Winegood returned in ten minutes. “That was a good guess,” he said. “Oat Finley’s been arrested twice. The first time was eight years ago, on suspicion of running contraband Scotch whisky into the country from a ship ten miles offshore. The charges were finally dismissed, because of some problem with the evidence — illegal search and seizure. Two years ago, Federal agents grabbed him on a similar charge — this time selling whisky without a tax stamp on it. He was convicted, but received a suspended sentence for a first offense.”
“Interesting.”
“Here’s something even more interesting. Did you know it was Finley who identified Jennings’ body yesterday morning? A card in Jennings’ wallet listed him as next of kin.”
“I’ll be damned!” Paul moved to the edge of the chair, feeling the rush of excitement through his veins. It was a long shot, but it had paid off. “I talked to him yesterday and he never mentioned it. In fact, he pretended to know nothing about Jennings surviving the boat accident.”
“He knew, all right.”
“I guess he did.” Suddenly the pieces were dropping into place for Paul. “When I talked with Ralph, he mentioned that he was dazed after the accident. The water wouldn’t have done that, but a hit on the head might have. I think Ralph was in on Oat’s smuggling activities. He must have known about them, with all the time he spent on the boat with Oat Finley. Something happened that night five years ago, and Oat tried to kill him. Ralph was scared and decided to play dead, until he heard about Helen’s remarriage to you. Then he decided to return and straighten things out — and Oat killed him again.”
“Where is this guy?” Winegood asked.
“Staten Island. I’m going out there.”
“So am I, Paul.”
“I think I can handle him.”
Jack Winegood smiled. “I’m still a newsman, and this is the best story I’ve had all summer. I’m sticking with it.”
They left together, and headed through Brooklyn toward the bridge to Staten Island.
Oat Finley’s boat was there, bobbing gently against the dock, but he was nowhere in sight. Paul squinted into the sun and finally settled on a bald little man who ran a hot-dog stand at one end of the pier.
“How’s the fishing, Pop?”
“Good, I guess. Don’t fish much myself.”
“We wanted to rent a boat. Oat Finley’s boat.”
“That one out there, with the big mast. Nice one, but he don’t rent it much.”
“You seen him around today?”
“Not in the last hour or two.”
“Where does he live, when he’s not on the boat?”
“Got an apartment with a nephew of his, up on the hill. That red brick building.”
“The nephew been around today?”
The bald man shook his head. “He usually works the boat with Oat, but I ain’t seen him in a couple of days.”
Paul climbed the hill, with Winegood behind, thinking as he always did that Staten Island was a place apart. Even the bridge, stretching across the harbor entrance like some steel umbilical, had fed the island only with greater numbers, but not yet with the peculiar turmoil that was the real New York.
“Wait outside,” Paul told Winegood when they reached the apartment building. “He might try to get away.”
“All right.”
Paul went up the steps carefully, wishing he had some weapon, then remembering that this was Oat Finley — old Oat, the neighborhood character. No one to fear, even if he were a murderer.
“Oat!” He knocked softly on the door, then louder. “Oat!”
The door was unlocked. Oat had never been one for locking doors. He stepped in, ready for anything except what he saw.
Oat Finley was seated in a chair facing the door, staring at him with three eyes. The third eye was a bullet hole, and old Oat wasn’t needing any of them to see.
Downstairs, Paul found Jack Winegood still waiting. “He’s dead, murdered. Not too long ago.”
The blood drained from Winegood’s face, and he seemed to sway.
Paul steadied him. “I know how you feel. If Oat Finley was guilty, that meant Helen was innocent. Now we’re back where we started, only worse.”
“She’s my wife, Paul.”
“And she’s my sister. I think...” He was staring back down the hill at the shoreline, watching one of the crafts pull slowly away from the dock. He couldn’t be mistaken. It was Oat Finley’s Brighter II. “Jack! Stay here and call the police!” he shouted, already running down the hill.
“Where are you—?”
Paul couldn’t hear any more. He was running with the momentum of a downhill race, his eyes never leaving the sleek white hull as it moved slowly, but with gaining speed, through the choppy waters of the Lower Bay. It might have been heading for Fire Island, or for a thousand other points on the opposite shore.
“Quick!” Panting, gasping for breath. “What’s the fastest boat I can rent here?”
“Well, mister, I’ve got a speedboat over there that’s pretty fast.”
“Can you catch the Brighter II”
“Oat Finley’s barge? Any day in the week!”
“Here’s ten bucks if you catch it right now.”
“You’re on, mister.”
The man knew his craft, sent it kicking through the crests as if driven by a fury. Within five minutes they were gaining, closing the gap with the Brighter II.
“He thinks it’s a race,” the man told Paul. “He’s speeding up.”
“Catch him!”
“I saw it go out, but that’s not Oat on board.”
“I know,” Paul said. He no longer had to ask who it was.
“Clouding up. Looks like a storm to the east.”
Spray in his face, salty to his tongue, Paul didn’t bother to answer. They were overtaking the Brighter II again, and this time they would catch her.
“When you’re close enough, I’m going to jump for it,” Paul told the man.
“Damn fool stunt! Give me my ten bucks first!”
He handed the man his money, then stood upright, grasping the sticky windshield. “Get a little closer.”
“You’ll kill yourself, mister.”
Paul waited another instant, until he felt he could almost touch the sleek silvery side of the other craft. Then he launched himself into space, clawing for a handhold. One foot hit the water, and he thought he’d be grabbed under, but then he was pulling himself over the railing, rolling into the stern of the craft.
He got shakily to his feet and clawed his way forward to the tiny cabin. He knew there’d be a gun, and when he saw it pointed at him he felt no fear.
“Hello, Ralph,” he said above the roar of the engines. “Back from the dead a second time?”
Ralph Jennings didn’t lower the gun. He kept his left hand on the wheel, but his eyes and the pistol were both on Paul. “You had to come after me, didn’t you?”
“Helen’s in trouble, Ralph. They’re going to think she did it.”
The eyes were hard and cold above the gun. “They’ll know soon enough it wasn’t me that got killed. I only needed to confuse things until I could get to that rat Finley and catch him off guard.”
“I know about all that, Ralph.”
“How, Paul? How’d you know?”
“I didn’t tumble for a long time, not till just a few minutes ago, in fact, when I saw the way you were handling this boat. But I should have. Of course I didn’t see the body, and neither did Helen. Winegood might have seen it while he was reporting the killing, but he’d never met you. And this morning I learned that Oat Finley had identified the body! That really set me to thinking. I’d already figured out how you and Finley were running whisky ashore from ships and selling it tax-free back in the old days. Your story about being dazed after the accident made me think that it wasn’t an accident at all, but a case of thieves falling out. Finley tried to kill you, and you decided to go into hiding rather than call the police and get yourself deeper into trouble.”