He finally quit his concentration. He began to sort the trimmed wood into two stacks.
I said, “You rent a house down there?”
“A bungalow at a big resort. Pay in advance, leave your brain at the door. You buy everything with beads. It’s hammocks and umbrella drinks and fresh fruit. Windsurfing, sunset cocktail parties, private hot tubs, birdsongs. A lot of chunked pineapple. Housekeepers beg to clean up, servers wait to fill your plates. For two weeks the employees do everything but change diapers. Better-quality Christmas music, and less of it. How you been?”
“Not bad. Got mugged an hour ago. Next to your future brother-in-law’s beautification project.”
He sneered at my having named Butler Dunwoody as a possible relative, knew I was joking, let it slide. “Connected to the body inside?”
“Could be, but I doubt it. The murder looked planned and orchestrated. I got jumped by three droolers in a low-roller pickup. The driver was Jemison Thorsby’s kid.”
Sam took a vintage-looking bastard file to a barely misfitted frame joint. “Bug Thorsby. So much more than just a petty thief. The kind of shit that makes you wish Michelin made condoms instead of tires. One less chubby baby. I assume you didn’t notify the police.”
I nodded. Key West folks knew Jemison Thorsby’s history, his expertise in reweaving the legal net, his proclivity for retaliation. “The weird thing is, they didn’t want to rip me off,” I said. “They wanted to mess me up, give me some street scars. Who am I to draw contempt?”
“What’re you gonna do about it?”
“Invest in hearing-aid companies.”
“An earthquake sound system?”
I nodded.
Sam shook his head. “The punks’ll never live long enough to get bad hearing. Whatever you decide, I’m a qualified coconspirator. But don’t tell Marnie.”
“Jemison still fishing commercial?”
“Ever since he got out of Eglin. The captains took a vote. They wouldn’t let him back in the Charterboat Association.”
“What do you need help with?”
Sam wanted to test-fit his shutters and screens to their tracks. One by one, for almost an hour, we placed the heavy pieces, matched predrilled holes with carriage bolts and wing nuts. Not one section failed to fit in its coded location.
Sam beckoned me to follow him inside. He popped two beers and told me how he’d finish the porch. He’d mentally placed his funky nautical artifacts, stuff he’d found floating or washed onto beaches at Ballast Key, Woman Key, or out in the Snipes. Old wood blocks from shrimp boats, colored Styrofoam floats, antique louvered shutters. Two swings would hang on galvanized chain. He’d collected six mismatched wicker chairs, and four antique-green glass Japanese net floats in macramé slings.
“You don’t know how hard it is to find a ceiling fan that turns slowly,” he said. “The ones they sell these days, on the lowest setting, they’ll blow your Wheaties out of the dish. Set ’em on high, your whole dish scoots off the table.” He paused. “What’s up? You’re staring into a beer bottle.”
“I know you’d rather not talk about him, but how did Butler Dunwoody get so far into that project so quickly?”
Sam finished his beer, took a bowl of fish stew from the fridge. “Butler’s been sneaking around town for a couple years. He would fly in, stay at the Ramada, take cabs, order pizzas into his room or hang out in restaurants by the airport. He never called Marnie. Claims he didn’t want to make waves, or compromise her position with the newspaper.”
“But he’s bypassed a lifetime of red tape.”
“I wondered about that, too. He explained it to me last month, one night before his second drink. About a year ago he hired every lawyer in the phone book, each for a different task. He went to every bank on the island to make deposits and apply for loans and open lines of credit. Made friends with bank board members. One by one, he took four
of the five city commissioners fishing. He wanted the city to kiss his ass, and every bank to have a vested interest in his success. He wanted all the attorneys to have conflicts of interest, in case someone tried to sue him. In case someone tried to issue a ‘stop work,’ or mess with his permits. He did a lot of groundwork through the lawyers.”
“Pretty astute for an island newcomer.”
“Over the years he’d heard Marnie talk about the old Conchs and their ways. Come to think of it, she said he’s been subscribing to the
Citizen
and
Solares Hill
since the mid-nineties. He’s done okay, acquainting himself with the system.”
“Julie Kaiser told me her old man, Holloway, was on Butler’s side, too.”
Sam shrugged. “Why am I not surprised?”
Not many first-timers had been so foresighted. The Conchs had survived a hundred and seventy years by knowing who’d come ashore, who’d arrived in town with a bankroll or a hustle, a load of coal or ice or illegal slaves, a get-rich-quick scheme or a willingness to be plucked. No one could possibly count the people who’d come to the island with loads of money only to be regulated into submission. Wiped out by the town powers. Locals always had understood blue-chip favors, the subtle graft of job opportunities, the delay factor in disguising paybacks, the virtues of dropped criminal proceedings. The victories all had gone to the inspection and taxing authorities, to foreclosures, red tape, and forgotten promises.
For generations a half dozen surnames had shared power. The nineteenth-century roots, the instincts of seamless manipulation, were pure in survival. Unfortunately, since the 1960s, greed had bloomed as the primary motivator. There’d been Hatfield-McCoy range wars, shifts in the power elite. A few newcomers had been allowed to share the booty. Still, few state officials or federal investigators ever penetrated the shady maze.
I said, “Butler confided his battle plan. He must have trusted you.”
“We were best pals in early December. In spite of his building project, Marnie was excited about having him in town. So I played along. I mean, I didn’t know much about their relationship when they were younger. I was nice to the guy, the first week or so, even when he critiqued my cooking. But I found myself insulting him earlier each evening, so he’d leave sooner.”
“It work?”
“Half the time. When it did, Marnie’d look steamed, but she wouldn’t say anything. Of course, the
Citizen
got on his case, once he broke ground on Caroline Street. Marnie was embarrassed to go downtown. It got worse the more he drank. I mean, how do you socialize with a guy who calls his woman Baby Girl and Sugarbush in mixed company? One time, in front of his own sister, he called her Heidi Baloney. PC crap aside, it’s still a stupid-ass joke. Plus, Mamie’s trying to beat her problem, trying not to drink anything at all. Finally one night after they left, after they’d refused a cab ride, Marnie got on the Internet She bought us two air tickets south.”
“Marnie do okay?”
“Wallowed in it. Maximum water time, in or on, and minimum sunburn. The whole trip, not a drop of wine, a total of two rum concoctions. I let that part be her decision, all the way through. She handled it.”
“I thought you’d sworn off work on Sunday.”
“That’s fishing. Chores are different. I never liked weekenders, anyway. A man can’t take a day off in the middle of the week, he’s not living right. He probably can’t afford to fish with me, either.”
“That’s your modest estimation?”
“If it’s true it ain’t braggin’. Plus, I’m taking a break on boat maintenance. Captain Turk found us a boy to take care of
Flats Broke
and
Fancy Fool.
The kid’s perfect and proper, leaves notes, warns us when corrosion’s taking over. Seventeen years old, saving up to buy his own bonefishing skiff.”
“Like that character Fonda played in
92 in the Shade.
The Skelton boy.”
“Tell you what, they filmed that thing a year or two before you arrived. You missed one fandango of a party.”
A remote telephone handset buzzed. Sam extracted it from a maze of tin snips and masking tape. By the tone of his voice I assumed Marnie was on the other end. After thirty seconds, without expression, he hung up.
“She’s a basket case. She’s on her way home. I just hope she doesn’t stop at Fausto’s. She’ll want to restock the Napa-Sonoma sauce.”
“I’m out of here. You fishing tomorrow?”
Sam nodded. “Thanks for your help.”
I rode the island diagonal from Wheeler’s to my house via Windsor Lane, the bottle-mirror wall, and Grinnell. No traffic. The path around the cemetery too confusing for three-day visitors. My route had fine architecture, better foliage than the primary streets.
I turned off Fleming, rolled down Dredgers Lane. I coasted into the backyard. I opened the porch’s rear screen door as a black Ford F-150 pickup jerked to a stop in front of the house. Silver lettering on the driver’s door:
TNT SECURITY
. The door swung wide. Tommy Tucker, the county’s corrupt former sheriff, climbed out and waved to gain my attention.
My day to have the world’s ass in my face.
I intercepted Tommy Tucker in the yard. I didn’t want him on my porch. He swayed toward me, oddly bowlegged, as if holding an invisible beach ball between his knees. His bulk kept his arms from hanging straight down, but he looked more out of shape than obese. An unlighted cigar was clamped in his fat-lipped mouth. With a final step guaranteed to keep the island at sea level, he stopped and stared. Same old charming guy. He wanted me to say the first words.
I had nothing to say.
“You still in freelance, Bubba?” He held the soggy cigar in his teeth while his lips moved to talk. “I got photo work for you.”
I had learned the hard way. Most people believed that the “free” part of “freelance” ruled negotiations.
“How about ‘Rutledge’ instead of ‘Bubba,’ Mr. Tucker?”
He scratched the back of his neck. “Well, I’m bein’ neighborly . . .” His salt-and-pepper hair, swept back with gel, looked unwashed rather than stylish. His pudgy face barely allowed his squinty eyes to function. A wide leather belt supported baggy, olive-toned chinos, with the larger task of containing his belly. Always the cop, Tucker carried a belt-line equipment array: two pagers, a cell phone, a key
case, and a snap case for Mace or pepper spray. I sensed that his black oxfords concealed steel toes. The red TNTS logo above his shirt’s left breast pocket defined his revised authority. The American flag shoulder patch was a fine touch for a man who’d missed being a felon only through the charity of an overworked county prosecutor. The FDLE had yet to charge Tucker with his crimes. Talk in town had the prosecutor falling first, for having let the sheriff slide.
“I wasn’t born on the island, sir. Never claimed to be a Conch.”
“I believe that.”
“So we can stick to real names, and not sound like old friends?”
A placating gesture. “Whatever you say.”
Five months ago Monroe County Sheriff Tommy Tucker had been a shoo-in for reelection. His few opponents—all law enforcement veterans—were untested politicians. His campaign posters, TV and radio spots, and newspaper touts had spewed the pompous attitude of a race already won. Graft distributors anted up brown bags of cash. Suck-ups and toadies contributed buttons and bumper stickers. A Big Pine clothing-store owner had printed
TT YES
ball caps, effectively securing a steady stream of county purchase orders over the next four years. Tucker’s appointees, sensing job security, ordered new skiffs and pickup trucks. A victory was as certain as sunshine.
One week before election day, the sheriff’s druggie son, “Little Howie” Tucker, known statewide as a burglar and thug, murdered his wife and dumped her body in the city cemetery. He stripped Chloe Tucker’s body of eight rings and three bracelets, fled to Broward County, checked into a ritzy resort, and hocked the jewelry for a two-night supply of discotheque pills. Within a day, three “concerned citizens” had interrupted Little Howie’s one-man party and delivered him to the police. An investigation by the print media—that is, by Marnie Dunwoody—and by the sheriff’s own Internal Affairs team confirmed that, as bad as the kid’s record had tallied, it should have been worse.
Sheriff Tucker had been covering his son’s ass for years, hushing up busts, “unfounding” and redirecting investigations, squashing cases, and destroying files.
The post-murder publicity had undermined Tommy Tucker’s reelection chances. Chicken Neck Liska, the Key West police detective who’d been my main link at the city, launched a last-minute, low-budget effort. He clobbered the incumbent, pulled sixty-four percent of the vote. Little Howie’s murder trial had lasted less than two weeks in late November. His sentencing would take place in early February. Consensus held that the punk would ride one more chemical high, courtesy of the governor.
Tommy Tucker had evolved into a rent-a-cop. I tried to picture myself employed by a man who’d disgraced himself.
“I’m kind of booked solid, the next couple months, Mr. Tucker. What type of work you got in mind?”
“Buildings, mostly. Storefronts. Few vacant lots. Arcade interiors, rental properties. Pretty much the whole list of Mercer Holloway holdings.”
“This all from a security viewpoint?”
He shook his head. “Investments.”
“Subcontracted?”
“It sure ain’t.”
“Mr. Holloway hired you to deliver a message?”
He scratched his head again. “I never got a chance to say. I always liked your work. Wish you’d have come full-time with the department.”
Tucker had a nervous tic. He’d just told his second lie. For the second time, he’d scratched the back of his neck with his left hand. Each time I got to view the brown stain in his armpit.
He let his alleged praise settle, finally shut his mouth.
An hour ago I’d sworn off crime-scene work with the city. Not that they’d called much lately. I knew that I needed to replace lost income. “This photo work, Tucker, do I deal with Mr. Holloway directly, or through you?”
“I been asked to invite you by his office, tomorrow at
three.” He handed me a business card engraved with Mercer’s elaborate monogram. A single fine-print phone number in the lower right corner.