Jack Beale 00 - Dangerous Shoals

it was like driving through Niagara Falls. The windshield wipers flailed back and forth, unable to cope with the volume of water falling from the sky. Visibility reduced to mere blinks, and traffic slowed to a crawl.
    A long five minutes passed and then he was through the front of the storm. The rain continued, but the traffic resumed a more reasonable pace. The aspirin was kicking in, and he was soothed by the rhythmic swooshing of the wipers on the windshield and the tires on the wet road. As he turned onto I- 495 a plan began to form in his head.
    Six months ago, before he took his present job, before he got stuck in that godforsaken New England town, before that damned cat messed up his hand, and before he made so many mistakes, he never would have conceived such a plan. But with the combination of the ever-increasing pain in his hand, his recent lack of sleep, his overall frustration, and the fact that so far luck had been on his side, it seemed to make sense.

CHAPTER 83
    TOM, JACK, AND GLADYS all arrived at the station within a few minutes of each other. Tom held the door for Jack and Gladys, then ushered them into his office. He began shuffling through the papers on his desk until he found the photo he was looking for.
    “Gladys, thank you for doing this. Could you look at this photo and tell me if this was the man you saw in the canoe?”
    He held out the beach paper with the picture of Tim and Jane from Duluth, Minnesota. She looked at the page. “No, I’ve never seen them before,” she said, handing the paper back to Tom.
    “I don’t mean the couple in the front, I mean that man, standing back in the crowd.” He handed the paper back to her and pointed at the figure in the background.
    “Oh,” she said as she studied the photo again. “Yep, that’s him. He’s the guy I’ve seen floating around in the marsh all summer, ‘bird-watching.’”
    She gave the paper back to Tom. “Anything else?”
    “No, not right now. Thank you. I’ll just have you leave your contact information out front.”
    Tom escorted her to the front desk while Jack remained behind. He didn’t know exactly how to feel. There was excitement because of this new development. There was also fear because this man was probably the person who had broken in the other night and had injured Cat. He was probably the one who had planted the bug. He had probably killed Daniel. And he was still around.
    “Well, now we know,” said Tom as he returned.
    “Yeah. We know he’s around, he’s getting bolder, and Max and I are in his crosshairs. Shit.”
    “Jack, we’ll get him.”
    “I sure hope so.”
    * * *
    “Hey, Max.” Jack had returned to the bar after he finished with Tom.
    “You okay?” she asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
    “Yeah, I’m okay. It’s just the heat.”
    The sky had continued to get hazier and the atmosphere thicker. It was just a matter of time before the rain would come.
    “Beer?”
    “Sure.” But there was no energy in his response.
    As she placed the beer in front of him she said again, “Are you sure you’re okay? Is it Cat? You really look like something is bothering you.”
    “That canoe. The one those kids found at Straws Point. We think that it might belong to Kurt.” He paused.
    Max stared at him. “Are you sure?”
    “Pretty sure. We think he ditched it after he broke into my place last night.” He paused again.
    Max became very quiet. He thought he picked up a slight trembling in her voice when she asked, “And how do you know this?”
    “Tom questioned the boys who found it. Then when he was finished with them, we loaded it into my truck to take to the station. That was when this older lady, Gladys, drove up.”
    “The birdwatcher?”
    “Yes, do you know her?”
    “Everyone knows Gladys. She thinks that the salt marshes are her personal territory. She knows every bird on the seacoast and is a walking encyclopedia when it comes to the marshes.”
    “Well, she pulled up and said she knew who belonged to the canoe. Apparently she was on the harbor side of the marsh and watched as the boys pulled it out of the water. She was curious and drove over.”
    “That sounds just like her.”
    “Well, she knew whose canoe it was. She didn’t have a name, but from her description it sounded like it might be Kurt.”
    “Kurt? The Kurt Daniel told us about?”
    Jack paused before answering. He looked down at his beer and softly said, “It looks that way.”
    “What