Maggie Canfield was just getting out of her car when they approached. “Thank you for letting me join you and Max on your walk.”
“It’s not always a walk, lots of stopping and starting, but it’s always an adventure, especially when ol’ Joe, the boatyard cat, is around.”
Maggie walked beside O’Brien, both following Max as she sniffed beneath the coconut palm trees, the fronds rustling from a sudden breeze across the water. Maggie said, “Jason told me what happened, how you got your anchor caught on that submarine and found those things. He also let me know he promised you confidentiality. That trust was broken. Trust is something his father and I always tried hard to instill in our son. I’m sorry this got out of hand so quickly.”
“Don’t sweat it, Maggie. Jason’s a good kid.”
“What’s all this on the news about some kind of nuclear material? Is that what you found out there?
“Maybe.”
“Dear God … what are you going to do?”
“Where’s Jason now?”
“He’s home in his room, playing video games on his computer. Why?”
“Keep a close eye on him.”
“Is my son in some kind of danger … please … after Frank’s death-”
“Maggie, just tell Jason to be aware of his surroundings. If he even suspects he might be followed, call me immediately.”
“I’m scared now. I haven’t felt this way in a long time.”
“It’ll be fine. Hopefully, it will pass in a couple of days.”
They stood next to one of the docks and watched a forty-two foot Chaparral enter the marina, its green and white running lights diffused in the mist above the water. Maggie turned toward O’Brien. “Jason is so looking forward to working on your boat with you this summer. Thank you, again, for giving him a greater sense of purpose.”
“It’ll be a good summer. We need to catch fish, and leave sleeping subs alone.”
Maggie smiled and pulled a loose strand of dark hair behind one ear. She watched Max a moment and said, “I’d love to have you over for a home-cooked meal. I can broil a great fish, that’s assuming your crew can catch a few.” She laughed and touched O’Brien’s arm.
“I’d like that, Maggie.” He glanced toward the Tiki Bar. “Would you like a drink? I think we can make last call.”
Maggie smiled, the revolving light from the lighthouse illuminating the tops of sailboat masts and the highest coconut palms. “I’d love that, but I better head home. I have an early day tomorrow, and I told Jason I’d be back soon.”
“I’ll walk you to your car.”
Max followed them, stopping only once across the parking lot, the sound or laughter coming from the Tiki Bar. At the car, O’Brien said, “Maggie, tell me what you know about Eric Hunter?”
“Who?”
“He said his name’s Eric Hunter.”
“I don’t know anyone by that name.”
“He said he knew you and your husband, Frank, knew him before the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole.”
“Sean, I don’t know this man, and I never heard Frank mention his name. What’s going on?”
“I don’t know.”
Maggie studied him for a second, and then said, “I need to get home.” She leaned in and hugged O’Brien. He could smell the shampoo in her hair, the perfume she always wore twenty years ago, the way she used to hold him close, her head on his chest.
She brushed her hand against the Glock. “What’s that on your back? Is it a gun?”
“Yes.”
“Do you always wear a gun when you walk Max?”
“Upon occasion.”
“Just tell me one thing … is my son safe with you?”
“Yes.”
She leaned up on her toes and kissed O’Brien on his cheek, and then she drove away. O’Brien watched her taillights swallowed in the fog. He heard the wail of a siren in the distance and saw the beam from the lighthouse rake across the rising mist, giving symmetry and animation to ghosts climbing the masts of sailboats.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The following morning the FBI arrived at 8:00 a.m. Two men. One wore blue jeans, knit golf shirt, sneakers, and a nine millimeter on his hip. The other man dressed in a blue sports coat, kakis, and a button-down, white shirt. They walked toward Jupiter.
Jason was hosing down Jupiter as O’Brien and Dave shared a pot of coffee on Gibraltar’s cockpit. O’Brien saw them approaching and said to Dave, “We have some company. Are they your guys?”
“Not my guys, although I am retired, remember? However, one of our guys would be somebody who looked like a marine diesel mechanic. Those two have to be Homeland or FBI.”
“I have a close friend, an agent in the Miami Bureau.”
“Lauren Miles?”
“Yeah, Lauren. Wonder why they didn’t send her. Because of what Abby Lawson and her grandmother, Glenda, told me … I’m not eager to volunteer a lot of information to the FBI at this point. I see no use in showing every card in a deck that might have been marked a long time ago.”
“The days of J. Edgar Hoover, eh? Let’s hope that’s not the case.”
As the men got closer to Jupiter, O’Brien stood. “Good morning.”
The one in the sports coat said, “Sean O’Brien.”
“That’s me.”
The one in the blue jeans said, “Recognized your face from TV. You mind coming over here so we can talk?”
“You mind telling me who you are?”
The man in the sports coat took off his sunglasses and stared as if he needed to see O’Brien with his naked eyes. He stepped close to Gibraltar. The morning light wedged in his black eyes. Square jaw shaved so close his skin was still red from his razor. “I’m Special Agent Steve Butler. And this is Special Agent Mike Gates.” Gates was in his mid-sixties, thinning grey hair combed straight back, eyes cool and detached. O’Brien thought he resembled the actor Anthony Hopkins.
O’Brien said, “Sure, I can come up there on the dock, but it might be more comfortable if you fellows joined us down here for coffee. This is Dave Collins. The kid hosing off my boat, right over there, is Jason Canfield. The lady sitting in her deck chair on that nice trawler right behind you is Mrs. Pittman. Sweet lady. Has ears like an elephant and the personality of Henny-Penny, you know, the sky’s falling.”
The men looked around them to the marina community awaking, people moving, watching. They walked down the side dock and stepped onto Gibraltar’s cockpit.
“Coffee?” Dave asked.
“No thanks,” they said in unison.
O’Brien said, “I imagine you might want to chat with Jason. He’s my deckhand. I’ll call Nick. He’s in the boat on the other side of Dave’s boat. He was with us when we found it. That way you can ask whatever you want, get it all out of the way at once.”
“We’ll decide who we question and when we question them,” said Special Agent Gates, his voice chilly, just above a whisper.
“Let’s not get off on the wrong foot,” Dave said. “Please, sit down. The deck chairs are pretty comfortable. Or if you want, we can go inside.”
“This is fine,” said agent Butler. He and Gates sat. Agent Butler began the questioning, “Tell us how you found the German submarine.”
“Okay,” O’Brien said. “It started when I decided I’d get into the charter fishing business.” O’Brien told them the story as they scribbled notes, nodded and broke in with a question from time to time. When he finished, O’Brien asked, “Anything else?”
“What did you bring up from the sub?” asked Gates.
“Nothing.”
“Did your dive partner, Nick Cronus, bring up anything?”
“No.”
“Would you submit to a polygraph?” asked Butler.
“Yes.”
“Could you find the sub again?” Gates asked.
“Maybe.”
Agent Butler raised his left eyebrow. “What do you mean by maybe? Aren’t the coordinates in your GPS?”
“No, they’re not. We were at anchor, fishing. Catching nothing. I didn’t see a need to mark numbers. When we caught the sub, there was so much excitement, we forgot.”