He paid the check and they left the cafe. Downstairs, in the tavern, Brad saw that the checker game seemed not to have progressed at all. One of the old men stared intently at the board, the other out the window. If either of them noticed the Randalls neither gave a sign.
“Let’s look around the wharf,” Brad suggested, as they came out into the sunlight.
Most of the slips were empty, but five or six fishing boats were still tied up, with men working on them, repairing nets, tinkering with engines, inspecting equipment. They walked the length of the wharf, pausing to inspect each boat as they passed it. No one spoke to them, and once, when Brad offered a tentative “hello,” there was no response.
“They don’t talk much, do they?” Elaine observed as they neared the end of the pier.
“Odd, isn’t it?” Brad replied. “Apparently the image of the happy fisherman hasn’t reached Clark’s Harbor yet.” He glanced around as if unsure what to do next. “Shall we go for a ride?”
Before Elaine could answer him there was a blast of a siren and a police car pulled up to the wharf. From the driver’s side a barrel-chested man of about sixty emerged, then circled the car to open the door for a heavyset woman. She got out of the car, one hand clutching the police officer’s arm, the other holding onto a crumpled handkerchief.
All activity on the wharf came to a halt as the men on the boats stared at the new arrivals.
“Something wrong, Chief?” a voice called.
“Something’s always wrong when Harney Whalen comes to the wharf,” another voice shouted.
Police Chief Harney Whalen didn’t acknowledge the second voice, but chose instead to answer the first.
“Don’t know,” he called out. “Miriam Shelling here can’t seem to find Pete. Any of you guys seen him?”
There were negative murmurings among the fishermen, and they began leaving their boats to gather around the chief. Miriam Shelling still clung to Whalen and dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief.
“He went out last night,” she said, looking from one of the men to another, then another, her eyes never resting for long on any single face. “He said he’d be back about four o’clock this morning, but he never came in.”
One of the fishermen nodded in agreement. “Yeah, he was right behind me when I went out last night, but he didn’t come back in when I did. He’s probably found a school and wants to get all he can.”
Miriam Shelling shook her head. “He wouldn’t do that,” she insisted. “He’d know I’d be worried. He’d at least have called me on the radio.”
The men exchanged glances among themselves. Harney Whalen looked uncomfortable, as if he was wondering what to do next, when the silence was broken by the blast of an air horn. Everyone turned toward the harbor, where a small launch was speeding toward the wharf. Miriam Shelling’s fingers tightened on the police chief’s arm.
The launch pulled up into one of the empty slips and a line was tossed out, caught, and tied to a cleat. A man leaped from the small boat, his face pale. He looked quickly around, his eyes coming to rest on Harney Whalen.
“Are you a policeman?”
“I’m the chief,” Whalen said. “Something the matter?”
The man nodded. “I found a boat drifting out there. When I hailed it there wasn’t any response, so I went aboard. The boat was deserted.”
“Where is it?” Whalen asked.
“It’s anchored about a mile north, maybe three hundred yards out,” the man said. “It’s called the
“That’s Pete’s boat,” Miriam Shelling cried. The man stared at her for a moment, then pulled Whalen a few feet away. When he spoke again his voice dropped low.
“Its nets were out,” he said softly. “I decided to pull them in. And they weren’t empty.”
Whalen glanced quickly at Miriam, then back to the stranger.
“A body?”
The man nodded. “I brought it back with me.”
Whalen moved to the launch and stepped down into it. The fishermen crowded around as Whalen pulled back the tarpaulin that lay bundled in the stern. Pete Shelling’s vacant eyes stared up at them.
Ten yards away the Randalls watched as the fishermen reacted to the death. They stared mutely down into the boat, then one by one began drifting away, as if somehow embarrassed to be in the presence of death. They passed Miriam Shelling silently, offering her neither a word nor a gesture of comfort. When they were gone and only Harney Whalen and the owner of the launch remained, Miriam finally stepped forward and peered down at her husband. She froze for a moment, then wailed his name and threw herself into Harney Whalen’s arms. He held her for a moment, then spoke quietly to the man who had brought Pete Shelling home. Finally he led Miriam Shelling from the wharf, helped her back into the police car, and drove her away.
“My God,” Elaine breathed softly. “How awful.”
Brad nodded, his eyes still fixed on the wharf. Elaine grasped his arm.
“Let’s get out of here,” she said. “Please?”
Brad seemed not to hear her. “Did you notice?” he asked. “It was almost as if nothing had happened. They didn’t speak to her, they didn’t speak to each other, they didn’t ask any questions, they didn’t even seem surprised. It was almost as if they were expecting it.”
“What?” Elaine asked blankly.
“The fishermen. They didn’t react to that man’s death at all. It was almost as if they were expecting it, or it didn’t have anything to do with them — or something. But what happened to him could happen to any of them.”
Elaine looked carefully at her husband. She knew what was coming. She tried to head it off.
“Let’s leave, Brad,” she said. “Please? I don’t like Clark’s Harbor.” But it was too late, and she knew it.
“It’s fascinating,” Brad went on. “Those men didn’t react like normal people at all. Not at all.” He took Elaine’s hand and squeezed it.
“Come on,” he said, “let’s find that inn.”
“We’re staying?” Elaine asked.
“Of course.” Brad grinned. “What else?”
Elaine felt a twist of fear deep in her stomach and forced it away, telling herself it was unreasonable. But deep inside, the fear remained, unreasonable or not.
Far out on the horizon, a storm was gathering.
3
The Harbor Inn, its Victorian facade painted a fresh white with sky-blue trim, perched almost defiantly in the center of a neatly tended lawn. It gazed suspiciously out over the water, as if it expected the sea to snatch it away at any second. From a room on the second floor Elaine Randall stared at the sea in unconscious imitation of the inn. She listened to the wind whistle under the eaves of the old building and marveled that the fishing boats, secured against the growing storm, rode so easily in the choppy water of the bay. As rain began to splash against the window she turned to her husband.
“I suppose it will do for one night,” she said doubtfully, glancing around the room. Brad grinned at her.
“You love it and you know you love it,” he chuckled. “If it hadn’t been for that drowning, you’d be happy as a clam.”
Elaine sat down heavily in the slipcovered wing chair that filled one corner of the small room and tried to analyze her feelings. She knew Brad was right: if they hadn’t been on the wharf when that man’s body had been brought in, she would now be raving about the room, raving about the town, and excitedly planning to spend a year here. But the fisherman’s death had drained her enthusiasm, and now she looked bleakly at the antique furnishings of the equally antique inn and found herself unable to muster any positive thoughts at all.
“It’s run-down,” she said sourly.
