Elmore Leonard - Gold Coast

There was a silence.

“You have more to do than keep watch on me,” Karen said.

Grossi nodded.

“Assign the bonds over and let’s stop all this.”

“I have to think about it a little more.”

“But you will keep Roland away from me.”

“Don’t worry about Roland.”

She sat quietly, aware of sounds, voices around her. She waited, wanting to be sure. Ed Grossi touched the cottage cheese again with his spoon, then put the spoon down and picked up his napkin.

“I won’t have to go to court then,” Karen said.

“No, you won’t have to go to court, if you give me time, let me be sure in my mind it’s all right.”

“Thank you,” Karen said.

Maguire’s body, arms raised, a piece of fish in each hand, formed a Y. He stood on the footrung of an aluminum pole that dug into his groin, the pole extending from a platform on a slight angle, so that Maguire’s fish-offerings were held some fifteen feet above the surface of the Flying Dolphin Show tank.

He said to the mothers and fathers and children lining the cement rail, “Okay… now this double hand-feeding can be a little tricky, considering the height”-looking up-“ and the wind conditions today. The dolphins could collide in midair, with a combined weight of”-serious, almost grim-“nine hundred pounds. And you know who’s gonna be under them if they do. Yours truly, standing up here trying to look cool. Okay… here they come. Bonnie on my right, Pebbles on my left-”

Or was it the other way around?

The pair of dolphin rose glistening wet-gray in the sunlight, took the fish from his hands and peeled off, arching back into the water.

“And they got it! How about that, fifteen feet in the air. Wasn’t that great? Let’s hear it for Bonnie and … Peb-bles.”

Applause, as Maguire stepped down off the pole to the platform. He got three hunks of cod from his fishbucket, quickly threw two of them out to Bonnie and Pebbles, and waited for Mopey Dick.

Come on-

Mopey’s head rose from the water, below the platform. A wet raspberries sound came from Mopey’s blowhole.

“What? You didn’t like the double jump, Mopey?”

Rattles and clicks and whines from the blowhole. The kids watching, looking over the rail, loved it.

“You say you can jump higher?”

More rattles and clicks.

“Well, let’s just see about that.” Maguire sidearmed Mopey the piece of fish he was holding, stooped to the bucket and selected a long tailpiece. “You think you’re so good, let’s see you come up six teen feet and take the fish out of my mouth. Okay, Mopey? Everybody want to see him try it?”

Of course. The kids yelling, “Yeaaaaaaa-” as Maguire, with a piece of dead fish hanging from his mouth, adjusted the pole, raising it a foot, thinking, Jesus Christ-

Karen came out of the round white building, Neptune’s Realm, down from the Flying Dolphin Show. She waited on the walk, looking around, as the moms and dads with their cameras and kids moved on to the Shark Lagoon.

There he was. Across the lawn, walking with a girl brushing her hair. Both wearing the white shorts and red T-shirts. He must have come out another exit. Karen watched them go through the fence enclosing the shark pool. Maguire mounted the structure that was like a diving platform, playing out a mike cord behind him. The girl remained below: cute little thing with a lot of Farrah Fawcett hair. Karen wondered how old the girl was. Not much more than twenty. She noticed Maguire was quite tan, healthy looking; different than the man she remembered sitting in the dark. She approached the crowd that rimmed part of the cement lagoon. There was an island in the middle, a palm tree and several sleepy pelicans. Sharks moved through the murky water like brown shadows.

He looked younger in his white shorts. Good legs. His voice was different, coming out of the P.A. system. It sounded like a recording.

“Nurse sharks do not have a reputation as maneaters, but like all sharks they’re very unpredictable. They might not eat for three months, then go into a feeding frenzy at any time. What Lesley is doing is jiggling that ladyfish on the end of the line to simulate a dying fish, which gives out low-frequency sound waves that can be detected by a shark as far as… nine… hundred… yards away. There’s a shark coming in from the left… Look at that.”

Karen watched Maguire, then let her gaze move over the crowd, pausing on some of the men. Which one would you pick as an armed robber? Maguire would be about the last one.

“Well, this time for bait we’re going to use… Lesley. Yes, Lesley is going down in to the lagoon in an attempt to hand-feed a shark with her bare hand… using no glove or shark repellant of any kind or… feed a barehand to a shark if she isn’t careful.”

The girl’s face raised, giving Maguire a deadpan look. Karen saw it. For some reason she thought of Ed Grossi, Ed eating his cottage cheese with a spoon-an hour ago at Palm Bay.

Then coming over the S.E. 17th Street Causeway and seeing the sign, seascape. Why not? She felt like doing something. She felt thoroughly herself, almost relaxed, for the first time in a week. And probably the only woman here in a dress. Beige linen, gold chain and bracelet. She should have gone home first and changed-remembering him saying, “Practically around the corner,” and telling him she had never been here.

He was saying to his audience, “We’re not having a whole lot of luck getting the sharks into the feeding area. As I mentioned they can go as long as three months without feeding. There’s one… no, changed his mind. Well… let’s give Lesley a big hand for getting down in the shark lagoon”-pause-“she may need one some day.”

“You sounded a lot different,” Karen said.

“I know,” Maguire said. “I hear my voice on the P.A., I think it’s somebody else. You want a Coke or something?”

“Don’t you have to work?”

“The main event’s on next. Go over there-see the yellow and white awning? I’ll meet you there in a couple of minutes. He seemed glad to see her, but hesitant, almost shy.

Karen got two Cokes and sat down at a picnic table away from the cement walk and the refreshment counter behind the grandstand. She heard, over the P.A. system, “Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls. Welcome to Brad Allen’s World-Famous Seascape Porpoise and Sea-Lion Show.” Pause. “And now, heeeeeeeeere’s Brad!”

Karen said, “Was that you?” as Maguire sat down across from her.

“I’m afraid so.”

“You always do it the same way?”

“Well-no, not always.”

“The other night, I couldn’t imagine you working here.”

“No-”

“I wasn’t inferring anything by that.”

“No, I understand. I’m a little out of place, but nobody’s caught on yet.”

“Maybe I know you better than most people,” Karen said. “Do you like doing this?”

“It’s all right. It beats tending bar.”

“Why don’t you quit?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

“Did you-” Karen paused. “Well, it’s none of my business. I wondered if you sent your friends their share.”

“Yeah, their wives. I sent ’em money orders. They can use it.”

On the P.A. system in the background, Brad Allen was introducing Pepper, Dixie, and Bonzai to the audience.

“I still don’t know the difference between a porpoise and a dolphin,” Karen said. “You never told me, did you?”

“No, I guess we got into other things.” Looking away from her and then back, hesitantly.

He’d been doing that since she approached him. Natural, but just a little shy. She liked it and smiled when he said, “You didn’t have to get all dressed up to come here.”