We started walking back, and my stomach tightened with dread. I did not want to make this dive and I did not like the people I had encountered this day. Certainly, I had gotten entangled in bureaucratic barbed wire before when cases involved government or big business. But this was different.
“Tell me something,” Green spoke again in his scornful tone, “do chief medical examiners always personally go in after bodies?”
“Rarely.”
“Explain why you think it is necessary this time.”
“The scene of death will be gone the moment the body is moved. I think the circumstances are unusual enough to merit my taking a look while I can, and I’m temporarily covering my Tidewater District, so I happened to be here when the call came in.”
He paused, then unnerved me by saying, “I certainly was sorry to hear about Dr.
Mant’s mother. When will he be back to work?”
I tried to remember this morning’s phone call and the man called Young with his exaggerated Southern accent.
Green did not sound native to the South, but then neither did I, and that didn’t mean either of us couldn’t imitate a drawl.
“I’m not certain when he’ll return,” I warily replied.
“But I’m wondering how you know him.”
“Sometimes cases overlap, whether they should or not.”
I was not sure what he was implying.
“Dr. Mant understands the importance of not interfering,” Green went on. “People like that are good to work with.”
“The importance of not interfering with what, Captain Green?”
“If a case is the Navy’s, for example, or this jurisdiction or that. There are many different ways that people can interfere. All are a problem and can be harmful. That diver, for example. He went where he didn’t belong and look what happened.”
I had stopped walking and was staring at him in disbelief.
“It must be my imagination,” I said, “but I think you’re threatening me.”
“Go get your gear, you can park closer in, by the fence over there,” he said, walking off.
Chapter Two
Long after he had disappeared inside the building with the anchor in front, I was sitting on the pier, struggling to pull a thick wet suit over my dive skin.
Not far from me, several rescuers prepared a flat-bottomed boat they had moored to a piling. Shipyard workers wandered about curiously, and on the dive platform, two men in royal blue neoprene tested buddy phones and seemed very thorough in their inspection of scuba gear, which included mine.
I watched the divers talk to each other, but I could not make out a word they said as they unscrewed hoses and fitted belts with weights. Occasionally, they glanced my way, and I was surprised when one of them decided to climb the ladder that led up to my pier. He walked over to where I was and sat beside me on my little patch of cold pavement.
“This seat taken?” He was a handsome young man, black and built like an Olympic athlete.
“There are a lot of people who want it, but I don’t know where they are.” I fought with the wet suit some more.
“Damn. I hate these things.”
“Just think of it as putting on an inner tube.”
“Yes, that’s an enormous help.”
“I need to talk to you about underwater comm equipment. You ever used it before?”
he said.
I glanced up at his serious face and asked, “Are you with a squad?”
“Nope. I’m just plain ole Navy. And I don’t know about you, but this sure isn’t the way I planned to spend my New Year’s Eve. Don’t know why anybody’d want to dive in this river unless they got some sort of fantasy about being a blind tadpole in a mud puddle. Or maybe if you got ironpoor blood and think all the rust in there will help.”
“All the rust in there will do is give you tetanus.” I looked around. “Who else here is Navy versus squad?”
“The two with the rescue boat are squad. Ki Soo down there on the dive platform is the only other Navy except our intrepid investigator with NIS. Ki’s good. He’s my buddy.”