Tropic of Stupid

by Tim Dorsey

  “I already assumed that.”

  “I’m trying to solve a murder that’s been in the papers. Sure you saw it,” said Serge. “One Raúl Dixon.”

  “Serge, I think you’re overestimating my ability,” said Gypsy. “I can’t solve murders.”

  “I’m not expecting you to,” said Serge. “Just spit out hacked data based on my parameters. I was laboriously working on this with the geometry of genealogy—”

  “I don’t even know what that means.”

  “Neither do I, but it sounds impressive. That’s how you always must phrase things in life to go big.” Serge shifted the phone to his other ear. “Building my required family tree has been slower than I anticipated, but the recent homicide just turbo-charged the process. The murder was overkill-personal, and so full of coincidences that they are no coincidences. My pile of chips is on someone who knew him. I want you to start with Dixon and move outward, compiling a ten-year list of every name that’s appeared with his on any public document, and the private ones you have a knack for finding. Then give me the list in descending order of frequency, with any unusual background on the names that appear the most. Meanwhile, I’ll e-mail you photos of my corkboard.”

  “Oh, is that all?” said Gypsy. “You sure you don’t want me to also solve the Amelia Earhart disappearance?”

  A horrific scream from Serge’s end of the line, then slapping sounds. “You fucker!”

  “What did I say?”

  “Nothing. Can you just do this simple thing?”

  A harrumph. “I’ll see what I can find. But I expect to be paid.”

  “Handsomely,” said Serge. “And I promise to fix the windshield.”

  “You cracked my windshield?” yelled Gypsy.

  “Not my fault. Coleman lost control of the coconut bra.”

  “What?”

  “Later.”

  The Cobra reached the eastern edge of the Everglades next to the Miccosukee casino. It made a right at the Dade Corners truck stop and drove down into the bottom of the state.

  Agriculture, farmhands in straw hats, giant sprinklers, barbed wire at the immigration detention center. They reached the end of civilization in the town of Homestead. The Cobra sat at the curb as Serge pointed a camera upward. Click, click, click.

  “I just love the old Seminole Theatre! Built in 1921 with the period’s classic-style marquee extending over the sidewalk. And the name ‘Seminole’ is spelled out on one of those throwback vertical lighted signs rising up against the side of the building.” Click, click, click. “Can you imagine such a grand cinema at such a remote edge of humanity?”

  “I’m looking at it,” said Coleman. “So, yeah.”

  “It’s actually the second Seminole Theatre,” said Serge. “The first was built when they took apart the Airdome Theatre in Miami in 1916, and sent the pieces on a train over here . . . Woohoo. I’ve been waiting for this day forever!” Click, click, click. “The joint had been closed for almost forty years, so it became an eyesore unsuitable for proper photographic documentation. Thank God for preservationists! They restored the landmark and now I can have my pictures.” Click, click, click.

  A phone rang, and Serge answered.

  “Gypsy, that was fast!”

  “Don’t get too excited yet,” said Gypsy. “But I got an early hit that I thought you’d want to know about right away.”

  “Somebody with the most documented contacts with Dixon?”

  “Actually not,” said Gypsy. “I found a dozen people with three to six hits in the records. But it was a dude with only two who caught my eye. In 2013, he bailed Dixon out of jail in Marathon for drunk and disorderly, and three years later, he turned up on a transfer of title.”

  “Sold a car?”

  “No, boat, fourteen-foot skiff,” said Gypsy. “Must not have been much of one because it only went for seven hundred.”

  “So why is the guy with only two hits on your list interesting?” asked Serge.

  “Because I traced everything I could find on the dozen above him, and nothing, and then I hit him.”

  “Leaving me hanging?”

  “I hacked into the court systems, sealed juvenile records. Arson and animal cruelty.”

  Serge nodded. “Two of the markers of a future serial killer.”

  “That’s why I thought you’d want to know.”

  “Thanks. Anything on the location?”

  “The later records show Ramrod Key, but the earlier juvie stuff is from Homestead. I’ll keep working on a current address.”

  “Coincidentally, I’m in Homestead right now. So I guess I’m on my way to Ramrod. Thanks.”

  “A question,” said Gypsy. “Why me? The FDLE is much better with murder investigators.”

  “Infinitely better,” said Serge. “But you can hack cyberspace like a Nobel laureate, and you’re not picky about search warrants. Anything else?”

  “Windshield.”

  Click.

  The Cobra drove away from the Seminole Theatre. Farther south. Surrounding neighborhoods depressed, the homes dribbling off as the town gave way to mangrove swamp.

  Serge sped past one of the last streets, where a two-bedroom house stood with black stains on the concrete walls. The yard was dirt and the mailbox full of junk flyers. It appeared for all the world to be vacated. The blinds were drawn, and the lights were never on. The only clue was a sunbaked Chevelle in the driveway, which only a few neighbors had witnessed coming and going in the middle of the night. It was one of those houses where the rest of the block thought: Leave well enough alone.

  Inside, a light was actually on, but all the windows were taped up with black paper. The light was a naked bulb in the back bedroom. The bureau sat covered with empty beer cans and stacks of unwashed dishes. The toilet in the bathroom remained unflushed. A rat scampered unmolested through crumpled newspapers on the floor.

  Then a paradox: a lone shelf on concrete blocks. Full of books. Textbooks. Graduate level. Biology, calculus, theoretical physics and so on. Mensa stuff.

  In the corner, a middle-aged man in a white tank-top sat in a lawn chair, transfixed, eating Ramen noodles so slowly as to appear that the resident was coming around after taking a tranquilizer dart. The broth trickled down his chin and onto the shirt. He had been staring for an hour. It was something on the wall.

  A corkboard was full of notecards and pushpins and colored yarn, just like Heather’s and Serge’s. Except this wasn’t a family tree. There were pictures and dates and a souvenir collection of driver’s licenses. Half of the photos were grainy, long-range zoom shots. The people in them were in shopping malls, strolling through parks, loading groceries, all seemingly unaware. The other half of the photos were the same people. Mostly in the woods. This time they were even less aware, because they weren’t breathing anymore.

  The resident continued eating soup, staring at the boards, and caressing an unlaundered woman’s undergarment in his lap.

  Chapter 39

  South Florida

  Henry Flagler’s Overseas Railroad really opened up the Keys.

  Christened in 1912, it was converted for automobile traffic in 1938. Today, motorists drive over many of the magnificent original bridges connecting the islands, as well as the new one next to the Long Key Viaduct. Other old spans have also been retired, like the first Seven Mile Bridge over Pigeon Key.

  There stands one particular decommissioned bridge, however, that is the runaway favorite among amateur and professional photographers alike.

  A blue-and-white Cobra sped across a modern span near mile marker 37. Serge pointed south out the window.

  “There it is! There it is! The old Bahia Honda bridge, still standing after all these years. The most picturesque, postcard-ready sight on this whole highway!” Click, click, click.

  “It looks rusty,” said Coleman.

  “Because it’s righteously aged.” Click, click, click. “A fabulous five-thousand-foot monument to camelback truss construction connecting
this island to Spanish Harbor Key.” Click, click, click. “Fun fact: Flagler’s trains used to run through the middle of the trusses, which were so frighteningly narrow that upon approaching the bridge, the conductors used to make everyone close all the windows so arms wouldn’t get chopped off.”

  “Arms not getting chopped off.” Coleman swilled a Schlitz. “Hooray.”

  “You sarcastic cretin! Then I shouldn’t share with you that when they converted it for cars, the bridge was too narrow for two lanes, so they assembled the concrete highway decks at a harrowing height on top of the trusses, and the guardrails weren’t much to speak of back then.” Serge punched Coleman in the shoulder.

  “Ow!”

  “I’m imprinting. You’re in the presence of glory!” said Serge. “If there were a list of Florida’s Seven Wonders, this would be on it. Even better, it’s now a state park.”

  The Cobra pulled through the entrance and up to the guard shack. Serge flapped a small green book out the window. “Rock that ink pad, dude . . .”

  Serge soon stood with Coleman on the shore of the Gulf Stream. “Look at that water! Look at that sand! This place is regularly voted one of the top two beaches in all of Florida, and that’s stiff competition, usually neck and neck with Crescent Beach on Siesta Key . . . Coleman, let’s go!”

  “Where?”

  “To climb the bridge!”

  “What? . . .”

  Moments later, another familiar scene. Serge standing proudly with a chestful of appreciation, enjoying natural magnificence with dozens of other tourists. Coleman on his hands and knees vomiting.

  “Coleman, stop fooling around and get up here! You’re missing everything.”

  “Hold on. I got a little more coming.” Retching sounds.

  “And normally I’d be pissed off, but you’re effectively clearing out the other tourists, providing solitude for my experience.”

  Coleman struggled onto two legs and staggered. “Serge, there’s a gap in the bridge with barricades.”

  “That’s right. We’re up on the old concrete highway deck. They had to cut away a small space in the bridge so that jokers and drunks wouldn’t barrel around ‘Do Not Enter’ signs.” Serge slowly pirouetted in an organic buzz. “Dig the view from way up here! Turquoise and emerald water, sailboats, sugar-white sand. Everyone should be taking photos! . . .”

  Click, click, click. The sound wasn’t from Serge’s camera, but a zoom lens aimed up at the bridge from behind a coconut palm.

  Serge pointed at the corner of Coleman’s mouth. “. . . You got spit-up.” His pocket vibrated. He answered the cell phone.

  “Gypsy, word.”

  “Serge, I want a grand.”

  “I think I can find that lying around . . . someone else’s place. What have you got?”

  “An address and name.”

  “That’s my Gypsy.” A notebook and pen came from another pocket. “Ready to write.”

  “Here it is . . .” He burped out the info. “And I checked it on Google Earth. It’s kind of eerie. You sure you know what you’re doing?”

  “What’s it ever looked like?”

  “That’s my point. And I want my car.”

  Serge lowered his head. “Godspeed.” He hung up and looked at Coleman. “Is it me?”

  The 1970 Ford Cobra pulled out of Bahia Honda State Park and headed back to the mainland.

  A moment later, a sunbaked Chevelle pulled away from the park onto the same road.

  Coleman sucked smoke out of a coconut repaired with duct tape. “What do you want to watch on TV tonight?”

  “I want my money’s worth out of my portable DVD player,” said Serge. “So I guess Sea Hunt.”

  “Again?” said Coleman. “But we’ve watched it every night this week.”

  “Because Sea Hunt is the best!” said Serge. “It was a magical time. If you watched any television at all in the sixties, you know what I’m talking about, and I give Jacques Cousteau credit. All those educational oceanic specials. And then for some paranormal reason, maybe because scuba diving was still relatively novel, the whole country went gaga. All these TV producers in meetings: ‘We’re stuck on the plot for the next episode of our cops-and-robbers show. Fuck it, make ’em scuba dive.’ If you need any more proof, even James Bond got into the act in 1965 with Thunderball. And suddenly all these dramatic network shows began changing their denouements. Instead of gunfire in an alley or a side-swiping car chase, the final confrontations went underwater, and every other TV show ended in scuba diver fights. I’ve been diving a lot, and not all the divers have sparkling personalities. A lot of broiling rivalry and arguments in the beach bars after dark, and yet I’ve never seen an underwater fight, not even shoving. But back then on TV, there were always fights, and it was always the same fight. A knife fight. And you always knew how the fight was going to end: one of the guys would slash the other’s air hose.”

  “I once saw a show where a guy got shot with a speargun,” said Coleman.

  “The exception that only proves the rule,” said Serge. “That scriptwriter was clearly overqualified.”

  The day drew to a close as a 1970 Cobra crossed the bridge from Key Largo, entering the first spongy mangrove miles of the mainland. Serge glanced down at a scrap of paper in his lap.

  “So Gypsy really came through?” asked Coleman.

  “We’ll soon find out.” Serge looked ahead where the road merged with the route from the Card Sound Bridge and Alabama Jack’s. “It’s right up here.”

  The Cobra passed the darkened marquee of the historic Seminole Theatre. Serge soon took a left and doubled back south through the badlands of greater Homestead. Headlights reached a fork that led down to the Everglades National Park center on the bottom tip of the state near Cape Sable. Serge took the other spur, into a smattering of concrete homes at the end of the line . . .

  A hundred yards back, a sunbaked Chevelle made the same turn. The driver knew the way by heart.

  Serge slowed as they approached the address from Gypsy. He stopped at a curb and rechecked the numbers. “I think this is it.”

  “Looks abandoned,” said Coleman. “No lights on, no car, no lawn, grimy walls, junk mail all over the porch.”

  “That’s how all serial killers’ homes look.” Serge grabbed his door handle. “It’s like they have their own Homes and Gardens special edition.”

  “Wait,” said Coleman. “You’re just going to walk right up to that house?”

  “That’s the best way to get there unless you have a jet pack.”

  “No, I mean if he really is a killer, what if he’s home? We could get hurt . . .”

  Behind them, at the far end of the block, a Chevelle with its lights off slowly rounded the corner and parked ten houses down.

  “Coleman, there’s no car in the driveway, and this is the kind of remote real estate where you don’t exactly walk home.” Serge stepped out of the car. “I guarantee it’s perfectly safe.”

  Serge led his pal around the side of the house, looking for the most opportune entry point. “Here we go. An unlatched window.”

  “That was careless of him.”

  “Lazy. The latch is broken.” Serge raised the window. “Now I’m more confident we’re at the right place.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because the glass is completely taped up with black paper. Another decorating tip from that Homes and Gardens edition . . . I’ll boost you up first because I can climb in on my own. Put your right foot in my hands.”

  “Okay.”

  Serge thrust. “And in you go!”

  Coleman’s drumstick legs disappeared into the house, followed by a violent tumbling noise. “Ow! Shit! Ow!”

  Serge deftly followed him in without incident. He felt along the walls for light switches and flicked them, but none worked. “Coleman, here’s your coal miner’s head lamp. We’ll use these until we can find some illumination. Remember, the lamp faces forward.”

  “Thanks.”<
br />
  A pair of beams crisscrossed the dark stillness as they worked room to room. Coleman’s beam kept pointing down. “Look at all the trash. And there’s rat poop.”

  “Stay on mission,” said Serge. “We’re looking for evidence that this is our guy.”

  They came up empty, space after space, until there was only one spot left, the back bedroom. Serge’s beam hit a lamp with a naked lightbulb. He pulled a chain. The room lit up.

  The pair froze. They stared at a wall. “Jesus Christ!”

  The corkboard was unsettling. Long-range surveillance photos of future victims, their souvenir driver’s licenses and then the gruesome pictures. As their eyes moved, it became increasingly chilling. More zoom photos, but these were recent. Serge’s mouth hung open as his gaze slowly moved over them. There were a half-dozen black-and-white shots of Heather walking out of her city office. Then an equal number of grainy pics of Ranger Bobby.

  Coleman gasped and pointed. “That’s me! And me again! And you! What’s going on?”

  “They were taken at the park,” said Serge. He removed a pushpin and plucked Heather’s business card from the corkboard. “Our fellow has been a busy beaver. He somehow got wind that after all these years, the authorities had picked up his trail. Probably from the late Mr. Dixon.”

  “What are we going to do?” asked Coleman.

  “This.” Serge stepped back with his cell phone, taking photos of the wall.

  “But what if he’s nearby?”

  “He’s very nearby,” said Serge. “In a sunbaked Chevelle at the end of the street.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because he’s been following us ever since Bahia Honda,” said Serge.

  “You saw him the whole way?”

  “No, just when he parked at the end of the block a few minutes ago.” Click, click, click. “But yesterday I found a magnetic GPS tracking device under my back bumper. I always check every morning. Judging from these photos, I’m guessing he attached it when we were away from the car inside Bobby’s apartment at Myakka.”

  “But how could he have followed us if you threw the tracker away?”