Gator Aide (13 page)

“I’m looking for Trenton Treddell.”

Dolly planted her legs firmly apart, her hands clenched in fists on her hips.

“And just what do you want with Trenton?”

“I’m with Fish and Wildlife. I’d like to talk with him for a few minutes. Is he at home?”

“Is he at home?” Dolly mocked, her imitation of a Northern accent a strident bray. “No, he ain’t home, and unless you got a legal and dated warrant, I suggest that you trounce yourself right on outta here. We don’t take kindly to no Fish and Game agents in these parts.”

As tough as Trenton, the woman knew her law. She didn’t flinch as my hand made a calculated move toward my .357.

“I just want to speak with Mr. Treddell, that’s all. I’m not here to cause any trouble.”

Pulling at her bra strap to realign a breast, Dolly didn’t see it that way. “If you’re with the government, you ain’t nothing but trouble. I want you off my land right now.”

She began to roll forward as a Ford Explorer came tearing down the dirt road from behind, its chassis heading straight at us. Determined not to go alone, if that was Trenton’s intention, I threw an arm around Dolly’s neck, pulling her close. The Explorer churned up a geyser of gravel as it slammed on the brakes just before impact. The car door flew open and I found myself face-to-face with Hickok’s Moby Dick. At five feet eleven inches and weighing a solid 180 pounds, Trenton was as tightly built as his airboat. Impeccable in pressed jeans and a blue oxford shirt, he had the relaxed look and deep cocoa tan of a tycoon just back from vacation. His sleeves were rolled up to reveal rock-hard biceps that Popeye would have envied. Broad shoulders and a bodybuilder’s neck led up to a head sporting a mane of shiny silver hair. Steel blue eyes looked out from a face that maintained a neutral expression. The only odd feature on his face was an overly long nose that could have passed for a gator’s snout. He wasn’t at all what I had expected.

Glancing down, I saw in his hand an illegal shocking machine used to catch fish. Strings of perch and sockalee dangled at his side. Restraining a dangerous desire to laugh, I realized that I had him. The man Charlie Hickok had been after all these years. It was this simple, if I was crazy enough to try and pull it off.

“Are you Trenton Treddell?”

Treddell looked as though he hadn’t a care in the world. “That’s me. And may I inquire as to who you are?”

His voice was as deep, soft, and smooth as an old forties’ matinee idol, throwing me for a loop.

“I’m Rachel Porter with Fish and Wildlife, and you’re under arrest for illegally shocking fish.”

Once in jail, all it would take would be a phone call to Delbart Lumstock to make him a free man. But until then, I had him. It was something even Hickok hadn’t done before.

Treddell stood waiting for the punch line, until the charge began to sink in. His steel blue eyes turned to two lethal darts that were an icy shade of grey. His hands rounded into fists, the knuckles a bony ridge of threatening projectiles beneath the skin. The nerve under one eye twitched, and the muscles in his neck bunched tautly, thick as cords of rope.

It was Dolly who broke the silence, pulling back to get a better view of the suicidal woman beside her.

“You fucking bitch! Who the hell do you think you are? Do you have any idea who you’re dealing with?”

She moved toward me with ten coral claws unfurled as I reached for my gun. But Trenton intervened, holding her back before she hurled herself at me.

“There’s nothing to get upset about, Dolly. She’s just doing her job and wasting her time.”

I was left with an unsettled feeling as a second passenger stepped out of the van. Gaunt and gnarled as a windblown cypress, he had long, stringy hair straggled in different lengths. It fell below his shoulders to form three distinct girdles of color in a garish rainbow around his head. His ribs protruded through a black tee shirt, while his jeans rested on the bones of his hips. One gaunt arm had an elaborate tattoo of a gator crunching down on a human skull. A tiny gold alligator dangled from one pierced ear. His blackened nails clung to strings of perch and sockalee in both hands, exactly matching Trenton’s catch. As he moved slowly to stand beside Treddell, the three made for the strangest trio I had ever seen.

Trenton reverted to his former smooth self. “Let me introduce you to Gonzales, my swamp creature.”

For a fleeting second, I wished I had never sought out Trenton Treddell.

Gonzales’s eyes flickered toward the road, and I half expected him to bolt, but a stern look from Treddell held him in place.

Looking askance at my wreck of a car, Trenton motioned toward his own Explorer. “Are we supposed to travel in your vehicle, or would you prefer to take mine?”

I struggled to hear the question above Dolly’s shriek.

“You aren’t actually going to let this bitch take you in!”

Trenton maintained a cool demeanor. “We’ll be back before supper, Dolly. No need to worry.” He held up the strings of fish. “Can these be left for tonight’s meal, or do we need to bring them along?”

Stunned by his decision to let me bring him in, I wrapped my uncertainty inside a brisk demeanor.

“We’ll take my car. The fish are evidence.”

Trenton didn’t blink an eye. “Then I suggest you fold them in a tarp and place them inside the trunk. Slidell’s a long way off, and they’ll have begun to rot by then.”

There was no menace in his tone, but I felt myself shiver.

With calm deliberateness, Trenton walked to my car as Gonzales followed, both dropping their fish on the ground as they climbed inside as best they could. Twisting his gaunt body into a fetal position, Gonzales took what there was of a backseat. Trenton folded himself into the front as Dolly watched in disbelief. Rolling up the fish, I tossed them into the trunk and joined the two men inside. We pulled out to a stream of curses as Dolly stood in the middle of the road, shaking her fists in rage.

“You’re a fool, Trenton Treddell!”

Her words echoed after us as the house disappeared from view. Trenton gazed out the window in silence. His long silver hair hid his face from my view, camouflaging whatever he was thinking. We were halfway down the dirt road by the time my own stupidity struck me. As I slammed on the brakes, the men turned toward me and stared.

“Under the circumstances, I think it would be best if I handcuffed you both.”

In no position to wrestle each man to the ground., I didn’t want to pull my gun after getting this far without it.

Trenton studied me for a moment in silence. “Agent Porter, if I wanted to escape, don’t you think I would have done so before we stuffed ourselves into this tin can you call a car? I’m coming along with you willingly. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be alive to tell about this day.”

Trenton had made his point. Starting the car up again, I continued down the road.

“Why don’t you tell me what the angle is?” I asked. “Just why are you letting me arrest you?”

Trenton slowly smiled. “Charlie Hickok and I go back a long ways. He’s been working hard to catch me for the last twenty years. He can taste it, he wants it so bad. I don’t mind the game. Sometimes I even enjoy it. But the older that man gets, the more ornery he’s become. He needs to be taught a lesson. Letting you bring me in is the most humiliating thing I could do to Charlie Hickok. It’ll add a notch to your belt, and you’ll owe me one. Besides, Delbart will have us out in time for dinner. Isn’t that right, Gonzales?”

Gonzales guffawed in the backseat as he slapped a thin thigh. “Dis’ll get ol’ Charlie Hickok good. ‘Wil’ Bill’ I call him. Dat man, he gonna go crazy.”

Treddell was right. Whether Charlie admitted it or not, this would be a notch in my belt. It was something that Hickok would have to recognize sooner or later and deal with. The arresting officer on Treddell’s file would bear my name, written proof in black and white that would never go away. It would be an event that everyone in the Service would eventually learn of. For better or worse.

Treddell turned to face me. “Now it’s time for you to answer a question, Agent Porter. What made you decide to come after me?”

I thought of the flames that had nearly engulfed me. And of Charlie’s black mood ever since.

“I was in the boat with Hickok a few nights ago.”

Treddell continued to gaze at me blankly.

“The night you drove us out of the marsh by setting that fire.”

Gonzales howled, slapping his thighs in rapid succession as a low chuckle escaped Treddell’s lips.

“Oh, my. Oh my. This is gonna be good. It’s just a game we play, Agent Porter. I knew Hickok had plenty of time to back out. But I had no idea there was a woman with him.”

“Would it have made any difference?”

Trenton caught sight of a baby gator and, holding his two fingers together in the shape of a pistol, pretended to take a potshot.

“Probably not. So, you came after me for revenge?”

“No. I came after you to get Charlie Hickok off my back.”

Treddell pulled a packet of Red Man from his shirt pocket. He delicately lifted a small wad of the chewing tobacco between his thumb and forefinger as if it were a piece of priceless china, examining it for a moment before slipping it behind his bottom lip. A few brown strands fell onto his pants and he picked up one sliver at a time, placing each back in the pouch before throwing it over the seat to Gonzales.

“How did this game between you and Charlie get started in the first place?” I was counting on Treddell to fill me in the details that Hickok never would.

Trenton spit a stream of tobacco out the window, taking care not to hit my car.

“I think it had to do with the forty gators I was skinning a night. But that was years ago when I was a young man. Charlie was new around these parts and he came gunning for me. Thought I’d be as easy as all those other turkeys he’d managed to catch up till then. He didn’t know at the time that he was dealing with the King of the Outlaws.” Trenton attempted to stretch, but there was nowhere for him to move in the tiny front seat. “Then there was the night of our boat race. Since then, it’s been a blood feud between Charlie and me.” Trenton looked over and smiled. “He ever tell you about that one?”

“Charlie only tells me stories about the ones he caught. Up until recently, I didn’t know there were any that got away.”

Gonzales fidgeted in the backseat in a futile search to find a comfortable position. “Dat Charlie! He don’t tell de good stories den! Trentone, he got plenty of dose.”

Trenton leaned his head out the window. This time a breeze blew the brown wad of tobacco juice back against the side of my car. “It was another one of those nights when Hickok was set on bringing me in. He’d been hearing about my exploits from all the small fry he was catching, and I think his ego was itching. I’d already been pretty busy that night snagging gators, but I still had plenty of hours to go and a lot more killing to do. I heard his boat before I spotted him. But I knew who it was.”

Gonzales tossed the Red Man back and Trenton took out another wad before folding the pack up and putting it away.

“He thought he had me this time. We were both in our putt-putt boats and pretty evenly matched. But what Charlie failed to realize is that no one knows this marsh better than me. I grew up here. I know every twist, every turn, and every tree stump there is. I’m like the Vietcong, and Charlie ain’t nothing but another upstart invader. So, I decided to teach him a lesson. I took him for a ride that he’d never forget, showing him the ins and outs of my hometown. He was good. Kept on my tail and never let up. But he started getting a little too smug and stopped looking where he was going. So I let him get real close, almost have a taste of me. Meanwhile, I’m leading him to his doom.” Trenton gave me a sly glance. “Just like the other night. I’m that elephant with the big tusk that Hickok is hankering after, and he wants me real bad. So there I am, heading for a big stump barely sticking out of the water, when I swerve. And Charlie’s wondering why the hell I just veered out of the way. Well, let me tell you, that boat of his went flying up in the air like he’d just been shot out of a cannon. It was better than
Smokey
and the Bandit
. He had a lot of explaining to do, to get himself a new boat after that. I missed him there for a while.”

Gonzales guffawed, spraying a mist of tobacco juice on the backseat as I tried to picture Hickok flying off into the wild blue yonder.

“Then you don’t hate Charlie Hickok?”

“Oh my, no. I consider him one of my best friends. He just doesn’t know it. Without Charlie, I’d never have earned the reputation I have today.”

Passing the turnoff for Morgan City, I wondered if such a legend had ever have heard of Marie Tuttle. Or a onetime gator poacher by the name of Hillard Williams. With a long drive ahead, I told Treddell bits and pieces about the Vaughn case. After I finished, Trenton was quiet for a long time.

“I knew that little girl many years ago. At one time, Marie Tuttle was a close friend of mine.”

His tone of voice led me to believe that friendship had only been part of it. While the image of Marie in her high-top sneakers didn’t jell with the near-prissy neatness of Trenton Treddell, there had been no sign of any husband at her place. Thinking back on it, one or two of her kids even bore a slight resemblance to the man sitting next to me. Trenton asked for the details on Valerie’s death, and I filled him in, going so far as to tell him about Hook.

“I gave her that gator.”

The remark took me by surprise. “But that gator was only a few years old. I thought you hadn’t seen Valerie since she was a child.”

Trenton stared dead ahead, and, for a minute, I was afraid that was all the information I was going to get.

“The last time I saw Valerie was when I gave her that gator. It was a going-away gift. She said she wanted to take a part of the bayou along with her. She needed to leave for a while. Dry out, I suppose. I never thought it would be to New Orleans. That wasn’t where I’d arranged for her to
go.
”

The fact that he’d been in touch with her up until that point was something I wanted to know more about. I drove on in silence, hoping that, given the time, he’d continue his story.