Carl Hiassen - NativeTongue

"Oh, ho," said Kingsbury. "So you got something against golf?"

"That's the deal. Take it or leave it."

"You think you can scare me? Hell, I got gangsters shooting at me. Professionals." Kingsbury cut loose an enormous sneeze, and promptly plugged his nostrils with the handkerchief.

Winder said, "I was hoping to appeal to the pragmatic side of your nature."

"Listen, I know how to handle this situation from up North. The way to handle it is, I cut the wop bastards in. The Zubonis, I'm talking about. I cut 'em in on Falcon Trace, you'd be surprised how fast they let bygones be bygones. You watch what good friends we are once I start using Zuboni roofers, Zuboni drywall, Zuboni plumbing." Kingsbury looked positively triumphant. "Blackmail, my ass. The fuck are you going to blackmail me with now?"

"I believe you misunderstood the offer," Joe Winder said. "I'm not planning to go to the mob. I'm planning to go to the media."

Defiantly Kingsbury snatched the hanky from his nose. "Jesus, you're pissing me off." He picked up the phone and commanded the operator to connect him with Security. Joe Winder took two steps toward the desk, raised his paw and shot the telephone console to pieces.

Impressed, Kingsbury probed at the tangle of wires and broken plastic. "Goddamn lunatic," he said.

Winder sat down and tucked the gun into the furry folds of the costume. "Think in terms of headlines," he said. "Imagine what'll happen when the newspapers find out the Amazing Kingdom of Thrills is run by a Mafia snitch. You'll be famous, Frankie. Wouldn't you love to be interviewed by Connie Chung?"

"Let me just say, fuck you."

Winder frowned. "Don't make me shoot up more office equipment. Stop and consider the facts. You obtained the bank notes and financing for Falcon Trace under false pretenses; to wit, using a false name and phony credit references. Ditto on your construction permits. Ditto on your performance bond. Once the money boys find out who you really are, once they read about it on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, not only is Falcon Trace dead, you can look forward to spending the rest of your natural life at the courthouse, getting your fat ass sued off. Everybody'll want a piece, Frankie. We're talking cluster-fuck."

He now had Francis X. Kingsbury's undivided attention. "And last but not least," Winder said, "is the criminal situation. If I'm not mistaken, you're still on probation."

"Yeah, so?"

"So the terms of probation strictly prohibit consorting with known felons and other unsavory dirtbags. However, a review of your Security Department indicates you're not only consorting with known criminals, you've surrounded yourself with them."

"This isn't Orlando," Kingsbury said. "Down here it's not so. easy to get good help. If I was as strict as Disney, I'd have nobody working for me. What, maybe altar boys? Mormons and Brownie Scouts? This is Miami, for Chrissakes, I got a serious recruiting problem here."

"Nonetheless," Joe Winder said, "you've gone out of your way to dredge up extremely primitive life-forms."

"What's wrong with giving a guy a second chance?" Kingsbury paused for a second, then said, "I'm the first to admit, hell, Pedro was a bad choice. I didn't know about the damn drugs." Speaking of Pedro, he thought, where the hell is he?

"What's done is done," Winder said. He fanned himself with his spare paw, it was wretchedly hot inside the costume. "Frankie, this is a matter for you and the probation bureau. Between us boys, I wouldn't be surprised if they packed you off to Eglin for six or eight months. You do play tennis, don't you?"

The haughtiness ebbed from Kingsbury's face. Pensively he traced a pudgy finger along the lines of his infamous rodent tattoo. "Winder, what exactly is your problem?"

"The problem is you're mutilating a fine chunk of island so a bunch of rich people have a warm place to park their butts in the winter. You couldn't have picked a worse location, Frankie, the last green patch of the Keys. You're bulldozing next door to a national wildlife refuge. And offshore, in that magnificent ocean, is the only living coral reef in North America. I believe that's where you intended to flush your toilets – "

"No!" Kingsbury snapped. "We'll have deep-well sewage injection. High-tech facilities – no runoff, no outfall."

"Imagine," Winder mused, "the shit of millionaires dappling our azure waters."

Kingsbury reddened and clenched his fists. "If I go along with this deal, what, it's some major victory for the environment? You think the ghost of Henry Fucking Thoreau is gonna pin a medal or some such goddamn thing on your chest?"

Joe Winder smiled at the thought. "I've got no illusions," he said. "One less golf course is one less golf course. I'll settle for that."

"The lots, Jesus, they're worth millions. That's what this goddamn piece of paper'll cost me."

"I'll settle for that, too."

Kingsbury was still stymied. He glared furiously at Charles Chelsea's final publicity release.

"You'll never understand," Winder said, "because you weren't born here. Compared to where you came from, this is always going to look like paradise. Hell, you could wipe out every last bird and butterfly, and it's still better than Toledo in the dead of winter."

With a dark chuckle, Kingsbury said, "No kidding."

"Don't read too much into this operation, Frankie. I'm just sick of asshole carpetbaggers coming down here and fucking up the place. Nothing personal."

It came out of the blue, Kingsbury saying, "There was a guy named Jack Winder. Big-time land developer, this goes back a few years, before I was selling waterfront. Winder Planned Communities was the company."

"My father."

"What?" said Kingsbury. "Quit whispering."

"Jack Winder was my father."

"Then what the hell are you doing? Biting the hand is what I'd call it. Dishonoring the family name."

"Depends on your point of view."

Kingsbury sneered. "I hear this line of bullshit all the time: "We got our slice of sunshine, fine, now it's time to close the borders." Selfish is what you are."

"Maybe so," Winder said. "I'd like to fish that shoreline again, that's for sure. I'd like to see some tarpon out there next spring."

Dramatically, Francis Kingsbury straightened in the chair. He began talking with his eyes and hands, unmistakably a sales pitch: "People come to the Amazing Kingdom, they might like to play some golf. Mommy takes the kids to the theme park, Daddy hits the fairways. So what?"

Winder said nothing. Kingsbury began to knead his jowls in exasperation. "What the hell's so wrong with that picture? Eighteen lousy holes, I just don't see the crime. It's what Disney did. It's what everybody does with prime acreage. This is Florida, for Chrissakes."

"Not the way it ought to be, Frankie."

"Then you're living in what they call a dreamworld. This ain't Oz, son, and there's no fairy wizard to make things right again. Down here the brick road's not yellow, it's green. Plain and simple. Case closed."

But Joe Winder wasn't changing his mind. "I hope the papers get your name right," he said.

Bleakly Kingsbury thought of front-page headlines and multimillion-dollar lawsuits and minimum-security prisons with no driving range. "All right," he said to Winder, "let's talk."

"You've got my offer. Read the press release, it's all tied up with a pretty ribbon. You shut down Falcon Trace for the noblest of reasons and you're a hero, Frankie. Isn't that what you want?"

"I'd rather have my oceanfront lots."

Then the door flew open and there, bug-eyed and seething, was Pedro Luz. He aimed a large blue handgun at Joe Winder and grunted something unintelligible.

"Nice of you to put in an appearance," Kingsbury remarked. His eyes flooded with a mixture of rage and relief. "This asshole, get him out of my sight! For good this time."