The Firm

The driver shook his head.

'Good job. Here's forty bucks.' Mitch looked at his watch. 'It's almost one. Can you be here at exactly two-thirty?'

'No problem, mon.'

The road ended at the edge of the beach and became a white-rock parking area shaded by dozens of royal palms. The front building of the lodge was a large, two-story home with a tin roof and an outer stairway leading to the center of the second floor. The Grand House, it was called. It was painted a light blue with neat white trim, and it was partially hidden by bay vines and spider lilies. The hand-wrought fretwork was painted pink. The solid wooden shutters were olive. It was the office and eating room of Abanks Dive Lodge. To its right the palm trees thinned and a small driveway curved around the Grand House and sloped downward to a large open area of white rock. On each side was a group of a dozen or so thatched-roof huts where divers roomed. A maze of wooden sidewalks ran from the huts to the central point of the lodge, the open-air bar next to the water.

Mitch headed for the bar to the familiar sounds of reggae and laughter. It was similar to Rumheads, but without the crowd. After a few minutes, the bartender, Henry, delivered a Red Stripe to Mitch.

'Where's Barry Abanks?' Mitch asked.

He nodded to the ocean and returned to the bar. Half a mile out, a boat cut slowly through the still water and made its way toward the lodge. Mitch ate a cheeseburger and watched the dominoes.

The boat docked at a pier between the bar and a larger hut with the words Dive Shop hand-painted over a window. The divers jumped from the boat with their equipment bags and, without exception, headed for the bar. A short, wiry man stood next to the boat and barked orders at the deckhands, who were unloading empty scuba tanks onto the pier. He wore a white baseball cap and not much else. A tiny black pouch covered his crotch and most of his rear end. From the looks of his brown leathery skin he hadn't worn much in the past fifty years. He checked in at the dive shop, yelled at the dive captains and deckhands and made his way to the bar. He ignored the crowd and went to the freezer, where he picked up a Heineken, removed the top and took a long drink.

The bartender said something to Abanks and nodded toward Mitch. He opened another Heineken and walked to Mitch's table.

He did not smile. 'Are you looking for me?' It was almost a sneer.

'Are you Mr. Abanks?'

'That's me. What do you want?'

'I'd like to talk to you for a few minutes.'

He gulped his beer and gazed at the ocean. 'I'm too busy. I have a dive boat leaving in forty minutes.'

'My name is Mitch McDeere. I'm a lawyer from Memphis.'

Abanks glared at him with tiny brown eyes. Mitch had his attention. 'So?'

'So, the two men who died with your son were friends of mine. It won't take but a few minutes.'

Abanks sat on a stool and rested on his elbows. 'That's not one of my favorite subjects.'

'I know. I'm sorry.'

'The police instructed me not to talk to anyone.'

'It's confidential. I swear.'

Abanks squinted and stared at the brilliant blue water. His face and arms bore the scars of a life at sea, a life spent sixty feet down guiding novices through and around coral reefs and wrecked ships.

'What do you want to know?' he asked softly.

'Can we talk somewhere else?'

'Sure. Let's take a walk.' He yelled at Henry and spoke to a table of divers as he left. They walked on the beach.

'I'd like to talk about the accident,' Mitch said.

'You can ask. I may not answer.'

'What caused the explosion?'

'I don't know. Perhaps an air compressor. Perhaps some fuel. We are not certain. The boat was badly damaged and most of the clues went up in flames.'

'Was it your boat?'

'Yes. One of my small ones. A thirty-footer. Your friends had chartered it for the morning.'

'Where were the bodies found?'

'In eighty feet of water. There was nothing suspicious about the bodies, except that there were no burns or other injuries that would indicate they had been in the explosion. So I guess that makes the bodies very suspicious.'

'The autopsies said they drowned.'

'Yes, they drowned. But your friends were in full scuba gear, which was later examined by one of my divemasters. It worked perfectly. They were good divers.'

'What about your son?'

'He was not in full gear. But he could swim like a fish.'

'Where was the explosion?'

'They had been scheduled to dive along a series of reef formations at Roger's Wreck Point. Are you familiar with the island?'

'No.'

'It's around the East Bay on Northeastern Point. Your friends had never dived there, and my son suggested they try it. We knew your friends well. They were experienced divers and took it seriously. They always wanted a boat by themselves and didn't mind paying for it. And they always wanted Philip as their dive captain. We don't know if they made any dives on the Point. The boat was found burning two miles at sea, far from any of our dive sites.'

'Could the boat have drifted?'

'Impossible. If there had been engine trouble, Philip would have used the radio. We have modern equipment, and our divemasters are always in touch with the dive shop. There's no way the explosion could have occurred at the Point. No one saw it or heard it, and there's always someone around. Secondly, a disabled boat could not drift two miles in that water. And, most importantly, the bodies were not on the boat, remember. Suppose the boat did drift, how do you explain the drifting of the bodies eighty feet below. They were found within twenty meters of the boat.'

'Who found them?'

'My men. We caught the bulletin over the radio, and I sent a crew. We knew it was our boat, and my men started diving. They found the bodies within minutes.'

'I know this is difficult to talk about.'

Abanks finished his beer and threw the bottle in a wooden garbage box. 'Yes, it is. But time takes away the pain. Why are you so interested?'

'The families have a lot of questions.'

'I am sorry for them. I met their wives last year. They spent a week with us. Such nice people.'

'Is it possible they were simply exploring new territory when it happened?'

'Possible, yes. But not likely. Our boats report their movements from one dive site to the next. That's standard procedure. No exceptions. I have fired a dive captain for not clearing a site before going to the next. My son was the best captain on the island. He grew up in these waters. He would never fail to report his movements at sea. It's that simple. The police believe that is what happened, but they have to believe something. It's the only explanation they have.'

'But how do they explain the condition of the bodies?'

'They can't. It's simply another diving accident as far as they're concerned.'

'Was it an accident?'

'I think not.'

The sandals had rubbed blisters by now, and Mitch removed them. They turned and started back to the