Free Dead in the Water by Ted Wood Page B

lying underneath Winslow, but it's common for a suicide to hang on to his weapon in his death throes, so it should have been in the boat somewhere if he'd done himself in. And secondly, the outboard motor was shut off and was turned the way it would have been to steer up against a dockside or the hull of another boat. It meant Winslow could have been alongside another boat when he died, maybe his marked rendezvous. It proved nothing, but it suggested that he had been helped to die.
    I reached the lock and pulled in against the low concrete wall below it. There were a couple of kids fishing, lithe young ten year olds, brown as butterscotch. I didn't want them looking in the boat. I called Sam out and walked him around a circle about ten yards from the boat. "Keep," I told him and ran up the slope to the lock house.
    The lockkeeper was a slow, fat man in his fifties, sucking on a can of beer some boater had given him. He saw me coming and tucked the beer behind him, breaking into the oily greeting of the mildly guilty. "Hi, officer, how's it goin'?"
    "Where's the phone?"
    "In the shack." He pointed awkwardly with his left hand, still concealing the beer with the other.
    "Come with me," I told him and ducked into the shack.
    I was already dialing when he came in. I spoke as I dialed. "Listen close. I want the lock closed for the day. Don't let anyone through, and try to remember anyone who's been through in the last two hours."
    The phone was burring as he spluttered, "Don't let nobody through. How in hell can I do that? They're on their vacation."
    "I've got a dead man in the boat and I need a tarp to cover him."
    Murphy lifted the phone at the other end. His voice was calm, and it reminded me that I had to do the human thing first, before I got on with the police procedure. "Murph, this is Reid," I spoke slowly. Outside I could hear Sam giving tongue. Someone was going too close to the boat. Within moments they would be crowding me here. I covered the phone and told the fat man. "For Crissakes, put that beer down and get a tarp. Hurry, will you?" I spoke into the phone again, conscious that the fat man had not moved, would not move until he had heard who was dead. "I've got bad news, I've found Winslow."
    "Dead?" His voice was without tone, dead as Winslow.
    "I'm sorry."
    Murphy cleared his throat. It was as much emotion as he ever showed. "Drowned?" he asked.
    "I think he was murdered. His throat is cut and no weapon in sight. I'll know better when I've had a chance to examine the body."
    There was a long silence on the line and Sam's barking outside, and then the shouting started.
    I did what had to be done. "I'm closing off the lock this end. Nobody gets in or out without a slip we can issue. I want you to bring a pad from the office and a date stamp. Then drive up here with the boat trailer."
    "All right. Anything else?" He was calm again. It was wartime once more for an old soldier.
    "Yeah, phone Carl Simmons to come down to the station with his camera. And put this on the telex, ready…"
    After another pause he said, "Fire away."
    I took out my notebook and unflipped it to the entry I had made earlier in the day. Pardoe's name and address, plus the description I had jotted down and the license number of the Volvo. I read them off to Murphy, finishing in the same instant that the first of the boaters crashed in to the lock hut with the news. He was a small man in a summer shirt, shorts, and sandals. His face was white and he was breathless. He started to jabber at the fat man, then saw me and made a grab for my shirt.
    "Off'cer, quick, there's a dead man in the boat."
    I nodded. "I know. Just a minute."
    The man leaned against the wall, looking as if he was going to throw up while at the other end of the phone line Murphy read back the description of Pardoe. I heard it through, then went over the instructions again. He said "Check" and I asked him, "One last thing, have you got the funeral parlor's number handy?" He had