Deceived

14

With so many prime fishing spots between Sanibel Island and Punta Gorda, I’d had no need to make the tricky turns and cuts required to find the Helmses’ property by water until Joel Ransler arrived the next morning. He was ten minutes late and dressed for fishing but also carrying a briefcase in one hand, a small cooler in the other.

The first thing I asked was if there was any news from the medical examiner about Rosanna Helms.

“Heart attack,” he said, giving me a close look after he had stepped aboard my skiff. We talked about the woman awhile before he added, “You look tired. Up late?” Then offered a look of concern to assure me it wasn’t an insult.

“You’re the one who’s been investigating a murder,” I replied. Rather than mentioning I had read about the victim, the elderly man named Clayton Edwards, I asked, “Anything unusual?”

“I’m in an ugly line of work,” Joel said, “nothing I haven’t seen before. But on a morning like this”-his eyes were taking in a lucent April sky; the bay, which was glassy-“I’d rather talk about you. Tired or not, Hannah, you look incredible. And a perfect day to be on the water, huh?”

The special prosecutor sounded so cheerful and caring, I felt a twinge of guilt. I hadn’t slept much, it was true, and part of my wakeful night had been spent wondering why Joel hadn’t come right out and told me the truth about Dwight Helms. It had provided me with a solid reason not to trust the man.

I wasn’t going to admit I’d seen the crime scene photos either. Ransler was my client. If he wanted to discuss the subject, that was up to him. Did he have that kind of honesty in him? Even if he did, why should I care?

“It’s supposed to be calm all morning,” I replied. “Do you want to fish first? I found a school of reds off Hemp Key-that’s on the way.”

No, the special prosecutor wanted to go straight to Deer Stop Bay, which was linked by tidal creeks to the cove where the late Dwight Helms had built his dock during the peak of the pot-hauling trade. It was also where Helms had been chased down by a person or persons unknown who, after wounding him badly, had finally finished the job. All night long, awake and in my dreams, those photos had hounded me and forced me to imagine the terrible sequence of events. To murder a human being was bad enough, but the way Mr. Helms had died was hideous.

Pretending to enjoy the twenty-minute boat ride to the old dock wasn’t easy. Even when my full attention was required by shoal water and oyster bars, I remained subdued. Maybe Ransler sensed it, because he complimented me when I dropped the skiff off plane, saying, “Even with a chart, most people couldn’t have found this place. A couple of deputies tried over the weekend but radioed in it was too shallow.”

“It is too shallow,” I replied, nudging the throttle back, “unless you know where the deep water is.” Which might have sounded smug, so I added, “The channel isn’t marked. Local fishermen always tear down the markers if someone tries.”

“The deputies said their boat was too big.”

“Oh?”

“A twenty-four-foot Grady White, I think. Bigger than this boat.”

I didn’t want to sound critical, but I also wasn’t going to lie. “Back when they were hauling pot, I heard they ran small shrimp boats in here. A thirty-footer wouldn’t have a problem if the tide’s right and if the mangroves were trimmed-but maybe this place is harder to find from Sematee County.”

Joel had a nice easy way of laughing that made it hard not to like him. “The marine division should follow my lead and hire you,” he said. “They ran aground, that’s exactly what happened-who knows where-and it took the guys something like three hours to get back.” Then he did a slow circle with his eyes, seeing walls of green all around-mangroves fifty feet tall on the shoreward side. To the west, mangrove ledges trimmed by hurricanes, where pelicans and white wading birds were perched, warming themselves in sunlight. Shards of limestone rock, too, that pierced the shallows like teeth; sometimes a limestone outcropping that angled from tree roots into the water.

“This is Deer Stop Bay?” he asked.

“No, that was the first bay we came through. I don’t think this place has a name.”

“Prehistoric,” the man responded, his voice softer.

“How long have you lived in Florida?” I asked, because he behaved like a person who was experiencing something for the first time.

“I was born right here in Sematee County,” he answered and grinned at my surprise before explaining, “but I grew up in the Midwest. I spent spring breaks here when I was going to Valparaiso, then moved down after law school. That was four years ago, almost five.” His eyes returned to a shoal area of limestone and water. “Are those oysters or rocks?”

I told him what he was seeing, then explained, “A geologist told me a limestone ridge angles northwest from the mainland but doesn’t break the surface often. Not wide, either, where it branches off. A section runs across Pine Island. There’s another off Sulfur Wells. I know spots in only six or eight feet of water where you can catch grouper because of the rock ledges. Spiny lobster, too-I used to dive for them when I was a girl.”

It was the sort of thing fishing guides are expected to say, and my client liked it, but his eyes were busy. “I don’t see the dock-am I missing something?”

“Around that point,” I said, “unless I got us lost, too.”

Joel took it as a joke and made one of his own by hinting he wouldn’t mind being stranded alone in a boat with me. Or maybe he wasn’t joking, because he nudged the little cooler he’d brought and said, “I made a thermos of margaritas-you’ve earned a drink. Or we can be proper about it and wait until noon.”

I smiled but was thinking, Don’t let him get too familiar. Which is why I answered, “I don’t drink when I’m working, but clients can make themselves at home.” Then nodded as we rounded the point and asked, “Is it the way you pictured it?”

The loading platform Dwight Helms had built was supported by a double span of sixteen-foot stringers on telephone pole pilings that had been jettied deep. The planking was thick enough to hold a pickup truck or two plus a metal derrick. The derrick was still there but leaning badly because the wood had rotted. The diesel engine next to it appeared to be frozen in brown rust.

“Quite an operation,” Joel said, and moved forward. Because he was wearing shorts and a blue polo, he looked like a tennis player from where I stood, with his long tan legs and golden body hair. He placed his hands on the casting platform while he studied the dock, then said, “It looked smaller from the satellite photos.”

“From space, it probably would,” I replied.

The man glanced back. “I can usually read sarcasm. Not with you, though.”

Now I actually did smile. “Sorry. I don’t think making fun of people is funny, so don’t worry. What I meant is, the dock was bigger-the way I remember it anyway. So of course it would be smaller from high up.”

Ransler was interested. “Oh. You saw it back in the days when it was…”

“Operational?” I said, helping him out. “Yeah, I did. My Uncle Jake brought me in here once or twice when I was a little girl. Not because of the dock, we came here to fish, but I saw it.” Then I told the prosecutor what I remembered, which, possibly, had been colored by what I’d heard in later years. Dwight Helms, and others in the pot-smuggling trade, had rigged a shrimp net in the trees like an awning to camouflage the dock from DEA planes passing overhead.

“It was like a gigantic tent,” I said, “covered with tree branches and leaves. I remember thinking it was even bigger than a tent. You know, impressive to a girl only seven or eight years old. My mother didn’t believe me when I described it-she was so sure I was exaggerating, I remember getting mad. My uncle said it was a good lesson for me.”

Ransler looked over his shoulder again. “The lesson being?”

I had to think for a moment. “Something about It’s easier for a stranger to trick us because they’ve yet to be caught in a lie. Or maybe he said to con us, I forget. Loretta-my mother-she would have believed a stranger, that’s what he was telling me.”

“You’ve mentioned him a couple of times. You must have been close.”

“Jake?” I said. “He was a lot more fun than Barbie dolls and dress-up parties. Probably because he treated me like a friend, not his precious little niece.”

Joel hadn’t asked about my father, which was a relief but made me suspicious. He had telephoned Loretta with questions about Rosanna Helms, that much she had already admitted. But had she strayed-or been led-on to other topics? Before her stroke, my mother had avoided embarrassing topics. Now there wasn’t any word or subject too tasteless for her to share with the postman or even with passing strangers while out shopping. Worse, she had begun to confuse me with my late aunts, Hannah Two and Hannah Three, whose bad judgment and love of men had brought both of their lives to a violent end. Trying to avoid my late aunts’ errors was complicated enough without the fear of Loretta telling a stranger that To get Hannah’s panties down, just tap her on the head. I had heard her say those exact words to Christian, our good-looking UPS man, and so now began to wonder if Joel Ransler’s flattery was based on misinformation provided by my addled mother.

No way of knowing because Ransler stuck to the subject of my late uncle.

“Did he help support you two? She told me how hard up for money she was-a single woman raising a little girl. It had to be tough… on both of you.”

The man sounded sympathetic, but I didn’t like the direction the conversation was going. There was no guessing what else Loretta had said about me. One thing I felt sure she hadn’t mentioned while discussing money was her long affair with a married man-something she has never admitted and I’ve never brought up. No reason to embarrass her needlessly, plus it was a secret comfort to have the ammunition ready if Loretta ever pushed me too far. Her lover had been a wealthy man-although the source of his income was a mystery-who she had never brought to the house, but I had heard them talking on the phone often enough to know his name was Arnie-something. Thanks to Arnie, Loretta had had a nice car and money enough for shopping, which she loved. There had been a few hard times financially, but that was after Arnie or Loretta-both, possibly-had found religion, which had ended their affair. Joel’s gentle way of asking questions, however, made me feel obligated to be conversational because there was still water between us and the dock.

“Jake helped out when he could, I suppose, but most of his income went to alimony. Loretta always managed to get by, and I give her full credit for that. I didn’t have to go to work until I was a sophomore in high school, which was late in the game compared to a lot of kids on the islands.”

“You worked in your uncle’s detective agency,” Ransler said. “At least you’re listed as an employee in state records. Hope you don’t mind that I checked.”

“It was better than waiting tables,” I responded. “I wasn’t crazy about being in an office, but I learned how to keep books, and I did the computer searches, too. So, no, checking on me, I understand that it’s part of your job.”

“Office work beats what some of your neighbors did to make a living,” the special prosecutor said, his eyes on the derrick that had hoisted unknown tons of drugs.

His meaning was obvious and his tone had a hint of superiority, which was irritating.

I turned, opened a hatch, and got out the stern line, before saying, “One thing you might not understand is why people here starting running marijuana. Used their mullet boats to meet bigger boats offshore, then off-loaded the bales in places like this because the Marine Patrol and Coast Guard didn’t know the local waters.”

“Money,” he replied. “Isn’t it always about money? Then they’d truck the drugs to Miami, sometimes Atlanta, right? Poor men became millionaires in a few months. Hannah, I have done a fair amount of research on the subject. For a while, the DEA kept active files on more than half the adult population of Sematee County and Sulfur Wells-did you know that?” The man looked at me in an odd way, which put me on the defensive.

“You’re skipping over something important,” I countered. “The state put a lot of commercial fishermen out of business in those days. More and more regulations, then a net ban. Families that had been fishing for five or six generations were suddenly out of work and they didn’t know any other kind of work.” I nodded to indicate the dock we were approaching. “If you had a mortgage to pay and children to feed, do you think you might have chosen pot hauling to losing your home?”

“Maybe,” he said. “But not cocaine and crack hauling, which made some of those same guys even richer. Or, at least, I’d like to believe I wouldn’t.”

Joel had a point, but he’d oversimplified the dilemma fishing families had faced during two decades that had all but eliminated their working heritage. I knew from local gossip that pot hauling had turned ugly when smuggling cocaine became a more lucrative option. It brought professional criminals and crime syndicates into the area. It also got some of the locals and their children hooked on the product. Cocaine was the division line between ethical and unethical behavior in the minds of many fishermen and those who refused to do it were soon forced out of business.

As I explained this, the special prosecutor swung around to face me from the casting platform and was nodding before I’d finished. “I’m not making moral judgments. You want to know why I’m so interested?”

“Let me finish,” I said. “What I’m saying is, sometimes a new law can make criminals out of people who’ve never broken a law in their life. But my Uncle Jake wasn’t among them and I get the feeling you believe he was. Isn’t that why you keep asking about him? Half the population of Sulfur Wells was being investigated, you said. That’s only about a hundred people, not counting kids.”

Ransler shrugged in a way that suggested he was open to all possibilities. “It crossed my mind, but so what? Your uncle’s dead, plus the statute of limitations ran out years ago-on smuggling, at any rate.”

Had the special prosecutor just implied something?

To communicate disapproval, I cleared my throat before saying, “If you did background checks, you know Jake was a highly decorated detective, Tampa police force. Wounded while saving the lives of at least two other deputies, maybe more. If you’re asking questions because you suspect Jake of murdering Mr. Helms, you couldn’t be more wrong.”

Joel Ransler flexed his jaw and smiled at the same time, giving me his handsome Sundance Kid look. “No, you’re wrong. The reason I’m interested in your family is because”-he laced his hands together and flexed his jaw again-“well, there are a couple of reasons, and I’ll just be up front. You’re an unusual woman. I find you attractive, Hannah. Didn’t I already say that?”

“It wouldn’t matter if you had,” I replied, trying not to sound flustered. “I’m in a serious relationship. If that’s why you offered to hire me as an investigator, though-”

“Hold on a second,” he said. “I’m trying to explain something.” He stopped, reconsidered, then switched gears. “Does that mean you decided to take the job?”

“If someone’s trying to rob my mother and some of her friends, sure, I’d like the chance. But not if it’s because you’re interested in me personally.”

“Two entirely separate things,” he responded. “But I do like you. You’re not glib, you don’t chatter, and you don’t act like you have to prove yourself. Something in your background made you different. So I’m curious about the people who raised you-on a personal level. But my interest is professional, too. Is that so offensive?”

No, but neither could I respond sensibly, so I blocked the subject by asking, “Do you want to tie up or is this close enough?” I had swung my skiff parallel to the dock and shifted to neutral.

“Let’s get out and look around,” Ransler said, amused. “Want me to take the bowline?”

I seldom accept help docking but the man had proven he was competent, so I replied, “When you step out, watch that decking. It looks bad.”

JOEL WAS GOING through his briefcase while I roamed the dock, checking the shallows for fish, but also imagining the murder that had occurred here. As he searched folders, he surprised me by asking, “Are you mad at me for some reason? Something’s bothering you.”

I wasn’t going to bring up the crime scene photos, so I reminded him, “I was attacked by dogs and someone with an axe not a hundred yards from here. And Mrs. Helms died somewhere over there”-I motioned toward the trail-“a woman I knew my whole life. You can’t blame me for thinking the place is a little spooky.”

Ransler glanced around us, willing to be supportive. “Yeah… it is, isn’t it?” Then tested his heel on the dock but not hard because the planks were rotten. “And her husband died where we’re standing. Drug smuggling and violence. There is a weird vibe, I agree.”

“That’s another thing,” I said. “I still don’t know why you wanted to come here. Are you looking for new evidence about the murder? Or…” What I wanted to ask was Or a quiet place to drink margaritas, just the two of us? but didn’t. Couldn’t bring myself to be mean to a man who, thus far, had only been thoughtful and complimentary.

Joel was perceptive, though. He got the message and became more businesslike. “A twenty-year-old murder isn’t the reason. Not the main reason anyway. I wanted to confirm something.” He looked at the bay for emphasis. “You just proved that if your attacker came by boat, he has to be a local. And not just any local, he’s probably a commercial fisherman-or someone who learned the channel smuggling drugs. Make sense?”

Not entirely. I had already told him and the detectives about the old horse trail that led through the mangroves to Sulfur Wells but mentioned it again.

“I’d like to see it,” Joel said.

“We’ll need more mosquito spray,” I told him, “and we should have brought a machete.”

“I don’t mind bugs. But first, there’s something you should know. I wanted to be sure of the details before I said anything.”

In his hand was a crime scene map. Finally, the special prosecutor told me that Dwight Helms had been murdered with an axe. Then asked a question my Internet research hadn’t prepared me for.

“You ever hear any rumors about who found Helms’s body? The department never released the names to the public.”

I remembered a newspaper story crediting an unnamed informant, but that’s all, so I shook my head.

Ransler was serious now. “There were actually two people who reported the body, both men. Do you remember anyone around named Arnold?-that was his first name. The dispatcher either didn’t get his last name or he refused to give it.”

“Arnold,” I repeated. “We were taught to call adults by their last names, mister or missus, so I seldom knew an adult’s whole name.” I mulled it over. “Arnold. It sounds familiar, but I’m not sure why. So far, no one comes to mind.”

“That was a long time ago, I know-more than twenty years, but there’s a reason I’m asking, Hannah.” He paused. “Or.. maybe you know the reason.”

The way Joel said it put me on guard. I sensed a trap. “If you have something to say, say it,” I told him. Then stared at him for a moment before taking a guess. “Was my Uncle Jake one of the men who found Mr. Helms?”

“Yes,” Joel said. “He was the first to call it in-a little after midnight, according to the report. I assumed you knew.”

“Jake?”

“Captain Jacob Hansen Smith. That’s him, right? I was hoping you could help me with the name of the second man.”

When I turned away to collect myself, Joel reached as if to put a hand on my shoulder but stopped when he saw me flinch. “Your uncle was never a suspect, I wasn’t lying about that. He still isn’t, as far as I’m concerned.”

“Jake never said a word about finding a body-but I was only eight or nine at the time, so-”

“That’s right,” Ransler cut in as if he hadn’t thought it through. “You were only a kid. Of course he wouldn’t have said anything. Even later, why bring it up? I’m such an idiot sometimes.”

The special prosecutor shook his head, disappointed with himself, and continued to apologize. My mind was already on something else. I was picturing how it had been for my uncle the night he found the body, used my eyes to match crime scene photos with the area around the dock.

Twenty feet away was a huge buttonwood. Dwight Helms had lost part of his hand near the base of a large tree-possibly the same tree. They had found his ankle and foot, his boot still tied, near the diesel engine that was now red with rust, but, on a night twenty years ago, had glistened beneath flashbulbs. Helms had curled himself in a fetal position beneath the derrick. He had died there, his head crushed by several blows. Jake, or a man named Arnold, had been the first to find the carnage-the first to report it, anyway, which gave the murder a new importance.

Arnold… Arnold. The name continued to bounce around in my head. It was familiar, I felt sure of it, yet my memory couldn’t attach the name to an adult who had lived on the island.

Then it hit me. Arnold-or Arnie for short! It was the name of Loretta’s secret lover. I had never discovered the man’s last name because I didn’t want to know it. A nickname didn’t prove her old boyfriend was a murderer, of course, or even that he was the same Arnie, but it was a startling connection. Suddenly, I wanted to know more about Arnie-especially now that the reputation of my late uncle might be involved through association.

“Hannah… are you okay? I wasn’t trying to be graphic.” Joel was touching my elbow, I realized. It took me a moment to understand I had missed something he’d said, something important, apparently.

I took a full breath and forced a smile. “Fine, fine-my attention wanders sometimes. What were you saying?”

The special prosecutor had been easing into the facts about the murder. “The way Helms died was so brutal, I see only three possible options. I’m not going to bother you with details. I’m projecting from the killer’s point of view.”

“Options?” I asked.

“Motives, I mean. It was a crime of passion or a revenge killing or… a message, like a warning to other smugglers. That’s my read. The murder was so brutal, it scared people, so they avoided the subject by telling outsiders that Helms had been shot. After a while, the lie became accepted as fact. We both know that a lot of islanders went into drug running. If the killer was sending a message, it worked in one way: the murder scared them. The question is, what was the message the killer-or killers-was sending?”

I nodded as if I agreed but was trying to recall more about Loretta’s lover. The relationship had gone on for a decade. I suspected I had seen the man on more than one occasion-in church, most likely-yet had no idea who he was or what he’d looked like. Loretta had guarded the secret carefully, but it was my own distaste for the truth that had provided the strongest shield.

Now Joel was saying, “I didn’t come here to trap you. More than anything, I was trying to help. The way Helms was killed isn’t related to what happened to you Friday night. My theory hasn’t changed. You surprised a burglar-some local crackhead, most likely-hoping to find money or drugs. He probably heard the dogs, too, and grabbed the first weapon he saw-an axe. It was a coincidence.” The man sighed. “Instead of making you feel better, I screwed up by assuming you knew more than you did. Sorry, Hannah. Like I said, I’m in an ugly business. Sometimes I forget there are still people you can be open and honest with.”

This time I let the prosecutor place a hand on my shoulder-but as a comfort to him, not to me. His regret seemed genuine, and I soften easily when touched by the upset of others. “Joel,” I said, “I believe you, okay? So let’s drop the subject.”

“Rance,” he corrected, then squared himself so both hands were on my shoulders, holding me as if to reassure me of his support. He had done the same thing the night I was attacked.

“Rance,” I conceded, then joked, “I usually don’t tolerate pushy clients.”

Sundance Kid from the movie, yes, Joel had the same jaw-flexing smile as we stood face-to-face, joined by the warmth of his hands. Smart gray eyes, too, with a glint-boyish, but in a devilish way. For a moment, I felt comfortable standing close to this good-looking attorney who was trying so hard to win my approval… but then the look in his eyes struck me as more devilish than boyish and I began to doubt my own judgment. Two of my aunts had died because they had misread the intentions of charming men. I knew nothing about Joel Ransler, had yet to even run a background check, yet here we were alone, just the two of us.

“Hang on a second,” I said, then ducked under his arms and walked toward my skiff.

“Where you going?” He sounded hopeful when he added, “The thermos of margaritas in the cooler-we could probably both use a drink.”

I replied, “I’m getting bug spray. If you want to see the horse trail, we need to go. I’ve got to be back by noon and the tide’s falling fast.”

“Noon?”

“I have an afternoon charter,” I told him.

Birdy Tupplemeyer wasn’t paying me, but that didn’t make my excuse any less true.