Seawitch

ELEVEN

Solis led me back to the foyer with its polished wooden floor and up the stairs. He stopped at the top and glanced toward the back of the house. “The children are in the boys’ room. They should be all right until dinner. My office is in the attic; we’ll hear them if they misbehave.” I wasn’t sure he was talking to me as much as reassuring himself.

In a moment he opened the door to what I’d thought was a closet and started up a steep, narrow staircase to the attic.

The space under the roof was roughly divided by a partially finished wall that cut across near the back of the house. The much larger area in the front was plainly an artist’s studio with easels and drawing tables arranged to take maximum advantage of the light through the large dormer windows on three sides. Work in various stages of completion hung or leaned everywhere there was room. There was even a covered lump on a half pillar that I guessed was a small sculpture in progress—progress that had stopped long ago, judging by the accumulation of dust on everything. The floor was dusty, too, except for a trail leading to a door in the rough wall.

Solis unlocked the door with the ease of habit and waved me through as he stepped aside to fetch a chair from the studio.

His office was wide but shallow, taking up the whole width of the house at the back, but only eight feet or so of the depth. Unlike the studio, his office had only one dormer window and that was partially shaded by a huge old tree in the backyard. His desk—a pair of cheap folding banquet tables set at a right angle—took up the area under the large dormer. Piles of cardboard and plastic file boxes and a few battered two-drawer steel filing cabinets took up some of the remaining space on the floor at each side, but most of the area was empty. The walls, on the other hand, were covered with papers and photos so numerous it was difficult to see the surface on which they were pinned. I even saw scraps of fabric and small objects in plastic bags pinned, clamped, or tied among the pages. Various lamps stood here and there or were fixed to the table edges and exposed joists. I stared at it all, turning slowly, with the bell in its canvas sack swinging gently against my knees.

Where my office was carefully buttoned up—all files and notes put away and hidden from clients’ eyes—Solis’s private space was like a murder board for a serial-killer investigation. It looked as if every case he’d ever worked haunted the walls with paper ghosts.

He watched me until I stopped to blink at him, amazed and stunned. He gave a half shrug and quirked one corner of his mouth. “My wife’s family has their madness. I have mine.” He removed his coat and suit jacket and hung them on a hook at the back of the door before holding his hand out for my own coat. I gave it to him and he placed it on top of his. Then he turned back into the room and his close-hugging energy corona flushed a bright gold color as he seemed to brace himself or change mental gears. “Now let us take another look at the bell,” he added, dragging the spare chair up to the desk.

I followed him and he removed a small pile of file folders to a box on the floor to make room for our prize. I put the bag on the table and pulled out the bell, keeping it over the bag to contain any glop we’d missed earlier. Solis pulled one of the lights down closer and drew up the desk chair beside the other one. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket—I didn’t think anyone actually carried them anymore—and wiped the bell with care, clearing water and the last of the embedded goop off the engraving.

The bell was made of bronze all through as far as we could see, but nothing new was revealed by the wiping, except a small loop on the top for a lanyard to be threaded through. The lettering still read S.S. VALENCIA and nothing more.

Solis frowned in thought, murmuring, “Valencia. So, whatever the neighbor, Mr. Francis, thought he heard, it most likely was not about shipwrecks in Spain,” he added, shooting me a sly look from the corner of his eyes.

“Maybe the wreck of Valencia,” I suggested.

Solis nodded his head a bit, but I wasn’t sure he was conscious of it. “Ghosts . . .” he muttered, keeping his eyes on the bell. His aura pulled down to a thin line of cold blue for a moment. Then he abruptly swung the chair around and scooted it to face his computer, a boxy old desktop machine that squatted like an electronic gargoyle on the corner where the two tables met. He clacked away with his ancient keyboard and mouse and the printer made some grunting noises. “I’ll start printing the other case files while we search for Valencia,” he said, barely glancing up.

He didn’t touch-type comfortably, looking down several times even though his fingers were hitting the right keys most of the time. In a minute or so the browser coughed up a Google search; all the visible listings related to a steamship named Valencia that had been wrecked in 1906. We read through the top six articles, including a Wikipedia entry and one from HistoryLink.org that revealed a grim story:

On January 20, 1906, the passenger steamer Valencia had left San Francisco heading for Seattle. It was standing in for another ship that had been dry-docked for repairs, but though the Valencia was a little older and of a less-hardy design, it was thought to be up to the task. On the night of January 22, Valencia attempted to enter the Strait of Juan de Fuca in the teeth of a storm that quickly proved to be more than the ship could weather and the steamer’s hull was gashed open on unseen rocks. Water gushed into the interior compartments—most of which were not watertight—and the boat was in danger of sinking. The captain tried to turn and beach the ship safely, but the stern ran up, not on soft sand but on a rocky reef along the southwest coast of Vancouver Island. Valencia was trapped on the rocks below a cliff twenty miles north of the strait and unable to move in any direction or safely put out the lifeboats—of which there weren’t enough to save everyone, anyhow.

The fierce storm beat at the ship without mercy and began to tear into the structure. Abandoning everything in the cabins and holds below, everyone on board—most still clad in their nightclothes—huddled on deck or in the stern cabins that were still dry and whole. At the first break in the storm the captain attempted to put the women and children ashore in six of the seven lifeboats, with two men per boat to row, but as the men left on board watched in horror, the tiny wooden boats were capsized by waves or crushed on the rocks, killing all aboard them, save nine of the men, who made landfall alive. The nine climbed to the cliff tops, but in the slashing rain they turned the wrong way and wandered away from the lighthouse that could have saved them. On the ship the remaining men climbed into what still stood of the rigging, trying to keep out of the raging surf that battered the crumbling vessel to pieces.

The last lifeboat was finally put down with just three men aboard, under instructions to reach the cliff top and drop a line to the boat so the remaining passengers and crew might climb to safety. This time the boat reached land and the men found a sign directing them to the lighthouse. Abandoning their instructions, they walked for two and a half hours to the lighthouse, where they were finally able to call for aid to save Valencia’s surviving men. But even when help arrived, many of the boats were unable to safely draw close enough to the sinking steamer to remove anyone and had to turn away. Some of the remaining men of the Valencia were rescued by the responding boats, but not all, and when another party arrived on the cliff with ropes to haul the last ones up, the ship broke apart and sank before their eyes, taking several dozen men, who clung to the rigging, to their deaths. They had weathered two days in the storm, watching their fellow passengers and crew die and their ship tear away and sink in pieces beneath them, seen others rescued, but not them. . . . Of the men, women, and children who had been aboard when Valencia left San Francisco, only thirty-seven men survived.

The stories differed as to how many people perished in the tragedy—maybe 117, possibly 136 or 181, since records didn’t include children or late-arriving passengers who paid when they boarded—but of the unknown total who boarded, not a single child or woman had survived. Twenty-seven years later the Valencia’s lifeboat number 5 was found adrift in a cove nearby. The nameplate was preserved in a museum, but the rest of the ill-fated steamer was left to her grave on the rocks below Pachena Point.

The wrecking of the Valencia was later dubbed America’s Titanic and was accounted to be the worst peacetime shipping disaster in North American history. And we had found its bell hidden in the engine room of another ill-fated boat.

Solis leaned back in his chair and tapped his lower lip with his right index finger. “What connects them?” he murmured, capturing my own thoughts as well. “How did the bell from one come to be in the engine room of the other?”

“I can’t imagine. Seawitch wasn’t a salvage vessel and there’s no record of any diving equipment on board, so they didn’t go out to explore the wreck. Almost eighty years apart, totally different types of vessels coming from opposite directions . . .”

“Both were in or near the Strait of Juan de Fuca when they were last seen.”

“That’s not much to start with,” I said. “Seawitch was heading up to the San Juan Islands, but it’s a big area inside the strait and we don’t know for certain that the boat ever made it out of the south sound.”

“Perhaps the pages from the log will say,” Solis suggested.

I didn’t turn to watch him, taken by a stray thought. “Did you notice that the last lifeboat was found twenty-seven years after Valencia sank?”

“I had not, but it is an odd coincidence that the Seawitch also returned after twenty-seven years lost. Do you have any suggestions about what that means?”

I had to shake my head. “No.”

Solis looked unhappy and turned to pick up the sheets that had been spilling out of the old printer while we’d been reading about the wreck of the Valencia.

The first document he picked up was nothing but text and he started to put it aside. I took it from his hand and looked it over.

“Odile Carson’s death reports. I’d almost forgotten about her.”

“I thought it best to be certain of what happened. It seems unlikely, but if hers was not an accident, it would link the Seawitch definitively to a homicide—which is my area of investigation.”

“That would keep you on the case.”

He nodded. “For a while.”

“But if not, then would you be able to close the case at your end?”

“No. There would still be the matter of the blood and the condition of the boat’s interior. If there is a link in that to a major crime, the case will remain with me.”

“Unless there’s something in the log pages to give us a clue, the only lead we have on the condition of the Seawitch may be this bell,” I said. “The connection to the Valencia—if we can figure it out—is unlikely to be admissible evidence of a major crime. I mean, there is something going on, but it might not be . . . solid enough to force you to remain on this case.”

Solis cocked his head. “Force?”

“Yes. I think you can wiggle off this hook pretty easily as long as Odile Carson’s death wasn’t a homicide.” I reached again for the report.

Solis put his hand over mine, holding it down on top of the pages. “One moment, Blaine. You believe I’ve been forced onto this case and want to ‘wiggle’ out of it?”

“Well, I assumed so.”

“Why?”

I drew away to sit back in my chair and shrugged at him. “You hate mysteries and you especially hate this sort of case full of coincidence, unexplainable circumstances, and, frankly, the weird crap that lands on my desk.”

“I requested the case.”

That stopped me cold and I blinked at him, puzzled and frowning.

Solis graced me with a tiny smile. “My captain made the same expression.”

“I imagine so,” I replied. And though it sounded incredibly stupid, I added, “But why?”

“I have heard,” Solis said, looking down at his hands, “that a definition of insanity is continuing to do as you have always done while expecting a different result. Here I saw a case that could not help but fall into your hands and I thought I might learn something if I observed it from within—if I approached the mystery from a new angle: yours. I don’t find myself liking the sensation—I don’t believe I ever shall—but am finding it . . . illuminating.” He glanced up and I could’ve sworn his eyes sparkled. “And why should I inflict your . . . affinity for the bizarre on some innocent policeman?”

I snorted and started to reply, but found myself lurching forward and gasping as a spurt of fight-or-flight adrenaline shot through me. My chest felt hollow and battered as my heart rate accelerated like a sprinter from a standing start. This wasn’t my emotion. . . .

Solis reached for me in concern and I shook him off, forcing myself up to my feet, trembling as I fought off the sensation with long breaths. “I’m fine,” I gasped at him. “I’m fine.” I fumbled in my pocket and clutched my cell phone.

I brought out the suddenly slippery thing, turning it on as I did, and started poking in a message as fast as my shaking fingers could manage. Damn Quinton’s security paranoia that favored dumb pagers over smartphones. I tapped one last key and sent the “Call me now” code and wished we had established one for “What the hell was that?”

“Are you certain?” Solis asked, and for a moment I wasn’t sure what he meant, but I nodded, confirming that I was all right.

“Yeah.” I offered no explanation and he continued to watch me, niggling threads of curious yellow and anxious green leaking into the Grey around him. “Let’s just . . . get back to the case in hand,” I suggested, putting my phone on the desk as I sat back down. My heart rate was sliding back to normal already, but I’d be happier once I heard from Quinton.

Solis scowled at me for a moment and I almost laughed. It was like old times. He shook it off and took the autopsy report from under my hand. “I will read this, since it is a past case and department property. You review the log pages.” He moved his chair aside so I could park mine in front of the monitor and flip through the digital images from the log book. I appreciated the distraction.

The log entries were mostly dull and out of order. Some of the pages hadn’t been salvageable and others were still unavailable, but I read through a few, including a couple with some diary-style notes courtesy of Gary Fielding, including one that referred to a “strange feeling” he had whenever he was near Shelly Knight. I wondered if that was an actual sensation or an emotion. I clicked onto the next page and found an entry that read in part, “Carson totally flipping out about his wife—”

“Odd,” I muttered.

“What?” Solis asked, looking up from his reading of the Odile Carson death report.

“There’s an entry here that mentions Odile . . .” I replied.

“Is the date June nineteenth?”

I peered hard at the image and increased the size on the screen, but it didn’t help. “It’s hard to be sure, but, no, it looks like the eighteenth.”

“That is the day before Mrs. Carson’s body was discovered.” He scowled.

“When did she die?”

“The night of the eighteenth. What more does the passage say?”

“It’s very smeared, but what I think it says is that Les got into an argument with . . . someone . . . after dinner and then . . . he wanted a record that he had been on board continuously since they left port. Fielding’s note says, ‘This is to affirm . . .’ There’s a further note about fishing—making a change of plan to go fishing at . . . Port Townsend. Then it appears that Les Carson received a call via the radio about Odile’s death . . . but when isn’t recorded here that I can see, and the next page seems not to have been salvaged.”

Solis paged through the report and found a call log. “June nineteenth at eleven forty-four a.m. A call was made to Seawitch via the radio telephone service for the purpose of notifying next of kin.”

I closed my eyes, slightly nauseated by the idea. “The log says they were going to stop at Roche Harbor that day . . . but there’s no record in the insurance report that they did. It looks like Les Carson knew his wife was dead before she died. . . . And Seawitch went missing later that day without making port or being reported in trouble by any other boat or either coast guard. What the hell happened? Did Les Carson kill his wife and use the trip as an alibi?”

Solis shook his head. “The timing is impossible, and Mrs. Carson killed herself.”

“Really?”

“The medical examiner is very clear. Mrs. Carson left a note and the disposition of the body was consistent with suicide by electrocution in water.” I thought I saw him shudder before he added, “She was thorough in guaranteeing her death.”

“Could it have been murder for hire?” I suggested.

Solis shook his head, rolling his eyes. “It is my experience that the clever professional assassin exists principally in the minds of thriller authors and Hollywood scriptwriters. Those who kill strangers for money rather than the satisfaction of their own psychotic impulses are most frequently violent thugs with criminal records and the minds of twisted children.”

I almost smiled at his vehemence. “So . . . not a fan of Barry Eisler’s novels, I’m guessing.”

He gave an amused snort that didn’t quite bloom into a laugh. Then he shook off the moment and looked back down at the report. “It appears that the coroner certified the death as ‘misadventure,’ in spite of the autopsy and scene investigation.”

“Maybe the family brought pressure to keep the suicide ruling out of the public record,” I suggested.

He nodded. “Possible. No city is perfectly without corruption.”

“Seattle’s built on it.” I would have said more, but my phone rang, jiggling across the surface of the folding table where I’d left it to fall onto the floor near my original position. I dove for it as the office door opened and a small brown face peeped through the gap.

“Blaine,” I barked as I answered the phone, falling onto my shoulder on the floor and trying to keep an eye on the newcomer at the same time.

“Papa?” the face asked.

“Sí, Mario?”

The little boy started in Spanish, then switched to English after Solis frowned at him. “Mama says dinner’s ready and Grandmama came out of her room again. But she’s OK now.”

Solis nodded. “We will be downstairs in a moment. Tell your mama we’ll wash up first. Just like you.”

“Sí, Papa.”

Mario withdrew his head and closed the door gently. I couldn’t hear him leave over the sound in my ear from the phone.

“Harper!” Quinton yelled over the sound of traffic, “I’m sorry. I’m at a pay phone in downtown. It’s really loud here.”

“I can tell. What happened earlier?”

“When earlier?”

I checked my watch. “About forty minutes ago. I felt something.”

Quinton didn’t reply for a moment and only the sound of cars on the street filled my ear. Finally he spoke. “I saw someone from the past. He shouldn’t be here and he wants me to do something I can’t agree to.”

“I understand. Are you OK?”

“I am now. I . . . I’ll tell you the rest later. Here and now is not good.”

“I’m with Solis at his place—we’re going over files. Do you need me to meet you somewhere soon?”

“No. Whenever you’re done, page me. I’ll come home then. I want to stay out here until the last minute. Just in case.”

“If it’s that past, then they already know who I am and where I live, if they want to find you.”

“Yeah, but . . . humor me.” Then he cut the connection.

Goody. More fun and games dodging Quinton’s scary ex-boss.

Solis lifted an inquisitive eyebrow as I put my phone back into my pocket.

“Boyfriend trouble,” I said.

He grunted and made a lifted half nod with his chin. “Do you need to leave?”

“Not yet. I’d like to get through this paperwork while we can. Qu— he’ll be all right.”

“I’m sure he will.” He stood up and put the death report back into a neat, squared-off pile on the table before motioning for me to follow him. I went along and I noticed that he paused to lock the office door behind us as we left.