Dangerous Depths (4 page)

Finally I made it into the open area of
Elyse’s cabin. Carr came in right behind me. I could see blood
seeping from his arm and tingeing the water pink. A piece of jagged
metal had sliced right through his wet suit. When I motioned to the
wound and signaled, he noticed it for the first time, gave me the
okay sign, and shrugged his shoulders. He probably hadn’t even felt
it. He would later though.

Elyse’s belongings were strewn all over the
place. A potted bird-of-paradise lay broken in her bunk along with
several tattered books. In the head, one of her sandals was stuck
in the toilet. The cabinet above the commode hung precariously,
swaying back and forth slowly in a sluggish current. I opened it.
Inside were toothpaste, toothbrush, a hair pick, medication.

While Carr held the evidence containers, I
scooped up sea water along with the contents. I didn’t really
expect these things to tell me much. But I’d learned that
thoroughness the first time through a scene paid off. Maybe there
was a print, or something that would tell us what had happened on
the
Caribbe
. Really, I was just following protocol for lack
of anything else to do.

I checked my gauges. We’d been down almost an
hour. My air was at 700 psi. Standard procedure was to start back
up when the gauge read 500 psi, enough air to safely make it to the
surface. But we were finished down here. I signaled to Carr. We
were gliding over the sandy bottom when I spotted something black
in the sand—one of the stove knobs, perfectly preserved. I scooped
it into an evidence container and we headed up.

Stark and Snyder grabbed the evidence bags
when we surfaced. Then we handed up our weight belts and climbed
out into the sun and onto the warm dock. Carr sat down, breathless
from the exertion of making it out of the water with his tank
on.

“One of these days I’ve got to quit smoking,”
Carr said. Then he leaned back, grabbed his shirt that lay in a
puddle of sea water on the dock, and pulled a soggy cigarette out
of the pocket.

“How about now?” I taunted. Carr had been
talking about quitting since I’d met him.

I picked up the pack of cigarettes and
threatened to throw them in the water.

“Come on, Hannah. I’m an injured man. Give me
the damned cigarettes.”

“These things are going to kill you, Carr,” I
warned, handing the crumpled pack back.

Stark and I helped him out of his wet suit as
Jimmy went to retrieve the first-aid kit from the
Wahoo
. The
cut in Carr’s upper arm was deep but thin. I dabbed disinfectant
onto it and then Jimmy put a butterfly bandage over it to keep it
closed.

“Well, you going to get around to telling us
what you found down there?” Stark asked.

I described the stove, told him that it
looked like the explosion had been caused by propane collecting in
the bilge.

“How would that happen?” Jimmy asked,
incredulous.

“It’s pretty obvious,” Carr said, his tone
reflecting an amazement that the kid could be so stupid. “She left
the gas on.”

“I never be knowin’ Elyse to be dat
careless,” Jimmy said.

“Come on. Happens all the time. Most people
smell the stuff before it explodes. Elyse probably passed out
drinking that bottle of wine,” he said, indicating the bottle we’d
retrieved.

“Elyse does not drink, and I don’t need your
opinion, Ed. We will be treating this like a crime scene,” I said,
pissed that Carr was so eager to blame the explosion on Elyse. But
Carr was not in charge here. Christ, he wasn’t even a cop. He was a
damned banker along to help with the dive.

I could hear the anger and defensiveness in
my voice. I was thinking about the sticky note that I’d discovered
under the salon table. Maybe if I’d seen it when I’d gotten in last
night, Elyse wouldn’t be fighting for her life right now.

“Sorry,” I said a moment later. I didn’t need
to take my frustration and fear for Elyse out on Carr.

“It’s okay,” Stark said. “We know how close
you and Elyse are. Let’s get this stuff to the lab, have them check
for accelerants, prints on that stove knob, the other stuff you’ve
collected.

We loaded the gear and evidence containers
into the
Wahoo
and I handed Stark the three rolls of film
I’d shot as well as the pill bottle I’d pulled out of the water
last night.

“You coming?” he asked.

“Naw, I’ll take the Rambler. I want to stop
in at the hospital.”

When I got there, Mary was sitting in Elyse’s
room, reading poetry to her—Pablo Neruda.

“Can’t hurt,” she said. “People say that
hearing and awareness can be acute, even though a person is
unconscious. I’m reading the uplifting material and maybe I’m
keeping her brain waves active.”

“Makes sense to me,” I said, bending to give
her a quick hug. “How long have you been here?” By the tired eyes
and rumpled clothes I’d guess hours.

I’d met Mary the day Elyse had dragged me up
to Mary’s home in the hills to look at the black ‘65 Rambler that
Mary was selling. It was typical Elyse, convinced she knew what was
best for everyone around her. Mary had a car to sell; I needed one.
To Elyse, it was obvious. And she’d been right. It was the perfect
car, a boxy old convertible in mint condition. It was only later
that I realized the car had been only part of Elyse’s motivation.
The other part was introducing me to Mary.

Mary was the psychiatrist who had helped
Elyse through a hard time some eight years back. She’d diagnosed
Elyse with bipolar disorder, helped Elyse come to terms with the
illness, and managed her medication. They’d been close friends ever
since. In fact, Mary was more a mother to Elyse than a friend.

“How’s she doing?” I asked.

“No change. The neurologist is supposed to be
getting in any time.”

Just then Dr. Hall and another man walked
in.

“Mary, Hannah, this is Dr. Marks.”

“Good day, ladies. Please excuse my
appearance. Just stepped off the ferry from Red Hook. Kind of a
salty wet day out there.”

Dr. Marks was probably fifty, with
salt-and-pepper hair and a hard New York accent. Hall had said he
was one of the best, a high-powered doctor who had decided to
retreat from the city to a more reasonable lifestyle in the Virgin
Islands. He had given up a lucrative practice to do it. I had to
admire the guy.

“I’ll be examining Elyse, going over the
charts, running a few more tests. It will probably be tomorrow
before I have a complete picture unless something unexpected
occurs.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“You just never know with head injuries.
Sometimes the patient just comes around,” he said.

Or dies
. He didn’t say it, but the
unspoken hung in the air.

When Mary and I entered the brightly lit
waiting room, Chief Dunn was there, sitting in the corner, head
buried in the
Island News
. As usual, he wore a suit, white
shirt, and dark tie. Dunn’s idea of casual was to remove the
jacket. He was big—a good two-sixty, six-three. He was always
struggling to keep the weight down—difficult with a wife who could
cook like Julia Child. His hair was close-cropped and peppered with
grey. No one messed with Dunn. He carried himself with the dignity
and authority of a man who was used to being in charge. He was my
boss and head of the Tortola Police Department.

“Hi, Chief.”

“Hannah, Stark said you’d be here. Hello,
Mary. How is Elyse?”

“Same. Still comatose.”

“I talked to Carr and Stark,” Dunn said,
turning to me. “They told me what you found on the
Caribbe
.”

I knew what was coming. Dunn and I had been
agreeing to disagree since I’d started in the department.

“What makes you think a crime was involved
here?” Dunn asked. He knew I was treating the explosion as an
attempted murder.

“What makes you think it wasn’t?”

“Come on, Hannah. That propane stove of hers
was ancient.”

“Calvin said he’d just gone through the thing
last week. It was working fine.”

“What about that empty bottle you found down
there? It seems possible she decided on a glass or two before
dinner, fell asleep with the burner still on.”

“Jeez, you sound like Carr.” I told Dunn
about the note Elyse had left on the
Sea Bird
, that she’d
wanted me to come by the
Caribbe
, no matter how late.

“You’re making something out of nothing,
Hannah,” Dunn said. “She probably wanted to talk about her love
life or some violation involving dead sea creatures. Besides, why
would anyone want to hurt her?”

“Come on. You know Elyse. She’s always in
someone’s face about something.”

“Okay, let’s go through it. What was she up
to this last week or two?” Dunn asked, turning to Mary.

“Nothing out of the ordinary. We had lunch a
few days ago,” Mary said. “She was up to her usual, monitoring
water quality over near Simpson’s Bay, collecting data at the dive
and snorkeling sites. Actually, Elyse has been feeling very
optimistic about the state of the reef. Of course that doesn’t mean
she doesn’t find her battles.”

“What about her personal life?”

“She’s been dating Alex Reidman. He owns the
Callilou, out at Burt Point,” I said.

“Sure, I know Reidman. Nice restaurant,
pricey. Were they having any problems?”

“No. Elyse likes Reidman but she’s not
serious about him. He’s been pursuing her, but he’s not someone she
could really care about.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s ambitious, an entrepreneur, into fast
cars and money. That’s not Elyse. She could care less. Her values
lean toward the esoteric. You know that. Besides, Reidman is
extremely self-centered. When he thinks about the world, he thinks
about it in terms of how it relates to him. When things happen,
they happen to him. He’d never be there for Elyse if she needed
him.”

“Doesn’t sound like you like him much,” Dunn
said. “Why would Elyse be seeing him if he’s such a jerk?”

“Oh, he’s charming, good-looking, and they
have a good time together, but she told me she was going to break
it off with him.”

“You seeing that as a motive, Hannah, spurned
lover? Doesn’t seem too likely.”

I knew Dunn was right. Reidman could never be
that wrapped up in any woman. He was too wrapped up in himself.

“Come on, Chief. I’m not saying it was
personal. But dammit, this whole thing reeks of foul play.”

“What else was she involved in?” he asked,
looking at me like I was hopeless.

“There is one other thing,” Mary said. “I’d
asked Elyse for some help with one of the kids I’ve been working
with. You know her, Hannah. Jillian Ingram.”

“Sure. She comes over to visit Elyse, hangs
out on the boat.” Elyse had told me about Jilli.

“Jilli has been into drugs,” Mary explain to
Dunn, “not just marijuana, but heavy stuff—speed, acid. I’m sure
that the drug use is just a symptom and that Jilli is running from
something.

“I knew that Elyse would understand this. She
used illegal drugs herself when she was struggling to control her
mania and depression without a diagnosis or a doctor’s care.

“Elyse has been a tremendous support,” Mary
said. “Jilli doesn’t get any help from her parents. They are in
total denial that Jilli has a problem. They believe it’s just a
phase, that she is getting involved with the wrong kids. They
resent Elyse’s involvement. Jilli is only fourteen and extremely
angry at her parents. Elyse has been good for her. She’s helped her
through some very rough stuff.”

“What kind of stuff?”

“Jilli was picked up over on Saint Thomas
last month. She’d been caught trying to buy narcotics from an
undercover cop,” Mary explained.

“So she’s got a record?”

“Not yet. She was lucky that she was picked
up by the police before she got involved with someone who would
really hurt her, or ended up overdosing in an alley. They arrested
her and she called Elyse. Elyse called her parents and went with
them to Saint Thomas to explain the situation to the cops. They
released Jilli to her folks with an agreement she’d get into a drug
abuse program. That hasn’t happened.”

“How does any of this remotely relate to the
explosion?” Dunn asked. “Nothing indicates that this was anything
but an unfortunate accident.”

About then Hall and Marks walked into the
waiting room. Hall stood for a moment thumbing through Elyse’s
chart.

“We’ve gotten the head and neck scans back.
There is a small epidural hematoma, causing edema on the right side
of her brain. It shows up as white density. I’ve started mannitol,
which will help to absorb some of the fluid. The big factor will be
whether the bleeding continues. For now, we’ll monitor her closely,
do another CT tomorrow. If it shows continued or increased
bleeding, we’ll have to do surgery to release the pressure or there
will be increased brain damage.”

“Have you been able to assess the damage to
this point?” I asked. Christ, the thought of Elyse being paralyzed
or having brain damage. I mean, talk about unfair.

“It’s just too soon to tell,” Marks said.
“But I must be frank. There is always the chance of physical and
mental impairment. The hematoma is small, but I am concerned that
she may have microscopic axonal injuries not detected in the CT
scan.”

“This simply cannot happen to Elyse. She’s
had enough trauma in her life,” I insisted, hands on hips, as
though I could demand that it not be so.

“What else have you found?” Mary asked.

Hall flipped through the sheets on the chart,
running a bony finger down the page. “We did do a complete drug
screen also. No alcohol, barbiturates, THC. But there was one
thing—she was positive for benzodiazepine.

“What’s benzodiazepine?” Dunn and I asked in
unison.