The Devil's Waters (13 page)

Iris beamed, a toothy beauty. She strode to LB, slipped her arm inside his so they could walk linked down the last stairs.

“The Filipino cook has no touch. I do not eat the heads of fish.”

“I’ll see if I can’t whip you up something special for dinner. Some pasta.”

“Are you a good cook?”

“I’m better than fish heads.”

She laughed and patted his forearm. This was his reward for letting her lie. It seemed fair pay. She took his arm down the steps.

At deck level, Iris released him. “Let’s walk to the bow. It’s my favorite place.”

She led him along the starboard rail. They moved single file through the skinny passage, more tunnel than walkway. Here on deck, the ship seemed livelier than from the cool vantage of the bridge or the high perch of the wings. The water sloughing off the great hull whispered a constant shush. Under LB’s boots, the floor vibrated. The huge engine, even hobbled, murmured in the steel. Thick walls suggested the mammoth weight this ship could carry. All the angles were sharp, the passage studded with ladders, beams, low-hanging lanterns. The
Valnea
had been designed and built every inch for cargo, not comfort. According to Drozdov, she was also disposable.

LB followed Iris Cherlina past a large red lifeboat hung on davits, and smaller life rafts packed into plastic barrels along the rail. The stroll to the bow and back would cover a quarter of a mile.

As they stepped onto the open bow, the night’s first stars appeared behind Iris’s head. The crimson sun had been doused only minutes before. One of Bojan’s Serbs strode the opposite rail, black-clad. Spotting them, he reversed course and approached, keeping his weapon slung but laying an obvious hand on it.

“Dr. Cherlina. He is not allowed here.”

Iris held up
a palm to halt any further comment. Despite her imperious raised hand, the guard parted his lips to say more. She stopped him again.

“He is with me.”

She tucked her arm inside LB’s to turn away from the Serb. LB didn’t like having his back to a gun, any gun, but Iris towed him away, and the guard returned to his patrol.

Iris Cherlina was no passenger on this ship—that much was plain. She had authority the guard couldn’t top, and she wasn’t shy about showing that to LB.

The bow offered more room to move than elsewhere on the ship, though it was cluttered with large hawsers, a pair of oversize windlasses for raising and dropping the twin anchors, rusty chains with links big around as LB. In the center, a high mast rose, topped by an unlit beacon. He looked back the length of the ship to the pilothouse, over the vast and vacant container deck that resembled a no-man’s-land for giants, with its rows of fences and steel cables.

Straight off the bow, at the foot of the slumping sun in a rippling red pool, the silhouette of a small ship lay miles ahead.

Iris leaned over the rail. LB copied her. Both looked far down to the bulbous bow cutting high out of the water. Several dolphins swooped on either side, cruising in the breaking crest. Iris waved at them.

Over the slapping wash, his shoulders touching hers, LB asked, “Why’d you say ‘poor man’ about the captain?”

Iris did not straighten. The dolphins kept her bent over the rail. LB pulled himself erect, fixing on the dim outline of the small ship, bobbing without running lights in the
Valnea
’s path.

Iris came up, flushed. She considered him a long moment.

“You do pay attention, don’t you?”

“I’m in a life-and-death profession. It’s what I do.”

LB liked her long blinks, as she retreated behind her lids to make a plan. She looked sexy when she closed her eyes, smart when she opened them.

“All right,” Iris Cherlina said. “This comes from Grisha, but it is
also painfully obvious. The captain is a troubled man.”

“Check.”

“A few years back, he was hijacked in these waters. His ship was anchored off the coast for eight months while the insurance company negotiated with the Somalis. The crew was treated well enough, but the captain didn’t take well to captivity. He fought with the pirates, and they beat him. After the ransom, Drozdov went home to Russia. He became a drunkard. He was dismissed by the company. His wife left him. This year he became sober, and they took him back.”

“For this voyage.”

Again Iris blinked like an owl.

“Yes. How did you know?”

Because it made sense. Find a captain so down on his luck that he’d accept a cargo he knew nothing about. No curiosity.

“Just a guess.”

He glanced at his watch. Time for him to head back to the infirmary.

“Tell me something.”

“That’s what I’ve been doing, Sergeant.”

“Yeah. Why’re you okay with talking to me?”

Iris Cherlina withdrew, playacting as if hurt. “Do I seem standoffish?”

“No. But Drozdov says you don’t talk to anyone, and they don’t talk to you. You eat by yourself, wander around by yourself. How come?”

“I don’t know. I’m an outsider; they are busy all the time. We just fell into mutual silence. But after two and a half weeks of scant attention, to be honest, I am very glad to have a man show some interest in me.”

“Sounds like you talk to Grisha.”

“Some. But he…well, he is not you.”

He dipped his head to the flattery,
even though her explanation didn’t square with what Drozdov said, that she kept mostly to herself.

The shadow ship in the
Valnea
’s path loitered, one mile bigger in the twilight.

“Let’s go back. I’ve got to check on the infirmary. Then dinner. I’ll have a chat with the cook.”

He led the way into the narrow passage. Again LB swung his shoulders to avoid bumping into the hard pillars supporting the overhang. Far below the rail, in the faint light, phosphorus twinkled in the foaming wake.

They passed another strolling Serbian. The guard backed out of the way, wordless. LB wondered how good Bojan’s guys would be in a scrap. In his long experience, the ones with the attitude most often came up short. Doc and Quincy were plain Nevada cowboys, Jamie was shy, Wally was clean-cut, and LB had seen every one of them dive into whatever hot or freezing hell the job threw at them. LB would take Mouse, even young Robey, every PJ or CRO he’d ever known, over these arrogant Serb security guards any day.

Reaching the superstructure, Iris stayed with LB in the infirmary, bathing the cadet’s bandages while LB checked the pace of the saline IV and the fentanyl drip. The boy’s urine flow lagged behind the input of saline, meaning that his body was still holding fluids in its tissues and blisters. Iris was unfazed at the boy’s bubbled, boiled skin, unmoved by his half-awake moan, raised no eyebrows at the catheters. She had a scientist’s easy detachment. Nikita had added another toe to his wiggling.

Grisha agreed to stay in the infirmary through dinner if he could share in whatever meal LB would prepare for Iris. The first mate got a peck on the cheek from the departing Iris.

Down the hall, LB stabbed the elevator button. When the door slid open, Chief Engineer Razvan stood inside, clutching a brace of folders and loose printout sheets. LB
let Iris step in first. The engineer nodded curtly to them both.

Iris lit the button for F deck, explaining she needed a rest before dinner. When the elevator stopped, LB spoke as she exited into the hall.

“See you at dinner.”

“I expect genius,” Iris called around the closing door, “from a relative of Nero’s.”

The door slid shut on Iris turning away. LB would check in with Drozdov on the bridge, have the captain assign him quarters, then head back down to the galley to introduce himself to the Filipino chef.

The elevator continued its ascent. Chief Razvan appeared agitated, finger-tapping the thick sheaf of sheets in his arms. LB made quick conversation, telling him that Nikita might recover; the cadet showed improvement but wasn’t out of the woods. The Romanian nodded, staring at his shoes. He seemed to want to burst out of the elevator.

Rising to the top floor, before the door opened, LB quizzed the engineer. “What’ve you got? Your eyes are bugging out of your head.”

Chief raised a finger. “You.” He stuck the digit into LB’s chest. “You are a reliable person.”

“Yeah?”

Before LB could question him further, the elevator stopped. Razvan charged out, up the steps to the pilothouse, leaving LB to walk in his wake.

“Captain,” the chief called the instant he entered the cool, broad pilothouse, “a word.”

From his chair, Drozdov presided over the array of controls and screens. Outside the ship’s wide windows, the steaming white light glowed in the dusk above the faraway bow.

Without turning from his instruments, Drozdov said, “In a minute.”

Razvan hurried to stand beside the
captain’s chair, hefting his bale of pages.

“I am sorry, Captain, but now.”

Drozdov pivoted a taut face. Something else had been bothering him before Chief exploded into the bridge.

“Yes.”

Razvan slapped his papers. “The accident was no accident. It was deliberate.” Chief glanced around the wheelhouse, though only the three of them were there. “Somebody on this ship. Sabotage.”

LB was jolted. The secrets on the
Valnea
were starting to become oppressive. He kept silent, but suddenly, badly, he wanted off the ship. Stuck here for another thirty hours. He thought of calling Torres on the satellite radio in his vest, telling her to come get him.

Drozdov stayed icy. “How do you know this?”

“I have searched every record of the engine. I found this.” The Romanian plopped his stack of papers on the console.

Before he could dig in, Drozdov said, “Just tell me.”

“Yes, all right. At oh-four-thirteen this morning, voltage for cylinder seven dropped off one instant before the accident. The injection timing signal to the cylinder was interrupted. This caused fuel to come in the wrong time to piston stroke. That blew the gasket. Then, poof, like magic, the voltage returned to the cylinder.”

“Tell me why you think this is sabotage. And be quick, Chief.” Drozdov pointed at one of his radar screens. “I have another problem.”

Chief leaped to his explanation. “In computer records, when there is short in the power, I will see two alarms. The first is pre-alarm. It tells me where to look. It is like skid marks in front of car wreck. The second alarm is actual power interruption. In this case, Captain, I only have alarm, not the pre-alarm. No skid mark. This says the power failure did not come from failure of engine but from outside. This was human hand.”

“How was it done?”

“Simple.
Anyone with knowledge can go to fuse box for cylinder seven. Pull the correct fuse. Two seconds. Put it back.”

“You are sure?”

Chief gathered his computer sheets off the console. “Of course. I am sure also that only cadet, Nikita, this American, and I did not do it. The rest of you, I watch now.”

Drozdov turned his weathered face to LB. He asked, “Who would do this?” as if an outsider to the ship might have the best idea.

You, for one, Captain, LB thought.

“Chief,” LB asked, “can you see the pistons from the fuse box?”

“No. Whoever did this could not see Nikita and cadet. Perhaps that was mistake. But I do not forgive.”

Drozdov’s chin dropped to his chest. After a quick moment, he raised his gaze to his controls and the radar sweep.

The small ship off the bow lurked only a mile away, and dead ahead. The blip faded in and out, its radar signature on the water small and sketchy.

LB asked, “What’s that?”

“That, Sergeant, is my other problem. Right now, the greater of the two.”

“Is it pirates?”

Drozdov answered by bringing a walkie-talkie from his lap to his lips. He thumbed the talk button. “Mr. Bojan, this is bridge. Bojan, bridge. Respond.”

Before the Serb guard could answer, the captain unclipped another microphone from the console. In clear tones, he said, “All hands, all hands. This is the captain. Officers to the bridge. Crew prepare to take secure position. This is not a drill.”

Razvan pivoted with his papers for the stairs. Drozdov said at his departing back, “Chief, please tend to the engine.”

LB was left
alone with Drozdov. The captain’s face was set hard. LB looked for a crack in the man’s composure, some flashback to captivity, thirst for a bottle, a wince, a lick of the lips.

Drozdov locked eyes on the radar screen, measuring distance and time, calculating the next move, staying captain.

LB asked again, “Pirates?”

In a low growl, Drozdov said, “I do not know. I have never seen this from pirates. One vessel at dusk, sitting in the path of a freighter. This is new. The Somalis come at sunup. In two or three skiffs. They race in from both sides, shoot their rockets, threaten on the radio until we stop. This ship ahead”—Drozdov pointed again—”this one is quiet. We will find out shortly.”

He put his chin into an open hand, pulled down on his jowls. Drozdov was not panicked. The gesture spoke instead of calculation.

“And someone I trust has disabled my ship so these
mudaki
may hijack us more easily.” The captain turned his head to fake a disgusted spit. “Disloyal
zhopoliz
.”

Who would want to be hijacked? It made no sense.

One of the officers rushed from the stairwell into the pilothouse. Instantly Drozdov ordered, “Go to manual. Starboard five.”

The mate positioned himself between the leather chairs, standing at the console. He punched a button and set hands on the tiny steering wheel. He came starboard five degrees. Moments after, the ship ahead moved to stay in the
Valnea
’s course.

Drozdov leaned forward to tap the radar screen. He said to LB, “I have seen mornings after storms where containers have been opened and emptied. Leather jackets, Dom Pérignon, motorcycle parts. In storms, Sergeant. Pirates are desperate men. They cannot be predicted.”

Grisha chugged in, huffing. Drozdov instructed him, “Hail the vessel in our path.”

LB had
no role on the bridge. If pirates were coming, he belonged where he could do some good.