I don’t remember falling asleep. I awoke half on the bed, half off, and took a shower. First I checked the water, smelling it, rubbing it between my fingers, then letting it run for several minutes to make sure it wouldn’t scald.
I thought my situation over pretty thoroughly and drew some grim conclusions. Someone was out to kill us, Rob and me. I was lucky to be alive. Rob . . . Not so lucky.
The brain will wander through a forest of explanations and sometimes climb the likeliest tree, however naked and ugly it is. I found my tree. Someone had poisoned the food on board the Sea Messenger—perhaps with hallucinogens. I had spent most of the voyage in my cabin and had missed my dose.
Dave Press had gotten his dose, that was clear. And Mauritz.
Mauritz had gone mad and shot up the ship.
Maybe you did speak to Mauritz. Maybe you did get your dose and forgot all about everything—including killing Dave Press.
I shook my head in a violent quiver of disgust and pounded the wall. I was still naked and wet from the shower, and my hand left a damp print on the striped wallpaper.
In the opposite room, someone pounded back and shouted for me to sober up.
I rubbed my finger inside the Mr. Coffee’s water reservoir and sniffed it, then checked the Seattle’s Best packet for pinpricks. Nothing suspicious—nothing I could see—but I decided against having coffee, anyway.
Betty Shun was involved, somehow, lying to her boss about my conversation with Mauritz. But why lie? She didn’t seem the type, didn’t seem to dislike me.
That made me wonder if the connective tissue, the center of it all, was actually Montoya, the rich god of Puget Sound.
I looked at the clock radio. One in the afternoon.
I pulled the armoire back into place, replaced the television, wiped the sweat out of my armpits with a wet washcloth, and got dressed.
Packed my bags.
Time to get the hell out of Dodge.
I opened the door, bags in hand, just as two men in suits lined up outside. The shorter and older had his hand in the air, balled into a knocking fist. He drew back, eyebrows raised, nostrils flaring. The other looked at me in some surprise and reached inside his jacket.
I watched this questing hand with somber fascination. They had guns. They had the look of sworn peace officers.
They thought I might be dangerous.
“Going somewhere?” the taller man asked, suddenly cracking a smile. To this TV cop wit, no good answer popped to mind. I stared back and lowered my suitcases.
“I’m Detective Tom Finn, Seattle Police Department, Homicide. This is Detective Keeper. Are you Henry Cousins?”
I nodded.
“Pleased to meet you, Dr. Cousins.” Finn entered the room, gave it an innocent, hands-off once-over, saw nothing that interested him (though he did bend down beside the ripped-out TV cable and go tsk), and invited me to come downtown.
Keeper helped me with my bags.
17
I’ve led a straight-and-narrow sort of life; I’ve never been arrested. No drugs, no shoplifting, no embezzlement. My worst sin has been bullheaded and egotistical stubbornness. Crime once passed me unseen in the night. I used to feel protected, even privileged. But in the last few days, I had dropped through an unseen trapdoor into a low place where nasty things happen all the time, and the police take an unwanted interest in your affairs.
If I had had any doubts about that before, I had none now.
Finn and Keeper drove me downtown and escorted me to an interrogation room at the end of a long, busy hall on the fifth floor of the Public Safety Building. The room was eight feet by twelve, pale vanilla and tan, with a sturdy wooden table and four plastic chairs. No half-silvered peep mirror, only an empty corkboard and a small, barred window. They left me alone for a few minutes while they gathered their papers. I looked around, sad and jittery, getting a headache from no breakfast.
I looked through the barred window onto a sunny stone plaza. It was dotted with courthouse workers on break, sitting cross-legged or with arms slung back on benches, reading newspapers and drinking Starbucks. Transients napped in rough but civic comfort on a miniscule triangle of lawn. The view through that window, minus the bars, was a postcard of peace and justice, if not equality, for all.
Detective Finn came back first and began with a little catch-up. “The Kitsap County Coroner just ruled Dave Press’s death an accident. He drowned. Head injuries occurred postmortem.”
Keeper entered with a can of Diet Pepsi and shoved it at me. No sugar, just caffeine to ramp up jitters. I had no idea what that meant: a little grilling, just between friends?
“Dr. Mauritz shot and killed his wife before he joined you on the Sea Messenger.”
“I didn’t know that,” I said.
“We found her last night,” Finn said. “The shipboard murders are a federal problem, but this one’s in our jurisdiction, and the FBI is giving us the reins. The questions keep piling up.”
Keeper took a seat and hunched forward like a gargoyle in a Haggar suit.
“Murder on a ship full of scientists doesn’t make sense,” Finn continued. “You were nowhere near the Sea Messenger when Mauritz started shooting. But do you have any idea why Press jumped overboard?”
“He was acting strange throughout most of the dive,” I said.
“What sort of strange?”
“Trying to swear. Erratic behavior. Finally, he got violent.”
“Some sort of rapture of the deep? Both of you, maybe?”
“Just him. I don’t know about rapture. I don’t think so.”
