Captiva

CAPTIVA

Also by Randy Wayne White

THE DOC FORD TRILOGY

Sanibel Flats

The Heat Islands

The Man Who Invented Florida

NONFICTION

Batfishing in the Rainforest

The author would like to thank Karen Bell, Captain Kim Gerz, Dr. Roy Crabtree, and Lieutenant Gary Beeson for kindly sharing their time and knowledge. I would also like to thank the many Floridians on both sides of the net ban controversy who, out of concern for the fishery, generously provided information and opinions on this complex issue. Any factual errors or misrepresentations of fact are entirely the fault of the author. Finally, I would like to thank my friends Glenn Miller and Susan Beckman for dutifully reading the early drafts.

For women who burn brightly and cast a powerful wake: Debra Jane, Mother Marie, Jayma Gillaspie, Sherry Lavender, Katy Hummel, Renee Wayne Golden, Rilla Kay White, Lorian Hemingway, Phyllis Wells, Gigi Cannella, Debbie Flynn, Jennifer Clements, Deb Votaw, Cheryl Moore, Gloria Osburn, Chris Allman, Jacquie Meister, Janet Henneberry, Sandra McNalley, the Wilson sisters—Georgia, Jewel, Delia Sue, JoAnn, Johnsie, and Judy—and for Kimberly Gerz, who left a comet's trail.

Captivity is Consciousness— So's Liberty.

—EMILY DICKINSON

What thou lov'st well is thy true heritage. . . .

—EZRA POUND

Sanibel and Captiva Islands exist, but they are used fictitiously in this novel. The Smith sisters, Hannah and Sarah, are taken from Florida history and, the author hopes, have been accurately portrayed. Hannah Smith of Sulphur Wells, however, is a fictional character, although her hereditary characteristics—a hellish independence, among them—are not uncommon among women throughout the South. In all other respects, this book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.

CAPTIVA

Chapter 1

The reason I was awake at four a.m. when the bomb that killed Jimmy Darroux exploded was that my friend Tomlinson and I were on the dock taking turns squinting through a telescope, inviting—or so said Tomlinson—"ocular confirmation" that telepathic messages he believed he had received were, indeed, being transmitted by space creatures.

"It's loaded with them out there," he told me. "Sentient beings? For sure. Real living souls who generate very heavy vibes. They're aware a few of us earthlings are tuned in. Seriously; I shit you not. Couple of weeks ago, I just flashed on it. The whole scene. Trust me. They're definitely out there."

I thought: So are you, Tomlinson. So are you.

But I didn't swing out of bed on a cold January morning in the hope of contacting Tomlinson's deep-space kindred. He's a believer; I'm not. However, one of my journals promised there was an interesting planetary oddity to be seen in the pre-dawn sky. Venus was in apogee and, over the period of a few days, would seem to pass in front of Jupiter. I'm not an astronomer. It's a sometimes hobby. Over the years, I've acquired a working knowledge of the night sky because my poor sense of direction has gotten me lost often enough to know that stars are handy navigational aids—that, plus it makes me uneasy to see something over and over again that can't be identified. Which is why I've learned enough waypost constellations to keep me comfortable. So, as long as Tomlinson was badgering me to break out the telescope, I decided the best time to do it was when there was something interesting to see. Tomlinson could look all he wanted for signals from space. I'd look at Jupiter and Venus.

I awoke a few minutes until three, just before my alarm clock clattered. First thing I did was look across the bay to make sure Tomlinson was awake. Lights were on aboard the thirty-five-foot Morgan sloop that is his home, the portholes creating lemon-pale conduits in the darkness. The guy was up, probably meditating, burning incense, drinking green tea, no telling what else. I lit the propane ship's stove, listening to Radio Habana on the portable shortwave—my thought patterns switching comfortably into Spanish—as I dressed in chino pants and a soft sailcloth shirt. When the coffee was ready, I poured a mug and took it outside. The sky was clear: glittering stars suspended from a purple macrodome. Checked the weather station on the outside wall and found the barometer steady, temperature 49 degrees—cold for the southwest coast of Florida, even in January. Got a bomber jacket from one of the storage lockers and checked my watch: 3:13 a.m.

Later, I would relay some of those details to the police detective who investigated Jimmy Darroux's death.

There is a weight to the early-morning hours; a palpable density that's a little like being underwater. You can feel the press of it on your shoulders, the pressure of it in your inner ear. The resonance of one's own heartbeat is the test of silence—a fragile, fragile sound. I went through the list of my morning chores: check the fish tank, clean the filters, check the complicated pulley system I use to moor my boats . . . confirm that some late-night visitor hadn't swiped an engine or the onboard electronics. Lately, a lot of that had been going on up and down the Florida coast. Everything was in order, but I moved more methodically than usual, slowed by the weight of the hour. Then poured another mug of coffee, hunkered down on the porch and listened to the night noises, waiting for Tomlinson.

I live in a remodeled fish storage shack in Dinkin's Bay, Sanibel Island. The shack is built over the water on pilings, so I could hear the draw of tidal current, a mountain stream sound . . . the knuckle pop of pistol shrimp . . . the bee-wah croak of catfish. The lower level of the house is dockage, the upper level is wooden platform. Two single-room cottages sit at the center of the platform, both under the same tin roof. One of the cottages is home, the other I've converted into a lab. The lab is necessary because I run a small company, Sanibel Biological Supply, selling marine specimens, alive or preserved, to schools and research firms around the country. It's a good place for a biologist to live and work, particularly when the biologist is a bachelor who likes living alone but who occasionally wants company. Dinkin's Bay Marina, located down the mangrove shore, provides that when I want it, just as the marina store provides staples such as chips and conch salad and cold beer in quart bottles.

From across the bay, I heard the ratchet cough of an outboard too cold to start on the first pull. After a couple of more tries, I heard Tomlinson's muted voice: "Japanese scum!" Then the engine caught, and a few minutes later, he was tying his Zodiac up at my dock, saying: "Um-m-m, coffee. I smell coffee ... or yeah, maybe a beer would be good. Something light, a breakfast beer. Maybe loosen up the receptors, make it easier to communicate." He climbed barefooted up to the main platform, combing fingers through scraggly blond hair, tugging at his beard, intense, focused, ready to communicate with the universe. As always, he smelled of Patchouli, the old hippie perfume.

I said, "Interesting choice of clothing, Tomlinson."

"Got to look sharp—that's what I always say. Look sharp, feel sharp."

"The serape makes sense. Nice Clint Eastwood touch. But a sarong? Isn't it a little cold to be wearing a sarong?" With his long bony legs showing, the man resembled a stork.

"Sah-rong" he said, correcting my pronunciation. "Night like this, my body wants to breathe. Teach Mr. Happy the world's not always a warm and cheery place. Living in Florida has spoiled the both of us."

"Ah."

"Self-deprivation is a forgotten path to spiritual awakening. The Buddha didn't live naked in the desert just for laughs."

"Nothing funny about that," I said.

"Pain purifies."

"Yeah, well. . ."

He was trying to hold down his billowing skirt. "Shit! That wind comes blowing right up the prune whistle, huh?"

"If you're cold, I've got some sweatpants you can wear."

"Goddamn right I'm cold. Take a whiz, I'd have to goose myself and grab Mr. Happy when he jumped out." He was pulling open the screen door, headed into the house. "You want a beer too?"

"I'll stick with coffee."

"Just in case, I'll bring a couple." Meaning he would drink them both.

As I told the detective (his name was Jackson), we heard a boat enter the bay sometime between three-thirty and quarter to four. There was no moon, just a haze of stars, but I could tell it was a commercial netter's boat by the sound. Net boats are usually open boats, twenty to twenty-four feet long, and their engines are mounted near the bow through a forward well. Because of the well, a net boat can run forty miles an hour in nine inches of water and turn as if on a spindle, but the prop augers a lot of air. The cavitation noise is distinctive.

Tomlinson and I noticed it at the same time, a bumblebee whine at the mouth of the bay two miles away. "This time of year," Tomlinson said, "those people don't sleep at all. The netters." He had his eye pressed to the telescope, looking and talking at the same time. "They got what? Five months left? Six?"

"The net ban goes into effect in July. After that, they're out of business."

"Yeah," he said. "Permanently. People wonder why they're desperate? Fish all day, all night, trying to bale all the mullet they can before the clock runs out. Babies to feed, mortgage payments to make. Shit. Out there alone in a boat, all that on their shoulders."

I said, "You voted for the net ban. The guilt starting to get to you?"

He looked up from the telescope as if mildly surprised. "I did? Jesus, I guess I did. Oh man. . . . That's exactly why I hate politics. Always having to make decisions. But they were wiping out all the fish, and fish can't vote. You're the one told me that."

It was true, but had I told him that? I couldn't remember—although lately, it seemed, I'd been saying and doing more small dumb things than usual. "What I meant was, it's the migrant netters who come down and strip the place bare. The ones from North Florida, Georgia, Texas; all over. They come down for December and January, take the fish, dump their garbage, and leave."

"The mullet roe season," he said. "That's right, I remember now. They sell the fish eggs to the . . . Taiwanese."

"Taiwanese. Filipinos. The Japanese. They dry it, consider it a delicacy. Or can the milt."

"Take the seed stock and the fish can't reproduce. Exactly."

Which was also true. But he was missing the point—rare for Tomlinson because the man has a first-rate intellect. Granted, he's eccentric, often bizarre. As a late-sixties drug prophet, his mind sometimes takes odd and quirky turns, though it's impossible to say whether it's through enlightenment, as he claims, or because he has done serious chemical damage to the neural pathways and delicate synapse junctions of his brain. Tomlinson's genius is nonlinear, empathic, able to make intuitive leaps from illogical cause to logical effect. There are times that 1 don't take Tomlinson too seriously, but neither do I discount anything he says. That's not true of the general cast of New Age mystics, crystal worshipers, alien advocates, astrology goofs, macrobiotic back-to-the-earthers, and their politically correct brethren. If one of them told me they had been communicating with extraterrestrials, I would nod, smile pleasantly, then angle for the door. But when Tomlinson says it, you think: Well . . . probably not, but . . . maybe. He possesses a kind of stray dog purity that is without ego or malice. I have never met anyone anywhere who didn't like and trust Tomlinson.

"He must have struck fish," I said. The sound of the boat had traced the western bank of Dinkin's Bay . . . kicked up mud at the shallow Auger Hole entrance—I could hear it—and grown louder as it neared the marina, then stopped abruptly. The mullet fisherman had dumped his net, probably, and was now hauling it in.

"Yeah," Tomlinson said. "Or maybe she did. I see women working right along, out there no matter what the weather. White rubber boots and plastic rain jackets, picking fish all by themselves. Couple of 'em." Tomlinson had begun to tinker with the telescope again, scanning through the viewfinder. We'd already taken a good long look at Venus. It appeared as a tiny moon in crescent phase, gold-tinged by the reflected light of its own yellow clouds. Jupiter was an ice-bright globe, its four visible moons suspended around it. I was satisfied. Felt it was worth getting up at three A.M. because looking through a telescope creates, in time, a pleasant converse perspective. You naturally imagine what it is like to be seen from space: a milk-blue planet, the peninsula of Florida dangling into the sea, the Gulf Coast, a sleeping island, the clustered lights of Sanibel and Captiva, clustered stars and infinity beyond.

I stood shifting from one leg to the other, trying to stay warm now that Tomlinson was free-ranging the Celestron. To the west, the marina was still. Occasionally, a refrigerator generator would kick in or the sump of a bilge pump. I could hear the desert-wind baritone of surf on the Gulf side. The only other noises were the squawk of night herons and, once, the cat scream of raccoons. In another couple of hours, the fishing guides would be stirring, getting their skiffs ready for work. But now the docks were deserted. In the harbor's deep-water slippage, the trawlers and cruisers and doughty houseboats were as dark and motionless as a charcoal sketch. People aboard were buttoned in tight against the January cold. At the shore docks, near the gas pumps and bait tanks, smaller boats—the Makos, Aquasports, Hydrasports, Lake & Bays, Boston Whalers, and Mavericks— were tied incrementally and in a line, like horses.

My eyes swept past . . . stopped . . . and swept back again. I had seen something on the docks. What. . . ? For an instant, just an instant, an image lingered—the suggestion of a human figure hunched down, moving past the bait tanks.

"Far . . . out," whispered Tomlinson. "Hey—I think I've got it!" He was folded over the telescope, holding his hair back in a ponytail. "Yes ... a signal of some sort . . . definitely a signal. Flashing light . . . getting . . . getting . . . brighter." He stood, motioning with his bony hands. "Take a look, Doc. I think my space buddies are sending us their regards."

I looked once more at the docks . . . saw nothing.

"They're waiting."

I removed my glasses, stepped to the telescope, and leaned to see a pulsing dot move across the optic disc and gradually disappear. I adjusted the focus, disengaged the clock drive, moved the scope's tube on its axis, and found the dot again. As I followed the light, I listened to Tomlinson's running commentary. One night, in the cockpit of his boat, he had been in deep meditation, just him and the stars. A meteorite—a comet, he called it—had swept down out of the sky and the shock of its appearance, its brilliance, had vaulted him through into another dimension of awareness.

"An awakening is often catalyzed by a shock or a surprise," he explained. "In the fifth century, a simple monk gained enlightenment and became Buddha after he stepped on the tail of a very vicious dog."

The comet, Tomlinson said, had drawn his consciousness outward, beyond the confines of earth. All that night he sat in meditation, allowing his brain waves to probe the stars. It was cold out there, he said. He sensed the infinite chill of nothingness, the black abyss of space.

"It was a serious downer, man; a very heavy mojo. I mean, scary. That emptiness, it was like pulling me apart, molecule by molecule. Diluting me. You know how the beam of a flashlight diffuses over distance? Like that. But I kept going, fighting the panic."

Finally, he said, his mind had sensed a flicker of warmth. "It was sentient consciousness, man. You hear what I'm saying? Life, energy— whatever you want to call it. It was out there, very frail at first. Still a long way away, but I was homing in on the signal. It got stronger. Then—truly amazing—I began to sense other signals, but from different directions. Spread out all over the place. Thought . . . power. In far corners of the universe, these little islands of . . . divinity. I was making contact! This was. . . two weeks ago. Every night, I do deep meditation, man. Bypass all that deep-space bullshit so it's gotten to be like dialing from a cellular. If I had a cellular."

He chattered on and on while I used the telescope to chase the flashing dot. Universal energy fields. Chakras, auras. Life registered a specific measure of electrical current—that, at least, was true. All matter in the universe was structural repetition. An atom with electrons, a planet with moons. . . adapted fins which were a bird's wing, the fingers of a child's hand. And had I looked down to notice that a stream of urine spirals like a DNA helix? Communication was nothing more than conduction; the dipoles could be at opposite points in the universe and it would make no difference. Tomlinson had simply accessed that current . . . and made a few new friends.

"God's out there!" Tomlinson said. "God is out there, and He's not us. What a relief!"

I stood from the telescope, cleaned my glasses and put them on. "Tomlinson?"

He had been curling his fingers in his hair—a nervous habit. He moved toward the telescope. "The Big Guy wants to talk to me now?"

I didn't want to have to tell him. "Not exactly."

"Then what?"

"It's ... an airplane. That's what you were seeing. An airplane."

" What? Naw. . . ."

"It took me a while to figure because the running lights weren't quite right. And it was moving so fast."

"An airplane? They were going to give me some kind of signal. It popped right into my mind: ocular confirmation. Just the other night, making very heavy contact. Those very words. Right there on my boat, they were telling me to look."

I shrugged. "Yeah, well. . . but this is some kind of fighter jet, probably out of MacDill or could be Homestead. Maybe a Tomcat with its war lights on, an F-14. Pretty strange. They do strafing and bombing runs in a restricted area off Marco. Remember that time we were anchored off the Ten Thousand Islands and heard explosions?"

Tomlinson said, "Shit. Wouldn't you know."

"They like to scramble early, avoid the civilian traffic. They've got Air Combat Maneuvering Instrumentation towers out there, built way off shore."

He said glumly, "The military industrial complex is going to fuck with me one too many times. Seriously. Mark my words."

Disappointing Tomlinson is like disappointing a child. I nodded toward the Celestron, checking my watch as I did: 4:00 a.m. We had a good hour of darkness left, and I was about to suggest that he scan another part of the sky. I was facing the marina . . . had, once again, confirmed that there was no movement on the docks; realized I had probably imagined the human form . . . and I had begun to say, "Check the northern sky—" when the dock exploded. An orange corona bubbled up over the water, I heard a suctioning ka-WOOF, and then the entire marina was illuminated . . . illuminated just for an instant, as if a flashbulb had gone off. All this in a space of microseconds.

I yelled without thinking: "Incoming!"—a response programmed long ago. Yelled it even before I realized what had happened; yelled it as I collapsed, dragging Tomlinson to the deck.

A fireball ballooned above the dock, back where they kept the sport-fishing boats. Not a big explosion, but it generated enough energy to arch debris, rubble, burning slats high into the air, toward my stilt house. And I thought stupidly: Grenade? Light mortar?

Tomlinson poked his head up. "Holy shit! The sonsabitches opened fire on us!" Which didn't make any sense either . . . nothing was making sense . . . then, out of the confusion, his meaning took form: He was referring to the jet. He thought the jetfighter was attacking us.

Ludicrous; it should have been funny . . . but the dock was blazing, looked like a couple of the boats had caught fire too. By then I was thinking: Gas fumes in the bilge, ignited by a spark. It was a reasonable explanation, even probable, but I didn't pursue it because out of the flames stumbled a human figure . . . no, a human torch, clothes ablaze, arms clawing, sputtering, whooshing, making a guttural caw-w-w-w-ing sound. I was already on my feet and running toward the marina when the torch seemed to kneel, a gesture of submission, then tumbled, hissing, into the bay.

It was a man. Not that I could tell at first. I went sprinting down the dock past the bait tank and gas pumps. . . then tried to stop so quickly that my feet went out from under me and I bounced along on my butt. I had realized something: If the fire got to the gas pump, the fuel tank beneath the marina's deck would blow. Instead of one burn victim, there would be dozens—myself included.

I found the storage tank's emergency shutoff switch in a gray box beside the pumps. Hit the switch, took two strides and leaped off the dock into the water. The tide was up, but that area of the harbor is so shallow that I had to half swim, half slog to what, in the copper light of the fire, resembled an inflated garment bag. Grabbed it without knowing what or where I was grabbing . . . pulled it to me, felt weight, felt life . . . and the thing rolled over in my arms to reveal a mask of black from which two bright, dazed eyes blinked.

A hole formed in the mask and a croaking sound came from it: "I can see . . .Jesus. I can see Jesus."

The image of a human who has been maimed goes straight to the motor reflex region of the brain. It touches all the genetic coding for flight and survival, leaching a primitive, chemical excitement from the adrenal gland—which is probably why the trash newsmagazines and some of the trashier media have come to rely on human suffering as stock-in-trade. If they can't create excitement one way, they'll serve it up in another. Their favorite shield—"We're journalists, trained professionals"—is as clouded as a pornographer's videotape, which at least makes their cry "It's what the viewers want!" analogically accurate.

What I knew was that I wanted to pull this guy onto the dock and get him covered up before the gawkers arrived. Tragedy is a personal thing; a human property to be shared—if by choice—but not stolen away in film bites.

I moved to touch the man's head; realized I shouldn't. Instead, I said, "I'll get you out of here. You'll be okay." Wondered if he had even heard the lie.

There were people shouting now . . . the heavy thump of bare feet on wood . . . the whine of a boat engine. Tomlinson came racing around the corner in his Zodiac as someone called in a panic: "Is he hurt? Who is it?"

I looked toward the flames, saw silhouettes, and I answered, "Don't know. I can't tell who it is"—pleased, on some perverse level, that my voice remained calm, controlled. "He needs help. Call nine-one-one, tell them we want a medevac. A chopper."

I was slogging around with the man cradled in my arms, trying to find enough footing to swing him up onto the dock, but Tomlinson interceded. There would be less stress, he said, if we rolled him into his rubber boat. "Plus, we can flood it with cold water. That's what he needs now. Until the paramedics arrive."

The two of us lifted the man into the inflatable; then Tomlinson took charge, calling for the water hose, calling for buckets of ice while he got the man's legs elevated, already treating him for shock.

I had a dim memory of Tomlinson telling me that, at some time in his life, he had taken an emergency medical technician course. Tomlinson, an unlikely person, often did unlikely things. Already, there were a couple of marina regulars sloshing around with us . . . people who seemed to know more about first aid than I. Once they had a blanket over the guy, I left them to their work and hoisted myself onto the dock to help fight the fire.

It wasn't as bad as it could have been, but it was pretty bad: four small sportfishing boats—known locally as flats boats—were ablaze. Mack, who owns the marina, was doing what he could, getting people organized. While some cut the lines of nearby boats and drifted them to safety, others used fire extinguishers and water to control the fire. Just as a precaution, I took another look at the fuel tank's emergency shutoff switch—and was very glad I did. Some well-intended person had come along after me and switched it off again, thereby switching it on.

The marina is connected to the main road by a sand road. The Sanibel Fire Department is located just a few hundred yards from that intersection. The trucks arrived in minutes, lights flaring, and they had the fire under control not long afterward. But they couldn't save the four boats, and two others were badly damaged. Nor could the emergency room doctors save the man I had pulled from the bay.

He died later that morning, with Tomlinson at his side.

Chapter 2

I helped around the marina until my help wasn't need, then shuffled back to the cottage to hang bomber jacket and clothes out to dry. I'd been slogging around in boat basin muck; the stink of it was still on me. I took a cold-water shower. Kept lathering and rinsing, lathering and rinsing. Decided there are some things—the memory of an odor, for instance—that cannot be washed away with soap.

By then, it was nearly ten a.m. I felt as if I had been awake for days, but didn't feel like sleeping.

Because of the petroleum and spent chemicals that had gone into the bay, I was worried about the fish tank aquarium where I keep live specimens—some to sell, most just for my own research and pleasure. I had built the fish tank on a reinforced section of my lower deck, using half of an old wooden cistern. From a distance, the thing looked like a whiskey barrel. Raw water is constantly drawn into the tank by a Briggs pump housed on shore. Then the water is aerated and clarified by a hundred-gallon upper reservoir and subsand filter, then sprayed as a mist into the main tank.

But even the multiple filter systems couldn't protect the aquarium from big doses of chemical contaminates. That's why I was concerned. Because of the cold weather, I had a Styrofoam cap on the tank. But the sun was out now—the norther had blown through, and the temperature had already climbed to 65—so I removed the cap and let the sun in. The water in the tank was clear, three feet deep. I released a long slow breath, relieved: everything was still alive. Snappers, with their black masks, were doing slow figure eights, flushing shrimp before them. There were whelks and banded tulip shells, and one great big horse conch, its orange foot out, suctioned to a clam. There were also sea squirts and tunicates—the bay's natural water filters. The most delicate animals in the tank are my reef squid. It took me a while to find them. They can change colors and blend in, their chromatophores changing with the background. But they were alive too . . . and so were six immature tarpon that I had recently rescued from a drainage ditch near the island's Pirate Playhouse.

I stood watching the tarpon, debating whether to switch off the raw-water intake. The fish held nose-first into the current; thin bars of silver that seemed to generate their own light. Over at the marina, the cleanup continued. The tide was still carrying out charred fragments and white pellets of synthetic goo. I decided that cutting the raw-water intake was the safest course. For a day or so, the recirculation system and aerator could keep my animals isolated and alive.

"Dr. Ford? It's doctor, right?" I looked up to see a sheriff's detective: sports coat, loose tie. He had introduced himself earlier, asked a few questions, then dismissed me. Ron Jackson. He was on the boardwalk that connects my stilt house to shore, coming toward me.

I waited until he was closer before I said, "Just Ford. I'm not a physician."

He smiled a cop smile, illustrative of genial mistrust. "Out on the islands, I keep forgetting. Everything's informal. Probably why the tourists like it." He had his notebook out; found a piling on the lower deck and leaned against it, making himself at home. "Let's see . . . I've already got your number, your name. So . . .just a coupl'a other things. You got a spare minute?"

I'd already told him everything there was to tell. "Not really. I was getting ready to ..." I cast around for an excuse. Sleep was out of the question and I didn't feel like working. "I was just getting ready to go for a run.

The smile again. "There you go; best way to get rid of stress. I'm a runner myself. You don't mind, I'll follow you around while you change. It'll save us both some time."

Jackson didn't look like a runner—short, bull-necked, hair sprayed smooth—but then I don't look like a runner either.

He followed me through the companionway into the cottage and took a seat at the dinette table, allowing me to change in private while he made small talk. Stress fractures were on his mind—he'd recently recovered from one. The Gasparilla Run, he'd done that, was thinking about the Seven Mile Bridge run, and wasn't it hot as hell, running in the summer? Then he got to the point, saying, "I have two or three more questions."

"Ask away."

"Let's see. . . . You didn't know the deceased, right? That's what you told me."

I hesitated. "The guy died?"

"Yeah . . . you couldn't have known. One of our guys just talked to them, the hospital. Tentatively, we've got his name as Jimmy Darroux, a commercial fisherman from Sulphur Wells. That's an island near here, huh?"

I said, "That's right. Darroux . . . the name's not familiar. It took us about an hour to count heads, me and the others from the marina. Make sure it wasn't one of us. But the way he was, I wouldn't have recognized him if it had been my best friend."

Jackson had the soft, rounded speech pattern of the southern regions of the Middle Atlantic. All o-u combinations rhymed with "boot." He said, "Yeah. Burns are the worst."

He told me about finding a boat with a commercial sticker hidden in the mangroves; they had traced the numbers. As I listened, I guessed he was from Virginia, maybe Maryland. Hadn't been here long; wasn't familiar with the agricultural and fishing island of Sulphur Wells.

Jackson was reviewing his notes. "You described the explosion . . . the fire . . . what you did. You and your buddy out with the telescope. ... Is he around? I need to speak with him, too."

"Tomlinson rode in on the medevac, him and a paramedic. He didn't know the guy either. But I've got your card, I'll have him call you."

"He didn't know Darroux, then why did he—"

"Tomlinson is ... a very religious person. He went to the hospital because he felt he could help."

"I see. Um-huh . . . what I was wondering about—"Jackson looked up when I came around the locker that separates my bed from the kitchen. I had changed into shorts, sweatshirt, and Nikes, and began to stretch, hands against the wall. "What I was wondering about," he said, "were some of the things you told me earlier. Some of the phrases you used."

"Oh?"

" 'Point of detonation.' You said that. 'Accelerant flare.' What you said was"—he was reading from the notebook—" 'I saw the accelerant flare before the noise reached me.' You said 'magnitude of compression.' "

"So? I was telling you about the explosion, what happened. It was a small explosion with a lot of fire. I don't understand your—"

"The way you told me, that's what made me curious. The phraseology"

"Phraseology? What was I supposed to say?"

Jackson's laugh dismissed it as unimportant. "Before my wife and I moved here, I was in D.C., the capital. Jesus, it was like living in Ghetto National Park. Nothing but brothers and half-assed political flakes, and all these squirrelly little bombers. You ask somebody what they saw, they say, 'It just went boom!' Or, 'Blowed up, man.' Or, 'Ka-POW See where I'm headed? In D.C., I heard a lot of people describe a lot of explosions. But you say, 'I saw the accelerant flare before the noise reached me.' You say 'point of detonation.' "

"I was trying to give a precise account of what occurred."

The notebook again. "A guy at the marina told me. His name is Graeme . . ."

"Yeah, Graeme MacKinley, the owner. Mack."

"Mr. MacKinley told me that you're a biologist. I wouldn't expect a biologist to be familiar with those terms." Jackson looked at me blandly. "So how do you know so much about bombs, Dr. Ford?"

"Bomb? I never said anything about a bomb—"

"Well . . . explosions then. Were you in the military or something?"

I paused a beat before I said, "I worked for the government for a while. We had a few courses, I probably picked up the language there."

"The government. What did you do for the government?"

"I was with the foreign service."

Jackson chuckled. "Up in D.C., saying you work for the foreign service is like a hooker saying she works with people—no offense. But it's pretty broad—"

"I did clerical stuff," I said. "A paper shuffler." I was getting tired of Jackson. Law enforcement people are the standard—-and the victims—of the unappreciated imperative. Day in, day out, they deal with misfits, liars, drunks, and head bangers. Their only reward is low pay, bad hours, and a firestorm of criticism if they make a mistake. If you're a bureaucrat and screw up, you get a private memo from the department head. If you're a cop and screw up, you get headlines. As a result, law enforcement people are usually a hell of a lot more efficient and professional at their jobs than professionals in other fields. But they also develop a myopic under-siege view of the world. They trust no one—why should they? I didn't blame Jackson for being suspicious. But now he was prying into unrelated affairs—things that were none of his business.

"Where did you work? Countries, I mean."

"Quite a few. Lots."

"Don't get shy on me, Dr. Ford."

"Then let's get something straight: You're not suggesting I had anything to do with the explosion?"

"You mean you didn't do it?" He was looking at me, smiling like we were buddies and it was a joke. But it wasn't a joke. He wanted to see how I reacted.

I didn't react. I didn't smile. I said, "I've got a lot of work to do today, Detective Jackson. Anything else?"

He was nodding his head, confirming something. "The people I talked to, that's exactly what they said. You're kind of bookish and straighdaced, everything's work work work. No, I can't see the motive. Everybody over there likes you, so why blow up their boats? See, what I'm doing . . . I'm trying to neaten things up, get them straight in my mind. It was bugging me. But the way you told about it—it makes sense now."

Fine.

He tried to parry my sudden coolness by being conversational. "You ever get to Central America?"

"Once or twice."

"Yeah? I almost went there with my wife on vacation. Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia—one of those cruise ship deals? But all the stuff you read, the violence and stuff. I asked this guy I knew, if we went, should I maybe pack a side arm. He worked for one of the federal agencies. Least, I'm pretty sure he did. Know what he said? He said, 'You take a gun down there, make sure you file off the front sight before you leave. That way, it won't hurt so bad when the guerrillas stick it up your ass!' "

I had gone to the screen door, was holding it open. "I think of anything else, Detective Jackson, I'll call you."

"And your buddy—"

"He'll call you too."

"Those were his last words; the last thing he said to me. Practically the only thing he said."

I asked, "What? His name?"

"His name? He never said his name. Man, he could hardly speak. The ER doctor said the vacuum—from the explosion?—it forced this intense heat down him. His pharynx, his lungs, everything. I know there's perfect symmetry to every event, every little thing that happens, but that is one shitty way to go, man. No, the last thing he said was, 'Take care of Hannah for me.' He told me that. 'Take care of Hannah.' Said it about three times, the name. Hannah. I was holding his hand. By then, the ER doctor said that contact, the risk of infection . . . well ... it just didn't matter."

Tomlinson was flopped down in the reading chair by the north window. I was on my bed, head propped up with pillows. Crunch & Des, the black marina cat, was down by my feet, projecting enough lazy indifference to create his own space. I had been trying to read my new BioScienceJournal but kept dozing offuntil Tomlinson rapped at the screen door. It was a little before six p.m. The chemical stink of melted fiberglass, charred wood was still in the air.

"Who's Hannah?"

Tomlinson shrugged. "Jimmy Darroux's daughter? His wife? I don't know. Maybe his one true love. He didn't say." Tomlinson looked exhausted, shrunken, all the joy sucked out of his eyes. He was wearing green physician's scrubs. Apparently the sarong had seemed out of place in an emergency room, even to him.

"That's what I was asking you. How did you find out his name?"

"One of the cops gave me a lift to the marina. Mack told me. A detective told him."

I got up on an elbow and looked out the window to see if Detective Jackson was still around. There were a few gawkers milling near the site of the fire, but they couldn't stray into the area because of the yellow crime-scene tape. There were a couple of policeman in uniform and a couple of men wearing blue windbreakers, ATF in white letters on the back. The feds. But no one wearing a green, checked sports coat like Jackson's.

"Did Mack also tell you the guy probably blew himself up with his own bomb? That's what the police are working on. He was a commercial fisherman, probably mad about the net ban. That mullet boat you and I heard—they found it tied over in the mangroves. He'd apparently waded in, had the flats boats targeted. They got his name through the registration."

Tomlinson put his face in his hands and made a wincing noise, like pain.

"That poor, poor fool."

"Jimmy Darroux isn't getting much sympathy around here. Two of the guides are out of business because of him. Nelson and Felix both. They'd just gotten those boats, a new Parker and a Hewes. The one just like mine."

"He was carrying the bomb?"

"I don't know. Carrying it, trying to put it someplace. That's what they're working on."

"But they're not sure."

"They didn't confide in me, but it's not that hard to figure out, Tomlinson. Renegade commercial guys have been vandalizing marinas up and down the coast, stealing engines, electronics. Setting boats on fire, trying to even the score. They blame the sportfishermen for pushing the vote."

"Revolution, man, right on. That's how it starts. I thought they'd been stealing stuff just for the cash."

They'd been doing that, too.

Tomlinson paused. "So now I've got to find Hannah."

It took a moment for it to register—Darroux's last words. "If he and Hannah were close, I'm surprised she didn't show up at the ER."

"I told you, no one knew who he was. By the time I left, they still didn't know. If they did, they didn't tell me."

"So, you find her, what are you going to do?"

"I don't know—ride the Karmic Highway. Nothing happens by accident, man. There's no such thing as coincidence. I ended up with Jimmy Darroux for a reason. At first, I thought it was to heal him. Use my hands to fill him full of universal energy, take away the pain—"

"It didn't work?" I wondered if Tomlinson would admit it.

"Well... his dying sort of put the nix on the whole approach. So now I've got to find Hannah."

"Look, that guy ... his bomb, he could have killed one of the guides. Tell, if the fire had gotten to the fuel storage tank, he could have killed as all."

"He was a human being, man. I'm not here to judge him. And I'm not saying the vibes weren't bad. There was a darkness in him, I sensed that, but let's face it: he'd just gotten blown up. A thing like that will definitely darken the mood ring. The man died holding my hand, Doc. It's what we call a karmic obligation."

I stood up, stretched, returned the magazine to the bookshelf "Terrorism is what I call it. I don't share your sympathy."

"I'm talking about the girl. The woman, whatever. You need to help me find her."

"His last words to me were about Jesus—"

"See? At least he was a religious man—"

"That he could see Jesus. Nothing about a woman. I don't understand how that obligates me."

Tomlinson was out of the chair, some of his energy returned. He still looked tired, but he was as serious as I have ever seen him. "Come on, Doc. You were the first one to him. No coincidences, remember? You're good at this stuff, finding people. Me, I'm a concept person. In all the years we've known each other, have I ever asked you for a favor before?"

I almost answered truthfully—seldom a day went by that Tomlinson didn't ask me for something. Instead, I said, "They know his name, where he lived—Sulphur Wells. You don't need me for that. Check the phone book, under D for Darroux. Someone at his house will know."

"See? You're already getting things figured out. What would it hurt to hop in your boat and run over there? A ride, that's all I'm asking for. Then I'll buy you dinner. Find a place at Sulphur Wells or stop at Cabbage Key. You name it."

"The guy dies and we just pop in, start asking questions."

Tomlinson made an open-palmed gesture—he was going. "I'd ask to borrow your truck, but you have to drive halfway up the mainland, then way south again to get there. Two hours minimum by road but only about in hour in a fast boat. Or I'll take my dinghy . . ."

I pictured Tomlinson pulling into the commercial fish docks at Sulphur Wells, all those rednecks staring at him, probably wearing some beer by this time of day. And already pissed off about losing one of their own.

"It'll be dark in an hour."

"Then I'll need a light. Can I borrow your spotlight?" I swung open the door and stepped out to see if my bomber jacket was dry—the norther had slipped through, but it would still be cold out there on the water. "I'll go, I'll go. We'll take my boat."

I made a stop before we got under way. After my talk with Ron Jackson, I'd found Janet Mueller out by the front gate loosening up to run, so we'd jogged a couple of miles together before I broke away and headed to the beach to finish my workout. As I left her, I'd suggested that we get together later for a beer and something to eat.

Now I had to cancel the date.

Marina communities are gypsy communities—boats are, after all, built for travel. If you're sailing the Intercoastal north to Texas or Mexico, or south to the Keys or Yucatan, Dinkin's Bay is just off the main channel, Marker 5 on the chart. The cruising guides list it as a "quaint" back bay marina hidden in the mangroves, electrical hookups, showers, laundry, and ground transportation available . . . but not recommended for vessels over forty feet or that draw more than six feet. So we get a steady turnover of small cruisers and gunkholers. Usually couples, often retirees—"When the kids were young, we always dreamed of buying a boat,"—but almost never women traveling alone.

Janet Mueller was an exception.

She'd come chugging into the marina a couple of weeks earlier in a little Holiday Mansion houseboat that was so beaten up that the bright blue paint job couldn't disguise the misuse . . . unless you were an absolute novice—which Janet was. She'd banged the docks, fouled her lines, then banged the docks some more. By the time we got her tied up, her hands were shaking, she seemed near tears. She kept saying, "I just bought this. I don't know anything about it!" She continued to apologize, even as we said our goodbyes.

Because marinas are gypsy communities, the cruisers and the marina regulars usually mix easily. Not Janet. She stayed to herself; spent a lot of time above deck in the heat of the day, scrubbing, polishing, studying manuals. Sometimes she would throw off the lines and chug around the bay. My impression was that she did it so that she could practice docking. I liked that—she seemed determined, independent; a stubborn lady.

But Janet Mueller also had the shell-shocked look of a person who is trying to recover from some debilitating event. You see it often in Florida: the introspective stare, the weighted shoulders, the slow declination of chin. They don't say much, they sigh a lot. They seem to have trouble concentrating, as if some private chord echoes in their ears. They are traveling, they say, or on sabbatical. It's not true. They are in flight; trying to escape the divorce or the death or the bankruptcy that has dismantled their lives. They come down hoping the beaches, the sunsets will provide a curative—just like the brochures suggest. Yet, all too often, the abruptness of the change, the neon glitz and ocean space of Florida only add to the shock of being untethered. You can escape everything by leaving home . . . except yourself.

The only thing I knew about her was that she was from a place called Montpelier, Ohio—she told me that—and she liked oldies rock and roll. I could hear it coming from her boat when I walked past on the dock. Also, she knew a great deal about computers—Tomlinson told me that. She was a plain-looking woman. Not unattractive, just plain. She was probably in her early thirties, had short brown hair, a round face, a body prone to plumpness, legs, hips, and torso not constructed for the cargo shorts and pullovers she usually wore. I could picture her sitting at the back of the classroom, not saying much but getting good grades. I could picture her in business clothes, neat, punctual, indispensable at her work. She had that aura of steadiness. But, in the very few times we spoke, I also got the impression that had I clapped my hands unexpectedly, she would have dived "or cover or burst into tears. Post-traumatic stress syndrome is not the exclusive province of war veterans. Women, particularly the quiet ones, the plain ones, can suffer it as well.

In a small community, romance segregates, so I've made it a rule not to date women who live at the marina. But that morning, Janet had been among those in the water with Tomlinson trying to help Jimmy Darroux. She hadn't been shy or timid then. We had the explosion in common now. and suggesting that we get something to eat had seemed to provide polite closure to our run. It was an offhand invitation, innocent, but I didn't want her to think that I'd simply forgotten it.

As I idled over to the marina, Tomlinson jogged over by land to see if anyone knew where, exactly, Jimmy Darroux had lived. It wasn't his idea, it was mine. Sulphur Wells is a big island. There are several waterfront settlements; five or six commercial fish houses, and unlike Tomlinson, I didn't trust karma to steer us to the right one. I nudged my skiff around the oyster bar off the T-dock, then along B-dock where Janet's houseboat was moored. She had it bumpered nicely, stern to, curtained pilothouse windows clean, lines coiled. I glided in and caught the safety rail, calling, "Hello the boat!"

I felt the little houseboat's trim shift slightly; then she poked her head out of the pilothouse door, grinning. She was wearing a terrycloth robe, scrubbing at her hair with a towel. She had just gotten out of the shower. For absolutely no logical reason, I had the terrible feeling that she had washed her hair and was about to get dressed up just for me. She said a little shyly, "I didn't know you wanted to go so early. You want to come in for a drink? Or I can . . . geez, just give me ten minutes and I'll be all ready. I promise. I'll put on some music."

I said, "Well, that's not exactly why, uh . . . Something's come up, you see and ... I know I said earlier that we would, uh . . ." the whole time wondering how a grown man could sound so stupid.

Her smile began to fade. "We're not going?"

"Sorry, can't. I have to do a favor for a friend."

The smile disappeared. "Oh. Well ... I know you're awfully busy."

"It's not that. It's just that this thing came up."

"Honest, don't worry about it." She said that in a soothing way, as if more concerned with my feelings than her own. The smile was back in place, but she had withdrawn, eyes avoiding me, casting around as we continued to talk; those green eyes reminding me of some shy small creature that had retreated to the safety of its cave, peering out.

"We'll do it another time."

"Sure we will, Doc, sure. Or maybe just go for a run."

When her door closed, I punched the throttle, wheeling my skiff around on its own length. Looked up to see several of the fishing guides— Jeth Nicholes, Nelson Esterline, Felix Blane—staring at me, probably wondering why I was kicking up a wake. Jeth used his hand to signal me, and when I'd swung into the dock, he said, "You muh-muh-mad about something?"

"Yeah, I guess I am. Have you seen Tomlinson?"

Nels said, "What'a you got to be mad about? They didn't burn your boat. I'm the one's got a right to be mad. Me and Felix both. Jesus Christ, I've got charters booked and my wife, she just bought a new washer-dryer!"

I'd meant to talk to them about losing their boats. "How long before you get your checks from the insurance company?"

"They said two, but it'll be more like four. Weeks, I mean. A whole damn month at least, which will ruin a big chunk of the prime season for us."

I said, "I don't have any orders right now. Well. . . I've got one for sea horses, but I can catch them with my drag boat. What I'm saying is, any way you two want to split it up, you can use my skiff for a while."

Jeth looked at Nels. Said, "See? People don't loan their boats, buh-buh-but here's Doc doing it."

Which seemed an odd thing to say, until I took a look at the faces of Mels and Felix and several other men who had gathered around them in a tight little pack. A kind of physical hostility emanated from them, directed it me. I couldn't understand it. We were all friends, Jeth a close friend. Just :wo months ago, Nels and I had placed our boat orders together to get a setter price: each buying a twenty-foot Hewes Light Tackle flats skiff, a kind of maximum-length fishing sled, beautifully designed and built, huge live wells and plenty of storage, rigged with jack plate, power trim, and a big Mariner outboard. Mine was gray. Before the explosion, his had been teal green.

I looked at Felix, then back to Nels. "You guys want to tell me what's going on?"

Felix shifted from one foot to the other, stared at my skiff for a moment before he said, "That's up to you, Doc. We got something we want to ask."

"Yeah?"

Nels said, "What we're wondering is where you stand on all this."

"All this . . . what?"

"Those goddamn netters, that's what. They think they can come over here and screw with our livelihood, they bit off more than they can chew. The voters kicked them out of their jobs, that sure as shit don't mean we're gonna stand around with our thumbs up our ass while they take it out on us. They want a war, they got it."

"As of tonight," Felix said, "we're doing shifts. Guarding the place. It's the same with the other marinas on both islands, Sanibel and Captiva. I didn't get into the guide business to carry a gun, but that's what we'll be doing, by God."

What the hell were they talking about? "I'm going to ask you one more time: What's this have to do with me?"

"We know you spoke at some of those meetings," Jeth said softly. "That's what it's about. Some of the guys think you were on the nuh-nuh-netters' side. And Tomlinson was just over here asking about the guy who buh-burned up, where he lived, saying you two were goin' up there to help his family, some woman."

"We're asking how you voted," Nels said. "That's what we're asking. Whether you're on our side or theirs. That's what we're talking about."

I was in my skiff; they were on the dock. I looked up at them: big men in fishing shorts, ball caps, pliers on their belts, their faces scorched black from three hundred days a year out there on the flats, burning up their lives to make a living. You don't try to manipulate this kind of men and you can't finesse them. Not that I would have tried. So I did exactly what they expected me to do—I told them the truth. It wasn't a question, I said, of me being for the netters or for the sport fishermen. Yes, netting was an indiscriminate and destructive method of fishing. And yes, the netters were their own worst enemy. They had used spotter planes to exterminate the king mackerel. Once snook and then redfish had been protected, the netters—pushed into a corner—had competed to exterminate the mullet. Each winter, migrant netters came down and trashed the beaches, trashed the islands, and trashed the canals, outraging equally hardworking home owners. I knew all that too.

But had the state legislature done anything to stop it? No. As usual, legislators shied from making the tough decisions. They could have implemented a lottery system to control the fishery and drastically reduced the number of netters. Or they could have legislated riparian rights, allowing netters to fish only where they lived.

There was an incontestable fact that pro—net ban advocates conveniently ignored: Every netter who fished Florida waters was issued a commercial saltwater-products license by the state. The state did not hesitate to sell those licenses to any wandering, itinerant fisherman who could plunk down the money. They sold the licenses to out-of-state netters as eagerly as they sold them to native Floridians whose families had fished the same waters for a hundred years. While the state stamped out licenses, state bureaucrats sat back, brows furrowed, expressions aloof, and made dire, but curate, predictions about the imminent collapse of the fishery.

The irony was lost on legislators, who chose an uncharacteristic haven—silence—then watched safely from the background as special in-rest groups battled it out and finally brought the net ban to the ballot.

Would the ban revitalize Florida's shallow water fishery? Absolutely. But there would be a long-term price. When disturbed, water oscillates far beyond the point of contact. The same dynamics apply to the environment—and to society. With netting banned, many of the back-bay fish houses would be forced to close. Most of them were located on the rater in delicate mangrove littoral zones. They were already zoned for commercial use, they already had docks and dredged canals. Who would uy them out? Big condo developers and marina investors, that's who. No permits required, no environmental hoops to jump through. And where would Florida's banished netters go? They would join the growing numbers of migrant fishermen and thereby contribute to the decimation of fisheries in states—such as the Carolinas—that still allowed netting.

The world market demands sea products. Nothing is going to change hat. When there are innate conflicts between man and the environment, I believe it is wiser to dilute the problem by sharing and wisely regulating the burden. Saltwater and sea creatures do not acknowledge the boundaries of states or nations.

I told the guides that. I could have added that because the amendment had been couched as an ultimatum, a reasonable person had no choice but to vote for the ban—unless that person wanted to register a protest vote against the spineless behavior of the legislature. But I didn't tell them that. Didn't want it to sound as if I were trying to contrive an excuse. Instead, I said, "Truth is, I voted against the ban."

Nels looked at Felix and nodded: See? I told you.

The men shuffled around on the dock, no longer hostile, but neither were they conciliatory. Nels said, "I'm sorry to hear that. I truly am. I always figured you for a friend of ours."

Jeth was upset, becoming impatient. "He told you why he did it. Jesus damn! He had reasons. What's the big deal? A lousy vote."

"The big deal," Nels said, "is, you looked at my boat lately? I'll shoot the next one. You tell your netter buddies that, Doc. I swear to God I will.

When you're up there on Sulphur Wells, trying to make 'em feel better 'cause that sonuvabitch burned up, you tell 'em."

I was getting a little impatient myself. "You think I approve of them blowing up boats because of the way I voted? That's stupid. You can take that any way you want to take it, Nels. Like you said—I thought we were friends."

"Well. . . it's something we're gonna have to think about. Yes it is. This is serious shit and we need to know who stands where."

I started the engine and pushed away from the dock. Tomlinson was over by the canoe ramp talking with Mack. When he saw me, he strolled out. I pressed bow-up to the pier so he could step aboard, then backed into deeper water.

"Just like you wanted," he said, "I got the information. Gumbo Limbo, that's where Jimmy Darroux lived." He held up a six-pack of Coors Light. "Brought the entertainment, too."

I didn't say anything; wanted to get away from the marina first. When we were out of the harbor, I let it go: "You damn dumb old hippie! Why'd you tell the guides we're going to Sulphur Wells?"

"Hey," he said. "I'm not that old. What's this 'old' business?"

"It didn't cross your mind they might be just a little upset about their boats?"

"For sure. Exactly what I intended, too. Those fellas—I love 'em, don't get me wrong—but those fellas, they're way too hung up on material possessions, man. Man gets killed, all they can think about is their boats."

"Yeah, and making their mortgage payments and feeding their kids. Jesus, Tomlinson!"

He was making a calming motion with his hands. "Don't freak out on me here, Doc. You'll ruin the whole ambience of the trip. Although . . . although ... at least you're showing some emotion. A growing experience—that's good. Any kind of emotion—for you, that's real good."

"A growing experience, my ass! Like you're doing me a favor? Let me tell you something, Tomlinson—I may have lost a couple of friends tonight. And I disappointed a lady who doesn't appear to need any more disappointment. All because of you."

He was suddenly interested. "A lady, huh? No shit. Pretty? Who's the lady?"

I told him. Watched him fold his hands and nod sagely. "Yes, Janet has had some trouble. Heavy domestic stuff. . . but I can't go into it. We've had some long talks."

I found that irritating—was there anyone who didn't pour out their soul to the guy? But I didn't want to hear anymore of his Ping-Pong talk. I stood at the wheel and pressed the throttle forward. Felt the wind-roar torque, felt the trim of the skiff settle low and fast over the water as I steered us out past Woodring Point, then west toward the Mail Boat Channel, running backcountry as far off the Intercoastal as I could get. The sun was low, diffused by clouds. The clouds resembled desert mountains . . . bronze-streaked, like an Arizona landscape. To my right, far across the water, was St. James City. To the left, Sanibel was an expanding mangrove hedge above which a crown of milky light bloomed: they were playing Softball at the school field; already had the lights on even though there was an hour of daylight left.

Tomlinson went forward and began to rummage through the cold-storage locker. "Want a beer?" he yelled.

He'd forgotten that I no longer drank beer during the week. Popping three or four Coors prior to bedtime had gotten to be a habit, and habits have a way of ultimately dominating the host. So I now drank only on Fridays and Saturdays. Today was Thursday.

"Nope," I said.

Ten minutes later, when Captiva Pass was a small breach of silver in the charcoal void, he was pawing through the ice again. Looked up at me to say, "You ready for another one?"

Chapter 3

Sulphur Wells was a back bay island named for the artesian springs that Spanish fishermen found when they settled there in the 1700s. The island was isolated by shallow water and a haze of mosquitoes that bred in the mangrove fringe. Because Sulphur Wells had no beaches, it had yet to be divvied up, reconstituted, and sodded by resort conglomerates and international investment groups. But the island's day would come. Florida developers were running out of beachfront property, so the back bay islands were the next logical target of the concrete stalwart. Now, though, the economy of Sulphur Wells—what there was of it—was still based on agriculture, commercial fishing, and blue-collar winter residents who didn't have the money for big-ticket properties over on Gasparilla Island or Manasota Key.

In this way, Sulphur Wells was a Florida anachronism. The people grew peppers and pineapples and mangoes; they wholesaled mullet and blue crabs caught from boats that they had built up from wooden stringers and glassed themselves. There were a couple of stores, but no mall, no 7-Elevens, no car lots. The Florida of Disney World and Holiday Inn, the slick destination of interstates and jetports, was far away, over on the mainland, across the steel swing bridge that joined Sulphur Wells with the current decade; a decade which, inevitably, presaged the island's own future.

I ran up the eastern rim of Pine Island Sound toward Charlotte Harbor, hugging the mangrove banks. I had visited the island a few times by truck on recent buying trips. Still had a few friends who lived there; guys I'd known back in high school. But it had been years since I had boated to the small settlement where Darroux was said to have lived, Gumbo Limbo.

Which meant that I wasn't familiar with the submerged creeks and gutters that constitute channels on the flats. The water was seldom more than a couple of feet deep and, worse, the weak light made the bottom tough to read. The tide was up but falling, so I held to the wind-roiled water; avoided the slick streaks that can be created by the surface tension of protruding sea grass or oysters. Had the engine jacked high, Tomlinson on the bow, running sheer.

Sulphur Wells lay to the east, a long ridge of mangroves and casuarinas. Occasionally, the mangroves would thin to reveal the docks of a fish camp or a cluster of mobile homes. The trailers were set up on blocks, like derelict cars, their aluminum shells faded a chalky white or pink. As we flew past, a man looked up from a fish-cleaning table and stared. A woman gathering wash gave us a friendly wave. Both were quickly absorbed by the marl shore and crowding mangroves. Just east of a mangrove thicket called Part Island, we raised Gumbo Limbo: a curvature of land that extended into the water, its perimeter fringed by a strand of coconut palms. Now, at afterglow, the trunks of the palms were yellow, the canopies black, their heavy fronds interlaced like macaw feathers. A dozen or so wooden houses were elevated on shell mounds beyond. I could see the glow of their windows through the bare limbs of gumbo-limbo trees. Some of the windows were still trimmed with Christmas lights. Houses and palms appeared buoyant on the small raft of land, supported by the mass of water, but adrift, as if the freshening wind could blow the village out to sea.

"I don't suppose you know which house was Darroux s?"

Tomlinson was standing beside me at the console, staring. Probably tuning in the vibrations, expecting karma to point to the place. "Don't know," he said. "One of them." He shrugged. "There aren't many."

"Then we'll have to use the commercial docks. I don't want to beach it. The tide's going, we're losing our water."

"Those hills, the shell mounds. Reminds me of Mango." He was talking about a place where an uncle of mine, Tucker Gatrell, lived. "Old Florida, man, with those Indian mounds. They still do farming—smell the cow manure?"

"I smell it. Open that bow hatch and get the lines ready."

The channel into Gumbo Limbo was lined by a bank of limestone— that much I remembered. Miss the cut and you could kill your boat—

maybe even kill yourself—on the rocks. So I used the good water to run in close to shore, then dropped down off plain when I picked up the first wooden stakes that served as markers. The markers led us into a dredged canal, at the mouth of which was a warehouse on pilings. The docks were lined with simple plywood boats that were brush-painted blue or white. Men in jeans and white rubber boots moved around beneath the lights. Someone's radio was blaring. The whine of twangy, achy-breaky music was louder than my outboard. There were commercial scales and a cable hoist mounted on the loading platform. A sign above the warehouse read: Sulphur Wells Fish Company.

As we idled down the channel, men on the dock stopped what they were doing. Put down the crates they were carrying and watched us. Tomlinson smiled, waved—got blank stares in return. Still looking at the workers, he spoke to me out of the corner of his mouth: "These fellas don't seem too friendly. Kind of standoffish."

"That's one way to put it. Standoffish."

"The way they're staring at me."

"I noticed."

"Hey . . . I'm not still wearing that damn sarong, am I?" He had his chin on his chest, inspecting himself.

"Nope."

"That woulda explained it. A sarong would get some funny looks around here. Not as sophisticated like Sanibel."

"What you look like is a soap opera doctor in those scrubs."

"There's a possibility. Maybe they think I'm on TV."

Was he serious? "No, what they're thinking is, we're crazy. Come here in a flats boat at night, enemy territory. And they're right. The smart thing to do would be turn around and head back to Dinkin's Bay. You want to talk to Hannah? Track her down over the phone."

"Let's at least ask somebody first, okay? They probably don't get many visitors. Like country people, not used to dealing with strangers."

We had come to the end of the canal, and I swung into an open area of the dock. "Yeah," I said, "probably just shy," as a couple of men who had been trailing us along the dock caught up.

As the men approached, I called, "You mind if we tie up here for a while?"

They waited until they were above us: both of them tall, one maybe six three, bony-looking. Probably in their mid-twenties, jeans and T-shirts with long arms hanging out, showing their biceps. The taller one was the talker. Had a couple of generations of Georgia piney woods in his voice, and proud of it. He answered, "Tie up? Sure, you boys can tie up. Tie up just long as you like." Which came out: "Show-er, yew boys kin tah up,"; the dialect exaggerated, and with a mock friendliness that Tomlinson took at face value.

"Thanks, man." Tomlinson had the bow line in his hand, already reaching for the galvanized cleat. Then, as he reached up over the dock and took a wrap, the talker—he was wearing a bandanna on his head knotted pirate style—moved with an amused, catlike laziness and used his rubber boot to pin Tomlinson's wrist between the deck and the cleat.

"Uh-h-h—whoops-a-daisy—you're stepping on my hand, man."

"Huh?"

"My hand. You've got your foot on my hand."

The talker turned and looked at his partner blankly. "What the hell this boy talkin' about? He got an imagination in his brain, don't he?"

The partner was laughing—big joke. "That's what he got. 'Bout the only thing, Julie."

I thought: Julie?

Tomlinson gave a yank, trying to get free. "Seriously, man . . . really! You're like cutting off the circulation."

"Naw-w-w. Me?"

"See—there's your boot. That thing under it? My hand. Look for yourself."

Julie lifted his right boot, putting the full weight of his left on Tomlinson's wrist. He peered at the space beneath his right boot, said, "You must be invisible 'cause I don't see a damn thing."

If Tomlinson hadn't already taken a solid wrap around the cleat, I would have backed away. Let Julie decide if he wanted to be pulled into the canal, then pop my skiff up on plane and wash all those net boats into the pilings to thank Sulphur Wells Fish Company for its hospitality. But I couldn't go anywhere because we were already secured to the dock.

When I switched the engine off, the blaring radio became the dominant noise: Redfish ain't ro-o-o-ses to my baby—lyrics that were strangely familiar, but I didn't take the time to try and remember why. I stood there a moment, not saying anything, letting my inactivity draw their attention. When they were both looking at me, I said, "The smart thing to do would be get your foot off him."

"Hoo-wee, a tough boy! You don't mind, I'll stand where I damn well please."

"Just a suggestion."

"You take your suggestions and leave. That's my advice."

"Move your foot, we will."

"You have a mind to do somethin' about it?"

I was shaking my head. "Walk clear up his arm for all I care, I'm not going to help him. Take a look at those clothes he's wearing. Those are hospital clothes. You know why? Because he's sick. The guy's a leper."

Julie made a face, saying, "Huh?" then lifted his foot just as Tomlinson gave a tremendous pull. . . and backpedaled across the bow . . . teetered for a moment, almost caught himself, then sprawled into the water.

I leaned away from the splash, aware that other men were now coming along the dock toward us, hurrying.

"He ain't sick. You serious?" Julie was thinking maybe he'd been duped, but didn't want to show it. I ignored him, waiting for Tomlinson to scull to the surface. Held out a hand to help him vault back aboard as the partner said, "He ain't no leopard, what a bunch'a shit. It ain't a disease anyway. I seen pictures'a leopards."

Heard Julie say, "Mr. smartmouth fuckin' with us. Got his girlfriend all wet!" Laughing, as if that had been his plan all along.

To Tomlinson, I said, "You okay?"

He was wringing out his hair. "Water's kind of refreshing. Cold but nice."

"One of these days, you'll learn to listen to me. See that mob coming?"

He didn't; he was looking at Julie. Wiped water from his eyes and yelled, "Violence covereth the mouth of the wicked, and the name of the wicked shall rot! You hurt my hand on purpose!" As an aside to me, Tomlinson said, "That's from Proverbs, man. When you're pissed off, the Pali just doesn't have the juice."

I was shaking my head. "Just close your mouth and do what I tell you to do. You start the engine while I try to get the bow line. When I tell you, gun it. Run us straight into the bay." I stopped to place my glasses on the console . . . and the world became a blurry place of bright coronas and moving shapes. Then I stepped up onto the casting deck to confront Julie.

I am not an eager let's-prove-something-here fighter. I'd much prefer to talk it out. Or leave. Or even run. Which is probably why I have been in so few street fights. But when there are no options, when it is fight back or else, I do not double the fists and start swinging—except, long ago, when they placed us in a training ring with leather gloves and substantial chunks of Everlast headgear strapped around our ears. But no bare-knuckled boxing. Ever. By the time I was nineteen, I'd seen enough fistfights to know that no one ever wins; one man just loses more painfully than the other. I also knew that the clean, bare-knuckled choreography that constitutes fighting in books and movies has no more basis in reality than film's absurd lionization of the martial arts. A fistfight—or any fight—is ugly, bloody, and brutal; a quick descent to the primate roots. It is proof that, in the deepest wells of our own brains, Neanderthal man still lives. There is always a lot of grunting and growling. A lot of scrambling and panicked scratching amid the sweat and adrenal stink. And a fight always, always ends up on the ground. Which is why an average college wrestler could humiliate any one of Hollywood's kung fu movie stars—or a good professional boxer—were he so inclined.

As our instructor told us in that long-gone boxing ring, "We're teaching you this because, someday, you might have to fight a man that you're not authorized to kill."

Which, if nothing else, demonstrated that some of our instructors had a flair for exaggeration.

I didn't want to fightjulie, and I certainly wasn't going to climb up on the dock and try to slug it out. All I wanted was to get my bow line and the opportunity to run back to Dinkin's Bay. . . tail between my legs, if need be.

Behind Julie and friend, I could hear men asking, "What's going on? These guys giving you trouble?" Heard Julie say, "Couple smartass sport-fishermen. One just went for a swim."

He had an audience now, plus backup, so I didn't have much doubt about what he'd try to do. As I reached for the cleat, he lifted his left boot to stomp me—which I anticipated. I jumped to reach him, grabbed his right heel and pulled. Julie seemed to hang suspended in midair for a moment, then crashed spine-first onto the dock, both legs hanging over. I locked his knees under my arms and let my body weight—about 220 pounds—snatch him crotch-first into the cleat. A cleat is a mooring device with pronounced metal horns at each end, and both of those horns disappeared into Julie. He made a falsetto cry of shock, tried to sit up when I applied more pressure, then settled back, hollering for help.

To Julie's partner, I yelled, "Know what a wishbone is? Take one step toward this boat, your buddy better make a wish." I turned to Tomlinson. "Start the engine."

"You boys just hold 'er right there! You ain't goin' noplace!" A small man had pushed his way through the ring of fishermen, something in his hand. Without my glasses, I couldn't tell what. "Let go'a that man's legs or you'll wish you had. Don't be reaching for that line, neither!"

Tomlinson said very softly, "He's got a gun."

I released Julie and told Tomlinson, "Kill the engine."

I had my glasses on, trying my best to be conciliatory. The man's name was Futch, Arlis Futch—he told us that—and he was the founder, sole owner, operator, and the only one who much mattered around the docks of Sulphur Wells Fish Company. He told us that, too.

Judging from the way the fishermen deferred to him, I didn't doubt it.

"You boys get back to work. This ain't no dance. I need any help, you'll hear shots. By then I won't need no more help." He didn't laugh when he said it.

Futch had a body type that I had come to associate with the male descendants of Gulf Coast settlers: narrow shoulders, blunt fingers, bandy legs, but with hands and forearms large out of proportion, and trapezius muscles so pronounced that his head seemed to sit atop a pyramid. Also, he had the characteristic myopia. His eyes, magnified by thick glasses, were owl-sized.

"You hurt bad or just making noise?"

Julie had his arm over his partner's shoulder, sucking in air. "The sonuvabitch 'bout crippled me."

"He draw blood?"

"I'd rather bleed than have my nuts squished out my nose. That cleat liked to ruin me."

"Well, don't be feelin' your thingumabob around me, goddamn it! You want to inspect your personals, find a bush. Now somebody tell me what happened."

Julie still had enough wind to talk. "What happened was, these here two come in high and mighty thinkin' they could tie up. When I told 'em it was private they got smartmouthy, kind'a pushy. He tripped me, the big one, and I fell wrong or they wouldn't be here botherin' you now."

"That's how it happened, huh?"

"Ask J.D. Ain't that how it happened?"

J.D.: Julie's partner had a name.

Arlis Futch looked down at me, asked, "That the whole story?"

I said, "Not much that I recognize," but didn't offer any more.

"You gonna believe him? Shit." Julie was up pacing around now, kept glancing over, eager to take another shot at me, I could tell. "I was just tryin' to help, Mr. Futch. They come in here acting like big shots, what you want me to do?"

Futch had the shotgun tucked in the crook of his arm. Now he levered it open, looked as if to make sure it was loaded. "What I-want you to do is mind your own affairs. Someone wants a slip, they ask me, not you. That's just about exactly the way she goes round here."

"I didn't know you wanted flats boat business."

"Don't use that tone to me. What I want ain't none of your concern. You ain't from around here and you ain't no kin—"

"We been sellin' you fish for the last month, that's all—"

"And I paid you cash for 'em. Don't owe you diddly-squat. Don't even know your damn names and I don't want to know 'em. What I do know is, you and some of the others camped up the shore drink way too much whiskey, smoke your damn dope, and you're tryin' to get my local boys mixed up in matters they're damn near desperate enough to try. Somethin' else I know is, you're trouble. Just plain dog-mean trouble." Futch snapped the shotgun closed, but kept it pointed at the dock. I noticed just the wryest hint of a smile as he added, "So what you boys gonna do is jump in your skiff and disappear. Want to take a minute, hunt around the dock for any small things you lost, your thingumabob, whatever, that's fine. But don't come back."

"You sayin' you ain't buyin' no more fish from us?"

"You find someone else to haul it in, that's your business. Just don't let me catch the two of you on my property."

J.D., it turned out, was a talker too. He took turns with Julie hollering at Arlis Futch. They made obscene and impossible suggestions; they offered vague threats. Each was prefaced by "old man." Futch ignored them until he'd heard enough; then he looked at his watch before saying softly, "You boys want me to tell you when your time's up? Or should I jes' surprise you?"

Which sent the two of them walking toward their boat. When they were under way and out of the canal, Futch turned his attention to us. Because of the way he'd treated J.D. and Julie, I expected him to assume that we were the wronged parties and behave cordially. He didn't. He popped open the shotgun and shoved the shells into his pocket, saying, "What you waiting on? Get out. I don't want you around here neither."

Tomlinson said, "We need a spot to tie up," and told him who we were looking for and why.

Futch worked at appearing indifferent—he yawned a couple of times—but I could tell the story touched a chord. When Tomlinson had finished, he asked, "You was there when Jimmy Darroux burnt up? Maybe you're just sayin' that 'cause you're a cop or somethin.' "

Tomlinson said, "Do I look like a cop to you?"

"You look like just one more damn Yankee tourist to me."

"I was with him at the hospital. When he died. That's why we're looking for Hannah."

"Hannah, huh? Tell me somethin'—did he suffer real bad. At the end, I mean. Jimmy?"

"It didn't last long. If you were a friend of his, you can take comfort from that."

"I don't need no comfort, not from you I don't. Common sense gives me all the comfort I need." Judging from Futch's tone, his expression, I got the impression that he hoped Darroux had suffered, and was irritated that Tomlinson didn't offer more details.

"Jimmy Darroux made a request of me on his deathbed," Tomlinson said. "I'm determined to honor it."

Futch thought for a moment, stared along the dock where the commercial fishermen had returned to work but were still keeping an eye on us. "You looking for Hannah," he said finally, "that would be Jimmy's wife, Hannah Smith." In reply to my sharp look, Futch added, "I won't call her by her married name. She was always Hannah Smith to me, still is to this day."

"Do you know where we can find her? If she doesn't want to talk, considering what she's been through—-"

"Hannah ain't no prissy, mopey kind'a woman. She doesn't want to talk, she'll tell you plain enough. I ain't the one to make her decisions for her. She lives down the road a couple hundred yards, the yellow cabin up on the Indian mound." Futch pointed vaguely. "The cops've already talked to her, so if you're here to ask more questions she'll figure that out quick enough, too."

"So it's okay to tie up?"

"Didn't say that."

"We . . . can pay you."

"Don't want your money. You boys just ain't clear about the way things stand, are you? You own this here boat?" He was talking to me. I nodded. "Let me explain the way it is. You paid more for this fancy boat then some a these men make in a year. Boat with a fancy platform over the motor so you can stand up there, dressed real nice, and look for fish when you got the time. Well, mister-man, those used to be our fish. Used to be our bay until the rich sports got their lawyers together and found a way to push us out.

"Time was I'd see only one or two of these here boats in a month. Helped 'em out many a time, too, tellin' where I saw the tar-pawn schoolin' or when the tripletail was around the traps. Tarpon and tripletail weren't nothin' to me, and it was the neighborly thing to do, I figured. Now'days, though, there're hundreds, hell, thousands'a these boats ever' where you look. Can't hardly strike a mess'a mullet without one'a these here flats boaters blastin' through givin' us their dirty looks." Futch hacked, spat, hacked, and spat again. "What you think it does to our boys, see a boat like yours? They got the whole world comin' down on their heads, sick kids, payments to make, banks yammering for their money and not a cent comin' in after the nets is banned in July. A lot of 'em didn't even finish high school, figuring they could always make a livin' fishin'. Now what they gonna do? You sports in the fancy boats got it all. You sports in the fancy boats took it all. Now you come in here lah-de-dah-de-dah askin' to tie up?" Futch had his face squinched into a thoughtful frown. "I reckon I jes' couldn't be responsible, you tie your boat here. One of the boys might mistake her for a two-holer and poot his mess on the deck. Or maybe worse. Lines might break and it'd drift off and catch fire, nobody's fault. My advice to you fellas is get the hell out an' don't come back. Hannah wants to talk to you, that's her business. But my docks ain't got no room for a boat like yours."

Chapter 4

Tomlinson seemed surprised when I beached my skiff in the mangroves south of the fish house so that we could look for Hannah Smith Darroux on foot. He'd been scolding me for skewering Julie on the cleat— "Violence is like a boomerang. It always comes back at you"—but he paused when I swung toward shore, favoring me with his you're -growing-as-a-human-being, expression—a look, happily, that I seldom receive. But I didn't beach my boat out of sympathy or to please Tomlinson. The way Arlis Futch had behaved interested me . . . interested and angered me both. I admired the fact that he empathized with the younger men, and he had summed up the inequities of the net ban accurately. Yet he also seemed to take perverse pleasure in being defiant and intractable. That kind of belligerence enjoys a mythos to which every region lays claim: the flinty Yankee, the bow-necked mid-westerner, the resolute cowboy. It is a character standard from folklore in which "good old common sense" is an essential bedrock ingredient. But too often, "common sense" is the safe harbor of ignorance and an excuse for intellectual laziness. They don't need the facts because they already know the truth—their common sense has spared them the effort of investigation or thought. It was precisely that attitude which too many cottage industry netters brought to the fishery, and, in doing so, they helped destroy their own way of life. Arlis Futch was an intelligent man. Stupid people don't build successful businesses or earn the respect of their peers. So why would he cloak himself in stupid indifference?

But that's not the only reason I swung into shore. The way Futch had reacted to Tomlinson's story piqued my interest. He had asked about Jimmy Darroux hoping to hear that the man had suffered. I was sure of that. It was in Futch's tone, his eyes. He hadn't approved of Darroux as a husband for Hannah Smith—a woman he spoke of with a degree of respect he certainly didn't show the men who worked around the docks. Tomlinson says my best quality and my worst quality are the same: an orderly mind. I think he's half right. Tomlinson is mystical, I am methodical. He believes in the Great Enigma, I do not. The behavior of any organism should be understandable once external influences are deciphered. When an otherwise predictable animal behaves oddly on the tidal flats—or on the docks—a little alarm goes off in my head. The inexplicable attracts me because there is nothing that cannot be explained. When the explanation is not readily apparent, I become compulsive about isolating the external influences. It attracts me in the same way that jigsaw puzzles and chess draw in similar types of people. Assemble enough pieces, make the right moves, and the reward is clarity.

The alarm had gone off when Arlis Futch asked about Jimmy Darroux, and when he spoke of the wife. Not a loud alarm, just a gentle chime of suspicion. But that, connected to the experience of holding a charred body in my arms, was enough. I wanted to meet Hannah Smith Darroux. I wanted to see for myself why Futch held her in such high regard.

I idled in close to shore, looking up at the lights ofhouses built on Indian shell mounds. When I judged we had gone a couple hundred yards, I tilted the engine and poled us toward a patch of mangroves. I didn't want to leave my skiff unattended in the open. There was no moon, but the night sky was star-bright, and Julie andJ.D. were out there cruising. I stern-anchored so that we could haul the boat off when we got back; then we waded through muck and oysters to the road that ribboned between the houses and the bay.

Tomlinson stood in the middle of the road, fingering a braid of his hair. There was no traffic. It was quiet but for crickets and the whine of mosquitoes. "I have a feeling it's that one. I don't know why, man, I just do." He was pointing to an old cottage with an open board porch. The porch light showed peeling, colorless paint. "I'll walk up and ask."

"No," I said, "we stay together. We'll start with the first house. If they don't know where Hannah Darroux lives, someone at the next house will."

But the elderly man in the first house knew. Turned out that Tomlinson had guessed correctly.

Hannah Smith Darroux was not the sun-wizened fishwife that I imagined she would be. She was like nothing I could have imagined—my imagination is not that fanciful. When Tomlinson knocked at the screen door, the floor of the porch on which we were standing began to vibrate with the weight of approaching fdotsteps; a steady, authoritative thud. I expected a man to answer. Instead, the door swung open and a woman confronted us, asking, "Help you?"

Tomlinson didn't speak for a moment, and then he said, "Huh?" as if he'd been dozing.

The woman said, "Huh what? Do I know you men?"

"We're . . . looking for Hannah Darroux."

"Pretty close, but what you found is Hannah Smith. What's your business?"

Tomlinson cleared his throat; he seemed to be having trouble speaking, but he was probably reacting to a kind of sensory overload. He had been as unprepared as I for the woman who stood in the doorway. Hannah Smith Darroux was well over six feet tall—probably six two, six three. Balanced on long crane legs, she had a busty, countrified body: big hands, shoulders, and bony bare feet. I guessed she would weigh 155, maybe 160. She wore jeans and a blue denim work shirt with the tail knotted and bloused loosely above skinny adolescent hips. I guessed her to be in her mid-twenties, maybe a shade older. Her hair was Navajo-black, the whole heavy gloss of it combed over onto her right shoulder as if she didn't want to be bothered with it. She wore no makeup, no jewelry of any kind—not even a wedding ring. The result was a kind of unconscious stylishness. She had wide, full lips, deep sun lines at the corners of her brows, good cheekbones, a squarish quarterback's jaw, and dark perceptive eyes that looked from Tomlinson to me, then back to Tomlinson, taking us in, assessing us, then dismissing us as unimportant. I saw no telltale redness in those eyes. The widow Darroux hadn't done much crying.

"I know this hasn't been the best of days, Mrs. Smith, but I'd like to speak with you. For just a few minutes."

"If I had a few minutes, I'd throw you in my dryer and close the door. You're drippin' all over my porch."

"Oh . . . well, see, I had a little. . . encounter down at the fish house—" Tomlinson was backing down the steps, trying to wring more water from his shirt.

"Arlis Futch throw you in, or just have one of his boys do it?"

"Actually, I sort of fell—"

"Men that fall off docks ought to live in the mountains. If you're sellin' something, I suggest you try Denver. Wet the porches there."

"Seriously, I'm not selling anything, Mrs. Smith—"

"I should say you're not. Question is, why are you bothering me?"

Tomlinson opened his mouth as if to speak, then stopped to collect himself. By continually anticipating what he was going to say, then interrupting to reply to it, the woman was not only keeping Tomlinson off balance, she also was establishing a weird dominance that had even me wishing he would finally say something that would interest her.

After a second or two, he chose the direct approach. "I'm here because your late husband asked me to come. My friend pulled him out of the water this morning; I was at the hospital with him when he died. My name's Tomlinson, his name's Ford."

Which threw her off her rhythm. Caused her to narrow her focus, partly out of suspicion, I sensed. "Jimmy told you to come here?"

"Sit down, I'll tell you everything."

"Before he died, right? Not something crazy, like talking from the hereafter? You seem that kind to me."

"I am! You've got a good eye for people, Mrs. Smith. You want to give transsphere communications a try, we can discuss the possibilities later. For now, though, the only thing he ever said to me was while he was still alive. His last words."

"But the cops told me, this Lieutenant somebody, that Jimmy never regained consciousness. Now you're saying he spoke to you?"

"The police haven't interviewed me yet. I'll tell them, but I'd rather tell you first."

"I see." She pressed a long index finger to her lower lip, a reflective pose. "You could be cops just tryin' to trick me into something. The county cops or the A.T.F.—they already took up half my day. And me with mortuary arrangements, a million things to do. You try to trick me, I reckon my attorney would have to nail you to the wall. Or you could be reporters, same thing. They were nosing around here earlier."

I found it impressive that she differentiated between the sheriff's department and the federal Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms officers.

Tomlinson said, "We're not cops and we're not reporters. Civilians, that's us. Just concerned human beings. I'm telling you the truth."

"Jimmy told you something before he died."

"He spoke to me. Yes."

"What about your friend?" She turned and gave me her full attention for the first time. For a moment, just a moment, I thought I saw her react: a mild flash of recognition, as if she had seen me before, so was scanning the memory files, searching for confirmation.

I said, "A few words. Not much."

She was still staring at me, pondering, when from inside the house came a man's voice: "Anything wrong, Hannah?" Looking through the doorway, I could see a man walking toward us through what appeared to be a sparsely furnished living room. He wore a desert-gray safari-style shirt and matching shorts; a big man in his mid-thirties who took his appearance seriously; the contemporary backpacker and kayaker look— which seemed out of place on Sulphur Wells. He wasn't quite as tall as Hannah, but he had the tight muscularity that I associate with collegiate sports—soccer, lacrosse, tennis, that sort of thing. He had to poke his head over the woman's shoulder to speak to us. "Can we help you fellows?"

"They're here to talk to me, Raymond, not you. You stop by tomorrow, we'll finish our business. 'Bout four or five, before I go to work."

"Do you know these men?"

She gave him a warning look. "Tomorrow, Raymond."

Raymond reached around and placed his hand on the woman's arm, a territorial gesture. "Hannah's had a terrible shock today, fellas, so I think it would be best if—"

That quick, the woman had Raymond by the elbow and was hustling him past us down the steps, off the porch, and into the shell driveway where some kind of utility vehicle sat in the shadows, a Ford Explorer maybe. Heard her say, "Damn it, Raymond, if I want a guardian I'll have you fill out an application. Not that you'd be high on the list. You want to talk business, come tomorrow. You don't, that's fine too."

Raymond mumbled something, mumbled something else, then started his car.

Striding back to the porch, Hannah said to Tomlinson, "You get those clothes off. Yeah—right where you stand. Nobody comes down that road much, but I'll turn off the porch light if you're modest. You"—she was speaking to me—"take your muddy shoes off and get inside out of the mosquitoes while I find your friend a towel and some of Jimmy's dry things. . . ." She was still staring at me. "What did you say your name was?"

I told her . . . and watched her expression soften slightly. "I know who you are; I've seen you. At the Conservation Board meeting at Tallahassee. You were 'bout the only one that had anything good to say about us commercial people."

Which wasn't true, but Hannah Smith had the politician's knack of making people eager to please.

I said, "I told them what I believed, that's all."

"But you had a good way about you. You talked soft. All those facts and numbers—but not too many. People listened. When you got done, -I thought maybe, just maybe, we had a chance."

"I'm surprised I didn't notice you."

"Oh, I was in an' out of the room, carryin' papers, makin' sure our men were where they were supposed to be. Tryin' to organize fishermen is like trying to organize a bunch of snakes. I had my hands full. I was there— one of the green hats. I just blended in."

"No, I think I would have remembered."

Which earned me a quick smile . . . and then she was done with me, her attention back on Tomlinson. "Hurry up now! I don't care a thing about seeing your skinny little butt. Hand me your wet stuff." She grabbed the ball of clothes out of Tomlinson's hands. Tomlinson, naked, gave me a wan look, shrugged, then followed her into the house. Heard her say, "Well, you got hair like a woman, but that's 'bout as far as she goes. Towel off in the bathroom. Jimmy's stuff may be a little big around the shoulders, but it'll do. Might as well just keep it. Lord knows, Jimmy, he won't need it no more."

"Raymond Tullock is like most men. His balls tell him he should be in charge, but his brain's just not big enough to steer the load. You want ice tea? I had some Co-Colas but I handed them out to the cops."

I was sitting in the small living room on a rattan couch waiting for Tomlinson to come out of the bathroom. He was showering. The water had just started. Hannah was puttering around in the kitchen. She had the clothes dryer thumping on the back porch; something was simmering on the stove: smelled like black beans, a cumin and bay leaf smell.

"Raymond used to work for the marine extension agency, a government job. Worked with the oystermen, the netters, tellin' us how we could do our business better. A liaison—you know what I mean?"

I said, "Sure."

"Now we've got a woman. She was down here . . . Tuesday? No, Monday. Brought another woman with her to tell us how to make low-cost meals, where to go for food stamps. Getting us ready for welfare handouts because of the net ban. Had a meeting at the Community Center, all these island women sitting around in their print dresses. What they did was treat us like a bunch of snot-nosed kids who'd starve if they weren't there to show us how things're done. Know what the government woman said? Wendy something. Wendy graduated Duke, knows everything there is to know. Wendy says, 'I strongly recommend you try to limit fats in your families' diets. Too expensive and bad for the heart.' She says, 'Seafood is a good low-cost substitute, the cheaper grades of fish.' "

Hannah poked her head out from the kitchen to see how I'd reacted to the punch line. "Get it? This bossy college woman, teeth like ice, tellin' us to eat fish now that we can't net them. Jesus! She says, 'I recommencl broiled fish as opposed to frying. Peanut oil is so expensive.' That's exactly what she said. I grew up cookin' for my daddy and brothers up in the Panhandle, Cedar Key, down here. Knowin' how to cook. But there's Wendy, an easy government job and all the gall in the world, telling us about fish."

I said, "I can see why you find that offensive."

"Damn right we were offended. After the meeting, this little old lady,

Miz Hamilton—she's some relation of mine, way, way back; little bitty thing—Miz Hamilton totters up to Wendy, and she says, 'Missy, if the gov'ment paid you a dollah to come heah' "—Hannah had thickened her own accent, making it sound real—" 'the gov'ment paid you a dollah too much. I think them micra-waves done boiled your brain!' "

I sat there listening, smiling. The woman seemed to be on a talking jag, and I wondered if it was because she was trying to avoid the subject of her husband's death. Denial is the first stage of mourning. So far, the talking jag was the only slim sign of bereavement that Hannah Smith had displayed.

"That's what he did up till about three years ago. Then he went into the private sector." She was back on the subject of Raymond Tullock. "I guess he got tired of the bad pay, carryin' a clipboard around. Driving those white state cars everywhere he went. You know they got to keep track of every single mile? With all the connections he had, Raymond got himself appointed to the state Fisheries Conservation Board—'bout the only one on it who talked against the net ban. And he set himself up as a kind of wholesale seafood agent. A restaurant needs softshell crab up on the Chesapeake? They call Raymond and he works it out, top price. He's the one that found our Japanese buyers for mullet roe. Some other place, too— Indianesia? He goes to those places, scouts around. So instead of Arlis Futch sellin' to the big fish wholesalers, we sell direct to the buyers from over there. A better deal for them, a lot better price for us, and Raymond takes his piece off the top. Does it all over the phone and fax, doesn't even own a boat. Pretty smart, huh? For a man like Raymond."

She appeared long enough to hand me a mason jar of iced tea, wedge of lime, then carried a second glass into the bathroom. Heard her say, "Don't be leaving hair in the tub, neither!" Heard Tomlinson make some enthusiastic reply; couldn't understand the words.

The tea was made with local water. Had a heavy, sulfuric musk to it that she had tried to cover by making it very sweet and strong. Tasted as if she had mixed in some New Age herb for spice. Boil any dried leaf, they call it tea.

It was different, but good. So I sat there with tea, feeling the house shake beneath me. Whenever Hannah walked—whenever anyone walked—the whole house vibrated. It was one of those old Florida cottages built of heart pine on foot-high shell-mortar blocks, raw shell beneath. The living room had a varnished oak floor and a brick fireplace. On the mantel were arrangements of dried flowers in wicker baskets, a feminine touch. There were also four or five small glass spheres, dark green in color. The spheres were smaller than a tennis ball; reminded me of old glass net floats. Hanging from the ceiling were mobiles made of seashells, and on the walls, a couple of strange paintings: dark backgrounds with fluorescent loops and whirls. The furnishings were inexpensive, simple. Wood frames and bright cushions, beanbag chairs, a rocker, a Lay-Z-Boy, and a Sony television mounted on an orange crate in the corner. A small foyer with jalousie windows faced the bay. There was a breakfast table there covered with baskets of food, cakes, a roast chicken. The kind of gifts that country people bring when there has been a death in the family.

I tried to picture the charred creature I had held in my arms sitting at that table, eating a meal, sipping coffee after a hard night on the water. Tried to picture him walking to the refrigerator for a beer, plopping down on the couch to watch a ball game . . . pictured him taking Hannah into the bedroom.

But the imagery didn't work because the props wouldn't fall into place. There was no man-spore around the house. No heavy boots on the stoop, no tangle of clothes in the corner, no sports page folded beside the Lay-Z-Boy, no tools scattered around the porch. It had been only, what? sixteen hours since Jimmy Darroux had come tumbling out of the flames. My eyes drifted up to the mantel: no wedding picture. Married couples who are childless (I saw no sign of children in the house) usually keep a wedding picture prominently displayed—a gesture I have always found touching. It is as if they are reminding themselves that they are, indeed, a family.

"Sounds like your friend's enjoying his shower. But he surefire can't sing worth a flip. What's his name again?" She was still in the kitchen, but didn't have to talk loud to be heard, The place was so small.

"Tomlinson," I said.

"He always so happy?"

"Always." Why tell her that Tomlinson also had a dark side? Twice since I had known him, he'd descended into a depression so emphatic that he did not eat; would barely speak.

She said, "He's kind'a different. No offense."

"None taken."

"I didn't mean it bad, because I like people who are different. I really do. The poet types, people who paint. That sort. See, because I'm kind of like that myself. Different. Since I was a little girl, always sort of, you know—weird. Even my daddy said so. I think I scared him."

Because I could think of no other reply, I said, "You seem normal enough to me."

She poked her head out of the kitchen just long enough to smile and say, "That's because you don't know me very well yet," then vanished again, still talking. "Part of it's I'm a Gemini born on the cusp. But with Leo rising. Like two people in one body, both of us bossy." Her chuckle was a series of soft bell tones. "Women aren't supposed to speak their minds, do whatever they please. Know why? Because it reminds men how much spunk they lack. Scares 'em, makes them feel sheepish. What about you, your sign?"

I wasn't even sure I knew. When I took a guess, she said, "Gad! We're complete opposites. You're the real logical type, everything real orderly. I bet you think astrology's a bunch of crap. Well . . . how about this? You know what a birth veil is? Mama said I was born with a veil over my face. This flap of skin or something, the placenta, I guess, connected when I came out. Like I didn't have eyes or a mouth or nothing. The midwife about fainted—that's what Mama said—because a baby born with a veil is supposed to have the power of second sight. That's what the midwife believed. She was my mama's closest friend, Miz Budd. A colored woman."

All nonsense. But I liked the sound of her voice, the vitality of it. I said, "Tomlinson's the one you should be telling. He's interested in folklore."

"There. I knew he was different. What's he do?"

"Tomlinson? He lives on a sailboat and . . . well, that's what he does. He pulls up anchor occasionally, cruises around, then comes back."

"To make a living, I mean. For money."

I'd wondered about that myself. "I think he has a small income from his family. He does research projects for organizations. Scholarly things. He's written some books—"

"Books!" She was suddenly very interested. She stood in the doorway for a moment, a wooden spoon in her hand. "What kind of books? You mean that he wrote himself?"

"Well. . . yeah. I haven't read them . . . not clear through, anyway." I'd given Tomlinson's most recent volume, Variations of the Yavapai Apache Sweat Lodge Ceremony, a determined effort, but failed.

She paused for a moment, thoughtful. "I'm writing a book myself, but don't know nothing about how to get it published. Hell, truth is, I don't know nothing about how to write it. It's about the fishermen. We're the last of about ten generations—if the bastards get their way. And about my great-grandmother and my great-aunt, too, Sarah and Hannah Smith. You ever hear of them?"

I told Hannah that I hadn't, then listened as she told me that, back in 1911, Sarah Smith had driven a two-wheeled oxcart across the Everglades—the only person to ever do it, man or woman.

"Just her alone, doin' what she wanted to do," Hannah said. "Some of the history books, they've got a picture of her. All the Crackers called her the Ox Woman. Because of what she did, and because she was so big. Made her money chopping firewood. Swing an ax like that, you've got to be stro-o-o-ng. Sarah had a sister named Hannah—my great-aunt—and she was big too. Like six two, six three. My size, so the old-timers called Hannah Big Six. Because she was more than six feet tall? Sometimes I think I'm Hannah come back. You know . . . like another life?"

I told Hannah, "When Tomlinson gets out of the shower, you two will have a lot to talk about."

I could hear a blow-dryer in the bathroom. Tomlinson was getting himself spruced up—a measure of Hannah Smith's effect on him.

"I almost telephoned you after that meeting." She was still making noises in the kitchen: the clank of a steel lid, the clatter of dishes being washed. I wondered if she expected us to stay for dinner—and why she would want us to. She said, "The meeting in Tallahassee? You impressed me, that's the truth. No fancy talking. Just the facts. The sportfishing guys, they didn't like it, neither. Didn't want to hear nothin' but their own lies."

Which wasn't true. Most sportfishermen wanted what was best for the fishery. They were willing to listen. I opened my mouth to correct her, but hesitated, allowing the opportunity to pass—and realized that I, too, was oddly eager to please her. A powerful woman.

She came into living room, wiping her hands on a towel, adding, "You didn't have an ax to grind, just told it out straight," then dropped down into a beanbag chair near the fireplace, one stork leg folded over another. "Truth is . . . that wasn't the first time I seen you." The expression on her face intermingled amusement and challenge. She waited for a reply; proof that she had my full attention.

I said, "Is that so?"

"Yep. It was maybe a year ago. I was down fishing in Dinkin's Bay, just me. 'Bout sunset, just after. Still some light but not a lot. I was pushing along the bushes looking for a mess of mullet to strike, when I see this big blond hairy man come waltzing out on the porch. Stripped his clothes off and started washing himself from the water cistern. Brushing his teeth, scrubbing all the shady spots. I banged my paddle a couple times, figuring it was the polite thing to do. Let you know you had an audience. But you never heard. Like you was a million miles away. I found out your name after that. Some people on the island knew. Then I saw you at that meeting."

I remained indifferent—but it took some effort. "I must have had a lot on my mind."

"I'm not complaining. Quite a show you gave me." Her frankness seemed an innocent conceit; a friendly affectation. She added, "The Punta Gorda Fish Company built that shack where you live. My daddy, when he was a boy, he and his daddy used to stay there sometimes. Fished for the company. That was before they moved to Cedar Key." Then she lifted her knees above the vinyl bag, pirouetted on her buttocks, and tossed the towel she had been holding into the kitchen. It landed—still folded—on the counter.

She was graceful for a big woman; had a lazy fluidity of movement that you only see in good athletes or very young children. I found myself looking at her, staring, and when I tried to look away, my eyes drifted back to her again. Hannah Smith was one of those rare women who, the longer you're around them, the more attractive they become. At first glance, she was just a tall, gawky girl with big hands and a blank, unremarkable face. Then gradually, very gradually, the unnoticed details revealed themselves and soon dominated. It wasn't that she was beautiful. It had nothing to do with beauty. It was in the cat flex of thighs when she moved, the taut, countersync jounce of breasts when she walked. Beneath the blousey shirt and jeans had to be an extraordinary body. Her skin, which initially appeared sun-blotched and salt-dried, was also a peculiar, lustrous shade of gold. I had seen beaches in California with that same sun-burnished coloring. Her hair, her nails, her muscle tone, all exuded the body gloss of a healthy young female, a prime example of her species, who was in the ripest years of her fertile life. It took a while, but Hannah projected that kind of sexuality. A ruddy, musky, robust sexuality. Projected it, at first, on a noncognizant sensory level that was very slow in alerting the conscious. Which was probably why Tomlinson was in the bathroom blow-drying his hair.

"You still listening? Or just thinking with your eyes?" Hannah was sitting there grinning at me, her stare burrowing into me, as if she knew where my mind had been, letting me know it, enjoying my discomfort.

I fought the perverse urge to say something about the man I had held in my arms that morning. . . . Then I didn't fight it anymore. "Sorry, Hannah. I guess I was thinking about the way your husband died."

The grin faded, but her eyes still held me. "Like hell you were. You weren't thinking of Jimmy no more than I was." She let that settle before adding, "And I know what I was thinking about." Then she stretched, fists together, hands over head, breasts arched high, before favoring me with a softer look, the vaguest trace of a smile. "You bite back, don't you, Ford? Go right for that soft vein in the throat."

She waited; I remained silent.

"Mind if I call you Ford? It's a simple, no-bullshit name. Seems to fit."

I stared back; wasn't surprised when she refused to look away. Said, after a long silence, "You can call me anything you want." Then the stubborn set of her jaw, the cattish expression on her face somehow struck me as funny, and I began to laugh . . . then we were both laughing. Hers was a heavy, guileless guffaw, not at all like the bell note sounds she made when amused.

Wiping at her eyes, she said, "Truce? I'll put the knife away if you will."

"Only because I'm so outclassed."

"A gentleman about it. Damn!" She sat up straighter in the beanbag chair, getting serious. "See, the thing you don't know about that bastard Jimmy is—"

"Sorry I took so long." The bathroom door swung open, emitting a steamy effluvium. Tomlinson came out wearing a red T-shirt and green denim pants that were bunched tight at his waist with a leather belt, everything very baggy but a couple of sizes too short. His blond hair was fluffed and combed smooth, like a shampoo commercial. I'd never seen his hair so carefully arranged. Even had it parted in the middle. He said, "You live on a boat, man . . . shower out of a rubber bag, you come to appreciate the finer things in life."

Hannah was using her hand as a fan. "Whew, you smell like the perfume counter at Eckerd's."

"You've got a nice selection in there. Hope you don't mind."

"See? That's Jimmy's stuff I never got around to throwing out." To Tomlinson, she said, "Set yourself down. I was about to tell Ford about Jimmy Darroux."

Tomlinson's expression described compassion. "A terrible thing. Awful. He was a good spirit."

Hannah said, "Jimmy was an asshole."

Tomlinson shrugged. "The man had his problems. That much even I could tell."

Chapter 5

Hannah had moved to the rocker. The topic seemed to require the added dignity of elevation. First off, she wanted to know what Jimmy had said to us, why we'd run clear up the bay after sunset on a falling tide. Tomlinson talked, then I talked. Then Tomlinson talked some more. She had a good way of listening, the natural-born-executive's talent for nodding at the appropriate time, asking just the right question to lever more detail, letting you feel the full force of her attention as she followed along. She didn't want to be spared anything. She wanted it all.

When we had finished, she sat quietly for a while. In the big rocker, she was the portrait of an anachronism, the pioneer woman at peace. She looked solid. Maternal. But through the open bedroom door, I could see the emblems of a woman who had yet to abandon all adolescent interests: big poster of a country music star tacked to her wall; a banner from Disney World; lazy, whirling ceiling fan with some kind of corsage dangling from the middle. After a time, she said, "Jimmy said he could see Jesus?"

"That's right. He was in shock, I guess."

"Jimmy finally met up with Jesus—you'd have to know him to understand just how funny that is. Jimmy? If the medical examiner hadn't told me himself on the phone, I'd think somebody else burnt up. But they called me and I told em how to get the dental records. He'd gone for some fillings just last month. Dr. Gear."

One of Tomlinson's great gifts is his ability to empathize. "If you're feeling bitterness, it's understandable," he said. "Your husband left violently, without explanation. So it's natural. Don't feel guilty, just let it out."

"Guilty? I don't feel guilty one bit. Bitter, sure. But not guilty. You never knew the guy—"

"His last words were about you, Hannah. Looking out for your welfare. I was there, holding his hand. I mean—seriously—the guy obviously cared deeply."

She sat up a little straighter, spread her fingers wide to brush the hair out of her face. "That's another thing that doesn't make sense. Why would Jimmy say that? What'd he say? 'Take care of Hannah for me'? Is that what he said?"

"His exact words."

"See, that wasn't like him. Know what I think, Tomlinson? I think— this may sound crazy—but I think you and Ford were sent to me for a reason."

"Of course we were. Except for Doc, a person would have to be a dope to doubt it."

"No, that's not what I mean. Not just to comfort me, but something else. Bigger, you know? It's this feeling I've got."

"Could be, Hannah. Wouldn't be the first time in my life."

"You really believe it's possible. What I'm saying?"

"I'm just a tool. You wouldn't believe some of the stuff God's gotten me into."

Hannah leaned forward slightly, ready to share. "Then you'll understand this. What I think is, that was Jimmy's body there on the table, and it was Jimmy's voice you heard . . . but those weren't Jimmy's words. Couldn't have been."

"Yeah? You think so?"

"I really do. It's just an idea. No way to prove it—"

"He . . . was a bad person?"

"Yes, he was." Her voice dropped a note or two—a confessional tone—making her point. "Jimmy was selfish as a three-year-old. And lazy. Trust me, if it wasn't for his pecker, he'd've never even learned to drive. Mean, too. Just plain, downright mean. Jimmy didn't give a damn about me."

"There was a darkness in him. I even told Doc that."

"There you go. But do you see what I'm getting at?"

Tomlinson held his hands out, palms up. "No, but I love the concept."

Hannah said, "What it could be—I'm just thinking out loud—but it could be that something, some force, spoke through him. Wanted us three to meet. 'Take care of Hannah for me.' Jimmy wouldn't say that. The words just came through his mouth, see? When I first saw you on the doorstep, I gave you a hard time, but what I was feeling was—"

"You don't even have to say it." Tomlinson was nodding his head, way ahead of her. "Like I already knew you. That's the way I felt. Saw you standing in the door—"

"Exactly."

"That's just the way it happens. I knew this was your house."

"You took your clothes off, no questions asked!"

He was chuckling along with her, his hair showing a lot of sheen and bounce. "Yeah . . . well ... I've done that for strangers many a time. But, with you, I couldn't even talk. I mean, wham. Like, there you were."

"This doesn't sound weird to you?"

Tomlinson made a fluttering noise with his lips. "Let me give you some words to live by: Weirdness only seems weird if you fight it. Believe me, I know about these things."

I sat there listening, trying to make sense of it. . . then abandoned any hope of trying to reassemble their exchange into rational conversation. What puzzled me most of all, though, was this troubling reality: No matter what Hannah Smith said, no matter what ridiculous opinion she fronted, I still found myself inexorably attracted to her.

Tomlinson was saying, "As a phenomenon, it's not that uncommon. Some person, dead or alive, serves as the medium for a larger voice. The power speaks through them. Some spirit who has left this world and gone to another. Or some sentient consciousness that has no other means to verbalize .. . Hey . . . wait. . . a . . . minute! I'm getting something here—"

Hannah said, "A larger voice," pondering it.

"This morning, when Doc and I were using his telescope, I was expecting a sign. This deep meditation I've been into, I've made daily contact with a very powerful consciousness—"

She interrupted him. "That's just what I want to learn. Meditation. Can you teach me?"

"It would be an honor. But listen to what I'm saying. I've been locking onto these signals, these little islands of. . . divinity. I mean, I really knew I was going to receive some sign from them." He looked at me. "What did I tell you this morning, Doc? What did I say?"

It startled me for a moment, being included in the conversation. "You said something about ocular confirmation," I said. "That's what you told me."

"My very words. Ocular confirmation. You understand, Hannah? I was looking for a light, some kind of signal, way out in space. So what do they give me instead? A fucking explosion that knocks me right off my pins. I'm so damn dumb! Typical unenlightened earthling. I keep forgetting that time and distance mean absolutely nothing."

"Then Jimmy spoke—"

Tomlinson's head was swinging up and down; already knew the direction she was headed. "He spoke, but it could have been this power, this consciousness speaking through him. Jimmy was going to be at our marina anyway. He was going to be carrying the gas or bomb, whatever the hell it was. Free will—never underestimate it. He had his own plans. Blow up boats, burn the marina. Whatever. Destructive behavior, a very negative gig. Not that it mattered, because it was his time to pass on, so they just selected him."

Hannah stood, touched her fingers to my shoulder—a brief conduit of heat—then placed her hand on Tomlinson's shoulder. "Right or wrong, I feel like something brought you here. Things like this don't happen by accident."

"Exactly."

"Ford said you write books."

"Several. I have a small but enlightened following. Some truly twisted souls, as well, but that goes with the territory. They send me letters . . . strange clippings . . . interesting herbs . . . once, a dried bat. They're devoted people, my readers."

"I want to write a book. Maybe you could help me."

Tomlinson smiled at her. Said, "I'm here for a reason."

It was more than an hour later. Hannah had walked us down and introduced us to Arlis Futch. When she told him I could dock my boat there "any damn time he wants," I was surprised that Futch simply smiled meekly, as if arguing was futile. "Whatever you want, Hannah. If they're friends 'ayours."

We had eaten, and now were sitting on the porch, in darkness, looking at the bay through a framework of palm fronds. The January sea breeze was chilly, blustery; blew the mosquitoes away. I was worried about my boat. The tide was still falling. If I wanted to run back to Dinkin's Bay across the flats, we'd have to leave soon.

Yet I didn't want to leave. Hannah sat between us, kicked back in her chair, bare feet on the railing. Every now and then she'd reach over and squeeze my wrist to amplify what she was saying, or give me a rough shove after the punch line of some joke. Most people are reluctant to violate the perimeter of space that defines the boundary of another person's body. But she was a toucher, a patter, a nudger. Her effective way of bonding, of breaching the chasm.

"I expect you wonder why I married him. A creep like Jimmy. If he was so bad."

"It doesn't make a lot of sense, I have to admit."

"Everybody makes mistakes, man. Kids are young, they think getting married's a way to change their lives."

"Nope, Ford's right. It didn't make sense, doesn't make sense, never made sense." She sat quietly, thinking it over, then began to tell us how it was. "I first met Jimmy . . . yeah, just a little less then seven years ago. Some girlfriends and I loaded up a car, this big green Bonneville convertible had a dented-in front fender. So old we had to play eight-track tapes—The Doors, Steppenwolf, Cream, that stuff, and it sounded great. Just loaded it up and headed for New Orleans. Had the top down, wine coolers in an Igloo, smoking cigarettes, acting wild. I was. . . eighteen?" She touched a long finger to her lips, thoughtful. "Yeah, eighteen. All of us. Lissa Kilmer and Mary Lou Weeks. We'd just graduated high school from Cedar Key, fishermen's daughters, and we thought, what the hell, let's get out and see the world. Lissa had a brother who crewed the shrimp boats outta Morgan City, right there near New Orleans, and that's how I met Jimmy. Jimmy was ... different. I told you I liked people who were different?"

"Know what? I could tell that about you. The moment I walked in here, the whole aura of this place."

For just a moment, she rewarded Tomlinson with her full attention, a kindred acknowledgment—they were still on the same cerebral frequency.

Jimmy was twenty-some years older than me, more than forty. I liked that. Liked the way he looked, the way he smelled. Kind'a spicy with some sour mixed in. He was a Creole, what they call a mulatto. Not real black but butterscotch-colored. He had these long arms, real strong, and, truth is, he was 'bout the first man I ever met that wasn't scared of me. Jimmy didn't yap at my heels trying to please me, didn't slobber from the tongue because he wanted in my pants so bad. I'm not bragging—no reason to, it's such a pain in the butt—but nearly every man I've dated ends up hounding me till I can't stand it. It's like a sickness."

I thought: Understandable.

"But Jimmy wasn't that way," Hannah said. "Nope, with him everything was smooth and easy. If I wanted it, fine; if I didn't there were plenty of other women. First time, we were on the bow of a shrimp boat, the Baffin Bay Bleu out of Corpus Christi—can you believe I remember the name of it? It was night, and he stripped my clothes off so quick we just did it right there on that wet deck. Bruised myself, I pounded those boards so hard, humping away like dogs in the diesel fumes. Spray coming over the bow, both of us bareass-naked, headed out Pontchartrain Cut, with the whole crew watching from the pilothouse for all I knew. I didn't care. Didn't care about anything but what we were doin' and what we kept doing. Every spare minute, grabbing each other anytime we wanted, squeezing into every little cubbyhole on the boat, for three days, Pontchartrain to Morgan City, out in the Gulf. It was like I was drunk and feverish both. That's the way it was with Jimmy at first."

I thought: Why is she telling us this?

Hannah said, "He told me later he'd put a spell on me. Like he was joking. When I got to know about him, I wasn't so sure." She exchanged a glance with Tomlinson, confirming that he understood. Then looked at me to see how I was reacting to the story . . . before explaining patiently, "I say things the way they are. The truth doesn't embarrass because I've told no lies to be ashamed of. You knew Jimmy, you wouldn't think the business about spells was so silly. I said he was a Creole? He spoke the language better than he spoke English. His people were all swamp people. Coon Asses, he called them, but that's because he liked to think he was better. He grew up in a place called Calcasieu Marsh, this village of shacks up on stilts. He took me there, showing me around, and these people had Catholic stuff on the walls—plaster crucifixes, Virgin Marys—but they had another religion, too. The families from way, way back did. And the Darrouxs had been there forever."

"Obeah?" Tomlinson offered. "The slaves, they integrated it into Christian ceremonies. Blood sacrifices, occult rituals. Scares people shitless, plus plenty of social outings—a first-rate theology, you ask me."

Hannah shook her head. "Jimmy never called it that. He just outright called it voodoo. His mama was like the main witch lady. He showed me all her stuff, which really pissed her off. Not that she didn't take to me. But she didn't like Jimmy, and Jimmy hated his family. So, what did he care?"

Tomlinson was warming to the topic, enjoying the opportunity to be talking about something that interested her. "The woman, Darroux's mother, did she have an altar in her home? Some kind of a carved head with a cigar, or maybe a cigarette, sticking out its mouth?"

"Yeah ... a cigar, and some beads on this blue velvet tablecloth. Feathers. . . and a shot glass full of liquor. The liquor, it was always there. I remember, because Jimmy, he'd walk past and drink it, then laugh like crazy. Rum. I could smell it."

Tomlinson winced. "Oh man, no wonder he and his mother didn't get along." He turned to me to clarify—"That's like a Baptist stealing from the collection plate"—before asking Hannah, "You happen to notice any small brown bottles around? About this tall?" He held his thumb and forefinger a few inches apart. "Rows of them, probably hidden out of sight, but not anywhere close to the altar. And a Bible nearby?"

Hannah stared at him a moment, impressed—or maybe uneasy—but a little impatient, too. "I don't remember. What I meant was—" She stood up suddenly, went into the house and returned with the pitcher of tea. "What I meant was, it was like being under a spell. Not that I really was. By the time Lissa and Mary Lou and me got back to Cedar Key, I didn't much feel one way or the other about him. Just sort of burnt itself out. It was fun, but that's about it. He'd telephone sometimes, always late at night and Pretty drunk, which really pissed off my daddy. Next day he'd be roaring, She's got Negroes callin' her! Negroes!' " She was laughing as she finished filling my glas^'T'd heard through Lissa that he got into trouble down in Mexico. Campeche, I think. For buying cocaine or selling cocaine. Some °f the shrimpers, they were into that.

"Then, about two years ago, he shows up here. He'd been mullet fishing in Texas, but the nets got banned there, so he and about a jillion others naturally come to Florida to steal our fish. I was working my own boat by then, rentin' this place, but I wanted to buy. My daddy'd just died, and, in his will, he left me a little more than ten thousand dollars. But there was a . . . what'a you call it? ... a stipulation. I had to be married and settled down for at least two years before I could touch the money. That's what the lawyer told me: Married and settled down." She chuckled softly. "Even from the grave, Daddy was still scared of me. Of what I'd do." She shrugged, a display of indifference.

Tomlinson said, "So you decided to marry Jimmy"

"That's right—two years ago come May. I coulda married about any man on the island, but guess it was the devil in me that made me choose him. Just meanness. What did I care who my husband was? I wasn't ever going to get married, and I'll never get married again. Maybe I was tryin' to show how independent I am, marrying somebody Jimmy's color—but island people are a lot more accepting than you'd think. If Jimmy'd been worth a damn, they'd have taken him right in. But he kept a dirty boat. He'd cut in on somebody else about to strike fish. When he wasn't drunk, he was high on crack. That man purely loved the rock."

I said, "You stayed married to a man you didn't like or trust just to get your inheritance."

The fingernails of her right hand found the back of my neck, flexed briefly into the skin, then began to make a soft, affectionate circular motion in my hair. "That's right, Ford. I'm greedy. I'm going to buy this house. The net ban's not gonna run me off. My Great-Aunt Hannah, Big Six herself, lived right here on Sulphur Wells. I need that money. I'm starting some kind of business, Arlis Futch and me. Maybe Raymond Tullock, too."

When I asked, "What business?" her fingers found my ear; touched it delicately, explored around inside, then began to stroke the lobe. Normally, such an intimate gesture would have made me uncomfortable. But now it seemed weirdly natural; homely and friendly and simple-hearted. I leaned closer to her, so that our shoulders touched.

Heard her say, "I'm not sure, but it's gonna take money. These little fishing shacks like mine used to sell for next to nothing. A pine house and a chunk of shell on the bay islands. Who'd want it? Like old Mr. what's-his-name at Eljobean, he gave away most of the beachfront over on Gasparilla just for back taxes. But it's getting to be worth something now. Arlis has developers snooping round his place all the time, askin' how much he wants. They're chomping at the bit, can't wait till us netters are gone. That's why everybody on the island's so pissed off at Jimmy for getting himself blowed up. I told you we're still fighting the net ban? What we're doing, we found a lawyer in Gainesville who's going to file a lawsuit. Ask a state judge to grant an injunction against the ban, and also seek economic relief."

"Make the state buy back your boats and nets," I said.

"Yeah, or let us keep fishing. Which is why the stupidest thing a netter could do is cause trouble. Give the state a reason to refuse. But there goes Jimmy and some of those other idiots, stealing motors, starting fires. Mostly, they're white trash outsiders, but there're a few local boys, like Kemper Waits and his crew. Like they're getting even, but really just hurting us all."

She had become increasingly animated, this gangly twenty-five-year old Woman waving her arms around. Now she leaned back in her chair. "Well... I say good riddance. I'll see that he's shipped home. I'll see that his family knows what happened. But I won't miss him, and I won't shed a tear. Does that sound mean?"

Tomlinson said very softly, "He hit you. That was it."

Hannah was nodding slowly—amused that Tomlinson already knew. "Yeah, that was it. Part of it. After we got married, he'd only lived here about two weeks when he got drunk and started slapping me around. I tried to fight back, but ended up with two black eyes. The cops took him off to jail, but that didn't last. So I went to a lawyer, got a judge to sign some papers, and we tossed his stuff in the yard the next day.

"About a week later, after midnight, I heard him outside. Kicking down the door. I'd been expecting it; knew just exactly what I was going to do. Had it all planned out because I swore to myself that no man would hit me again. Ever. One of us would die first. But instead of fighting him, I talked real sweet, real nice, getting him calmed down. Then I brought out the rum bottle. For about two hours, I just kept talkin' and feeding him rum. It took the whole bottle. Then, when he passed out, I dragged him down to my boat and ran him into Boca Grande Pass. By then, it was daylight." She paused for a moment, remembering it.

"This was a year ago last June. You've been in Boca Grande Pass in June? I found a spot off the beach, away from the fleet that's always there. Tarpon were rolling all over the place, these big hundred-pound fish kicking water into the boat. First thing Jimmy sees when he wakes up is these tarpon flashing all around. He kind of shook his head—he didn't know what to make of that. Then he realizes that his hands and feet are tied, and he's not wearing any pants. He didn't know how that happened, and he's getting worried. Then he notices that there's a loop of fishing line knotted tight around his pecker, and he looks up to see that I've got the other end of the line in my hands—I'm just sitting there smilin' at him— and there's a hook on the line baited with a live mullet.

"He looks at his pecker, looks at that baited hook, thinks about all those hungry tarpon. Then he begins to sort of sob. His face screws up like a baby's face, and he starts beggin' me not to throw that bait in the water. I just sat there real calm . . . and tossed that live mullet into a pod of tarpon. Then I said to him, 'Jimmy? That little bit extra you got just ain't worth the bullshit. So you want to come to an agreement? Or do you want to fish?' "

Tomlinson said, "Far out," his voice a constricted whisper.

"I know, I know—but for a long time after that, I didn't have any more trouble with Jimmy." Hannah laughed, sighed; a weary sound . . . and I watched her lean her head on Tomlinson's shoulder; turned to notice for the first time that the long, lean fingers of her left hand were resting on Tomlinson's thigh. Heard her say, "So that's why I'm glad Jimmy's gone."

My boat was nearly high and dry. The new moon had sucked so much water out of the bay that I spent a soggy half hour slogging around in the muck, pushing, pulling, and rocking to get the thing out into the foot of water it took to float it. I had to brace my back against the transom and lift until my muscles creaked and my shoulders popped, just to budge the damn thing.

That was bad enough, but I had begun to feel mildly sick ... a little woozy and dazed, probably from lack of sleep. I'd been up since, what? before three? Not that I was sleepy. After four or five glasses of Hannah's strong tea, sleep was out of the question. All that caffeine had my heart pounding; created an unpleasant roaring in my ears.

Every time I stopped to rest, I could hear the murmur of voices. Tomlinson and Hannah were still up on the porch, chattering away.

For some reason, that infuriated me.

Both of them way too involved to lift a finger to help me get my boat ready to run back to Dinkin's Bay. Probably talking about mystic revelations. Karmic spirits. Voices from the grave. Space creatures who inhabited the walking dead and blew up boats. Who the hell knew? Or cared?

Well. . . the two of them were a perfect match. A drug-addled, draft-dodging hippie peacenik and a superstitious, manipulative, domineering twenty-five-year-old sex commando who netted mullet for a living when she wasn't busy marrying any sadistic Hottentot who happened to show up on her porch step, just to qualify for her inheritance.

That's what I was thinking. Mean thoughts to go with the roaring in my ears.

When I had the stern of the boat out deep enough, I plunked the anchor into the water, took two steps toward shore . . . and nearly knocked my toe off on something beneath the surface. I reached down and yanked out what proved to be about a five-pound horse conch shell. Looked at it, shook it at the sky, then threw it savagely out into the bay. Son of a bitch!

Which is when I caught myself. Made myself take a deep breath and review just exactly how I was behaving. Reminded myself that, woozy or not, irrational anger—like jealousy—was the province of the forever adolescent. Stood there in knee-deep water, actually feeling a little drunk because of all that tea.

Thought: That's just the way I'm acting. Like a drunk.

I checked to make sure the anchor was holding, then splish-splashed my way back to the mangroves, toward the road. Saw a silhouette ahead. Realized it was Tomlinson, so I waited for him to come down the path. When he was close enough, I said, "Did you bring my shoes?"

"Got 'em, man."

I took the shoes and began to put them on. "I nearly severed my toe, getting that boat out. Spend an hour listening to Hannah, you feel obligated to walk around barefooted. I should have known better."

"Isn't she something?"

"She's something. I'm just not sure what."

Tomlinson can communicate through the tone of his laughter. The sound he made now was one of understanding . . . but also condescension, which I found irritating as hell. He said, "You don't like her."

"It's not that I dislike her. It's just that I think I see her a bit more objectively than you."

That laugh again. "You know what it is? Hannah and I talked about it. What it is, you and she have the same linear qualities, the same drive to be independent. You and Hannah are both . . . extreme people. See what I mean? In that way, she's like you in a woman's body. Just as smart, too. Which may get into a whole male ego thing . . . but the point is, you are also emotional opposites, man. She's a Gemini, but she's got Leo rising—"

"No more astrology lessons," I said. "Astrology lessons I can do without.

"You're sounding a tad grumpy. Come on . . . let's see a smile. Who's your buddy—?"

"Damn it, Tomlinson, I'm not grumpy Judging from the blood and the swelling, my toe may be broken, but I'm not grumpy."

He remained silent while I finished tying my shoes. Then: "You felt it, didn't you? That's what's troubling you. The lady has some very serious juice, and you felt it. When she'd touch me, it was like . . . zap."

"Nope. No zaps."

"Like electric. I could feel it in her hands, man, her fingertips. A higher level of consciousness. And her lips—my God."

I stood abruptly. "Her lips? What the hell were you two doing up on that porch—?" I stopped myself I didn't want to hear it. Used my hands to wave him along, and said, "Get in the boat. The tide's so low we'll have to run the channel all the way back to Dinkin's Bay. Which will take two hours, unless I stop at Cabbage Key for a beer. Which I plan to do."

"On a Thursday night? You're the one keeps reminding me you don't drink—"

"They're my rules. I can break them when I want." I turned toward the bay, took a few steps before I realized that he wasn't following along. "You forget something?"

"Well . . . see, Doc, it's like this—"

"Nope, I'm not waiting. You want to talk to her, call her on the phone. Or drive over. You've fulfilled your karmic obligation ... or the directive from Mars—whatever it was. I'm leaving."

"Yeah, well, I think I'm going to stay."

"You mean . . . stay here. Gumbo Limbo."

"She asked me. I said yes." He was stroking his goatee, pleased with himself.

"Sleep in her house."

"We've got so much to discuss, man. All these avenues to explore. Meeting Hannah has been . . .just the impact of it. Jesus. She wants to learn sitting meditation. Do a sort of zazenkai, just her and me . . . only as an ordained monk, her Roshi, I have to give serious thought to the moral limitations that would put on our relationship. Then there's this book she wants to write. It could be an important historical document."

I started walking toward my boat.

"Doc—before you go."

I turned.

"Can I ask you something?" Tomlinson stepped close to me, very close. For an uncomfortable moment, I thought he was going to give me a brotherly hug. Instead, he said, "Can I borrow maybe ten bucks? Or a fin? If we go out for breakfast, I'd like to at least offer to pay—"

I took out my wallet, handed him a twenty. As I did, I heard familiar bell notes of amusement; then a woman's voice called, "I'll stick him in my boat and bring him home. Don't you worry, Ford." Looked up to see Hannah standing in an orb of streetlight, the long, lean shape of her, hands on her hips, pelvis canted to the left like a bus stop floozie, loose blouse and black hair catching the sea breeze.

I got in my boat and headed out the channel.