W. Griffin - The Last Witness

They did not answer and made no eye contact.

No surprise, Payne thought. No one talks to cops.

But we have to go through the motions. .

Byrth already had his cell phone out and was holding it up, showing them Elizabeth Cusick’s photograph on the Department of Transportation ID.

“Do you know this girl?” Byrth said, then added in Spanish, “?Conoces a Elizabeth?”

They both glanced at it, then at each other, then shrugged and slowly shook their heads.

“How long have you been coming here?” Payne pursued.

They shrugged again. Then the line moved forward. They wordlessly turned and quickly shuffled across the snow to close the gap.

Payne looked at Byrth, and nodded toward the door.

“Let’s just work the line. We know where they’re going if we need them.”

Ten minutes later, they had reached the door. Not a single person acknowledged knowing the girl in the ID photograph.

“Let’s see how much worse our luck can get in here,” Payne said, and stepped through the doorway.

The house was warm but had a stale, musty odor.

Just inside the door, a folding table was set up, behind which an obese black woman sat in a folding chair. Her weight stressed the flimsy chair to the point it leaned left. She had her head down and was writing on a yellow legal pad. When she looked up she immediately looked right past Payne, then farther up, at the Hat. The white of her eyes grew impossibly large. Then she tried to recover from the initial surprise.

“What you two want?” she blurted, finally finding her voice as her big eyes darted between them.

“I’m guessing you’re in charge?” Payne said.

“Guess all you want. Who’s asking?”

Matt showed her his badge.

“No offense,” she then said, “but you don’t look like you walk no beat. Never can trust who’s who coming round here.”

“I’m with the Homicide Unit,” Payne said, as he saw Byrth surveying the area.

The dirty living room, with a flight of stairs along the left wall leading to the upstairs bedrooms and baths, had a wooden floor worn bare. A mismatched pair of sagging threadbare sofas faced each other in the middle. A dozen plastic stackable chairs were scattered around a low table that held an old television with an antenna of aluminum-foil-wrapped rabbit ears and a picture that flickered between color and black and white. On the right wall, beyond one of the sofas, a dusty hand-printed poster with faded lettering read: NO SMOKING, NO DRINKING, NO DRUGGING, NO DAM EXCUSE!

“Someone dead?” the woman said, her tone matter-of-fact.

“From the looks of it. .” Byrth muttered, looking toward the back of the room.

The woman’s eyes went to him, and not pleasantly.

Payne forced back a grin.

“We’re looking into that,” Payne said, “and need to ask some questions.”

She glanced over her shoulder toward the open doorway at the back wall.

“Eldridge!” she called out.

A moment later a muscular black male stood backlit in the doorway that obviously led to the kitchen. Eldridge wore a stained chef’s apron. With a practiced rhythm he was working a large carving knife up and down a foot-long sharpening rod. He had very short gray hair and looked to be in his forties. His bulging biceps stretched the sleeves of his black T-shirt.

The enormous black woman looked at Payne.

“He the man. Talk to him.”

Little Bight Bay

Saint John, United States Virgin Islands

Monday, November 17, 7:10 P.M.

After shutting down the Internet connection and finishing her traditional sunset glass of wine, Maggie had gone inside the cabin and thrown the lighting breakers on the electrical panel. Then, back on the well-lit deck, trying to figure out what she could possibly do next, she busied herself going around the boat methodically making sure everything was as it should be.

She neatly coiled all the lines on the deck-from the mainsail and jib halyards and sheets down to the last docking line-and then re-coiled ones that she thought didn’t look exactly right. She went forward to where the anchor line was cleated, untied it, tugged hard on the line to ensure the hook was still secure in the bay bottom, then re-cleated the line, snugging each wrap before finally tightly cinching the line. Then she neatly coiled the remaining line.

And then she went around the boat a second time.

And then, frustrated, she leaned against the aluminum mast, sighing as she looked out.

Now what? I can’t keep spinning my wheels.

Ricky said two hours. And that was at five-thirty.

So-after what, the next twenty minutes? — he carries out his threat?

Who gets to die now?

Under the thin crescent of moon she watched the navigation lights of sailboats slowly moving in the distance. A blanket of twinkling stars reflected everywhere. Waves crashed just outside the mouth of the bay.

I’m just so damn far away.

She went back inside the cabin and poured another glass of wine.

She saw the notebooks on the table, next to the casino bag with the poker chips and stack of cash she had photographed.

This is absolutely insane.

It’s impossible to physically get those books back.

And even if by some miracle I did give them to those bastards, there is no question that they would kill me. Either right there on the spot, or eventually. .

She rocked the wineglass stem, slowly spinning the merlot around the glass as she thought, then took a big swallow.

But. .

She quickly went to her computer and got back online.

Signing in to the text messaging website, she found the conversation with the one she considered the Eastern European.

She rapidly typed in the new bubble:

MEET AT LUCKY STARS CASINO AT 10 TONIGHT.

She then quickly clicked SEND-and stared at the screen.

The clock in the upper corner showed: 7:14.

Come on, c’mon. .

It took three minutes for him to reply:

267-555-9100

CASINO IS NOT SATISFACTORY.

I wonder why? Too many people?

Too bad. Then all the more reason to do it there.

My rules. .

She sent:

I GET TO SELECT THE PLACE. AND THE CASINO IS QUITE SATISFACTORY.

BUT NOT INSIDE.

ON THE BOARDWALK ALONG THE RIVER IS A PIER. WHERE THE CASINO HAS A TOUR BOAT.

She waited, sipping her wine, her eyes darting to the clock as the minutes ticked off: 7:16. . 7:17.

Why the hell no reply?

I don’t have much time. .

She then typed:

OKAY. THE NOTEBOOKS WILL BE IN THE CASINO BAG THAT WAS IN THE PHOTO I SENT YOU EARLIER. I WILL TIE ON ITS HANDLE ONE OF THOSE SMALL PLASTIC BAGS FROM THE DOG PARK THAT’S THERE AT THE BOARDWALK.

YOU WILL GET AN EXACT SAME BAG FROM THE CASINO, PUT THE CASH IN IT, AND TIE ONE OF THOSE PET BAGS TO ITS HANDLE.

AT 10 P.M. YOU WILL WALK TO THE END OF THE CASINO’S PIER, DROP THE BAG IN THE TRASHCAN BESIDE THE LAST IRON BENCH THERE, THEN LIGHT A CIGARETTE. YOU WILL THEN LEAVE THE BOARDWALK AND CIRCLE THE PARKING LOT, FINISHING YOUR CIGARETTE.

EXACTLY 20 MINUTES LATER YOU WILL REALIZE YOU ACCIDENTALLY LEFT SOMETHING IN THE BAG AND RETURN TO RETRIEVE IT.

IF I FIND THAT ALL THE MONEY YOU PROMISED IS IN THE BAG THAT YOU LEAVE, YOU WILL FIND THE NOTEBOOKS IN THE BAG THAT I LEAVE.

I WILL BE WATCHING. WHAT WILL YOU BE WEARING?

She read that over once- Not that I could possibly count two hundred thousand dollars in the freezing dark -then sent it.

Five minutes later she nervously upended her wineglass, then fired off: