Sea Change

The boat was empty. After his walk-through, Jesse began to search each space. He began with the master bedroom. Most people hid the most incriminating stuff, Jesse knew, in their bedroom. Or stateroom, or whatever the swabbies called them.

There were women’s clothes and toiletries as well as men’s.

There were sex toys in the top bureau drawer under some neatly folded sport shirts. One of the toys was a massager which was held onto the back of the hand with springs and imparted its vibration to the hand. Jesse remembered that when he was a small boy in Arizona, his grandfather had used one like it for scalp massage. Jesse smiled. Or maybe not. In the bottom drawer of the same bureau, among a lot of exotic woman’s underwear, was a stack of videotapes held together with a thick red elastic band. Jesse picked them up and took off the rubber band. The tapes were numbered with a Magic Marker, but there was nothing else to say what they were. Jesse glanced around the bedroom. In a wall cabinet was an entertainment center which included, Jesse was sure, a videotape player. Jesse studied the equipment. There seemed to be a computer involved. After awhile he shook his head.

Defeated by technology.

If I try this, I will fuck it up, and they’ll know I was here.

He glanced around the room. He didn’t see anything that would help. He went to the closet and opened the bifold doors. The clothes were hung neatly and carefully spaced.

Men’s and women’s. On the top shelf were several long-1 1 6

S E A C H A N G E

billed caps and a stack of videotapes. Jesse took them down.

They were unmarked, and, he realized, unopened. He went back out and up the stairs to the helm and navigation area, and found a Magic Marker, one of several, in a beer mug on the shelf by the steering wheel.

He took it back downstairs, took out the stack of numbered videotapes, slipped one from the middle, number five, took the wrapping cellophane off the new video, marked it number five, slipped it in among the others marked tapes, put the red elastic back around them and put the real number five inside his shirt. He put the other new videos back where he’d found them, crumpled the cellophane that he’d removed and put it in his pocket.

Let’s hope it’s not his kid’s confirmation.

Jesse went through the other rooms, and found a lot that was titillating, but nothing that was useful. Then he went back and sat and looked at the master bedroom. He thought about the tapes. It could all be in there. How hard could it be? He studied the entertainment center.

Okay, this is the remote.

He studied the many buttons. Some had arrows or squares or two bars, or dots. Some were labeled. He found a switch that was labeled all on. He found no other switch that said all off.

So this must be the one, all on/all off.

He pressed it. The set clicked on, the screen brightened.

And in a moment there was a picture. Jesse studied it for a moment. He was looking at a small shower. He clicked the 1 1 7

R O B E R T B . P A R K E R

button that read CH. He was looking at a bed. The plaid spread looked familiar.

For Christ’s sake. It’s on the boat. The bastard’s got the place wired.

Jesse stood and walked to the bedroom with the plaid spread. He placed a pillow in the middle of it and went back to the master bedroom. The bed on the screen now had a pillow in the middle of it. Jesse went back, replaced the pillow and stood in the small bedroom looking at the ceiling. There were small recessed lights in the ceiling. Jesse examined them in the low ceiling. He could find nothing unusual. He went back to the master bedroom and clicked the cha

Each shower and each bedroom could be accessed on the screen, including the master bedroom. Jesse went and turned on one of the showers and came back. He could hear it.

Sound and Picture.

He went back and shut off the shower. Then he went to the master bedroom and pressed the all on button. The screen went black. Jesse whistled to himself softly. Master technician!

Has to be through the ceiling lights. The fact that I can’t figure it out means nothing. I can’t even play the fucking VCR. He put the remote carefully back where he’d found it. He looked around. Everything looked the same as it had.

Jesse went up on deck and over the side onto the harbor boat. Hardy eased it away from the Lady Jane, and curled it inconspicuously back in toward the town wharf, moving slowly among the moored sailboats.

1 1 8

25

T he videotape player in Jesse’s office was simplicity itself. It didn’t do anything but play, and required only the ability to push the play and stop buttons on the remote. Jesse put in tape number five and clicked pla .

y

It was a red-haired woman with slim hips and, Jesse spec-ulated, enhanced breasts. The videotape showed her naked in a variety of activities: taking a shower, shaving her legs, washing her hair, putting on makeup, changing clothes, having various and inventive sex with Harrison Darnell. The tape was a long one and repetitive. Showers, sex, changing clothes, sex, showers, clothes.

Jesse sat quietly at his desk watching. He felt like a dirty R O B E R T B . P A R K E R

old man, alone in a room watching sex videos. It was exciting for about a minute. The pleasures of voyeurism. A moment of discovery. Jesse could not remember seeing a naked redhead before. And then the increasing boredom as the scenes became repetitive. There was sound, but little to listen to, except the sex with Darnell, which was so noisy that Jesse muted it. Somewhere in the middle of the tape the redhead got a perm. What had been longish wavy hair became short curly hair. Otherwise she continued to shower and change clothes and have sex with Darnell.

The tape ran an hour. The boredom was penetrating. Jesse forced himself to watch it. When it ended he rewound it and sat quietly in his office for a while. He was pretty sure what was on the other tapes. Blondie probably had her own tape.

What if tape number five had been Florence Horvath. Then he’d have a choke hold on the son of a bitch. Jesse shook his head. He was guessing. Darnell may not have known Florence Horvath. Florence Horvath might have fallen off the Stiles Island Causeway and drowned. Darnell may have lied just because he didn’t want to be bothered. Guys like him would be too busy to be involved in a homicide. Had nude film to watch. Jesse sat for a moment doodling the yellow legal pad on his desktop. Why would Darnell kill Florence?

Why would he go to such voyeuristic lengths to get nude movies of women he saw naked regularly? Sick bastard.

The door opened a crack and Molly looked in.

“Got some time?”

“Sure,” Jesse said.

1 2 0

26

M olly brought in Sam Holton and his wife and daughter.

“You know Sam,” Molly said.

“From softball,” Jesse said. “Lotta stick, not much foot.”

Sam said, “Hi, Jesse.”

“This is his wife, Jackie, and his daughter Cathleen. Cathleen says she’s been raped.”

“I’m sorry,” Jesse said.

Cathleen nodded. She was a tall, robust, dark-haired girl with big breasts and long legs. She looked about twenty-five. Her mother was thin and small and pale-ski

narrow lips and small eyes which looked bigger behind thick glasses. Nobody said anything.

“Says it happened onboard a yacht named the Lady Jane, ”

Molly said.

Thank you, Lord.

“Tell me about it,” Jesse said.

“I already told her,” Cathleen said.