The Web (12 page)

Chapter

16

The following morning brought cooler air and cotton-swab
clouds drifting from the east.

“Rain,” said Gladys, as she poured our coffee. “Five or
six days.”

The clouds were translucent and filmy, not a hint of
moisture.

“They pick up the water as they go,” she said, offering
the bread basket. “Sucking it up from the ocean. Do you like
whole wheat?”

“Sure.”

“Dr. Bill does too, but a lotta people don’t. One time
he had me bake rolls for the kids at school. They
didn’t eat too many.”

She tugged the corner of the yellow tablecloth. We were
the only ones at breakfast.

“Kids like the soft stuff. We used to get lots of white
bread on the supply boats. Now, when we get anything, it’s
stale. Were you planning on swimming again?”

“Yes.”

“Well, don’t be fooled by those clouds: be sure to put on
sunscreen. You got the nice olive skin, ma’am, but the
doctor here, with those pretty blue eyes, he could burn.”

Robin smiled. “I’ll take good care of him.”

“Men think they’re tough, but they need to be taken care
of. How about some nice fresh-squeezed juice?”

At the lagoon,
the fish were quick learners, approaching for a handout
but swimming away quickly when we had nothing to give them.
Robin managed to get one large, latecoming, pink-and-yellow
wrasse to nibble at her fingers. Then it too realized she
was all show, and it shot away to a high mound of coral,
where it snaked through a hole and disappeared.

She followed, head turning constantly, her eye for
detail in full play. When she stopped, paddled in place, and
waved me over, I joined her.

A tiny bald head floated in the crack. Chinless. Gray-brown
skull. Oversized eyes bright with intelligence.

A baby octopus, legs as thin and flaccid as boiled
spaghetti. It kept staring, finally retreated, slithering
into a crevice, turning impossibly small.

We pressed closer.

It squirted ink in our faces.

I laughed, got water in my tube, and had to tread water
to clear it. The surface of the water was a clean metal
plate. The beach was empty.

I went under again, tagging along with a school of
yellow surgeonfish, watching the bony, sharp protrusions
under their pectoral fins pivot at the sense of threat,
feeling the calmness of their blank, black stares.

Paradise.

We were back at the house by two. Jo’s door was closed
and an untouched lunch tray sat on the floor nearby. I
imagined her tapping her keyboard in hopes of blunting her
grief.

Studying the wind. Something too vast to control.

Moreland, on the other hand, delighted in manipulating
nature’s small variables. Had he once harbored grand plans
for the island? Was his own grief what had kept him up last
night, sitting in the dark?

I worked. No medical oddities, no gore, and the only
untimely death I found was a young woman with ovarian cancer.

Another two cartons, more routine. Then the name of a
drowning victim caught my eye.

Pierre Laurent, a twenty-four-year-old sailor lost in a squall
near the Mariana Trench. The body had been returned to Aruk,
and Moreland had certified the death, making note of the
eighteen-year-old widow, four months pregnant with Aruk’s future
police chief.

Right below, Dennis’s birth chart. A ten-pound baby,
healthy.

Two more hours of tedium.

I liked that.

Just as I was heading for the back room to fetch yet
another box, Ben knocked and came in. “Base just called. Navy
copter’s picking you up in an hour on South Beach.”

“VIP treatment?”

“It’s either that or they send down a big ship or
rowboats.” He took in the clutter of my desk and I thought I
saw disapproval. “Need anything by way of supplies?”

“No thanks. Are you coming tonight?”

“Nope. One hour, you’ll all be leaving from here
together.”

He started to leave and I said, “Hold on, I’ll walk back
with you.”

He shrugged and we left together.

“How’re the vaccinations coming along?” I said.

“All finished till next year.”

“Tough job?”

“Not really. It’s for their own good.”

“You had a real rhythm going, yesterday.”

“That’s me,” he said. “Natural rhythm.”

The taste in my mouth matched his expression. We walked
in silence toward the big house.

As we neared the fountain, he said, “Sorry, that was
out of line. I’m not like that. .   .   . What I mean
is, race isn’t a big thing to me.”

“Me neither; forget it.”

“Guess I’m bushed. The baby was up all night.”

“How old?”

“Six months.”

“Boy or girl?”

“Girl. All of them slept great except her. Sorry. I
mean it.”

“No problem. Dr. Bill said the dinner was formal casual.
What does that mean, tux jacket and jeans?”

His smile was grateful. “Who knows? Typical military,
give out rules without explaining them. You serve any time?”

“No,” I said.

“After a month in the Guard I knew it wasn’t for me, but
no choice by then. I told them I was interested in medicine,
so they put me in a hospital on Maui, pulling sea urchin
spines out of toes. Never even hit the water. I love the
ocean.”

“Do you dive?”

“Used to. Used to sail, too. Had an old catamaran that
Dennis and I took out the few days a year we had enough wind.
What with the kids, though, no time. And Dr. Bill keeps me
busy. No complaints—it’s what I like.”

He gave another smile—full and warm. An old,
dented gray Datsun station wagon was parked near the front steps of
the house. A Chinese woman got out of it.

Tiny, with a bone-porcelain face under very short hair,
she wore a red blouse tucked into blue jeans. Her eyes were
huge. She smiled at me and gave Ben a sandwich wrapped in
wax paper.

“Tuna,” he said, kissing her cheek. “Excellent. Dr.
Delaware, this is my wife, Claire. Claire Chang Romero, Dr.
Alex Delaware.”

We exchanged greetings.

“Everything okay?” said Ben. “We still on for hibachi
dinner?”

“After homework—addition practice for Cindy and
composition for Ben Junior.”

He put his arm around her. He was a small man, but she
made him look big. Walking her to the car, he held her door
open. He looked happy. I left.

Casual formal for Robin was a long, sleeveless black dress
with a mandarin collar and high slits on the side. Her hair was
piled and mabe-pearl earrings glistened like small moons.

I put on the linen sportcoat she’d bought me for the
trip, tropical wool slacks, blue shirt, maroon tie.

“Spiffy,” she said, patting my hair down.

Spike looked up at us with big eyes.

“What?” I said.

He began baying like a hound.

The give-me-attention-I’m-so-needy bit. Our dressing up
was always a cue.

“And the Oscar goes to,” I said.

Robin said, “Poor
baby!”
and bent down and
mothered him for a while, then coaxed him into his crate with an
extra-large biscuit and a kiss through the grill. He gave out a
bass snort, then a whine.

“What is it, Spikey?”

“Probably “I want my MTV,”’ I said. “His internal
clock’s telling him
The Grind
’s on in L.A.”

“Aw,” she said, still looking into the crate. “Sorry,
baby. No TV, here. We’re roughing it.”

She took my arm.

No TV, no daily newspaper. The mail irregular, packed
on the biweekly supply boats.

Cut off from the world. So far, I was surprisingly
content.

How would it suit me, long term?

How did it suit the people of Aruk? Moreland’s letters
had emphasized the isolation and insulation. Preparing us,
but there’d been a bit of boast to it.

A man who hadn’t switched from rotary phones.

Doing it his way, in the little world he’d built for
himself. Breeding and feeding his bugs and his plants,
dispensing altruism on his own schedule.

But what of everyone else on the island? They had to
know other Pacific islanders lived differently: during our
stopover on Guam, we’d had access to newsstands, twenty-four-hour
cable, radio bands of music and talk. The
travel brochures I’d picked up there showed similar access on
Saipan and Rota and the larger Marianas.

The global village, and Aruk was on the outside looking in.

Maybe Spike wasn’t the only one who missed his MTV.

Creedman had said Moreland was extremely wealthy, and
Moreland had
confirmed growing up on ranchland in California wine
country.

Why didn’t he use his money to improve communication? There
was no computer in his office. Journals arrived in the
unpredictable mail. How did he keep up with medical progress?

Did Dennis Laurent have a computer? Without one, how
could he do his police tracking?

Was the failure to find a repeat of the beach murder the
result of inadequate equipment, and was
that
why Moreland was
still worried?

“Alex?” I felt a tug at my sleeve.

“What, hon?”

“You all right?”

“Sure.”

“I was talking to you and you spaced out.”

“Oh. Sorry. Maybe it’s contagious.”

“What do you mean?”

“Moreland spaces out all the time. Maybe it’s island fever
or something. Too much mellow.”

“Or maybe you’re both working too hard.”

“Snorkel all morning and read charts for a couple of
hours? I can stand the pain.”

“It’s all expenditure of energy, darling. And the air.
It does sap you. I find myself wanting to vegetate.”

“My little brussels sprout,” I said, taking her hand.
“So it’ll be a real vacation.”

“For you too, doc.”

“Absolutely.”

She laughed. “Meaning what? The body rests but the mind
races?”

I tapped my forehead. “The mind makes a pit stop.”

“Somehow I don’t think so.”

“No? Watch me tonight. Pinkies out, hmph hmph, how
about them Dodgers?” I went limp and rolled my eyes.

“Maybe I should bring a snorkel, then. In case you nod
off in the soup.”

Chapter

17

Moreland was sitting in the Jeep when we got there.
Wearing an ancient brown blazer and a tie the color of
gutter water.

“We’re waiting on Pam,” he said, looking preoccupied.
He started the car and gave it gas, and a moment later the little
red MG sped up and screeched to a halt. Pam jumped out,
flushed and breathless.

“Sorry.” She ran into the house.

Moreland frowned and looked at his watch.
The
first hint of paternal disapproval I’d seen. I hadn’t
noticed any closeness, either.

He checked the watch again. An old Timex. Milo would
have approved. “You look lovely, dear,” he said to Robin.
“As soon as she’s ready, we’ll get going. Mrs. Picker’s not
coming, understandably.”

A few minutes later,
Pam sprinted out, perfectly composed in a blazing white
trouser suit, her hair loose and shining, her cheeks flushed.

“Onward,” said Moreland. When she kissed his cheek he
didn’t acknowledge it.

He drove the way he walked, maneuvering the Jeep slowly
and awkwardly down toward the harbor, veering close to the
edge of the road as he pointed out plants and trees.

At the bottom of the road, he turned south. The sun had
been subdued all day, and now it was retiring; the beach was
oyster-gray, the water old nickel.

So quiet. I thought of AnneMarie Valdos sectioned like a side of
meat on the flat rocks.

We got out and waited silently near the edge of the
road.

“How long of a copter ride is it?” I said.

“Short,” said Moreland.

A scuffing sound came from the top of the coastal road.

A man emerged from the shadow of the barrier and came toward
us.

Tom Creedman, waving.
He wore a blue pinstripe suit, white button-down shirt,
yellow paisley tie, tasseled loafers. His black hair was
slicked down and his mustache smiled in harmony with his
mouth.

Moreland’s eyes were furious. “Tom.”

“Bill. Hi, Moreland
fille.
Doctor-and-Robin.”

Insinuating himself into the middle of our group, he
tightened the knot of his tie. “Pretty nifty, personal
aerial escort and all that.”

“Not much choice if they want us there,” said Moreland.

“Well,” said Creedman, “we could swim. You’re a strong
swimmer, Pam. I saw you today, taking those waves on the
North End with Chief Laurent.”

Moreland blinked hard and snapped his head toward the
water.

“Maybe I should try it one day,” said Pam.
“What is it, a few knots? Do you swim, Tom?”

“Not if I can avoid it.” Creedman chuckled, fished a
wood-tipped cigarillo out of his jacket, and lit it with a
chrome lighter. Sucking in deeply, he examined the lagoon
with a flinty stare and blew smoke through his nose. Foreign
correspondent on assignment. I waited for theme music.

“Funny, isn’t it?” he said. “After all the enforced
segregation, they decide it’s party time—at least for the white
folk. I see Ben and Dennis weren’t included.
What do you think, Bill? Is brown skin a disqualifying factor?”

Moreland didn’t answer.

Creedman turned to Robin and me. “Maybe it’s in
your
honor. Any Navy connections, Alex?”

“I played with a toy boat in the bathtub when I was
five.”

“Ha,” said Creedman. “Good line.”

Pam said, “You don’t swim, you don’t sun. What do you
do all day, Mr. Creedman?”

“Live the good life, work on my book.”

“What exactly is it about?”

Creedman tapped his cigarillo and gave a Groucho leer.
“If I told you, it would kill the suspense.”

“Do you have a publisher?”

His smile flickered. “The best.”

“When’s it coming out?”

He drew a finger across his lips.

Pam smiled. “That’s top secret, too?”

“Has to be,” said Creedman, too quickly. The cigarillo
tilted and he pulled it out. “The publishing business is
vulnerable to leaks. Information superhighway; the commodity
is .   .   . ephemeral.”

“Meaning everyone’s out to steal ideas?”

“Meaning billions are invested in the buying and selling
of concepts and everyone’s looking for the
golden
idea.”

“And you’ve found it on Aruk?”

Creedman smiled and smoked.

“It’s not like that in medicine,” she said. “Discover
something important, you’ve got a moral obligation to
publicize it.”

“How noble,” said Creedman. “Then again, you doctors
chose your field
because
you’re noble.”

Moreland said, “I think it’s coming.” His finger was up
but he was still facing the ocean.

I heard nothing but the waves and bird chirps. Moreland
nodded. “Yes, definitely.”

Seconds later, a deep tom-tom rumble sounded from the
east, growing steadily louder.

A big, dark helicopter appeared over the bluffs, sighted
directly over us, hovered, then lowered itself on the road
like a giant locust.

Double rotors, bloated body. Sand sprayed and we
dropped our heads and cupped our hands over our mouths.

The rotors slowed but didn’t stop. A door opened and a
drop-ladder snapped down.

Hands beckoned.

We trotted to the craft, eating sand, ears bursting, and
climbed into a cabin walled with canvas and plastic and
reeking of fuel. Moreland, Pam, and Creedman took the first
passenger row and Robin and I settled behind them. Piles of
gear and packed parachutes filled the rear storage area. A
pair of Navy men sat up front. Half-drawn pleated curtains
allowed us a partial view of the backs of their heads and a
strip of green-lit panel.

The second officer looked back at us for a moment, then
straight ahead. He pointed. The pilot did something and the
copter shuddered and rose.

We headed out to sea, hooking southeast and following
the coastline. High enough for me to make out the bladelike
shape of the island. South Beach was the point of the dagger,
our destination the hilt.

The blockade was no more than a paper cut from this height.
The mountaintops were a black leather belt, the banyans
obscured by burgeoning darkness and the
ring of mountains. The copter veered sharply and the east
end of the island slid into view.

Concrete shore and choppy water, no trees or sand or
reefs. The windward harbor was a generous soupspoon
indentation. Natural port. Ships large enough to look
significant from these heights were moored there. Some of
them moved. Strong waves—I could see the froth, piling up
against a massive seawall.

We turned north toward the base: empty stretches of
black veined with gray, toy-block assemblages that had to be
barracks, some larger buildings.

The copter descended and we touched down perfectly, the
trip as brief as an amusement park ride, the blockade’s cruel
efficiency clearer than ever. The pilot cut the engine and
exited without a word. The second officer waited till the
rotors had quieted before releasing our door.

We got out and were hit by a blast of humid air, stale
and chemically tainted.

“The windward side,” said Moreland. “Nothing grows
here.”

A sailor in a contraption that resembled an oversize
golf cart drove us through a sentry post and past the
barracks, storehouses, hangars, empty airstrips. Concrete
fields crowded with planes and copters and disassembled craft
made me think of Harry Amalfi’s aerial junkyard. Some of the
planes were antiques, others looked new. One sleek passenger
jet, in particular, would have done a CEO proud.

The harbor was blocked from view by the seawall, a
monstrous thing of the same raw construction as the blockade.
Above it, an American flag whipped and snapped like a
locker-room towel. I could hear the ocean charging angrily,
hitting the concrete with the roar of a gladiator audience.

Looking toward the base’s western border, I saw the
area where Picker must have gone down. At least half a mile
away. Twenty-foot chain-link fencing completed the banyans’
prison. Creedman had said the base was run by a skeleton
crew, and there were very few sailors on the ground—maybe
two dozen, walking, watching.

The golf cart veered across a nearly empty parking lot,
through a small drab garden, up to a colonial building, three
stories high, white board and brick, green shutters.

HEADQUARTERS
CAPT. ELVIN S. EWING

Next door was a one-story building of the same design. The
Officers’ Club.

Inside the club was a long walnut hallway—deep red wool
carpeting patterned with crossed sabers, brass fixtures. The
paneling was lined with roiling seascapes and model
ships in glass cases.

Another sailor took us to a waiting room decorated with
photo blowups of fighter jets and club chairs. A sailor in
dress uniform stood behind a host’s lectern. Glass doors
opened to a dining room: soft lighting, empty tables, the
smell of canned vegetable soup and melted cheese.

The sailors saluted one another, and the first one left
without breaking step.

“This way,” said the one behind the lectern. Young, with
clipped hair and a soft face full of pimples. He took us to
an unmarked door. A sign hanging from the knob said
Captain Ewing had reserved the room.

Inside were one long table under a hammered-copper
chandelier and twenty bright blue chairs. A portrait of the
President wearing an uneasy smile greeted us from behind the
head chair. Three walls of wood, one blocked by blue drapes.

A new sailor came and took our cocktail order. Two
different men brought the drinks.

Creedman sipped his martini and licked his lips. “Nice
and dry. Why can’t we get vermouth like this in the village,
Bill?”

Moreland stared at his tomato juice and shrugged.

“I asked the Trading Post to get me something dry and
Italian,” said Creedman. “Took a month and what I ended up
with was some swill from Malaysia.”

“Pity.”

“Go to any duty-free in the booniest outpost and they’ve
got everything from Chivas to Stoli, so what’s the big
deal about filling an order here? It’s almost as if they
want to do it wrong.”

“Is that the theme of your book?” said Pam.
“Incompetent islanders?”

Creedman smiled at her over his drink. “If you’re that
curious about my book, maybe you and I should get together
and discuss it. That is, if you’ve got any energy after your
swims.”

Moreland walked to the blue drapes and parted them.

“Same view,” he said. “The airfield. Why they put a
window here, I’ll never know.”

“Maybe they like to see the planes take off, Dad,” said
Pam.

Moreland shrugged again.

“How long did you and Mom live here?”

“Two years.”

Three men came in. Two wore officer’s garb—the first
was fiftyish, tall and thickset, with rough red skin and steel
glasses; the other even taller, ten years younger, with a
long, swarthy, rubbery face and restless hands.

The man between them had on a beautiful featherweight gray
serge suit that trimmed ten pounds from his two hundred. Six
feet tall, heavy shouldered and narrow hipped, with a square
face, bullish features, slit mouth, rancher’s tan. His shirt
was soft blue broadcloth with a pin collar, his foulard a
silver and wine silk weave. His hair was bushy and black on
top, the temples snow-white. The contrast was almost
artificial, as dramatic in real life as on TV.

He looked like Hollywood’s idea of a senator, but Hollywood
had nothing to do with his becoming one, if newspapers and
magazines could be believed.

The story was a good one: born to a young widow in a
struggling Oregon logging camp, Nicholas Hoffman had been
tutored at home till the age of fifteen, when he’d lied about his age
and enlisted in the Navy. By the end of the Korean War, he
was a decorated hero who gave the military another fifteen years of
distinguished service before entering the real estate
business, making his first million by forty and running
successfully for the Senate at forty-three. His doctrine was the
avoidance of extremes; someone dubbed him Mr. Middle-of-the-Road
and it stuck. True believers on both ends tried to use
it against him. The voters ignored them, and Hoffman was well
into his third term after a no-contest race.

“Bill!” he said, barging ahead of the officers and
stretching out a meaty hand.

“Senator,” said Moreland softly.

“Oh, Jesus!” roared Hoffman. “Cut the crap! How
are
you, man?”

He grabbed Moreland’s hand and pumped. Moreland
remained expressionless. Hoffman turned to Pam. “You must be
Dr. Moreland, Junior. Christ, last time I saw you, you were
in diapers.” He let go of her father and touched her fingers
briefly. “You
are
a doctor?”

She nodded.

“Splendid.”

Creedman stuck out his hand and announced himself.

“Ah, the press,” said Hoffman. “Captain Ewing told me
you were here, so I said invite him, show him open
government in action or he’ll make something up. On
assignment?”

“Writing a book.”

“On what?”

“Nonfiction novel.”

“Ah. Great.”

“What brings
you
here, Senator?”

“Fact-finding trip. Not one of those sun-and-fun
junkets. Real work. Downsizing. Appraising military
installations.”

Unbuttoning his jacket, he patted his middle. He had a
small, hard paunch that tailoring had done a good job of
camouflaging.

“And you must be the doctors from California.” He stuck out
his hand. “Nick Hoffman.”

“Dr. Delaware’s a psychologist,” said Robin. “I build
musical instruments.”

“How nice   .   .   .” He glanced at the table. “Shall
we, Captain?”

“Certainly, Senator,” said the red-faced
officer. His voice was raspy. Neither he nor the swarthy man
had budged during the introductions. “You’re at the head,
sir.”