Not the End of the World by Christopher Brookmyre Page A

because he had been there. He and Sophie. Both been there. Thinking there couldn’t be a tomorrow after this.
    A hospital. A gurney. Tubes, lines, fluids, bags, machines.
    A numb car‐
ride under streetlights. An empty house. A bedroom. A glass of water. Darkness. There couldn’t be a tomorrow after this. But there was.
    The Coast Guard’s office was south along Pacific Drive, a crisply white building that couldn’t have been open more than a few months. From the road it looked like a one storey deal, but a lower floor extended beneath it on the ocean side, descending to the purpose‐
built marina that harboured the CG launches. There were dozens of marinas all along the coast, at Venice, Malibu, Long Beach, but even without the signposts Larry would have known that this was the place because it was the only one that didn’t have a fish restaurant on it. He had come past the old Coast Guard premises on the way. It was being reconcreted and turned into another private marina, with a hotel under construction at the back. Larry figured the realty deal must have paid for a large slice of the set‐
up before him. The location wasn’t as picturesque as its predecessor, but on the other hand, the new offices didn’t look like a canning factory.
    He got out of his car and began walking towards the automatic doors. A girl in long blue shorts and a white T-shirt was squatting down in front of the soda machine that stood on a platform walkway running around the building on the right‐
hand side. She stood up again, Coke can in hand, and fed more quarters into the slot, then turned around. She wore a blue baseball cap with the Coast Guard’s badge on the front, and had a blonde ponytail sticking out neatly through the gap above the adjustment strap.
    ‘What’ll it be?’ she called, smiling, as he approached.
    ‘Huh?’ said Larry, unsure what she was referring to or even whether she was referring it to him.
    She laughed. ‘To drink.’
    ‘Oh right. Coke’s fine. ’Less you got Mountain Dew.’
    ‘Sure have.’
    She hit the panel and retrieved the can, tossing it to him as he drew near. ‘Larry Freeman, right?’
    Larry ceased reaching for his ID. ‘How’d you guess?’
    ‘I know an unmarked police car when I see one. Nobody under sixty would be driving that thing through choice. Not a new one, anyway.’
    Larry looked back at the frumpy lime four‐
door. She had a point.
    ‘I’m Janie Rodriguez.’ She held out a hand, which Larry gripped firmly. He noticed the wedding band on her other one, which explained why the least Hispanic‐
looking woman on the coast had a name like that. She looked mid‐
twenties, barely five feet but all of it bursting with energy. Must be the sunshine and the ocean. Larry figured there was a film crew shooting a Wrigley’s commercial round the corner wondering where she had disappeared to. ‘Been expecting you,’ she continued. ‘You’re here about the Mary Celeste. Let me show you.’
    Janie led him along the walkway a few yards and around the corner to the front, stopping where the platform looked down on the boats in the marina. They both rested their elbows on the rail and leaned forward. Larry opened his can and took a long drink, a light sea breeze playing on his face, sun glinting up off the water and drawing squiggly patterns on the underside of the walkway’s wooden canopy. Janie had one foot on the base of the railing, and Larry realised she was looking at him.
    ‘What are you smiling about, Officer?’ she asked.
    ‘Just thinking,’ he said. ‘This beats working for a living.’
    ‘Well, ’fraid we gotta do that too. That’s the boat in question down there.’
    ‘You mean the big one that don’t say “Coast Guard” on the sides?’
    ‘That’s correct, Officer. Scientific research vessel the Gazes Also, out of the Californian Oceanographic Research Institute right here in Santa Monica.’
    ‘What’s that all about?’
    ‘From what I gather they were