Skinny Dip

Twenty-four

Dr. Charles Regis Perrone bounced behind the steering wheel of his Hummer, weaving down the levee at a ludicrous speed. Every so often he poked his head out to scan the sky, which was full of helicopters. It was the weirdest spectacle, choppers buzzing over the Everglades like giant candy-colored dragonflies.

Chaz felt like the Ray Liotta character in GoodFellas, racing around like a lunatic with a load of hot guns, wondering if the helicopter following him was real or imaginary-except that instead of that Harry Nilsson song from the movie, Papa Thorogood was blasting in Chaz Perrone's ears, asking who did he love.

It was ideal road music, but Chaz couldn't get into the spirit. He was heading out to collect another water sample, and he was highly agitated. Maybe there was an innocent explanation for the helicopters- baby blue, green, red, white, baby blue again…

Maybe a hunter or fisherman had gotten lost, Chaz speculated. Except these weren't rescue-type choppers he was seeing-they were private executive-style models, similar to the nifty little Bell 206 leased by Hammernut Farms to ferry Samuel Johnson Hammernut back and forth across his holdings. Red had given him the grand tour soon after Chaz signed on as his mole; Chaz's first and only helicopter ride, swooping low over the checkerboard fields of crops. From the air Chaz had been able to track the precise path of the pollution, the gridwork of shallow brown canals that carried the tainted runoff from the soil of Hammernut Farms to the throat of the Everglades. "God's septic tank," Red had called it, guffawing behind tinted goggles that had made him look like a psychedelic fruit fly. Dr. Charles Perrone had laughed, too, an obsequious reflex though hardly insincere. Chaz gave not a damn about the wetlands below, or what a continual soaking with fertilizer might do to them…

Shit, Chaz thought, here comes another one!

He kept his eyes on the red-striped helicopter for so long that he nearly drove the Hummer off the levee. The jostling awakened Tool, who mumbled, "Slow down, dickbrain."

Urgently, Chaz jabbed a finger upward. "Check it out!"

"A whirlybird. So what?"

"There's a whole bunch of 'em!"

Tool sneezed, then wiped a woolly arm across his nose. "Maybe they's shootin' a movie."

As Chaz scanned the horizon, his head twitched back and forth. It reminded Tool of a lizard scouting for bugs.

Tool said, "You crash this fucker into the water, I'll strangle your ass before ya can drown."

"But what if they're following us?" Chaz asked.

"What if fish had tits?"

"I'm serious. Jesus, see that blue one? Right behind us! Look in the mirror!"

Tool, who was feeling the effects of a fresh fentanyl patch, slammed his eyes shut. "Whirlybirds. I swear to God," he said, and promptly nodded back to sleep.

Chaz parked at the spillway, struggled into his wading gear, grabbed the two-iron and slogged into the brothy water. He counted seven helicopters in the sky, each circling at different heights. That they were surveilling him seemed chillingly obvious, so Chaz was careful to conduct the runoff sampling with diligence and deliberation. He tried his hardest to appear unconcerned, although he peed copiously into his waders when the baby-blue chopper dipped low and slowed to a hover directly above his head.

By the time Tool awoke again, Chaz was racing back, halfway down the levee. The helicopters were gone.

"Gimme the cell," Chaz said.

"Whaffor?"

"I need to call Red."

Tool tossed the phone to Chaz, who was sweaty and flushed with anger. Chaz speed-dialed the office in LaBelle and demanded to speak to Mr. Hammernut.

"He's where? Fishing? That's terrific," Chaz snapped at Red's secretary.

Tool smiled drowsily. Fishing sounded like a pretty sweet way to spend the day.

Chaz was fuming. "Then put me through to his voice mail."

"Call him later," Tool advised.

"No, no, this can't wait. Red? Red, this is Chaz. Listen to me real good: We get out to the second spillway this morning and the whole damn sky is full of helicopters-I'm not sure who they are, or where they came from, or what the fuck's going on. But since you're the only one I know that can afford to hire a goddamn fleet of choppers… what I'm trying to tell you, Red, is be careful. Very, very careful. You don't want anything bad happening to me, you truly don't. You want me to stay happy and calm and cool, which is dead opposite of the way I feel right now-shit, the machine cut me off!"

Chaz was so upset that he was panting. Tool grabbed the phone and said, "Boy, you done lost your marbles."

"That's what you want me to think, isn't it? That's the secret plan, right?"

Chaz poked his head out of the Hummer and looked up anxiously. The sky was bright and clear and empty, except for a solitary vulture rafting high in the thermals.

Joey Perrone had remembered that GoodFellas was one of her husband's favorite movies; that's what gave her the idea for helicopters. Corbett was thrilled and said it would be spectacular. He called the charter service himself and put the whole tab, more than twenty-three grand, on his platinum card. Joey didn't like to fly because of what had happened to her parents, but Corbett promised that she'd have a fine time. Choppers are a blast, he said.

And he was right. The baby-blue Bell Ranger picked them up on the island and shot out low across the bay, then up the coast. Corbett took the seat next to the pilot; Joey sat beside Mick Stranahan, both hands latched to his left arm. He pointed out Stiltsville, where he'd once lived; then Key Biscayne, South Beach, the high-rise canyons along Collins Avenue. The helicopter banked and began to pass over dense suburbs gridded by impossibly congested roads. Joey could see that the interstate was locked down in both directions because of an accident; at the vortex of the traffic jam was a twinkling of red and blue emergency lights.

Corbett swiveled in his seat and raised his voice to be heard over the rotors: "No offense, Sis, but I'd stick darning needles in my brain before I'd live in a place like this."

Later, as the pilot angled northward, Joey heard her brother gag in revulsion at the sight of western Broward County, where new subdivisions were erupting like cankers in all directions; thousands upon thousands of cookie-cutter houses, jammed together so tightly that it looked like you could jump from roof to roof for miles on end. Where there were no homes stood office parks, shopping plazas and enormous auto malls-acres and acres of Toyotas and Chryslers, cooking in the sun. Only a slender dirt levee separated the clamorous tide of humanity from the Everglades.

"At least they left a lake or two for the kids," Joey remarked. Mick shook his head sadly. "Rock pits," he informed her. "Hundreds of feet deep. That's where they dredged up the fill for the roads and houses."

"But what used to be out here? Before all this?" He pointed toward the other side of the levee. "That," he said. "The widest river in the world."

Corbett let out a sarcastic whoop. "I just saw a tree!" he cried. "I swear to God. A real tree!"

Before long, the sprawl gave way to wet saw grass prairies that undulated like flooded wheat in the brisk spring breeze. Except for an occasional airboat, gnat-sized specks on the tan landscape, there was no evidence of human occupation. Stranahan spotted three small deer bounding for the shelter of a tree island, and it occurred to Joey that- except for the occasional garbage-looting raccoon-these were the first truly wild animals that she'd seen since moving to Florida. She'd always been curious about the Everglades, but Chaz had refused to take her along on field trips, claiming it would violate the water district's rules. That he never spoke of the place, except to gripe about the snakes and the insects, was even more stunning to Joey now that she'd finally seen it for herself. How could Chaz-a biologist, for God's sake-not be dazzled?

Obviously, however, he wasn't. He had betrayed the wetlands as nonchalantly as he had betrayed Joey. He had sold out-this greedy swine she'd married-so that megatons of noxious crap could be pumped day and night into the glistening waters below. Maybe for someone as soulless as her husband it wasn't much of a reach, Joey thought, from killing a place to killing a person.

"Look out there," Stranahan said.

The other choppers had arrived, six in all, flying clockwise in concentric circles. It was quite a show. Joey turned to Corbett and said, "You've outdone yourself. This is fantastic!"

Chaz Perrone's yellow Hummer was hard to miss, even without the plume of dust trailing it down the levee. Stranahan handed Joey a pair of binoculars, through which she could see her husband's windblown head protruding from the driver's window and cocked toward the sky.

"He does not look overjoyed," she reported, drawing a gleeful cackle from her brother.

Their pilot was on the radio, double-checking the flight paths and altitudes of the other helicopters. A Cessna from the Palm Beach Sheriff's Office broke in, a Sergeant Robinson inquiring about all the chopper activity. The pilot of the baby-blue Bell replied that they were rehearsing an aerial chase for the new James Bond movie, a glamorous lie that produced the desired effect: The police Cessna banked sharply and drifted away. Authorities in South Florida were famously accommodating to the film industry, and had been known to shut down major freeways so that a teenaged vampire drag-racing scene could be shot and re-shot without artistic compromise.

When Chaz finally parked the Hummer and waded into the water, Joey insisted on buzzing him. It was Corbett, however, who persuaded the pilot to put the aircraft into a hover directly above his brother-in-law's hatless noggin. The helicopter stayed high enough that Chaz couldn't have seen who was aboard, but he didn't even try. It was amusing to watch him fumble with the water bottle while pretending not to notice the shadow of the chopper, or its earsplitting racket.

"That's enough," Joey called out, and the pilot pulled away.

They circled at a greater distance, alternating low sweeps with the other helicopters, until Chaz finished with the sample and sped off in the Humvee.

"What do you suppose he's thinking?" Corbett asked.

"Unhappy thoughts," Joey said.

Mick Stranahan laughed. "Wait until he sees the newspaper."

Later, after returning to the island, they all went fishing in the Whaler. Stranahan caught several nice yellowtails, which he fried Cuban-style for dinner. Afterward Corbett lit a cigar and Joey modeled the silk Michael Kors skirt that she'd purchased at the Galleria. Mick uncorked a bottle of Australian cabernet. The three of them sat together on the seawall and watched the sun go down, Strom parking his black brick of a head on Joey's lap.

"What should I say about you on Thursday?" Corbett asked. He was drafting his speech for the memorial service.

"You can say I was a kind and loving sister," Joey said.

"Aw, come on. We can do better than that."

Stranahan said, "Say she was a tiger. She never quit fighting."

Corbett beamed. "I like that."

"Say she was full of life and had a big heart."

"No, a dumb heart," Joey said.

"Not true." Mick touching her arm.

"I'll say you were idealistic," Corbett said.

Joey frowned. "Which is just another word for naive.''

"Then say she had great legs," Stranahan said.

"Well, why not?" Corbett chortled.

Joey covered her ears. "Stop it, both of you."

Corbett hadn't been able to line up a choir on short notice, so he'd settled for a trio of guitarists. "They do the folk Mass at the Catholic church in Lighthouse Point. The priest tells me they're pretty good."

Joey said, "What if Chaz doesn't show up?"

Corbett tipped up his red-blond chin and blew a wreath of smoke. "Oh, he'll be there. He knows how bad it would look if he didn't."

Stranahan agreed. "Right now he's scared to death of making a wrong move. He's got no choice but to play the grieving widower to the bitter end."

"God, I wish I could be there," Joey said.

Stranahan shot her a look. "Don't even think about it. You promised."

"But I could make myself up so that he'd never know it was me." Her brother said, "Joey, this isn't The Lucy Show. The man tried to murder you."

She was silent for a while, sipping her wine and stroking Strom's sleek neck. The sun dropped over the horizon and the sky over Bis-cayne Bay turned from gold to pink to purple. Joey wondered what her husband would wear to the service. Where he would sit. What he might say to her friends. Whether he would notice Rose in the first pew.

Of course be would notice Rose.

"Now, that was a first-class sunset," Corbett said, flicking his cigar into the water. The hiss roused the Doberman. Corbett whistled and the dog clambered to its feet.

Stranahan got up, too. "Let's go take another look at the video."

Corbett remarked that it had turned out surprisingly well, for having been shot in a single take. "You two have a future in television."

"Hey, I just thought of something." Joey rose, smoothing her skirt. "What if Chaz wants to say something at the memorial service? What if the jerk decides he's got to get up and make a speech?"

"Damn right he's making a speech," Corbett said. "I already left a message on his answering machine. Told him he's getting five minutes in the pulpit to make you sound like the saint you were. Told him it better be good."

Captain Gallo pointed at the jelly jars on Karl Rolvaag's desk and said, "Those are the worst-looking urine specimens I ever saw."

Rolvaag faked a chuckle, out of deference to rank. "It's just water."

"After passing through what-a diseased buffalo?"

"Water from the Everglades." The detective had meant to conceal the jars inside his desk, in order to avoid precisely this conversation. Normally, Gallo took a much longer lunch hour, but evidently his bimbo du jour had stood him up.

He peered disgustedly at the hazy contents of the jars. "Christ, there's bugs and crap floatin' around in there."

"You betcha," Rolvaag said.

"Can I ask what the hell it's doing out here?"

Unlike most of the other detectives, Rolvaag never felt comfortable lying to Captain Gallo's face, even when it was the eminently sensible thing to do. This time he gave it a try.

"It's for my snakes. There are too many chemicals in the water coming out of the tap," Rolvaag said. "All that fluoride and chlorine, it's not healthy for them."

"And that shit *»?" Gallo asked incredulously. "You're a head case, Karl, no offense. Who else do you know has pets that need swamp water and live rats?"

The detective shrugged. Telling Gallo the truth wouldn't have accomplished anything. He would have scoffed at Rolvaag's field trip as a waste of time, which it most definitely was not. Using Marta's map, Rolvaag had located by automobile a sampling site adjacent to Ham-mernut Farms. There he had waded barefoot into the cattails and filled three mason jars with water the color of root beer, which he'd delivered to a professor friend at Florida Atlantic University. Rolvaag's amateur samples had revealed illegal levels of suspended phosphorus at 317, 327 and 344 parts per billion, respectively. The figures contrasted dramatically with Dr. Charles Perrone's suspiciously consistent findings of only 9 ppb in the runoff from the vegetable fields.

Rolvaag did not share his own test results-or his damning conclusions-with Perrone's co-workers at the water district. While politely deflecting their questions, he'd gotten the distinct impression that none of them would be heartbroken to see Chaz dragged off in handcuffs. The detective had offered no details about his investigation, for it was possible that the scientist's fraudulent water charts were unrelated to the death of his wife. If Joey Perrone's last will and testament was authentic, Chaz might have killed her purely for the money. If the will was a forgery and Joey's inheritance was not an incentive, Chaz might have killed her for any one of a dozen pedestrian reasons that drove spouses to homicide.

Explaining the phosphorus scam would have brought either a blank stare or a skeptical snort from Captain Gallo, who'd have instantly pointed out the difficulty of selling such an arcane motive to a homicide jury. Nonetheless, the fact that Charles Perrone was faking the Everglades data was a valuable piece of information for Karl Rolvaag. It put the strange blackmail scheme into a more ominous context, considering what was at stake for Samuel Johnson Hammer-nut. Disclosure of his illicit arrangement with the biologist would be devastating, financially and politically. The pollution violations would draw hefty government fines, and bribing a state employee was a felony punishable by a hitch in prison. Even if Red Hammernut managed to escape conviction, the publicity alone would forever stain the reputation of his company. Rolvaag believed that the crusty tycoon would do whatever was necessary to protect himself from the blackmailer and also from Chaz Perrone, whose loyalty would evaporate as soon as the cell door slammed behind him.

When Gallo asked how the case was going, Rolvaag said, "Not so great. I'm getting mixed opinions on Mrs. Perrone's will. Her brother says it's a fake. Unfortunately, so does one of my two handwriting experts."

"Does that mean somebody's trying to set hubby up for a fall?"

"Possibly. Chaz hasn't got many admirers."

Rolvaag sneezed convulsively. It was one of those days when the captain had put on his cologne with a fire hose.

"Too bad about the will," Gallo said. "I thought we had our lucky break."

"Me, too."

"So you're finally ready to bag it?" Gallo asked hopefully.

"Unless something breaks loose, I don't know what else to do," Rolvaag said. In truth he knew exactly what to do: sit back and watch.

"No sense banging my head against the wall," he added.

"You gave it a helluva shot," Gallo said.

"Oh well."

"By the way, Karl, I got your paperwork on the resignation. I tore it up and threw it in the trash."

Rolvaag said, "That's all right. I made copies."

"Would you knock it off already?"

"I'm quitting, Captain. Seriously."

"For Edina, Minnesota? Leaving Florida?"

"Honestly, I can't wait."

Another dog, a toy poodle, had gone missing at Sawgrass Grove. Rolvaag had never heard of binge feeding by pythons, but he couldn't discount the possibility. Something seemed to be preying on his neighbors' pets, and his missing snakes were prime suspects. The detective planned to mail an anonymous check for one thousand dollars to each of the grieving couples, an act that would clear not only his conscience but also his bank account.

"You've got a bright future here," Gallo said.

Rolvaag tried not to appear amused.

"The man himself has taken notice of your good work," Gallo added in a confidential tone. The man being the sheriff.

"I thought he was ticked off about me interviewing Hammernut," Rolvaag said.

"Hell, no, Karl. He was just covering his ass is all. He's a big fan, trust me."

The detective did not for a moment suppose that the sheriff was a "fan," and he could barely summon the energy to act flattered.

Gallo said, "For Christ's sake, what have I gotta do to change your mind? And don't say 'Indict Charles Perrone.' "

Rolvaag smiled. "Don't worry."

The detective had accepted the fact that Perrone would never be charged with murdering his wife, even though he had most certainly pushed her off the cruise ship. What had saved Rolvaag from abject discouragement were the jars of cloudy liquid on his desk; swamp water salted with the harshest man-made fertilizers. That Chaz Perrone would betray a place as hallowed as the Everglades for money was proof of his congenital dishonesty, rancid morals and general worth-lessness. Yet while the discovery of the biologist's sleazy crime had confirmed Rolvaag's suspicions about the so-called scientist, it was more ironic than revelatory.

Because Charles Regis Perrone was doomed.

The detective had never been more sure of anything. After sifting every wisp of information that he'd gathered, Rolvaag realized that he needn't waste another minute trying to send Chaz Perrone to Death Row.

The man was already a goner. Toast.

He was arrogant and impulsive, and Samuel Johnson Hammernut was going to make him disappear. Even had Rolvaag wished to intercede, he would only be delaying the inevitable.

Chaz Perrone was, as his brother-in-law had observed, a hopeless fuckwit. If for a moment he feared that his fakery of the pollution data would be exposed, Perrone would immediately roll over and rat on Red Hammernut, meanwhile casting himself in the least felonious light. And who would foresee this scenario sooner or more clearly than the man who'd recruited the young biologist precisely for his craven-ness and casual mendacity? Red Hammernut could smell a butt fuck coming a mile away, and he'd never stand still for it.

Karl Rolvaag could now leave South Florida with a measure of peace, if not satisfaction. Chaz Perrone would never be prosecuted for killing his wife, but he would be punished.

All that remained to nag at the detective was a solitary loose end, something that had turned up on a routine inquiry to American Express. In the twelve days since Joey Perrone went overboard, somebody had used her credit card to rent a Chevrolet Suburban, and also to purchase women's shoes, makeup, designer sunglasses and numerous articles of fine clothing, including a two-piece Burberry swim-suit. Rolvaag didn't believe that Chaz Perrone was reckless enough (or tasteful enough) to embark on such a shopping spree, though it was possible that one of his female acquaintances had found and pocketed Joey's gold AmEx while visiting Chaz's house.

"I can't believe you're actually boxing up all your shit," Gallo was complaining, his knuckles planted on Rolvaag's desk. "I can't fucking believe you're going through with this."

The detective smiled apologetically. "I miss the snow," he said.

One more visit to West Boca Dunes Phase II. Then he could start loading the U-Haul.