Randy White - Dead of Night

Interesting. He’d met the woman. They appeared to get along fine. Yet, he’d thrown this out to measure something, I felt sure. Maybe to find out how much independence I’d retained, how much I’d forfeited to the woman who would soon be the mother of his half sibling.

There were complicated subissues involved. Children are no less complicated than adults-survival requires heightened awareness in primate young. I had to tread lightly.

I said, “Your mother isn’t my biggest fan to begin with, and letting you stay longer wouldn’t raise my stock. If you’re not home by Sunday, she’ll never let you come back. Let’s not risk it.”

Lake tilted his head-part shrug, part nod of concession-which told me that he was aware I’d dodged his deeper question.

Tomlinson, however, seemed oblivious to the subtext, because he plowed ahead. “The boy’s right, Doc. It’s no accident that the secret files of Jobe Applebee got dropped in our laps. We have a moral obligation to see this thing through-no matter what it reads on your plane tickets. We don’t choose our evils; our evil chooses us.”

I said nothing-Lake had to leave Sunday because what I’d said about his mother was true. She’d never let him return. Even so, I listened as Tomlinson asked, “What are the chances we’ll crack these files within the next day or so?”

I said, “Zero. Even if we discover the cipher’s key, we’d still have to create an algorithm that would convert it from numbers to letters. Either that or translate it one word at a time. Ransom probably knows enough about computers to do the programming, but we’re still talking days. Maybe weeks.”

Tomlinson had anticipated the answer. “Okay, then here’s what we need to do.” He nodded to me. “Let’s drive to Kissimmee tomorrow and find where Frieda was killed. Take a look around, see what makes sense, what doesn’t. If her death was accidental, then this deciphering gig is no longer a moral priority. You can both fly off as planned. But if we see something that tells us the lady was murdered, then that’s our dharma. You can no more run off to Iowa than we can hear the sound of one hand clapping.”

In reply to my son’s puzzled expression, I shook my head quickly: Don’t ask.

“Same’s true for me,” Tomlinson continued. “I’ve got to follow it through. How pissed off do you think your sister’s going to be if I’m not here on Sunday for our live Webcast? She’ll shit a brick. Or ice cubes, is more like it. What would that cost her in Good Karma offerings?”

I could see that he was inwardly pleased with the idea.

After they’d left, alone in my lab I continued the copepod procedure, hooked on the idea that a hybrid could be developed. During the waiting periods, I did some research on Florida’s sugar industry-“Big Sugar,” it’s commonly called-hoping for a clue to what Applebee might have hidden in his encrypted files. Internet search engines produced a pile of hits.

I’d forgotten how big Florida’s sugar industry is, and how much political clout it has. I was also surprised at some of the environmental-friendly changes that had taken place in the last few years. Most of those changes had to do with the way the industry disposed of water.

More surprising was an entry in a Dutch newsletter that someone had translated into English and posted on an investment group’s Web page. It claimed that Florida’s sugar industry faced certain collapse. It predicted that much of its agricultural acreage would soon be for sale.

Could that be true?

I spent half an hour confirming it.

Something else I did was fret about Dewey. I’d left a message for her earlier. Around 1 A.M., I realized she hadn’t returned my call.

I’d left the phone in the house, and so I walked across the breezeway and dialed Dewey’s home phone. I got her voice mail again. Same when I tried her mobile.

I tried an hour later. Same results.

Odd.

It was only midnight, Iowa time, but it wasn’t like her to stay out so late, even on a Friday. It also was unusual that she didn’t answer her cell phone. The woman carried the thing everywhere.

I continued tinkering with Applebee’s files, messing with different decoding keys, trying to get my mind off Dewey. Not easy.

I pace when I’m worried and I soon began to pace. I paced between the lab and the house, alternately willing the damn phone to ring, then willing Jobe’s complicated cipher to give me a little break.

Neither cooperated.

We all have perverse, destructive components in our psychological makeup. I don’t know why, but we do. Gradually, on some perverse level, I was pleased that Dewey hadn’t answered, even though I was anxious to confirm that she was okay.

How many times had she criticized me for calling too late, or forgetting to call? Now here it was 2:30 A.M., Florida time, and she hadn’t even bothered to tell me she’d be out of touch.

In the adolescent game of scorekeeping, leverage shifted a little bit my way. In the future, if I didn’t feel like calling for a night or two, the lapse was now acceptable. She’d set the precedent, not me. In fact, all future demonstrations of independence were now justified-satisfying because Lake had questioned whether I could still act independently.

I tried one more time at 2:45, standing outside on the porch above the shark pen, looking at stars, feeling a tropic wind on my face.

No answer, so I cloaked my indignation in a message saying that I was concerned, to please call no matter what time she got in. Added too sharply that I’d be driving to Kissimmee in the morning because of Frieda’s death. I didn’t need any additional worries.

Then I clomped down the steps to check my specimen tank a final time. Paused once for long seconds, listening, because I thought I heard the sound of footsteps on shells. Paused again, hearing something, or someone, moving through mangroves.

Got my rechargeable spotlight; shined it around from the top deck. I varied the search pattern, switching it off for minutes. Then switched it on, painting the shoreline yellow.

Raccoons.

I went to bed.

LOG

18 Dec. Saturday, 06:30

From Dutch financial newsletter: “Florida’s sugar industry anticipates its own collapse as confirmed by insiders who are quietly formulating plans to sell off fields as buildable real estate. These privately owned companies depend on federal subsidies and import limits for survival. Owners recognize that trade barriers are vanishing as U.S. transitions to a global free market.

The agricultural area consists of nearly a million acres located south of Disney World…

Frieda had spent her last living moment on a stretch of isolated asphalt that linked State Route 60 with Canoe Creek Road, not far from where Lake Kissimmee once flowed as a river toward the Everglades but now runs straight, with dragline precision, through pastureland and citrus, partitioned by locks.

Rona wasn’t with us. She’d gotten a case of island fever-“Sanibel Flush,” it’s called-and decided to spend the rest of the weekend on the beach and in the bars with Mack and her other new friends before returning to Kissimmee.

It happens. The causeway from the mainland is three miles of bridge and palm islands. Crossing it is a little like approaching Sanibel from the sea. It’s on that first seaward approach that some are forever changed by what awaits-blue island beneath a sun-blue sky-and they are never again at ease on the mainland side of the bridge.

It happened to Rona. The flush is unmistakable, and I’d seen it in her. Which was fine, because she was an interesting, attractive lady who’d make a nice addition to the marina’s orbiting, ancillary family of visitors.