Black River

EIGHTY-SEVEN

Two days later, O’Brien met with Dave on Gibraltar. O’Brien sat on the couch, Max in his lap, Dave making a bloody Mary behind the bar. “Nick’s bringing a bushel of oysters over. He almost swore off oysters after his encounter with Malina.”

O’Brien filled Dave in on everything that happened. Dave listened without interruption, sipping his drink, the breeze off the marina water wafting the curtains hanging on Gibraltar’s open port side windows. Dave said, “I feel bad for Kim. Something like this is the stuff that causes post-traumatic stress disorder for a long time. Maybe for life.”

“I’ve spent the last couple of days with her. She’s staying home, inside. I’m going to rent a cottage off Key Largo to take her there. It’s somewhere she loves.”

Dave nodded. “I’ll give Alistair Hornsby a full report. Where’d you put the diamond and Civil War document?”

O’Brien reached inside his sports coat and pulled out the Ziploc plastic bag. “Here you go.”

Dave took it, putting his glasses on, opening the bag and lifting out the diamond. He held it between his thumb and finger in the light. “It’s exquisite. Truly unbelievable in size and brilliance.” He set the diamond on the bar and removed the old document, reading the first paragraph. He looked up over the tops of his bifocals, his eyes wet. “This was the last thing Ike read, probably the last thing he held before he was murdered.”

O’Brien said nothing.

Dave placed the document and diamond back inside the plastic bag. “What are you going to do with them?”

“Give them to Laura Jordan, and go with her so she can place them in a safety deposit box.”

“Do you think she’ll return the stone and contract to the British?”

“Maybe.”

Dave nodded. He looked at the reflection of the sun off the marina water. “So Frank Sheldon is sailing to England. You’ve got the compromising video of him on your phone. Or ostensibly in the cloud. He’s expected to return the painting to Laura Jordan. You said a poem written on the back side of the painting indicates what was left of the Confederate gold might still be somewhere in the river. You think this was the real reason Gus Louden was searching for the painting…maybe he remembered part of it as a kid?”

“I don’t know. I’ll ask him.”

Dave inhaled deeply, his cheeks puffing when he exhaled. “Well, we do know that Silas Jackson, a sadist, rapist, possible serial killer — a man with a warped mind so bent you can’t even label it — is dead. James Fairmont, a man with no traceable ID, who we know was a former British agent, was skewered to Jackson’s door by an arrow through neck. Where’s Joe Billie?”

“He told me he was going back to the river to get his canoe. He’d hidden it in the brush when he guided me back across the river that night. Joe could be anywhere right now. He’ll never be connected to any of this.”

“And apparently neither will you. We’ll done my friend. The media are reporting that an apparent drug deal had gone bad in the Ocala National Forest when the bodies of two men, Silas Jackson — a convicted felon, man known to have cooked and sold meth, and an unidentified buyer, a man who drove a rented late-model BMW, were found in a shootout in Jackson’s cabin. Police are saying no one has come forth as a witness. They did indicate it looked like Jackson used a bed in the shack as some kind of sadomasochism sex room. There were wide tracks from tires usually found on pickup trucks. However, only Jackson’s truck was at the scene. All they found alive in the vicinity were roosters, chickens and a dog. And they found a shallow grave, the body of a teenage girl. The information came in from an anonymous tip. I’m assuming that was you.”

O’Brien was silent, scratching Max behind her ears.

“The henchman you laid out on Jackson’s property…he never saw you?”

“No. He’s probably a convicted felon, too. We left him soaked in his own urine. When he awoke, I’m sure he fled, never looking back and never going back.”

“How the hell can you grasp the enormity of this…the murky way it all connected, all from seemingly nowhere, but yet there was an undefined, somewhat overgrown path all along. You just happened to be the one who stumbled upon it. Why?”

“I’m not sure I can answer that. Maybe that burden has been lifted.”

Dave studied O’Brien over the lens of his bifocals for a few seconds. He said, “What started out ostensibly as a hunt for an old Civil War era painting, a portrait of a beautiful enigmatic woman, resulted in fighting another kind of war.”

O’Brien stood. “Can you keep an eye on Max for a little while?”

“Of course. Where are you going now?”

“To rendezvous with Gus Louden and make a delivery to Laura Jordan.”

Nick approached, came across the catwalk with a bushel of oysters on chopped ice. He said, “Sean, man, where the hell you been? Did you find Kim?”

“Yes.”

“Is she okay?”

“She’s going to be fine.”

“What happened? Where are you heading?”

“Dave can fill you in. I have an errand to run.”

“How about a lunch of oysters and Corona before you go? You never know, Sean. You might get lucky and find a pearl.”

“You’re right about that, Nick. Save one for me.”

O’Brien turned and walked down L dock, a Vagabond sailboat leaving its slip, from the cockpit speakers came the Bob Marley song, No woman, No Cry.