They turned into the ramshackle building that had BAR painted over the porch and went inside to unexpected coolness. The concrete slab floor was kept constantly wet from a ten-foot length of half-inch well pipe drilled every two inches or so, and an ocean-fresh breeze blew right across it.
“Didn’t anybody ever hear of water conservation?” Chana asked Berger.
“They don’t need it here,” he added. “That’s artesian water. Been flowing from the ground since the island was formed, I guess.” He led them to a table that had to be his personal spot, considering the size of the chair in the corner. It was evidently handmade, being oversize and extra well braced. He grinned when he lowered himself into it and relaxed with satisfaction. “A man needs a few small comforts,” he said. A wave of his hand brought the bartender over with a pitcher of cold beer and three glasses, and when they were filled he toasted their arrival and said, “Now, where do we begin?”
Chana reached into her pocketbook and took out her compact, laying it beside her glass. It didn’t look like a miniature recorder at all.
“Nice equipment,” Berger said. “How long does it run?”
“An hour fifteen minutes.”
“Won’t take nearly that long,” Berger told her. “You want to ask questions or for me to just tell it?”
“Since we have all your initial reports, suppose you just update them and then we can do the question bit.”
“Sure, but I wish I knew what to tell you. One thing is certain... those boats were sunk. Ain’t no way these islanders would do that to themselves or anybody else either. Trouble is, the stories we get are ridiculous. Each one gets worse than the last one.”
“How?”
Berger spread his hands and shrugged. “Well, these people are... islanders, you know? They believe in a lot of funny things and when it comes to superstition ain’t nobody got them beat. So whatever one says or thinks he sees, then the next one’s got to double it, and believe me, don’t try to change their mind none or say they’re lying. Do that and you’re out, and I do mean out.”
Chana nodded, frowning. “Is there any common point in their stories?’
“Yeah. Something is trying to eat them. Doing a damn good job, too.”
“That’s nonsense and you know it.”
“But they don’t know it. The thing has been seen...”
“Your report said ‘not actually.’”
“True,” Berger agreed. “It was something there in the night. It was seen against the stars. It breathed and smelled bad.”
“Could that be imagination?”
Berger finished his beer and refilled his glass from the pitcher. “Absolutely. I’ve seen them imagine a lot worse. Thing is, you can’t tell. Put them on a polygraph and there wouldn’t be a single indication of them lying. What they tell you they absolutely believe in.”
“What do you think about it, Charlie?”
After a moment’s pause, Berger looked at her seriously. “I’m only contracted to work at a local level, Chana.”
“Fine, we’ll regard it as educated guessing. You’ve been here nearly twenty years, so your opinions could mean something.”
“Okay,” he said. He took out a section of map from his pocket and spread it out on the table.
“Where’s the rest of it?” Colbert asked.
“This is all we need.” He had circled an area to the east of Ara and Peolle Islands and tapped it with his forefinger. “What we’re interested in is here, not the whole supposed Triangle. Now a few accidents have happened recently outside this area, but they were fully explained. All the crazies are right in here.”
“What do the numbers mean?” Chana asked him.
“Those indicate the order they were sunk. Notice that there’s no set pattern except that the early ones weren’t too far off the islands. Then one goes out a hundred miles, the next eighty miles south, then in close, south again, then a hundred fifty miles north, then right up to the Arico Queen, who went down a hundred ten miles due east of here.”
Chana turned the map around and studied it, then passed it to Colbert. When he finished he looked across the table and said, “What’s it mean to you, Charlie?”
“Well,” Berger said deliberately, “whatever’s getting them doesn’t stand still. It goes looking.”
“Nonsense,” Chana almost hissed. Then she stopped and looked at Colbert. The captain’s face had the same expression Berger’s had, as though they were talking about something they couldn’t quite believe but had no choice because the evidence was right there in front of them.
With a laugh, Chana broke the tension. “All right, enough jokes. Let’s just drop the monster theory and zero in on other possibilities. What have you got that’s political, Charlie?”
“Only what I hear from the fishermen. They make observations, never conclusions.”
“That’s our job anyway,” Chana told him.
“Uh-huh. Well, they got a lot of Cubans out there on the water.”
“There have always been a lot of Cubans out there.”
“I know. Number five on the map there was a Cubie and he got it just like the others and was just as shook up as they were too.”
“That isn’t political.”
“No, well, the way another Cubie boat got in and took the two survivors off the rescue craft before they could reach shore could be. The trawler that went down was low in the water as if they had a full hold, but one of the boats that had seen them headed south said they couldn’t have had fish aboard because their nets were just junk, all rotted and kind of hanging there, the same as they was the last time he saw them a month before.”
“What are you thinking, Charlie?”
“They don’t import narcotics into South America. They do import guns.”
“So they had a cargo of Russian armament on board. If that was the case the Company will have a record of it.”
Colbert let out a noncommittal grunt and said, “Maybe that’s why she sunk. The Company likes to let the Cubies know they’re being watched.”
“Possibly,” Berger said. He sipped at his beer again, then put the glass down and leaned forward. “Does the Company know about the three mines that drifted up on the south end of Scara Island?”
Chana and Colbert looked at each other. This was something they weren’t briefed on, so the Company didn’t have any knowledge of it at all. “When did this happen?”
Berger shrugged. “I can’t pinpoint it, but they appeared at different times, maybe four weeks between each sighting, and are still there.”
“Why didn’t you report this?” Chana demanded.
“Because I just heard of it yesterday. Scara isn’t much of an island... no water, little vegetation, some trees... nobody lives there and the only reason the mines were spotted was because the boats pick up a few sea turtles in the area.”
“Did they know what they were?”
“Sure. They saw plenty of them during the war.”
“They should have said something!”
“What for? Those mines weren’t going to damage anything. Whatever grounds itself on Scara stays there. It’s a collect-all around here. The existing currents seem to bring all kinds of crap to that place. What I’m getting at is an old rumor about a ship that went down out there about 1942. Supposedly, a couple of the old hard hat divers went down on her but there was nothing to salvage. The rumor says the deck was loaded with crated mines.”
Colbert tapped the table impatiently, a new look of concern on his face. “That wasn’t a rumor. That was the Alberta. She took a torpedo in the bow, tried to beach on one of the islands but couldn’t make it and went down in three hundred feet of water.”