Everglades Assault

On a September afternoon filled with saffron light and the smell of jasmine, I rode my ratty ten-speed bike through old Key West, then along Roosevelt Boulevard, and turned right down the dirt road, to Yarbrough’s Marina and Boat Service.

He had stayed on in the Everglades for a few days to comfort Myrtle and to talk to the law-enforcement boys. He had insisted that I have nothing to do with it; assured me that it would be a simple matter of answering questions and explaining just why there were four new corpses in south Florida and one man who had disappeared completely.

My blind lie to Mickey Rather that the feds were after him had hit the mark. They were—but we had beaten them to the punch.

So they called it self-defense and buried them and their files away. Myrtle, said Hervey, had at first been shocked by Billy Cougar’s murder, but then just relieved. She finally reasoned that he would have drunk himself to death anyway, and besides, it was time that Eisa had a proper father. And when the right man came along, she said, she would know. Until then, Johnny Egret’s third unmarried son had returned from Immokalee to comfort her....

So I hadn’t seen Hervey since he’d returned. And I hadn’t even bothered to call April—for reasons I couldn’t verbalize. I just knew it had something to do with her youth in conflict with my own lethal lifestyle.

I leaned my bike against one of the draping oaks in the yard by the board house. Chickens scratched and bickered in the sand, and the Chesapeake thumped his tail lazily at me from the shade and lifted his head, showing the bare racing-stripe scar between his eyes. He got to his feet, gave me two grudging licks, on the hand, then collapsed in the shade.

Hervey met me at the door. His wife, small and squat with her Indian good looks, smiled at me from the kitchen. But there was a nervousness to the smile—and then I noticed the nervousness in Hervey.

I looked at him strangely. “What’s wrong with you, Yarbrough? You look as if I just caught you stealing something.”

“Stealing—hah! That’s a good one, Dusky. Why don’t you and me jump into the boat and head on out to the reefs? Grab us a few lobster for dinner, what say? I got a spot out there none of them sporty divers know about—”

April came walking down the hall from her bedroom. I had never seen her so beautiful—or wearing a dress, for that matter. It was one of those prim cotton print things with a knee-length skirt that accented her figure and the black sheen of her hair. Her long legs seemed to glow within the stockings, and her perfect face held an odd pixyish smile.

She trailed the man along behind her, holding his hand. He was a frail, bookish-looking guy about my age. He wore a tweed jacket over an open sports shirt, and he had that maddening aloofness of the self-styled intellectual.

“Dusky, this is a friend of mine from the university, Professor Noel Watson. He’ll be staying with me for awhile. He’s doing research. Noel—this is Dusky. He’s an old friend of the family.”

We shook hands. First meetings can tell you much. He didn’t like me. I didn’t like him. I sat in the living room for as long as I could stand it, making small talk. At first, April seemed to enjoy the confrontation. But then I could see that it was hurting her, too, so I made my excuses and escaped outside, sucking in the fresh September air like an animal just out of captivity.

All the way back to the marina at Garrison Bight I swore at myself, called myself improbable names, suggested that I perform impossible acts upon my own person.

The phone booth in the marina parking lot gave me a flash of inspiration. The operator gave me the number of the Flamingo bar and restaurant. A woman with a smoker’s voice answered. Could she connect me with Stella Catharine Cross’s apartment?

Stella seemed happy to hear from me. At first. But then that same strange nervousness came into her voice.

I thanked her for the long-gone evening, agreed to her demands that I call again, and hung up.

They make the rounds of the bars, get drunk, and hunt for meteoric crossing of lust, willingness, and mutual boredom.

So I rode my bike dejectedly across the parking lot to the dock where Sniper was moored. Bored with swearing at myself, I whistled an aimless tune.

I looked up to see Steve Wise, dockmaster and Key West playboy. He had his hands stuffed in his pockets and an unusually forlorn look on his face.

He nodded over his shoulder. Behind him, aboard his chunky houseboat, the two Playmate twins seemed to be having a discussion. Or an argument. They wore thin bikinis that grabbed at the heart. Their chins were speared out at each other, their faces red. Suddenly, one of them held up a fierce middle finger—an unmistakable gesture. And, just as suddenly, the other grabbed a beach sandal and hurled it at her.

Steve sighed dejectedly. “No matter what those Mormons say, one man can’t please two women. Not at the same time, anyway.”

“Women! To hell with them.” He eyed my boat, a new look on his face. “Dusky, do you realize I haven’t booked you for a charter all week?”

“Five more long days. I can’t take it. God, I can’t get any sleep and I’m losing weight.”

“Then I think the two of us could make the Tortugas in a day—then take four days getting back.”