Randy White - Everglades

On all the walls, beneath the bare rafters, are copies of paintings that I like, or photographs, and sometimes recipes, tacked at eye level so I can look at them when I want.

What passes for sleeping quarters is a section along the south wall, shielded by a triad of beaded curtains. There’s a simple bed, a double stand-up closet, a locked sea trunk beneath the bed, a dispatch box that I also keep locked, more bookshelves, another reading lamp and a table that holds a brass windup alarm clock next to spare glasses.

As she moved around the place, she demonstrated her uneasiness with a rapid-fire monologue. “This whole day’s been such a blur, I don’t even know how I ended up here. I wanted to get away, so I told myself a weekend at the beach. After that, it was like the car was steering itself, driving way too fast across the ’Glades. Next thing I know, I’m at the Sanibel bridge, paying my toll, then at the Holiday Inn on Gulf Drive, telling myself I wasn’t going to bother you. That I had no right to impose.”

I stood, twisted the cap off a beer, and said softly, “Old friends are always welcome. Anytime, day or night. That doesn’t change.”

“You’ve been on my mind a lot lately. Maybe because of all the weird stuff that’s been happening. You, this little house-safe. That’s the way I think of you. Just like this island. Safe. So I’ve been sitting on your porch for an hour, maybe more. Kept getting up to leave, but my legs wouldn’t let me. Plus, with him standing out there in the mangroves, this just seemed the best place to be. I’m so sorry, Doc.”

Hysteria has a tone and, possibly, a pheromone signature. My immediate impression was that this old friend was teetering on the far, far brink of emotional collapse. To interrupt the talking jag, I crossed the room, pulled her close to me, and gave her a slightly stronger hug to silence her.

“Sally? Sally. I’ll listen later. Right now, let’s deal with the guy outside. Is there anything else I should know before I talk to him?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. Give me just a couple of minutes to calm down, collect my thoughts. I don’t think you realize how hard this is for me. Coming here, seeing you.”

She took a few steps and touched her fingers to the old cast-iron Franklin stove in the northwest corner of the room. “This is new. A fireplace. I would have remembered, back when we… when we were dating. You put it in afterwards, right?”

I said, “I needed something. In winter, the wind blows up through cracks in the floor. We get a bad cold front, I can see my breath in here. The good heaters, I keep in the lab.”

I had to raise my voice to be heard, because the storm cell was now over us, rain loud as hail on my tin roof, water cascading over the windows, the light beyond a greenish-bronze. It was as if my little house had drifted beneath a mountain waterfall.

There was a rumble and boom of thunder, then another that caused the walls to vibrate. Sally hugged her arms around herself. “Whew! I’m cold now. It’s like winter in here.”

So I put her in the reading chair, and started to pour her a glass of red wine-once her beverage of preference-but she stopped me, saying, “No. No alcohol, please. I stopped using alcohol more than two years ago. I made a lot of changes in my life two years ago, and for the better, believe me. Maybe some herbal tea?”

Herbal tea I’ve got. Tomlinson brings me boxes of the stuff, then forgets he’s brought it, and so brings more. I keep a thirty-two-ounce screw-top specimen jar filled with a garden variety of bags, identifiable only by their little paper tabs.

I checked the window again. Through a waterfall-blur, I could see that the man was still out there: a dark shape hun kered beneath the buttonwood. If nothing else, he was vigilant.

There was already lighter pine and newspaper in the stove. I took just enough time to light the fire, and put water on to boil, asking her, “What else can you tell me about the guy outside? I don’t suppose you know what kind of car he drives?”

“I’ve seen it enough in my rearview mirror. One of those big shiny cars, luxury American model. It was black, almost new.”

“Your car?”

“A blue BMW, the sedan. A present from Geoff just before he disappeared. He was generous. That much I can’t fault him for.”

“Anything else?”

She shook her head.

I told her, “Then pull your chair up to the fire, wait for the water to boil. Warm up; enjoy your tea. I won’t be gone long.”

As I went out the door, I heard her say, “Be careful. He’s a really big guy.”

“I’m going to talk to him, that’s all.”

“Okay. But don’t get hurt. Believe me, it’s not worth it.”

Something else had been added to her tonal inflections, and it is among the saddest of human sounds: the sound of self-loathing.

The rain had slowed, but the wind had freshened, blowing shadows through the mangrove rim of Dinkin’s Bay, leaching storm light from a darkening sky half an hour before sunset.

I went downstairs to the seaward deck where I keep my skiff. It’s a twenty-one-foot Maverick, a beautiful little boat, with the new Mercury 225-horsepower Opti-Max I’d just had mounted, the combination of which suggested roadster and dragster qualities-for good reason.

I got a couple more peripheral glances as I started the boat and pulled away: The man was still there, still watching.

I idled the short distance to the marina, and tied off at my usual place just inside the T-dock where the fishing guides keep their skiffs. Because of the rain, a little crowd of locals had taken cover under the tin awning by the bait tanks.

But not everyone. Friday is the traditional weekend party night at Dinkin’s Bay Marina, so there was a slightly larger group braving the downpour, eager to get things moving because it was already late.

Three of the fishing guides-Jeth, Neville and Felix-were setting up picnic tables, while others, wearing foul-weather jackets, milled around the docks, carrying coolers and platters of food, or strolled and chatted with fresh drinks in hand.

One of the liveaboards had turned the music up loud, so, through her big fly bridge speakers, I could hear Jimmy Buf fett singing about one particular harbor, and the day that John Wayne died.

I said a few quick hellos, promised everyone who tried to engage me in conversation that I’d be right back, then walked across the shell parking lot toward the gate that Mack, the marina owner, closes and locks each Friday before sunset.

There were two lone vehicles parked on the other side of the gate, near the trail that leads to my wooden walkway. Sally’s BMW was there, a sporty 5 Series-an expensive choice that seemed out of character for someone I’d thought of as having simple tastes.

Behind it was a black Lincoln Town Car with gold trim, gold-spoked wheels and Florida plates. I found a stick, and noted the license number in sand beside the gate, before shielding my eyes and pressing my nose against the tinted windows.

On the passenger seat was a Florida road map, cans of Copenhagen snuff in a cellophane tube (one can missing) and the sort of rubber gizmo that nervous people squeeze to improve their grip. I also noted that the glove compartment was open.

So what do stalkers or private investigators stash in a glove box? Binoculars? Or maybe a handgun.

I used my T-shirt to rub prints off the window, then I stepped into the mangroves, moving quietly over the monkey-bar roots, feet sinking into the detritus bog, mosquitoes whining in my ears.

The path to my wooden walkway channels through limbs and roots, a dark, green tunnel that is a shady conduit walled by swamp.

I was close enough to the boardwalk path so as not to be seen without some effort, but close enough to be aware of anyone approaching or leaving the boardwalk.