Dark Passage (18 page)

Patting myself on the back for being clever enough to dress in a uniform-like polo shirt, Bermuda shorts and running shoes that morning, I followed Pia out of the Orpheus Theater and around the corner to a crew-only elevator, tucked away in a corner. I'd passed it almost every day without noticing.

Pia flourished her staff ID. ‘Magic powers!' She swiped it over the magnetic card reader next to the elevator and, when the doors slid open, we climbed aboard.

When we emerged from the elevator on one of the lower levels of the ship, Pia led me through narrow hallways that were marked off into zones; the stairways were also numbered. ‘This way,' Pia said as she preceded me down a steeply pitched, uncarpeted stairway. Clutching the clipboard to my chest, I grabbed the iron railing with my free hand to steady myself as I practically stumbled down the steps after her. We passed a white wall phone and a water fountain in a crew assembly area where framed citations and extensive deck plans hung on the bulkheads. I didn't see any security cameras, and there were no windows.

‘Here we are,' Pia said at last.

Ahead of me, green and white linoleum stretched on forever down a wide corridor that must have run the entire length of the ship. To one side of the door hung an oversized, shield-shaped, red, white and blue Interstate road sign. ‘I thought Martin was kidding about I-95,' I told Pia. ‘But there it is.'

‘All Phoenix ships have signs like that,' she explained. ‘And don't ask me why I-95 and not, say, Route 66.'

As we were talking, a man passed by wearing a white cook's uniform and a red bandana tied loosely around his neck. He considered us curiously, but I simply waved my clipboard. ‘Have a great day,' I said, smiling toothily. He touched fingers to his forehead in a casual salute and hurried on.

The recycling center was unbearably hot and reeked of wet, rotting vegetables. Ranging off to one side was a double row of large plastic garbage cans, exactly like the ones Paul and I put out on the curb at home. A couple of yellow handcarts sat to one side, next to a cube of folded cardboard boxes about four feet high that was stacked on a pallet.

‘This is horrible,' I said, trying not to breathe as I gawped at another row of trash cans brimming with glass bottles – white, green, brown – all sorted by color. ‘This is where he brought her?'

Pia sighed. ‘I think this is where he dumped her.'

‘But Officer Martin told me that he'd roped off the place where Julie was found with crime scene tape or something. I don't see that.'

‘Let's explore.' Pia skirted a small forklift, led me past an enormous steam pipe – about eight feet in diameter, wrapped with insulation – and around one of the pallets. There, in a corner, stretched between a pair of smaller steam pipes and wrapped around an electrical conduit, was a length of barrier tape. I expected it to be yellow, imprinted with the words ‘Crime Scene Do Not Cross.' Instead, the tape was red and warned, ‘Danger Do Not Enter.' For some reason I was disappointed, as if Officer Martin had let me down. But perhaps they didn't have the right tape to hand, or had just run out of the yellow kind.

I crouched, stared at the scarred linoleum and thought of Julie lying alone and unconscious in that hot, dirty corner of the ship, so close to the throbbing engines that it was difficult to carry on a conversation without raising your voice. Whether it was that image, or the heat, or the stench of the garbage, I'll never know, but it made my stomach churn. ‘Thanks for bringing me here, Pia.'

Pia didn't answer. Perhaps she, too, was thinking about Julie, and about other girls who had suffered in the same way.

I pulled my iPhone out of my pocket and, as Pia watched silently, I took pictures of the area. When I'd finished, Pia squared her shoulders, faced me and said, ‘Tell you what: let's go find David Warren.'

‘Can you get away?' I said to Pia's back as we climbed up the stairs and made our way back to the crew elevator.

It had been my observation that cruise ship crew works practically 24/7. The guy who serves you drinks in the piano bar at 11.30 p.m. might be the same guy who brought you your cheese omelet at 7.00 a.m. the following morning.

‘I think so,' Pia said, punching the button for deck four. ‘This is my time to rehearse with Tom, but he's pretty flexible, especially this late in the run. I'll just check with him …' She paused as the elevator glided to a halt and the doors slid open. ‘When you find David, will you let me know?'

‘Where shall I find you?'

‘Backstage,' she said as the elevator doors slid closed.

‘Over the last five years, sexual assault and physical assaults on cruise vessels were the leading crimes investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation with regard to cruise vessel incidents. These crimes at sea can involve attacks both by passengers and crew members on other passengers and crew members.'

Cruise Vessel Security and Safety Act of 2010

(H.R. 3360)

W
hen I went to check in with my sisters, I found Georgina napping in her cabin, an open book propped up on her chest. She'd been keeping Julie company while she slept. Ruth was there, too, paging through an issue of
People
magazine. When I came in, she looked up. ‘Did you know that Katie Holmes was voted by
Fitness
magazine as having the best revenge body of the year?'

‘Revenge body? What the hell does that mean?' I asked.

Ruth shrugged. ‘Eat your heart out, Tom Cruise?'

I crooked my finger and pointed to the communicating door. ‘We need to talk,' I whispered.

In the privacy of our cabin, I said, ‘I know Georgina asked us not to call Scott, but I'm sorry, that's nuts. What is the point of keeping the bad news from him? He's going to find out when she gets home anyway and, if I were Scott, even though I know there's nothing he could do until the
Islander
returns to port – unless he flew in on a helicopter – I'd be pissed off that she didn't call me right away. When she wakes up, I'm counting on you to talk some sense into her.'

I took a deep breath. ‘And, we need to take Fortune's advice and call a lawyer. We can't wait for Georgina to do it. Julie was kidnapped, and that's a federal crime. Ben Martin seems to be cooperating now, but there's absolutely no guarantee he's going to follow through once we reach dry land and Phoenix's lawyers get involved.' I touched her arm. ‘What I'm getting at is I think you should call Hutch, let him know what's happened, and ask what steps we should take
before
leaving the ship.'

‘I already have,' Ruth whispered, pointing to the cabin phone. ‘Per minute cost was simply outrageous. Seven freaking dollars, but what can you do? Hutch said that as soon as we hung up he'd contact the F.B.I.'s Baltimore field office to make certain that they've been notified.'

‘That's good,' I said, patting her arm. Then I told her about my plan to meet with David Warren.

As it turned out, tracking David down was ridiculously easy. I picked up the cabin phone, asked the operator to ring his stateroom and when it rang, the man actually answered.

My voice still a little shaky, I told him about the attack on Julie.

‘God damn,' he said. ‘Not another one. We need to talk.'

We decided to meet in the library, which was such a hotbed of drunk and disorderly activity – as if – that Phoenix hadn't even bothered to install surveillance cameras there. Pia wasn't backstage, so I left a message for her at the Oracle bar, then headed for the library where I made myself comfortable at one of the game tables, sipping a latte I'd picked up on the way. Pia arrived, still wearing her server's uniform, followed shortly by David, who was dressed in shorts and a T-shirt and was toting an oversized briefcase.

‘I'm sorry about your niece.' David pulled out a chair and sat down. ‘Maybe I should have posted warning signs all over the ship: Danger: Sexual Predator On Board.'

He plunked his briefcase on the tabletop and got right down to business. ‘I'm convinced that Charlotte had stumbled on the identity of that sexual predator. He learned of it somehow and killed her to shut her up. I have a list of the people that were aboard the
Voyager
on the day that my daughter died, Miss Fanucci. By keeping my eyes open and asking discreet questions, I've confirmed that a number of them are aboard the
Islander
today. I've started a list. I'm wondering if you could look it over.'

David extracted a thick folder from his briefcase and slid the folder across the table. Pia tilted her head and opened it cautiously, as if expecting a Jack-in-the-Box to spring out at her.

‘Holy cow, Mr Warren! Where did you lay your hands on
this
? I can't believe that Phoenix Cruise Lines gave up a passenger manifest voluntarily.'

Inside the folder was a sheaf of papers held together with a black binder clip, the print so tiny I thought Pia'd need a magnifying glass to read it.

David's grin was humorless. ‘The Miami detective I hired had someone on the inside and called in an I.O.U, but you didn't hear that from me.'

David had given Pia an impossible task. ‘There are
hundreds
of names on that list, Mr Warren,' I said. ‘How can Pia
possibly
know everyone on this list who is also aboard today? My head hurts just thinking about it. I attended the captain's cocktail party for the Neptune Club – same as you, David. Half the people in the room that night were frequent cruisers and could be suspects – you, me, the lady in the wheelchair, even Cliff and Liz Rowe.'

‘Not you, Hannah. You weren't on the
Voyager,
' David pointed out reasonably.

‘True,' I said.

‘But, Cliff and Liz?' Pia hooted. ‘You've
got
to be kidding! They're as nice as they come.'

I flapped a hand. ‘Just saying.'

‘Isn't that what the neighbors always say when a pedophile is arrested?' David said. ‘ “He was such a nice man! Dressed up like a clown and passed out candy to all the kids on Halloween. Shoveled snow off my sidewalk. Jump-started my car when the battery died.” Being personable is the pedophile's stock in trade, Miss Fanucci. It's part of the job description. Charisma. Think Ted Bundy.'

‘I'd really rather not,' Pia said, shivering. ‘But Cliff and Liz? Surely …'

David's gaze didn't waver. ‘Why else do you think I arranged to be seated at their table?'

I sat back, speechless. The man was as relentless as Inspector Javert.

‘I think I have a way to narrow it down,' Pia said after a moment as she leafed quickly through the reams of paper David had set in front of her.

‘I don't think we're looking for a passenger at all. As far as I know, Charlotte wasn't fraternizing with any of the passengers – she didn't have time for it – and I'm sure she wasn't being stalked, or she would have said something. So, it's got to be a member of the officers, staff or crew, or maybe even one of the concessioners.'

‘What do you mean, concessioners? I thought everybody on board works for the cruise line?'

Pia shook her head. ‘Absolutely not. Tom and I don't work directly for the cruise line, for example. We get our gigs through a booking agency. Tom's immediate boss is the ship's cast performance manager who reports to the entertainment director, that lounge lizard who introduces all the programs, acting as if he wrote, produced and directed them all himself. Our agency provides acts to a lot of the major cruise lines. We're just one of them.'

‘And all the shops are concessions, as you probably guessed,' David cut in.

‘I figured that,' I said. ‘Like duty frees everywhere, stamped out with a cookie cutter. Frankly,' I added, ‘I don't get it. I can buy my Courvoisier just as cheaply at the liquor store back home in Annapolis.'

‘Not in the market for diamonds?' Pia teased. ‘Or Chanel No. 5?'

‘I'm not the Chanel type. With my husband, it's splash a smidge of Eau de Bifteck behind my ear and he'll follow me anywhere. But, seriously,' I said, ‘if you don't actually work for the cruise line, why are you tending the bar at the Oracle?'

Pia blushed. ‘They were short-handed – the regular girl is confined to her cabin with a stomach virus. They asked for volunteers, I was available, and …' She winked. ‘They pay me extra.'

I noticed that David was drumming his fingers lightly on the table. Taking the hint, I got back on message. I rested my forearms on the table and leaned forward, giving him my full attention. ‘So, to summarize. Charlotte was a youth counselor on
Voyager
and spent almost all of her time while on board in Tidal Wave, right?'

Pia was quick to confirm this fact. ‘Except for the early morning hours – and sometimes even those were taken up with staff meetings – Char had practically no time on her own.'

‘Therefore, it's reasonable to assume that whatever information she'd stumbled on had to do with the teen center. Do you agree?'

David nodded and laid his hand on the sheaf of papers that still lay on the table in front of Pia and pulled it back. ‘As I said, this is a printout where I've marked everyone on
Islander
who I know was also on
Voyager
. In the teen center, that narrows it down to Wesley Bray, who now manages the Tidal Wave – although he was just a youth counselor back then – one of the other youth counselors, and the overall supervisor, the Activities Director, Ethan Hines.'

That was a new name to me. ‘Pia, do you know Ethan Hines?'

She shrugged. ‘Just to say “hi” to.'

I wondered if I'd seen him hanging around the Tidal Wave. ‘What does he look like?'

‘Medium height, five-eight or five-nine, brown hair in a buzz cut to cover up the fact that he's going bald. Looks like a Mormon missionary, if you want to know the truth.'