Стюарт Стерлинг - Collection of Stories

“Right sizeable fish.” Koski tapped one of the oarlocks where red glinted from the bronze plate. “Or else whoever was rowing was hurt bad.”

He peered across the boiling rip toward the opposite shore. “If she was sunk this side, no telling where she came from. But if she got those holes in her bottom across the channel, that’s about where she started her drift.” He pointed.

“No yachts over there,” Mulcahey said. “Nothin’ except Allied Diesel Works. Hulburt’s sand and gravel dock. And — the Beacon Light.”

Koski went forward, got the police boat underway. “Some of the hands off the club yachts spent their off-time in the Beacon, don’t they?”

“Spend their pay, too.” Mulcahey nodded. “Would it be your notion one of the engineers or stewards got a little schwocked, maybe?”

“Haven’t any notion.” Koski sent the Vigilant smashing into the chop with a bone in her teeth and feathers of spray streaming from her pilot house. “All I’ve got is a dink somebody tried to sink. Plus a glob of blood somebody might have figured would wash off if the boat did sink. I don’t know what it adds up to. It doesn’t look like the score of a tiddlywinks game.”

Abruptly the bedlam in the Beacon died to a hush as Koski stalked in, alone.

The noisy group at the far end of the bar became abruptly silent. A belligerent argument between a drunken youth in dungarees and a stringy blonde in a low-cut dress, broke off unfinished. The off-key yowling of an alcoholic quartette, in a booth near the door, trailed away in discord. Even the juke, wailing the final notes of “Drop Dead,” became quiet Everybody eyed the lieutenant’s cap.

Koski’s long slicker said “cop.” The cap said “Harbor Squad.” Ordinary patrolmen caused no stir along the waterfront. Francy’s customers had learned, through hard experience, to respect men of the Harbor Precinct. Men wearing that cap seldom interfered in mere barroom brawls.

Bull-necked, hog-jowled Francy himself broke the spell.

He wiped his hands on a dirty apron, sidled along the bar, mopping up beer slop with a filthy rag.

“Crummy night, Lieutenant.” His voice held no welcome. Uniforms were bad for trade.

“Little breezy, yair.” Koski gave the customers the once-over. They glared back.

He went to the bar. “Know who belongs to a yacht called Sea-Pup?”

He directed the question to Francy, kept his eyes on the back-bar.

The proprietor shook his head. “Any you scuts know a craft called Sea-Pup?”

A rumble of negatives answered him. But in the mirror Koski saw heads down at the end of the bar swivel toward a keg-chested banty with long arms and a close-shaven bullet-head. He glowered pugnaciously at Koski’s back.

“What goes, Francy! You op’ratin’ without a license or somep’n? Just because a John Law crashes the Joint, we all got to hold our breaths?! Set ’em up in the same alley!”

Francy frowned uneasily. “Cornin’ right up, Buzz. Two Jamaick, one sloe, one rye, four lights.”

Koski murmured: “Make mine Scotch and tap.”

Swiftly the proprietor slapped a whisky glass in front of him. “Any special brand, Lieutenant?”

The barrel-bodied character hammered the bar with his fist.

“Look at that muckin’ sign over yer cash register, Francy! Says Thirst Come, Thirst Served, don’t it? Well, I got my order in first and my friends ain’t takin’ no back seat for any fuddlin’ badge!”

“Take it easy,” Francy warned, “and you’ll get it constant, Buzz. I’m servin’ one on th’ house.”

Buzz banged the bar with the flat of his palm. Beer glasses jumped. “Rush them drinks, hear me? I ain’t waitin’ on any clabber-brain copperoo!”

Koski strode down the length of the bar.

The group around moved aside to let the Harbor Precinct man pass, shouldered in behind him as he came close to the cocky man with the shaven skull.

Koski kept his voice casual: “Full of fizz and vinegar tonight, aren’t you, bud?”

Buzz stuck out his jaw; fumbled for an empty beer glass on the bar. “I’m mindin’ my own business and buyin’ a few drinks for my pals, and I don’t want no trouble from any bulldozin’ ftatfoot! Hear?”

“Spendin’ free and easy, aren’t you?” Koski cut in. “Hit the jackpot, somewhere?”

Buzz’s right hand dug into the pocket of his soiled ducks, came up with a thick roll. “My own dough! You any right to tell me how to spend it?”

“Depends on how you got it.” Koski watched the beer glass dangling at the edge of the bar. He spoke mildly to Francy, over the shoulders of Buzz’s companions. “I’ll try some of that pinch bottle.”

Buzz stuck out his lower lip. His eyebrows, rust-colored and unshaven, met scowling above the bridge of a flattened nose. “I don’t earn my jack stickin’ my snoot into other folks’ business, like some mugs aroun’ here!”

Koski grabbed the man’s Melton jacket at the top button. He was in too close to use his gun. He didn’t like to go for his automatic unless it was necessary. It didn’t seem necessary at the moment.

He jerked Buzz toward him, crowding him against the bar. “Where do you work, Buster?”

Buzz was caught with his right hand stuffing the money back in his pants. His left elbow was jammed against the bar. He wrenched around, to free it.

“I’m an engineer. Leggo!”

“What ship?” Koski ignored the angry undercurrent of mutterings behind him.

“No ship. Ain’t workin’ now.” Buzz got his right fist free, swung it.

Koski blocked the blow with his elbow. “Just paid off tonight, hah? Where was your last job? Aboard the Sear Pup?”

Buzz snarled: “I never hear of no yacht with that name. You show me any yacht with that name around the Island, I’ll buy you enough Scotch to swim in!” He levered his left arm loose, smashed the beer glass on the bar.

Francy yelled: “Stow that stuff, Buzz!” He banged the pinchbottle in front of Koski.

Buzz jabbed the jagged glass at Koski’s eyes.

The Harbor Squad man swept the whisky bottle off the bar with his right hand, sent it flying. It caught Buzz in the teeth, threw him off balance for a second. Koski seized the engineer’s left wrist, stooping, pivoting!

The wrist came up over his shoulder. So did Buzz, slashing downward in midair with the deadly glass.

Lancing pain bit into Koski’s forearm as Buzz did a no-hands cartwheel up over the bar into the bottles ranged against the mirror.

Before Buzz fell on his head in a mess of busted glass, Koski was going up and over in a one-hand vault.

He landed heavily on Buzz. The engineer was out cold. He lay with his mouth open, his eyes glazed.

Koski wound his fingers in the other’s collar. “Anybody wants a helping of the same potatoes — I’ll meet him up at the end of the bar.” He dragged Buzz along past Francy who kept hollering:

“Who’ll pay for the damage? Who’ll pay the damage?”

Koski bent, felt in Buzz’s pockets.

“Here.” He peeled two twenties off the fat roll. “Take your breakage out of this. He’ll need the rest for cigarette money, where he’s going.”

When Koski got his prisoner back to the Vigilant, Sergeant Mulcahey was working in the cockpit. Mulcahey called: “Love of cheeses, what you got there, Steve?”

Koski clumped down to the float. “Buzzsaw with a few teeth missing.” He dumped the unconscious engineer off his shoulder to the coaming. “Maybe we can get him to humming again if we work him over a little.”

The sergeant laid Buzz on the engine hatch. “Are you sure it would not be better if a medico did the work? This guy looks in very poor shape.”