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problems.”
    â€œDid you smell any gas fumes?”
    â€œNo. Well, maybe. But nothing that I thought anything about. Nothing at all, really. Just that sort of oily smell you get sometimes from an engine.”
    â€œWe saw you and Jim as you passed the lighthouse. Then what happened?”
    â€œWe were rounding the shallows off Cape Pogue when I noticed that the anchor line was adrift off the foredeck. I left Jim at the helm and went forward. I was up there coiling line when it happened. I guess it blew me overboard. The next thing I knew I had a mouthful of water and all I could see was fire. I tried to see Jim, to get back to him, but . . .” His cracked lips tightened and he stared ahead of him, looking hard at a spot in midair.
    â€œOkay, Billy. Don’t think about that.”
    â€œI can’t help thinking about it. I’ll always think about it. I’ll never forget it. Jim was my friend and I couldn’t help him!”
    I let a moment pass. When his eyes were again in focus on me, I said, “One more time, then—you’re sure that nobody had any reason to want to get rid of you?”
    He came back from his gloom and almost smiled. “Oh, I’m sure that some of my old pals wouldn’t have shed any tears if it had been me that got killed out there. But none of them would actually do it, you know? They’re just dopey people trying to find money for their next fix, they’re not killers. Hell, they haven’t got their shit together enough to be killers.”
    â€œThere’s a lot of dope on this island, and the guys who are running the show have a lot of money at stake. Their shit is plenty together.”
    He shook his head and grimaced. “I wouldn’t know. I never knew any guys like that. I got my stuff from friends.” He thought back. “Friends. Sure, some friends . . .”
    *  *  *
    I drove home. Sometimes people know things they don’t know they know, so they can’t tell you. Other times they know things they don’t want to tell you. Other times they just lie. As I drove past the June People soaking up the rays of the Vineyard sun and splashing in the little waves hissing on the beach, I thought about the various things I’d been told.
    When I got home, I opened a beer and made lunch. If you live alone you’re apt to start eating carelessly, tossing down whatever comes easiest because it doesn’t seem worthwhile spending time on food if there’s no one to share it with. I try to treat myself like a guest. Today my guest got ham and cheese sandwiches and deli-style half-sour pickles with his beer. A feast fit for a king. Then I spent half an hour with the food processor, chopping veggies and mixing up a jug of gazpacho: into a gallon jar went tomato juice, chopped tomatoes, onions, cukes, green peppers, and garlic; and salt, pepper, oil, and sherry. I put the cap on the jar, shook everything up, and put it in the fridge. Tomorrow it would be delish, with or without vodka.
    After I’d washed and stacked my cooking tools, I got the Gazette and found a story I’d glanced at earlier. A small story about an enigmatic ongoing investigation by the D.A. and off-island law enforcement people. The Gazette prefers to underemphasize the dark side of Vineyard doings, so not much was said, and it was not said deep in the paper. Or maybe not much was said because the reporter didn’tknow much. I reread the story of the explosion and noted again that Jim Norris’s parents lived in Oregon. I’d never heard of the town.
    I dug out my Boston phonebook. It was five years out of date, but it still had the number I wanted. It belonged to a reporter who works for the Globe. We’d met when I was a Boston cop, and we’d hit it off the way a cop and reporter sometimes will. He still owed me a favor, particularly since I’d had him down to the island a couple of times during