Read Online Rocky Island by Jim Newell - Free Book Online

radar, and if not, then maybe that freighter wasn’t that far off shore after all.”
    “W-e-l-l, that freighter was having engine trouble and had to be towed into Halifax.”
    “I guess my questions are, when did he lose his engines and where exactly was he when the tug met up with him? Did anyone check to see whether there was damage to the bow of that ship when it was tied up in Halifax?”
    “Don’t know. But I’ll find out. So far, Mr. French―”
    “Toby.”
    “Jason, here. So far, Toby, we don’t have anything to go on at all. Your idea seems to me to be worth pursuing. Thanks very much. I appreciate your help. I’ll be in touch.”
    Toby told Allison what he had been thinking about and recounted his conversation with the policeman. Allison agreed.
    “Dad would never be out that far, especially knowing there was a storm. And anyway, what would he be fishing for that far out and in October? He was probably handlining for halibut and they should have been maybe ten miles out. But I don’t understand why the bow of The Smitty II arrived in a couple of days but it took more than two weeks for Harvard’s body to come ashore.”
    “We may never know. One of those ocean mysteries, Allie. But I think you’re right about the distance your father was from shore. That’s a halibut area. They’re bottom fish and that area is the right depth. If there was a freighter in that close, then she was running too close to shore for safety.”

CHAPTER SIX
    Early in the New Year, Inspector McLellan and his two drug unit officers held another conference.
    “Guess what, guys,” began the Inspector, obviously in a good mood. “We have found that the owner of the Helen of Troy is a New York company called Antonelli Imports and Exports. The DEA has been watching that outfit for a couple of years but has never been able to get close enough to pin anything really positive on them. Now they’ve found something new.”
    “What?” asked Staff Sergeant Kellerman.
    “Antonelli Imports and Exports also owns N. A. Transport, a small trucking outfit that runs between New York and Maine. They mostly carry potatoes and fish. They have an agent in Presque Isle and another in Bar Harbor.”
    “But those are customs ports of entry. Since 9/11, you don’t smuggle drugs through customs.”
    “Presque Isle isn’t a port of entry. But there are plenty of places to sneak across the border near Presque Isle and there are small harbor near Bar Harbor where small boats could land undetected, just like the south shore of Nova Scotia and the coast of Newfoundland.
    “So what’s our next move?” asked Jason Brock.
    “We watch for the sailing of the Helen of Troy and keep a close watch on the harbor of Shelburne County,” replied McLelland, “and that will be a big job.”
    *
    January was a rough month for weather along the coast of Nova Scotia.
    The lobster fishermen were not at all happy as they were forced to remain tied up to the wharves for almost an entire month of the fishing season. Storm after storm blew up the Atlantic seaboard from the south piling snow and high winds on many parts of New England, then crossing the mouth of the Bay of Fundy to slide up the south shore of the Canadian coast toward Newfoundland. The low pressure areas causing the storms collided with low pressure areas moving eastward across the rest of Canada after following the jet stream south from the high Arctic, and altogether, the combination played havoc with the weather.
    Rocky Island, and indeed the areas along the adjacent shoreline received more rain than snow because of the warmer temperatures off shore over the water, but there was more than enough snow to cause a spate of shovelling now and again. The white stuff was wet and heavy, and after changing to rain and following with freezing temperatures, ice formed on everything. For most of the month, the weather was just plain miserable, the walking treacherous and life on the island was quite