The Darkening Archipelago (43 page)

“Guess so,” said Darren, cutting the engine back to dead slow.

“Don't look so bad,” said Cole.

Darren was nosing the boat toward the shore. Adjacent to the open salmon pens was a pier. Several boats were tied along the slip.

“To talk with Archie you'd have thought that Satan himself was operating these things,” said Darren, angling the boat into a moorage.

Cole forced a laugh. “Archie had a way of painting things in black and white.” As the
Rising Moon
came to rest along the pier, Cole could see the old
DFO
research station on a rocky outcrop through the cluster of trees on the shore.

“Yeah, he did,” said Darren. While Darren was preoccupied, Cole searched the cluttered floor of the boat's cockpit. He found what he was looking for. He slipped a heavy flashlight into the pocket of his coat. Cole was developing a penchant for Maglites. Might buy me some stock in the company, he mused, if — when — I get off this island.

“Here,” said Cole. “Let me get the bow line.” Before Darren could protest, he had swung himself up onto the bow of the boat and uncoiled the new line. Nice, he thought. As the boat came even with the dock, Cole jumped onto it and made the line fast around a cleat.

Darren cut the engine. “Now what?”

“We have a look around.”

Darren shrugged. He stepped off the boat and stretched. Cole looked around them. Half a dozen pens sat in deep water just off the point known as Jeopardy Rock. At the end of the dock sat a small, squat building that Cole suspected served as a supply hut, likely for storing fuel and other gear. Another newer building to the west of it was probably used for handling the operations for the pens and housing workers. Food pellets, antibiotics, maybe even the chemicals used to give the lacklustre farmed Atlantic salmon their rosy hue would be found there. And beyond that, on a rocky outcrop overlooking Tribune Channel, was the old dfo research station. It was a small, sturdy building, with boxy windows facing the eastern mountains and the waters nearby.

“Shall we see if Dr. Thurlow wants to show us around like he said?”

“You sure that's such a good idea?” Darren fiddled with something in the pocket of his float coat.

“Why not?”

“Don't we suspect this guy is connected to Archie's death somehow?”

“I think Dan Campbell killed him,” said Cole, looking at Darren. “But I think Thurlow is somehow tied up in it. I just don't know how.”

“And we're just going to walk right up there and say hi, and ask him to show us the joint?”

“Yup. He invited us. I bet that's his boat there,” said Cole pointing at a newer-looking speedboat. “Heck, Darren, it's two against one. We can take him if he pulls anything.”

“Guess so,” he said. “You're a bit of a mess, though.”

“Think I might scare him?”

Darren just shrugged.

“Lead on,” said Cole, pointing to the research station with his chin. “I'm so scary to look at, he better see you first or he'll soil his pants.” Cole laughed.

Darren trudged up the hill, hands in the deep pockets of his orange float coat. The silence of the woods was broken by the croaking of the occasional raven. The lightly used path was festooned with pine needles and hedged with thick tangles of salal. The cool air held the tang of fish and salt water. The forest was sprayed with a light gossamer sheen of mist. Cole became acutely aware of his surroundings, his senses heightened with adrenalin. They made the top of the rocks in a few minutes, both men breathing hard, the wound on Cole's face pulsing.

“Think this place has got a doorbell?” Cole joked.

“Don't know,” said Darren.

“Come on, lighten up, Darren. This will be fun. Take a look around here for a way in,” said Cole, “and I'll see where this pathway leads.” Cole disappeared around the back of the building.

“If you say so,” said Darren, fidgeting with his pockets. He looked back and forth across the windows.

“Found a door here,” said Cole from the back of the building. “It's open.”

“Great….”

Darren turned the corner to see the door close in front of him. He took his left hand from his pocket to open the door, his right hand still buried in his coat. He opened the door and stepped through.

Cole was waiting for him on the other side. Blackwater swung from behind the door, the heavy flashlight coming down hard on the back of Darren's head. Darren stumbled forward, his hands splayed before him, the hatchet he held in his right pocket clattering across the concrete floor and out of reach. Cole stepped in and kicked him in the ribs, and First Moon rolled onto his side. “Stop,” he coughed. “Enough!”

Cole reared back with his right foot and began to swing it toward the man's face.

“Please, please, I got kids.”

Cole skidded to a halt, almost tripping over the prone man. Cole was sweating. His hands trembled. He held the flashlight so tightly that his knuckles were white.

Darren lay on the floor and coughed. He curled into the fetal position, tucking his knees into his chest, his hand holding the place on the back of his head where Cole had hit him. He began to cry. Not gentle tears, but great sobs that came hard and fast. Cole looked down at him. His hand relaxed. He drew a breath. He felt a wave of nausea sweep over him and he forced himself to breathe so he wouldn't vomit.

Cole stepped back from Darren and looked around the room. Upon entering he'd had time enough only to confirm that he was alone. Now he took in the details of the space. He had stepped directly into the laboratory. There were two dozen cement ponds in the room, each ten feet long, their walls rising two and a half feet off the floor. Cole walked to where Darren First Moon's hatchet lay and picked it up, using the sleeve of his coat to protect any record of fingerprints. He cast a disgusted backwards glance at Darren as he did, and saw the sobbing man still curled on the floor.

Each pen contained salmon at various stages of development, many of them encrusted with sea lice.

Cole continued to walk around the room. Near the windows that overlooked the eastern slopes of Tribune Channel were aquariums packed with sea lice.

On the southern wall was a door. Cole checked to see if it was locked. It was. He stepped back and with his booted foot kicked it at handle-height, and it splintered into a hundred pieces, the wooden jam collapsing as it did. Cole looked into the room. It was a makeshift office that included tables with hundreds upon hundreds of vials. Cole could only imagine what was contained there.

He walked back and crouched before the trembling body of Darren First Moon. He still held the hatchet and heavy flashlight in his hand. He poked Darren with the light.

“Darren, get a hold of yourself.”

Darren tried to draw a deep breath but could not.

“Darren, where's Thurlow?”

Darren's eyes seemed to come into focus.

“Darren, where's Thurlow?”

First Moon sucked in a breath and let it out. His eyes zeroed in on Cole's.

“Where is he?”

“He's gone to Port Lostcoast.”

30

The radio crackled in the harbour master's cabin. Rupert Wright stood up from his desk and walked to the table on which it sat and listened carefully.

“Port Lostcoast … Blackwater … read me?”

“I read you four by two, party radioing Port Lostcoast.”

“… trouble … Can you reach … Ravenwing?”

“Party radioing Port Lostcoast, I read you four by two … loud but not very clear. Say again?”

“Grace Ravenwing … trouble … Warn her.…”

“Party radioing Port Lostcoast. I am hearing Grace Ravenwing is in trouble and needs to be warned. Am I reading you correctly?”

“Correct.…”

“Can I tell her the nature of the threat, over?”

“Dr. Thurlow … on his way.…”

“Are you saying Dr. Thurlow is on his way to Port Lostcoast and Grace Ravenwing has reason to be concerned?”

“Yes!”

“Should I alert the authorities? Is it that serious?”

“Yes!”

“Five by five,” said the harbour master. “I'll alert the RCMP and will try to find Grace Ravenwing. Port Lostcoast out.”

Cole put down the mic and looked at Darren behind the wheel of the
Rising Moon
. “You had better pray to God that Grace Ravenwing and Nancy Webber are fine. If Thurlow harms one hair on either of their heads, I'm going to take it out on you,” said Cole, his eyes boring into Darren First Moon.

The boat skipped over the light chop of Tribune Channel, full throttle, heading for the bigger waters of Knight Inlet. The wind had picked up since that morning, pushing the swell to three feet.

“Can I raise the RCMP on this thing?” Cole had his hand on the radio again.

“Should be able to. They monitor channel fourteen.”

Cole turned the dial and pressed the button.

“RCMP dispatch, this is Cole Blackwater on the
Rising Moon
, do you copy?” He waited a moment. “RCMP, this is the
Rising
Moon
, do you copy?”

“This is Alert Bay. We copy four by four,” came a voice over the radio. “What is the nature of your message?”

“This is an emergency. I have reason to believe that two women in Port Lostcoast on Parish Island are in danger.”

“What are their names?”

“Nancy Webber and Grace Ravenwing. They are staying at Archie Ravenwing's home, the bluff house. I don't think the place has an address….”

“Hold a minute,
Rising Moon
.”

Cole watched the forest whir past as Darren guided the boat around the turn at McNichol Pass into Knight Inlet.

“
Rising Moon,
we have a boat on the way to Port Lostcoast. Detective Sergeant Alan Bates is heading there on the Ravenwing missing person's file. Your information has been forwarded to them. They're on the way.”

“A Dr. Darvin Thurlow is either in Lostcoast now, or on his way, and is likely trying to get his hands on information that connects him to the murder of Archie Ravenwing,” said Cole, shielding the mic with his hand.

“I'll pass that on,
Rising Moon
. Alert Bay out.”

Cole put down the microphone. Now all he could do was sit tight and pray.

Darvin Thurlow sat quietly at the galley table, his long, lean hands folded before him, his legs crossed. The tiny room was dark, the sound of the ocean resonating in his ears. He breathed slowly, taking air in through his nose and letting it out through his mouth, the way he had learned to do in a meditation class many years before. He felt a sense of abiding peace. He felt certain that nothing could go wrong for him today.

It hadn't always been like that for Darvin Thurlow. His time at u vic had been unfulfilling. The school was a haven for ideologically driven zealots masquerading as scientists. Saving the salmon, stopping sewage from being diffused in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, protecting spotted owls — Darvin Thurlow had no beef with conservation. His father had been a farmer whose livelihood depended on sound stewardship of a resource. Darvin Thurlow believed that for the greater good to prevail, some sacrifices had to be made.

It was almost by accident that Thurlow stumbled upon work that developed the resistance among farmed Atlantic salmon to sea lice. It was thanks to another researcher's efforts that he came to appreciate how he might counter this breakthrough with one of his own. Humanity would not prevail, might not even survive, if it clung to outdated modes of feeding itself. There were too many people now. Scale had become the dominant issue in food production. Sacrifices had to be made for the greater good of humanity. And so while other researchers at the university sought ways of protecting wild salmon from decline at the hands of a fingernailsized parasite, Dr. Darvin Thurlow fostered other ambitions.

Thurlow heard boots on the dock and drew a breath, letting it slip soundlessly from his mouth in the darkened room. He sat still in the darkened galley.

Three years ago he found a perfect partner willing to finance his inquiry and not ask too many questions, as long as what he learned helped build more salmon farms along the remote bc coast, feed more people, and create more profit. Thurlow could care less about profit. The approval he sought had nothing to do with money. How far might he go? There really were no limits. He was on the verge of unleashing a pestilence on the world that people would talk about for a generation, and in the end, he would be thanked. A decade-long confrontation would end, and humanity would triumph. And like his father, who had spent his life finding ways of growing more apples on a small farm in the bc interior, Darvin Thurlow would finally succeed in winning the sanction he had sought all his life.

But there were loose ends.

The boots stopped and he felt the boat dip as someone stepped onto it. He closed his eyes and steadied himself.