Deadlock

from the rope and deflected Grafalk’s arm. A bullet grazed the water near me and the yacht moved away. A hatch cover blew off and a small fireball flew at the tiller.

Bit of the yacht broke off and floated past me. I seized a spar and leaned on it, kicking doggedly. My left shoulder ached from the cold.

The Brynulf continued to move away from me, her sails still catching the wind while Sandy struggled with them, finally letting them go so they hung limply. The yacht then floated in a little circle about fifteen yards from me, moved by the heat of the fire.

Grafalk appeared next to Sandy. I was close enough to see his shock of bleached white hair. He was arguing with Sandy, grabbing him. They struggled in the flickering light. Sandy wrenched himself free and leaped overboard.

Grafalk shook his arms in fury. Walking to the stern, rifle in hand, he searched the water and found me. He pointed the rifle and stood there for a long minute, sighting me. I was too frozen to dive, too frozen to do anything except move my legs mechanically up and down.

Suddenly he dropped the rifle over the side and raised his right arm in a salute at me. Slowly he walked toward the flaming tiller. Another explosion came, this one jarring my numb arms. It must have stove in the side, for the yacht began to sink.

I thought I saw Wodin, who cares nothing for murder, come for this out-of-time Viking to carry him off in his dragon-ship pyre. As the Brynulf went down a sudden gust tore loose a flaming shard from one of the sails and sent it over my head. It lit up the black fearsome water around me: Wodin was calling me. I clung to my spar, gritting my teeth.

Strange hands pulled me from the water. The spar was locked in my fingers. I was babbling of gods and dragon ships. There was no trace of the Brynulf.

29 The Long Good-bye

We sat on a stone terrace overlooking Lake Michigan. The water, pale blue under a soft summer sky, lapped gently at the sand below us. A green canvas awning protected our faces. The May day was bright and clear, although the air was cool out of the direct light of the sun. I buttoned my green serge jacket up to my chin.

Claire Grafalk inspected the brass and teak trolley. I could see a bottle of Taittinger poking over the side of a silver ice bucket. Some salmon, something that looked like a duck sliced and reassembled, and a salad were the only items I could identify without peering too greedily.

“Thank you, Karen. We can take care of ourselves.” As the stocky maid disappeared up the path toward the house, Mrs. Grafalk deftly uncorked the champagne and poured it into a tulip glass.

“I don’t drink myself, but I enjoy serving champagne-I hope you like this.”

I muttered something appreciative. She poured water for herself and handed me a plate, creamy bone china with her initials on it twined in a green and gold wreath. She was wearing a gray shirtwaist dress with a scarf neck and a strand of heavy pearls. Her high cheekbones were covered with the circles of rouge which were doll-like yet somehow elegant and endearing.

She perched her head, birdlike, on one side, eyeing me questioningly but not talking until I had filled my plate. I sipped the champagne and ate a little cold duck. Both were excellent.

“Now, I must hear what happened. The papers gave only the sketchiest accounts. What happened to Niels’s boat?”

“There was an accident in the galley and the hull caught fire.” This was the answer I had given to the police and to Murray Ryerson and I wasn’t going to change it now.

Mrs. Grafalk shook her head vigorously. “No, my dear. That won’t do. Gordon Firth, the chairman of Ajax, came to visit me two days ago with a most extraordinary story about Niels. He had a young Englishman with him, Roger Ferrant. Mr. Ferrant says you and he discovered that Niels was running Grafalk Steamship at a loss and had cause to suspect him of blowing up Martin’s ship.”

I put the champagne glass down.

“And what do you want me to tell you?”

She looked at me sharply. “The truth. I still have to deal with this matter. I am still Niels’s chief heir; I shall have to dispose of the remaining assets of Grafalk Steamship somehow. Martin Bledsoe would be the ideal person to take over the company. He and I-were good friends a number of years ago and I still have a special spot for him. But I must know the whole story before I talk to him or to my lawyers.”

“I don’t have any proof-just a chain of suggestions. Surely you don’t want to hear a lot of unsubstantiated allegations. The police or the FBI or the Coast Guard may find proof of wrongdoing. But they may well not. Wouldn’t you prefer to let the dead bury the dead?”

“Miss Warshawski. I am going to tell you something that no one besides Karen knows. I expect you to respect my privacy-but if you don’t, it doesn’t matter that much. Niels and I have lived as two neighbors for over a decade.” She fluttered small, ring-covered hands. “We gradually grew apart. It happens that way, you know. Then he became more and more obsessed by Grafalk Steamship. He couldn’t think about anything else. He was bitterly disappointed that our son wasn’t interested in the steamship company: Peter is a cellist. Our daughter is a thoracic surgeon. When it became clear that no one of his name lived to care about Grafalk Steamship, Niels removed himself emotionally from the house.

“I have paid little attention to Niels in the last several years. Nevertheless, it became quite clear to me that he was growing more and more erratic over the past eight or nine months. I invited you up here for lunch because you struck me as clever and intelligent the day we talked. I think you can tell me what Niels was doing. You were not a social acquaintance of my husband’s. I don’t believe you were his mistress-”

She paused to look at me sharply. I couldn’t help laughing, but I shook my head.

“Yes. You don’t have the look about you. Now. I want to know why you were on Niels’s boat and how it came to burn up.”

I took another swallow of champagne. If anyone had the right to know, Claire Grafalk did. I told her the whole tale, beginning with Boom Boom’s death and ending with the icy waters of Lake Michigan. I glanced at it, involuntarily shivering.

“And how did you get out? Someone rescued you?”

“Another sailboat came up. They were attracted by the fire. I don’t remember it too clearly.”

“And the evidence of Clayton’s death?”

I shook my head. “I still have the plastic pouches with his hair and the carpet scraping. I think I keep them because they give some reality to the whole episode, not because I want to use them.”

Her head was still perched on one side. She reminded me of a robin or a sparrow-not cruel, just impersonal.

“But you don’t want to prosecute?”

“I talked to Mrs. Kelvin. She’s the black woman whose husband was killed in Boom Boom’s apartment. I figure she and I are the chief mourners-Jeannine doesn’t count.” I stared unseeing out at the lake, remembering the conversation with Mrs. Kelvin. I spent two days in the hospital recovering from the shock of my near drowning; she came to see me late on the second day. We talked for a long time, about Boom Boom and Henry Kelvin, and love.

“Niels and Sandy are both dead, so there’s no one left to prosecute. Legal action against your husband’s estate would bring no pleasure, only sully the memories of two heroic men. We have no interest left.”

She didn’t say anything but nibbled with delicate energy on a petit four. I drank some more champagne. The food was excellent, but reviewing my time in Lake Michigan brought knots to my stomach. It looked so peaceful now under the May sun, but it is not a tame lake.

“The United States Government may try to prove a case against Grafalk Steamship. It will really depend on their proving that your husband engineered theft of the depth charges and all the rest of that. With Sandy and Howard Mattingly both dead, there aren’t any witnesses. And as long as he gets the Lucella floating again, Martin doesn’t want to push it too hard. I think the investigation