was still there, a long, battered shark festooned with nets and cables. Amanda estimated it was nearly two hundred feet long and loomed thirty feet above the water, dwarfing the smaller local shrimp boats at either end. It looked as if it was undergoing maintenance; crew scurried over the wharf and up onto the decks, checking equipment.
The name ACADIA SEAFOOD COMPANY was stencilled on its hull and a Canadian flag flew above the top deck. When Amanda tuned her ear to the crew’s conversations, she could hear nothing in a foreign tongue. Chris checked in with the harbourmaster and asked to be directed to the trawler’s captain. While they waited, he squinted out toward the sea. “I wonder if I’ll get further showing my badge, or not showing it.”
“If he’s got anything to hide, even if it’s got nothing to do with Phil, he’ll clam up at the sight of your badge.” She grinned. “A lesson I learned on my travels.”
He pulled a sad face. “And here I am, such a nice guy. I’d even rescue a fly from a spider’s web.”
Boots clomped purposefully along the concrete behind them, and they both turned to see a short, stubby man with sausage-like limbs and a barrel chest that strained the zipper of his jacket. He wore a grease-stained ball cap and mirrored sunglasses against the morning sun glancing off the bay. Behind the glasses, his face was inscrutable.
“Captain Boudrot is not here. I’m the chief mate, and I’m on a tight schedule,” he said, “so make it quick. Those fucking picketers have thrown everything off.”
He had addressed Chris, so Chris took the lead and explained that they were looking for a friend and his son, who had mixed up their rendezvous location.
“We were supposed to go out on a boat together and I understand he came to talk to your captain a couple of days ago.”
The man’s expression barely changed, but Amanda sensed a curtain falling, shutting them out. He shook his head. “This is a big harbour. Lots of boats come and go. But this is a shrimp trawler, not a pleasure boat. The boat tours run from over there.” He flicked a disdainful hand toward a wharf across the bay.
“Thank you,” Chris said, without even a glance in that direction. “But we were planning some deep-sea fishing, not a boat tour. I’m told he asked about that possibility.”
“I doubt it. The captain’s gone down the coast to pick up a new sonar.”
When Amanda dug out her phone to show him the photos of Tyler and Phil, he barely gave them a cursory glance. “We don’t do recreational fishing, either, even if it was in season, which it’s not. You charter those boats from over there too.”
“I understand that,” she said, “but did you see them at all, sir? We’re really at a loss here.”
He sighed and tilted his head at the photo thoughtfully. Chris kept quiet, perhaps recognizing that her pleading approach might net better results. “No, I didn’t see them. Well, maybe the kid, running down the wharf.”
“Where were they heading? Over to the boat tours?”
“Could be. I had better things to do than watch.”
The boat tour office was deserted, as was the wharf in front of it. A notice stuck to the window listed their hours as 8:30 to 9:00 a.m., when the boat tour departed, but also gave a phone number underneath for inquiries and reservations. Amanda phoned, but the woman who answered had no record of anyone named Phil Cousins having booked a tour. Just as Amanda was searching for her next question, a pickup truck pulled up outside the office, and a man climbed out. Handsome, confident, and in charge, he asked if he could help.
Amanda trotted out her usual explanation and showed him the photo. His eyes lit up. “I remember that kid. He really wanted a boat tour. We’re still offering a half-day whale-watching and coastal tour every morning if the weather is good and we get enough people. But the dad was having none of it. He was going to go talk to the captain of that trawler across the harbour there. Left the kid on the wharf feeding the seagulls. A few minutes later he stormed back over here and said they were leaving. This is crap, I remember him saying. People are crap. That shut the kid up in a hurry.”
“Did you notice where they went?” Chris asked. “Or did they mention it?”
“No, just away from here. Away from people, he said. He was in some black mood, that’s certain.”
Chris and Amanda walked back to their vehicles in silence. From his puckered expression, Amanda suspected he shared her worry. They now had more questions than ever.
Had the chief mate lied about the captain speaking to Phil, or had Phil in fact talked to someone else in the crew? What had put him into such a foul mood? Was he merely angry about being turned down or was there some deeper reason? After years in developing countries, Phil had learned to laugh at minor disappointments, but these days, who could predict what triggers would plunge him into despair?
And the most pressing question of all, where to now? “Away from people,” Phil had said. That was their only clue.
The protest had heated up by the time they reached the main intersection again. The Fish, Food & Allied Workers union had formed a blockade across the road and were allowing traffic through only once they’d delivered their pamphlet and speech. Amanda glanced at the pamphlet before stuffing it into her pocket. LOCAL COMPANIES MEAN LOCAL JOBS, the headline proclaimed, with a photo of one of the stubby little shrimp boats she’d seen at wharves all along the coast.
The three officers from the local RCMP detachment, barely recovered from last night’s discovery of the body, were struggling to calm the angry nerves of union members and local residents alike, as well as tourists caught in the middle.
Chris angled his cap low and slouched in his seat as they inched by. Afterwards he shot her a sheepish grin. “I’m damned if I’m going to give up more of my time off to police that hornet’s nest. Time to get out of Dodge. Which way? North toward Cape Bauld, or south toward Roddickton?”
Amanda had been in charge of studying the map that morning while Chris, who was proving a much more adept campfire cook than her, served up their delicious breakfast of fried eggs and sausage. To the south, except for a few scattered fishing villages, vast swaths of coastline lay empty and untouched, even by road.
If Phil was trying to escape the toxic company of people, he might look no further. “South,” she said.
Chris clambered down from his truck to stretch the kinks from his long legs and study the gravel side road that led to the remote coastal village of Croque. They could see the potholes on the road from here.
“How many kilometres of that?”
She snorted. “That’s a fabulous road! You should see some of the roads in Africa. They take your tires out at least once a month.”
Chris patted the hood of his truck ruefully. “Sorry, baby. I promise you a nice new wheel alignment when we get back home.”
Amanda climbed down to join him, taking off her straw hat to shake her long hair loose. The sky was blue, the sun was deliciously warm, and the green hills beckoned. Perfect for an open-air ride.
“Let’s leave it here and ride on the back of the Rocket! It’s only twenty-five kilometres to Croque, and it might prove to be a complete waste of time and gas.”
“No helmet.”
