Death on the Mississippi (10 page)

He'd have to stop. After several hours of painstaking searching, his senses had dulled and become unresponsive. He hadn't found what he was looking for.

Lyon knew that the
Mississippi
was basically an unseaworthy vessel. It might be capable of making short hops between Caribbean Islands during fair weather, or it could safely navigate the inland waterway, but the craft's blunt lines and small draft made lengthy sea voyages not only hazardous, but nearly suicidal. His theory required the houseboat to still be in the vicinity of the Connecticut River. The expensive aerial map he'd prepared had not revealed what it should have revealed.

There was something he wasn't seeing. His knowledge of the state and shore had been confirmed by the aerial pictures, but there was still something he had either missed or hadn't viewed properly.

Sawhorses were placed on either side of the access road leading to the Pincus Resort. A two-by-four stretched between them carried a
ROAD CLOSED
sign. Lyon removed the barrier and drove into the complex.

In the few days since Dalton's disappearance, decay had already taken root at the unfinished project. Construction equipment had been abandoned in the middle of tasks, and building materials appeared as if they had been haphazardly dropped by departing workmen at a prearranged signal. The area had a general aura of desolation.

The dusty station wagon with the Pranko Construction Company logo on its sides was parked in front of a small building near what was to have been the recreation center. Lyon parked behind the wagon and entered the building. The reception area was deserted, as were the sales closing rooms and front offices. Empty desks and hanging wires marked where typewriters, copying machines, and other office equipment had once stood.

Two men were in small offices at the rear of the building. Sam, the construction foreman, was surrounded by dozens of phone books and had a telephone pressed to his ear. “A houseboat that's nearly eighty feet long called the
Mississippi
… any houseboats called anything … okay, thanks.” He slammed down the receiver. “So much for New Jersey, now I start on Delaware.”

“You're calling all the marinas on the Eastern seaboard?” Lyon asked in amazement.

“Damn right! He can't hide that tub forever. He has to stop somewhere for gas and supplies, and when he does, I'll find him.”

“The Coast Guard has already tried,” Lyon said.

“They don't have a stake in this like I do.” He began to dial another number. “Can't talk now. Got to keep calling until the phone company finds out what's going on and cuts off our lines … Hello, Blue Point Marina? I'm calling …”

Lyon went into the office next door. He recognized the man behind the desk as Dalton's partner and financial officer, Randolph Dice. Dice sat behind a desk piled high with ledgers and computer printouts. He held a pocket calculator in one hand and stared blankly off into space until he became aware of Lyon's presence. “If you've come to pick up the computer terminals, you're too late. The bank already grabbed them.”

“I'm Wentworth. I was on the
Mississippi
the other day.”

“If you're one of Dalton's friends, I don't need to guess why you're here. He borrowed money from you and you want to call in the note.”

“I'm trying to find him.”

“You are a member of a large but not very exclusive group.”

Randolph Dice was a short man bordering on the fat in his early thirties with a squat build. There was a physical softness about him that seemed reflected in the scrubbed pinkness of his complexion, flabby facial features, and a body that must have taken great pains to avoid all physical exertion.

“Do you have any ideas where he might be?” Lyon asked.

“If I did, I would gladly hire someone to annihilate him. Let me tell you something, Wentworth. I left an extremely prestigious position with a management consulting firm to join this organization. I had this mistaken idea that I wanted to become a bold, young entrepreneur. Instead, I am rapidly becoming a bankrupt, aging accountant.” He threw a ledger across the room and let it clatter against the wall. “And I got an MBA from Harvard for this?”

“That's our record,” Lyon said automatically.

“I beg your pardon?”

“An unimportant passing thought,” Lyon said. For years he and Bea had kept a tally on how quickly it took a Harvard graduate to announce his or her alma mater. Randolph Dice now held the record. “How much is missing?”

“About a million-two-plus, as best I can reconstruct it so far, but I'm not finished yet.”

“I still don't understand how he got all that cash from a company in financial trouble.”

“In any multimillion dollar operation there are numerous accounts, escrows, bank floats, compensating balances, and other types of money available to an unscrupulous and clever manipulator. The only difficulty is that most of that money does not belong to us. The bankruptcy court is going to bury us.”

“And you weren't aware of any of this?”

“Of excessive spending and poor cash control, yes. Massive fraud, no. He made false entries, ran the money through different accounts and finally converted it to cash. How the hell can I explain that to the authorities? Sam and I are going to look like fools at best, coconspirators at worst. In addition, we're going to lose all our personal assets.”

“You voluntarily put those assets on the line,” Lyon said, “because you thought this project would make money.”

“It could have.”

“Then why did Dalton steal from it and run with less than he could have made legitimately?”

Randolph Dice put both hands to his head and slowly rocked back and forth. “I don't know. If I understood, I might know a lot of other things.”

“What happens if he's found dead without the cash?”

Dice's hands dropped away from his face as he looked at Lyon with a new antagonism. “In that instance, I would be a murder suspect.”

“Who else could have known about the missing cash at the time Dalton disappeared?”

“Sam, of course. Dalton's wife, Pandora, could have known. Then there was talk that Dalton and Katrina Loops had a thing going. She might have known. If Katrina knew, and since she's involved with Bobby Douglas, he might have known.”

Looking out the window, Lyon saw a tow truck lifting the front end of the Pranko Construction Company station wagon. “Someone seems to be interfering with your automobile,” he said.

Dice took a disinterested glance. “They're repossessing it, like everything else around here.”

“What are your plans?” Lyon asked.

“I don't have any choice, Mr. Wentworth. Dalton's actions have sentenced me to an indeterminate sentence tied to this project until some court, months or years from now, lets me go.”

“I'd like to talk to Bobby Douglas,” Lyon said.

Dice's short burst of laughter was like the double snap of a clapboard. “That rat was the first to leave this sinking sandpile. He was gone the morning after Dalton's disappearing act. There's no one left out here except Kat Loops, who we let occupy one of the cottages.”

“She's still waiting for her boyfriend who ain't never coming back,” Sam said from the doorway.

Dice's face brightened for the first time. “You found out something?”

“Damn right! I just got off the phone with the Blue Bay Marina in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. They didn't know from nothing about the
Mississippi,
but thought it funny that a guy was there for two days asking the same questions. They said he was good looking and seemed to know boats. He had a great suntan and walked with a limp. Guess who?”

“What in hell is Bobby doing in Delaware?” Dice said.

“Because,” Sam continued, “from the way he talked to the marina people he expected the
Mississippi
to be there. The tennis-playing bastard intended to meet Dalton in Delaware.”

“Get the police on the phone,” Dice snapped.

“You got it!” Sam snatched the telephone from its cradle and began to dial.

Lyon turned to leave. “By the way,” he said to Dice. “When you boarded the
Mississippi
the other day you were quite angry until Dalton talked to you. What did he say?”

“Captain Norbert, please,” Sam said over the phone as he looked at Dice with interest.

Lyon had often heard the phrase “all the color draining,” but had never before actually witnessed anyone turn instantly pale. Dice's eyes widened, and he gulped air as if hyperventilating.

“What in the hell did he say to you?” Sam demanded.

“Nothing,” Dice finally articulated.

Sam's eyes locked with Lyon's. “That sounds like a hell of a powerful nothing, if you ask me.”

“It's not important,” Dice said as he stumbled around his desk and dashed for the hall and a small bathroom next door.

“I think someone has something on someone.” Sam said. “Hello, Captain Norbert. We got a line on the bastard.”

He found Katrina Loops sunbathing on the narrow beach just beyond the seawall. She lay facedown on a large beach towel with a small towel over her round bottom. She seemed to stretch from the high-water mark to the seawall. A paperback novel lay near her right hand, a small Thermos jug by the left. He noticed that there wasn't any bra strap crossing her bare back, and that gave him a strong suspicion that there was little if anything but Katrina under the small towel that covered her rear.

She had obviously fallen asleep in the warm sun, and this presented a problem of decorum. How do you politely awaken a nearly naked lady without causing her movements to throw off the single modest covering she wore? He decided that no matter how he approached the problem, there was going to be a moment or two when his lascivious thoughts were apparent. He bent down and gently shook her arm.

“Katrina. It's Lyon Wentworth.”

She didn't respond, but his modest shaking movement caused the towel to slowly slide onto the sand. She lay nude before him and he hastily stood and turned away. The waters of the Sound were a grayish blue with Long Island's low profile in the distance. Something was wrong.

Something was drastically wrong.

He turned and knelt. He felt her wrist and then his fingers searched for the carotid artery. He grasped her shoulder and slowly turned her over. Her eyes were wide open and the pupils were fixed as her head lolled loosely to the side. Katrina Loops was quite dead.

Lyon recoiled from the obscenity of death. He had seen its face many times, in different places and guises, but each time it seemed uniquely and horribly fresh. A living personality had been obliterated and reduced to a mass of dying cells.

A thin ribbon of blood had oozed from a narrow slit between her breasts. It seemed apparent that she had been stabbed with a thin-bladed knife that had pierced the sternum and entered the myocardium to cause instant death.

He turned away and walked slowly back to the office, where he found Sam and Randy in whispered consultation. They looked up with annoyance at his intrusion.

“I think you had better get Captain Norbert back on the phone,” Lyon said.

The Pincus Resort was located in the small town of Eastbrook, which did not have its own full-time police force. Police services were provided by a part-time constabulary and a resident state trooper with backup from the local barracks. This meant that Captain Norbert and his men descended on the scene in large numbers.

Lyon sat on the seawall fifty yards down from the body. Pan Turman sat by his side and shivered in the warm sun. Police cruisers, official vans, and an ambulance speckled the lawns. A bevy of officers and technicians surrounded the body and spoke in hushed tones.

“She must have family somewhere,” Pan said. “Later, I'll see if I can find her personnel file and see who it lists so I can phone them. She was such a beautiful woman. Large, but put together well with a marvelous figure. She was a great salesperson and sold more units than anyone else, but there is one little small, tiny thing about it all.”

Lyon looked at her. “What's that?”

Pan pulled his head down to her lips with both hands and whispered in a deep voice. “The wicked witch is dead. The bitchy witch is dead, and am I glad.”

Lyon recoiled from her and looked into her sparkling eyes. “You don't mean that.”

“I knew about them from the start, you know. Oh, they thought they were so smart about it, and she even took up with Bobby to throw me off the track, but I knew. I knew from the first time they did it together, and now she'll never screw anybody ever again.”

He inched along the seawall away from her, but she grasped both his hands in hers and held him. He wondered if the specks in her eyes were madness or reflected ocean light, or was her naiveté such that she didn't properly assess what she was really saying? Was this slight woman strong enough to attack and pierce the breastbone of a far larger woman with one thrust of the knife? “You don't mean what you're saying, Pan,” he finally said.

Her head tilted as she smiled with a childlike radiance. “Oh, silly, of course I didn't kill her. I just meant that it doesn't break me up. I will send lots of nice flowers to her family. Will we have to stay around here much longer?”

“They're going to want statements from both of us,” Lyon answered.

“Well, there's nothing I can tell them, except that I've been staying at your house, and when I came out here this morning I think Katrina purposely avoided me.”

“You know, Pan, they'll speak to you today and then check and cross-check until they're satisfied that you've told them everything.”

She hugged her shoulders as if a dank breeze had blown in from the sea. “They'll have lots of questions.” It was a statement.

“A great many,” Lyon answered softly. “They're going to want to know if you were aware that Dalton had a great deal of money converted into cash.”