The Gray and Guilty Sea Read online

  "What?"

  "Look at your hands."

  He did. He had the cane in his lap, and was gripping it so hard that his knuckles had turned white.

  "Sorry," he said.

  "Don't go apologizing. I don't like hospitals either. I need to ask you something before Zoe comes back."

  "Okay."

  She smiled, and for the first time since he'd known her, she looked scared. "She's a good kid, you know. Don't be fooled by the way she dresses. She may act out some, but she's good inside."

  "I know."

  "She's had to grow up fast. Way too fast. I feel bad about that. She didn't need to deal with my problems after everything she's been through."

  Gage patted her hand. "She's lucky to have you, Mattie."

  "Yeah, maybe. But I worry about what's going to happen to her when I'm gone."

  "Mattie—"

  "Let's cut through the bullshit, okay? I know the clock's ticking. It really started ticking when I said no to surgery and more chemo. I also know that girl; she's practically an adult as it is. But she's not. She's only sixteen. She's only hinted at it, but I'm pretty sure she wants me to sign some papers emancipating her so that she won't end up in foster care when I'm gone. And I don't blame her. Who knows what could happen to her then."

  Gage didn't know what to say.

  "But see," Mattie went on, her voice growing hoarse, "I don't think she's ready. Oh, she could take care of herself all right. She's more mature than most folks twice her age. One thing I did that wasn't stupid is I kept paying on my life insurance, so at least there's a little money—not much, but a little—to help her for a few years, maybe get her going at college. But she's not ready. You know what I'm saying? It's not the taking care of herself part. It's the being alone part."

  "Mattie—"

  "No, hear me out now. Zoe, she's been alone so much as it is. Her whole life, she's hardly had anybody." She swallowed hard, and he saw the muscles of her throat moving like the gears of an old motor. "So here's what I want to ask you, Garrison. Here's what I want to ask. I need somebody to look out for her until she turns eighteen. Will you do that for me? I know I'm asking a lot."

  Gage should have seen it coming, but he hadn't. The idea of watching over a child, even one almost an adult, scared the hell out of him. "You want me to let her go on staying at the house? Because that's fine. I wasn't going to kick her out. I could check on her now and then—"

  "No, no," she said, shaking her head. "I know this is hard, but I'm asking if she could live with you?"

  "Live with me?"

  Mattie nodded, her eyes bright and glimmering. It was strange, because it took tears to give her face new vitality. "Yes," she said softly. "I want to sign over custody of her to you."

  It was one of the few times in Gage's life when he was struck speechless. The last time had been a decade earlier, when Janet had told him in no uncertain terms that they were either going down to the courthouse and getting married before the month was out, or he'd have to pack his bags and find some other girl to shack up with. But this hit him harder. He'd never wanted children. It wasn't because he didn't like them—he was indifferent, really, not having strong feelings about them either way. They were usually just something he had to maneuver around on his way to something else. But he'd definitely never wanted any of his own. It had been easy, because Janet hadn't wanted them either.

  "You got that deer in the headlights look," Mattie said.

  "Sorry," Gage said.

  "It's not a prison sentence. It'd only be for a couple years."

  "I know. It's just . . . wow. There isn't—isn't anybody else?"

  She took his hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. "I wouldn't ask if there was anybody else—at least anybody I could trust."

  "What does Zoe think about this?"

  "To be honest, I haven't told her."

  "Oh."

  "I gotta be straight with you, Garrison. She'll probably throw one hell of a fit. But I'll make it my dying wish. She wouldn't dare spite me if I put it that way."

  Garrison shook his head. "Are you sure, Mattie? I mean, kids, you know . . ."

  "Oh, I know. Ain't something you ever saw yourself doing. But here's the thing. There's nobody I know I'd trust more than you, Garrison. Nobody. There's something about you. You're just decent right down to the core. Ain't nothing in the world could corrupt you, I think. I wonder sometimes if you know how rare that is."

  "No," Gage said, "no, you've misread me. I'm selfish, Mattie. I'm about as selfish a person as there is."

  "I think that's just an act."

  "No. No, it's the real me."

  She sighed. "I'm not going to argue with you. But I'm not changing my mind either. I realized on the way down here, I got to do this now before I miss my chance. You wouldn't turn me down, would you, Garrison? It's my last dying wish. It'd make me happy."

  Garrison stared at her, bemused at her chutzpah. "I thought you were going to use that line on Zoe?"

  "Oh, I will. But it's the kind of line I plan to get plenty of mileage out of."

  He laughed. He couldn't help it. "I don't know, Mattie. I just don't know if it's a good idea or not."

  "Well, think quickly, okay? Maybe if you thought a little about that girl on the beach, and imagined it being Zoe, it would help."

  He took her hand and squeezed it back. He didn't want to tell her, but he'd already done exactly that.

  * * *

  When Zoe came back, they visited with Mattie another hour, then Gage asked if Zoe wanted him to drive her home—since the hospital wanted to keep Mattie overnight. Zoe told him she had a friend who worked as an orderly and she'd catch a ride with him later. She'd said it with a fair amount of bite, as if she knew what Gage and Mattie had discussed. Gage imagined many years of such biting remarks from Zoe and left the hospital more depressed than when he'd entered it.

  Back in his van, he glimpsed the lake through the openings in the firs and the spruces, as smooth and blue as painted concrete. The cool breeze whistled through the gaps in his windows. Even a half mile away from the ocean, there was less salt in the wind; the air was fresher.

  He pulled a manila folder out from under his seat, the one containing the autopsy photos. Flipping through them, he saw there were about a dozen in all, computer printouts on glossy white paper. Somehow seeing her in the stark fluorescent lighting of the morgue was even more gruesome than seeing her on the beach that first time. She was so pale and white, and her surroundings so monochrome and sterile, that the bruises and cuts on her body leapt off the page. Who would do such a thing? It was the question that always flitted through Gage's mind when he witnessed such cruelty, but he never let himself dwell on it. He'd learned early on that it was madness to do so. He'd seen too much evil in the world to try to make sense of it.

  Evil was like Mattie's cancer—a foreign invasion into an otherwise healthy body. Why was it there? There was no why. It just was, and the only thing to do was to destroy it before it destroyed you. At least, that's all Gage could do. He'd leave it to the social workers and the psychiatrists and the politicians to look for evil's cause. Maybe some good would come from that sort of thing, but he doubted it.

  Because he was dealing with a Jane Doe, Gage knew there were lots of potential places to begin. It was like having a map without a destination. You could start walking in any direction and hope that where you were supposed to go would occur to you along the way.

  He lingered on the photo of her ankle, the one that showed the ring of dolphin tattoos. It was the sort of tattoo a girl who loved the ocean might get. It was also the kind of tattoo a girl might get when she'd moved to the coast. There were also all the piercings. He knew there was no guarantee that she'd gotten any of it done in Barnacle Bluffs, but it was a place to begin.

  There was only one tattoo and piercing shop in Barnacle Bluffs, TP Piercings and Body Art, in the strip mall across from the casino. It looked out of place, squeezed between a Starbucks and an
office supply store. The windows were so covered with colorful designs—fairies, elves, unicorns, and every other fantastical creature imaginable—that he couldn't see inside. At the far end of the strip mall, windsocks fluttered in the wind. Across the road, beyond the blocky orange buildings of the casino, the ocean filled the horizon.

  The glass door chimed when he walked inside. The shop was clean, bright, and organized, and he started to think that maybe it wasn't so out of place in the strip mall after all. With the polished granite counter and green marble floor, it looked like what he would have expected inside the office supply store. The front section of the store was cordoned off by portable dividers, the kind so common in corporate America, matted pictures of designs similar to the ones in the windows hanging on the gray felt. Thick white binders packed the metal bookshelves next to the door.

  A kid who might have been fourteen wandered around one of the dividers. He was dressed in black jeans and a sleeveless black T-shirt that showed off the tattoos that covered his arms from wrist to shoulder.

  "Hey, man," he said. "Here for a tat?"

  "I was wondering if I might ask you a few questions."

  The kid frowned. "Aw, man, I'm not buying nothing today, so if you're a salesman—"

  "It's nothing like that." Gage held up the manila folder. "I have a picture of a tattoo, and I was wondering if you might tell me if you did it."

  The kid hesitated. "You somebody's dad?"

  "Excuse me?"

  "It's happened before," the kid said. "Girl comes in and gets a tat, then Dad shows up wanting to punch the guy who did it. But if they've got ID, how are we supposed to know it's fake?"

  "No," Gage said, "it's not like that at all." He hesitated, wondering what to tell him, then decided that the truth was probably best. Gage had found over the years that unless there was a good reason to lie, then the truth was always preferable. He never knew when it would lead to unexpected discoveries. "You know that girl they found on the beach?"

  The kid looked taken aback. "Um, yeah."

  "She had a ring of dolphins tattooed around her left ankle."

  "Really? So you a cop?"

  "Think of me as a concerned citizen."

  "Huh. Like a good Samaritan or something?"

  "Sure. I don't know about the good part, though." He extended his hand. "Name's Garrison."

  The kid shook it. "Tim Paige," he said.

  "The owner?"

  "That's right."

  "You do a good business?"

  "Oh, yeah. We get a lot of folks wander over from the casino. We really try to make it nice and welcoming for all the women over with their girlfriends. Peggy, my sister, she's real good at that sort of thing. You know, putting them at ease and stuff."

  "Let me show you something." Gage opened the folder and pulled out the one showing the tattoo. The kid looked at it only a moment before shaking his head.

  "Nah, not mine."

  "You're that sure?"

  He nodded, and motioned for Gage to follow him. "Come around back here where the light's better. I'm the only one who does tats, so it's me or nobody."

  They rounded behind the office dividers, where there were two reclining, dentist-type chairs, three drawing easels, and lots of inks and needle equipment under banks of fluorescent lighting. Gage detected a hint of the tangy, sweet odor of marijuana. So much for the whole Office Depot façade. Tim took the photo from Gage and clipped it to one of the drawing easels, then flicked on the attached light. He leaned in for a closer look, then wrinkled his nose.

  "Oh, yeah," he said, "this ain't mine. I never forget a tattoo. Faces, not so much. This one, it was probably done by somebody not in business long."

  "What makes you think that?"

  "Because it stinks."

  "Oh."

  He laughed. "I shouldn't be so hard on it, but I'm kinda a tat snob. You know, like a wine snob? This one's got no flair, no style. It's small, but that's no excuse. Doubt it was even taken from flash—just probably made up on the spot. Look at how blocky it is. They didn't even use the right size needle. It was probably done by somebody real new, 'cause if they kept up like this, I doubt they'd be in business long. It wouldn't just be a dad wanting to punch 'em."

  "She didn't do it herself, did she?"

  "Oh no. Highly doubt that. It's done with professional equipment, I can tell you that much. Just badly."

  "Do you think it's very old?"

  The kid looked at the picture a little longer. "It's hard to say without seeing it in the flesh, but I don't think so. It doesn't have much fade or stretching. She was also pretty young, so how old could it be?"

  Gage placed the photo back in the folder, then pulled out a close-up of the girl's face. Her eyes were closed at least, but it was still gruesome enough that the kid swallowed hard.

  "Sure you've never seen her?" Gage said.

  "I don't think so."

  "You don't think so?"

  "I told you, I'm not as good with faces. I mean, I could have seen her in a club or something. It's hard to say. But I don't think so."

  Gage watched the kid closely. No dilating eyes. No hesitation in the voice. "Do you do many ocean-themed tattoos? You know, dolphins, sharks, mermaids, that sort of thing?"

  He nodded. "Some. Not as many as you might think."

  "Mostly kids?"

  "Depends on how you define kids. Almost everybody who gets a tat is under thirty, at least around here." He pointed at the picture of the girl. "That kid, though, I'd say she hadn't lived on the coast long."

  "What makes you say that?"

  "It's funny," Tim said. "You'd think it would be the locals who'd get sea-related tats, but it's almost never that way. I think it's 'cause the kids who grow up around here don't always want to be reminded of it so much. I don't blame them, 'cause I grew up around here. You get past the beach, it's pretty much nowhereville. It's the tourists and the people who just moved here that usually get dolphins and sharks and mermaids and stuff."

  Gage slipped the photo of the girl back in the folder. "Are there any other tattoo artists in Barnacle Bluffs?"

  "Nope. There's others up and down the coast, though. I'd try Sandy Cove, if I were you."

  "Why is that?"

  He shrugged. "They've got two tat shops up there and both do a pretty good business, Zander's and Ink and Exile. Most tattoo artists apprentice for a couple years—I did myself in LA—before going it alone. I know those two have a fair amount of turnover with apprentices. None of the longtime pros around here would have done such a crappy job, and I know most of 'em. Small world, you know."

  "Yeah," Gage said.

  "And if they remember her, ask if you can see their release forms. Not all the tat shops do that, but most of the good ones do."

  "Good idea. Well, thanks for your help. Okay if I swing back if I have other questions?"

  "Oh, sure," Tim said. "Always glad to do my part. Real sad, her washing up on beach like that. You think she was killed?"

  "Probably."

  The kid shook his head, and started for the front of the store. "You know, I just can't imagine a person who would do a thing like that. I like everybody, you know. I mean, even if I disagree with them, I really like people, doesn't matter the background. Mormons, skinheads, yuppies with their kids, I get along with everybody. I just don't know why anybody would want to hurt . . ."

  His voice drifted off when they rounded the corner. At some point while they were in the back, a homeless man had wandered into the store—or what Gage guessed was a homeless man based on his appearance. He looked like he'd gone to a Jerry Garcia lookalike convention ten years back and spent the last decade sleeping outdoors. His face was lost within a woolly cloud of gray hair and beard and behind tinted glasses so large they could have once been portholes in a submarine. He wore a blue rain slicker, gray sweatpants with patches in the knees, and heavy black boots covered with duct tape—all coated with years of grime and grease and who knew what else.

&n
bsp; He teetered on his feet like a man on a boat in rough seas. Outside, visible through the window, was a rusty red bike attached to a homemade wooden trailer, both loaded up with bulging shopping bags and cardboard boxes.

  "Ya got any cans?" he said. He was missing a few front teeth, and the teeth he did have were as yellow as old wax. Even across the room, his breath reeked of alcohol—it hit them like a swarm of flies.

  "Dude," Tim said, "I thought I told you never to bring your sorry ass in here anymore! Get the hell out!"

  Gage cringed. He guessed that "liking everybody" only extended so far.

  Chapter 6

  It was going on one o'clock when Gage left the tattoo shop. Thin vapors streaked the sky like scratches on blue enamel. A plastic Safeway bag bounded over cars and concrete barriers, a pair of cawing seagulls in hot pursuit. He caught the scent of grilling beef from the fifties nostalgia joint on the corner of the parking lot and his stomach grumbled.

  Realizing he hadn't eaten anything since the bagel that morning, he grabbed a burger, then used the phone book at a pay phone to make a list of all the tattoo shops up and down the coast. He was already exhausted—so much had happened during the day already—but there was no point in stopping now. A cold trail would only grow colder with time.

  After a quick call to make sure Mattie was still fine (she complained about the food, but did so with plenty of gusto), he got in his van and headed south on Highway 101. He planned to start with the two shops in Sandy Cove, and continue snaking down the coast, hitting the other half dozen shops through Waldport, Yachats, and Florence. If that didn't work, tomorrow he'd head north up towards Tillamook, Seaside, and Astoria.

  Usually, Gage enjoyed the drive. The coastal highway in Oregon was one of the best in the world; he remembered a long ago road trip, when his dad piled them all in the station wagon and they drove from Montana to Oregon to see the ocean. The vistas along the coast had made a lasting impression on him. It was no different now. The two-lane highway slipped back and forth from the high bluffs over the water to the dappled shade of firs and pines. The ocean, wrinkled with white seams, stretched out like a newly made bed.