he's heading to Bermuda?” Ceepak asks. “Maybe the Caribbean?”
“Jeez. He could be heading up to Canada, too. Nova Scotia. You're gonna need a freaking airplane.”
“We have two,” says Ceepak as he reaches for the ship's radio to check in with the other assets. See if the Coast Guard search planes have spotted anything suspicious.
Then he pauses.
“Gus?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you ever communicate with Mullen?”
“Whoa. Hold on, hot shot. I'm not going back on your freaking list again, am I? You making me for some kind of accomplice or something?”
Ceepak shakes his head. “Negative. But, as a fellow fisherman, do you ever chat over your radio with Captain Pete?”
“Sure. We all do it. Pass on tips. Hot spots. Plenty of fish out here for everybody. This, of course, was back before I knew Pete was some kind of freaking whack job.”
“But you know how to contact him?”
“Sure. I have his frequency programmed into a preset … hey!”
Ceepak holds out the microphone. Its coiled cord goes taut.
“Let's contact him now.”
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
This is Lady Fran for Reel Fun. Come in Reel Fun. This is Lady Fran.” Gus lets go of the thumb switch on the radio's microphone.
Shakes his head. Nothing.
Ceepak nods. “Keep heading due east, Danny.”
“You got it.”
I maintain my bearing of 90 degrees. Heading straight across the Atlantic Ocean for Europe. Maybe Spain. Probably Portugal. It's still Tuesday. We might make it to Lisbon by the weekend.
I check the radar. We're about an hour out. Thirty-some miles. On the long-range screen, to the north and further east, I see clusters of commercial fishing vessels working the Hudson Canyon and the scallop beds. To the south, I'm picking up even bigger ships. Probably oil tankers heading up to Newark to dump their loads and keep the air near the Turnpike smelling like rotten eggs. Here and there I see smaller dots. Fishing boats. Sailboats. Pleasure craft.
I look to my right and see Ceepak checking his cell phones. Both of them.
“No signal,” he says.
Gus points to his own cell phone, the one he keeps wrapped up in a tight leather case that reminds me of a steering-wheel cover. His phone is clipped to the control console so it won't fly overboard when the boat bangs across a six-foot swell.
“Cell phones only work about ten miles out,” he explains. “After that, no freaking towers. They're not putting 'em on buoys-not yet, anyhow. You know, I thought about getting one of those satellite phones. Maybe next Easter.”
“If we were in cell range,” says Ceepak, “we might be able to triangulate his location-provided, of course, he or Rita are currently carrying their phones.”
“Look, I hate to tell you this,” Gus says, “but he probably tossed her phone into the drink as soon as he brought his boat out of the bay.”
“Agreed.”
“The key,” I say. Sometimes the hypnotic drone of a boat's motor makes my mind drift.
“Come again?” says Ceepak.
“Dr. Winston's room key. The one we found near the dock on the north shore. He probably lost it on Cap'n Pete's boat when he and his wife went out on that fishing charter … probably just slipped out of his pocket while he was working his rod.”
Ceepak nods. “Indeed. Mullen then planted the key when he buried the snapshot of the redhead. Both clues were purposely left there to mislead us.”
Gus snatches up the radio microphone again.
“This is Lady Fran for Reel Fun. Come in Reel Fun. This is Lady Fran. You out there tonight, good buddy? Come back.”
We stay silent. Wait for a response. None comes.
I hear the propeller screws churning up water behind us: the constant washing-machine whoosh of waves and wake, the flap-slap sound of antenna poles and jacket fabric buffeted by the sea breeze. Thirty miles out to sea, the world is one gigantic Sharper Image sleep machine, but I'm wide awake.
I look up and make out an airplane's belly lights blinking across the sky.
“Think that's one of ours?” I ask.
“Negative,” says Ceepak. “Too high up for Search and Rescue.”
He's probably right. Maybe we should've called in more air support. Planes and helicopters cover square miles of water faster than we can. Maybe we should've called up some of those pilots who buzz the beach dragging ad banners. Frankly, I don't think the captain and crew of the S.S. Lady Fran have a chance in hell of finding Cap'n Pete. The ocean is too big, our boat too small.
“I suspect this was his modus operandi with the other girls,” says Ceepak.
I figure he's been ruminating on the case. Probably helps him forget that his girlfriend Rita is apparently an unwilling stowaway on a ship skippered by Admiral Whackjob.
“He didn't kill the girls at his place,” Ceepak continues. “He came out here, out to his secret fishing spot. Some place where he could drop anchor undetected, where no one could hear the girls scream. His boat became his floating torture chamber.”
We all let that one soak in for a second.
“The girls would be tied up,” Ceepak says in a way that makes you see it. “Probably down below. In the cabin. He would bring along provisions, enough for several days. He'd also pack his death kit. Torture tools neatly organized and arranged with excruciating care. He would derive tremendous pleasure from seeing the girls suffer and would, therefore, make efforts to prolong their pain. Death would most likely come at the climax of a final sex act. When he was finished, when he found his release and his fantasy was fulfilled, this would become his convenient burial ground.”
Ceepak waves his hand out at the ocean.
“He'd have his cutting tools on board, of course; the same tools he'd use on deep-sea fishing expeditions. Knives. Saws. Power equipment. He would slice up the girls’ bodies in the same manner he might a bucket of bait and chum the water with their flesh, blood, and bones.”
Gus and I wince. Like I said, Ceepak has a way of making you see these things. These awful, awful things.
“Sharks. Carrion birds. They'd help him destroy any forensic evidence. He'd keep the girls’ heads. He'd saw them off the spine with the same saw he might use on a ninety-pound swordfish. Then he would take his filleting blade and slice off the noses and ears. He would return to the cabin and preserve his trophies in jars of formaldehyde. His compulsions satisfied, he would chart a course for home, knowing he could safely return to society whenever he chose. No questions would be asked. No suspicions aroused. His profession gave him permission to be out at sea for days at a time, to be bloodstained, and to carry with him at all times the stench of death.”