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***
The second body washed up on a reef off Booker Lagoon on the south shore of Broughton Island in the early hours of the morning. Only the faintest glimmer of light etched the rim of the Coast Mountains when Markleson called to give Dan the news and the shrill peal of the satellite phone pulled him from a deep sleep.
After his cathartic meltdown of the previous night, he and Claire had stayed up late, talking about everything and nothing, savoring a new-found closeness. Both of them were very aware that she had to go back up to Bull Harbour and both of them wanted to delay the moment when her job would separate them again.
The lovemaking that followed the talking had been slow and sensuous, perhaps the most erotic they had ever shared. Over and over again they roused each other to fever pitch only to delay completion as long as possible.
Now, as he struggled up to consciousness, not sure what time it was but knowing that it had to be something important, he found the two of them were still tangled together, her leg draped over his thigh, her arm across his chest, her head on his shoulder.
Unbelievably she did not seem to have heard the shriek of the phone and he tried to ease himself out of the bed without disturbing her, but she woke at his first movement.
“What’s that horrible noise?” Her voice was thick with sleep as she pushed herself upright and blinked at him, her face lit by the harsh light shining through the porthole from the wharf. “Is that an alarm? Is there something wrong?”
“It’s the satellite phone,” Dan answered, already groping his way towards the wheelhouse. “Don’t worry about it. Go back to sleep.”
He heard her mutter something indistinguishable and then he was out in the companionway, the red light of the satellite receiver pulsing in time with the shrill squeal and reflecting off the walls. For a moment his sleep-addled brain thought an ambulance had managed to drive down the wharf and was parked on the float, but then reality reasserted itself although he found it hard to shake off the feeling of apprehension that had come with the image.
“Connor,” he mumbled as he lifted the microphone, still not fully awake.
“Markleson. We’ve got another body.”
Dan stared blindly out of the window into the night as the words slowly sank into his brain. Why was it, he wondered, that sounds were always louder at night: the chuckle of water against the hull, the splash of a drop of dew falling from the coach roof, the voice at the other end of the phone.
“Jimmy?”
“No. They think it’s a native man. Looks like he was a big guy. Long hair tied in a braid. No ID.”
“So one of the guys from Tsa’wit?”
“Probably, although without any information we can only assume that’s who it is. You’re going to have to go out there and talk to them. We don’t have any choice now.”
“Who found him?” The questions came easily. They were routine, but Dan was still on autopilot, not quite able to focus on what Markleson was telling him.
“Couple from Seattle. They’re up here fishing,” Markleson answered. “They’ve got an RV parked at the Quarterdeck in Port Hardy. Towed their boat up here on a trailer. They left the marina a couple of hours ago so they could be in place and ready to catch a few big ones.”
“A couple of hours ago?” Even half asleep Dan found that hard to believe. “It would’ve still been dark as hell. They would’ve had to run flat out to make it to Booker’s in that time. Hell, they would’ve been lucky not to rip the bottom off their boat on a deadhead or a rock.”
Markleson’s snort of derision was loud and clear. “Yeah, well I said they were up here fishing. I didn’t say they were smart or knew a lot about boating. We’ve already checked with a couple of their neighbors at the Quarterdeck, none of whom were happy to have been woken up that early. It sounds like this is the kind of thing this pair does pretty regularly.”
“So if it was dark when they got there, how did they find the body?” Dan’s brain was slowly starting to function again.
“They said the wife was hanging over the bow with a flashlight, making sure they weren’t too close to the rocks. There’s a pretty shallow reef there. I guess the body got wedged in at high tide and when the water went down it was exposed. Whoever it is, our guys say he’s been in the water a while. He’s not a pretty sight and it sounds like the woman is really freaked. The coast guard is bringing her back in now. The doctor is going to meet them at the wharf.”
Dan ran his hand through his hair and opened the wheelhouse door to see if the cool air would complete the job of waking him. The sky was a little lighter now and he could see movement further up the dock. It looked as if someone was loading a boat with fishing gear. More recreational fishermen heading out, these ones a little more knowledgeable, or at least more cautious, than the couple Markleson had described.
“So what do you want me to do? Sounds like you already have people at the scene.”
“I do, and they’ll be bringing the body in. The coroner wasn’t too pleased to be dragged out of bed, but he’ll be there when they arrive which should be in an hour or so. Maybe less. They’re already on their way and they’ll pick up speed with the daylight. I need you there too. Hopefully there’s enough of this guy left that we can get some kind of a description even if it’s just clothing, and then you can go over to Tsa’wit and see if you can get an ID.”
“Ah man . . .” While Dan was not fond of deskwork, or of spending hours on the telephone, there were two aspects of police work that he truly hated and autopsies were one of them. The other was notifying the family. It looked like he was going to be saddled with both.
“You don’t have to attend the autopsy. I’ll get Richardson to handle that. Just get over to the morgue so he can pass on the information he gets.”
Dan replaced the microphone and headed for the shower. At least he had been given a bit of a reprieve, but getting over to the morgue was not going to be easy. The hospital in Port McNeill was small and handled only run-of-the mill stuff. Anything more serious was sent to Port Hardy, which had a much larger facility and where there was a morgue.
To go there by boat would take far too long: the coastline at the north end of Vancouver Island was dotted with small islands, reefs and rocks that required careful navigation and a meandering course which added both miles and time to what on paper looked like a relatively short trip. Not only that but the town sat at the end of a deep bay that often experienced high winds funneled in through Goletas Channel, a narrow strip of water running all the way up to the open ocean of Queen Charlotte Strait.
The only other option was to drive. By road Port Hardy was about twenty-six miles further up the coast along a well-maintained blacktop highway, but Dan did not have a vehicle and neither did Claire. He briefly considered the local taxi, but there were only two and both were owned by a guy who believed that no one should be out later than midnight or earlier than seven in the morning so nothing would be available for at least a couple of hours. That meant Dan would have to walk up to the station and try to convince the guy on night duty to let him have a car.
He dried his hair, pulled on a clean pair of jeans and a T-shirt and went out to the galley where Claire was already making coffee.
“Sorry about that,” he said as he slid his arms around her. “I was hoping you could get back to sleep.”
He felt her shrug. “I’m an early riser anyway and it’s always good to get out before the morning rush.” She turned and looked up at him. “Bad news?”
He nodded and looked away. It was bad news. He knew he was one of those people who moved through life always believing the glass was half full and if there was no body then there was still hope. With the amount of time that had passed he had known on some level the chance of finding any of the men alive was almost nil, but he still stubbornly clung to the belief that if he kept on searching he might rescue them. It wasn’t realistic—hell, it could probably be called quixotic—but it was what drove him. The news that one of them had been found dead hit him like a personal loss. A personal failure. Even worse, it forced him to acknowledge that the others had probably met a similar fate.
“They found another body,” he said. “Looks like it might be one of the men from Tsa’wit.”
She looked at him over the rim of her cup. “So now you’ll have to go to there.”
It was more of a statement than a question.
“Seems that way. I guess they’ll call the band office and tell them I’m coming.”
She nodded. “Are you leaving right away?”
“No,” he answered. “I have to go into Port Hardy. They’re bringing the body in now and they want me there to talk to the coroner. We need something to help us figure out who he was: tattoos, clothes, jewelry. Anything that will help us get an I.D. He forced himself to smile. “How about you? Are you leaving right away?”
“Yes,” she said. “But I should be able to come back down in a few days.”
“That would be good,” he said as he pulled her to him and kissed her. Neither of them mentioned the telephone call he had planned on making.