by James Swain
I threw off the covers and went outside. The clouds had darkened and it was raining hard. My car’s windows were down, and I climbed in, and rolled them up. Then I dried the seats. My Legend had been good to me, and I was going to return the favor.
Back inside the motel room, I found Linderman clothed and brushing his teeth. He was the model of efficiency; his bed was already made, his dirty clothes put away. The only thing that looked out of place was the salt-and-pepper stubble dotting his chin.
“Since we’re telling everybody this is a fishing trip, I figured I shouldn’t shave,” Linderman said. “How’s the weather?”
“Crummy. It’s pouring rain.”
“You’re going to have to educate me. Do guys go fishing in the rain?”
“Guys go fishing if the beer is cold,” I replied.
“Is that a hint?”
“Only if you’re still buying.”
We soon hit the road. My first stop was a convenience store a few miles down the highway from our motel. I bought two coffees and a twelve-pack of cold Budweiser. The clerk gave me a harsh look as he rang up my items.
“You new around here?” the clerk asked.
“Visiting from Fort Lauderdale,” I said. “My buddy and I are looking to do a little fishing. Any places you’d recommend?”
“Best fishing is in the next county,” the clerk said.
Another born salesman. I thanked him and left with my items. Outside it was coming down hard. I got into my Legend, and gave Linderman the coffee, then put the twelve-pack on the backseat. Firing up my engine, I aimed my car toward town.
“What’s next?” Linderman asked.
“We need to buy some bait,” I said. “Shiners or minnows would be best.”
“Where do we go?”
“Normally, we’d go to a feed store, but I’m going to play stupid and visit a couple of different stores in town,” I said. “I’ve got a nasty feeling about this place.”
“Besides the sheriff being corrupt?”
We came to a four-way stop. Mine was the only vehicle on the road, and I threw my car into park and pulled the lid off my coffee. “So far, I’ve spoken to two residents, and both have tried to persuade me to leave.”
Linderman sipped his coffee and grimaced. “That could be a coincidence.”
I blew the steam off my drink and took a sip. It tasted like engine oil. I rolled down my window, and poured it out.
“I don’t believe in those,” I said.
Chatham was nothing to write home about. Main Street was a row of flat-roofed buildings with faded brick facades and dirty storefronts. Pickup trucks and old rusted cars were the vehicles of choice. The rain had pushed everyone inside, and I crawled past the buildings looking for a place to park.
“Not much in the way of parking,” Linderman said.
“Like I said, it’s a real friendly place.”
I drove down a side street and found a metered parking lot. I parked in a spot, and dug in my pockets for some change. Linderman produced a quarter.
“My treat,” he said.
He got out, and fed the coin into the meter. I saw him pull the rest of the change from his pocket, and start feeding in more coins.
“Damn meter only gives twelve minutes for a quarter,” Linderman said as we headed toward town. “Even Washington, D.C. isn’t that bad.”
We turned the corner with the rain blowing in our faces. Main Street was quiet, and I spied movement in a storefront window a block away. The fleeting image of a man’s face. It was gone as quickly as it appeared.
“We’re being watched,” I said.
“Think your car is safe?” Linderman asked.
I glanced down the street at my Legend. The notion that someone might break into the trunk and steal Linderman’s guns felt very real to me.
“Not really,” I said.
Linderman took Buster’s leash from my hand. “Why don’t you go do some snooping? I’ll stay here, and make sure no one breaks into your car.”
“Sounds like a plan. If you need me, just make Buster bark.”
“How do I do that?”
“Nudge him with your toe.”
I headed down Main Street. The sidewalks were cracked and uneven, with pools of water everywhere I stepped. I came to a pharmacy and ducked beneath the striped awning. I looked up and down the block, then went inside.
The pharmacy was empty. Along the back wall was an old-fashioned ice-cream counter with a hand churn and a penny lick. It was the first thing I’d seen in Chatham that felt friendly. Behind the counter stood a coarse-featured woman wearing blue jeans and an oversized man’s denim work shirt. Her eyes held mine suspiciously.
I can be as charming as the next guy. I flashed her my best smile.
“Good morning.”
“Can I help you?” she asked.
“My buddy and I want to do some fishing,” I replied, sticking with my script. “I was wondering if you could recommend a place to buy bait.”
“Try Reggie’s Bait and Tackle,” she suggested.
“Is that in town?”
“No. I can show you where it is on a map.”
“I’d really appreciate it.”
She moved down the counter and fetched a map that was stuck between the wall and the cash register. She walked with a pronounced limp, and used her hands to stop herself from falling. I got up close to the counter, and pressed my belly to the edge. Looking down, I saw that her right foot was missing from the ankle down.
“Aw, hell, this is the wrong map,” she said. “Hold on a minute.”
She grabbed a cane and pushed open a swinging door to a back room. A towheaded little girl darted out, holding an ice-cream cone.
“Mind your own business, Macey,” the woman said.
“Yes, Momma,” the little girl said.
The woman limped into the back of the store. Macey took her mother’s place behind the counter, the top of her head barely reaching the Formica. Her face was smeared with chocolate ice cream. I’d learned more as a cop talking to kids than I had from anyone else. I pulled a paper napkin out of a dispenser, and handed it to her.
“You’ve got ice cream on your face,” I said.
Macey wiped away the ice cream while licking her cone at the same time.
“How old are you?” I asked.
“I’m not supposed to talk to strangers,” she said.
“I’m a nice stranger.”
“Momma will spank me if she catches me talking to you. Momma doesn’t want me talking to nobody. Says people can’t be trusted.”
“Some people can be trusted.”
Macey eyed me warily. I pulled out my wallet, and removed a crisp five dollar bill. Placed it on the counter, and drew my hand away. Macey glanced back at the room where her mother had gone, then stuffed the bill into the pocket of her dress.
“I’m looking for a couple of friends of mine,” I said. “One of them is named Lonnie. The other is named Mouse. They live in Chatham.”
Macey shook her head. She didn’t have a clue as to what I was talking about.
“Lonnie is a giant,” I said.
The little girl’s eyes went wide, and she stopped eating her cone.
“Do you know him?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I need to find my friend Lonnie. Do you know where he lives?”
“In the woods.” Macey was quiet a moment, as if weighing her words. “The kids in school say that if you’re bad, the giant will climb through your bedroom window at night and eat you.”
“Have you ever seen him?”
“Once. I got lost and ended up where he lived. He was scary.”
I heard banging from the back room. I didn’t want Macey getting paddled, and I turned my back, and pretended to be looking through a rack of outdated hunting magazines. Her mother limped through the swinging door.
“Found it. Macey, you run along now.”
Macey gave me a look that said please don’t tell. I smiled and watched her lea
ve. Her mother slapped a map onto the counter and pointed.
“This here’s Reggie’s Bait and Tackle. I can give you directions, if you like.”
I looked at the map. The place where the woman was recommending that I purchase my fishing bait was in the next county.
“Isn’t there anything closer?” I asked.
“Afraid not.”
The woman crossed her arms in front of her chest. Her body language was anything but friendly. Outside, I heard Buster barking. I thanked her, and hurried to the door.
CHAPTER 47
I left the pharmacy and ran down the street. Linderman and my dog were nowhere in sight. Turning the corner, I saw the FBI agent standing in the metered parking lot, checking out my car. Buster was not with him.
I get nervous when I lose sight of my dog. My legs picked up speed, and did not stop running until I was standing beside Linderman.
“What happened?”
“Buster saw a guy trying to jimmy the door of your car, and took off after him,” Linderman explained. “The leash flew out of my hand.”
I could have been angry with Linderman, only Buster had done the same to me many times. “Where he’d go?”
He pointed at the stand of pine trees adjacent to the parking lot. The trees were so thick that I couldn’t see through them. Cupping my hands over my mouth, I let out a yell. From inside the pines came a happy yelp. I felt myself calm down.
“Your car took a hit,” Linderman said. “There’s some paint missing by the door.”
I gave it a quick inspection. The trunk was still locked, and so were the doors. The missing paint around the window wasn’t pretty, but I could live with it.
“Did you see the guy who did this?” I asked.
“Just his back,” Linderman said.
Buster emerged from the stand of pine trees walking on three legs. Stuck in his mouth was a rectangular piece of cloth. Whoever had tried to break into my car had gotten a real ass chewing. I checked his paw. There was a thorn stuck in the pad.
“I need some help,” I said.
Even the best dogs will bite you when in pain. I held Buster’s mouth while Linderman removed the bloody thorn from his paw. He didn’t flinch.
“Any luck at the pharmacy?” Linderman asked.
“I’ll tell you in the car,” I said.
I got the hell out of Chatham, and drove toward the highway and our motel. On both sides of the road I saw broken-down farm buildings and unworked land. Florida had more cattle and horses than Texas, yet none of it seemed to be here.
“Lonnie and Mouse live somewhere nearby in the woods,” I said.
Linderman turned in his seat to stare at me. If anything defined our relationship, it was my ability to surprise him.
“Who told you that?” he asked.
“I bribed a little girl with five bucks, and she told me. Little kids go cheap.”
“If a little kid knows they’re here, then probably most of the townspeople do.”
“That would be my guess.”
Linderman fell silent, and stared at the rain-slicked road. I sensed he was still having a problem with my Chatham conspiracy theory.
“I have a friend at the DEA’s office in Miami,” he said. “I was on the phone with him while you were inside the pharmacy. My friend works all the major drug cases in Florida. He said Chatham isn’t involved in trafficking drugs.”
“How about manufacturing crystal meth? That’s big in these parts.”
“Nope.”
“Could they be growing marijuana?”
“I asked, and he said the town was clean.”
Most of Florida’s crime problems over the past thirty years were drug-related. The fact that Chatham wasn’t involved in drugs only deepened the mystery. A convenience store appeared up ahead, and I tapped my brakes.
“Well, they’re doing something bad,” I said.
The store was called Shop amp; Save. Half grocery, half hardware store, with a rack of cheap clothes thrown in for good measure. I grabbed three prepackaged sandwiches and some cold drinks and went to pay up. The teenage kid working the register had shoulder-length hair and red-laced eyes. He rang up my items without making eye contact.
“You always smoke your breakfast?” I asked.
The kid lifted his head. I could have knocked him over with a feather.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he stammered.
“I smelled the reefer on your breath when I walked in.”
“I’m not stoned.”
“It smelled like homegrown.”
The kid’s face turned wet with fear. Linderman shouldered up next to me, and opened his wallet in front of the kid’s face. The gold FBI badge was hard to miss.
“Shit Daniels,” the kid said.
“Take a deep breath, and tell me your name,” I said.
“Tucker. My friends call me Tuck.”
“Are you from around here?” I asked.
“Next town over.”
“We’re interested in what you can tell us about Chatham,” I said.
Tuck swallowed the rising lump in his throat. I didn’t like scaring the daylights out of adolescents, but we needed some answers, and he looked like a good subject.
“Folks in Chatham have always been unfriendly,” Tuck said. “It got worse a couple of years ago.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“Some guys from Jacksonville showed up, and started asking questions. Then the townspeople started fighting with each other. Couple buildings got burned down, and I heard some folks disappeared.”
“They disappeared?” Linderman said.
“That’s what I heard. Can I ask you guys something?”
“Go ahead,” I said.
“You’re not going to arrest me, are you? I only took a couple tokes.”
“Whose buildings got burned down?” Linderman asked.
“Old Man Kaplan lost a barn and a bunch of animals,” Tuck said.
“Think he’d be willing to talk with us?” I asked.
Tuck saw his opening. He came out from behind the counter, and pointed at the road outside the store. “Go back the way you came. Four miles, you’ll see a dirt road. Drive down it, and there will be a big farm on your right. That’s Kaplan’s place. I’m sure he’d be willing to tell you what happened.”
Tuck had given us plenty of information to work with. I patted him on the arm. “Thanks a lot. One last thing. Don’t tell anyone about this conversation.”
Tuck walked us outside to our car, and shook both our hands.
“I won’t tell a soul,” the boy said.
CHAPTER 48
He got back on the road. Four miles later, an unmarked dirt road appeared, just like Tuck had said it would. We bumped along it until a farm came into view. There were acres of corn and tomatoes, plenty of cows, and a large pasture filled with chestnut-colored horses. The property was surrounded by three-board fence topped with barbed wire. Yellow signs warned trespassers that they’d be shot on sight. In one pasture, I spied a man riding a tractor. I wanted to speak to him, and flashed my brights. Instead of slowing down, the man drove to the opposite side of the field.
“Is that what they call Southern hospitality?” Linderman asked.
“This is one spooky place,” I said.
I pulled off and parked in the grass. We got out of the car and stood by the fence. Several minutes passed. Finally the man on the tractor drove over and killed his engine. It made a whistling sound as it shut down. He wore a long-sleeved shirt and a straw hat, and had olive-colored skin. The brim of his hat was pulled down, shielding his eyes.
“Mister Kaplan?” I asked.
“Mister Kaplan’s away.” The man had a thick Mexican accent.
“Can you tell us when he’ll be back?” I asked.
“Can’t you read the signs? No trespassing.”
Linderman took out his wallet and let the man see his credentials. The Mexican climbed down from the tractor
to look at his badge. The front of his shirt came out of his pants, revealing the black pistol tucked behind his belt.
“Mister Kaplan went to Orlando,” the Mexican said. “He’ll be back in a couple days. That’s all I know.”
“What can you tell us about the fire on his property?” Linderman said.
“Mister Kaplan don’t want us talking about that,” the Mexican said.
“I’m with the FBI,” Linderman said.
“I can read,” the Mexican said.
“You can get in trouble by not talking to us,” Linderman said.
“I lose my job if I do,” the Mexican said.
The Mexican climbed back on his tractor. Clearly, the FBI didn’t carry much weight in his world. He started up the tractor’s engine.
“We’re just trying to help,” I yelled in Spanish.
The Mexican looked down at me. I held my hands up in a pleading gesture. He pointed to the rear of the property, then drove away.
We drove around the property. Kaplan had a big spread of land, and had a dozen people working for him. It was the first working farm I’d seen in Chatham, and it looked prosperous. As I came around a curve, Linderman spoke up.
“Over there. Look.”
I followed the direction of his finger. In the rear of the property sat the charred remains of a burned-down building. The concrete footprint suggested a large structure. A hay barn perhaps. Or horse stalls.
We got out to have a better look and pressed our bodies against the fence. The remains appeared to have been there for a while. The cinders were old and gray, and the grass around the building had grown back. I spotted a wood sign stuck in the ground. Handwritten, the letters had long since faded.
“Can you read that?” I asked.
Linderman shook his head. We were on the same wavelength, and both hopped the fence. We crossed the property with an eye out for trouble. We stopped in front of the sign and still had to squint. The sign read, “To the varmints who torched my barn and killed my horses. Unlike the good Lord, I will not forgive you.”
“What do you think is going on here?” Linderman asked.
“I wish I knew,” I said.
The sound of gunfire snapped our heads. The shots had come from the forest behind Kaplan’s property, and sounded like a small-caliber rifle.
