Carl Hiaasen - Chomp

“What about your dad?” she said.

One look at Link and Wahoo knew there was no point in asking him to wait; the guy didn’t want Mickey on his boat again. Link unhitched the dock rope and climbed up in the driver’s perch, slapping a hairy left hand on the steering stick. He turned the ignition, and with his right foot he pumped the gas pedal, revving the engine.

Instantly the large propeller began to turn. The airboat eased along briefly before gathering speed and shooting forward through the grassy, cinnamon-tipped sedge. Link took the first bend fast, producing a steep sideways slide that never failed to delight the tourists. For balance Tuna locked arms with Wahoo, who would have enjoyed the moment had he not been distracted by an object that appeared dead ahead in their path, no more than a hundred yards away.

“Stop!” Wahoo yelled as they flew closer, but Link couldn’t hear him over the engine. It seemed impossible that from his elevated seat the driver didn’t see what Wahoo-and now the others-plainly did:

A bare-chested man stretched out upon a black, knobby object, which he was paddling like a surfboard across the water.

“Look out!” Tuna hollered.

By now, the other passengers were waving and shouting, too. Yet the airboat wasn’t veering away or even slowing down. Link sat erect and stone-faced as the wind made his grungy hair dance.

Psycho! Wahoo thought. Shaking free of Tuna, he yanked off his backpack, raised it above his head with both hands and hurled it at the control deck.

Somehow he got lucky. The flying satchel knocked Link’s boot off the gas pedal, sending the boat into a sputtering stall. It skimmed to a halt only a few feet from Mickey Cray, who calmly grabbed on and hauled himself aboard.

“Howdy, pilgrims,” he said.

The other riders sat speechless. Their disbelieving eyes went back and forth from the dripping, shirtless man to the bizarre craft upon which he’d been traveling-a stuffed alligator bolted to a log.

“Anybody got a towel?” Mickey inquired.

Wahoo said, “Sit down, Pop.”

Link was glaring at both of them. “Yeah. Sit your butt down.”

Passing overhead, Raven Stark peered out the window of a rented Bell 407 helicopter and tried to make sense of the strange scene below. Sitting in front of her was Derek Badger, who was preoccupied by other matters.

“Call the hotel,” he told Raven through her headphones. “Tell them to move me to a room with a Jacuzzi. Chop-chop!”

Susan Cray said her husband had the ideal occupation because he got along so much better with animals than he did with people. Sometimes that included his own family.

“Let me get this straight,” Wahoo said curtly to his father. “You went into the water-”

“That dumb goon threw me.”

“-with the cell phone in your pocket! Seriously?”

“He was way outta line-tellin’ me I don’t know a dead gator from a live gator!”

Wahoo tossed another branch on the fire. “Fantastic, Pop. Now we’re in the middle of nowhere without a phone.”

Mickey seemed unconcerned. “We can always borrow your girlfriend’s.”

“Not to call China we can’t,” said Wahoo. “And she’s not my girlfriend.”

The Crays had pitched their own small camp away from the TV crew because Mickey didn’t want to be around Derek Badger. Deep in the hardwoods, they were shielded from a breeze that would have otherwise kept away the mosquitoes. Now they were losing blood by the pint to the ravenous swarms.

Wahoo had set up a separate pup tent for Tuna, who poked out her head and said, “I hear you two characters talking about me.”

Mickey didn’t miss a beat. “Does your cell have one of those international chips? Don’t worry, I got a credit card.”

Barely, thought Wahoo.

Tuna pointed up at the clouds. “No signal way out here, Mr. C. Maybe when we’re back at the dock.”

“Sorry, son,” Mickey said to Wahoo, pretending Wahoo was more bummed than he was. Twice they’d tried to reach Susan Cray from the house before leaving on the Everglades trip, but all they’d gotten on the other end was static.

Tuna announced she was taking a walk. Wahoo’s father told him to go with her.

“What for?”

“ ’Cause you’re a gentleman.” Mickey looked serious. “Don’t make me ask twice.”

Wahoo brought a flashlight, mainly to make sure they didn’t step on any water moccasins or pygmy rattlers. A curtain of low ragged clouds blocked out the stars and the moon. The night air was warm and heavy; Wahoo wondered if a thundershower was coming. Above the western horizon they saw white pulses of heat lightning.

Centuries of water flow had shaped the island like a teardrop, the tallest trees clustered at the fat end. Tuna rattled off their Latin names as she walked: Myrica cerifera (wax myrtle), Annona glabra (pond apple) and Magnolia virginiana (swamp bay).

Wahoo asked if she had a photographic memory.

She said, “No, dear, I just study.”

Before long they heard voices, and through the trees they saw the campsite of the Expedition Survival! crew. No fire was burning, but the clearing was well lit by cheesy bamboo tiki torches.

A young woman from the catering company was cooking T-bone steaks on a big stainless-steel stove of the type used at fancy river camps in places like Alaska. The director, cameramen and sound technicians sat in a half circle of folding chairs, drinking beer, slapping at bugs and laughing boisterously.

“Turn off the flashlight,” Tuna whispered to Wahoo. “Let’s get closer.”

“No way. We’re not gonna spy.”

“It’s not spying, Lance, it’s observing.”

They crouched in a thicket of coco plums and inched forward. The crew members were taking turns telling stories. Wahoo couldn’t make out every word, but he got the gist. Even the catering lady was giggling.

“Who are they talking about?” Tuna asked Wahoo.

“Take a wild guess.”

“Not Mr. Badger?”

“I’m pretty sure.”

They stopped moving so they could hear better. The next story, which was recounted uproariously by the show’s director, involved a close-up scene in which Derek accidentally snorted a live earthworm up his nose.

“They make him sound like a horse’s ass,” Tuna whispered cheerlessly.

“You know how people talk when the boss isn’t there.”

Tuna hadn’t been around Derek long enough to know the truth. She was a genuine fan, one of millions, so it would take a while for her to accept that the real-life Derek was a different person from the one she saw on TV. Earlier, Wahoo had noticed her disappointment when she’d learned Derek was staying at a luxury hotel, not roughing it in the swamp as he pretended to do on the show.

She tugged Wahoo’s sleeve. “Somebody’s coming!”

“Be still.”

One of the cameramen had left his chair and was cautiously making his way into the unlit wooded area where Wahoo and Tuna were hiding. He was only a few steps away when he stopped beside a bay tree and began to unzip his pants.

Oh no, thought Wahoo. Not here.

In the shadows he couldn’t see Tuna’s expression, but he could sense her alarm. He touched her arm so she would stay calm-if the two of them were caught snooping, Raven would immediately fire Mickey, just as she’d threatened to do.

Tuna gently pushed Wahoo’s hand away. Next she did something completely unexpected: she grabbed one of the coco plum bushes and began to shake it.

The cameraman who was about to relieve himself froze at the rustling noise in the darkness. Tuna wasn’t finished. She let out a low, rising growl that an untrained ear could easily have taken for an unhappy bear or an ill-tempered bobcat, or even a mama panther.