Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. Vol. 133, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 811 & 812, March/April 2009

The charming young boating types tell the make-believe commodore they’d like to come along, just for the ride, they don’t care about wages, all that’s wanted are board, a hammock below deck, a gratuity at the end of the trip, maybe. They’re young and carefree. A bottle of rum and Hi Diddle Doodle “and here we are, Admiral. At your service. Check that global positioning system, adjust that automatic pilot, swab your decks, untangle your lines.”

So owner and girlfriends cavort in mahogany- and teak-lined cabins and the charming young boating types run the equipment, swab the decks, polish the plastic, slave away, grinning and singing.

Yes?

No. Not for long, anyway.

Ah, can you hear the double-bass groan as this scenario unfolds? As soon as the yacht is out of sight of land the newfound friendly crew, eager to please, point out an imaginary albatross or a killer whale or some other oddity. “Look over there, sir,” Sir, and the girlfriends, get shot through their heads. The live-in pirates check the yacht’s depth meter, sail to where they have a good distance under the keel, take their victims’ jewelry (did you see the ads for $30,000 watches in Architectural Digest and Vanity Fair?), cash, credit cards, electronic devices (especially laptops that store double bookkeeping, hidden wealth, numbered bank accounts complete with passwords), driving licenses, and other identification for future use and reference, and heave-ho-overboard the suckers go. The pirates usually take the trouble to attach weights to their victims’ bodies. That way the corpses, once they balloon with intestinal gas, can’t pop up to cause trouble to the living. Once safely on the bottom something will eat them pretty quick. The pirates don’t like to worry, they’re busy right now. Hoist all sails and look sharp, dead south as she goes.

Deep waters are the habitat of dogfish.

Dogfish, that’s a kind of shark. We have lots of them in Downeast coastal waters. Nasty-looking creatures. They won’t go for the living so much but they sure cherish the dead. Lobsters like corpses, too. Ever eat a Maine lobster? Tasty, eh? I like lobster myself. Lobsters and crabs are recycled dead meat, but it doesn’t do to be picky. Dogfish meat is also good, but it’s a hassle to drag those big buggers across the gunwale. Lobsters I dive for, grab a few from where they wave their antennae between the seaweed. In winter I go down, too. I have a good dry-suit. It’s fun down there between the waving kelp, especially when the sunlight filters through marine foliage.

The pirated yacht, under new management, sets a course around Florida and is sold to a Venezuelan oil mogul or a Mexican police general or a Colombian drug lord who had been checking out some luxury harbors. The foreign visitor points his choice out to the charming young boating types he has been introduced to by his U.S. Organized Crime agent, a two-sided government mini-mogul, most likely. Ese bote me sirve, amigos, Don Ladron says and pays some cash up front, promises the balance on delivery in a Mexican harbor, and drives his rental limo to a private jet waiting at Bar Harbor airport.

Good business, also for the heirs of the dead owners who, in time, will collect some considerable insurance.

A couple of those charming young boating types did appear in Bunkport three summers ago, and, a few weeks later, a yacht owned by a former CEO (now “pursuing other interests,” he told us, buying drinks at the Thirsty Dolphin) got reported as missing, together with Moneybags and his ladies. The very same lads showed again last summer, but this time the situation was different. Both pirates were shot dead, the hired skipper and his wife were executed, and all four corpses were found on the yacht Take It Easy, so a Coast Guard lieutenant told us.

So what happened?

Here, I put together a script.

Crime story #3

A local one-legged Vietnam veteran is enjoying his therapy in his converted fishing boat. It’s autumn. He watches summer birds taking off for the south and winter birds coming in to replace them. The fellow suffers from a Multi Traumatic Disorder. The psychiatrist told him his best bet to stay normal would be, apart from taking his medication regularly, to do next to nothing.

Our protagonist feels it’s time to take a nap. He maneuvers his boat behind some huge rocks where it is protected from currents. He drops his anchor. Just as he wants to slip into the cabin he spots the top of a mainsail on the other side of the rocks. He claws himself onto the roof of his boat’s cabin and witnesses Dramatic Action.

What do you know? There are the two beach bums in designer jeans he remembers from their previous appearance at the Thirsty Dolphin, where Commodore Moneybags hired them to run his vessel. The Cloud Nine was presumed to be lost at sea with the commodore, passengers, and crew lost forever.