Ron Base - Tree Callister 04 - The Two Sanibel Sunset Detectives

by Ron Base

“I mean, I don’t even like soup all that much. And what’s so good about soup that, despite everything, you go ahead and make it, anyway? Maybe we can find out, Tree. Do you suppose we can?”

  “Ryde, where are the kids?” Tree demanded.

  Instead of answering, Ryde produced a faint smile and settled back against the pillows. He closed his eyes.

  “Ryde?” Tree said.

  The wounded man began to breathe softly, asleep again.

  _________

  Every so often Ryde shifted in the bed, producing a snore, but otherwise he remained fast asleep. A pretty young nurse entered the room. She checked the plasma bag and then did something with the LCD screen monitoring Ryde’s heart and blood pressure.

  Tree introduced himself. The young nurse said her name was Lindsay. She asked if Tree was a relative. Tree said he was in charge of Mr. Bodie’s security. Nurse Lindsay looked at him curiously and then said Ryde was the first patient she’d had requiring security. “You don’t have a gun or anything like that, do you?”

  “I provide security without a gun,” Tree said.

  “That’s good,” Nurse Lindsay said. “Guns make me very nervous.”

  “Me, too,” Tree said.

  Nurse Lindsay said, “I don’t mean any offense, but aren’t you a little old to be doing this sort of thing?”

  “You mean sitting here?”

  “Providing security. What if something should happen?”

  “I sit here hoping nothing will happen,” Tree said.

  Nurse Lindsay gave him one more dubious look before exiting with a crisp swish of starched efficiency.

  About five o’clock, Tree grew tired of being a bodyguard and decided to stretch his legs. There was no sign of Lindsay, but another nurse directed him to the cafeteria. He shared the elevator with an old man on a gurney, attended to by a hulking male nurse in green hospital scrubs. “This would be a great place if it wasn’t for the sick people,” the old man said to the hulking nurse. The nurse just stared at him. The old man looked at Tree. “What do you think?” he asked.

  “It gives the place charm,” Tree said.

  “Maybe you’re right,” the old man said.

  Tree bought a smoothie in the cafeteria. He saw Nurse Lindsay sitting with three or four other nurses and a couple of young doctors in white hospital coats. He waved at her. She looked at him and gave a vague wave back. He was leaving the cafeteria when his cellphone rang. Freddie said, “Hi. Where are you?”

  “I’m at the hospital with Ryde Bodie.”

  “What are you doing there?”

  “I’m providing security,” Tree said.

  “For Ryde?”

  “That’s right.” Did he sound defensive when he said this?

  “Shouldn’t the police be doing that?”

  “Well, they’re not.”

  “Listen to me, my love. You almost got yourself killed. If someone comes for him again, what in the world could you ever do, except maybe end up dead this time?”

  “You’re the second person in the last few minutes to question my ability to protect a client.”

  “This is something for the police,” Freddie said.

  “There are no police, there’s only me,” Tree said. “I may not be much, but right now, I’m all he’s got.”

  “I know I waste my breath when I say this, but please, be careful.”

  “Call me Careful Callister,” Tree said.

  “That’ll be the day,” Freddie replied, and hung up.

  Tree took the elevator back up to Ryde’s room. By now it was approaching six o’clock. Metal dinner carts were being rolled out along the corridor, filling the air with the warm, neutral aroma that bland hospital food gives off.

  Tree stepped back into Ryde’s room. Except Ryde was no longer there.

  19

  Freddie was surprised to see Tree when he arrived home. “I thought Careful Callister was providing security,” she said.

  “It’s difficult to provide security for someone who’s not there.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means that Ryde is no longer at Lee County Memorial.”

  “How can that be? He was shot.”

  “Apparently a little thing like a gunshot wound doesn’t stop Ryde Bodie.”

  “Do you have any idea where he went?”

  “Who knows?” Tree said. “Certainly I don’t.”

  “If I didn’t know any better,” Freddie said, “I would say the Sanibel Sunset Detective is somewhat upset.”

  “I don’t get this guy,” Tree said. “I truly don’t.”

  Nurse Lindsay had not seen Ryde leave, and neither had anyone else on the floor. Somehow, either by himself or with someone’s help, he had disentangled himself from the monitor, pulled out the IV drip, not to mention his catheter, dressed, and left.

  “He couldn’t keep his eyes open while I was there,” Tree said. “In fact, he slept the entire afternoon.”

  “Until you left,” Freddie said.

  “I just went downstairs to stretch my legs and get something to drink.”

  “So maybe he wasn’t really asleep.”

  “But he has a bullet hole in him,” Tree said. “I can’t believe he just left the hospital.”

  Freddie said, “Why would he hire you to protect him and then leave?”

  Tree was saved from having to answer a question for which he had no answer, by his ringing telephone. “I should take this,” he said to Freddie. “It may be Ryde.”

  But it wasn’t. “Hey, Mr. C,” Tommy Dobbs said.

  “Tommy, I can’t talk right now,” Tree said, trying to keep the note of irritation out of his voice. Not trying very hard.

  “I’ve been thinking all day about what to do, Mr. Callister. So before I do anything, I really think it’s important we talk.”

  “It’ll have to wait.”

  “I think we’d better do this tonight, Mr. C. Otherwise, it may be too late.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I’m outside your house.”

  Tree closed his eyes momentarily, and then said, “All right. Stay there. I’ll be right out.”

  He looked at Freddie. “It’s Tommy Dobbs.”

  She looked at him expectantly.

  “He’s outside. He wants to talk to me.”

  “Well, okay,” Freddie said. “You’d better invite him in.”

  Tree thought of Tommy going on about nine million dollars and a story in The Chicago Sun-Times. Right now, he did not need those complications. “It’ll be a lot faster if I just talk to him outside.”

  “I’m never quite sure exactly what you’re up to.”

  “That makes two of us,” Tree said.

  A banged up Chevy Impala, with Tommy huddled behind the wheel, was parked on the roadside. Tree wondered if he looked as dumb and out of place as Tommy did when he was staking out someone. Probably.

  The passenger door opened with a grinding howl as Tree slid in beside Tommy. “This had better be good,” Tree said.

  “This is good, Mr. Callister,” Tommy said. “Believe me, you won’t be disappointed.”

  The sartorially resplendent Thomas Dobbs had disappeared—possibly with the confession he wasn’t yet part of the Sun-Times editorial staff— replaced by a more island-friendly character wearing knee-length New Balance workout shorts, a Florida Gators T-shirt, and a New York Yankees baseball cap.

  He shifted around in his seat so that he faced Tree. His face in the uncertain street light was flushed with excitement. “Like I said to you earlier, I’ve been trying to decide all day what to do. Whether to come to you or to go to the police. Finally, I decided I should meet with you, see what you think, and go from there.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “What I’m talking about is where I was the other night. And what I saw. That’s what I’m talking about.”

  “Where were you?”

  “Let’s put it this way. I was at a certain addre
ss on Rabbit Road.”

  Even in the darkness, Tree could see the flush of excitement on Tommy’s face. “You were outside Ryde Bodie’s house?”

  “Let’s say for the sake of argument I was.”

  “What were you doing out there?”

  “What else? Following you, Mr. C.”

  “Tommy, how many times have I asked you not to follow me around?”

  “I know, but maybe this time it’s just as well I didn’t listen to you. I was sitting there trying to stay awake, when I heard this loud blast and then, shortly after that, a second loud blast. The next thing I know, this little man and woman run from the house.”

  “Okay. Then what?”

  “I wasn’t sure what had happened. They got into a van parked at the side of the house. I hadn’t noticed it before. I figured something was wrong, and so I followed them.”

  “You followed the van?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Where did it go?”

  “That’s the thing, Mr. C. The police are looking for these people, right?”

  “Yes, they are,” Tree said.

  “I can take you to them.”

  “Tommy, we don’t do this. You go to the police.”

  “If that’s all I wanted, I would have gone to the cops already. No, Mr. C, there’s a big story here, and together we can make it happen. Tree Callister, the Sanibel Sunset Detective, solves the mystery of the Rabbit Road Shootout—aided by his pal, ace Chicago reporter Thomas Dobbs.”

  “You’ve got to stop looking at me like I’m some sort of ticket to the top of your imaginary journalistic mountain. I’m not.”

  The excitement had faded from Tommy’s face, replaced by a petulance Tree had not seen before. “Do you want to see where these people went, or not?”

  Tree sighed and said, “How far away are we talking about?”

  “Not too far. At least have a look. Then if you decide we need the cops, well, okay. I’ll go along with that. How’s that for a deal?”

  “I’m not trying to make a deal with you.”

  “Don’t tell me you’re not curious. I’ll bet the last thing in the world you expected was this guy Bodie getting shot. I’ll bet you’re trying to figure it out. You’re not telling the police much, I know that. They think you’re withholding information. There’s more going on here than meets the eye, I’ll bet you anything. So what do you say, Mr. C? You want to go for a ride or not?”

  20

  Elvis sang “Viva Las Vegas,” as Tommy Dobbs turned onto I-75 headed south toward Naples.

  “Turn that down, will you?” Tree said as he poked out a number on his cellphone.

  Freddie answered almost immediately. “Where are you?” Trying not to sound angry.

  “I’m with Tommy. We’re headed south on I-75, but don’t ask me where we’re going.”

  “Tree, how could you just take off like that? I’ve been worried.”

  “It’s the only way he would do this,” Tree said.

  “Tell her I’m sorry,” Tommy said, eyes on the road ahead.

  “Did you hear that?”

  “What?” Freddie demanded.

  “Tommy says he’s sorry.”

  “Tree, this has nothing to do with anyone else’s crazy. It has to do with your crazy. You’re the one I worry about.”

  “At times like this, I worry too.”

  “But you still go off and do these things.”

  “I know,” Tree said. “But then I don’t know.”

  “I’ve got to go,” Freddie said. “It’s late and I have to be up first thing in the morning.”

  “I’ll stay in touch.”

  Freddie hung up the phone.

  Tree swallowed a couple of times, trying to keep the anger in the pit of his stomach where he could control it. He wasn’t so much angry at Tommy, who, he had to admit, was only trying to help. No, he was furious with himself. He had a beautiful, wonderful wife who loved him waiting at a comfortable home where there was not a care in the world. What the hell was he doing to himself—not to mention what he might be doing to his marriage?

  There was no answer. Only the madness of Tree Callister.

  “This had better be good,” Tree repeated, this time through gritted teeth.

  “Don’t you think Elvis remains the great mystery of American popular culture, Mr. C?”

  “I don’t care,” Tree said. “Let’s just get this over with.”

  “Here was a young guy from the South, a truck driver, a polite, intelligent teenager who came from a good home full of strong values. He wasn’t a rebel in any real sense of the word, hadn’t even really performed in public before he walked into Sun records. Yet somehow he was able to create this ground-breaking music, unlike anything anyone had heard before. Then he threw it all away, made thirty lousy movies because a bunch of old guys thought that was the right thing to do. And even though he probably knew better, he allowed himself to become addicted to prescription drugs, ended up having a heart attack, and falling off a toilet. This totally unique talent self-destructed and died at the age of forty-two. There’s something awesomely, tragically American about that, don’t you think?”

  “This is not a subject I’m currently giving a whole lot of thought to,” Tree said.

  “How did that happen? You’ve got everything in the world you could ever want, and you throw it all away.”

  Yes, you do, Tree thought. Yes, you do.

  “Why do we chase after the sort of fame and fortune Elvis attained?” Tommy rattled on. “What do we think? That somehow it’s going to make us happy? If you look at Elvis and Michael Jackson, Janis Joplin, Whitney Houston, the list goes on and on, reaching the top didn’t make any of them happy. Just the opposite in fact. It destroyed them.”

  “That’s why I want to be Mick Jagger in the next life,” Tree said. “He seemed to get through just fine—and he’s still out there, dancing.”

  “Just like you, Mr. Callister,” Tommy said, taking his eyes off the road momentarily and throwing Tree a sly grin. “You’re still out there dancing.”

  “If I end up dancing alone, thanks to you and your hare-brained ideas, I’m going to kill you. I swear I will.”

  ________

  Two hours later, Tree was fighting to stay awake when Tommy swung the Chevy Impala off Tamiami Trail East onto Collier Avenue. He drove past the sign that marked the entrance to Everglades City. They had arrived on the southwestern edge of Everglades National Park. Tree couldn’t believe it. “You followed them here?”

  “That’s something, isn’t it? Pretty amazing, don’t you think?”

  Tree didn’t say anything, but he thought: two idiots on a wild goose chase driving into Everglades City in the middle of the night. Insane.

  Along Collier Avenue, the Chevy’s headlights caught tall palm trees staked out on the median. A motel flashed by on the right. They passed silent one-story houses, their driveways choked with pickup trucks and power boats perched atop trailers.

  Tommy turned onto a side street that soon exhausted any pretense of being a road and became a dirt track threaded through bursts of mangrove. Cypress trees pushed against the track. Beyond the mangrove, somewhere in the darkness, if Tree had his geography right, Chokoloskee Bay, its Ten Thousand Islands, and the Gulf of Mexico.

  Tommy turned into a narrow clearing and brought the Chevy to a stop. Tree stared out the windshield at—what? There was nothing to see. At least nothing Tree could see.

  “Yeah, this is the place,” Tommy decided, reassuring himself as much as Tree. “Come on.”

  They got out of the car, Tree stretching, his sciatic nerve sending shards of pain pulsing down cramped legs. He limped along, deciding he was getting too old for these long rides. He was getting too old for everything, certainly for an early morning wild goose chase like this. He felt tired and stupid, and the sight of Tommy peering into the distance annoyed him even more.

  “What’s the matter now?”

  “I think we’re
in the right place,” Tommy said. “It was so dark that night, it’s hard to say …” His voice trailed off.

  “Hard to say what?” Tree demanded. “Come on, enough’s enough. What are we doing here?”

  Instead of answering, Tommy stalked away, headed back to the roadway. Tree called after him. Tommy turned and put a finger to his lips, demanding quiet. Tree rolled his eyes, and then followed him.

  The track took a sharp left, past a cypress tree draped in moss partially obscuring the view of a cabin on stilts above a rickety dock. A sleek ivory yacht was tied to the dock. Tree realized with a start this was el Trueno, the same craft he had seen moored at the marina in Fort Myers Beach.

  “This is the place they ended up at after the shooting,” Tommy whispered. “This is where I followed them.”

  “Was the boat here?” Tree asked.

  Tommy nodded. “Yes, it was.”

  “What did they do when they got here?”

  “The two of them went inside. Then, about an hour later a couple of guys showed up in an SUV, and went inside.”

  “Then what?”

  “Then I got the hell out of there,” Tommy said.

  No one appeared to be moving inside the cabin. The boat also looked deserted.

  “I don’t think anyone’s there now,” Tree said.

  “Let’s take a look.” And before Tree could think about stopping him, Tommy crouched, and then began running like a wobbly stork toward the shack. Tree started after him. Tommy mounted the narrow porch framing the rear of the shack. By the time Tree clambered up the steps, Tommy was peering in the window of the back door. “It’s locked,” he announced.

  No sooner had he said that than the door opened. The tiny, hatchet-faced woman Ryde called Paola stood there holding a gun. She cried something loud and angry in Spanish an instant before Tommy, in a quick thinking act that astonished Tree, smashed her in the jaw with his fist. The woman flew back, dropping the gun as she took flight. She landed inside the cabin, her head striking the floorboards with a loud crack.

  Tommy crashed into the interior, Tree following. The woman lay on her back, not moving, the gun a few feet away. Tree knelt down to her. Tommy, meanwhile, was bent over, holding his fighting hand, and moaning. Tree glanced at him. “What’s the matter with you?”