“No offense, sir, but by your coarse language I could tell it’s been awhile since you brought your soul to church. Here, please take the Word.”
Fry held his breath. Slowly his father drew the .45 and placed the barrel upon the florid tip of Brother Manuel’s nose.
“Manny,” Skinner said, “I got my own word: Semiautomatic.”
The leaflet fluttered from the moaner’s fingers. “Easy, dog,” he said.
“This is my church,” Skinner went on, “this island out here and all the others—so many islands that nobody’s counted ’em all. And the sky and the Gulf and the rivers that roll out of the ’glades, all of it’s my church. And you know what? God Almighty or whatever His name might be, I believe He’d approve.”
Fry said, “Come on. Let’s go find Mom.”
The boy was more worried than before. Learning of the gunshots plainly had set his father on edge, too.
“Manny, I’m gonna ask you a personal question and I expect an honest, upright Christian answer,” Skinner said. “You’re fornicatin’ with Sister Shirelle, aren’t you? You already baptized that young lady in your own special way, am I right? Told her to close her eyes and get down on her knees and wait for sweet salvation.”
Half-lit by the moon, Brother Manuel blinked once in slow motion, like an anemic tortoise.
“Thought so,” Skinner said. “Look—me and my son are gonna leave now, and you’re gonna go back to your people and boogie for Christ and forget you ever laid your sorry heathen eyes on me. Got it?” Skinner lowered the .45.
“Amen,” said the moaner and ran away, his white robe flapping like a shredded sail.
Eighteen
Boyd Shreave dreamed he was working at Relentless, phoning suckers at dinnertime. He was trying to sell residential lots on a sodded landfill in a future housing development called Lesion Hills. To the east was a pig farm and to the west was a dioxin factory; upwind, a crematorium. All unsavory details were perversely included in the telephone script, and elucidated with appalling candor to prospective customers.
It was a nightmare. Everyone whom Shreave called would insult him savagely then hang up. When he turned to commiserate with Eugenie Fonda, he was aghast to find her cubicle occupied by his wife, who menaced him crudely with a Taser. And the dream got worse: Shreave neglected to observe that the last number on his call sheet belonged to one D. Landry, a disaster compounded by his failure to recognize his own mother’s voice until he was midway through the sales pitch, when he heard a string of witheringly familiar debasements that culminated with the phrase “worthless pile of muskrat shit.”
Shreave awoke in a sweat. He remembered where he was, though it gave him no comfort. His wristwatch showed 3:46 a.m. He called out Genie’s name but didn’t get a response. With larval contortions he shed his sleeping bag.
The stars were gold and the temperature was falling and the campfire was dead. In such a setting it seemed reasonable for a man to seek a snuggle with his girlfriend. Through the shadows Shreave crawled toward the tent that held Eugenie, only to find it empty.
“She hit the bricks,” Honey Santana said, startling him.
“Not funny.”
Honey’s head popped out of the other tent. “She ran off with an Indian. I peeked.”
“You can do better than that,” said Shreave.
“Some big Indian with a gun. I know what I saw.”
“Just tell me where she is.”
Honey said, “This is hopeless,” and closed the flap.
Shreave shouted for Genie again and again. He grabbed his flashlight and went stomping into the trees, a decision quickly reconsidered and reversed. Angrily he stood outside Honey’s tent and commanded her to reveal what had really happened.
“I told you already,” she said.
Shreave foolishly reached inside, snatched the end of the sleeping bag and attempted to shake her out. Honey’s second kick landed flush on his chin, causing him to buckle. Through a starburst of pain he fumbled to realign his lower jaw with the rest of his face.
She said, “I’m nominating you for the Dickhead Hall of Fame. Seriously.”
Once again, assertiveness had brought pain and indignity to Shreave. It seemed doubtful that he’d ever transform himself into the sort of physical beast that aroused women such as Eugenie Fonda. His only consolation was that she hadn’t been there to witness him getting kicked in the kisser.
“This is all on you,” he whined at Honey, “for scamming us into this trip. It’s your fault she got kidnapped.”
“Kidnapped? That Indian was ripping off our supplies when your girlfriend begged to sneak away with him. She practically offered to ball him on the spot.”
“Liar!”
“She moves fast, Boyd.” Honey emerged from her tent and started to build a new fire. “I pretended to snore so he’d think I was sleeping.”
“Why the hell didn’t you do something?”
“Gosh, I don’t know. Because he was holding a rifle?” She set a match to the tinder and watched it flare. “Anyway, we’re alone now, so let’s have a talk.”
“What about?”
“You,” Honey said.
The subject appealed immensely to Shreave.
“Tell me an enthralling life story,” she said, “so I can understand you better.”
“Not a problem.” Shreave misread her interest in the predictable way. His jaw was throbbing but if she wanted to talk, he’d talk. Whatever floated her boat.
Honey said, “First, you should get up off your knees—no, never mind. That’ll work.”
Turning away, she opened the remaining duffel and removed some items out of Shreave’s sight. She asked him to shut his eyes and, idiotically, he complied. His dismay over Eugenie’s defection was rapidly evaporating at the prospect of intimacy with another handsome woman, even if she happened to be wacko.
The campfire was blazing again. The heat felt good on Shreave’s face. He heard Honey stepping across the broken oyster shells and then moving about the bushes. He hoped that she’d snuck off to get undressed.
Moments later she was standing behind him, whispering: “Give me your hands, Boyd.”
He was delighted to oblige. She smelled wonderful, and he noticed he was getting hard—a marvelous development in the wake of the stun-gun accident. Not even the sound of duct tape being ripped from a roll crimped Shreave’s rising anticipation.
When he turned to peek, Honey thumped him smartly on the head. Thinking only of his erection and the daring ways it might be gratified, he obediently remained motionless while she taped his wrists and ankles behind him. Then something as light as a lei, though more coarsely textured, settled around his neck.
“Don’t dare move,” Honey said.
Again she slipped away. Soon there was a slight noise behind him.
“What’re you up to now?” Those were Shreave’s final words before the rope drew snug around his throat.
His eyes popped open and Honey reappeared, divinely backlit by the fire glow. Shreave was disappointed to observe that she was fully clothed. She informed him that he was attached to a noose looped over a poinciana bough. If he attempted to pull free, she said, the slipknot at the base of his neck would come tight and possibly strangle him.
Shreave believed her, although he clung like an ape to his carnal ambitions. He’d watched a cable documentary about asphyxiating sexual practices, and he speculated that Honey was seeking to initiate him. Spurred by Eugenie’s drop-of-a-hat betrayal, he’d decided to let himself be seduced no matter what the dangers might be.
Honey said, “Sorry about this contraption, but you already assaulted me twice.”
Shreave grunted an objection but said nothing. He feared that even the smallest muscle twitch required for speech might cause the rope to cinch down a crucial millimeter or two.
“Go ahead and talk. It’s really not that tight,” Honey said.
Kneeling ramrod-straight, he wheezed, “I didn’t ‘assault’ you
, I just tackled you.”
“You’d be in jail if you tried that on Biscayne Boulevard.”
“And that business with the sleeping bag, I’m the one who got hurt!”
“The veins in your neck are bulging.”
“Whatever. Can we hurry up and get on with this?”
“Certainly, Boyd.”
“Well…? You gonna strip me or spank me, or what?”
Honey looked perplexed. “It hadn’t crossed my mind.”
“Oh, come on.”
She shrugged. Gloomily Shreave realized she was telling the truth.
“Goddammit,” he said. It was impossible to envision a brute like Van Bonneville being tricked and tied up by a deranged single mom.
Honey sat cross-legged by the fire and brushed her hair; short, emphatic strokes. “What’d you do before you became a telephone solicitor?” she asked.
“Sales.”
“What did you sell?”
“My knees hurt.”
For padding, Honey folded a woolen blanket and scrunched it beneath him.
“So, what did you sell?” she asked again.
“The usual shit,” he muttered.
“Tell me all about it.”
“Genie’s in on this, isn’t she? You and her cooked up this sick little scene just for giggles.”
Honey laughed. “You think very highly of yourself, Boyd. I’m sure Genie’s got bigger fish to fry.”
He felt his ears get hot.
“Ever sell cars?” she asked.
“Sure. Buicks and Saabs.”
“What else?”
“TV sets,” he said. “Pet supplies. Orthotics.”
“Oh my God, that’s a riot!”
She has a great smile, Shreave thought bitterly, for a psycho. “I’m glad one of us is having fun,” he said.
Honey scooted closer. She repositioned the rope above his Adam’s apple and smoothed the collar of his ripening Tommy Bahama shirt.
“Don’t worry, there’s a point to all this,” she told him.
“I can’t wait.”
What are the odds? he wondered. One sales call out of thousands—and some crazed bitch freaks out, tracks me down, lures me into a swamp and makes me her prisoner.
“You have kids?” Honey asked.
“Not me. Not for all the gold in Fort Knox.”
“Being a parent is no picnic, that’s for sure. Good luck trying to raise a kid with a positive outlook. Face it, we live in a stinking shit-wash of cruelty and greed and rotten manners. Look at you, Boyd. You’re a classic specimen.”
“Not this again,” he sighed.
“Yes, this again! My one and only son is growing up in a culture where the values are so warped that a creep like yourself can masquerade as a respectable citizen.”
Shreave bridled and said, “I never hurt anybody.”
“So, talk to me. Help me figure out what makes your engine run,” Honey said.
“First let’s go look for Genie. What if she’s in trouble?”
“We’re all in trouble, Boyd. For heaven’s sake, don’t you read the papers—”
They were interrupted by a single gunshot, the brittle echo soaring away on the wind. A scream followed.
Honey jumped up. “That’s not poachers. It’s the Indian, I bet.”
And away she ran, Shreave hollering after her: “Don’t leave me here! Don’t you fucking leave me all alone!”
In his agitation he toppled sideways, the rope rubbing into the loose folds of his neck. It hurt, yet he seemed able to breathe without difficulty.
Until a voice at the edge of the shadows hissed, “Don’t be scared, asswipe. You ain’t alone.”
Sammy Tigertail ordered his latest voluntary hostage to sit with Gillian and the white man who might or might not be a death spirit. The Indian kept for himself one jug of water and two power bars, and he strictly rationed to the others what remained in the stolen duffel bag. He hadn’t meant to take all the kayakers’ food, but there had been no time to sort the contents.
Alone he receded to the far end of the clearing and hunkered down with the Gibson. He was struggling to pick out the opening notes of “Tunnel of Love” when his spectral nemesis, Wilson, lurched out of the woods. It was the first time that the deceased tourist had appeared while Sammy Tigertail was wide awake, and it caught the young Seminole off guard. He’d been hoping that he had seen the last of the carping corpse.
Wilson looked worse than ever. His sodden clothing was rotting to rags, and the scavengers had made a grisly patchwork of his flesh.
“I asked you to move my body somewhere warm,” he said reproachfully.
“Beat it,” said the Indian.
“That goddamn river is colder than a witch’s titty. And look here what the crabs and snappers did—” Wilson displayed the most gruesome of his recent mutilations. “It’s lonely out there, man.”
“I can’t help you.” Sammy Tigertail had never felt so low. He was failing as a hermit, and failing as the great-great-great-grandson of a Seminole chief. His mission to isolate himself from the corrupt white world had backfired completely; he was now besieged by white people, dead and alive. He’d even kissed one.
“Nice ax.” Wilson nodded admiringly toward the guitar.
“Don’t touch.”
“Can you play ‘Folsom Prison Blues’?”
“Never heard of it.” Sammy Tigertail thought a jolt of pain might expunge the nagging apparition, so he scratched his own forehead with the broken oyster shell that he’d been using for a pick.
The dead tourist did not disappear. “That was really stupid. Now you’re bleeding,” he said. “Actually, I’m jealous.”
“Hey, don’t blame me ’cause your heart gave out. Maybe you should’ve laid off the booze and french fries.” Sammy Tigertail felt a tickle of warmth roll down his nose.
Wilson said, “What about Garth Brooks? You know his stuff, right? I’ll sing one, so you can figure out the chords.”
“I wish you wouldn’t,” said the Indian.
Wilson waved him off and began crooning mercilessly about a girl in Louisiana. The lyrics made Sammy Tigertail remember the way he’d felt after his first night with Cindy, before learning of her problems with homemade methamphetamines, check kiting and serial infidelity. He expected he would be no less smitten by Gillian once he slept with her, and no less shattered when her true dysfunctional self emerged. Each new verse of the country song deepened the Indian’s melancholy.
When the white man finished, he said, “Well—can you play it?”
Sammy Tigertail noticed that blood from his self-inflicted laceration was dripping onto the neck of the Gibson. He hurriedly wiped off the frets and braced the instrument upright between his knees. Then he reached for his rifle.
Wilson chuckled. “Don’t waste your bullets, bro.”
With one arm the Seminole aimed the barrel at Wilson’s algae-bearded face. “Worth a try,” he grumbled, and squeezed the trigger.
Wilson didn’t flinch, but on the other side of the clearing one of the women hostages shrieked. Sammy Tigertail felt sick.
“Now you done it,” said the dead tourist, dissolving to fog.
For Dealey, dawn couldn’t come soon enough. After the Seminole had shown up with Boyd Shreave’s girlfriend, Gillian promptly had ratted out the private investigator.
Eugenie Fonda confronted him as if he were a common restroom peeper: “This is for real? Boyd’s wife is paying you to spy on me and him?”
“And take dirty movies,” Gillian interjected helpfully.
“Pitiful.”
Dealey said, “It’s my job. No lectures, please.”
They were sitting in a semicircle sharing dried pineapple chunks and passing a jug of water. Sammy Tigertail sat off by himself, morosely picking at his guitar. There was a consensus that he ought to be left unbothered.
“That’s some scummy job you’ve got,” Eugenie said to Dealey.
“The truth can be scummy
merchandise, Miss Fonda. Which, by the way, is a totally bogus name. Your real one is Hill.”
Eugenie nipped her lower lip. “I suppose I should be impressed.”
“Believe me,” Dealey said, “I wish I hadn’t touched this goddamn case—I’ve never run up against so many card-carryin’ fruit-balls in all my life.”
Gillian said, “Tell her how much the guy’s old lady was gonna pay for the money shot! Go on, Lester, she won’t believe it.”
“My name’s not Lester.”
“The what shot?” Eugenie asked.
“Mrs. Shreave happens to be a kink,” Dealey said. “I got all the stills and video she’d ever need, but she wanted more.”
“Needed for what—a divorce? Oh please,” Eugenie said.
Dealey raised his hands. “Why do you think wives hire me?”
Gillian couldn’t restrain herself. “Twenty-five thousand bucks! That’s what she was gonna pay for a triple-X shot of you and your boyfriend. That’s why Lester came all this way.”
“Twenty-five grand?” Eugenie had to laugh.
Dealey said, “For what it’s worth, nobody’s seen the other tapes or pictures except me and my client.”
Which was untrue. However, Dealey felt no need to enlighten Eugenie about the on-line popularity of her stellar blow job at the delicatessen. After all, he’d scrupulously doctored the photograph to obscure her face.
He was surprised to hear her say, “Show me what you got, Lester. I’m curious.”
Gillian piped up eagerly, “Me too. Let’s see.”
“Sorry. It’s all in a lockbox back in Fort Worth.” The investigator thought: What is it with these women?
Gillian colorfully shared the tale of her sorority sister turning up on a Girls Gone Wild video, then she asked Dealey, “What’s the all-time freakiest thing you ever got on tape?”
“That’s easy,” he said. “Threesome in River Oaks—the two guys wore Road Runner masks and the woman was Wile E. Coyote.”
Gillian clapped. “Tell me you didn’t make copies of that one!”
Eugenie steered the conversation back to Lily Shreave’s twenty-five-thousand-dollar offer. “Now, what exactly did she want you to get?”
“The impossible,” Dealey said.