Breaker

Bridges pondered for several moments in silence, and it was clearly hard work. Whatever anesthetic he'd taken-cannabis, alcohol, or both-he was having trouble getting his mind into gear. 'This doesn't make sense,' he said with sudden belligerence, his eyes focusing on Campbell like two little spy cameras. 'I know for a fact Steve wasn't in Lymington on Saturday night. I saw him Friday night, and he told me he was going to Poole for the weekend. His boat was out all Saturday and Sunday, which means there's no way he could have reported a drowning in Lymington.'

'She didn't drown here, sir. She drowned off the coast about twenty miles from Poole.'

'Ah, shit!' He emptied the lager can with one swallow, then crumpled it between his fist and threw it at the beer crate. 'Look, it's pointless asking me any more questions. I don't know anything about anyone drowning. Okay? I'm a mate of Steve's, not his blasted keeper.'

Campbell nodded. 'Fair enough. So, as a mate, do you know if he has a girlfriend down here called Bibi or Didi, Mr. Bridges?'

Tony leveled an accusing finger. 'What the hell is this?' he demanded. 'Over my dead body are these routine questions. What's going on?'

The DS looked thoughtful. 'Steve isn't answering his telephone, so his agent's the only person we've been able to talk to. He told us Steve had a girlfriend in Lymington called Bibi or Didi, and he suggested we contact you for her address. Is that a problem for you?'

'To-ony!' called a drunken female voice from upstairs. 'I'm wa- aiting!'

'Too right it's a problem,' said Bridges angrily. 'That's Bibi, and she's my sodding girlfriend, not Steve's. I'll kill the bastard if he's been two-timing me.'

There was the sound of a body slumping on the floor upstairs. 'I'm going to sle-ep again, Tony!'

Carpenter and Galbraith traveled out to Crazy Daze on the harbormaster's rib-a souped-up dinghy with a fiberglass keel and a steering column- captained by one of his young assistants. The night air had become noticeably cold after the heat of the day, and both men wished they had had the sense to wear sweaters or fleeces under their jackets. A stiff breeze was funneling down the Solent, making rigging lines rattle noisily against the forest of masts in the Berthon and Yacht Haven marinas. Ahead of them the Isle of Wight crouched like a slumbering beast against the shadowy sky and the lights from the approaching Yarmouth-Lymington ferry danced in reflection across the waves.

The harbormaster had been amused by police suspicion over their fruitless attempts to raise Harding via radio or mobile telephone. 'Do the man a favor! Why should he waste his batteries on the odd chance that you lot want to talk to him? There's no shore power to boats on the buoys. He lights the saloon with a butane gas lamp-claims it's romantic-which is why he prefers a buoy in the river to a pontoon in a marina. That, and the fact that once on board the girls are dependent on him and his dinghy to get them off again.'

'Does he take many girls out there?' asked Galbraith.

'I wouldn't know. I've got better things to do than keep a tally of Steve's conquests. He prefers blonds, I know that. I've seen him with a right little stunner recently.'

'Small, curly blond hair, blue eyes?'

'Far as I recall, she had straight hair, but don't quote me on it. I'm no good with faces.'

'Any idea what time Steve's boat left on Saturday morning?' asked Carpenter.

The harbormaster shook his head. 'I can't even see it from here. Ask at the yacht club.'

'We already have. No luck.'

'Wait till the weekenders come down on Saturday then. They'll be your best bet.'

The rib slowed as it approached Harding's sloop. Yellow light glimmered in the midship portholes, and a rubber dinghy bobbed astern in the wash from the ferry. From inside came the faint sound of music.

'Hey, Steve,' shouted the harbormaster's lad, rapping smartly on the port planking. 'It's Gary. You've got visitors, mate.'

Harding's voice came faintly. 'Bog off, Gary! I'm sick.'

'No can do. It's the police. They want to talk to you. Come on, open up, and give us a hand.'

The music ceased abruptly, and Harding hoisted himself through the open companionway into the cockpit. 'What's up?' he asked, surveying the two detectives with an ingenuous smile. 'I guess this has something to do with that woman yesterday? Were the boys lying about the binoculars?'

'We've a few follow-up questions,' said Detective Superintendent Carpenter with an equally ingenuous smile. 'Can we come on board?'

'Sure.' He hopped onto the deck and reached down to assist Carpenter before turning to help his companion.

'My shift ends at ten,' the lad called to the police officers. 'I'll be back in forty minutes to take you off. If you want to leave earlier call on your mobile. Steve knows the number. Otherwise get him to bring you back.'

They watched him turn away in a wide circle, carving a gleaming wake out of the water as he headed upriver toward the town.

'You'd better come below,' said Harding. 'It's cold out here.' He was dressed-much to Galbraith's relief-in the same sleeveless T-shirt and shorts he'd been wearing the day before, and he shivered as a wind blew across the salt flats at the entrance to the river. Barefoot himself, he looked critically at the policemen's shoes. 'You'll have to take those off,' he told them. 'It's taken me two years to get the planking looking like this, and I don't want it marked.'

Obligingly, the two men unlaced their boots before padding across to the companionway in search of welcome warmth. The atmosphere inside the saloon was still redolent of the previous night's heavy drinking session, and even without the evidence of the empty whisky bottle which stood on the table, neither officer had any difficulty guessing why Harding had described himself as 'sick.' The muted light of the single gas-operated lamp served only to accentuate the hollows in his cheeks and the dark stubble around his unshaven jaw, and the brief glimpse they