Plum Island

The ferry passed through Plum Island Gut, and I could see the Orient Point Lighthouse on the right. To the left, the old stone Plum Island Lighthouse was dark and forbidding against the night sky.

The Gut was choppy, and Emma remarked, 'That storm's tracking this way. The seas get rough long before the weather moves in.' She added, 'Also, the barometer drops. Can you feel it?'

'Feel what?'

'The falling air pressure.'

'Uh…' I stuck my tongue out. 'Not yet.'

'I can feel it. I'm very weather sensitive.'

'Is that good or bad?''

'I think it's a good thing.'

'So do I.'

'Are you sure you can't feel it? Don't your wounds ache a little?'

I focused on my wounds and sure enough, they did ache a little. I said to Emma, 'Thanks for bringing it to my attention.'

'It's good to get in touch with your body, to understand the relationships between the elements and your body and mind.'

'Absolutely.'

'For instance, I get a little crazy during a full moon.'

'Crazier,' I pointed out.

'Yes, crazier. How about you?'

'I get very horny.'

'Really? During a full moon?'

'Full moon, half-moon, quarter-moon.'

She laughed.

I glanced at Plum Island as we passed by. I could see a few channel lights and, on the horizon, a glow from where the main lab would be behind the trees. Otherwise, the island was as dark as it had been three hundred years ago, and if I squinted I could imagine William Kidd's sloop, the San Antonio, reconnoitering the island one July night in 1699. I could see a boat being lowered off the side with Kidd and maybe one or two others aboard, and I could see someone in the boat rowing toward the shore…

Emma interrupted my thoughts and asked me, 'What are you thinking?'

'Just enjoying the night.'

'You were staring at Plum Island.'

'Yes… I was thinking about… the Gordons.'

'You were thinking about Captain Kidd.'

'You must be a witch.'

'I'm a good Methodist and a bitch. But only once a month.'

I smiled. 'And you're weather sensitive.'

'That's right.' She asked me, 'Are you going to tell me any more about this… this murder?'

'No, I'm not.'

'All right. I understand. If you need anything from me, just ask. I'll do whatever I can to help.'

'Thanks.'

The ferry approached the slip, and she asked me, 'Do you want to stay at my place tonight?'

'Well… I do, but… I should go home.'

'I can stay at your place.'

'Well… to tell you the truth, I was supposed to talk or to meet with Detective Penrose today, and I should see if I can sfill do that.'

'All right.'

And we left the matter there.

I dropped her off at her home. I said to her, 'I'll see you tomorrow after work.'

'Good. There's a nice restaurant on the water that I'd like to take you to.'

'Looking forward to it.' We kissed on her doorstep, and I got into my Jeep and drove home.

There were seven messages for me. I was in no mood for them and went to bed without playing them. They'd be there in the morning.

As I drifted off, I tried to figure out what to do about Fredric Tobin. There's sometimes this situation when you have your man, yet you don't have your man. There is a critical moment when you have to decide if you should keep stalking him, confront him, smoke him out, or pretend to lose interest in him.

I should have also been thinking that when you corner an animal or a man, he can become dangerous-that the game is played by both hunter and hunted, and that the hunted had a lot more to lose.

But I forgot to consider Tobin as a thinking, cunning animal because he struck me as such a fop, the same way I'd struck him as a simpleton. We both knew better, but we'd both been lulled a little bit by each other's act. In any event, I blame myself for what happened.

CHAPTER 29

It was raining Monday morning when I woke up, the first rain we'd had in weeks, and the farmers were happy even if the vintners were not. I knew at least one vintner who had bigger problems than a heavy rain.

As I dressed, I listened to the radio and heard that a hurricane named Jasper was off the coast of Virginia, causing unsettled weather conditions as far north as New York 's Long Island. I was glad I was driving back to Manhattan today.

I hadn't been to my Seventy-second Street condo in over a month, and I hadn't accessed my answering machine messages either, partly because I didn't want to, but mostly, I guess, because I forgot my access code.

Anyway, at about nine a.m., I went downstairs dressed in designer jeans and polo shirt and made coffee. I was sort of waiting for Beth to call or come by.

The local weekly was on the kitchen counter, unread from Friday, and I was not too surprised to see last Monday's murder on the front page. I took the paper out on the back porch with a mug of coffee and read the local hotshot reporter's version of the double murder story. The guy was imprecise enough, opinionated-enough, and was a bad enough stylist to write for Newsday or the Times.

I noticed an article about Tobin Vineyards in which Mr. Fredric Tobin was quoted as saying, 'We will begin the harvest any day now, and this promises to be a vintage year, perhaps the best in the last ten years, barring a heavy rain.'

Well, Freddie, it's raining. I wondered if condemned men are allowed to request wine with their last meal.

Anyway, I threw the local weekly aside and picked up Emma's gift, The Story of Pirate Treasure. I flipped through it, looked at the pictures, saw a map of Long Island, which I studied for a minute or so, then found the chapters on Captain Kidd and read at random a deposition of Robert Livingston, Esq., one of Kidd's original financial backers. The deposition read in part,

That hearing Capt. Kidd was come into these parts to apply himself unto his Excellency, the Earl of Bellornont, the said Narrator came directly from Albany ye nearest way through the woods to meet the said Kidd here and wait upon his Lordship. And at his arrival at Boston, Capt. Kidd informed him there was on board his Sloop then in Port, forty bales of Goods, and some Sugar, and also said he had about eighty pound weight in Plate. And further the said Kidd said he had Forty pound weight in Cold which he hid and secured in some place in the Sound betwixt this and New York, not naming any particular place, which nobody would find but himself.

I did a little math in my head and figured that forty pounds of gold would be worth about three hundred thousand dollars, on the hoof, so to speak, not counting whatever historical value or numismatic value it would