Salvage (3 page)

Mayor stood to show the way, but Scarnum interrupted him again, lifting his hand. “I'll find it,” he said, holding up his hand. “I'll be right back.”

Then he walked outside, without glancing at the receptionist, and stood on the porch of the little house and smoked a cigarette.

When the cigarette was done, he walked back in with a rigid smile on his face. He nodded to the receptionist and stepped back into Mayor's office.

“All right then,” he said, smiling. “It's one of Falkenham's boats. That should make it easier to get paid. Man's got no money problems I know about.”

Mayor turned on the big smile again, standing as Scarnum came in. “You got that right,” he said. “That should make this easier.”

He looked at his watch. “I might even get their people on the phone this afternoon. Why don't you go back home and keep an eye on that boat? I'll give you a call when I know what's what.”

Scarnum smiled back. “All right,” he said, “though I gave my phone a dunking last night. Tell you what, give Charlie a call and leave a message. I'll call you back.”

Mayor stood to shake Scarnum's hand. Scarnum thanked him and turned to go but stopped in the doorway, with his back to the lawyer.

Mayor said, “I'll try to get this done quick and clean. Don't expect to have to bother you much.”

Scarnum turned back to him, without a trace of a smile. “Yeah,” he said, gazing past Mayor, out the window, his face stiff, his mouth pursed. “I don't want to have to talk to Falkenham. I'd rather tow the fucking boat back out to the ledges and leave it where I found it than have anything to do with him.”

Mayor laughed nervously. “That shouldn't be necessary,” he said. “This is pretty straightforward.”

On the way home, Scarnum stopped at the liquor store and got himself a quart of Crown Royal.

Charlie was puttering in the yard, waiting for news. He appeared to have a witticism he wanted to share, but when he saw Scarnum's face, and the brown liquor store bag in his hand, he bit his tongue.

“It's one of Falkenham's boats,” said Scarnum. “Lawyer says we ought to keep an eye on her, not let anyone get aboard her.”

Charlie stared at him. Scarnum offered a thin smile. “Suggested if you see any strange cars pulling up you ought to do some rat hunting.”

Charlie laughed. “I believe it is rat season,” he said. “Been thinking it was time for a rodent roundup.”

“Lawyer's gonna call when he has news,” said Scarnum. “I'm going down to my boat for a time.”

“All right, partner,” said Charlie, and he watched his friend slink down to the wharf.

W
hen Charlie came down an hour later and knocked on the side of the boat, Scarnum was sitting at the salon table with a glass and an ashtray, listening to Hank Williams. A third of the whisky was already gone.

Scarnum got up and opened the hatch. His face was puffy, his hair was mussed, and his eyes were red.

Charlie was grinning on the dock, holding his ball cap in his hand. “I hate to interrupt your getting drunk,” he said, “but the lady of the house wonders if you'd like to join us for a bowl of chowder.”

“No b'y,” said Scarnum. “Tell Annabelle thanks, but I'm more thirsty than hungry, if you know what I mean.”

Charlie giggled. “I might know exactly what you mean, you old fucker,” he said. “I'm thirsty meself.”

“Lord fuck,” said Scarnum, stepping back with an exaggerated sweep of his arm. “Come the fuck down, then, and have a drink of whisky, you old saltwater cowboy.”

Charlie grinned. “By the Jesus, that's some kind of you, Phillip,” he said. “I'd be too shy to ask, of course, but since you're kind enough to offer, I'd love to have a wee taste of your whisky.”

As he climbed into the cabin, he noted the level of the whisky in the bottle. “B'y, I'll thank you for the drink tonight, but tomorrow you'll thank me for taking it,” he said.

“Why's that?” said Scarnum, digging out a glass and pouring his friend two fingers of rye.

“'Cause you won't be quite so fucking hungover,” said Charlie, and he held up his glass for a toast. “To the
Kelly Lynn
.”

Scarnum joined the toast and drained the whisky in his glass. He poured himself another three fingers.

“Seemed to me I should help you celebrate your salvage,” said Charlie. “Pretty fucking good going, me son.”

“Yuh,” said Scarnum, nodding. “I just wish it wasn't one of Falkenham's boats.”

Charlie nodded into his whisky. “Yes b'y,” he said. “I wouldn't think you'd want anything to do with him, but then again, what the fuck's it matter whose boat it is?”

He fixed Scarnum with a steely gaze. “What matters is that you're going to get paid,” he said. “This'll change your life, Phillip. You ought to get a good payday from that old boat. A serious payday. What's she worth? Near two hundred, I'd guess. They won't give you that much, but it ought to be a fair piece, since she'd be smashed to shit if you hadn't hauled her off the rocks.”

Scarnum grinned at him, but his eyes weren't smiling.

“You want to, you could get a bigger boat to live on,” said Charlie. “Christ, you could buy a fucking house with that kind of money, if you wanted, use
Orion
the way most people use their boats — take it out for a sail on a nice day, week or two of holidays out the bay. You could settle down some if you want. Christ, you're not too old to start a family.”

Charlie stopped his little speech when he looked up at Scarnum's face and saw that his smile had turned into a scowl. His jaw was set and his eyes were cold.

“I told Mayor that I'd rather haul the fucking thing back out to where I found it than talk to Falkenham,” he said.

Charlie laughed and Scarnum took a gulp of whisky. “I told him seven years ago that if he ever showed his fucking face down here I'd cut him open like a flounder,” he said. “And I haven't changed my mind on that.”

“As I recall,” said Charlie, “we haven't seen him down here since.”

“No,” said Scarnum, “and every time I see him in town, he turns around and walks the other way. That's the way I fucking like it.”

“I'd say he got the message,” said Charlie. “So what are you going to do with the money? Mayor give you any idea how much it might be?”

Scarnum was gazing out the porthole. “You have no idea,” he said, and he turned to look at Charlie. “You have no idea how much I regret not killing him when I caught him with Karen.”

His hands knotted into fists on the table in front of him. “I could have smashed his fucking face in, and I don't think a jury'd a convicted me. Hard to convict someone of beating a man when he catches him fucking his woman. Maybe they'd a got me on manslaughter, put me inside for a year or two. But I'd a got out, he'd still be dead and Karen would be back in Toronto, and I'd be able to walk down the street without the risk of running into either of them.” He drained his whisky and looked out at the bay.

Charlie looked down at his glass. “Phillip, old buddy,” he said. “I'm no Doctor Phil, but I'm not sure that you're demonstrating the, uh, healthiest mental outlook here, me son.”

Scarnum fixed him with a hard look, then broke into a grin. Then he started laughing hard. Charlie joined him, giggling.

“No b'y,” said Scarnum. “I believe you might be right.”

He held up his glass, toasted Charlie, and knocked it back. “That's what the whisky's for,” he said and winked.

The sun hadn't quite set when Charlie climbed out of
Orion
and made his way up to the house, where Annabelle was waiting for him.

Alone on the boat, Scarnum drank the rest of the whisky, until he was in a stupor. He vomited in the head and fell asleep fully dressed on his V-berth.

S
carnum was awake, with a terrible headache, a mouth like sandpaper, and a bursting bladder at 4:00 a.m.

He emptied his bladder in the cramped head, grabbed a cup of water and a smoke, and went on deck.

Hunched over in the cockpit, drinking his water and smoking his cigarette, he looked out over the inky waters of the Back Harbour — the black silhouettes of the moored boats against the dark grey of the water, which dimly reflected the porch lights from the houses along the other shore of the bay.

All in all, he thought, things could be worse. A few Tylenol, a few quarts of water, and another few hours of sleep, and he'd probably feel all right by the time the sun came up. And what did he care if he'd salvaged Falkenham's boat? His money was as good as anyone's.

Scarnum was spending the money in his head when he saw the fellow in the canoe.

He was paddling straight up the bay, toward the
Kelly Lynn
, paddling very carefully, using what they called the “Indian stroke,” the quietest way of moving a canoe, without even lifting the paddle out of the water.

Without thinking about it, Scarnum found himself cupping his cigarette in his hand to hide the glow. He pinched the heater between his fingers and dropped the smoke in the water. Careful to keep his silhouette low, he crept off his boat and onto the dock. He moved, bent at the waist, along the dock to the corner nearest the
Kelly Lynn
. He stepped onto Charlie's old wooden Cape Islander and crouched behind the wheelhouse and peeked up through the window and watched the canoeist paddle up the bay. Scarnum couldn't see the man's face, but he could see that he was wearing dark clothes, and he could see that he knew how to paddle a canoe.

The man steered the canoe on the far side of the
Kelly Lynn
and then behind the boat. Scarnum could see the man looking along the docks before he paddled the canoe toward the stern.

Scarnum ducked his head down and looked around. At his feet was an old marine battery — the size of a car battery. It had a plastic carry strap on top and a tangle of wires coming from its terminals. Scarnum yanked the wires loose. He hefted the battery, jumped up onto the dock, and swung it back and forth in his arm. He ran a few steps back down the dock, then turned and ran to the end, swinging the battery back behind him like a bowling ball as he ran. At the end of the dock he let it fly, aiming it at the canoeist, who was holding on to the stern of the
Kelly Lynn
and getting up, ready to board.

The man in the canoe turned at the noise just as the battery glanced off the stern of the canoe and hit the water with a splash. The canoe turned in the water and the man was knocked on his arse to the bottom of the canoe.

“Get off my fucking boat, you cocksucker,” Scarnum bellowed. He looked around for something else to throw and spied an old plastic bucket filled with rusty nuts and bolts. He dug in and whiffed one at the canoeist, who was now scrambling for his paddle.

The bolt hit him in the back as he started to paddle hard down the bay.

“You like that, you cocksucker?” bellowed Scarnum. “What do you want with my fucking boat?”

Scarnum's next throws missed, and the canoeist was soon behind the
Kelly Lynn
and out of sight.

The light in Charlie's house went on and Scarnum knew the old man would soon be out.

By then, though, the canoeist would be long gone. Scarnum jumped into Charlie's twelve-foot aluminum runabout and cranked on the little two-horsepower outboard. It was a temperamental old two-stroke Evinrude, and he had to fiddle with the mixture knob and choke and crank it a few dozen times before it coughed to life.

By the time he headed off down the bay after the canoeist, he could see Charlie walking down to the dock, wearing his pajamas and rubber boots, with his flashlight in one hand and a shotgun cradled over his forearm.

Scarnum gave him a wave and opened up the Evinrude and took off down the bay. The canoeist was hammering the water now, paddling hard, switching from side to side, aimed for a rocky beach near the mouth of the little bay. Scarnum might have caught him but the damn Evinrude sputtered out after a few minutes and Scarnum had to fiddle with the mixture knob again before it would start.