Sea Change

“Anything else?”

“Well, I mean money can only buy you so much. Some of these freakos are scary. Harrison isn’t. He’s kinky, yes. But if you aren’t kinky in the same way, he doesn’t insist.”

2 6 2

S E A C H A N G E

“Is he jealous?”

“Of what?” Blondie said.

“Any of his women being with other men?”

“Oh God, no,” Blondie said. “This is recreational, Jesse.

Nobody gets jealous or possessive or anything.”

She grinned at him and finished her first Lillet.

“We just all like to fuck,” she said.

Jesse smiled.

“Doesn’t make you a bad person,” Jesse said.

Blondie didn’t laugh.

“Actually, I am sort of a bad person,” she said. “I’m shallow and careless, pretty selfish. But I try to be honest.”

“That why you told me that Darnell was lying about the two crewmen in the video with Florence?”

“Oh hell, I don’t know,” Blondie said. “You looked pretty good on the boat. I thought it might be fun to see how good you were in bed.”

“So it was a seduction ploy,” Jesse said.

“Yeah,” Blondie said. “See what I mean? I ratted out Harrison, just because you looked like you might be hot.”

Jesse nodded. The waitress delivered lunch. A tongue sandwich on light rye for Jesse. Something called a California Salad for Blondie. Blondie ordered a bottle of Char-donnay.

“Was Florence Darnell’s favorite?”

“I don’t think so,” Blondie said.

“I was told she was and that he ditched her for you.”

Blondie Martin looked at Jesse with blank astonishment.

2 6 3

R O B E R T B . P A R K E R

“Ditched her? For me?”

Jesse nodded. Blondie stared.

“Harrison’s favorite,” Blondie said, “was whoever gave him his most recent BJ.”

“Well,” Jesse said. “It’s a standard.”

“The only way this whole deal works on the boat is that absolutely nobody aboard cares about anything but their own orgasm,” Blondie said.

“Including the high-school girls he recruits locally?” Jesse said.

“Sure. You think they’re out there looking for love?”

“Maybe,” Jesse said.

“Oh, fuck the shrink shit,” Blondie said. “They are out there to get laid.”

“Like you,” Jesse said.

“Like me,” Blondie said, “and have some laughs and a good time and maybe come away with a little jing.”

“So why did Florence send him the videotape?”

“She sent it?”

“Didn’t she?”

“I don’t know who sent it. I picked up our mail in town that day. There was no return address. When I gave it to Harrison he wondered who sent it.”

“Did you see it?”

“Sure, we watched it together. It was cool. Harrison especially got a kick out of it. Wanted to try it with me. But . . .”

Blondie shook her head.

“And he wasn’t upset by it?”

2 6 4

S E A C H A N G E

“No, of course not. What’s to be upset about. He loved it.”

“So when did it arrive? Can you remember?”

“While Florence was off the boat.”

“Off the boat?”

“Yeah.”

“So when was the last time you saw her?” Jesse said.

“She came up with us on the boat from Florida.”

“This trip?”

“Yeah, sure,” Blondie said.

“And everybody on the boat saw her.”

“Sure.”

Blondie sipped her wine. She hadn’t, Jesse noticed, eaten much of her California Salad.

“And everyone lied about it,” Jesse said.

“Of course we lied,” Blondie said. “We didn’t want anybody snooping around into our lifestyle.”

“So how come you are talking to me now?” Jesse said.

Blondie shrugged.

“I like you. I want to impress you. I’m drinking. I feel like it.”

“So how did she die?” Jesse said. “You know that, too?”

“No. She went ashore for a few days. Said her daddy was in town. The tape arrived while she was gone. I remember Harrison being excited to watch it with her and asking when she’d be back.”

“And it was mailed from Miami,” Jesse said.

“I didn’t notice,” Blondie said. “But that’s what Harrison told me.”

2 6 5

R O B E R T B . P A R K E R

“So if she were really here with her daddy,” Jesse said, “she couldn’t have mailed it to him.”

“Somebody could have mailed it for her,” Blondie said.

She poured herself some wine.

“Why would she go to that trouble?” Jesse said.

“Haven’t got the foggiest,” Blondie said. “You’re the damn master detective.”

“Yeah,” Jesse said. “That would be me.”

He sat and looked at the second half of his sandwich.

Blondie drank some wine.

“Do you remember when she went ashore to see her father?” Jesse said.

“Nope.” Blondie said. “No idea really. You know, Florence wasn’t a big deal to me.”

Blondie picked up a small tangerine segment from her California Salad and ate it.

“How was she when she came back?” Jesse said.

Blondie drank some wine and swallowed, pursed her lips and looked at the corner of the room for a moment.

“I don’t think she came back,” Blondie said.

2 6 6

57

E -ZPass transponder number you gave me,”

Healy said, “belonging to Willis Plum of

Miami?”

“Yeah.”

“Was used between June first and June fourth in Mary-land and Delaware and Jersey and New York, and in the Fast Lane entrances on the Mass Pike inbound at Sturbridge and at Brighton. It was used going the other way between June seventh and twelfth.”

“Why would he have an E-ZPass transponder, living in Miami?” Jesse said.