Deadly Stillwater

Mac passed to the left of the houseboat at a moderate speed. He kept a close eye on his depth finder. The St. Croix north of Stillwater has an uneven bottom, and one could easily beach a boat on a sand bar. He had done it once many years ago, paying more attention to the girls in their bikinis on the back bench of the boat rather than to where he was going.

A larger river cruiser was next, up another two hundred yards. As he approached from the starboard side, he could see a man and a woman up top. Mac eased up on the throttle some, trying to get a better view. Burton said that Smith had a large cruiser, although he was short on details. However, the man was short and stocky, almost round with thinning gray hair, which didn’t fit any of the descriptions. The woman was taller and blonde, and when she gazed back in Mac’s direction he saw that she was young and didn’t look anything like Monica Reynolds. The vessel’s name was Bull Market, and Mac suspected that she was either the man’s daughter or trophy wife. In either case, it wasn’t the vessel they were looking for. Mac checked the depth finder and blew on by.

There were two more boats in the distance. The next was a cigarette boat with two large men at the wheel. “Dicky Boy, what do you make of the next one?”

“Maybe. Get me a little closer.”

Mac leaned into the throttle and began to close the gap, but it soon didn’t matter. Their target slowed and turned right into a cluster of cruisers and pontoons beached along a sandy island in the river. The island was full of tents and campers setting off their own fireworks. Brown wouldn’t be going there.

Smith came back up to find no river traffic ahead of them and little traffic behind. A cigarette boat was in the distance, perhaps three or four hundred yards back. Smith put the glasses on them. A man in a golf shirt and baseball cap and a brunette in a tight shirt were cruising north, a couple looking for open water and maybe a secluded place to celebrate.

They were approaching a left turning bend in the river, and Smith turned to check their path. The steel-arched train bridge appeared a half mile in the distance, towering two hundred feet in the air over the river.

“Dean, let me take over, will you,” Smith said. “I’d like to drive the last leg.”

Dean stepped back and Smith took control, his left hand on the wheel, his right resting on the throttle.

It was 9:17 PM and the sun was getting low. To the east, the darkness was moving in and the cliff walls soon blocked the remaining sunlight. It would be completely dark in twenty minutes.

There was one more target ahead of them, well in the distance. “Express cruiser ahead,” Fornier said. “It’s a big one, at least a thirty-footer. Nice boat.”

“Burton said a large boat,” Mac added as he once again pushed down on the throttle, up to twenty-five miles per hour now, gradually closing the gap to about two hundred yards.

“Dick?”

“Get me a little closer,” Lich replied.

Mac closed the gap a bit more. He could see one man and now another.

“That’s our boat, Mac,” Lich bellowed. “There are two men up top.”

“I see them.”

“One is large, muscular, dark hair. I’m only seeing him from the back, but a big guy,” Lich reported. “If we assume that’s a Mueller, the other man may be Brown. Mueller is six three. Brown is six foot, and I’d say there’s maybe a three-inch height difference between the two. Wait… He’s got the glasses on us here, be cool.”

It was getting darker, but Mac saw the man looking their way in the dimming light, binoculars up. He eased back just slightly on the throttle and turned to Fornier and smiled, “come close to me.”

She did and Mac put his arm around her, pulling her close, kissing her on the head. “Does this mean we’re going steady?” The female cop asked, putting her arms around Mac’s waist and laughing.

“My girlfriend might object. But I’ll definitely buy you a beer for being a good sport,” Mac answered, putting on a smile. But his gaze remained straight ahead on the man looking in his direction. After a minute the binoculars came down, and a moment later the man turned away.

“Mac, that’s Brown,” Lich yelled excitedly.

“You’re sure?”

“Hell yes. I had a good look at the face for a few seconds when he took the binoculars down. I know it’s getting dark, but that’s him.”

Brown was now steering to the left around a bend in the river and disappearing from their view. Boat traffic was only allowed to go north maybe another mile before they reached a sign that prohibited motored boats from going further upriver. Mac dialed Riley. “We’ve got them, Pat. They’re in a large express cruiser. They are about a half mile south of the train bridge. What’s your position?”

“We’re a half mile or so east of the river, about a mile southeast of you. Where do you think he’s going?”

That was a good question. He looked to Fornier. “What do you think?”