Night Moves (Doc Ford)

11




MACK, WHO OWNS THE MARINA, INTERCEPTED ME near the gate, warning, “You’ve got to do something about your dog! Anybody else, I would have called Animal Control. Or the Marine Patrol. Where’ve you been?”

I was shouldering my backpack, a quart of cold beer still unopened in my free hand. “Marine cops?” I joked. “What’d he do, Mack, steal a boat?”

My smile vanished when the man replied, “No—three of them! Two kayaks and Stu Johnson’s Whaler. He was chewing the lines on a Donzi when we caught the bugger or it would’ve been four.”

I was confused. “From the water? The boats drifted off—”

“No! He chewed through the lines and swam them back to your lab! We can’t have it, Doc. My clients pay good money for slippage. Just because he’s your dog doesn’t mean he can nick any boat he fancies. Mooring line’s expensive.”

I was surprised. The behavior didn’t mesh with the well-trained retriever I’d left on the porch. I placed my bag on the ground and held up the quart of beer, asking, “Want a glass? Come inside and calm down while you tell me about it.”

Mack shook his head, and said, “Jesus, what a day!”

Mack is Graeme MacKinley, a New Zealander who sailed to the States years ago, and took the big step. He bought controlling interest in a marina. Like many immigrants who’ve prospered, he’s wildly patriotic but also a raging libertarian who despises government interference. But he’s not the type to rage at me, or any other local, unless there is good reason.

“He’s not my dog,” I heard myself say, trying to picture what had happened. “You say he swam the boats back to my place? With his teeth?”

“The kayaks, he pulled them up next to your gate. But the Whaler was too heavy, I guess. God knows where he’d’ve ended up with a thirty-foot Donzi. The bugger did it all from under the docks. That’s why we didn’t see him.”

Mack isn’t one to exaggerate, so it must have been true. “We’ll find the dog’s owner,” I told him. “My guess is, there’s a reward. A big one possibly. The money’s yours, would that make you feel better? Until then, I’ll pay for the damage.”

The man sighed and patted his pockets, looking for a fresh cigar. He’s a wide-bodied, bighearted man, but he loves money and is not ashamed to admit it. My offer softened him. “The kayaks, no worries about those. They’re rentals. But the Whaler and the Donzi, I should replace all the lines so they match. Doesn’t hurt to be classy. You know, have the moorings in Bristol shape before I have to explain to the owners.”

I said, “Tell me how much, I’ll write a check.” Then, because I know Mack well, suggested, “Or would cash be better?”

That softened the man even more. “Oh hell, Doc, it’s not that big a deal. I shouldn’t dump on you, but the crazies were out today. A woman bought a pound of squid for the pelicans—never mind the damn Don’t Feed the Birds signs—then went screaming off the dock, about thirty pelicans chasing her. Probably end up with a lawsuit because of all the barnacle cuts on her legs. And I had to send Jeth to pull another rental boat off the beach—it was swamped, of course—then . . . then the lady I’ve been seeing calls and cancels dinner. Which I’d been looking forward to all bloody day.” Mack sighed and lit his cigar, suddenly uncomfortable.

Sunday is always the busiest day of the week at the marina, a crush of vacationers in a rush to have fun. That wasn’t the real problem, though. So I took a guess about one of the ladies aboard Tiger Lilly and asked, “How is Rhonda doing?”

Mack’s no actor, but he did a decent job of appearing confused. Midway through an intricate lie, though, he paused, disgusted with himself, and said, “Awww, hell with it. Are you the only one who knows?”

I shrugged, “Probably. JoAnn doesn’t, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“She suspect?”

“No. She would have told me.”

“I’m a fool,” Mack said, “a bloody fool. But I’ve always had a soft spot for Rhonda. And she’s been having a tough go of it lately. Hormone issues—happens to a lot of them, she says.”

I offered the unopened beer again, saying, “Why not come inside and talk.”

The man thought about it a moment, pushed the straw hat back on his head, then redacted his confession and our exchange. “When we finally got your dog out of the water, a woman offered to help, so I let her take him. A Mrs. Arturo—lives on the beach, third house down from the Island Inn? That’s what I really came to tell you.”

I looked at Mack and nodded, “If that’s the way you want it,” meaning his relationship with Rhonda was not to be discussed.

“She said she’s a friend of yours. Damn striking woman, you ask me.” Then Mack sealed our bargain, and turned the tables. “You know, local gossip has it that someone’s trying to kill you or Tomlinson, or both. Maybe a jealous husband. I know it’s not true, of course, or cops would be all over the place asking questions. Boat people love to talk.”

“Yes, they do,” I replied.

“But a rumor like that makes the locals nervous. No one wants to get caught in the crosshairs of another man’s trouble. Not that we wouldn’t stand up for you if it’s true.”

I said, “Tomlinson gets in these moods and he thinks everyone’s out to get him. He’s probably the one started it.”

The man nodded and pretended to be convinced. “That’s what I figured. Plus, you would have gone straight to the police.” After a beat he added, “Right?”

“Someone’s trying to kill you, it would be stupid not to,” I replied.

No . . . he wasn’t buying it. I’ve lived next to the marina too long, and this wasn’t the first unsettling rumor that had made the rounds about me. Even so, he said, “Good. I was almost convinced that’s why you asked Jeth about that Stiletto. You know—worried about some jealous husband spying.”

“Just curious,” I said. “JoAnn said she’s never seen the owner.”

“Nothing mysterious about that. A hired captain brought her in one night, and the owner made all the arrangements online. Some corporate secretary, anyway. Paid by wire transfer. That’s not the only boat new to A-Dock. That big Lamberti? Probably a million-dollar yacht, but no one’s said a word about it. The owner’s Brazilian and he paid the first week cash. In euros. The guy’s a jogger, you haven’t seen him? Runs every morning.”

I made a mental note to have a look at the Lamberti but stuck with the subject of the Stiletto. “It’s probably all that carbon fiber that makes people suspicious. Tinted windows, a black hull. What’s the name of the corporation?”

Mack blew a cloud of smoke toward the sunset sky, pleased he had finally confirmed the rumor was true. “I’ll find out what I can and let you know. Can’t have the marina’s most respected citizens bullied by some jealous tycoon, now can we?” He turned to go but then stopped. “By the way, where did you and Tomlinson disappear to today?”

Less than a minute into my cover explanation, the marina owner checked his watch to keep from yawning. “Doing a fish count in Lostman’s River,” he said. “Love to hear about it—but later, Doc. Okay?”

—

I WAS IN THE WATER, opening the gate of the stingray pen, when my cell phone beeped. When I looked I saw that I’d missed two calls, not one. Mrs. Crescent Arturo and my new workout partner, Hannah Smith, had dialed simultaneously—a coincidence I wouldn’t risk sharing with Tomlinson.

Hannah, I wanted to speak with. No doubt she had stopped to tend to the dog, as I’d requested, but had found the dog missing. This after driving her fast little flats boat from across the bay to help, so I owed the woman an explanation.

It wasn’t just about courtesy, though. Hannah is one of the rare independent ones, tall and confident in the way she moves, but also guarded at times—a private woman who protects personal boundaries or, less likely, who is aware of some inner frailty that she keeps hidden from outsiders. She is complex, like all interesting people, and I was just getting to know her. For now, we interacted on the most basic of levels. Hannah was a superb fly fisherman with a good laugh and among the few willing to swim a quarter mile along the beach after a three-mile run with me.

Cressa Arturo, I had to speak with. I’d enjoyed parts of our evening together, but now I was obligated. She’d rescued the dog from Mack’s wrath, and my mental image of her elegant beach house didn’t include paw prints and room for a rangy, sodden, oily-coated retriever.

Even so, both would have to wait. After opening one side of the pen, I sloshed my way to the back of the netting, then stomped around until the female stingray spooked in a jet stream of silt. Her wake left the five immature rays rocking like drunken birds, so I stepped into the pen and shooed them carefully, very carefully, toward the opening. My lone stingray wound had come from a ray no bigger than a plate. If body size was in any way proportionate to the amount of poison and pain inflicted, god help the poor bastard who stepped on a big one. The pain is so intense that the Maya used fresh stingray barbs to induce trances and also to prolong the agony of human sacrifices. It’s because the barb is a saw-blade of spines composed of vasodentin, a substance harder than bone, and each spine is grooved to transport venom-secreting cells when the barb is plunged into a victim. As long as the spine remains in the flesh, the venom continues to flow. Among Mayan ruins in Guatemala, I’d seen stone carvings of stingray barbs protruding from the hearts and necks of tormented priests and contorting victims. Damn right, I was being careful!

Sissified—if someone was watching, that’s how they might have described my careful use of feet and hands. I didn’t care. Soon the family of six had disbanded, each stingray flying its separate way, all singular links in an ancient chain, indifferent to everything but survival.

Then I headed upstairs to clean up before returning calls and tending to lab specimens. Later, I would decide on dinner.

—

MY HOUSE IS ACTUALLY two small houses on a platform, both perched above the water on stilts. It’s an old place built to store ice and fish in the days before refrigeration, so it has an outdoor shower fed by a cistern that collects rain from the roof. I was just finishing beneath the shower, the bottle of cold beer finally open, when my phone beeped again.

Hannah Smith.

So I wrapped a towel around my waist and answered, “I owe you dinner. Name the place, and I’ll explain why the dog wasn’t here.”

Southern women who are natural contraltos have an edge when their tone turns icy. “Why, bless your little heart,” I heard in reply. “Aren’t you the sweetest man ever? No wonder you’re so popular with the ladies.”

I cleared my throat and said, “Uhhh . . . did I do something wrong?”

“Not the first little thing. I’m just calling to make sure that bad memory of yours didn’t put you on a plane to Alaska. Or wandered off in some supermarket and locked yourself in a freezer. A man gets a certain age and—well, I don’t much care for the term feebleminded. And senile is such an ugly word—”

I interrupted, “I would have called and saved you the trip, but I didn’t know the dog was gone. It has nothing to do with my memory—”

“Well, the important thing is, you’re okay,” Hannah breezed along. “At a certain point, a middle-aged man, he starts doing things that are sorta clumsy. Like walking into walls or, you know, that cause him to look just plain dumb and thoughtless. A Christian girl has a duty to check on a person like that or I wouldn’t’ve risked interrupting your nap.”

“Hannah,” I said, “you’ve made your point. Only thing missing now is the part where you tell me what you’re talking about.”

The woman’s tone returned to normal, but more business-like than friendly. “So I finish up my six-hour charter. I drop my clients at Boca Grande, then run like crazy ’cross the backcountry to tend to your dog, just like I promised. And what do I find?”

My brain had raced ahead in search of a scenario that could cause upset, which is why, just in time, the image of Cressa Arturo surprising Hannah popped into my mind. Two women meet unexpectedly in a small house. My house.

“I can explain that,” I said.

“There’s no need, Marion. We’re friends. It’s okay.” Hannah’s sudden sincerity only caused me to feel worse when she added, “We’re fishing pals and swim buddies. I understand that. What I don’t understand is why a woman I’ve never met—a girlfriend you’ve never even mentioned—would talk that way right to my face.”

I dreaded the answer but had to ask, “What did she say?”

“I don’t use rude language as a habit. You know that.”

“We’re both adults,” I replied. “And she’s not my girlfriend.”

“It’s not the sort of thing I’d repeat. What kind of parents would name a girl Crescent, anyway? Flower children, is that what you used to call them? Probably where she learned it was okay to use raw talk.”

I said, “Hannah?”

“Okay! ‘Doc only picks workout partners he wouldn’t screw.’ That’s what the woman said! But didn’t say ‘screw,’ if that’s plain enough. So it made sense to her—after looking me over—that you partnered up with a woman not nearly as pretty as her. Is it true you talked that way about me?”

“No,” I replied. “Not to her, not to anyone.”

To mask the hurt, the woman added, “My lord, as if I’d even think about hopping into bed with a man who dates married women! Just because she’s rich and owns a beach house? It’s not my place to judge, but there’s some who consider stealing another man’s wife to be shabby behavior.”

Hannah’s gambit of using pride as a mask was even more upsetting. I was thinking, Tomlinson did this! He had dredged up some throwaway line I’d used months ago, probably after a few beers: I’m not going to lose another workout partner to the bedroom. Then he had blabbed it to Cressa Arturo, oblivious to the possibility of her storing it away to use later if needed.

I said, “The woman had no right to be in my house, Hannah, let alone confront you. I have no idea why she’d say something so mean.”

“You don’t remember asking her to check on your dog?”

“Absolutely not. I barely know the woman! And she knows even less about me.”

In a very different tone, Hannah said, “Please don’t lie to me, Marion, or I will get mad.”

Once again my brain raced ahead, and I pictured the married mistress moving around my house like she owned the place, already familiar with every drawer and cupboard. So that’s how she had played it. Hannah was the unwelcomed outsider, Cressa a member of the Ford and Tomlinson inner circle. No one in their right mind would believe that Cressa Arturo and I weren’t close after finding her alone in my house.

What to do?

Beyond the porch, fragments of a winter sunset told me it would be dark soon, but the moon, almost full, would be up in an hour. Perfect night, cool and calm, to travel by boat. I’d had a long day, but it was only six-thirty. Plenty of time to retrieve the retriever, say a sharp word to the married mistress, then win back Hannah’s respect over dinner. But at what risk?

The truth was, Hannah Smith scared me—scared the bachelor in me, anyway. She is not the type to share her favors, or even confidences, without first establishing a relationship based on trust. With the few Hannahs that exist in this world, a date was not just a date, secrets were not just secrets, and bed was a hell of a lot more than a recreational trampoline.

No . . . I was walking a fine line. I had already lied to her more than once—most recently about my trip to “Tampa” and the bite wound on my arm. My god, deception wasn’t just a tool in my life, deception was my profession, and I had no right to lead someone like Hannah on. Yet, now this good woman with the solid laugh, and her gift for honesty, was warning me not to lie again and she meant it. Had in fact, I sensed, come very close to hanging up on me.

So I said, “I only met her last night for the first time and she’s Tomlinson’s friend, not mine. And I did tell Tomlinson once that I didn’t like losing workout partners to the bedroom, but it wasn’t about you. He must have mentioned it to her, anyway, and she decided to use it. I don’t know why, Hannah. I’m sorry.”

There was a long silence. Finally, the woman said, “Thanks.”

“I really am,” I told her.

“I can tell . . . or we wouldn’t be talking.”

Yes, she had come damn close to hanging up. For Hannah, there would’ve been no going back. The relief I felt was unexpected. Way out of proportion to saving what, until now, I had considered to be an interesting, peripheral friendship. So I prattled, “I just got out of the shower. I’m out here walking around in a towel, so I skipped the truth to hurry the conversation along. Stupid. I feel like an ass.”

“We’ve all got one. Sooner or later, we show it,” was the reply.

I laughed. Probably overdid it, because Hannah quickly amended, “That didn’t come out right. I wasn’t hinting around about . . . Not that I’m a prude, because I’m not!”

“If you are, who cares?” I said. “How about a run and a short swim tomorrow. Around sunset?”

For some reason, that prompted another thoughtful pause before I heard, “You don’t care, huh? I guess that’s a good thing.”

“Sure it is. Your personal life is none of my business.”

“But I’m not a prude. Just careful when it comes to men—unless I was actually interested in someone.”

“If you say so. Point is, it doesn’t matter. Not to me, it doesn’t.”

“I see,” she replied, then thought about it some more before telling me, “I don’t make friends easily, Marion. Wish I could. That’s one of the things I admire about you. If you don’t mind, though, let’s take a week or two off. I understand the way things are now. By then maybe I’ll feel like running.”

End of conversation.

I stood there mystified, phone in my pocket, wondering what new blunder I had committed. I walked a few feet, then stared at the dog’s empty food bowl. Then a few feet more and my eyes found the empty bench that was the cat’s favorite spot to doze in the sun. A black cat gathers heat like an oven on winter mornings, so Crunch & Des had been as warm to the touch as freshly baked bread.

I berated myself: You live alone by choice, Ford—THEIR choice, every woman you’ve ever met.

Then Mack’s voice came into my head: I’m a fool, a bloody fool.

No shit, Sherlock! Six words that summarized the regrets and dumb behavior of every male who has survived the slippery trip through the womb and then stumbled through life.

I went into the house where I changed, then continued to wallow in self-pity as I did the grunt work required of an aquarist. Three times the phone rang and I ignored it—Cressa Arturo was pissed, apparently, because I had yet to appear. Good.

But not a word from Hannah Smith.

Can you blame her?

When the phone beeped a fourth time, I looked and read a text. Bernie Yeager wanted to make contact via military SATCOM. That, at least, presented an opportunity to think about something else. So I dried my hands, hung my lab apron on a hook, and called.

—

FIFTEEN MINUTES WE TALKED, Bernie doing most of it while I made cryptic notes. He didn’t have all the information I’d requested, but enough to snap me out of my piteous mood. My wise old friend also grounded me with an axiom I had jotted in a notebook and shared with him long ago:

The fact that unexplained elements are noted within a similar time frame while in the field does not guarantee those elements are linked or are even significant.

He was referring to the jumble of unknowns I’d dumped on him: a strange boat, missing planes, a married mistress, and a filmmaker who seemed to have ulterior motives.

“Focus,” Bernie told me after he’d shared what he’d uncovered. “You don’t have to be a botanist to cut down a tree.”

The homespun aphorism wasn’t an exact fit, but close enough to get his point across. And by the time we signed off, I was focused, fully in the moment, even though there were plenty of blanks unfilled.

The hunter is being hunted, Tomlinson had told me. That’s your drug of choice.

Apparently so, because the buzz of elevated awareness returned. I switched off lights in the lab, slipped a tiny semiauto pistol into my pocket—a .32 caliber Seecamp stainless—then headed for the door. I lived alone—so what? Their choice, my choice—either way, traveling life single was the least cluttered of vehicles. More maneuverable, life was cut closer to the bone.

As I closed the walkway gate, I was trying to convince myself. The less baggage, the less chance of leaving something behind.