Randy White - Everglades

I wrapped a towel around my waist, walked to the front door, then paused. I could see Sally through the window, staring at the fire, mug of tea in hand. Across the water, at the marina, there were Japanese lanterns glowing red, green and orange, a bunch of people out there on the docks listening to music, still having fun despite the passing storm.

I tapped on the window to get Sally’s attention, then held up an index finger- Give me a minute, I’ll be back -then clomped barefooted down the steps to the wooden cistern that is my main fish tank. I switched on the overhead lights.

Every morning of my life, my first few waking minutes are filled with mild dread because, more than once, I’ve lifted the lid of that tank to find a soupy mess of decomposing specimens, the filter fouled, or the raw-water intake plugged. Keeping sea creatures alive is a time consuming, demanding job, and I had yet to check on my collection since returning.

Relief. The system was working just fine. The pumps were sucking in raw water, spilling overflow out. The hundred-gallon upper reservoir, with its subsand filter, was cleaning the water, then spraying it as a mist into the main tank where sea squirts and tunicates continued to filter, which is why the water therein is too clear to slow the human eye.

Through the water lens, I could see small snappers, sea anemones, swaying blades of turtle grass, sea horses, horseshoe crabs, whelk shells, the whole small world alive. There were five immature tarpon stacked beneath the exhaust of the upper reservoir, as motionless as bright bars of chrome. There were immature snook, as well, heads turned into the artificial current, a few sea trout, grunts and cowfish, too-strange little animals that look like something dreamed up at Disney World.

My reef squid were the hardest to find because their chro matophores allow them to blend with the sand bottom. But there they were, the entire miniature sea system healthy and well, indifferent to the world of primates going on above and around them.

As I stood looking into the tank, a voice called from the mangroves, across the water: “In that white dress, you look like some fuckin’ Fiji warrior. Or a guy in one of them old Tarzan movies. Put some clothes on or I ain’t crossing over.”

I’d installed shepherd’s-crook lamps along my boardwalk, and so I turned to see Frank DeAntoni in the distance, standing ashore in a circle of light.

Smiling, I said, “She’s agreed to talk to you, Frank. Come on aboard.”

Sally said to DeAntoni, “Before I answer any of your questions, would you mind answering a couple of mine?”

Frank said, “Sure, absolutely. Ask me anything.”

The three of us were on the porch, DeAntoni sitting close to Sally, giving her his full attention. He’d been watching the woman for a while, but this was the first time they’d met face-to-face. It put an unexpected touch of shyness in his voice; seemed to make him eager to please.

“I was telling Doc that a lot of weird, bad things have been happening to me lately. Maybe you know something about it, maybe you don’t, but I’ve got to ask. How long have you been following me?”

He said, “’Bout two weeks. I guess maybe a little more since the company called. Asked if I’d take the case.”

“Everglades Home and Life?”

“Yes. Your husband’s insurance company.”

“Did you ever break into my house? Someone’s been coming in when I’m gone, going through my personal things.”

DeAntoni’s face demonstrated concern. “It wasn’t me. My right hand on the Bible. I’ve got no reason. You don’t have a security system?”

“Yes. Supposedly, a very good one. So whoever’s breaking in is no amateur. That’s why I’m asking.”

DeAntoni said, “Do they steal stuff?”

Sally said, “No. They leave everything exactly the way they found it.”

“Then how do you know someone’s getting into your house?”

“That’s the same question the police asked me. I’m… I’m not sure. It’s more of a feeling I have. An awareness. Almost like an odor-I can tell that someone’s been going through my things. My files, even my clothing. Plus, all the weird bad luck I’ve been having. It’s being done intentionally.”

She told us it began shortly after her husband vanished. She’d get into her car and the battery would be dead. Or the battery cable loose. Or a tire flat. “A brand-new BMW,” she said. “What are the chances?”

It was always when she was out. Never at home.

“It’s as if someone wanted to make sure I’d be delayed coming back,” she said.

Someone had been getting into her computer, too. She’d checked the records of her Internet provider and found that a person had been signing on under her password from an outside computer, and also from her own personal computer. She’d changed passwords several times, but wasn’t certain if her e-mail was still being monitored.

“Something else bad happened to my… to a pet I had. A dog,” she said, her voice beginning to crack. “But I… I don’t want to talk about that now. Maybe later.” She turned to me, regaining her composure. “That’s all I wanted to ask Frank. Should I trust him?”

I said, “Yeah. I think you can.”

Sally told us she couldn’t call the International Church of Ashram Meditation by its official name because she didn’t consider it a church. Pagan idolatry. That’s what the minister at her church called it. The Reverend Wilson.

An example: Bhagwan Shiva taught his followers that, once they were formally accepted, the morality of the outside world no longer applied to them. Everyone on the inside was a chosen person. Everyone on the outside was part of a spiritually dead society, so what outsiders thought-even family members-didn’t matter.

“That’s a guy I need to talk to,” DeAntoni said. “Shiva. I’ve asked his secretary for an appointment a half dozen times. Even did it in writing. So I may have to try walking into their Palm Beach compound, see what happens.”

Sally said, “You won’t get far. My husband used to talk about how good the security is. Family members on the outside are always trying to snatch their loved ones, because that’s the only way to get them deprogrammed. So Shiva has his own little group of enforcers, like guards. Archangels, that’s what he calls them. They dress in black. They’re scary-looking, their whole attitude. Men and women both. The ones I saw, they carry nightsticks, and those little guns that shoot electrical darts. What do you call them-?”

Listening to every word, DeAntoni said,“Tasers.”

“Tasers, yes, I think. And his personal staff, his Archangels, they swagger around like they can’t wait to use them.”

“Talk about one crappy religion. How nice is that? People get in, they can’t get out.”

Sally said, “Once you reach a certain level-they’ve got a hierarchy of secret levels-once you get so high in the organization, yes, I don’t think you can just one day say, hey, I’m out of here. I don’t think they’ll let you leave.”

“How high did Geoff get?”

“About as high as a member can get. Over a period of slightly more than three years, he went to the top. Probably because he had so much personal interaction with Shiva-their business dealings. He was proud of himself, all his church promotions. He was such a goal-oriented person, so obsessive, that he had to excel at everything.”

Frank asked, “Your husband and this religious guy, would you consider them friends?”

“No. I don’t think Shiva has friends. He’s set himself up like a God, so everyone else is beneath him. Besides, Geoff began to realize that Shiva wasn’t all that he pretended to be. I know they had at least a couple of blowups.”