Carl Hiassen - Sick Puppy

No, Katya and Tish were not common. Within a week Clapley had installed them in one of his part-time residences, the sixteenth-floor Palm Beach condo, which featured a seven-jet Jacuzzi, a Bose sound system, and a million-dollar view of the Atlantic Ocean from every room. Katya and Tish were in heaven, and demonstrated their gratitude to Clapley with ferocious ardor. Occasionally they would go out to actual modeling tryouts, but for the most part they filled their days with swimming, sunning, shopping and watching American soap operas. When eventually it came time for their visas to expire, Katya and Tish were crestfallen. They appealed to their generous new boyfriend, Bob, who suggested he might be able to fix their immigration problems in exchange for a favor; not a small favor, though.

Robert Clapley had been the youngest of five children, and the only boy. At some point in an otherwise unremarkable childhood, young Bob had developed a somewhat unnatural interest in Barbie dolls, which his sisters collected like marbles. In fact there were so many Barbies and Barbie playhouses and Barbie wardrobes in the Clapley household that Robert's sisters never seemed to notice when one or two of the dolls went missing, and in any case wouldn't have thought to accuse their meek little brother. Robert's attraction to the Barbies was more than a fleeting puerile curiosity; three of the voluptuous eleven-and-a-half-inch icons – Wedding Day Barbie, Cinderella Barbie and Disco Barbie (plus assorted costumes) – covertly accompanied Clapley when he went off to college at age eighteen. Later, running dope twice monthly from Cartagena to South Bimini, Clapley was never without his favorite Live-Action Barbie, zipped snugly into the fur-lined pocket of his leather flight jacket.

What did he so adore about the plastic dolls? Their pneumatic and shapely flawlessness, to be sure. Each Barbie was dependably perfect to the eye and feel. That Clapley's obsession had an eccentric sexual component, there was no doubt, but he would have argued on the side of harmless fantasy over perversion. And indeed he treated the toy Barbies with the utmost veneration and civility, undressing them only long enough to change (or iron) their exquisite miniature outfits. Innocent or not, Robert Clapley knew enough to guard his secret; who would have understood? Clapley himself was vexed by the doll fixation, and as he got older began to doubt he would ever outgrow it – until he met Katya and Tish. Instantaneously the future appeared to Clapley in dual thunderbolts of lust. The statuesque immigrants represented a luminous opportunity for a therapeutic breakthrough; the transcendence of appetites from toy to flesh, from Barbie worship to Barbie carnality. In other words: from boy to man.

So strong was their desire to remain in the United States (and retain twenty-four-hour spa privileges at Robert Clapley's condominium tower), that Katya and Tish weren't completely unreceptive to his ambitiously twisted proposal. Matching the hair was a cinch; the blond hue of Clapley's choosing came in a brand-name bottle. The surgery, however – to begin with identically sized breast implants – was the cause of some trepidation for the two women.

There's absolutely nothing to worry about! Clapley insisted. America has the best doctors in the world!

Ultimately, Katya and Tish were persuaded to go along, cajoled and flattered and spoiled as they were by their enthusiastic young host. And Clapley was enthralled to observe the concurrent transformations, each cosmetic refinement bringing him closer to his dream of living live-in Barbies. No, it wouldn't be long now!

He sat at the head of the dinner table, sipping a chardonnay and beaming as Katya and Tish hungrily hacked at the scorched little bird carcasses. Palmer Stoat seems like a fellow who would appreciate this setup, Clapley thought cheerily. I can't wait to see his face when I introduce him to the girls.

And Stoat, like every man who'd recently met Katya and Tish, undoubtedly would lean over to his host and whisper: Wow, Bob, are those really twins?

And Robert Clapley would smile and answer the way he always did.

No, but they will be soon.

Vecker Darby's house blew up and burned down while Twilly Spree was asleep. Twilly would notice the photograph in the newspaper two days later, and sleep just as soundly that night. "Justice," he'd mutter to McGuinn, whose chin rested on his knee. "Justice, boy. That's all it is." The dog would sleep fine, too.

They were parked in palmetto scrub off a dirt road near Zolfo Springs when Vecker Darby came into their lives. It was close to midnight. Presumably, Desirata Stoat was home in Fort Lauderdale with her worthless dick-head of a husband, and Twilly found himself thinking about her. He was sitting in the rental car with an empty pizza box on his lap. McGuinn already had downed supper, four heaping cups of premium dry dog food; Desie had strictly instructed Twilly on which brand to purchase. Vet's orders, she'd said. Typically, McGuinn wolfed the whole pile in about fourteen seconds. Afterward Twilly would sneak out the antibiotic pills, each concealed in a square-folded slice of rare roast beef, which McGuinn eagerly inhaled.

Twilly had the radio turned up loud for Derek and the Dominoes, so at first he didn't hear Vecker Darby's flatbed truck. Certainly he didn't see it, as Vecker Darby was driving without headlights. Twilly was drumming his fingertips on the pizza box and wondering if, in retrospect, he'd been too hasty in his decision to ditch Mrs. Stoat in Bronson. Not that she would run to the cops; he had a strong feeling she wouldn't. No, what bothered Twilly was how he sort of missed her. She was good company; plus, she had a lovely laugh. The dog was terrific, a real champ, but he didn't light up the car the way Desie Stoat did.

I wonder if I'll ever see her again, Twilly thought.

When the song ended, he turned off the radio. That's when he heard the truck nearby – specifically, the grinding hydraulics of the flatbed being tilted. McGuinn raised his huge black head and barked. Hush! Twilly whispered. He slipped from the car and circled back through the scrub until he gained a clear view of the truck and what the driver was doing. As the incline of the flatbed steepened, the truck's unbound cargo began sliding off the back – assorted barrels, drums, tanks and cylinders, tumbling one after another down a gentle mossy embankment toward the banks of the Peace River, where Twilly Spree had hoped to spend a soothing, restful night.

The driver, whose name Twilly wouldn't learn until he saw it in the paper, didn't bother to watch his own handiwork. He leaned one hip against the fender and smoked a cigarette and waited until the whole load went down the slope. Then he lowered the flatbed, climbed in the cab and drove the five miles home. Vecker Darby was still in the shower when Twilly hot-wired the truck and raced back to the river to retrieve the barrels, drums, tanks and cylinders. Two hours later, when Twilly returned, Vecker Darby was sleeping in his favorite Naugahyde recliner with six empty Coors cans at his feet and the Playboy Channel blaring on the television.

He failed to awaken when one of the bedroom windows was pried open and the screen was cut, and therefore didn't see the broken-off end of a plastic rain gutter being inserted into his house by a stranger clad in Vecker Darby's own canary yellow hazmat moon suit (which Vecker Darby almost never wore but stored faithfully under the seat of his truck, in case of encountering an EPA inspector).

Nor did Vecker Darby awaken during the following ninety minutes, during which approximately 197 gallons of virulent and combustible fluids were funneled from barrels, drums, tanks and cylinders directly into the house. The resulting toxic soup contained the ingredients of xylene, benzyl phythlate, methanol, toluene, ethyl benzene, ethylene oxide and common formaldehyde, any of which would have caused a grave and lasting damage to the Peace River. The risk to an occupied home dwelling was equally dire but would prove far more spectacular, visually.