Grafalk smiled with amusement over a glass of Niersteiner gutes Domthal. “Who usually hires you?”
“I do a certain amount of financial crime-that’s my specialty. The Transicon Company; that business last year with Ajax Insurance and the Knifegrinders… I just finished a job involving computer fraud in wire transfers at a small bank in Peoria. I fill in the gaps tracking down missing witnesses and serving subpoenas on people anxious to avoid a day in court.”
Grafalk was watching me with the same amused smile-wealthy man enjoying the foibles of the middle class: what do the simple folk do if they don’t own a steamship company? The smile grew rigid. He was looking at someone behind me whom he apparently didn’t want to see. I turned as a stocky man in a gray business suit walked up to the table.
“Hello, Martin.”
“Hello, Niels… Hi, Sheridan. Niels trying to enlist your help with the Ericsson?”
“Hi, Martin. This is V. I. Warshawski. She’s Boom Boom Warshawski’s cousin-down here asking us all a few questions about his death,” Sheridan said.
“How do you do, Miss Warshawski. I was very sorry about the accident to your cousin. None of us knew him well, but we all admired him as a hockey player.”
“Thanks,” I said.
He was introduced as Martin Bledsoe, owner of the Pole Star Line, which included the Lucella Wieser. He took a vacant chair between Sheidan and Phillips, asking Grafalk after he sat down if it was okay to join us.
“Glad to have you, Martin,” the Viking said warmly. I must have imagined the strain in his smile a few minutes before.
“Sorry about the Ericsson, Niels. Hell of a mess out there. You figure out what happened?”
“Looked to me like she ran into the dock, Martin. But we’ll know for sure after we’ve made a complete investigation.”
I suddenly wondered what Grafalk was doing eating a leisurely lunch when he had several hundred thousand dollars’ worth of damage sitting outside.
“What happens in a case like this?” I asked. “Do you have insurance to cover your hull damage?”
“Yes.” Grafalk grimaced. “We have coverage for everything. But it’ll boost my premium by a good deal… I’d rather not think about it right now, if you don’t mind.”
I changed the subject by asking him some general questions about shipping. His family owned the oldest company still operating on the Great Lakes. It was also the biggest. An early ancestor from Norway had started it in 1838 with a clipper that carried fur and ore from Chicago to Buffalo. Grafalk became quite enthusiastic, recounting some of the great ships and shipwrecks of the family fleet, then caught himself up apologetically. “Sorry-I’m a fanatic on shipping history… My family’s been involved in it for so long… Anyway, my private yacht is called the Brynulf Nordemark in memory of the captain who went down so gallantly in the disaster of 1857.”
“Grafalk’s a fantastic sailor in his own right,” Phillips put in. “He keeps two sailboats-his grandfather’s old yacht and a racing boat. You sail in the Mackinac race every year, don’t you, Niels?”
“I’ve only missed two since graduating from college-that probably happened before you were born, Miss Warshawski.”
He’d been to Northwestern, another family tradition. I vaguely remembered a Grafalk Hall on the Northwestern campus and the Grafalk Maritime Museum next to Shedd Aquarium.
“What about the Pole Star Line?” I asked Bledsoe. “That an old family company?”
“Martin’s a Johnny-come-lately,” Grafalk said lightly. “How old’s PSL now? Eight years?”
“I used to have Percy MacKelvy’s job,” Bledsoe said. “So Niels remembers every day since my desertion.”
“Well, Martin, you were the best dispatcher in the industry. Of course I felt deserted when you wanted to go into competition against me… By the way, I heard about the sabotage on the Lucella. That sounded like an ugly incident. It was one of your crewmembers?”
Waiters were bringing our entrees. Even though they slid the plates in front of us, barely moving the airwaves, it was enough of a distraction that I missed Bledsoe’s facial reaction.
“Well, the damage was minor, after all,” he said. “I was furious at the time, but at least the ship is intact: it’d be a pain in the ass to have to spend the main part of the season patching the Lucella’s hull.”
“True enough,” Grafalk agreed. “You do have two smaller ships, though, don’t you?” He smiled at me blandly. “We have sixty-three other vessels to pick up any slack the Ericsson’s incapacitation has caused.”
I wondered what the hell was going on here. Phillips was sitting stiffly, not making any pretense of eating, while Sheridan seemed to be casting about for something to say. Grafalk ate some minced vegetables and Bledsoe attacked his broiled swordfish with gusto.
“And even though my engineer really screwed up down there, I’m convinced that the guy just got overexcited and made a mistake. It’s not like having deliberate vandalism among the crew.”
“You’re right,” Bledsoe said. “I did wonder if this was part of your program to junk your 360-footers.”
Grafalk dropped his fork. A waiter moved forward and wafted a new one to the table. “We’re satisfied with what we’ve got out there,” Grafalk said. “I do hope you’ve isolated your trouble, though, Martin.”
“I hope so too,” Bledsoe said politely, picking up his wineglass.
“It’s so distressing when someone in your organization turns out to be unreliable,” Grafalk persisted.
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Bledsoe responded, “but then I’ve never shared the Hobbesian view of the social contract with you.”
Grafalk smiled. “You’ll have to explain that one to me, Martin.” He turned to me again. “At Martin’s school they went in for a lot of memorizing. I had an easier time, being a gentleman: we weren’t expected to know anything.”
I was starting to laugh when I heard glass shatter. I turned with the rest to stare at Bledsoe. He had crushed his wineglass in his hand and the clear shards sticking out of his palm were rapidly engulfed in red. As I leaped to my feet to send for a doctor I wondered what all that had been about. Of all the remarks exchanged, Grafalk’s last one had been the least offensive. Why had it produced such an extraordinary reaction?
I sent a very concerned maître d’hôtel to call an ambulance. He confided in a moment of unprofessional panic that he knew he should never have allowed Mr. Bledsoe to join Mr. Grafalk. But then-Mr. Bledsoe was not a gentleman, he had no sensitivity, one could not keep him from barging in where he did not belong.
Quiet panic prevailed at our table. The men stared helplessly at the pool of red growing on the tablecloth, on Bledsoe’s cuff, on his lap. I told them an ambulance was coming and meanwhile we should probably try to get as much glass as possible out of his hand. I sent the waiters for another ice bucket and began packing Bledsoe’s hand with ice and some extra napkins.
Bledsoe was in pain but not in danger of fainting. Instead he was cursing himself steadily for his stupidity.
“You’re right,” I said. “It was damned stupid. In fact I don’t know when I’ve ever seen anything to compare with it. But fretting over it won’t alter the past, so why don’t you concentrate on the present instead?” He smiled a bit at that and thanked me for my help.
I glanced briefly at Grafalk. He was watching us with a strange expression. It wasn’t pity and it wasn’t satisfaction. Speculative. But what about?
6 A Capital Ship