Skeleton Sea

CHAPTER 33

I said, “Bless Doug Tolliver and his azaleas.”

Walter went to find his cell phone.

I gazed out the Shoreline Motel's sliding glass door at the golden afternoon. Sunlight angled in and made me squint. Still a gorgeous day.

A long day.

A day of tragedy and a vision of swimmers that I feared was going to revisit me in my dreams.

A day of puzzles.

A day of accomplishment, too, balancing the ledger. It had begun with the discovery out at the dunes and, just now, it became a day of revelation.

“Bless Google search,” Walter said, opening his phone.

Yes, give credit where credit is due.

Still, it was Tolliver's azaleas that had set us on the search path.

I regarded the shining blue sea, flat and calm and vast. Looking utterly untouchable. I squinted, blurring the scene, picturing what lay out there, somewhere between the beach and the horizon.

I supposed one could say that the marine equivalent of Tolliver's azaleas was phytoplankton — if one were to take metaphoric license. I took it.

“Doug!” Walter said, his voice honeyed. “The red float — we've had a breakthrough.”

The azalea breakthrough.

No need to contact Walter's forensic paint analyst.

“What breakthrough?” Tolliver's voice, tinny through the speakerphone, sounded drained as I felt.

Walter's own voice turned brisk. “I believe you'll want to bring Oscar Flynn in for questioning.”

I listened as Walter explained to Tolliver what we had discovered, and I nodded when Tolliver emitted a long low whistle.

“I'll want you here,” Tolliver said. “You need to do the techy talk with him. I'll give you a call when I get hold of him — let you know when to come in.”

It was almost an hour before Tolliver called back.

Walter put him on speaker again.

“Never mind coming in here, I've located Flynn and we're going to go talk to him where he is now. You won't goddamn believe this.”

“What?” Walter asked. “Where?”

“The aquarium.”

CHAPTER 34

The tank was circular, a good ten feet in diameter. It gave the impression of a huge blue eye, awash in tears.

Tolliver stood with his back to the tank, facing us. “Here's what we know. This is as-of when I got the call, before I called you. Keep in mind, the natural history center is undergoing upgrades, new exhibits. They're not open to the public yet so nobody was in here until a couple hours ago when a worker passed through and saw… Well, you see.”

Yes. The empty tank.

I saw but I could not yet bring myself to believe.

The identifying plaque was already in place: Aurelia aurita.

The room itself had a nearly-finished look. A wall of photographs showed local marine life — crabs, fishes, anemones, kelp. A touch pool sat in the center of the room, already populated with starfish and sea urchins and hermit crabs. The room's bamboo floor was polished, unscuffed. The walls were painted an eggshell white. A painter's tarp was bunched in one corner and open cardboard boxes were shoved in another.

Staff were coming and going, passing through the aquarium room, to and from other rooms. Most wore casual you-caught-me-off-duty clothes, shorts and T-shirts and flip-flops. Most looked blown-away.

“Way I understand it,” Tolliver continued, “the aquarium has what's called an open system. Basically, water gets pumped out of the bay and into the exhibit to bring in, you know, the nutrients, and then it exits back into the bay. You get this gentle flow through the jelly tank, keep the buggers suspended, and then the screen over the outflow keeps them from getting funneled into the pipe. And then there's filters and that kind of thing but I didn't get into that, I only got the dummy version. Anyway, you can see that the screen became unattached, as I was told.”

Hanging by a screw was more like it. Stuck to the dangling screen was a gelatinous blob. Collateral damage. Not all the jellies made it out alive.

“And also, the screen on the pipe that goes into the bay became unattached. So I was told.”

“Sabotage?” Walter asked.

I looked around the room for Oscar Flynn but did not see him.

Tolliver said, “Sabotage would be my first call. But, I'm told, it could be just mishaps, the kind of thing that happens in the final stages of a project. Last minute changes, equipment problems, rush rush rush. I asked for a report. Should get something that makes some sense of it all real soon.”

I said, “So the moons we saw today…this is where they came from?”

“Seems so.”

“An aquarium. The kind of place you visit on vacation.”

“They'll need to do their tests but it looks like this is the source. It does explain the timing of what we saw today. Ebb tide last night around midnight starts taking the escaping jellies out the channel and then they ride the prevailing currents southward. By the time that bunch is arriving at Diablo Canyon, the next ebb tide, around noon, is sweeping the remaining jellies out through the channel. Past the beach. What we saw.” His lean features were drawn even leaner, grim.

“Then Dr. Russell was incorrect?” Walter asked. “Regarding the source?”

“Not necessarily. I'm told the aquarium collected its, uh, starter batch of jellies just offshore, with some kind cup-on-a-stick gadget. From those, they've been culturing new batches.”

“All of them cultured from a new strain of Aurelia? Meaning the aquarium has been growing toxic moons from the get-go?”

“So it would seem.”

“My God,” Walter said.

Tolliver nodded. “I didn't even think of this place as the source, earlier out at Diablo. Out at the beach. I knew they were adding an aquarium to the facility. But I didn't even think…”

“Who would?” I said.

Walter looked around the room. “And where is Oscar Flynn?”

Tolliver led us to the glass doors that opened onto a balcony.

The balcony overlooked the bay. An afternoon breeze rippled the water. I estimated the spot where I had kayaked four nights ago. I shifted my focus across the bay, to the sweep of the dunes, that long sugary white spine that separated the bay from the sea beyond. I looked for but could not spot the elephantine dune where Walter and I had found the red float this morning. That was farther south, toward the end of the bay. The field of view from the aquarium balcony did not encompass the entire bay.

Neither did the view from the balcony penetrate the murky water down below to reveal the intake and outflow pipes.

If there were Aurelia stragglers caught in some eddy down there, they were invisible from up here.

“Oscar,” Tolliver said.

Flynn stood at the far end of the balcony, gazing out over the water. I wondered if he was looking at his boat — there were quite a few big boats at anchor farther up the bay. I saw a big black boat but I could not make out the name from here. Flynn's back was to us. He wore the now-familiar outfit all in black. Black polo shirt, black jeans, black high-top sneakers.

He turned and favored us with a scowl. “Somebody's head is going to roll.”

“If you have any candidates,” Tolliver said, “speak up.”

Flynn was silent.

“Dr. Flynn,” Walter said, “we've just learned that you're a volunteer with the aquarium.”

“Docent. When the aquarium opens.”

“But you're here today.”

“I heard about the disaster with the jellyfish exhibit. I'm on a call list. I rushed here. Everybody on staff rushed here, not just full-timers but volunteers like me. This place couldn't run without us.”

Tolliver said, “Then you're familiar with the aquarium plumbing system? The pipes, and all that?”

“That's not my playground.”

Tolliver jerked a thumb, indicating the sea beyond the bay. “That your playground, out there?”

Flynn's black eyes went flat. “Are you mocking me?”

“I'm questioning you.”

“What about them?”

“Shaws and Oldfield will do the science-y talk. I'll just jump in when I feel like it.”

Flynn regarded Walter and me. “You keep barging into my life.”

Walter tipped his head. “We found something that might belong to you.”

“I didn't lose anything.”

“I fear that you did. A marine float, painted red?”

Oscar Flynn pressed back against the balcony railing.

Walter said, “Our story of the red float begins with a diver by the name of Joao Silva.”

“I didn't know him.”

“So you said, yesterday at sea.”

Flynn folded his massive arms. “Why should I care now?”

“Because he found your float.”

Flynn shrugged.

Walter continued the story, explaining the rescue of the diver, Lanny taking the float, our discovery of the float in the dunes, the mysterious paint. He concluded, “You can understand our bewilderment.”

Flynn shrugged.

“And then,” Walter said, watching Flynn closely, “Cassie and I had a breakthrough. We discovered something that could explain the puzzling use of a water-soluble glue with an iron-oxide paint in a marine environment.”

“The azalea breakthrough,” Tolliver put in. “That's what they call it. My azaleas gave them a lead.”

Flynn kept his focus on Walter. “What did you discover?”

“How to cool the climate.”

Flynn snorted.

“It's simple,” Walter said, “at least in theory. To reduce atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide, look to the plants of the sea. Phytoplankton, via photosynthesis, gobbles up large amounts of CO2. When the plankton die and sink to the seafloor all that CO2 is sequestered. If you want to remove more carbon dioxide — make more phytoplankton. One of the plant's major nutrients is iron, which is often in limited supply. Solution — fertilize the ocean with iron to make the phytoplankton bloom.”

“That's what you learned? That's called iron seeding. That's not a new thing.”

Walter cocked his head. “You're familiar with it?”

“I just said I was.”

“Well it was new to us. To continue our story, we learned that one form of iron used for the seeding is Fe203. I'm sure as a double PhD you know the formula for hematite. In fact, hematite is the form of iron in the paint on our red float. And so — with the iron seeding thing in mind — the problem of the water-soluble binder now becomes an asset. You want the paint to dissolve, to slowly release the hematite particles. To seed the water. To make the phytoplankton bloom.” Walter eyed Flynn. “When Cassie and I learned about that, it brought us to you.”

Flynn shrugged.

“The science-y bits,” Tolliver said. “Right up your alley, Oscar.”

“Just because I understand it, doesn't mean it has anything to do with me.”

“Oh indeed,” Walter said, “you'll see that it does. Let me explain. Let us back up in story-time to that morning last week on the beach. The rescue of the sea lion sickened by toxins from an algal bloom. Quite noble. And I'll remind you that Dr. Violet Russell told us of your interest in algal blooms. And then let us come to yesterday's encounter at sea. You and Jake Keasling, sampling the bloom, as part of the Marine Mammal monitoring program. Again, noble.” Walter rubbed his chin. “All of that is what brings us to you, with a question. Did you deploy that red float? Did you create that algal bloom?”

“Why would I want to do that?”

I said, “We wondered about that, ourselves.”

Flynn shrugged.

Walter said, “The iron-seeding strategy has been largely abandoned. It never really panned out.”

“Is there a question in there?”

“The question is why you chose to do it. Especially given the potential of nasty side effects. Stimulating phytoplankton growth can backfire, creating a bloom of the harmful variety. As we all saw out there.”

Flynn shrugged.

“And further,” Walter continued, “there is the problem of how to end a harmful bloom, once it gets started. So you see, I have to wonder if you know what you're doing.”

Flynn's expression hardened. “You're baiting me.”

“Answer the damn question,” Tolliver snapped.

“There isn't a question, there's an accusation.”

“Then answer it.”

Flynn straightened, abandoning his slouched perch against the railing. He loomed, big man towering over us, now looking down at us. “You're telling your story, Dr. Shaws. I am unenlightened. So I am going to tell my story.”

Walter stepped back, just enough so that he did not have to lift his chin to meet Flynn's look. “I'm all ears.”

“Yes, I created that bloom. And I know precisely what I'm doing.”

“That's good to hear.”

“To start with, your runaway bloom is preposterous. You saw the bloom — it's starting to dissipate. That's because I stopped the seeding.”

“Why?”

“Phase one of the experiment had run its course.”

“Wait a minute,” Tolliver said, “who authorized this experiment?”

Flynn waved a hand. “I have the paperwork. I'm doing a good thing.”

“Good, my ass. What we saw out there is a goddamn mess.”

“You're just looking at this bloom. Don't worry about it — it's less than ideal because I made it with the old method, dispersing the iron in the propeller wash of a boat. But I'm developing something new. It's a different dispersal method. That's the story of the red float — a slow and continuous release of particles.”

“About those particles,” I said. “Funny thing, your float seems to have transferred some grains into the rub rails of two boats. The Outcast and the Sea Spray.”

Flynn said, after a long moment, “First I've heard of it.”

“Really? Small town gossip and all that? But now that you've heard, any idea how it could have happened?”

“Floats float.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning I towed the seeding floats behind my boat. Experimenting with phase two.”

“Floats, plural?”

“A bouquet of floats, Ms. Oldfield.” He gave me a sly smile.

Was he mocking our azalea breakthrough? Didn't matter, he creeped me out.

“One float could have broken loose,” he continued. “Your boats could have come along at a later time and impacted the detached float.”

“Up at the rub rails?”

Flynn shrugged.

“And why would those boats be there, at your bloom, in the first place?”

“It's a free ocean.”

I shook my head. “So your detached float somehow impacted two boats, and then it was found by Joao Silva?”

“Floats float. People find and collect them. Marine stores sell them as curios. Maybe your Mr. Silva was doing a recreational dive and found the float.”

“This is the diver who was found poisoned at the Keasling beach.”

“So I understand.”

“It's a bit of a coincidence, don't you think? He was poisoned by eating anchovies contaminated with domoic acid. Which is, coincidentally, produced by your algal bloom.”

“It's a big ocean. There are other blooms.”

“But this diver found your red float. From your bloom. Maybe you wanted to prevent him from telling people about your project.”

“I just told you all about it.”

Tolliver said, “We just pressured you into telling us.”

“I'm a savior. Not a poisoner.”

I said, “Or a throw-somebody-overboarder?”

“A what?”

“Robbie Donie. The fisherman.”

“I didn't know him.”

“Funny thing,” I said, “the fisherman you didn't know found a yellow float that appears to have come from a monitoring instrument array on the reef beneath your algal bloom.” I added, “I'm referring to the setup Doug told you about yesterday at sea. The setup you claimed to know nothing about.”

“I wasn't prepared to tell my story yesterday.”

“But now we've encouraged you.” I smiled. “So, the yellow float?”

“Of course the bloom is monitored. As a matter of fact, we did lose a yellow float from the recovery package. A faulty attachment. So that fisherman found it? Floats float.”

“We?”

Flynn folded his arms again. “I see what you're doing. You think you're tricking me into telling you who I work with. You take me for a fool? Of course, we. It's not a one-man job. I do the development, the brain work. I hire people to do the grunt work. So when I say we I am referring to the hirelings, a company called Dive Solutions.”

Walter and Tolliver and I exchanged a look. Two plus two equals four. Of course.

Tolliver said, “We were just chatting with Fred Stavis about the red float. He claimed ignorance.”

“He follows orders. He signed a confidentiality agreement. My work is proprietary. I've made a provisional patent application. If my invention gets leaked at this point, an opportunist could steal it.”

“Lanny too? Did he sign?”

“Lanny?”

“Lanny Keasling, works for Fred Stavis.” Tolliver added, “The same Lanny Keasling you rescued five years ago when he hit his head and nearly drowned. You recall?”

“Of course I recall. So does he.”

Tolliver studied Flynn, as if he'd just met him. “How does that work with you, Oscar? You save his life, he owes you?”

“He pays me back.”

“Oh? You mean, working for you?”

“I mean he makes me a hero.”

Tolliver did not seem to know what to say. Nor did Walter. Nor did I. We stood there mired in wonder. I searched Flynn's face for a hint of a smile, for some sign that he was joking, but I realized that Oscar Flynn did not joke.

“And no,” Flynn added, “the Keasling boy didn't need to sign — Fred's signature covered all the hirelings.”

“All right, Oscar.” Tolliver raked his pompadour. “I still want to have a look at that paperwork you mentioned. Tie up loose ends. Why don't you bring it into the department tomorrow?”

Flynn sighed. “What time?”

“Let's say ten in the A.M. If that works for you. No earlier, for me. It's been one hell of a long day and I plan to sleep late.”

“Ten,” Flynn agreed. “I never sleep late.”

I planned to return to the lab and try to make sense out of Flynn's story — kick around some scenarios with Walter. Then grab dinner and get to bed early and, please, sleep until eight tomorrow morning, at the earliest.

I trailed Walter and Tolliver toward the glass doors. Along the way I skirted the balcony rail and glanced down into the water.

“Flood tide.”

Flynn's deep voice, way too close, almost in my ear. I would have jumped if I hadn't been weighted with fatigue.

“Look there,” he said. “One's riding the incoming.”

I saw it then, delicate little moon.

He said, “No way to tell, is there? Could be a humdrum. Could be a bad boy.”