The Black Silent

CHAPTER 21

Khan was tapping Frick's shoulder, but Frick was staring at the ferry disappearing in the distance.

"Don't let that ferry go!" Frick shouted at the deputy.

"How can I stop it?" the deputy shouted back. "You gotta call the department of transportation."

But Frick knew that the captains of the ferries made those decisions. Nobody told the captain of a ferry where he had to go when under way. They could ask. The ferry could be hailed on 16, but that was a public channel. They also monitored channel 9 and that was used by the public much less often. However, there was also a special channel used only by the ferries. He called the dispatcher, who had the special channel in a file, and he used that method. Instantly the captain was on, Frick explained and got his wish. It had been easy. The captain agreed to return.

Although decisions while under way were the captain's, it might be different once he was docked. To keep the ferry there all night, Frick might actually need the department of transportation. There was no way he was going to devote the manpower required to search the boat in a couple hours. He knew that Chase would not stay cooped up on a ferry tied to the dock, even in the unlikely event that he was on it. Delia put through an employee of the transportation department, whom Frick had been trying to get on the line for fifteen minutes.

"This is Roy Nageler."

"This is the sheriff of San Juan County," Frick lied, "and I have asked the captain of the ferry to stop and return to Friday Harbor. He's coming back to the dock."

"The ferry's coming back to Friday Harbor, you say?"

"Yeah, and I want to keep it here as long as it takes. Maybe all night."

"All night?"

"I think that's what I said," Frick said.

"This will have to go up the line. I doubt that all night's gonna fly."

Frick hung up, waiting for the next call.

"Our men at the scene think Opus could have dropped someone off at Orcas," Khan said.

"We can't worry about that."

"Earlier, a deputy saw a big blond guy down at the docks. He was with a blond woman named Rachael Sullivan." Khan consulted a set of notes. "Her uncle has a place on Orcas and her parents have a big place in Anacortes."

"I know who they are," Frick said. "That's bad if Opus dropped her off."

Frick put out a call on the radio to the deputies chasing Opus Magnum.

"Opus is going full out," Khan's men explained over the radio from the boat. "We nearly hold our own in the rough water on the way to Wasp Islands, in the San Juan Channel.

We're barely keeping her in sight on the radar when it's smooth. She looks like she's headed for Lopez." Frick clicked off, disgusted.

"They've gone to great effort to convince us they're leaving, and to spread us thin,"

Frick told Khan. "I think they're staying."

"So what's your suggestion?"

"The woman- Rachael's uncle owns Inevitable. It's the fastest express cruiser around.

Custom-made. Let's have someone waiting in Anacortes at her folks' in the event she goes there. We're running out of time, and if we want different results, we're going to have to use different methods."

"What are you suggesting?" Khan asked.

"We forget about Monday and the state police and the FBI and we concentrate on now.

We get results. Then you and I get out of here with the goods. I want Sarah James found, strapped down, and made to talk. She must know more than she's saying. I want to know about these scientists he's been talking with. I want to know what the hell is going on."

His mouth went dry with anticipation. "Actually, if they find her, I'll handle her myself."

"If we make people disappear, rough 'em up, we're gonna pay."

"I'm planning on leaving the country," Frick said. "Too much has gone wrong."

"That takes money," Khan replied.

"You'll have plenty," said Frick. "Like you said, we're working for ourselves now."

Khan's cell rang. He listened and smiled. "They caught Sarah James coming out of the woods, going for the neighbor's place."

The guns had missed her and anything vital. There was a hole right in front of her knees where the fiberglass was blown in. Haley was sure that there were more such holes behind her, but everything still ran for the moment. Turning down San Juan Channel, she headed for Lopez Island. Concentrating was difficult and at times Haley's eyes felt like they were being sandpapered. Green blips came and went as waves tossed the objects in and out of visibility and even seabirds sometimes appeared as unknowable, disappearing phantoms. Eventually it was a game that she would lose-unless she was lucky enough to make the planned finale before she hit the log with her name on it. Out in the San Juan channel heading south, there was a good chop and a rising breeze. Winds were at twenty-five knots on her nose and there were small craft advisories.

She slowed to seventy to maintain control. In the aftermath of the warm front, winds were blustery and seas were still building.

She was headed dead on toward the Fisherman's Bay navigation lights. With no lights on the boat she had taken off into the black abyss. She squinted trying to see the outlines of land, looking for something other than electronic security, but she could see nothing.

There was a plane flying low, probably looking for her. She decided to take a chance on a burst of speed. Her foot went to the floor. The wind blasted her face. The boat rocketed and then the props screamed. Off on the throttle, she told herself, then hard on it just before she scuffed the next wave. The boat landed so hard it hurt, but she kept on it to one hundred miles per hour. Any second she expected to lose control and die. Off on the throttle when she flew, back on it before she hit. She did it four times and then could stand it no more.

She cut to seventy, keeping the boat down. She could only hope that her wake would not phosphoresce. And that she didn't hit a log.

It was 3.1 nautical miles from inside Friday Harbor to the entrance of Fisherman's Bay on Lopez Island, but she had taken a substantial detour to Orcas. It took just over four minutes to get from the Wasp Islands back to calm water near the outer marker of Fisherman's Bay. Instead of slowing down in the calm water near the entrance, she punched it to one hundred miles per hour again, hurtling toward the channel and aiming for the marker like a rifleman lines his sights. Indeed she was traveling faster than a hardball pitch.

Ideas and images sped through her mind as if they were detritus on the sea-words moving on to the next words: Colored lights reflecting. Gauges. Heading. Swell. Bad bounce. Flash, flash, flash. Things on the water. Line up. Line up. The channel. The buoy. The reef. Throttle back. Line up. Okay. Hit the throttle.

The boat came into the narrow passage at fifty knots. It might as well have been an F15 breaking the sound barrier for the grand entrance. The trick was not to kill somebody else with this outrageous nighttime helmsmanship. Even at fifty knots, in this narrow channel, nearby boats would be split-second images in the night. Fortunately, she had been in through the snaky entry to Fisherman's Bay many more times than she could count-it was still the boat-driving challenge of a lifetime. More difficult in some ways than the run through the Wasp Islands.

The police boat was far out in the San Juan Channel looking for the disappearing race boat when she sped into the twisting ribbon of water. Close proximity to the land would mask her presence on their radar. The steep beach on one side and mudflats, a stone's throw away on the other, made it impossibly treacherous. Her hands gripped the wheel and fingernails sank into rubber. Brain and boat were fused. Entire yachts riding anchor passed in eye blinks.

The slightest deviation from the required course would send her hurtling to her death.

Her hands made every minute correction and her mind willed it past the inner buoys.

She had been inside the harbor only a couple seconds when she dropped the power. Her wake washed up on the beach and the sound of her homicidal engines was calmed.

Without a doubt she had brought shadows to the windows of the houses that lined the entrance. She glided toward the dock with frightening speed, throwing a massive wake as the stern settled. In seconds she had motored stern first into a slip with the finesse of the most seasoned of skippers. With the boat still completely dark she waited in the glow of the dock lights behind the only sizable yacht in the first dock complex of the bay.

The point was to make sure the deputies realized that she could have dropped a passenger.

After a moment she was distracted by shoes on the dock ramp and saw two men escorting a woman down to the floats. Something about them gave her pause and then she saw the woman turn and try to run. They grabbed her, obviously manhandling her.

Instantly she knew it had to be some of Frick's thugs. And she knew the woman was Sarah James.

Dear God, she thought. Watching her friend was agony. Sarah was an attractive woman, the kind who, by no effort of her own, would stir men like these. Like Rafe Black. One man held Sarah around the middle while they dragged her to the boat. There was something on Sarah's face, over her mouth. Probably tape. As she watched the pathetic spectacle, Haley gasped and bit her knuckles to keep from shouting. Somehow she needed to help Sarah, but she didn't have a gun-they did. And even if they didn't, she couldn't overpower them. It was hopeless.

Then she remembered the flare pistol.

Virtually every boat had one. Haley looked for the orange container under the dash and found it. Quickly she unscrewed the top from the bottom. It was roughly football-shaped but flattened on the ends. She found the pistol and loaded a shell.

The men had dragged Sarah near their boat and were trying to force her in. Haley looked toward the channel and saw the chase boat streaking into Fisherman's Bay. She had to decide. She watched them struggling with Sarah and she began to weep. One flare shell with two men would not work. If she stayed, she would not get Opus Magnum out of the slip. With two boats she could be pinned. If they got desperate, they might start shooting. It boiled down to Sam's life, to Ben's life. The whole plan was at risk if she abandoned Opus. It was a horrible weighing of desperate circumstances. If it were just her own life at risk, the choice would be easy.

Now the police boat was coming fast toward the docks. The men on the dock, seeing the deputies' boat, seemed to hunch and shrink as they finally struggled to put Sarah in their boat. Obviously, regular deputies manned the sheriff's boat and Frick's ploy would be blown if they observed the crime Haley had just witnessed.

If real deputies saw it, she knew they would immediately rebel and Frick would lose control. She could only hope.

Haley remembered Sam's hand on hers and his quiet insistence that she follow the plan, no matter what. But Haley could not help herself. She had to try to free Sarah. Sam's words haunted her. He was counting on her.

Try to save her now or later?

"Oh God." She whispered her anguish.

Fortunately, the police boat was going for the second dock in front of the big resort, having missed her hiding place entirely. She shot the flare over their heads so they would know they were seen; then she fired the engines and actually screamed her anguish. The men with Sarah jerked their heads in surprise. Then she put a heavy foot on the throttle and the boat leaped out from beside the sleek yacht lying quiet in the night.

Like a cheetah it accelerated with shocking force that threw her back against the seat.

Turning hard over, she heeled the boat on its side and raced behind the startled deputies in the chase boat.

One of them reached for his gun and her heart went cold.

"We have a situation over at Lopez," Khan said.

"What the hell now?"

Frick took the phone. The deputies fetching Sarah James were on their cell. They had her securely in their custody, but there was other news.

"Opus Magnum went into Fisherman's Bay at the dock. It hid and got past one of the sheriff's boats. We saw it leave, but we can't be sure someone didn't get off."

"Are you telling me they could have unloaded someone there?"

"Yes, sir, on the docks at Lopez. Do we bring the woman now or search the boats at the dock? We don't think anybody got up the gangplank."

Frick sighed his disgust and thought for a moment. "How many boats to search?"

"Maybe ten, fifteen."

"I think it's a ploy. Bring the James woman here now."

There was a burst of white light streaking across the sky right over their heads. For a second Sarah thought the police had arrived. Then it was black, but for the halogen dock lights, and she could barely discern the outlines of Frick's well-known ocean racer among the boats at dockside. Frick.

"Walrus Face," with the mustache, twisted her arm behind her back. They had been abusing her ever since they caught her coming out of the forest. She cursed herself for not remaining in the forest, but she had wanted to make it to the rendezvous point set by Nelson Gempshorn.

Walrus Face also had garlic breath, and it was hot on her neck, smelling like the leftovers from an Italian restaurant. He moved her body around like it was a twig. His weight and strength, the size of his viselike hands, made her feel helpless. Something from a television show flashed through her mind and she acted on it, stomping on his instep, throwing an elbow into his gut.

"Uhhh," he grunted, favoring the foot; the elbow to the stomach was like hitting rubber-coated concrete. Limping and the pain of it put a fury in him and she could feel it, palpable, as if it were an aura. He grabbed her neck and she felt as if he might snap it.

Then he wrenched her arm and the pain shot up her shoulder, exploding in her head.

"You bitch," he said in a whispered rage, still favoring the foot she had wounded.

She was vaguely aware that Frick's boat was roaring away from the dock.

He let up. "Say anything and I'll kill you." She saw the flashing lights of a sheriff's boat and wondered how long they'd been there. Then it took off after Frick's boat.

Immediately he went back to twisting her arm.

"Okay. Okay," she muttered in response to the pain. She relaxed, unable to take the torque on her arm. "I'll go."

"Bitch," he muttered, still twisting her arm. "Tell me where Ben Anderson is or I'll break it off before we even get to Frick."

"I don't know. I don't know. I haven't talked to him."

"Have you talked to anyone?"

"Yes. They said they would meet me at my house," she lied. "And then you people came."

"Lying bitch. Your bags were packed."

"I thought they would take me away to Ben. I swear I did. But I saw Ben's boat. In the bay here. If you'll let go of my arm, I'll tell you where."

He let the pressure off.

"Who said they'd take you to Ben?"

"I don't know. A voice."

Instinctively she had known that the man with the walrus mustache was way over the line and he was convincing her that brutality was a viable option as a strategy to break her down and get her talking. And that confirmed that they would murder her when they were finished, and that had made her desperate.

Now they were on the radio and it was apparent that they were going to take her to Friday Harbor and Frick.

She couldn't let that happen.

Walrus Face had a layer of fat over most of him, especially in the belly, and he was round in the face with a bull neck. She guessed he was in his forties, had led a worthless life, and didn't know where he was going or just what he wanted, except enough ale and enough women. Worst of all, he seemed to have a nasty, cunning sense of what she loathed and what she feared.

The thin man had odd angles about his face. Things seemed as if they had been knocked askew: His Adam's apple stood out and his nose was long and a bit crooked. His hair was dark and starting to gray. She suspected that long ago someone had taught him right from wrong, but he was willing to forget it for enough cash. There was a maddening resignation about him that obviously allowed him to partake in things with which he had no agreement.

Now "Thin Man" held her while Walrus Face tried to get some kind of a charley horse out of his foot.

"Where is the boat?" Walrus Face muttered, sounding like he was ready for another round of brutality once he took care of the foot.

"You want to go to it?"

"Whatever the hell gave you that idea?" Walrus Face said.

"No, go ahead, tell us where it is," Thin Man asked her. He had held on to her by the arms, but didn't put his hands on her body. It was Walrus Face who had the obvious propensity for degrading women.

"Driving down the road, I believe I saw Ben's boat near one of the docks," she said.

"You wouldn't be bullshitting us now, would you?" Walrus Face said.

"No, I wouldn't. It's a twenty-seven-foot boat. A Sea Ray with an open bow. There aren't many around here."

Sarah hoped that Ben's boat had been left there many hours earlier and that Ben had been sending a different boat to fetch her.

They got on the radio and spoke with Frick a second time and received the go-ahead to check out Ben's boat.

"So you gonna be cooperative with the authorities?" Walrus Face asked as Thin Man untied the boat.

"You're thugs," she said. "Not the law."

Walrus Face stared at her with beady eyes and ran his hand over his mustache.

Thin Man jumped back in the boat and started the motors.

"You wouldn't dare turn me over to a real deputy," she said.

"No, ma'am, we wouldn't."

His forthright answer frightened her more than anything else.