The Wheel of Darkness Page 23

  “Is your staff conducting an investigation?”

  “My staff, sir, is strained to the maximum just trying to keep order, answer reports of disappearances, and reassure passengers. With all due respect, we are not in any position to gather evidence, question suspects, or conduct an investigation.”

  Cutter continued gazing at him. “Anything else, Mr. Kemper?”

  “I would recommend declaring an ISPS Code Level One on the ship.”

  The eyes focused briefly on LeSeur before swiveling toward the officer of the watch. “Mr. Worthington?” Cutter called out. “Estimated time to New York?”

  “At current speed and heading, sixty-six hours, sir.”

  “St. John’s?”

  “Twenty-three hours, sir, again if we maintain speed.”

  A long silence enveloped the bridge. Cutter’s eyes gleamed in the dim light from the electronics. He turned back to the security director.

  “Mr. Kemper, declare a Code One. I want you to close two of the casinos and half of the nightclubs. In addition, select the shops and lounges that have been doing the least amount of business. Reassign those employees to the maintenance of order on board this ship, as far as their skills and capabilities will allow. Close the game rooms, health clubs, theaters, and spas—and again reassign the staff to security duties, whenever possible.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Seal any areas that may contain forensic evidence of this and the other crimes. I don’t want any entry by anyone to those areas, even you.”

  “Already done, sir.”

  He turned. “Mr. LeSeur, a ten P.M. to eight A.M. curfew will remain in effect until we land. All passengers will be confined to their staterooms during those periods. Move up the restaurant dinner seatings so the last one concludes at nine-thirty.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “All room service and other passenger services are to be canceled. All waitstaff will follow a minimal cleaning schedule. All crew are to be confined to quarters when not on duty or at mess. No exceptions. Mr. LeSeur, you will take appropriate steps to cut down on the movement of nonessential personnel about the ship.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You will make an appropriate announcement to the passengers declaring an International Ship and Port Security nautical emergency on board ship and outlining my orders. Infractions will be dealt with sternly. There will be no exceptions granted to these rules, no matter how rich or . . . influential the person might be, or claim to be.”

  There was a long, long silence. LeSeur waited for the most essential order to come.

  “That will be all, Mr. LeSeur.”

  But LeSeur didn’t move. “Captain Cutter, excuse me for mentioning this, but surely you’ll be diverting to St. John’s?”

  As Cutter’s eyes rested on him, they turned cold. “No.”

  “Why not, sir?” LeSeur swallowed.

  “I am not in the habit of explaining my reasoning with junior officers.”

  LeSeur swallowed again in an unsuccessful attempt to loosen his throat. “Commodore, if I may—”

  Cutter interrupted him. “Mr. LeSeur, call the staff captain back to the bridge and confine yourself to your quarters until further orders.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “That will be all. Mr. Kemper, you may vacate the bridge as well.” And without another word, Cutter wheeled away and resumed his pacing.

  44

  CAREFULLY, CAREFULLY, PENDERGAST BROUGHT THE CRUMBLING box out into the light. He fitted a jeweler’s loupe to one eye and, with a pair of tweezers, began sorting through the debris inside—dead insects, particles of resin, sawdust, fibers—placing select items into small test tubes taken from his jacket pockets. When he had finished, he fitted the lid back on the box, reassembling it with exquisite care, and placed it back in the safe in the rectangle of sawdust from which he had taken it. He closed the safe, dipped the passcard into the reader to lock it, then closed the teak cabinet and stepped back.

  He checked his watch: nineteen minutes left.

  Blackburn had hidden the object—whatever it was—elsewhere in his suite.

  He peered around the salon, examining each object in turn. Many whose dimensions exceeded that of the box he could dismiss immediately. But there were many others that could fit in the box, albeit awkwardly; too many to examine properly within a quarter of an hour.

  He went upstairs and searched the bedrooms, baths, and exercise room. Blackburn, he noted, had only redecorated the salon—except for the silken bedcoverings monogrammed with a large and ostentatious “B,” the upstairs rooms remained in their original decor.

  He returned to the salon and paused in the center, his silvery eyes traveling around the room, fastening on each object in turn. Even if he eliminated all objects that were neither Tibetan nor Indian and more modern than the twelfth century, he was still left with an uncomfortably large number. There was an iron ritual lance damascened with gold and silver; a phur-bu dagger in massive gold with a triangular blade issuing from the mouth of Makara; several long prayer wheels in exquisitely carved ivory and silver, with sculpted mantras; a silver dorje ritual object encrusted with turquoise and coral; and several ancient thangkas and mandala paintings.

  All extraordinary. But which one—if any—was the Agozyen, the terrible and forbidden object that would cleanse the earth of its human infestation?

  His eye settled on the extraordinary thangka paintings that ranged about the walls: paintings of Tibetan deities and demons, bordered by rich silk brocade, used as objects of meditation. The first was an exquisite image of the Avalokiteshvara bodhisattva, the Buddha of Compassion; next, a fierce depiction of the Kalazyga demon, with fangs, three eyes, and a headdress of skulls, dancing wildly in the midst of a raging fire. He examined the thangkas at close range with his loupe, then plucked a thread of silk off the edge of each in turn and examined them as well.

  Next he moved to the largest of the mandalas, hanging over the gas fireplace. It was mind-boggling: an intricate, metaphysical representation of the cosmos that was, at the same time, a magical depiction of the interior state of the enlightened Buddha, as well as being the schematic of a temple or palace. The mandalas were meant to be objects of contemplation, aids to meditation, their proportions magically balanced to purify and calm the mind. To stare at a mandala was to experience, if only briefly, the nothingness that is at the heart of enlightenment.

  This was an exceptionally fine mandala; Pendergast gazed at it, his eye almost magnetically drawn to the object’s center, feeling the familiar peace and freedom from attachment emanating from it.

  Was this the Agozyen? No—there was no menace, no danger here.

  He glanced at his watch. Blackburn would be back in twelve minutes. There was no more time to examine individual objects. Instead, he returned to the center of the room and stood there, thinking.

  The Agozyen was in the room: he was certain of that. But he was also certain that further searching was a waste of precious time. A Buddhist phrase came to his mind: When you cease searching, then you will find.

  He seated himself on Blackburn’s overstuffed couch, closed his eyes, and—slowly, calmly—emptied his mind. When his mind was at rest, when he ceased caring whether he found the Agozyen or not, he opened his eyes and once again looked around the room, keeping his mind a blank, his intellect quiescent.

  As he did so, his gaze gravitated toward an exquisite painting by Georges Braque hanging unobtrusively in the corner. He vaguely remembered the painting, an early masterpiece by the French cubist that had recently been auctioned at Christie’s in London—purchased, he recalled, by an unknown buyer.

  From his position on the sofa, he examined the painting with relaxed pleasure.

  Seven minutes.

  45

  LESEUR INTERCEPTED STAFF CAPTAIN MASON AS SHE WAS entering through the outer bridge security hatchway. She paused when she saw his face.

  “Captain Mason . . . ,” he began, then faltered.


  She looked at him, her face betraying nothing. She still appeared cool, collected, hair tucked under the captain’s hat with not a single strand out of place. Only her eyes bespoke a deep weariness.

  She looked through the inner hatchway toward the bridge, taking in the current operational status with a quick, professional glance, then returned her attention to him. “Is there something you wish to tell me, Mr. LeSeur?” Her voice was studiously neutral.

  “You’ve heard about the latest killing?”

  “Yes.”

  “Commodore Cutter refuses to divert to St. John’s. We’re maintaining course for New York. Sixty-five hours and change.”

  Mason said nothing. LeSeur turned to go and felt her staying hand on his shoulder. He felt a mild surprise: she had never touched him before.

  “Officer LeSeur,” she said. “I wish you to come with me when I speak to the commodore.”

  “I’ve been dismissed from the bridge, sir.”

  “Consider yourself reinstated. And please call the second and third officers to the bridge, along with Mr. Halsey, the chief engineer. I will need them to act as witnesses.”

  LeSeur felt his heart accelerate. “Yes, sir.”

  It was the work of five minutes to quietly round up the junior officers and Halsey and return to the bridge. Mason met them at the security hatch. Over her shoulder, LeSeur could see that the commodore was still walking back and forth before the bridge windows. His pace had slowed still further, and he was putting one foot before another with excruciating precision, head bowed, ignoring everyone and everything. At the sound of their entry, he at last paused, looked up. LeSeur knew Cutter could not help but see the bridge staff arrayed in a row behind him.

  Cutter’s watery eyes went from Mason to LeSeur and back again. “What is the first officer doing here, Captain? I dismissed him.”

  “I asked him to return to the bridge, sir.”

  There was a long silence.

  “And these other officers?”

  “I asked them to be here, as well.”

  Cutter continued to stare at her. “You are insubordinate, Captain.”

  There was a pause before Mason replied. “Commodore Cutter, I respectfully ask you to justify your decision to maintain course and heading for New York instead of diverting to St. John’s.”

  Cutter’s gaze hardened. “We’ve been over this already. Such a diversion is unnecessary and ill-considered.”

  “Pardon me, sir, but the majority of your officers—and, I might add, a delegation of prominent passengers—think otherwise.”

  “I repeat: you are insubordinate. You are hereby relieved of command.” Cutter turned to the two security officers standing guard by the bridge hatch. “Escort Captain Mason from the bridge.”

  The two security guards stepped up to Mason. “Come with us, please, sir,” one of them said.

  Mason ignored them. “Commodore Cutter, you haven’t seen what I have; what we have. There are four thousand three hundred terrified passengers and crew on board this vessel. The security staff is wholly inadequate to handle a situation of this magnitude, something Mr. Kemper freely acknowledges. And the situation continues to escalate. The control, and therefore the safety, of this ship is at imminent risk. I insist that we divert to the closest available port—St. John’s. Any other course would endanger the ship and constitute dereliction of duty under Article V of the Maritime Code.”

  LeSeur could hardly breathe. He waited for an enraged outburst, or a cold, Captain Bligh–like rebuff. Instead, Cutter did something unexpected. His body seemed to relax, and he came around and leaned on the edge of a console, folding his hands. His whole demeanor changed.

  “Captain Mason, we’re all more than a little distraught.” He glanced at LeSeur. “Perhaps I was a little hasty in my response to you, too, Mr. LeSeur. There’s a reason why a ship has a master and why his orders are never to be questioned. We don’t have the time or luxury to start wrangling among ourselves, discussing our reasoning, voting like a committee. However, under the circumstances, I’m going to explain my reasoning. I will explain it once, and only once. I expect”—he glanced over at the deck officers and the chief engineer, and his voice hardened again—“you to listen. All of you must accept the ancient and time-honored sanctity of the master’s prerogative to make decisions aboard his ship, even decisions that involve life-or-death situations, such as this one. If I am wrong, that will be addressed once we reach port.”

  He straightened. “We’re twenty-two hours to St. John’s, but only if we maintain speed. If we did divert, we’d be plunging into the heart of the storm. Instead of a following sea, we’d be subjected to a beam sea and then, as we cross the Grand Banks, a head-on sea. We’d be lucky to maintain twenty knots of headway. By this calculation St. John’s is thirty-two hours away, not twenty-two—and that’s only if the storm doesn’t worsen. I could easily imagine arriving in St. John’s forty hours from now.”

  “That’s still a day ahead—”

  The captain held up his hand, his face darkening. “Excuse me. A straight heading to St. John’s, however, will take us dangerously close to Eastern Shoal and the Carrion Rocks. So we will need to chart a course around those obstacles, losing at least another hour or two. That makes it forty-two hours. The Grand Banks are riddled with fishing vessels, and some of the larger factory ships will be weathering the storm offshore, with sea anchors out, immobile, making us the give-way ship in all encounters. Knock off two knots of speed and add maneuvering room, and we lose another few hours. Even though it’s July, the iceberg season isn’t over, and recent growler activity has been reported along the outer margins of the Labrador Current, north of the Eastern Shoal. Knock off another hour. So we’re not twenty-two hours out of St. John’s. We’re forty-five.”

  He paused dramatically.

  “The Britannia has now become the scene of a crime. Its passengers and crew are all suspects. Wherever we land, the ship will be detained by law enforcement and not released until the forensic examination of the ship is complete and all passengers and crew interviewed. St. John’s is a small, provincial city on an island in the Atlantic, with a minuscule constabulary and a small RCMP detachment. It doesn’t have anywhere near the kind of resources needed to do an effective and efficient job of evidence gathering. The Britannia could languish in St. John’s for weeks, even a month or more, along with its crew and many passengers, at a loss to the corporation of hundreds of millions of dollars. The number of people on board this ship will swamp the town.”

  He looked around at the silent group, licked his lips.

  “New York City, on the other hand, has the facilities to conduct a proper criminal and forensic investigation. The passengers will be minimally inconvenienced and the ship will probably be released after a few days. Most importantly, the investigation will be state of the art. They will find and punish the killer.” Cutter closed his eyes slowly, then opened them again. It was a slow, strange gesture that gave LeSeur the creeps. “I trust I have made myself clear, Captain Mason?”

  “Yes,” said Mason, her voice cold as ice. “But allow me to point out a fact you’ve overlooked, sir: the killer has struck four times in four days. Once a day, like clockwork. Your twenty-four extra hours to New York means one extra death. An unnecessary death. A death that you will be personally responsible for.”

  There was a terrible silence.

  “What does it matter that the passengers will be inconvenienced?” Mason continued. “Or that the ship might be stuck in port? Or that the corporation might lose millions of dollars? What does it matter when the life of a human being is at stake?”

  “That’s true!” LeSeur said, louder than he intended. He was distantly surprised to hear that the voice which spoke up was his own. But he was sick at heart—sick of the killing, sick of the shipboard bureaucracy, sick of the endless talk about corporate profits—and he couldn’t help but speak. “That’s what this is all about: money. That’s all it boils down to.
How much money the corporation might lose if its ship were stuck in St. John’s for a few weeks. Are we going to save the corporation money, or are we going to save a human life?”

  “Mr. LeSeur,” Cutter said, “you are out of line—”

  But LeSeur cut him off. “Listen: the most recent victim was an innocent sixteen-year-old girl, a kid for God’s sake, traveling with her grandparents. Kidnapped and murdered! What if she had been a daughter of yours?” He turned to face the others. “Are we going to let this happen again? If we follow the course Commodore Cutter recommends, we’re very likely condemning another human being to a horrible death.”

  LeSeur could see the junior deck officers nodding their agreement. There was no love lost for the corporation; Mason had hit a nerve. The chief engineer, Halsey, remained unreadable.

  “Commodore, sir, you leave me no choice,” Mason said, her voice quiet but with a measured, almost fierce eloquence. “Either you divert this ship, or I’ll be forced to call for an emergency Article V action.”

  Cutter stared at her. “That would be highly inadvisable.”

  “It’s the last thing I want to do. But if you continue to refuse to see reason, you leave me no choice.”

  “Bullshit!” This profanity, so remarkable on the lips of the commodore, sent a strange shock wave rippling across the bridge.

  “Commodore?” Mason said.

  But Cutter did not reply. He was staring out through the bridge windows, gaze fixed on an indeterminate horizon. His lips worked soundlessly.

  “Commodore?” Mason repeated.

  There was no reply.

  “Very well.” Mason turned to the assembled group. “As second in command of the Britannia, I hereby invoke Article V against Commodore Cutter for dereliction of duty. Who will stand with me?”

  LeSeur’s heart was pounding so hard in his chest it felt like it would burst from his rib cage. He looked around, his eyes meeting the frightened, hesitant eyes of the others. Then he stepped forward.