"Yeah. My name just happens to come up a lot in places where I'd just as soon it didn't," I said, rubbing my palms together, still feeling the slick smoothness of the snake and the cool tingle of my own nerves.
Sims wrapped up the hypodermic and put the package back in the drawer and then washed his hands in a stainless steel sink built into the counter. I wondered if I should do the same.
"They knew you were there," he said, turning as he dried his hands with a paper towel and reading the flash of confusion that must have shown in my eyes. "At the hotel bar. I don't know how, but I'm positive they already knew it. They just wanted to know why."
It took me a second to gather myself. Of course they knew. Why the hell wouldn't Hammonds know? He'd been trailing me ever since I pulled up to the ranger's dock with news of a killing.
"I don't doubt it," I said to Sims. "I'd still like to know myself why it was that I was there."
The environmentalist seemed to consider the question for a few seconds as he oddly and carefully folded the damp brown paper towel in his fingers. Then he tossed the square into a wastebasket, walked over to grip both handles of the ice chest and lifted it off the table. He nodded his head to the door.
"Let's go drop this off," he said and I followed, holding open the door and wondering why I was letting him lead again.
We loaded the cooler into the back of the van and as Sims drove out to an empty asphalt road leading east he explained, as best he could according to him, what he knew of my invitation to Loop Road.
"You've got to understand, Mr. Freeman, there are generations of folks out there in the Glades that have lived lives far different than what modern-day people think of as Floridians."
"Yeah, I got that lesson from Gunther," I said, watching the road stretch out in a straight line into nothing but low-hanging green brush. Sims had no air conditioning in the old van and even the wind spilling through the open windows was hot. I was thinking about the warming state of the rattlesnake sliding around in the cooler behind us.
"What I mean is that, for some of them, the Glades is their neighborhood and you can't just move into the neighborhood without being noticed and without becoming suspect." He let the statement sit, waiting for my response.
"You mean my place in the old research shack?" I finally said.
"Glades folks notice something like that. People have used that old place for years when it was empty. But they also have respect. Your presence was known but no one was really sure what you were up to. They knew you weren't a hunter, or a fisherman. There was speculation that you were doing some kind of night research, but the professor and I couldn't come up with anybody who knew you."
"And how exactly did all this discussion come up?" I asked.
By now Sims had turned off the pavement and pulled onto a dirt road. It too was posted with a no-trespassing sign and bore the logo of the power company. Sims downshifted and started south down a lane that was flanked on either side with mangroves and long finger islands that stretched out into standing water.
"These are cooling canals. Man-made for discharging the water from the reactor," Sims said, answering the question I hadn't asked and avoiding the one I had.
"The company has acres and acres of property out here but although they can keep the people out, they can't easily control the animals that find their way in here. That's why they employ Professor Murtz and myself. To keep track of the native populations and monitor their growth and migrations. It makes them look environmentally concerned and benefits us at the same time. We have even developed a breeding ground for the American crocodile in here that almost singlehandedly rejuvenated a species that was very much on the endangered list only a few years ago."
As we jounced down the rutted road I tried to pull him back to my invitation to Loop Road.
"And the discussion about me being the new mystery man living in the old research shack?"
"I don't know who brought it up first. Word gets passed along out there and you rarely know the source, or even the truth of the stories. But it got to the bar. And then Blackman said he'd heard that you had been questioned by the police in connection to the killings of the kids."
"I suppose that eased some of the pressure among the natives."
"I don't deny that," Sims said as he slowed and then stopped the van in the middle of the road, in the middle of nowhere. When he got out, I followed. "There'd been a lot of talk since the child killings started. Some of it working off the same whiskey-inspired threats that had gone on for years about stopping the western flow of the suburbs," Sims said as he opened the back doors of the van and hauled out the ice chest.
"It was crude stuff at first. Like 'It's about time' and 'More power to 'em.' But then the investigators and agents started questioning people at their camps and ranches and folks started getting nervous."
He set the chest down in the dust about ten yards away and came back to the van. I watched the lid like it was going to pop open like some jack-in-the-box.
"They would have loved to have an outsider like you get blamed. But then we heard about you and Gunther. And as far as I know, it was Gunther who said you'd been in law enforcement up north. That's when Nate Brown decided we ought to talk to you ourselves."
I watched as Sims reached into the van and pulled out a golf club. A putter I thought at first. Then I looked closer at the head and saw that the shaft had been sheared off and the end had been bent to form a hook.
He walked back to the cooler, and using the hook, flipped open the lid. I could hear a bone rattle echoing inside. The snake had warmed up. Sims stepped closer and probed in the cooler for a few seconds and then lifted the rattler out. Its body was cupped on the hook about one-third of the way down its length. The tail was curling and twisting in the air with a motion independent of the head, which stuck out straight as a stick from Sims' club.
With the animal dangling, he walked it closer to the edge of the road. The embankment dropped several feet down into the water weeds and mangroves. When he set it down, the snake curled into an immediate coil and the rattle intensified.
"He'll probably just set there awhile until the sun warms him up," Sims said, standing far too close to the beast if its strike range really was the ten feet that I'd read about. "This is about the spot that we found him a couple of days ago. So we're just hoping he's close to home."
We stood watching the snake's tongue flick the air and listened to the click of the rattles. Finally, it began to unwrap itself. We watched as it then slid softly into the grass and down the embankment. First the body disappeared, and then the rattling sound went quiet. I stood behind Sims as he walked over and peered over the edge.
"Gone," he said, and then turned to me. "I still don't know why they had any interest in the snake venom."
I was still looking into the grasses and mangroves, a bit amazed at how quickly the animal had simply disappeared.
"The first dead child," I said. "Died from an injection of rattlesnake venom."
I looked up at Sims. His mouth was slightly open, his face was caught in a mask of pure, dumbfounded thought. Yes, he had computer access. Yes, he had a van and enough knowledge of the Glades and enough expertise with tracking devices to make a GPS seem like a toy. He even had size-nine feet. But the look in his eye told me he hadn't known about the snake venom. He might have been in on it at some point, but not when the real killing began.
CHAPTER 19
My truck was waiting for me in the lot when the cab dropped me at Billy's tower. The new glass was shining but the three gouges in the paint brought up a taste of anger I couldn't keep down. My keys were at the lobby desk and the assistant manager cleared me to the penthouse. I made a pot of coffee, drank half of it while I put my bags together and then poured the rest in a huge, wide-bottomed sailing mug. I threw the bags in my truck and drove out west to the ranger station.
When I pulled into my usual parking space, I could see Cleve and his assistant had pulled the Boston Whaler
out of the water on a trailer and were washing the hull, scrubbing the algae and dirt stain from the water line. Cleve tossed his brush into a galvanized pail, wiped his hands on his trousers and greeted me with a handshake.
"Max. Good to see you back."
The assistant was looking past us at my truck, his mouth had dropped open a bit and then he snapped it shut and turned away, shaking his head in disgust. Cleve and I walked up toward the office.
"I don't have a new canoe yet. But if the offer still stands, I'd like to borrow yours to get out to the shack," I said.
"No problem. But I'll have to get you the key," Cleve answered, moving through the office to his desk.
"After everything going on, I went out and put a hasp and lock on the door. Figured it might keep your stuff safe," he said, putting the key in my palm and then looking at it a second too long. "First time I ever had to do that."
I felt a pang of responsibility, like I'd taken something from him.
"I'm sorry," I said.
"Ain't your fault," he answered. "Things change."
We carried his canoe to the water. I loaded my bags from the truck and just before pushing off I called out to Mike Stanton, who was still working the waterline of the Whaler.
"If you want to fix her up again, I'll pay you."
He looked off across the ramp at my truck.
"OK. Yeah. Maybe."
I nodded, put my right foot in the middle of the canoe, grabbed the gunwales and pushed off.
My ribs were sore from the plane crash. My arms and shoulders knotted from the parking lot fight. And my lungs were dry and constricted from too much air conditioning and not enough exercise. Cleve's canoe seemed awkward and the paddle felt strange in my hand. I tried to get a rhythm going and got deeper into the flow of the current and around the first mangrove curves, but it wasn't working. I couldn't get the feel of someone else's boat. The trim felt wrong. The balance was off. The only thing that wasn't different was the river.
I still worked up a heavy sweat and a running heartbeat by the time I entered the mouth of the canopy. Inside the shade I stopped paddling and drifted into the coolness. A Florida red belly turtle stood guard on a downed tree trunk, his neck stretched out as if sniffing the air, the yellow, arrow-shaped marking on his snout pointing up the river. The white summer sky peeked through the leaves, its rays spattered the ferns below and in the distance I heard the soft roll of thunder. I resettled myself in the seat and moved on.
By the time I reached the shack it was raining, hard. The leaf canopy sounded like cloth ripping and lightning sent a flash through the undergrowth and for an instant stole the color from the trees. I lashed the canoe to my platform and ran the bags up the stairs but when I twisted the knob and pushed, the door rattled and stuck.
I'd forgotten Cleve's new lock and dug through my pockets for the key. Once inside I dragged the bags through the doorway and stood dripping on the pine floors and squinting through the dusk. I had seen too much of Billy's airy and fashionable apartment.
I found my way to the kerosene lamp and lit the wick. Hammonds' warrant servers had been civil. With the exception of a few counter items out of place, it was the same as I'd left it. I started a wood fire in the stove and set up a pot of coffee. I found my old enameled cup that some officer had misplaced on the drain board.
Outside the lightning snapped and I could hear the water sluicing off the roof and onto the cinnamon fern below the windows. I took off my dripping clothes and sat naked in my wooden chair, tipped back on two legs, put my heels on the table and listened to the rain.
I lay in my bunk that night half dreaming and half recalling, my skin moist in the humidity, and every time I closed my eyes I could see blue and red lights flashing through the trees. I was back in Philadelphia. The concrete sidewalk was still wet from some early-morning drizzle and up high at the top of the hill in the distance loomed the huge, yellowish back wall of the Museum of Art. In front were the tiered steps that the Rocky character had charged up and then shaken his fists at the world. In back was the Schuylkill River winding out through an urban park of maple trees and wooded lanes and granite cliffs. On that morning, between the museum and boathouse row, under a thicket of azaleas, lay a young woman with her running suit muddied and half pulled off, her Nike cross trainer on one foot but without a partner, and her throat cut from ear to ear.
I was working with a Center City detective squad, low on the totem pole and "learning the craft," according to my new lieutenant. We were on the first call out that morning.
It didn't take long to identify the victim. Although she wasn't carrying I.D. and the key she had strapped into a holder on the remaining shoe was unmarked, I recognized the store label on the running suit. It was a small specialty athletic place on Rittenhouse Square. It was five minutes away up the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and over to Walnut. When we got there the store manager went slack-jawed when he saw the Polaroid we'd taken of the woman.
"Susan Gleason," he said, turning away from the photo. She was a regular. A dedicated runner who lived across the historic square in a centuries-old building retrofitted into high- priced condos. He knew she ran from there down to the river and along the row early every morning. She went through a pair of shoes every twelve weeks. She was a very good customer.
We confirmed with the condo management. Gleason lived alone, a thirty-six-year-old stock analyst, loved the city and worked constantly. The running seemed her only outlet.
The blue lights were still spinning when we got back to the scene. The body and been removed and the other shoe had been found fifty yards away near a parking spot close to one of the rowing clubs along the river. Other members of the detective squad had interviewed several early morning runners. Some recognized the woman's running suit. Some also knew the parking spot was often occupied at dawn by a late-model, beat- up Chevy Impala with one of those orange, city employee parking stickers.
"A big, odd-looking white guy would just sit there with the window down. He's there every morning except on the weekend," a runner said. "You can see the Fairmount Dam from there. I figured he was just enjoying the view before starting the day."
The prints of a size thirteen work boot were found in the mud by the azaleas. The squad fanned out among city maintenance divisions in Center City. A supervisor at the City Hall-area subway division recognized a description of the Impala: Arthur Williams. "Yeah, big guy, kinda, you know, slow."
Williams worked in the underground subway access tunnels, sweeping trash and cleaning graffiti from the walls. He was in his 40s. Quiet. Didn't come in that day, which was unusual.
We got an address in North Philadelphia and another car went with us. An upper-class woman from Rittenhouse Square had been murdered while jogging in a popular park along the river. They weren't sparing any manpower at the roundhouse to button this one down by the evening news.
The house in North Philly was in the middle of a worn- down block of tired homes. They all shared a creaking roofline and were all connected so you could stand on the front porch at one end of the block and see your neighbor eight doors down standing out on his. Only a spindled railing separated your porch floorboards from the next guy's.
We were greeted by an elderly woman who talked through the screen door.
"Mrs. Williams?"
"No, sir. I am Fanny Holland. Mrs. Williams' sister."
"Is Arthur home, ma'am?"
She could see the other detectives moving about the Impala parked on the street.
"He's not going to lose his job over this is he?" the old lady said as she let us in. "He has never missed a day before."
Two detectives went up the narrow staircase. My partner and I went into the kitchen with Fanny Holland and sat her down at the table. She listened for sounds up through the cracked ceiling. The house was not unlike my own childhood home. It smelled of liniment and old cardboard, ancient comforters and soiled doilies. My mother had grown sick in such a place.
The othe
rs brought Arthur down. Big, docile, with a confused child's look on his face. They found him in bed covered with three blankets. He still had on his work clothes, including a pair of huge, mud-caked boots. He stumbled with his thick wrists cuffed behind his back and kept repeating in a low whine, "She was too pretty to die. She was too pretty to die."
I was left to explain to the aunt while the rest of the squad took Williams to the roundhouse. The old woman seemed confused and stunned and took the words from my mouth as something indecipherable.
Attack a woman? He could not. There was not a bully on the street, male or female, who couldn't slap the boy to shame since he was ten years old.
Cut her with a knife? He wasn't capable.
Weighing the situation, Fanny Holland let loose the family ghosts. And I listened.
Arthur had been a damaged child. A low I.Q., a momma's boy. A boy who fell further when his father left. His mother endured "until it got to be too much."
She'd committed suicide. Cut her wrists out in the garden. Her favorite place. Had carried the knife in her picking basket. She was dead when Arthur came home from school.
"You couldn't put a butter knife on the table since," the old woman said. "Cut a woman? Impossible."
Arthur's only habit was to leave his house early each day and find a green place. A garden of sorts. She herself went with him on weekends to the Longwood Garden's indoor arboretum in winter. It was the only thing he clung to.
When I got back to the roundhouse the TV news trucks were already stacked in the lot. Inside the bureau a knot of detectives was gathering in the hall opposite the interview rooms. I singled out one of the senior investigators and told him I thought I had some relevant information from the aunt on Williams.
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