"Sergeant Leonard Townsend of the Royal Bahamas Police Force," he announced with an unfriendly voice in baritone register. I looked up to see a muscular Bahamian staring down at me. He cut a handsome figure in his uniform: blue pants with a red stripe down the side like the U.S. Marines; semiautomatic pistol snapped inside a black leather holster at his side; and closely fitting white shirt. It was a seersucker weave, with narrow and closely spaced vertical blue stripes. Chevrons on each arm confirmed his rank.

      Sgt. Townsend shifted his stare to Rebecca. She let go of the shroud as if on command.

      Getting to my feet, I noticed that Sgt. Townsend wouldn't have any height advantage. He was about five-nine, just like me.

      I took a deep breath and answered with a full voice. "We found the body. That is, I found the body. I'm Benjamin Candidi. This is Rebecca Levis."

      Rebecca rose and stood at my side.

      I waited a few seconds for Townsend to offer his hand, which he didn't. He didn't say anything either. I used the time to look around. On the dock stood Townsend's sidekick -- a younger, thinner guy in tennis shoes, a blue jumpsuit and police ball cap. And at the head of the dock stood a dark blue jeep, its engine running and red emergency light flashing. The gold crest with velvet-fitted crown painted on its door matched the symbols on the Sergeant's shoulders. And a cloth bar pinned through the Sergeant's shirt at pocket level identified him as "1444."

      "You found the body like this?" he asked, with skepticism.

      "Just like this, right where it's lying."

      "Exactly like this?"

      "Yes."

      Sgt. Townsend responded after a long silence. "Covered like this?"

      "No," I replied, perhaps a bit too impatiently. "I put it on. It's our sheet. Rebecca threw it over to me." I waited for Sgt. Townsend to nod or say something. "It's unused and clean. It seemed the decent thing to do."

      How irritating when they use silence as an interrogation tactic.

      "And why were you on this yacht?"

      I looked around and saw plenty of spectators, but all were too far away to hear. Most of them were standing along the seawall, on the two-foot-wide strip of concrete that capped the basin's rough coral wall. Those people definitely wouldn't hear. Wade Daniels was still doing crowd control at the head of the dock, keeping people away but looking towards us most of the time. He wouldn't hear if we kept our voices down. The Sergeant had been talking loud. Maybe he was feeling competition from the engines which were also operating at baritone frequency.

      I turned sideways to the guy and moved a little closer. Speaking in my natural tenor range, I didn't have to raise my voice to compete with the gurgling diesels. I tried for an earnest expression. "Sgt. Townsend, we discovered this yacht foundering in International Waters, thirteen miles north of the Little Bahama Bank. We discovered it at six forty-five this morning while en route from Washington, DC. When I boarded the yacht to rescue it from imminent sinking, I discovered the body. I made temporary repairs that reversed the flooding." I looked for a nod of approval and received none, not even a blink. "Look, we have diverted our salvage operation to bring the body to you, as the nearest police authority capable of investigating the murder."

      "I see."

      Sgt. Townsend stepped forward and knelt, forcing Rebecca to step back. He used his left hand to lift the shroud carefully, not more than one foot. I glanced around, worrying that someone might see underneath. No, the people on the seawall couldn't see over the yacht's rail and the people on Wade Daniels' yacht were looking down from the wrong angle.

      Sgt. Townsend frowned, then pointed a stubby finger at the victim's bare rear end and the protruding thermometer. He shook his head. "You found the body exactly like that?"

      I answered him on the bounce. "No, it wasn't a rape-homicide. I pulled his pants down to insert a fever thermometer."

      Deftly Rebecca dropped to one knee and retrieved the thermometer, snapping it into a small plastic case she'd brought long. Returning to her feet, she said, "He did it under my instructions. We did it to be able to give you a time-of-death estimate."

      When Sgt. Townsend responded with a silent stare, Rebecca pretended not to notice. "I'm a medical doctor and he's a scientist. We recorded temperatures every half hour. The measurements indicate the death was eight hours before we found the body. That makes it ten-forty, last night."

      Sgt. Townsend dropped the shroud and rose to his feet. "Are you a specialist in forensic medicine?"

      "Estimating time of death is part of the standard medical school curriculum in the United States." She answered neutrally but she blinked under the force of his stare. "And Dr. Candidi has made a lot of careful observations that you should hear."

      Slowly Sgt. Townsend turned his dark brown eyes to me.

      Exerting considerable willpower to maintain a relaxed posture, I turned to the side and drew a step closer. Standing at short range would give me an excuse to ignore his eyes. "Look, Sergeant, there are a lot of people watching us and I don't want them to see me pointing a lot of things out to you. I'd just like to tell you the facts right here and now and then you can confirm them."

      "Very well."

      I told him how I'd jumped onto the boat and salvaged it. I told him about the position of the body, about finding night vision goggles, and the cocked pistol on the seat on the flybridge and that he could find it up there in the drink holder. I told him about the blood spatter from the head shot and that I believed that the chest shot came in at an upward angle. And I told him that the autopilot and the navigation lights were on.

      Townsend said nothing while I gave him the facts. But I didn't let his silent treatment jar me, either. I just told the story at my own pace. Nods from Rebecca told me I was doing okay. When I finished, Townsend pulled out a little notebook and made some notes. When he closed the book, I had more to say:

      "Here's what we think happened. The victim was standing on the flybridge with a loaded and cocked pistol. The murderer shot him in the chest from below. The victim dropped the pistol onto the seat up there and he fell to the cockpit floor. There, he received an executioner's shot to the back of the head. Then the gunman got off the boat and tried to sink it by shooting holes in it at the waterline. And he would have succeeded if we'd come half an hour later."

      Sgt. Townsend shook his head. "I would be very careful about making interpretations. They can cause you a lot of trouble."

      Was I dealing with a crooked cop who had a stake in this matter? "I don't completely understand. Could you explain what you mean?"

      Sgt. Townsend looked at the crowd on the seawall and threw a glance at the people on Wade Daniels' cabin cruiser. "It can be dumb to be too smart."

      "And that's exactly what I meant when I said that I didn't want to show you around this yacht in front of all these people. And that's why we're not going to tell them that Dr. Levis is a physician and that I'm a pharmacologist. And we don't want you to tell anyone anything, either. Just your superiors. For all we know, the murderer is looking at us right now. My unofficial story is that we don't have any idea how it happened."

      "That's right," Rebecca added. "We're going to tell people that Ben was too busy keeping the boat afloat to even look at the body.

      A small smile came to the Sergeant's face. "You are both very wise. And since we do understand each other, I will make it very easy for you. I am designating this yacht as a crime scene. I am asking you to step off this boat and stay off of it."

      Rebecca took that as a command and made for the dock. But I held my ground and answered loudly. "Sorry, Sergeant, but the boat is still in danger of sinking. As the salvage captain, it is my right and duty to stay with the boat."

      He turned to face me squarely. If physical intimidation was his game, his body gave him a definite advantage over me. His arms and upper body carried twice the muscle, his chest was huge, and he had the neck of a wrestler. His big head and heavy-duty, square-set jaw were intimidating, too. But I didn't think he would dare to lay hands on me in front of all these people. I stared back at him, trying to act curious as to what he would say.

      He took his time answering. And when he did, he answered loudly as if speaking as much to the crowd as to me. "Very well, Mr. Candidi, you may stay on the boat to complete your salvage. However, you must help enforce my order that nobody else comes aboard."

      I retreated one step and shouted back at him. "Nobody else except for Rebecca Levis."

      He didn't answer. He knelt over the dead man, reached under the shroud and searched pockets, finding nothing.

      I glanced at the crowd. Most of them were watching me. I played the role of the worried salvage man, leaning over the side and starring at my rubber foam patch. Soon a few of them started pointing it out to their neighbors.

      Sgt. Townsend moved to the main salon. I watched him through the door. He moved around with a sure-footed walk, making a quick, efficient search. He had excellent eye-hand coordination and, considering his stout build, he had a remarkable ability to position his body for tasks at any level. He was all muscle and no paunch.

      I shouted in to him. "Where you are standing, the water was up to your waist."

      "As I have already noticed," he answered.

      On the edge of the seawall, the pile of pallets was growing. I yelled to Edgar, "I'll need a lot more to hold up the boat."

      Edgar understood, and so did the crowd. With that taken care of, I went inside the main salon to check with Sgt. Townsend. His search for personal items had turned up nothing but a couple of changes of clothes hanging in a forward locker. Mounted on the wall behind a piece of clear plastic, we found a Coast Guard Documentation Certificate. It bore the same number that was painted on the bow. The certificate listed only a corporation with a Miami post office box as the boat's owner and operator. Townsend wrote it down, and so did I.

      Reflected daylight was strong enough to keep anybody from seeing in through the three big windows. Away from public scrutiny, Sgt. Townsend seemed a little more friendly and maybe even approachable.

      "Sergeant," I said, "when you find this guy's name and address, I would appreciate your giving it to me. I'll need that for my salvage claim."

      "How big a claim are you making?" He was still playing the boss man, but curiosity was starting to show.

      "For fifty percent of the boat's true market value, plus expenses."

      He smiled like he knew better. "I wish you luck. What do you need to do to complete the salvage?"

      "I need to brace the boat to lift the port side a few inches out of the water. Then I'll lay on a fiberglass patch. With a little luck, I can have it finished by tomorrow. But, like I said, I will need my partner here to help me."

      "Very well. Just be sure you don't disturb anything." He moved towards the door. "Now, I need you to turn off the engines. I want to speak to the crowd."

      "Sorry, but I can't do that. I need electricity to keep the yacht afloat and I don't know if the batteries can hold a charge."

      "Very well."

      He went out to the open cockpit and made a full-throated announcement for all to hear, saying he was a police officer, that the man under the sheet had been murdered, and could anyone identify him.

      Wade Daniels, the crowd-control volunteer, walked up the dock. With slow eyes, he surveyed the open cockpit. "It is probably Steve. It's his boat."

      The Sergeant pulled back the sheet just enough to reveal the victim's face.

      "That's him," Wade Daniels said. "Poor guy."

      Sgt. Townsend dropped the shroud. "What's his last name?"

      Wade Daniels' eyes were amazingly still. "I don't know. He's only been here for a week or so . . . on this boat."

      Sgt. Townsend resumed his address to the crowd on the seawall, saying that if anyone had information about the man who captained this boat, please see Constable Walker. That was the name of his sidekick in the blue jumpsuit.

      When no one came forward, the Sergeant gave the cockpit a good looking over and went up to the flybridge. Rebecca returned with a load of things from the Diogenes. It was as if she had read my mind. She brought a diving mask, diving light, tools, scissors, fiberglass cloth, resin, catalyst, paint brushes and a can to mix it up in. She even gave me money to pay Edgar and his buddy who had now assembled a big pile of pallets along the seawall. Two uniformed customs agents were standing impatiently at the end of the dock, wanting to go home. I asked Rebecca to take care of formalities for herself and the Diogenes.

      Sgt. Townsend left the boat and walked to the crowd, apparently to interview people about the victim.

      Before starting work, I flipped on the cabin and deck lights. It would be growing dark soon enough. I stripped down to my Jockey shorts and let myself over the port side. The water came up to my chest. The bottom was about four inches of ooze on top of rough coral rock. That would be just right for stacking pallets under the boat. Edgar and his friend were still standing by their pile of pallets and stones. As I waded toward them, the water got shallower. They handed me down a pallet and I weighted it by jamming in stones. Getting it settled under the stern was no trouble. Soon I had a whole column of them under the port side of the stern.

      Night was coming on fast but the deck light helped some and the marina had a few widely spaced streetlights. A dozen spectators remained, watching the lit-up Second Chance from the bend in the seawall.

      I had almost completed a second column on the starboard side when an orange and white ambulance arrived with flashing red lights. A stretcher team got out and Sgt. Townsend conducted them aboard. Their movements rocked the boat and that helped me to snug in the last pallet. I secured the column with rope.

      Rebecca was watching from the dock. "Ben, you be careful under there. It could shift and trap you."

      "I'm being careful. I've even been careful about breathing around the diesel exhausts."

      "Good. What's the salvage plan?"

      "I have two columns supporting the stern. I'm going to place a third one under the bow, right on the 'V.' When the tide goes down, the boat will be resting on them and the hole will be out of the water. Then I'm going to fiberglass it over. Tomorrow, when the tide comes up again, the boat will float off -- without any help from the bilge pump."

      Sgt. Townsend heard some of this. He reboarded the yacht and looked down at me from over the side.

      "Mr. Candidi, will you please tell me what you are planning to do?"

      "I'm going to patch the hole in the boat like I was just saying to Rebecca. After we're done here, I plan to return the boat to its home port of Miami and file a salvage claim. With that out of the way, I'll return here and we'll make up for lost time on our vacation. We'll sail our Diogenes to the Abacos and then to the Berry Islands."

      "You realize that I have jurisdiction over the boat. It is a crime scene."

      "Yes," I said, not wanting to argue with him in public.

      I went back to work, building a column of pallets under the bow. When I finished, I thanked and paid Edgar and his friend, saying I would no longer need them. When I stepped back onto the Second Chance, Sgt. Townsend was aboard, telling his Constable Walker to rig the boat with yellow tape.

      "This is an official crime scene," he said, gruffly. "And all are forbidden to enter it. You may only enter as necessary for the safety of the boat. The constable will enforce it."

      "Great. Could you introduce me to the constable and tell me his name?"

      "Constable Ivanhoe Walker."

      The Constable acknowledged me with a wide, friendly smile that included a prominent gold tooth.

      "Pleased to meet you, Constable Walker. I look forward to working with you."

      The Constable's smile disappeared quickly when he noticed that his boss was looking.

      "You will obey his instructions," Sgt. Townsend said.

      "No problem," I answered.

     IDLING DIESELS throbbed and the pallets creaked and groaned at us through the hull as the ebbing tide set the boat down on its improvised cradle. Sgt. Townsend had been gone for a long time. Rebecca had just returned from locking up the Diogenes. Now she was keeping me company in the main salon of Second Chance. In a fresh blouse, shorts and Oregon rafting sandals, she sat on a soggy cushion, leaning her back against the bulkhead and resting her thin, shapely legs on the dinette table.

      I was sitting on the other side of the table with screwdriver in hand, taking a break from work. I took a second to admire Rebecca's lovely face and rested my eyes on interesting contours around her thin neck and collar bone. Then I glanced down through the access hole in the bench for another look at my patch. Although I knew that the Second Chance was sitting firmly on solid supports, a part of my brain said that the yacht was swaying back and forth in resonance with Atlantic Ocean waves. It would take a day for this curious but well-known neurological effect to wear off. They call it "getting your land legs back."

      With darkness outside and the cabin lights on, we could be observed from the outside through the yacht's big windows. But we were innocent, now. The weight of the crime had been lifted onto the broad shoulders of Sgt. Townsend. The corpse was gone, and so was the pool of blood. Ditto for the night vision goggles and the revolver. We kept the cabin door open to let in the night air.

      "Thanks, Darling, for bringing me these corned-beef sandwiches. I was running on empty."

      "You were running on adrenaline." A teasing smile widened her narrow face. "Adrenaline and testosterone."

      "Are you talking about my communication with the Good Sergeant?"

      "Yes."

      "Give me a break."

      Rebecca defends herself with tai chi. I prefer karate.

      I flashed her a grin. "Don't forget that it was my testosterone in defense of your estrogen." I shook my head in mock disappointment. "Can't you see that he's one of your basic male chauvinist misogynists?"

      Rebecca laughed. She dug her fingers into her long black hair and threw it back. "Very funny, Ben -- using my lingo to explain yourself." She dropped her legs and crawled over to see what I was doing under the bench. A couple of black strands dropped over her face. "Hey, why are you loosening the screws from your patch? The hole's not out of the water, yet."

      I affected a jocular mood.

      "That's just it. I'm about to make a scientific measurement."

      "I see."

      I released the final screw and water came gushing in and splashing up. Rebecca squeaked and retreated. Feigning nonchalance, I pushed the timer button on my watch. "I'm going to measure how long it takes for the water to rise a couple of inches, fighting the bilge pump."

      Water came flowing out from under the bench. It streamed across the floor to the two-by-three foot opening where I'd removed the access hatch. It fell into the open bilge and the pump switched on. While we watched the contest being played out in the open bilge I ate a second sandwich. Water rose in the bilge. Slowly it crept along the floor of the V-berth up front.

      One-half an hour into the experiment, Rebecca offered a commentary. "The water's rising, but the pump's doing a pretty good job holding it back."

      "Yes, the level is rising at approximately one and a half inches per ten minutes," I said. "That's about right for the boat taking eight hours to flood the way I found it."

      "Ben and his calculations!"

      She said it with a giddy laugh. How many times her laugh had cheered me over the last several years! That's what we needed tonight -- a good laugh.

      I made a face. "You want the details? Then here goes." I slipped into a parody of a high school physics teacher, increasing pitch and tempo. "Eight hours equals four hundred and eighty minutes, times one and a half inches per ten minutes equals seventy-two inches. But since the floor area that it's flooding now has only half the area that will eventually be flooded -- because of the deep V shape of the hull -- the final answer will be only half as many inches, or thirty-six." I gave Rebecca a frown, like the teacher had turned impatient. "And that corresponds to 'up to your ass in seawater.'"

      "Excuse me," came a voice from behind us. I looked back to see a muscular guy about my age standing in the companionway, leaning with one hand against the door frame. Like me, he sported a lot of curly black chest hair. But the similarity ended there. "Can't you turn off those engines?" It was more of a demand than a request, and he made no effort to suppress his irritation. "Look, you're berthed right next to us and my girlfriend can't sleep. And the damn diesel exhaust's a bitch to breathe."

      "I'm sorry, but we're still in a state of emergency. I should be able to turn the engines off when I get a solid patch on. We'll be able to start work on that in another hour."

      His forearm was tense and his right hand was in a fist. "What do you need the diesels on for?"

      "To power the bilge pump . . . and in case I have to ground this boat somewhere to keep it from going under."

      He was handsome enough, with dark, widely spaced eyes and a broad forehead. But he didn't know a thing about charm. Like the Sergeant, he was doing too much staring and not enough thinking. "Why can't you use shore power to run your bilge pump?"

      "Because the power converter's been under water. I don't know if it will work. Same deal for the batteries and starter motors that I'll need to restart the engines."

      He looked away. "Well, it's a real bitch trying to sleep next to this thing."

      "And it's been a real bitch for us, finding this thing." I got up, and took a couple of steps towards him, making sure to splash some of the inflowing water in the process. I extended my hand. "I'm Ben and this is Rebecca. What's your name?"

      "Martin Becker." He shook my hand with a firm grip and nodded to Rebecca who was resting against the bulkhead. She nodded to him, then returned her eyes to the slowly rising water in the bilge. Becker frowned.

      "And what's your girlfriend's name?" I asked.

      "Beth Owens."

      "And you're the one with that sleek Bayliner with the diving flag on the side?"

      Rebecca winked approval of my flattery. Sure, that sleek boat would look great skimming along at 30 knots on a balanced plane in the protected waters of some bay. But caught in a winter storm in the Gulf Stream, it would be a rolling death trap.

      "Yeah, that's ours," Martin said.

      He was wearing a diving watch that was almost as thick as my sandwich.

      "Well, Martin, we've got something in common -- diving. You know, I don't think the mosquitos are too bad tonight. Maybe the solution would be to take a couple of bench cushions to that thatched pavilion where they have the picnic tables and sleep there. I'm sure everyone will understand."

      Martin's eyes turned to the right and he didn't say anything. Slowly his left hand found his right wrist and clasped it. Backing down would be a long, painful process for this guy.

      "Say, Martin, how did you get past the policeman they posted outside? He's supposed to be guarding the boat as a crime scene."

      "The guy's asleep in his car."

      "Figures. But his boss, Sgt. Leonard Townsend, is a lot more serious. And I hope you didn't touch anything, because tomorrow he's going to be dusting for fingerprints, trying to find a suspect."

      Becker pulled back. "No. Didn't touch anything. I guess I'll be going."

      "Nice meeting you, Martin. We'll turn the engines off as soon as we can."

      After he left, I consulted my watch and measured the height of the water. I also took a good look under the floorboards and discovered a couple of fresh-water tanks that were three-quarters empty. I thought for a second. Their buoyancy had offset the weight of the diesels. And that was all that had kept the yacht from flooding over its transom and taking a rump-first dive into Davy Jones' locker. I shuddered at the memory of my crawl in that dark engine compartment.

      When I looked up, Rebecca gave me a wink. "This time you get a good grade on public relations."

      "Thanks, but Martin didn't attack you like the Sergeant did. Anyway, we're keeping with the program -- playing dumb and telling people we don't know anything."

      "You know, Ben, I've been thinking that the best way to handle this would be for me to give the Sergeant a medical affidavit detailing what I found. And you could also write out a statement on the condition of the vessel. Then he wouldn't have to come back and interview us and nobody would see it."

      "I agree. We unload all the karma onto Detective Sergeant Leonard Townsend."

      Rebecca frowned at the water running over the floor. "What's your next step, Captain?"

      "To screw the patch back in and wait for the tide to drop so the hole is out of the water. Then we will fiberglass it over. In the mean time we'll put these soggy cushions out on the dock and we'll hose down this yacht's fine wood, Formica and fabric-covered interior with fresh water. But just the parts that were submerged. We will give special attention to the electric converter, the electric switches, and the starter motors on the diesel motors."

      "What do you want me to do with that satellite dish? It looks like it got soaked, too."

      "It's an RDF -- a radio direction finder. It's an antique. You can soak it in fresh water, then shake it out and hang it up to dry. Same with this hand-held radio that I found swimming around with it."

      We discussed how to desalt the bank of electronic equipment to the side of the pilot station. It had gotten sloshed but not dunked. I thought the best treatment would be to spray the outside with a fine mist, working from the bottom up, hoping that the salt would diffuse out and that we wouldn't have to put too much fresh water in. Rebecca agreed, calling it a "sponge bath."

     IT WAS WEARY work, hosing the interior as the tide slowly sank and the boat put more and more weight on our improvised platform. Luckily the interior damage was not too bad. Twenty-four hours is not long enough for saltwater to penetrate high-quality marine plywood. Luckily the electric converter was solid-state -- sealed as tight as Martin Becker's diving watch. I used the hose liberally in the engine room, paying special attention to the starter motors, alternators and electric switches. Then I handed it off to Rebecca for her fine mist project with the compromised electronics modules.

      After an hour or so the hole was three inches above water level. Rebecca went for the camera while I inspected the damage. No question, the shots were from the outside. After Rebecca photographed the holes, I went to work on them with chisel and hand file, preparing the jagged edges. Then we set up as a production team, with Rebecca whipping up small portions of a quick-setting mixture. I soaked the glass fiber cloth with it and laid it over the holes. And I brushed on resin. After it hardened, I let myself down in the water and waded out to apply a layer of fiberglass and resin on the outside. Alternating between the outside and the inside, I laid up a thick patch.

      Luck was with us. Rebecca's search of the compartments turned up a shore power cable which she connected. When I turned off the diesel engines, the electric converter worked. It could charge the batteries and we had lights. And when I pushed the starter buttons, the diesel engines sprang back to life. Mission accomplished! Rebecca had scavenged a hasp and combination lock off the rope locker of the Diogenes. We fitted them on the Second Chance.