Through Dark Water: A Phoebe Clay Mystery, #1

1

I

t was dark out—black in the campground—the only light coming from the humming fluorescent fixture over the washroom outbuilding door. Phoebe Clay stood under the canopy of dripping, old growth cedar, hemlock and spruce and tried very hard to ignore that light. They were too harsh, too stark. Too reminiscent of things in her past she would prefer not to remember. Nope, the almost total dark of the mostly uninhabited northeast coast of Vancouver Island was scary, but it was also a thick blanket that she could use to hide from so many things. Like Rick.

Around her in the chilly dark there were other campers stirring from the half-seen RVs and trailers scattered among the huge trees and the light brush of huckleberry bush, salal, and fern. Mostly the other campers were fishermen up early for a day chasing salmon in the northern Pacific waters. There were no other crazy fools like her in a tent.

She unlocked her Subaru that hunkered down beside the campsite and pulled a Coleman stove and breakfast supplies out onto the night-damp picnic table. A couple of matches later and she had a hissing propane burner going and water heating to brew coffee. Beyond the sounds of the campers stirring came the distant low rumble of ocean surf. The Inside Passage up the western coast of North America was ready and waiting just a stone’s throw away—if she could get her niece, Alice, up out of her sleeping bag.

Come on, kiddo, she said. We’ve got to get moving if we want to get our pick of kayaks for the day.

It was an early July morning and Phoebe stuck her head into the blue, three-man, domed tent where Alice, her twelve-year-old niece, had performed another face plant onto her sleeping bag. The girl was still in her sleeping t-shirt and underwear, though she had managed to pull socks on. A little progress, then, but a groan was all Phoebe got in response, from somewhere under the mop of blonde hair that hid Alice’s face. That and a snuffle that was suspiciously like a snore in counterpoint to the sound of the ocean.

You make me come in there and you’re not going to be happy, Phoebe sing-songed. To demonstrate, she reached in and tickled a sock-foot. In a sudden sign of life, the foot yanked away like a kid trying to hide a note in class, and then a single eye peered up at her through the matted curls, capturing what little light there was.

But it’s cold out there. And wet. And I hardly slept last night.

Tell me about it. All your tossing and turning and complaining didn’t make my sleep any easier either. But I want to see whales. I thought you did, too. So you’ve got five minutes to get yourself in gear and get out here for breakfast or I’m eating it all and leaving you here all day with rocky sleeping arrangements for company.

Alice groaned and dramatically covered her eyes with her arm.

Phoebe turned her back on the tent and poured boiling water through filtered coffee and then poured a cup and sipped. Hot. Strong. Good. She clutched the steaming red mug between both hands to keep her fingers from freezing.

This early in the morning it was flipping cold. A chill morning fog clung to the campground under the trees. Their thick branches tangled overhead with moss and ocean mist. It was morning, but dawn had yet to find the space under the trees. The darkness had lifted some, though. Instead of half-perceived points of movement, people were now sinister spectres around the campground.

Most of the camp’s fifty spaces were taken up with expensive RVs and trailers hauled by powerful pickups. Her little Subaru SUV looked like a pretender amongst all that metal and steel. The otherworldly glow of mist-diffused electric lights now came from inside those trailers and motorhomes as more people woke. The scents of bacon and eggs and omelets filled the air with enticements, along with the low drone of a morning news station reporting on the latest missing girl in the string of disappearances that had occurred along the Northern Vancouver Island highway. There’d been no bodies found yet. So much for happiness in the world.

She was glad she and Alice had run away for a little while. She turned back to the little Coleman stove, wondering why people would chose to bring the big bad world with them. It wasn’t her idea of a holiday—nor of how she wanted to enjoy her first days of retirement. Not that freezing her butt off on a chilly morning was, either, but for the chance to see live killer whales up close and personal in the wild, she’d do it. After a career of placing order on the bedlam of her classrooms, it was time to put some adventure back into her life.

Sighing, she held her hands over the stove, then dug four eggs out of their supplies and a bowl and frying pan. Now if Alice would just get her butt in gear.

It was thanks to her habitual over-planning that she had breakfast makings at all. She’d brought the stove and groceries as a last minute decision to be prepared for the worst—something she’d learned to do in twenty-five years in the classroom. She’d mistakenly thought that Pirate Cove, the highly publicized and picturesque resort and jumping-off spot to salmon fishing, killer whale viewing, and the famous Robson Bight would provide some amenities. Instead, the place was in reality no more than a campground and string of three-hundred-dollar-a-night cottages that were set up for the fishing and whale watching tours that ran out of the harbor. The restaurants weren’t open early enough to buy a hot breakfast for her and Alice before a day spent exploring and getting a feel for the water before the official whale watching kayak trip they would join tomorrow.

A rustling sound came from behind her and finally two socked and sandaled feet stuck out of the blue nylon tent followed by slim legs in black leggings and a grumbling girl in a blue Gore-Tex jacket.

Geeze. It’s still dark out.

It’s lighter than it was a few minutes ago. We get out from under these trees and it’ll be daylight.

What time is it? Alice asked, fists grinding at the sleep still in her eyes. It was a movement she’d had ever since she was a baby and one that continued to steal Phoebe’s heart. Sometimes she could still see that innocent toddler staring out at her from this moody preteen body—or the precious infant that her mother and Phoebe’s sister, Becca, had brought home from the hospital.

Alice scowled up at her. The time?

Well, maybe make that challenging young woman. And stubborn. And demanding. All the things that had had Becca asking over and over whether Phoebe was sure she wanted to take Alice with her on her first après-retirement adventure.

Phoebe lifted her chin at the concrete washroom building fifty feet away. Its flickering white light glared through the hazy mist around the door. It’s six-thirty. Go get washed up. I’ll have breakfast ready when you get back.

Still grumbling, Alice stood, zipped the tent behind her, and headed over to the amenities. Phoebe settled on the picnic table’s damp bench, sipping coffee, and turned on the second Coleman burner; the scent of propane tanged the air. Butter melted in the battered frying pan on the blue-flamed burner while she broke and whipped the eggs into a bowl. When Alice emerged from the washroom, she poured the eggs into the sizzling butter and stirred. Pulling the coffeepot off the other burner, she fished a couple of slices of bread from a bag and set the bread on the flame to toast.

By the time Alice returned, scrub-faced and with her still- matted hair pushed behind her ears, Phoebe was stirring almost fully cooked eggs and had two pieces of only semi-charred toast. She grabbed two paper plates—all she had for dishes—and shared out the food. Eat up. It’ll warm you up. There’s apple juice in a juice box if you want one.

I want coffee. It’s hot.

Not what she’d expect a twelve-year-old to drink. Does your mother let you drink coffee?

Sometimes. Alice shrugged and Phoebe sighed. The kid was born into the Starbucks age where twelve-year-olds were sucking back peppermint lattes; she might not agree but she poured her a cup. Handed it to her.

This morning only. I will not have your mother saying I corrupted her daughter, you hear? And by the way, there’s no milk. Or sugar.

She smiled to herself when Alice stared at the cup like it was from outer space.

Alice sipped, made a face, but the heat in the cup must have overcome her disgust. She tucked into the food and didn’t even mention the charred toast—fresh air somehow burned away youthful fussiness even when coupled with lack of sleep. Or maybe it was the promise of whales.

When they were done, the stove and supplies cleaned and packed away in the car, they headed out together. The light had increased and the mist had dissipated some—now it simply hovered in the branches overhead like a memory just out of reach. Around them the campground echoed with the sounds of voices—fishermen and women heading down to the pier and their waiting charter boats. The whale watching boats wouldn’t be out until a more livable hour.

Thankfully, the food seemed to have revived the spirit of adventure in Alice. She hopped over the puddles like a kid, then remembered herself and fell back to Phoebe’s more sedate pace.

This is going to be fun, right?

It is.

And we’ll see whales? Alice’s big blue eyes were even bigger than normal in her fine-boned face—if that were possible. She was still a sylph of a girl who had inherited her mother’s slim build as opposed to Phoebe’s more solid construction. It was always strange how children went through a transitional purgatory between childhood and teenagerhood, when they were neither fish nor fowl, instead threading through those years in the middle with a foot in each world.

We should. Like the brochure said, there are resident whales here. That’s why all the tourists come here. Even Jacques Cousteau said it was pretty amazing.

Who? Alice looked the question at her, and Phoebe felt even more her age: fifty-five and she had already lived over half of her life. Now she was just on the downhill slide.

She sighed. A marine biologist and oceanographer. He did a whole series of TV shows on the wonders of the underwater world. God save her from the terminally young.

Alice grabbed her hands and burst out laughing. I know who he is, Aunt Bee. Mom hauled his shows up off of YouTube and made me watch them along with a zillion other things before I left to come here. She giggled. You should have seen your face—like you thought you were so incredibly out of touch or something.

Still chuckling, she settled beside Phoebe; at twelve, her stride was already almost as long as her aunt’s even though she hadn’t reached her full growth. Where Phoebe was a solid five feet eight, Alice was only about five feet six, but the kid was all leg and had all the signs that she was entering another growth spurt. Given her dad was six feet four, she was likely going to be taller than her aunt by a long shot.

The briny scent of seaweed and the sound of surf met them as they rounded the corner from the campground and reached the tiny enclave of Pirate Cove. It spread before them, its ice cream colored clapboard buildings clinging for dear life to the backdrop of mist-draped cedar. Low marine clouds covered the sky, but wind off the water was stripping the clouds away and hints of blue shone through.

The water of the little bay was mostly smooth, the wind sending lazy, black, one foot swells curving onto the gravel shore. A lot of the buildings weren’t even built on land. Instead they sat precariously on boardwalks that strung out along the high bank shore on water-grayed pilings that were thick with mussels. At the far end of the boardwalk sat a warehouse-sized building painted rust red that glowered across the water. In the early 1900s, a prosperous salmon cannery and lumber mill had thrived in the town. Those businesses had been replaced by tourism and now a portion of the old cannery housed a Killer Whale Interpretive Center that Phoebe intended to visit before they were done.

They walked down slope toward the boat launch where they were supposed to pick up their kayaks and a packed lunch arranged through Pirate Cove Resort, but though the kayaks were there, their bright colors slashing the monochrome morning grey, no one else was. Instead a string of apparently abandoned trucks with fiberglass fishing boats on trailers stood in a line waiting to launch, while a silent crowd had formed halfway along the shoreline’s narrow tidal flats underneath the boardwalk pilings.

The wind curling around the bay ruffled Phoebe’s short gray-blonde hair, but brought the stink of something…dead. She recognized the scent from her nightmares.

Long dead, by the eye-watering stench of it.

Alice covered her nose with her hand. "What is that?"

Something unusual by the look of it.And judging by the crowd, something that drew attention despite the smell. Shall we go see?

Nose still wrinkled against the stink, Alice looked between the kayaks and the crowd. There’s no one here to give us our kayaks anyway.

She shrugged and led off down the boat launch and around onto the narrow beach between the water and the steep bank of the cove. Her bright blue jacket was a happy counterpoint to the grey morning.

Water lapped through the treacherous stones under their feet as they slipped and slid across the seaweed-slimed stone and driftwood. Among the barnacle-embossed stones were small colonies of sea anemone and large purple sea stars. The boardwalk was ahead and if the tide was fully in, they’d be walking knee-deep in water. The crowd of about twenty people had gathered under the pilings, a mix of the drab working fishermen’s colors of the locals with a few bright splashes of designer Gore-Tex that clearly marked visitors to the cove. But regardless of the rancid smell, the way they huddled together said something was seriously wrong.

Phoebe slowed and caught Alice’s shoulder. Stay back here a moment while I check it out.

Alice glanced up with teenaged resentment in her eyes—one of those moments.

Just do it because I’m your favorite aunt, okay?

You’re my only aunt.

So that should make me extra special.

Alice sighed as only a teenager could.

Leaving Alice a few steps away from the crowd, Phoebe reached the gathered people in the shadow of the boardwalk. Water splatted her head in a sad, briny rain from the mussels and seaweed that covered the pilings.

The people were strangely quiet—almost funereal. Whispers hissed between those at the rear of the gathering and someone closer to the center was sobbing, but mostly the people were strangely respectful.

What’s happened? Phoebe asked softly, coming up between a man who clearly was a local, wearing a gray-green mackinaw and jeans, and a rangy young man with freckles and a quick smile who looked like he could be the older man’s son. The older man had a thatch of sun-and-salt-faded brown hair, weathered lines around clear blue eyes, and clearly looked uncomfortable at what was happening. The younger one didn’t yet have his father’s breadth of shoulders, but he shared the older man’s blue eyes. He just looked interested.

A death in the family, I guess you could say, the older man said. One of the whales. Going to be a pall over the tour boats today. He shook his head.

The crunch of footfall over the stones behind her turned Phoebe around. Another man pushed past Alice. He was tall, official looking and wore a shockingly bright red jacket and pressed jeans.

Bert. The newcomer nodded at the man Phoebe had been speaking to. What’ve we got?

One of the whales, Bert said and tipped his head toward the center of the crowd.

Dead? asked the newcomer.

O’ course dead. Can’t you smell it? Bert said.

The newcomer pushed through the people and they parted like butter, revealing three people at the center of the crowd standing beside a huge black-and-white body that had rolled broadside onto shore. It lay half on its side, the massive black dorsal fin sagging against the steep bank of the cove. Killer whale. Orca.

In the gravel and seaweed, it was so unlike the majestic animals she’d come to see that it could have been a fake covered in white and black neoprene rubber. But it wasn’t. A blond-haired man in a blue jacket almost the same color as Alice’s knelt at the front of the body, examining the bottle-nosed head. Where its eyes should be were just red sockets, as if something had eaten out its eyes. Something was wrong with its mouth, though she couldn’t figure out what. A woman with dark hair pulled back in a ponytail and wearing the same blue colored jacket stood beside the man. She was the source of the sobbing.

At the other end of the body stood a youngish man—eighteen or nineteen, maybe—still feeling the weight of new-come adulthood. His hands were stuffed in his pockets and he glared resentment at her so hard that she almost left right there and then. Didn’t he like the fact that people were staring at the whale or was something else the problem?

The boy was tall, clearly First Nations, black hair worn long over the collar, with high cheekbones and narrow face that suggested a heritage that might harken back to great plains tribes rather than the coastal nations. When he looked away, his black gaze locked on the body of the whale as if he could not believe it was here.

Jeezus, the red-clad newcomer said, stopping beside the man at the carcass’s head. Do something, Wilbur. That damn thing is going to stink up the entire village. You think people are going to want a meal with this blowing in their faces?

The blond-haired man stood up from examining the whale’s mouth, his face pale. He was tall—taller than the newcomer—and had none of the manicured look of the latter. He had a weathered face, and she pegged him at about forty years old, like the man next to her, but something about the thoughtfulness of his face suggested he was no fisherman.

So just what would you like me to do, Sam? Blow her up like the fools did with that humpback down south? said the man named Wilbur. We could spread rotting whale meat all over this village if you like.

Who are they? she murmured to Bert, the fisherman.

That’s John Wilbur of the Whale Interpretive Center, Bert, volunteered. He’s a marine biologist who keeps track of the whale population or some such. The woman’s his assistant, Ayisha Meredith. She’s doing her PhD or something. Both of them whale crazy, you might say. The guy in the red jacket is Sam Rayburn, the resort owner. He basically owns everything in Pirate Cove, including the Whale Interpretive Center building. This is my son, Donnie. I’m Bert. Bert Clarke.

Phoebe Clay. She nodded and waved Alice forward. My niece, Alice. It’s a dead orca, Ali. You sure you want to see?

Of course she did. Kids were fascinated by death. Using her smaller size, she weaseled her way forward to the front of the crowd. Phoebe trailed after her until they stood at the inner circle of bystanders.

Well, you can’t leave it here. It has to be moved straightaway. Couldn’t we just tie a rope to it and drag it out to sea? said the manicured Sam.

John Wilbur’s hands flexed as if he was restraining himself. ’Fraid not, Sam. This is A39, one of the resident females. She’s clearly been dead for a few days judging by the damage done by other sea animals. He shook his head. "Damn shame. By the shape of her, we’d thought she was carrying a calf. Looks like she still is. It’s a blow to the restoration of the population. We need to determine what