Mangrove Lightning

by Randy Wayne White

  “You are very persistent. I’ve already told you, I have no memory of those events,” she said, then spoke to Lia in Chinese. Not sharply, yet her words caused the young Delta pilot to sit at attention.

  “Madame Min-Juan needs to rest,” Lia said. “She’s very pleased to have met us, and wishes us a safe—”

  Tomlinson, a Zen master, was also a master at bowing himself out of a room. He returned with a box draped in red, placed it at the woman’s feet, then fetched the other. “Until now, I knew nothing about proper procedures, so I did what I thought was best. These . . . human relics, where I found them, they had to be packed in a hurry.” Hands together, he bowed to the boxes. “Sorry about the red towels.”

  She removed the draping, peered inside, then sat back with a stunned look on her face. “Oh my goodness. Where did these come from?”

  “That’s why I mentioned Marco Island. I found them not far from there, and I suspect there are more. Probably hidden away, or underwater.”

  “Underwater?” It was a significant detail, also distasteful.

  “It’s a guess. A small settlement of Chinese laborers lived near a pond where . . . Well, I’m not sure what happened. This was around the same time your boat sank. I hope you’re not upset.”

  “Extraordinary.” She gazed down, seeing portions of skulls, braids attached. “But how did you know to bring them to me?”

  Lia, on her feet, asked permission to view the contents. The old woman joined her in opening the second box. They had a lengthy exchange in Chinese and made guarded gestures toward Tomlinson. After a bow to Madame Min-Juan, Lia sat and took his hand. “She agrees—you’re a messenger. A shaman, possibly. Madame wants to share her story with you—the truth this time. But she is tired. Can you come back tomorrow?”

  The airborne Zen student, looking good with short black hair, gave his hand a squeeze. “I’m a little overwhelmed myself. If you need a place to stay tonight, my apartment is small, but . . .” She let the sentence trail off, but the meaning remained.

  That damn cabin in the Glades. From Key West, it was a two-hour drive to Key Largo, then another two hours to meet Gracie, all before sunset.

  “Gad, how I wish,” Tomlinson responded. “I might be able to come back in a day or two, but just in case . . .” He took out his sketch of the brand on Gracie’s arm and unfolded it. “Madame Min-Juan, I need your help. Do you recognize this symbol? I believe it’s somehow related to a man, a bad man who—”

  He stopped because of the look of revulsion on her face. She spoke sharply to Lia in Chinese, then said, “You have no right to bring that into my home. No right! Who are you?”

  “Look at me,” Tomlinson said, putting the sketch away. “I don’t understand either, so look at me and tell me why I’m here.”

  The nurse was angry, too. “You don’t know? How ridiculous. Please leave or I’ll phone the police.”

  He ignored her while the old woman stared at him. Several seconds passed before she nodded, and told Lia and the nurse to leave the room.

  When they were gone, she said, “There is kindness in you, I see that. With so few days left, I must embrace the messenger whatever the message may be. Where did you find that sketch?”

  Tomlinson had watched the door shut. “Your nurse recognized the symbol, too. I could tell. She doesn’t appear to be Chinese, so why was she upset?”

  “It’s a chop mark, not a symbol. A thing that denotes ownership. The girl was frightened because she’s my nurse. She associates it with pain. I’ve seen that mark only a few times in my life.”

  “When you were a child?”

  The woman looked away, then back again. “Our boat didn’t sink. It’s a story I made up to avoid the truth.” Tomlinson offered his hand. She took it, before adding, “I wasn’t rescued, I was enslaved.”

  “By a man named Walter Lambeth.”

  Her fingers twitched.

  “Then there’s nothing coincidental about us meeting. You might find peace in knowing these bones were liberated from his property. If there’re more, I’ll find them. We’ll find them. He’s gone now, Madame Min-Juan. The man’s been dead for many years.”

  “Impossible.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because he’s not human. That’s the message you brought to me. You were sent for a reason, so I must show you.” She raised her head to confirm her resolve, then slowly parted the lapels of her blue satin robe to show boney shoulders, withered skin, and ribs. Seared into her left breast was a familiar scar.

  “It’s the mark of Shue Gwee, the water beast,” she said, and looked at the boxes. “In our province, he was called Demon Crow.”

  16

  Mr. Bird couldn’t stand jail, so he took flight. He preferred a big white GMC diesel, with its insulated bucket and Altec boom that telescoped fifty feet into the air if the outriggers were set. Maximum load, four hundred pounds—just enough to hold a man his size plus tools.

  No one questioned a utility worker. Not cops, or guards at gated communities, and definitely not at a Key Largo trailer park. He did a U-ie at Marina Del Mar, backtracked, then turned left into Capt. Jack’s Mobile Home Estates.

  Tootsie Barlow’s red F-150 was parked beside an older blue truck that had tried to follow him yesterday. Luckier yet, the ragged landscaping included a thatch of bamboo among some dusty banana plants. The bamboo was small, not the big timber variety from Asia—as if anyone here would know the difference. Delighted, he drove to the back of the park, where a utilities area was screened by fencing.

  It was Wednesday, a little after sunset. Too late in the day for the nine-to-five clock punchers, so it was ideal for a lineman who pretended to want extra work. He’d used that story so many times, it flowed naturally when needed. Like now, as a shrunken man with a Chihuahua wandered up and tapped on the glass. “Does the whole park got cable problems or just us? My wife says it’s the TV, which don’t make sense ’cause we got a almost new Toshiba.”

  “I’m not supposed to repair local cable,” Mr. Bird said, “but give me a sec while I call in and check. What’s your name and address, sir?” He pretended to write on a service pad. Climbing out was always the best part. The little dweeb’s head scrolled upward as if filming a sequoia until his eyes fixated on a tattoo that bridged neck and ear. A huge gloved hand prefaced their introduction: “Nice to meet you, sir. I’m a private contractor, name’s Vernon. Vernon Crow. If you keep this between us, I’ll do what I can.”

  He liked the name, had chosen it years ago, and that’s who he became when he wasn’t inside the truck or visiting from the past.

  Vernon often heard voices in his head. Probably from spending so much time caged or chained as a boy. He seldom traveled without Mr. Bird in his ear, or ol’ Walter for company, as well as Walter’s .36 caliber service revolver. No serial numbers on a gun so old, there was no record of its existence.

  The bucket had toggle sticks like a video game. Vernon elevated himself to maximum height. Barlow’s truck, and the truck that had tailed him, were still in the drive. A third vehicle, a van with louvered widows, was a recent arrival.

  He dropped a few feet and swung the bucket to a terminal box mounted on a pole. At his feet was a can of wasp spray, if needed. It wasn’t. He popped the lid to find a sheath of outdated candy-colored wires. He tracked pairs of wires, red and green, to their terminal screws. Many were flagged with names or addresses scribbled on tape. It saved time. Tracking wire was a pain in the ass.

  Vernon found the old man’s landline. On his belt was a heavy rubber telephone with a dial—a test set, it was called. He clipped in and heard a dial tone. No conversation to monitor, although that might change. He left the test set attached. An ohm meter would signal incoming and outgoing calls.

  There was a more modern way.

  From a case, he removed a telemetry transceiver. Cell numbers of
fishing guides were easily found even after they’d retired. Satellite towers lined the Keys, each assigning cell connections via a logarithm impossible to predict yet possible to intercept with a military scanner.

  Vernon knew his shit.

  Patience. He settled back and inhaled some primo flake using a vaporizer, binoculars within reach. Whew! . . . His brain coiled into a sharp little lens after the second hit. Trailer rooftops were packed in rows that thrummed. The view improved to the south, where, in a kidney-shaped pool, three couples were banging themselves into a sex frenzy, unaware that a privacy fence didn’t mean privacy. Not to a man in a bucket truck.

  Oh . . . some of the juicy shit he’d seen.

  He had a camera with a 185mm telephoto. Snap-snap-snap. The lens served as a transit for a GPS locator. Later, if he felt like it, he would match the numbers to an address and the address to a name. The big-money types seldom wed forgiving mates.

  Vernon had to make a living somehow. Mr. Bird could be an expensive guest.

  To the north was a line of storms. Lightning was always of interest to a man atop a metal fifty-foot boom. Cloud-to-cloud action accounted for eighty percent of all strikes. It was the other twenty percent that could kill you. Or, properly done, kill someone else; a person you wanted dead.

  Vernon’s eyes shifted to the piddly little clump of bamboo. It reminded him of a delicious trip a while back. Mr. Bird had accompanied him northbound on Route 27, the old railroad trestle to Palmdale, where the tracks skirted Lake Okeechobee and displaced Route 29 before continuing north. Whistle stops included Sebring, Winter Haven, Ocala, and Gainesville.

  Mr. Bird and Walter knew the route well. Walter had been a train-riding man.

  Past and present mingled on that trip until they got down to business. The Barlows had been railroad folk. The heirs gravitated like ticks to the black snake artery; probably didn’t understand why. Kevin Barlow they’d lured into a field west of Frostproof—a stroke of luck, that one.

  A million sizzling volts hadn’t done the job. Amperage and a good ground wire had.

  Their luck didn’t last with Tootsie’s grandson. The kid had left the RV on some errand before the squall hit. But the kid’s wife had come tumbling out of the blaze like a fireball.

  Mr. Bird, in feeding mode, had delivered a few strokes of his own before she died. Walter approved.

  Even in the grave, Walter Lambeth was not one to forgive and forget. The property was one reason, but not the only reason. Albert Barlow had had it coming. Long ago, he’d peached to the cops about slave coolies, and other such stuff, to save his own ass. Albert had confessed to other crimes in writing.

  Two Barlows down and two to go.

  The one Mr. Bird wanted most was the girl, Gracie—Gracie Yum-Yum—with her soft parchment. She was too young and pliant to kill all at once.

  Slaten had botched that job. And more.

  Vernon was thinking, If you want something done right, do it yourself, when the ohm meter signaled an outgoing call.

  —

  Gracie almost didn’t answer when she saw the caller ID but finally picked up, saying, “Please don’t be mad, Uncle Tootsie. I’m so sick of my family being mad at me, I can’t take it anymore.”

  “I’m worried, that’s all. You shouldn’t be alone. Are you at the cabin?”

  No, she was in the slow lane, I-75 south of Naples, where the highway bends east into the Glades. “Tomlinson must’ve told you the news. I knew he would because I gave him permission—not that he didn’t coax it out of me. Mom already knows.”

  “How’d she take it?”

  “What, that her unmarried daughter is pregnant? Pissed-off, disappointed, like I’m the biggest loser in the world. Just like I expected, and I don’t care. Now I suppose you’re going to tell her what Slaten and I did to . . . you know.”

  “Nope, not the police, either.” He said it again, “I don’t want you staying at that cabin alone,” then explained that Tomlinson had stopped in Key Largo on his way back from Key West. The man who had saved her, Marion Ford, was there, too. They were outside, talking, so her uncle had taken this private moment to discuss something else.

  “Let me guess,” the girl said. “If it’s about drugs, no, I’m not stoned. It’s tempting, though, if anyone else tries to spoil the first happy day I’ve had since—” She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been happy, which caused her voice to catch.

  “Are you crying?”

  “No!”

  “Lord knows, if any girl has a right to, it’s you, Hannah-Grace. You got your phone on speaker, don’t you? I don’t want you driving one-handed.”

  Only her uncle used her full name in an affectionate, not a threatening, way. She sniffed, and wedged the phone between her shoulder and ear. “Of course I’m on speaker. What do you want to talk about?”

  “Just that. You need someone to talk to. A woman. A nice woman who’d understand better. I’m too old, and Tomlinson, he’s a good egg and all—I know you two hit it off—but he’s, let’s face it, a man.”

  Gracie couldn’t argue that. While the tears rolled, she smiled a little.

  It was an idea Tootsie had come up with today while fishing with the biologist. Well, it had come to him after Tomlinson had shared the “good” news about her pregnancy. A friend of theirs was a crackerjack fishing guide up around Sanibel, a woman named Hannah Smith. Captain Hannah, Tootsie called her.

  “The name’s not all you got in common,” her uncle continued. “She’s in a family way, a couple months along, and she’s single just like you. They didn’t come out and say exactly, but I got the impression she’s dealt with some bad ones herself and always managed to come out on top.”

  “Bad men, you mean?”

  He wasn’t targeting Slaten, her uncle was quick to explain. He was speaking about experiences the two women might have shared. “Look her up. There’s some videos about her on the Internet. She’s pretty, in an unusual way—sort of like you. Tomlinson’s the one who pointed that out.”

  “Pretty? No way. He said that?”

  “Both of you, darn right. I was thinking, maybe give Hannah a call. You’ll be staying at the cabin anyway, and she wants to come down and fish Chino Hole.”

  “Tomlinson thinks it’s a good idea?”

  “No, and keep him out of this. This is just us talking. Fact that you’re my niece, I’d mention it to Captain Hannah right off. Could be that she’ll come on the run, and you two might hit it off. What do you think?”

  “It’s weird, calling someone out of the blue.”

  “So what? Invite her down, say, ‘My uncle can’t wait to meet you.’ Let her pick the day.”

  Uncle Tootsie. He’d had a mean streak in his drinking days, or so her mother claimed. Gracie had never seen that side. The man speaking to her now, his gravelly voice full of caring and fun and light, had been the same throughout her childhood.

  “You’re sweet,” she said, and meant it. “I don’t know, though . . .”

  “Gracie, darlin’, do it for me. Please?”

  “I suppose you’ll call her anyway, and be pissed if I don’t.”

  Her uncle laughed at that, saying, “Not until tomorrow, I won’t. Hang on, I’ve got the number right here.”

  —

  Gracie Yum-Yum was pregnant.

  Vernon Crow wet his lips when he heard that through the rubber phone clipped to his belt.

  Was there more good news?

  Perched high above his truck, there were a dozen unprotected Wi-Fi networks to choose from. He did an Internet search on Captain Hannah Smith, not expecting much, when he opened a video. The woman, tall with shoulders, was casting a fly rod.

  Holy hell . . .

  Full screen, he watched the footage again, noting the buckskin smoothness of her skin, long legs in fishing shorts, the heavy lift an
d fall of breasts beneath a blouse that flowed with her body.

  Rip the buttons off, make her howl. Excellent . . .

  He hit pause. Pulled the screen close to his face, nostrils wide, and sniffed. Into his head came the scent of flesh and girl sweat.

  Vernon shaded the screen. Pause, play . . . Pause again after the camera zoomed in: black hair, glossy as tallow. Female features—lips, face, and jaw—but a masculine sturdiness in her eyes.

  Raven Girl . . . That’s the way he thought of her because of her hair.

  Vernon’s coveralls became constrictive when he recalled Tootsie, saying, “She’s in a family way.”

  Pregnant, is what the old fool had meant. There was no belly bulge in a second video, and a Google search failed to confirm it was true. News articles about the woman, however, fanned his desire.

  Fishing Guide/P.I. Wounds

  Wanted Man, Claims Assault

  Interesting how the stories varied in detail, yet portrayed her as a nice girl hick who couldn’t be pushed around.

  I bet she’s a biter.

  He put his gear away and returned to Earth.

  It was twilight. Lightning popped in charcoal clouds and pushed the scent of rain. An ounce of flakka struggled to organize his thoughts. Gracie would be alone tonight at the cabin. A perfect opportunity he couldn’t pass up. He would go there and . . . do what?

  Watch her. Savor her body from the darkness. Snap some photos. That’s all. Not unless the tall one, Raven Girl, was there. It was better to wait a day or two—whatever it took—on the chance of capturing both females alone.

  Or was it?

  As he wrestled with the decision, the shrunken little man reappeared. No Chihuahua this time. “Cable’s working great, I sure thank you. Here’s a little somethin’ for your trouble.” The man hesitated at the sound of a growl that also might be thunder.

  Vernon, turning, looked down. “What do you want?”

  “To give you this. Sorry, mister, if I scared you.”