From where we rested, I had a good view of Randolph's Ranger. The landing float at the back was still out, and the speedboat rode at a short tether beside it. It didn't look like they were going anywhere soon. On the deck occasionally a figure in white moved, circling the deck slowly without any apparent mission. All the action was belowdecks.
The minutes continued to crawl past, pushing huge boulders ahead of them. The sun remained overhead it seemed forever, making no movement toward the west, getting no closer to the rim of the Pacific, hovering overhead while I waited.
Once, late in the afternoon, the speedboat made a wake-curling run back into the shack for more ice, but that was all. The gulls bobbed patiently on the dull blue water. We hung motionless, in suspended animation, off the southern point of Fair Harbor until finally, as I was about to pass my ninety-fifth birthday, the sun disappeared, in fact quite suddenly, behind the horizon and darkness began.
***
When it was as dark as it was going to get, we got the skiff into the water and Blondie got in to row me across.
'He'll wait around, near where he puts you aboard,' Mars said. 'He'll be there when you're ready to come back.'
'Can he row?' I said.
Blondie paid no attention to me. He was in the skiff with his hands resting on the oars.
'Blondie's good,' Mars said. 'Don't underestimate him.'
'Sure he is, so am I. I'll go over, dance two numbers with Simpson, and be back with Carmen. They'll think pirates boarded.'
'How long before we come in and get you?' Mars said.
'Use your judgment. But give me some time. Simpson has a private army everywhere he travels and you may not have enough firepower.'
Mars smiled his bleak smile at me.
'We'll see, soldier. We'll see.'
I climbed down into the stern of the skiff and Blondie pulled easily on the oars and we slid quietly over the dark still water toward the yacht.
CHAPTER 31
It was not as dark as I would have liked. The stars were bright and a nearly full moon loomed over the black water and the motionless yacht. Blondie pulled the skiff expertly up against the landing platform. I could hear the faint sounds of what sounded like it might be revelry, though it could have been an ax murder in progress. The voices were indistinct. The calm water lapped gently against the hull of the yacht. I could hear nothing else. No sounds of sentries on the deck. I stepped out of the skiff onto the float, and Blondie pulled away without comment. I felt the reassuring weight of the gun in my shoulder holster, then moved softly up the ladder toward the deck. It was a balmy night, with just enough coolness stirring off the ocean to make everything fresh. The deck seemed empty when I stepped on it, but I knew I had seen someone in a sailor suit earlier, and I stayed motionless behind a bulkhead and listened. Only the sound of the water and the faint human voices from below. I waited. The rigging creaked faintly. Looking off toward Mars' cabin cruiser, I saw nothing. It was sitting with no lights, behind the point. I couldn't see Blondie in the skiff. From below I heard kind of a pealing giggle, much higher pitched than the other sounds, that had a chilling quality to it, like the shriek of someone wailing for her demon lover. Carmen! On deck suddenly I heard the gentle scuff of feet wearing sneakers. And then I saw him, in a white sailor suit, wearing a web belt, with a regulation side-arm. Just like the real Navy except for the sneakers. A little sleepy, bored with the endless circuit of the boat, he went by me without seeing me and continued on along the deck toward the bow. I went aft toward a hatchway and reached it and was inside, quicker than the passing of youth.
Below, the sound of people talking came more clearly, and I could hear the clink of tableware. I went down another step, and then another, until I could see the corridor that ran, apparently, from bow to stern with compartments opening off of it. At the foot of the stairs, slightly forward, a compartment door was open and from there I heard the sound of voices. I went down the rest of the way and tried the knob on the compartment next door. It turned easily and when I stepped into the dark room I knew it was empty. An empty room feels different. It was as I'd hoped. Like many boats, ventilation grates were installed near the ceiling, connecting one room to another, relieving the closeness of belowdecks confinement with a little air circulation. The grate was open. I pulled a chair over and stood on it and looked through.
They were all assembled, Bonsentir, Carmen Sternwood, and a tall, soft-looking guy with a lot of curly hair and big horn-rimmed glasses, who had to be Randolph Simpson. They were seated on cushions on the floor, gathered around a low table with an engraved brass top, eating with their fingers. What they were eating appeared to be some sort of grain with fruit mixed in. It looked messy to eat with your fingers, but none of them seemed to care. Carmen was wearing loose silk trousers and a silk figured top that left her middle uncovered. She didn't from where I was standing appear to have a jewel in her navel. She ate with one hand and with the other twirled wisps of Simpson's hair and then untwirled them. Clever girl, our Carmen. Never at a loss to be entertaining. She wore no shoes and her toenails had been painted blue. Occasionally she would stop twirling Simpson's hair long enough to feed a small morsel to a yellow tiger kitten who would lick her fingers eagerly each time and then be disappointed in what he found and sit back and meow. Simpson wore a flowered shirt hanging outside of white duck pants. Bonsentir wore the same white linen suit I'd seen when he left Resthaven this morning. He leaned across the table and poured some reddish liquid into Carmen's glass from a crystal flagon. She drank some and giggled.
Her eyes were very wide and almost all pupil. And there was a sick bubbly sound to the giggle that went very well with the faint medicinal smell that drifted through the vent from the room. There were silk brocade hangings around the room and a bunch of flowering plants in big pots here and there. Simpson was staring at Bonsentir, and it was his voice that I heard, deep and full of overtones, like a B-movie version of God speaking from the clouds.
'You are too powerful, Randolph, he can't touch you. No one can. We can go on with our life as we have.'
Simpson gazed at him like the extras in ill-fitting sandals and moth-eaten robes would have looked at God in the B-movie. He drank some of the reddish liquid from his glass. Carmen scooped some rice and fruit off the platter with the first three fingers of her right hand and shoveled it into Simpson's mouth. He swallowed most of it, let a little of it dribble onto his shirt. Carmen wiped it away with a cerise silk napkin. And fed a crumb to the eager kitten.
'He won't stop,' Simpson said. 'He keeps coming around, asking questions. He found the old mine.'
