A Beautiful Place to Die (11 page)

There were a couple of dozen four-by-fours down at the point. I stopped at the right-hand end of the line. I kicked off my sandals and Zee climbed into her waders and we went to work. Her casts were straight and getting longer. I caught fish and she didn't. She didn't give up, though. After a while, I went over to her.

She had a disgusted look on her face. “I can't get out to them. They're beyond my cast. I can't throw half as far as you and the rest of these guys.”

“You're doing fine. Try my rod. It's graphite. The latest thing. Its action is different from yours, but once you get it down you'll add several yards to your cast.”

“But what'll you use?”

“Here. Just try it.”

“All right.”

She threw the plug straight up the first time and into the surf at her feet the next.

“Great, huh?” She laughed, shaking her head.

Using her rod, I made three casts. On the third, about two turns of the reel in, the rod bent. I set the hook and
turned to her. “This is your fish. You want to bring him in?”

“Bring in your own fish, Jefferson!” She was getting the feel of the graphite. I landed my fish and watched her as I took the plug out of its mouth.

When she finally made the cast correctly, I could see it from the start. The rod came back, swept forward and snapped the plug in a long, high flight that arched far out into the chop. The plug hit the water and the fish hit the plug and the rod bent. Zee hauled back and somebody yelled, “Yee haw!” It was me. I started to run down to help her, then stopped myself. I could hear the reel sing. She had a good one.

She fought the fish for five minutes before she gained much on it. She would stop and reel it in only to have it run off again with the line. Had I set the drag too light? I didn't think so. She worked the rod and finally began to gain. The rushes away from shore were shorter. Then they stopped and she was getting him in. Fifty feet out, the fish came dancing out of the water, standing on its tail.

“A beauty!” It was me again.

She brought it into the surf and backed up, the rod bent in a lovely arc. I ran down then, and as the fish flopped up onto the sand, I got between it and the waves. Many a fish has been lost right there. They give a last toss of their heads and they're back in the surf and gone. Zee wasn't going to lose this one.

Come on down and get him, I thought. Keep the line tight. She reeled down, leaned, and got a hand in his gills and pulled the fish up to the Landcruiser. Her cheeks were bright and she was wet with sweat. She was laughing and panting.

“Whee Hawkin!” She jammed the rod into the spike on
the front bumper, took the pliers from the hood, and got her plug back. “Wow! I am wiped out!”

I got the scales and weighed her catch. “A thirteen-pounder. Not bad, pardner.”

She grinned and I grinned. I slapped her on the shoulder. She patted the graphite. “Now I know the secret of your success. All this time I thought it was skill.”

“Damn,” I said. “There goes my image.”

We fished for another hour, until it was too dark to see the plugs hit the water. I felt good and we laughed a lot. She got three more fish, but none as big as the first one. On the way back, we scaled them at the Herring Creek and she gave all but the big fish to me.

“I'm keeping this one,” she said. “I'll eat it for the next month. I won't have to buy food until July!” I liked her for being proud and happy. “Come and help me eat it,” she said. “Tomorrow night?”

“Yes.”

When I got home, I filleted the fish and put the fillets in the fridge in a pan of water mixed with sugar and salt. The next morning I washed them off and set them on racks to air-dry for an hour. It was smoking day.

My smoker is out behind the shed. I made it from an old freezer I got from the dump and a 220-volt system I got from a stove there. I smolder hickory chips in an old frying pan for about six hours to get the fillets the way I like them. I bow to no one when it comes to smoked bluefish.

When the fish were in the smoker and smoke was oozing out from around the door at the approved rate, I sat down by the phone. Why was I doing that? I was going to have the biggest phone bill in the history of the world. I phoned Quinn. He was out, but someone answered his phone at the
Globe.
I left a message: Jackson wants to know if the names Billy Martin or Jim Norris mean anything to anybody. Cryptic stuff. The guy who took the message didn't even seem curious.

I looked at my watch. Eight
A.M
. Oregon was three hours earlier. Five
A.M
. there. Too early. I got out my newspaper clipping and again read the names of Jim Norris's parents:
Mr. and Mrs. Bradley Norris. They had two other children, a daughter, Nancy, and a son, Bradley, Jr. I dialed 1-503-555-1212 and got their telephone number.

At ten o'clock Quinn called. Neither name I'd left was in his notes, but both were now.

“What are you doing, J.W.? I thought you were out of the fuzz business?”

“I don't know what I'm doing.”

“Ah-ha! So you're in the newspaper business.”

“I admit to being a sorry sort of guy, but I haven't sunk that low yet.”

“You're pretty insulting for a man who's about to get a hot piece of genuine rumor.”

My ears perked up. “Not just a rumor, but a genuine rumor?”

“A genuine one. From what we in the fourth estate refer to as a ‘reliable source.' ”

“Let's have it.”

“It'll cost you. I want a bluefish on my line before the season passes. And I want you to smoke it for me so I can bring it home to my mother. She loves the stuff.”

“You got it. What's the rumor?”

“The rumor is that five days from now a lot of heavy DEA people plus a number of state narcs will be arriving on your quiet little island to perform a law enforcement operation that very night. If I can talk my editor into it, I'll be down myself to cover the story.”

“Well, for God's sake, stay out of sight. If the news gets out that a big-time media guy like yourself has arrived on the Vineyard, the baddies will know that something is about to happen and they'll head for the hills.”

“I'll wear Groucho glasses and mustache. They'll never
recognize me till it's too late. The next day I'll expect a fishing trip.”

“You'll get it.”

I put more chips in the smoker. The fillets were still pale and wet. Fishing takes patience. Smoking fish takes more patience. Lots of things take patience. I felt a little twinge near my spine where the bullet still rested. Was it working closer to the nerves or farther away? Or was it staying put, just like the doctors said it probably would? The spine, with all its parts, nerves, and blood vessels is not one of God's best designs. It's pretty fragile for the amount of work it's supposed to do. I hadn't even hurt when it happened. I hadn't even known I was shot. Too much was going on at the time. I'd been shooting, too, and the guy who shot me was falling down about the same time I was. I only hurt later. Now, after five years, I only had a twinge occasionally and the knowledge that the bullet they decided not to try to take out might one day move a bit.

At noon the fillets were browning nicely and I telephoned Jim Norris's parents. His mother answered. She was calm. I introduced myself as a friend of Jim's.

“Yes,” she said. “He was the sort of person who made friends wherever he went.”

“We fished together,” I said. “He was a nice guy. I want to ask you some questions about him. I hope you don't mind.”

“I don't mind. The funeral was yesterday. It was a closed-casket ceremony. They said it was better that way, so that's the way we did it. It's better to remember him the way he was, don't you think?”

“Yes.” I recognized the numbness of feeling that lay
behind her calm. Nothing could be worse than losing a child. “Tell me, Mrs. Norris, did Jim ever say why he came to Martha's Vineyard? Was there any particular reason?”

“Oh, no. Jimmy traveled around everywhere. He said he had a sugar foot, you know. After the army, he didn't want to stay home, so he'd just go off and work. He liked people and he liked seeing the country. He'd work somewhere and then come back home for a while and then leave again. Why, I guess he must have been all over the United States. He was a carpenter and he could get a job just about anywhere. I suppose he just wanted to live on an island for a while.”

“Did he tell you anything about what he was doing here? Any people he met?”

“I have his letters. He wrote every week. He was very good about that. He did mention his friends, of course. The only names I remember right at this moment are in one family. I think the father's name was George and the children were Bill and Susan. I can't recall the last name. He didn't use last names much, just first ones. I know he was excited about knowing them and that he was happy when he was with them.”

“Did he ever tell you about why, in particular, he decided to come to the island?”

“Why, no. I remember he was down in Georgia working when he wrote that he was going up there. He was really sort of excited about it, I remember. I don't think he'd ever been in New England before and he was anxious to go up there. That was so much like him—he was always excited to go someplace new. We just got a card that he was coming home, you know. I imagine he must have mailed it just the day before he was killed. It arrived after
we got the news. . . .” Her voice faded, grew thin like dispersing fog.

“Mrs. Norris, is your husband home? May I speak to him?”

“What? Oh, no, he's not. Brad's at work. He thought that it might be better if he just went to work as usual. He said that life goes on, that it was better if he just went to work and did something. I think he was right, don't you? Things do go on, of course. The lawn, the dishes, the bills. Everything just keeps happening and we have to do the same things we always do. I don't know. . . .”

“Mrs. Norris, please, was Jim closer to his sister or his brother?”

“Oh, to Nancy. Young Braddy is much younger, you know . . .”

“May I speak to Nancy, please?”

“Of course. Now, let me see . . . No, no, I'm sorry. I think . . . yes, Nancy's out, too. She's gone down for the mail. It's such a nice day. . . .”

“Please have her call me collect when she gets in. Do you have a pencil and paper handy?”

“Oh . . . yes, of course.”

I gave her my number and had her read it back to me. When she'd done that, I said, “I'm sorry about Jim, Mrs. Norris. Please accept my sympathies.”

“Thank you,” she said in her dull voice.

I put on an Emmy Lou tape and made lunch while Emmy Lou sang of the pangs of love. A hunk of cheese, a slab of white bread, chutney, and a fresh salad, washed down with beer. I checked on the smoker and added more wood chips. The fish were beginning to glaze. As I came in, the phone rang. It was Nancy Norris. I thanked her for calling and said: “I don't want you to be more unhappy
than you already are, but you should know that there is a remote possibility that the explosion that killed your brother was not accidental. I didn't want to tell your mother, but I must tell you because I need information about Jim.”

“What are you talking about? What do you mean it wasn't an accident? Do you mean somebody killed him on purpose? What do you mean? Are you a policeman?”

“I'm a friend of Jim's and of his friends the Martins, the people who owned the boat. It's possible that the explosion wasn't just an accident. I'm just trying to find out everything I can, you understand? May I speak plainly?”

“Plainly? Yes, of course. I want you to.”

I told her about Billy's past and about my failure to find anything to substantiate Susie's suspicion that someone had tried to kill her brother. “And now,” I said, “I'm trying to check Jim out. Jim was a friend of Billy's and so maybe Jim knew the same dealers and distributors on the island that Billy knew. Maybe Jim was a user, too. Was he? I need to know.”

“My God,” said her voice, “this is unreal.”

“Was he a user? Did he smoke or shoot up? Was he on pills?”

“No. Yes. I mean, is there anyone Jimmy's age who hasn't tried grass? But no more. No, he was a beer drinker. We used to call him ‘Red Neck' he was so straight. He told me once that he couldn't work stoned, that it wasn't his thing.”

“Did he ever work with law enforcement agencies?”

“What do you mean? As a cop? No, never. He was a carpenter. He liked working with wood, with his hands. He was smart, but he never wanted to go to college or anything. He could always find work wherever he went. Why did you ask that?”

“If he wasn't a user, I thought maybe he was an undercover cop.”

“Well, wouldn't the cops say so, if he was?”

“Yes. But sometimes one agency doesn't give information to another one. The feds keep secrets from the state cops; the state cops keep information from the locals; that sort of thing. I guess you're right that if he was a cop some agency would have announced it by now. It was a dumb question for me to have asked you.” I had no more even semi-logical questions to ask her, but I needed to grope around some more. Something wouldn't let me let it go. “Did he ever mention any enemies? Did he ever mention anybody he perhaps argued with?”

“No. Never. Not ever—really. I mean, he wrote home a lot and even kept a journal that he'd bring home when he came and he'd let us read it. He was funny and interesting in the way he looked at things and the stuff he wrote about. I never remember him writing or talking about arguments or fights. He liked people and they liked him.”

“Did he get along with your parents? Was there ever any strain between them?”

“No! They wanted him home more, but they loved him and he loved them. Not even natural parents could be better. None of us could love our natural parents more or be loved more. It's so sad; my dad and mom are in shock, I think. All of us are. . . .”