The Narrows (2004) Read online

  The components of his first skin were pushed into the new bag and he stepped out of the stall, the strap of the MGM bag over his shoulder.

  Backus went to the sink to wash his hands. He admired himself for the preparation he had taken. It was the planning and attention to the small details like that that made him who he was, that made him a success at his craft.

  For a moment he thought about what was waiting. He was going to take Rachel Walling on a tour. By the end of it she would know the depths of darkness. His darkness. She would pay for what she had done to him.

  He felt himself getting an erection. He left the sink and stepped back into one of the stalls. He tried to change bis thoughts. He listened to the fellow travelers coming and going in the restroom, relieving themselves, washing themselves. One man spoke on a cell phone while defecating in the next stall. The whole place smelled horrible. But that was okay. It smelled like the tunnel where he was reborn in blood and darkness so long ago. If they only knew who was in their presence here.

  He momentarily caught a vision of a dark, starless sky. He was falling backward, his arms flailing, the featherless and useless wings of a baby bird pushed out of the nest.

  But he had survived and had learned to fly.

  He started to laugh and used his foot to flush the toilet and cover his sound.

  "Fuck you all," he whispered.

  He waited for his erection to subside, pondering its cause and smiling. He knew his own profile so well. In the end it was always about the same thing. There was only a nanometer of difference between power and sex and fulfillment when it came to the narrow spaces between the synapses in the gray folds of the mind. In those narrows it all came down to the same thing.

  When he was ready he flushed the toilet again, careful to use his shoe, and stepped out of the stall. He washed his hands again and checked his look in the mirror. He smiled. He was a new man. Rachel would not recognize him. Nobody would. Feeling confident, he unzipped the MGM bag and checked on his digital camera. It was there and ready to go. He decided he would take the risk and shoot some photos of Rachel. Just some keepsakes, a few secret shots he could admire and enjoy after everything was all over.

  CHAPTER 8

  The fish box. Buddy's mention of it reminded me of the sheriff's report up in the chart station drawer.

  "I meant to ask you about that. You say this guy took the GPS?"

  "Phony bastard, I'm sure it was him. He went out with us, the next thing we know my GPS is gone and he starts a charter over on the isthmus. Put two and two together and you get asshole. I've been meaning to go over there and pay him a little visit."

  I was having trouble following the line of his story. I asked him to explain it to me in English, as if I didn't know a fish charter from a fish chowder.

  "This is the deal," he said. "That little black box had all our best spots on it. Our fishing holes, man. Not only that, it had the points marked by the guy I won it from. I won it in a poker game from another fish guide. The value assigned was not for the box but what was on it. The guy was putting his best twelve spots on the table and I won 'em with a full fucking house." "All right," I said. "I get it now. Its value was in the coordinates of the fishing spots recorded on it, not the device itself."

  "Exactly. Those things cost a couple hundred bucks. But the fishing spots, those come from years of work and skill, fishing experience."

  I pointed at the photo on the computer screen.

  "And this guy comes along and takes it and then he starts out his charter business ahead of the game. Using your experience as well as the guide's you won it from."

  "Way ahead. Like I said, I'm going to go pay him a visit one of these days."

  "Where is the isthmus?"

  "On the other side, where the island pinches together like a figure eight."

  "Did you tell the sheriff's department you thought he stole it?"

  "Not at first because we didn't know, you know? The thing turned up missing and we thought maybe some kids came onto the boat or something at night and grabbed whatever they saw. It gets pretty fucking boring growing up on the island, from what I hear. Just ask Graciela about Raymond-the kid's going stir crazy. So anyway we made a report and that was that. Then a couple weeks later I see this ad in Fish Tales and it's announcing this new charter out of the isthmus and there's a picture of the guy and I say, 'Hey, I know that guy' and I put it together. He stole my fish box."

  "Did you call the sheriff then?"

  "Yeah, I called and told them he was the guy. They didn't act too excited. I called back the next week and they said they talked to the guy-by phone. They didn't even bother to go out there for a face-to-face. He denied it like of course he would and that was that as far as they were concerned."

  "What's this guy's name?'

  "Robert Finder. His operation is called Isthmus Charters. In the ad he calls himself Robert 'Fish' Finder. My ass. More like 'Fish Stealer.'"

  I looked down at the photo on the screen and wondered if this meant anything at all to my investigation. Could the missing GPS box be at the center of Terry McCaleb's death? It seemed unlikely. The idea that someone would steal a competitor's fishing spots was understandable. But then to engage in a complicated plot to also kill the competitor seemed on the far limit of belief. It would require a hell of a plan and execution on Finder's part, that was for sure. It would require a hell of a plan on anyone's part.

  Lockridge seemed to read my thoughts.

  "Hey, you think this bastard could've had something to do with Terror going down?"

  I looked up at him for a long moment, realizing that the idea of Lockridge being involved in McCaleb's death as a means of gaining control and location of the charter business and The Following Sea was a more believable theory.

  "I don't know," I said. "But I'll probably be checking it out."

  "Let me know if you want somebody to go with you."

  "Sure. But listen, I noticed on the stiff's report that the GPS was the only thing reported stolen. Did that hold up? Nothing else ever turned up missing?"

  "That was it. That's why me and Terry thought it was so strange at first. Until we figured out it was Finder." 'Terry thought that, too, that it was him?"

  "He was coining around to it. I mean, come on, who else could it have been?"

  It was a worthy question, but not one I thought I needed to put front and center at the moment. I pointed at the laptop screen and told Lockridge to keep moving back through the photos. He did so and the procession of happy anglers continued.

  We came across one more curiosity in the photo series. Lockridge backed up to a set of six photos that depicted a man whose face was not shown clearly at first. In the three initial shots he was posed holding a brilliantly colored fish up to the camera. But in each shot he held the fish up too high, obscuring most of his face. In each of these shots his dark glasses peeked over the ridge of the fish's dorsal fin. The fish appeared to be the same in each of these three shots, which led me to assume that the photographer was repeatedly trying to get a photo that included the fisherman's face. But to no avail.

  "Who took these?"

  'Terror. I wasn't there on that one."

  Something about the man or maybe the way he had avoided the camera in the trophy photo had made McCaleb suspicious. That seemed obvious. The next three photos in the series were shots of the man taken without his knowledge. The first two were taken from inside the salon, shooting out into the cockpit where the fisherman leaned against the right gunwale. Because the glass on the salon door had reflective film on it, the man would not have seen or known that McCaleb had taken photos of him.

  The first of these two photos was in profile. The next a fiill-on face shot. Take away the setting and McCaleb had instinctively gotten mug shot poses, another confirmation of his suspicion. Even with these photos the man was still obscured. He had a full beard of brownish gray hair and wore dark sunglasses with large lenses and a blue L.A. Dodgers hat. What little cou
ld be seen of the man's hair appeared to be close cropped and matching the colorations of his beard. He had a gold hoop earring in his right ear.

  In the profile shot his eyes were crinkled and hooded, naturally hidden even with the dark sunglasses. He wore blue jeans and a plain white T-shirt beneath a Levi's jacket.

  The sixth photo, the last in the sequence, was taken after the charter had ended. It was a long shot of the man walking on the Avalon pier, apparently after leaving The Following Sea. His face was turned slightly toward the camera, though it still wasn't much more than a profile. But I wondered if the man had continued to turn after the shot and perhaps had then seen McCaleb and his camera.

  "So what about this guy?" I asked. 'Tell me about him."

  "Can't," Lockridge said. "I told you, I wasn't there. That was one Terry picked up on the fly. No reservation. The guy just showed up on the water taxi while Terry was on the boat and asked to go out. He paid for a half a day, the minimum charter. He wanted to go out right away and I was over on the mainland. Terry couldn't wait on me, so he took him out without me. Alone, which is a pain in the ass. But they got a nice Spanish mack out there. Not bad."

  "Did he talk about the guy after?"

  "No, not really. He only said that the guy didn't take the full half. He wanted to pack it in after just a couple hours. So they did."

  'Terry had an alert on. He took six photos, three while the guy wasn't looking. You sure he didn't say anything about that?"

  "Like I said, not to me. But Terry kept a lot of stuff to himself."

  "Do you know this guy's name?" "No, but I'm sure Terry put something in the charter book. You want me to go get it?"

  "Yes. And I'd also like to know the exact date and how he paid. But first, can you print out these photos?" "All six of them? It will take a while." "Actually, all six and give me one of Finder while we're at it. I have the time."

  "I don't suppose you want them framed, too."

  "No, Buddy, that won't be necessary. Just the photos."

  I stepped back while Buddy sat down on the cushioned stool in front of the computer. He turned on a nearby printer, loaded in photo-quality paper, and expertly went through the commands that sent the seven pictures to the printer. Again I noted his ease with the equipment. I had the feeling that there wasn't any content on the laptop that he was not familiar with. Probably nothing in the file boxes on the bunk above us either.

  "Okay," he said as he got up. 'Takes about a minute for each one. They come out a bit sticky, too. Might want to spread 'em out till they dry all the way. I'll go up and see what the charter book says about your mystery man."

  After he was gone I sat down on the stool. I had watched how Lockridge worked the photo files and was a quick learner. I went back to the main listing and double- clicked on the photo folder labeled mail call. A frame opened containing 36 small photos in a grid. I clicked on the first one and the photo enlarged. It showed Graciela pushing a stroller with a little girl sleeping in it. Cielo Azul. Terry's daughter. The setting appeared to be a shopping mall. The photo was similar to Terry's photos of the mystery man in that it appeared that Graciela did not know she was being photographed.

  I turned around and looked back through the doorway toward the steps to the salon. There was no sign of Lockridge. I got up and moved quietly into the hallway. I slipped through the open door of the bathroom. I pressed myself against the wall and waited. Soon enough Lockridge moved across the opening in the hall, carrying the logbook. He was moving very quietly so as to make no noise. I let him pass and then moved into the hallway behind him. I watched as he went through the door of the forward stateroom, ready to startle me with his sudden appearance again.

  But it was Lockridge who was startled when he realized I wasn't in the room. When he turned I was right behind him.

  "You like sneaking up on people, don't you, Buddy?"

  "Uh, no, not really. I was just-"

  "Don't do it with me, okay? What's it say in the book?"

  His face took on a pink hue beneath the permanent fisherman's tan. But I had given him an out and he quickly took it.

  'Terry put his name down in the book but nothing else. It says 'Jordan Shandy, half day.' That's it."

  He opened the book and turned it to show me the entry. "What about his method of payment? How much is half a day anyway?"

  "Three bills for a half, five for a full. I checked the credit-card log and there was nothing there. Also the checking deposits. Nothing. That means he paid cash."

  "When was this? I assume it is logged by date."

  "Yeah. They went out on February thirteenth-hey, that was Friday the thirteenth. Think that was intentional?"

  "Who knows? Was that before or after the charter with Finder?"

  Lockridge put the logbook down on the desk so we could both look at it. He ran his finger down the list of clients and stopped it at Finder.

  "He came a week after. He went out February nineteenth."

  "And what's the date on the sheriff's report on the boat burglary?"

  "Shit, I have to go back up."

  He left and I heard him bound up the stairs. I took the first photo out of the printer and put it on the desk. It was the shot of Jordan Shandy hiding his face with sunglasses and the Spanish mackerel. I stared at it until Lockridge came back into the room. He didn't try to sneak up on me this time.

  "We made the burglary report February twenty-second."

  I nodded. Five weeks before McCaleb's death. I wrote all the dates we had been talking about down in my notebook. I wasn't sure if there was significance to any of it.

  "Okay," I said. "You want to do one more thing for me now, Buddy?" "Sure. What?"

  "Go on up and take those rods down off the ceiling and go out and wash them down. I don't think anybody did it after that last trip. They're making this place smell sour and I think I'm going to be hanging out here for a couple days. It would help me a lot."

  "You want me to go up and wash off the rods."

  He said it like a statement, a treatise of insult and disappointment. I looked from the photo to his face.

  "Yes, that's right. It would help me a lot. I'll finish up with the photos and then we can go visit Otto Woodall."

  "Whatever."

  He left the room dejected and I heard him trudge up the steps, equally as loud as he had been silent before. I took the second photo out of the printer and placed it down next to the first. I took a black marker out of a coffee mug on the desk and wrote in the white border beneath the photo the name Jordan Shandy.

  Back on the stool I turned my attention once again to the computer and the photo of Graciela and her daughter. I clicked on the forward arrow and the next photo came up. Again it was a photo from inside a mall. This one was taken from a further distance and there was a grainy quality to it. Also in this picture was a boy trailing behind Graciela. The son, I concluded. The adopted son.

  Everyone in the family was in the photo but Terry. Was he the photographer? If so, why at such a distance? I clicked the arrow again and then continued through the photos. Almost all of them were from inside the mall and all were taken from a distance. In not one photo was any family member looking at or acknowledging the camera. After twenty-eight similar shots the venue changed and the family was now on the ferry to Catalina. They were heading home and the photographer was there along with them.

  There were only four photos in this sequence. In each of these Graciela sat in the middle rear of the ferry's main cabin, the boy and girl on either side of her. The photographer had been positioned near the front of the cabin, shooting across several rows of seats. If Graciela had noticed, she probably would not have realized that she was the center of the camera's focus and would have dismissed the photographer as just another tourist going to Catalina.

  The last two photos of the thirty-six seemed out of place with the others, as if they were part of a completely different project. The first was of a green highway sign. I enlarged it and saw that it
had been shot through the windshield of a car. I could see the frame of the windshield, part of the dashboard and some sort of sticker in the corner of the glass. Part of the photographer's hand, resting on the steering wheel at eleven o'clock, was also in the picture.

  The highway sign stood against a barren desert landscape. It said ZZYZX ROAD I MILE

  I knew the road. Or, more accurately, I knew the sign. Anybody from L.A. who made the road trip to and from Las Vegas as often as I had in the last year would have known it. At just about the halfway point on the 15 free- way was the Zzyzx Road

  exit, recognizable by its unique name if nothing else. It was in the Mojave and it appeared to be a road to nowhere. No gas station, no rest stop. At the end of the alphabet at the end of the world.