A bride was posing for pictures on the atrium’s winding staircase, her white satin dress spilling down the stairs like a champagne fountain. At her feet, a woman wearing a mother-of-the-bride blue suit arranged the train, setting it just so. The photographer lifted his camera and my cell phone vibrated. God, I decided. He wanted DeMott to call at the exact moment I saw this.
Closing my eyes, not bothering with caller ID, I said, “Raleigh Harmon.”
“Pilot’s on his way.”
“Marvin?”
“At your service.” Marvin Larsen, our FBI agent at Sea-Tac airport.
I breathed out. “Thank you. When does he land?”
“I have no idea.”
“Pardon?”
“Raleigh, all I can tell you is, the minute that ship docks in Skagway, run for the airport. Alaska’s got weather that shifts on a blade. If the wind keeps blowing like it’s been, I can’t guarantee this pilot will wait around. He’ll take off again. With the bracelet.”
“But he’s coming?”
“Let me put it this way. He’s flying in that direction. But I’m not promising he can land in Skagway.”
We had a brief talk about Ramazan, who was under arrest for stealing the bracelet but still not talking.
“Thanks for trying, Marvin. I appreciate what you’ve done. Really. Even if that bracelet doesn’t get to Skagway, you’re still my hero.”
“Oh, gee whiz.” He was one of those tough old FBI veterans, easy to embarrass.
I promised my first priority tomorrow was the airport, and we hung up.
The bride was still standing in the same spot on the staircase. She clutched her bouquet of lilies so tightly the blossoms shook. But the woman who was presumably her mother now fussed over the brown curls that dangled beside pearl-drop earrings. The bride’s smile was as icy as Sawyer Glacier.
Standing outside my cabin, fishing for my keycard, I heard Jimmy Buffett’s voice ambling down our hallway. It was followed by a young man wearing a floppy straw hat, wasting away again in the wrong time zone. His merry face was flushed, a bottle of beer in one hand.
“The music too loud for you?” he yelled.
I shook my head.
“Good,” he yelled. “That fat egg next door keeps complaining.”
I hoped he meant Claire, not my aunt, and pushed open my door. My first step landed on a white envelope. It lay on the crimson carpet with my name written on the front. Inside, I found a brief note from York Meriweather and three pages that detailed the work schedules for Ramazan and Serif. I scanned their calls. Fix leaking toilet. Remove broken chair. Repair broken shelf. Adjust sticking door. I ran down the passenger names that called; none matched with the movie crew.
And on the night that Judy Carpenter died, Ramazan was working way down on the Highway, helping repair a busted freezer. Serif was off duty. Which meant Serif could’ve been anywhere, at any time.
“Raleigh, is that you?”
My aunt knocked on the locked door between our cabins. When I opened it, she was standing at the bureau mirror, removing her makeup. Her eyes had the lashless appearance of a white rabbit, making her look even more tired.
Claire came trundling out of the bathroom carrying a glass of water. She walked to the windowsill and began talking to the plants she’d brought on board. Some feng shui thing. But I decided that maybe she was talking to the crystals. They were lined up there too.
“Even when I’m not here, I’m thinking of you,” she told the vegetable or mineral. “And I know that noise next door bothers you.”
I glanced at my aunt.
She gave a soft shake of her head. “Really, who can say it’s wrong?”
“You want a list?” I asked.
“Raleigh . . .”
“How’s Mom?”
“Heavily sedated,” she said grimly. “She wakes up scared, the doctor gives her more drugs.”
I looked away. Jimmy Buffett sang through the walls, telling me about changes in attitudes, changes in latitudes, and Claire began humming that odd vibration. Then suddenly she stopped.
“Charlotte.” She lifted a rock. “Something’s wrong. This aquamarine. The vibration is not working anymore. Did you call the steward?”
“Twice.”
I was incredulous. “You asked the steward to fix the mineral vibration?”
“Of course not.” Aunt Charlotte leaned into the mirror, rubbing night cream on her face. “I called him about the noise next door. Claire hasn’t been able to sleep.”
Claire lifted another stone, a lighter blue. Perhaps tourmaline. “And it’s not helping that we’re this close to the Arctic Circle.”
“We’re one thousand miles from the Arctic Circle,” I pointed out.
“That’s still closer than in Seattle.” She set down the rock like it was an uncooked egg. “These are very delicate vibrations, Raleigh. If you paid attention, you would understand.”
Once more I looked at my aunt, but held my tongue. With her makeup gone, I could see the tension lining her forehead, her brows gathered with concern. A close acquaintance was dead; her sister-in-law had lost her mind; and if she hoped to work in movies, it wasn’t going well.
And she had to share a room with Claire, listening to her whine about the noise.
I decided Jimmy Buffett was right.
“Claire,” I said, changing my attitude, “why don’t you take my room?”
She turned from the windowsill, surprised. “Really?”
“It’s quieter. I haven’t heard the music.” I looked at Aunt Charlotte. “If that’s okay with you?”
Her eyes seemed moist. “I think it’s a wonderful idea.”
Bundling up the plants like babies, Claire hurried them over to my cabin. “Don’t touch the crystals,” she called out. “I’m coming back for them.”
Once she was in the other room, I whispered to my aunt, “Please tell me the steward changed the sheets today.”
Her eyes were still moist, but my aunt’s plump face dimpled with a smile. “Raleigh Ann Harmon, under all that toughness you really are a very sweet girl.”
Sleep refused to come.
It wasn’t because of the Parrotheads next door, who did indeed party all night. And it wasn’t because of Claire, whose snoring drilled through the wall like a jackhammer. I couldn’t even blame my aunt, who talked in her sleep. She talked nonsense but said it all with great urgency so it was impossible not to listen.
I tossed and turned, then finally pulled back the curtains on the window above the bed. The sky was liquid amethyst, washing over the narrow channel, heavenly hues over the snowcapped mountains.
Sitting up, I pulled on my sweats and stepped into the hall.
My watch read 12:16 am.
I walked down to the atrium where a grand piano lingered on the marble floor, its ebony beauty awaiting tomorrow’s new song. The elevator was also empty and carried me directly down to Deck Four, and when the medical clinic’s automatic doors whooshed open, the nurse who glanced up from the round desk had wide-set blue eyes and corn-silk blond hair. Apparently Nurse Stephanie had returned to her coven for the night.
I introduced myself, then said, “My mom’s in here, Nadine Harmon.” I nodded at the darkened room across from the desk.
“I’m Shannon.” She extended her hand. “And I’m sorry to tell you this, but the doctor said you’re not . . . we’re not . . .” She was too nice to finish the statement.
I nodded. “I was just wondering if I could stay in the next room, if it’s empty?”
Her frown notched the skin between her wide eyes. “The rooms are only for patients.”
I imagined Claire, snoring in my bed. “I feel sick,” I told her.
“Fever?”
“Could be. But definitely nausea.”
She snapped some paper into a clipboard. “Follow me.”
In the room next to my mom’s I lay down on the bed, feeling the vinyl mattress cover under the sheets. The nurse placed two fingers on the inside of my wrist, then stared at her watch.
“Your pulse is remarkably slow,” she said.
“I might pass out.”
“That’s just what I was thinking.” She smiled and wrote something on the form. “We can’t be too careful. There’s a bad flu going around.”
She finished quickly, then left me alone. Except for the nightlight over the emergency call button, the room was dark. The clinic’s antiseptic odors began to fade, but I could hear faint intermittent beeps coming from the room across the way, where the elderly man lay with his wife by his side. Closer, I listened as the nurse’s shoes squeaked into my mom’s room.
No words were spoken. None. The drugs kept her dreaming, or maybe she had nightmares. Nightmares about me. I held my wrist to the emergency light. Twenty minutes to 1:00 AM. In five hours the ship would dock in Skagway. A long day was ahead, as Jack pointed out. I turned on my side, drawing several deep breaths. I willed myself to sleep.
But those thoughts kept coming. And behind them, they dragged condemnation.
I lied.
I cheated and broke my code of ethics.
I broke the Bureau’s rules.
I was a bad fiancée. Maybe the worst.
In the night while everyone slept, my flaws rose up glaring and raw, refusing to leave me alone. Defeating me. At times like this, I almost understood why my aunt worshiped the earth. Human beings were filthy creatures. Filled with weaknesses and ugly imperfections, committing stupid and selfish and evil mistakes. But those polished crystals stood shining, their pristine beauty unchanging and solid. Something visibly greater. The rocks and the mountains, this ocean with its wind; I had felt the pull of their gravity.
But as I tugged the blanket to my chin, I could hear my dad’s advice, whispering in my ears.
Get to the source, Raleigh.
My passion for geology started young, with the first rock found in the backyard garden. I spent hours gazing at picture books and reading about the great catastrophic forces that created the monumental landscapes. Earthquakes and floods and meteors. Minerals and rocks. By college I’d fallen in deep with crystal axes and atomic attractions and all that stunning order and symmetry. Intoxicating to think about it. So intoxicating that one day my dad felt compelled to remind me that it would all disappear. Every rock, every hill, each stitch of order. One day the oceans would rise and the mountains bow down, and every last speck of this cherished earth would be forced to recognize true power and true majesty.
My dad didn’t want me fooled.
Get to the source, Raleigh.
Pulling the blanket over my head, I realized the most stunning part of it all. The same God who created these breathtaking landscapes listened to me now. My confession of fear. My surrender of pride, all pretense of holiness gone.
My dad was my adoptive father, and the greatest man I’ve ever known. But he was gone. And he was never coming back. That was fact.
But another father adopted me and sent his own to pay my ransom. Here under the covers, I called out his name.
I called out his name. And he heard me.
And he caught every tear.