“Phillips called you Saturday night after he got my message, didn’t he?”
“Yes. I’m afraid Clayton was cracking. He was a smart enough man in his way, but he worried about details too much. He knew if you told Argus about the invoices his career would be finished. He wanted me to do something to help him out. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much I could do at that point.”
“Why’d you kill him, though? What possible harm could it do you if word got out that you’d been involved in some kickbacks in assigning cargoes? You own the controlling interest in Grafalk Steamship—your board can’t force you to resign.”
“Oh, I agree. Unfortunately, even though we hadn’t involved Clayton in the—uh—mishap to the Lucella, he knew my feelings toward Martin too well. He suspected I was responsible and threatened to divulge that to the Coast Guard if I didn’t protect him with Argus.”
“So you smashed a hole in the side of his head—What’d you use? One of these andirons?—and sailed him down to the Port. Putting him on the Gertrude Ruttan was a macabre touch. What would you have done if Bledsoe hadn’t had a ship in port?”
“Used someone else’s. It just seemed more poetic to use one of Martin’s. What made you think of it?”
“It wasn’t that difficult, Niels. The police patrol that facility. They were questioning everyone who’d been down there between midnight and six Sunday morning, inspecting their cars, too, I’m sure. So whoever put the body in the holds had to get to the ship without going by the police. Once I realized that, it was pretty easy to see it must have come by boat. A helicopter would have attracted too much attention.”
It pricked his vanity to have his great idea treated lightly. “We won’t run those risks with you, Vic. We’ll leave you a couple of miles offshore with a good strong weight to hold you down.”
I have always feared death by drowning more than any other end—the dark water sucking me down into itself. My hands were trembling slightly. I pressed them to the sides of my legs so that Grafalk couldn’t see.
“It was the destruction of the Lucella I couldn’t figure out at first. I knew you were angry with Bledsoe for leaving you, but I didn’t realize how much you hated him. Also, the Eudora shipping contracts I looked at puzzled me. There were quite a number of orders last year which Pole Star gave up to Grafalk Steamship. For a while I thought you two were in collusion, but there wasn’t any financial advantage to Bledsoe from the Lucella being blown up. Quite the contrary.
“Then he told me Monday that you’d pressured him while he was financing the Lucella—you knew he’d never raise the money if word got out on the street that he’d been in jail for embezzling. So you promised to keep it to yourself if he’d give you some of his shipping contracts.
“That explained the water in the holds, too. Once the Lucella was financed, you could tell the world and be damned, as far as he cared. He started underbidding you—considerably—and you got Mattingly to bribe one of the sailors to put water in her holds. So she lost the load, and in a rather expensive way.”
Grafalk wasn’t so relaxed now. He drew his legs up and crossed them. “How’d you know that?” he asked sharply.
“Boom Boom saw Mattingly there. He wrote Pierre Bouchard that he’d seen Mattingly under odd circumstances. I thought it must have been up here on the Brynulf, but Paige told me Mattingly didn’t go on that expedition. The only other really odd place for my cousin to have seen him was down at the Port. It bothered Boom Boom enough to try to get Bouchard to trace Mattingly, and he wouldn’t have done that for something trivial … But what I really want to know, Niels, is how long Grafalk Steamship has been losing money?”
He got up with a sudden movement that knocked his brandy glass over. “Who told you that?”
“Niels, you’re like an elephant on a rampage. You’re leaving a trail of broken trees behind you and you think no one else can see them. You didn’t have to tell me Grafalk Steamship was the only thing you really cared about. It was obvious the first day I met you. Then your fury with Bledsoe for deserting you was totally irrational. People leave jobs every day for new jobs or to set up their own businesses. I could see you might feel hurt if you gave Bledsoe his big chance. But, my God! You acted like King Richard when one of his barons broke the oath of fealty. Bledsoe didn’t work for Grafalk Steamship—he worked for you. It was a personal betrayal when he left you.”
Grafalk sat down again. He picked up his glass and poured some more Armagnac; his hand wasn’t quite steady.