Fire in the Stars (6 page)

“So can I.” He pulled down the tailgate of his truck and turned to her, all cop now. “Bodies can wash up from anywhere, sometimes months after a drowning. It may be hours before we know anything. You'd just be hanging around behind the perimeter with the rest of the village, waiting for news. Let's get your bike off the truck and stick to our plan. The best thing you can do for us right now is to go talk to the people at the café.”

Watching him roll the Rocket down the ramp, she struggled with fear and impotence. She wanted to plead further, but she sensed he wouldn't budge. She would be a third wheel at the scene anyway, feeling useless and hating it. “Okay, but please call me if —”

“I will.” He gave a quick crinkly smile that softened him. A chill wind whipped across the open meadow, bringing with it the tang of salt and the smell of rain. It blew his soft, floppy hair into his eyes. “You'll be sick of hearing from me.”

Then, with a screech of rubber, he was gone.

D
uring Amanda's short ride up the highway to the café, the clouds unexpectedly began to shred and roll out toward the east. The ocean quieted, and the lingering dusk painted the sea and sky in muted swirls of lavender and rose. Amanda's fatigue and hunger evaporated under the spell.

The Fisherman's Dory Café was situated on a bay in an old saltbox house painted flamboyant turquoise with yellow trim. Surrounded by practical but humourless houses sporting white siding, pickup trucks, and piles of firewood and tires in the front yard, it looked like a dancer at a plowman's match. She parked by the front window, fed Kaylee, and ran her around the parking lot before shoehorning her back into the trailer with a promise of better walks tomorrow. The dog gazed out at her, sad-eyed and unimpressed.

A blast of steamy air redolent with fish, garlic, and beer greeted Amanda when she pushed open the barnwood door. A stout woman in her fifties glanced up from behind a counter at the back, and a smile lit up her wind-weathered face.

Amanda felt as if she'd walked into a nautical-themed Disney set. Netting was draped in swoops along the walls, with various shells and fish woven through it. Lobster traps and stuffed fish hung everywhere. The place was empty except for three men clustered around a television at the back, watching football. Celtic music from speakers clashed with the breathless
play-by
-play voiceover, and every now and then the men erupted in shouts of excitement or disgust. The woman looked delighted for the interruption, and within seconds she'd introduced herself as Jill and settled Amanda at a table by the window as far from the shouting as possible. As Amanda was placing an order for a draught, seafood chowder, and grilled turbot, Jill spotted Kaylee outside.

“Oh for the love of God, that's no place for a dog! Bring 'im in, bring 'im in, darlin'! Dere's nobody here but us, and the boys will take good care of 'im while you eat. I gots just the piece of turbot for 'im.”

Amanda didn't raise the question of regulations, having learned that Newfoundlanders loved to ignore them anyway, and Kaylee wasted no time gobbling up the fish and charming her way into the middle of the men, who slipped her the occasional bite from the food in front of them. Relieved and happy, Amanda devoted herself to the bowl of steaming chowder Jill placed before her.

After the long day on the road, the chowder was divine, full of juicy chunks of cod, scallops, and shrimp. She waited until she'd savoured it all and Jill had returned with her plate of turbot before she picked up the thread of her search. Jill herself supplied the opening.

“You going up to the Viking settlement?”

Amanda shook her head. “I'm trying to find a friend and his son. The woman at Nancy's place said he came through here a couple of days ago. Did you see him?”

“A man and his boy?”

Amanda dug out her cellphone to show the photos. “Tyler's the kid's name and he's eleven.”

The woman's face crinkled in delight. “Oh, Tyler! Yes, they come through here a couple of nights ago — Monday, was it? — quite late. I was closing up the kitchen, but I fixed them some soup and burgers. The boy ate two full bowls of that chowder you had. Now that's a big bowl!”

Amanda could attest to that. She eyed the fish spread out before her, delicately breaded with a wedge of lemon on the side, and wondered whether she had room for any of it. No wonder there had been some left over for Kaylee.

Then Jill's smile faded. “The man hardly ate anything. Poked his food around his plate. Drank three pints of Quidi Vidi Premium, though.”

“Did he say anything? Talk about his plans?”

She shrugged. “Just sat there staring into his beer, leaving the poor boy with nothing to do but watch the football game or talk to me. He followed me around, asking me questions about all the fish on the walls, and them paintings. He weren't much of a football fan and anyways it weren't the CFL, so I took pity on him. No one's asked me about this stuff in years, so I told him my husband — God rest his soul — caught them all and I still have all his boats and equipment in our stage down at the harbour. I still go out in the strait with my brother sometimes, but the money's better here. When Tyler asked if he could see our stage, I offered to take him down.”

“His father let you do that?”

Jill must have heard the surprise in Amanda's voice. “This is Newfoundland, my dear. The father was happy for the babysitting and the boys here said they'd man the bar. So Tyler and I went down to the cove. It was dark by then, and all the boats were back in that was coming in, but a few fellers were still around, repairing their nets and the like.”

She paused to pull a chair out from the adjacent table. In the silence, Amanda digested the implications. Phil was paranoid about safety, particularly regarding children. What kind of shape had he been in that he'd let his son go off with a stranger, no matter how motherly she seemed? Jill eased stiffly into the chair, hiding a grimace behind a wide smile. “What a lovely boy he was! Questions, questions, questions. Reminded me of my own boys, all gone now to Alberta and Ontario. Nothing for them here except a few weeks' work at the fish plant down in Port au Choix if they're lucky. He told me his own dad couldn't get work here either and that's why he's so sad. Well, he's not going to find work at the bottom of a beer bottle now, is he?”

“No. That's why I'm looking for him. I'm worried about him. Worried about the boy too.”

“He's a clever one. Curious too,” Jill said.

A chorus of cheers drowned her out for a moment. Someone had scored something.

Jill glanced over at the table and pulled her chair closer to be heard. “He seemed like a good dad, made sure the boy liked his food and such, and Tyler sure loved him, so he must be doing something right.”

“Did Tyler mention any plans? Where they might go next?”

“Out in a boat,” she said, laughing. “To an island where they could see puffins and whales. That's what the boy wanted. He was disappointed the
deep-sea
-fishing season wasn't open yet.”

“Do you know where?”

“Well, there's boats all along the coast and plenty of fishermen eager to make an extra buck by taking them out.”

“What about boat tours?”

“Couple of them up in St. Anthony. That's about an hour and a half up the coast. But St. Anthony's a busy place and Tyler said they were looking for wilderness.”

She paused and swivelled to look at the men. “Hey Frank! Did that feller who was here a couple of nights ago — the one with the boy — did he say where he was going?”

Frank looked away from the game blearily. “The one sat over 'dere?”

“Yeah. Looked like he'd spent a week in the bush without a shower.”

“He didn't talk to us,” said another of the men.

“He talked to that other feller, though,” said a third man, who sported a thick grey beard. Jill had all their attention now, lured away from a dreary game by the prospect of intrigue.

“What other guy?” Jill asked.

“The hitchhiker that hardly talked English. Greek or something,” Grey Beard said. “You were gone by then.”

“Oh right!” Frank said. “He came in late, some cold and wet and hungry, b'y. Must've walked in off the highway. Didn't have proper clothes for the Newfoundland coast, I can tell you. He was after free food, leftovers, scraps, anyt'ing. Turns out he only had a dollar in his pocket, just off a boat up at St. Anthony. Your friend bought him food and a couple of rounds of vodka too. That was before they started arguing.”

Amanda grew alert. “What about?”

“Jobs. Fish. I dunno. We was watching the game.”

“It was mostly the Greek arguing,” said Grey Beard. “The drunker he got, the louder he got. ‘Dey's all cheaters,' he said.”

“Who?”

“Like I said, we was watching the game. Someone he was working for, I t'inks. Or supposed to work for. He said he just wanted to go home.”

“What was Phil doing?” Amanda asked. “My friend, I mean.”

“Trying to talk him down, weren't he?” Grey Beard said. “I couldn't hear what he said because he talked low and soft, but seemed like he were asking him questions. But each question just got the feller madder.”

“Right,” Frank said. “When the foreign feller started to cry, your friend said it was time to go. So he paid for everything and practically carried the feller out the door. Wasn't hard, guy couldn't have weighed more than a hundred and twenty pounds. Even soaking wet from the rain like he were.”

“Wait a minute. They left together?”

Both men nodded.

“Did you see what happened outside?”

“No, it were raining and dark as pitch out that night. I heard a truck drive off, but I don't know whose.”

Or who was in it
, Amanda thought. She sat for a moment, contemplating the implications. How like Phil to take a cold and penniless stranger under his wing. But what had happened afterward? Had he given the stranger a few dollars and sent him on his way? Or had he shepherded him into his truck and taken him to the warmth and protection of their motel?

When Norm Parsons had radioed his frantic call to shore, he'd been directed by the Harbour Authority in St. Anthony to dock at the fish plant as usual, but to wait on board for instructions from the RCMP.

Driving along the coastal road and through the interior as fast he dared during the height of moose time, Chris reached the town of St. Anthony in slightly over an hour. He had never been there, but given that it was the major centre for the upper Great Northern Peninsula, he was expecting a bustling town with lots of commerce related to tourism and fishing.

As he topped the hill coming into town, lights twinkled in the valley below and glistened off the water in the narrow bay. Homes and businesses were strung along both sides of the bay and up the steep hills above. He followed the main road down past assorted heavy industry and turned off onto the eastern shore road which twisted up and down the hilly side of the harbour. The streets were dark and quiet, but as he drew closer, he caught glimpses of the main pier, ablaze in lights and bustling with movement. Trucks and SUVs were parked helter-skelter along the road and on the gravel verges, their occupants crowding against the cordon at the entrance to the concrete pier. Some of the townsfolk had binoculars, Chris noticed, while others had cellphone cameras, even in this remote nook of the island. St. Anthony, he quickly learned, had an excellent cellphone signal.

An RCMP vehicle blocked access to the pier itself, splashing the scene in eerie red and blue. For good measure, yellow tape had also been strung across the entrance road. Stubby shrimp boats bobbed in a line along the pier, and rigging clanked in the stiff night wind.

Chris drew his own, very unofficial-looking GMC Silverado right up behind the RCMP vehicle, prompting a warning shout from the uniformed constable standing guard at the tape. Chris fumbled in his jacket for his ID as he climbed out.

“Corporal Tymko from Deer Lake,” he said. “Looking for Corporal Biggs.”

The constable snapped to attention. “He's up on the boat, sir. The body's still in the net. We're waiting for the medical examiner.”

Chris was amused. His corporal rank was brand-new; not so long ago, he'd been standing at the bottom of the ladder himself, gazing upwards in awe and hope. The constable pointed out the small shrimp vessel rocking in the water at the end of the pier. The edge of the pier was cluttered with storage boxes, netting, and coils of rope, but the pavement next to the boat was clear. As Chris strode along the pier, breathing in the sea air tanged with fish and salt, he mentally braced himself. Bodies pulled out of the sea could be bloated and chewed beyond recognition.
As long as it isn't Phil
, he repeated to himself over and over,
I'll be fine
.

The detachment commander's vehicle was parked beside the boat with its engine running and three people huddled beneath blankets inside, obviously chilled by the wind that licked off the ocean. Part of the crew, he assumed, suffering as much from shock as cold.

Powerful floodlights had been set up on the pier to supplement the boat's lights, and, looking beyond the boat's high steel hull, Chris could clearly see two men inside the cabin. One was pacing, while the other projected a quiet, watchful attention. After showing his ID to the constable in the DC's cruiser, Chris clambered aboard and ducked into the cabin. The stench of fish nearly closed his nostrils and he suppressed a gag. He wondered, irrelevantly, whether the crew could ever wash themselves clean of the smell.

Corporal Biggs lived up to his name in breadth as well as height, and his florid face and bulbous nose suggested a fondness for Newfoundland screech. He reminded Chris of an oversized leprechaun, but there was no hint of mischief or merriment in his eyes tonight. A waft of booze floated around him as he shook Chris's hand and thanked him for coming.

Chris glanced out the cabin window. The boat deck was empty, but suspended above it by ropes was a huge net of shrimp “Where's the body, sir?”

“Still in the net as per the instructions we were given.”

“May I see it?”

“Why?”

“I'd like to rule out a missing person.”

Biggs grunted. “All in good time. Nothing to see yet but a hand, a foot, and some clothes. It's a waiting game until the doc pronounces.”

“Any damn fool can see he's dead!” snapped the man who'd been pacing. He wore a seaman's cap and a heavy wool jacket. Biggs hadn't bothered to introduce him, but Chris took him to be the skipper.

“Well, I know that, Norm,” Biggs said, “but those are the rules.”

“Meanwhile I'll have to throw all that catch away.”

“Probably a wise move, anyway. Not too much call for shrimp that's been cozying up to a dead body for hours.”