The Seadragon's Daughter (Dragon de la Sangre)

by Alan F. Troop

  The thought of visiting Cockpit Country again—a wild and overgrown area with an irregular terrain so full of closely bunched, almost pyramid-shaped mountains and plunging sinkholes that few people dare to visit it—makes me yearn to go. It still is the only place I’ve ever been able to fly over in my natural form during daylight.

  I’m so preoccupied with my thoughts of Jamaica that I barely pay attention to Henri as we get in the Grady White, cast off from the dock and head toward his school. We’re already across the bay and near the channel to his school, before he tugs on my arm. “Papa! I said slow down. Please!”

  I push the throttles up, look around for any possible danger as the hull lowers into the water, the boat slowing, coasting forward, beginning to wallow. But the only other boats I see moving on the bay are far away, heading in other directions. I scan the sky for any signs of bad weather, study the few clouds scattered overhead, puffy white things that can’t even threaten to provide a sun shower. I look at Henri. “What?” I say. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing, Papa. Look!” He points to the water about twenty yards behind our boat. I see nothing for a few moments and then a gray fin breaks the surface, the dolphin arching its back for a moment, then disappearing.

  “So it’s a dolphin,” I say.

  “It’s been following us, Papa. Ever since we left home. I think it’s the same one as before.”

  “Maybe,” I say, watching for the fin, spotting it when it breaks water again, only ten feet from our boat. I push the throttles forward again. “We still have to get you to school on time.”

  Henri’s school, Coral Bluff, my alma mater, sits on land that would make any developer cry with envy. Occupying fifteen acres of prime bayfront land just a few hundred yards south of downtown Coconut Grove, the school boasts some of the finest tropical landscaping and some of the oldest coral stone buildings in the county—as well as the best academic reputation. All of which enables it to collect tuitions worthy of an Ivy League college.

  It is also the only local school I know of that has its own boat channel, docks and fleet of boats.

  We enter the narrow channel, motors slowed down to a purr, the Grady White just ghosting along, and pass the boathouse where the school keeps a half dozen rowing sculls and fifteen Optimist sailing prams, sitting one after another in a neat line along the south bank of the channel. The rest of the school’s fleet—twelve glistening, white Precision Sixteen sailboats—float tied up at the dock nearby. I smile at the array of boats and wonder if the children who attend this school realize how privileged they are.

  As per usual no boats are tied up at the visitors’ dock. As far I know, I’m the only parent who brings his child to school each day by water. Henri goes to the bow as I approach the visitors’ dock, and jumps off when I push the throttles to neutral and let the boat brush to a stop against the dock’s rub rail. “Look, Papa!” Henri points to the canal behind us. “It’s still with us.”

  I turn, see the dolphin’s gray fin, the outline of its gray body just below the water’s surface. From the size of it I assume it’s either a female or an immature male. I shake my head. I’m used to the small pods of bottlenose dolphins that frequent the waters near my island. I rarely have seen any of them swimming by themselves and certainly have never seen any dolphin follow a boat into any narrow channel.

  The dolphin swims by the boat slowly, as if it’s examining it, then flips around under the water, and with a kick of its tail shoots back out the channel. “See that?” Henri says, a wide smile on his face.

  I nod, watch the water for any sign that it might be returning. Its behavior’s so peculiar, I’m tempted to turn the boat around and chase it just to see what it will do.

  “Excuse me. Mr. DelaSangre?”

  Turning toward the voice, I find the school’s head administrator, Sam Maxwell, standing a few yards from the dock. Short and round, wearing a glossy black suit with a white shirt and a narrow deep green tie, his bald scalp glistening with sweat, he hardly looks like the type to be comfortable outdoors, certainly not under a bright and hot morning sun. “May we talk for a minute, Mr. DelaSangre?”

  I nod, motion him forward, wondering what mischief Henri’s done. Henri, I see, has the same thought. When I cock an eyebrow and look at him, he just shrugs and stares at the ground.

  As soon as Maxwell steps on the dock, he turns to my son. “Class is about to start, Henri. It wouldn’t do to be late.”

  Henri nods, says, “Bye, Papa,” and scampers off to class smiling, obviously happy to be dismissed.

  Maxwell watches the boy go, then turns to me. “Mr. DelaSangre, I’m so sorry,” he says, his hands out, fluttering as he speaks. “We believe in honoring the privacy of our students’ families. You know how many high-profile people, politicians and performers, attorneys and doctors, successful businessmen like you send their children here. You know how we try to control access to our grounds. I’m sick to my stomach that it occurred here. Absolutely disheartened. You must believe me.”

  My forehead wrinkles as I try to understand what he means. “I’m absolutely willing to believe you,” I say. “But I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  His eyes go wide, his face flushes a bright red. “You haven’t seen it yet? No one’s called you about it?”

  “About what?”

  “The picture. The article,” Maxwell says. He unclips a walkie-talkie from his belt, barks into it. “Miss Simon! I’m down on the dock with Mr. DelaSangre. Please bring me the paper that’s on my desk.” He pauses a moment, listens, then says. “Yes, that one. Now!”

  “What picture and what article?” I say.

  Maxwell takes a breath, sighs, flutters his hands. “I’d rather you see it yourself. I assure you I don’t believe a word of it. It’s not like it was in a legitimate paper. I want you to know we have a professional security force. They’ve been trained to keep the paparazzi out. We’ve already investigated and found the one who let him in.” The administrator huffs out an indignant breath. “For a hundred dollar bill, no less! Believe me, Mr. DelaSangre, we’ve already sent him on his way.”

  Miss Simon, a tall, thin woman in a light green dress that on her looks as shapeless as a cylinder, runs down from the administration building. Her high heels clack on the dock’s wood deck as she rushes up and hands Maxwell a thin newspaper. He hands the paper to me.

  I recognize it as one of the trashy weeklies that masquerade as underground newspapers and make their income mostly from restaurant and entertainment ads. This one’s masthead proudly proclaims itself as The Weekly Dish. A single color picture of me dropping Henri off at the school’s dock takes up most of the front page. The headline below the picture says, CAN THIS MAN BE A KILLER?

  Shaking my head, clenching my jaws, I open the paper, glance at the article long enough to see my name and those of Maria and Jorge Santos. Another name, Pepe Santos, also appears in the first paragraph. I read just enough to see he’s my accuser and then shut the paper.

  Glaring at the administrator, I spit out my words, “Can I keep this?”

  He takes an involuntary step back, caused no doubt by either my expression or the tone of my voice or both. “Yes, of course, Mr. DelaSangre. We have plenty of copies in the office.”

  My lips compress against my teeth. It takes all my self-control not to strike this fat, simpering, pompous little man.

  Maxwell realizes what he’s said and blanches. “Not that anyone’s going to keep any of the copies. I’ve already ordered that all of them be thrown out. There’s no place for trash like that in an institution like ours.”

  I nod, fold the paper, stuff it in the open compartment below the boat’s wheel. Without another word to Maxwell, I yank the wheel all the way over and throw the boat in gear, the motors roaring as I accelerate into a turn just tight enough to miss scraping the seawall on the other side of the channel.

  As soon as I straighten out, I gun the motors and race out the channel throwing a vicious
wake behind me that crashes water over the seawalls, dislodging a few of the school’s prams, washing them into the channel. Ordinarily such rude seamanship would draw an angry rebuke from the school. But I doubt that Maxwell feels anything but relief to see me gone.

  As soon as I clear the channel, I jam the throttles to full speed and mindspeak to Chloe, masked so Henri can’t hear us, {I’m going to the office before I come home. Remember the photographer I told you about? A couple of weeks ago? Some damn paper has the picture—Henri and me—plastered all over its front page.}

  {It’s just a picture, Henri. There are worse things than that.}

  {It’s not just the picture,} I mindspeak.

  Chloe says, {Peter, I rung up Mum—like you suggested. She was furious. She can’t stand to hear it ring. Mum swears she’s throwing out the phone. Anyway, I just got off the phone with her—}

  I interrupt her. {They have an article too! About me and Maria Santos and her brother, Jorge.}

  {Now? After all these years? Why?}

  {It’s all the disappearances. They’ve interviewed the Santos’s cousin, Pepe, and now they’re questioning whether I might have something to do with all the missing boaters.} I turn the boat left, head for the old seaplane channel just north of Dinner Key Marina.

  {Peter, that’s terrible. How can they do that? Couldn’t your people stop them?}

  I pass the main channel marker, slam the wheel over so violently that the Grady White skitters sideways as it turns toward Monty’s docks. {Maybe they could have stopped them. If they knew about it. We don’t own any stock in that paper. It’s too damned small. We own enough to control all the majors. Who’d have thought that a piece of crap like the Dish would ever bother us?}

  {The Weekly Dish?} Chloe mindspeaks.

  {That’s the one.} I cut back on the throttles as soon as I speed past the NO WAKE sign at the entrance to Monty’s marina. It’s one thing to rock a few little sailboats, quite another to send a few millions of dollars worth of motor boats crashing into their docks and each other.

  {I’ll look it up online. But I fear there’s worse, Peter.}

  I groan, mindspeak, {What now?}

  {Mum says Derek’s gone. She says he disappeared more than three months ago.}

  6

  Ordinarily I enjoy the leisurely pace of the final approach to the docks, cruising the last few hundred yards to my slip at Monty’s, the Yamahas rumbling gently, everything slowing down after a fast dash across the bay. But now I grit my teeth, tap my hand against the boat’s wheel as the Grady White glides through the water, leaving only ripples in its wake.

  Today I wish I could ignore the NO WAKE signs. I just want to dock the boat and get to the office.

  I can’t stop thinking about my brother-in-law, Derek Blood. I shake my head as I maneuver into my slip. I go from wondering if he’s somewhere in Miami to doubting that he could be so stupid. After all, he is Chloe’s older brother. He shares the same genetic background with her. But I have to admit he’s never exhibited any of the cleverness I’ve seen in the rest of her family.

  The very clumsiness of all the disappearances. The very greed of taking so many, in such a small area, in so short a time all point to someone as limited in scope and judgment as my brother-in-law. I tie the boat off, roll up my copy of The Weekly Dish and jump onto the dock.

  Fortunately, it’s a weekday and the dock’s clear of other boaters. I have no patience to tolerate idle chat now, no willingness to suffer any fools. Should someone interfere with me today, I’ll gladly lash out at them.

  I huff out a loud sigh. The creature would be dead now if it weren’t for his sister’s intercession. Had I killed Derek three years ago, when he and his father tried to take over my company and my holdings, he would be no worry today. But this time, if Derek has been stupid enough to return to Miami, I doubt Chloe will intervene on his behalf again.

  Rushing down the dock, I ignore the few workers readying the tables under the thatch-top cheekee huts at Monty’s outdoor dining patio nearby. I realize only after I first place foot on the asphalt surface of the restaurant’s parking lot that I’m barefoot. Unless I plan to go ashore, I rarely wear more than cutoffs and a tank top when I take Henri to school.

  No matter. I smile. Few people pay notice to any of the many boaters who walk around near the Grove’s waterfront. The guards at the Monroe building are used to seeing me come in dressed for boating. Surely my bare feet will hardly register with them.

  Striding across South Bayshore Drive, I pay no attention to the stoplight or to the cars that screech to a halt or zoom around me. I barely glance up at the Monroe building on the southwest corner of the intersection. I know full well the height of it, the green-and-beige design of its exterior. It, like the company it houses on its topmost floors, belongs to me.

  Men in dark suits and women in equally stuffy business dress come and go from the six brass-door elevators that service most of the building. The two guards who oversee this constant bustle spot me as soon as I enter the marble-floored foyer. They ignore everyone else, rush to keep up with me as I walk to the private elevator on the other side of the lobby—the only one that goes to LaMar Associates’ executive offices.

  “Mr. DelaSangre, how you doing today?” says the heavier of the guards, a pock-faced man who I remember goes by the name of Harry.

  I nod, force a smile and walk on. At the elevator door, I put my hand in my pocket and find it empty. “Damn!” I say. “Look, Harry, would you use your key? Mine’s at home.”

  The man’s rough face flushes pink. His right hand reaches for the ring of keys hanging from his belt, then drops away from it. “Mr. DelaSangre, you know I’m not supposed to use my key without Mr. Tindall’s permission. You know how he is.”

  I nod. I know exactly how Ian Tindall is and I understand the guard’s fear of him. Unlike Arturo Gomez, who likes to warn people before he acts, Ian never tolerates any violation of his rules. To him any offense, no matter how trivial, merits at least immediate dismissal. I’ve seen him do worse to the few employees who’ve been stupid enough as to openly oppose him.

  Still, the security guard should know better than to refuse me. “Did you forget who Ian works for, Harry?” I spit out. “Open the damn door!” I also tell him to call ahead, tell Ian, Arturo and his daughter, Claudia, to meet me in my office.

  The elevator door opens opposite LaMar Associates’ reception desk. Sarah, the receptionist, already standing, says, “Good morning, Mr. DelaSangre. Mr. Gomez and Mr. Tindall have been notified that you need to see them in your office. Ms. Gomez won’t be in for a few more minutes. She called to say she’d been delayed.”

  I nod and say, “Thank you, Sarah,” and grin at her rigid posture, the forced smile on her face. Whenever I’m near her, the woman gives off an aroma tinged with just the slightest acrid scent of fear. Understandable, I suppose. With a word I could have her gone.

  Still, I wonder. Other than Sarah’s timidity in my presence and her constant battle with her weight, I know little about her. Father told me a few humans, very few, can sense our difference. “They don’t understand it. They just know we make them uneasy. You have to watch for them, Peter. Fear always makes humans unpredictable.”

  I’m tempted to stay near her for a while—just see how she’ll cope with it. “It’s beautiful out there today,” I say.

  Sarah’s eyes widen. She looks around the room, down the mahogany-paneled corridor, then lets out a sigh. “Oh, there’s Mr. Tindall,” she says.

  Turning, I see the tall, skeletal frame of LaMar Associates’ legal counsel and co-manager. “Peter!” he says, his black suit obviously well tailored but still hanging loose on his too-thin body, his pale, thin lips pressed into an insincere smile as he reaches out to take my hand. “This is an unexpected pleasure.”

  I take his bony hand in mine, squeeze it just hard enough to make him wince. Father never tired of warning me. “Never trust any of them. I’ve never seen an honest Tindall. They’r
e nothing but scoundrels. But useful,” he said. “After all, what need would we have for an honest lawyer—if we could find such a thing?”

  Ian talks about sports, the Miami Heat basketball team, as he follows me down the hall to my office. “You should let me get tickets to the games for you and Chloe next year,” he says. “Everyone goes to them, the mayor, the archbishop, everyone important.”

  I enter my office, barely glance out the large window overlooking the marina and Biscayne Bay beyond it and sit down behind my desk, putting The Weekly Dish face down on the desktop, motioning for Ian to take one of the leather seats facing me. “Just what I need,” I say. “Chloe’s already talked me into season tickets at the Coconut Grove Theater, the Philharmonic and the Theater of the Performing Arts on Miami Beach.”

  The thin man waves his hand as if to dismiss my objections. “Don’t forget, Peter. I’m the one you called to arrange your seats. You may complain a lot, but I know you love doing it for her,” Tindall says.

  “True,” I say, nodding, thinking about my wife and her desire to expose herself to all the things she missed growing up in her secluded valley. Because of her, I’ve seen more theater, more music and more art in the last few years than in all the rest of my life.

  A waft of Aramis cologne enters the room. I shake my head. Wishing that sometimes my sense of smell could be dulled, I look toward the doorway. The scent of Arturo Gomez’s amply applied cologne always precedes him. “Hi, Arturo,” I say, just before the man steps into my office.

  Wearing a perfectly tailored Armani suit, his dark complexion made even darker by hours of boating in the sun, the man flashes me a smile full of bright white, capped teeth. “Peter! I didn’t expect to see you so soon.”