by Tim Dorsey
“It wasn’t.” The examiner snapped off his gloves. “We thought so at first, since no signs of trauma. Today it’s a rarity, because manufacturers now isolate all the wiring, but some older tubs get a short circuit in the pump system and you’ve got electrocution.”
“But it’s not?”
The examiner shook his head. “Tip-off is musculature, quick acidic buildup in the fibers. This was something else. Won’t know for sure until we get test results.”
“But you have your suspicions?”
“Let’s step aside.” They walked behind the poolside bar. “What I’m going to tell you now is definitely off-the-record.”
“Understood.”
“When those spectrometer results come back, I’ll bet my life we find spikes in heavy earth alkaline metals. I’m guessing compounds with barium or calcium.”
“This is all Greek.”
“If the compound also was mixed right, it would react aggressively with water, giving off a highly lethal hydrogen-cyanide gas.”
“They didn’t notice?”
“The tub’s massage jets create turbulence and bubbles that would have masked the reaction in the water. And since it was cool last night, the rest was probably concealed in steam coming off the surface.”
“Wouldn’t it have stunk? That’d get me hopping out of the tub.”
The examiner shook his head again. “Actually it’s quite pleasant. The last thing they would have smelled was almonds . . . Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
White walked back to the other agents. “Mahoney, how’s Serge with chemistry.”
“Like falling off a log ringing a bell.”
White exhaled hard and stared out at the sea. The Doberman crawled up the sand toward the resort like a stealth navy commando. Surrounded by TV camera lights that lit up the entire beach and drew a crowd of late-night strollers.
“We have to find Serge fast.” White turned back around. “Any hunches in that gut, Mickey Spillane?”
Mahoney removed a matchstick. “Ghost rider.”
Chapter Thirty-four
The Next Morning
Forty miles southeast of Fort Myers, at the upper edge of the Everglades, sits the scorched landscape of an outpost called Immokalee.
In the sticks.
Immokalee is a quiet agricultural community of migrants near the poverty line. It was originally named Gopher Ridge, but changed to an Indian word that translates “my home.”
“Downtown” consists of a few small blocks that look like a place where you’d stop and ask directions to downtown. Cowboy hats, Spanish signs, taco stands, horseflies.
Our Lady of Guadalupe.
An inland pocket of Florida with no breeze. Stagnant heat that feels like it’s pushing down on your shoulders. People sit on curbs and aimlessly walk streets in withering defeat. The chief source of entertainment is boredom.
The late Miami author Charles Willeford set a novel in Immokalee, where a farm boss locks the doors of a boardinghouse before each payday and fumigates the workers.
The Seminoles just put in a casino.
On the eastern side of town, across Lake Trafford, is a place even more remote where nobody farms. There is a parking lot but few cars. Today, a ’69 Barracuda had its choice of empty spaces.
Three people got out. More windless heat, vicious humidity and the sizzling buzz of insects. Nothing but scrubland in all directions except a wooden building with visitor information, nature exhibits and a gift shop.
“We’ve arrived!” Serge pulled hard against a straining chain leash.
“Where?” asked Coleman.
“The Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary. I love the Corkscrew!”
Coleman took a slug from a flask. “What’s to do here?”
“Take sanctuary.”
The flask went back in a pocket. “Still don’t understand why you wanted to come here just to look at a single flower.”
“Not just any flower,” said Serge. “The ghost orchid. They attach themselves to trees in swamp forests.”
“Ghost?”
“Most elusive orchid of all, immortalized by Susan Orlean in The Orchid Thief.” Mikey began pulling Serge toward the building like a sled dog. “Can only be found growing wild in the wetlands of southwest Florida and Cuba. The most rabid flower freak can live ten lifetimes without seeing one. And not for lack of trying. These people gladly march miles in hip-deep water just to stake out a tree at two A.M., waiting for a flower that blooms only one night a year. But the holy grail is the ghost orchid, whose sighting is so rare it makes the newspapers. And this is my big chance!”
“Hold it,” said Coleman. “I can understand bird-watchers, but you’re telling me there are people that just stand around watching a flower doing nothing?”
“And with a passion that eclipses the Frog Listening Network in Thonotosassa, who go out at night with tape recorders to cut CDs for easy listening in their cars.”
They headed for the building. A deep motorized sound cut through the insect drone. Serge turned around. “Here they come now.”
A giant air-conditioned tour bus pulled into the parking lot and stopped next to the building. Doors hissed open.
Off they poured, grouping together by the side of the bus. All white-haired seniors with uncharacteristic tans. All adhering to an unspoken dress code. Fanny packs, cargo shorts, straw hats, pith helmets, hiking boots, binoculars, long-range cameras and novelty T-shirts from their club chapter: I’d Rather Be Resupinating, I Brake For Epiphytes and Orchid Lovers Do It Perennially.
The driver opened the luggage bay.
Coleman scratched his head as the collection of enthusiasts reached into the compartment, unloading telescopes, tripods, video equipment, camera cases, collapsing sun canopies and folding canvas tailgating chairs with drink holders.
“This is a bonus,” said Serge, getting out his wallet. “Seeing a ghost orchid and testing my next fugitive ‘Out’ technique.”
“Flowers are an ‘Out’?”
“All these clubs have lines of merchandise for fund-raising. Watch and learn.” He approached the gang. “Excuse me? Who’s in charge of marketing? I’d like a whole bunch of your crap!”
“That’s me,” said a red-faced man with a British accent, knee-high socks and white nose cream. “What are you interested in?”
“Everything!”
The man pulled a styrene bin from the luggage compartment and opened the lid.
“Oooooooo!” said Serge. “I’ll take three of each: T-shirts, tote bags, water bottles, laminated species guide, sun hats with roll-down neck protector, field glasses, can coozie for Coleman and that big souvenir button with a picture of a ghost orchid on a milk carton that says Have you seen me?”
“Our best customer,” remarked the Brit, pocketing currency. The club went in the building for tickets.
Serge, Coleman and Mikey donned their new T-shirts and hats in the parking lot and followed the others inside.
They reached the ticket counter. “Two adults, one child.”
“Here’s a map,” said the park employee. “You go out back here—”
Serge held up a hand for him to stop. “Don’t need a map. Know the place by heart: two-and-a-quarter-mile, round-trip boardwalk through eleven-thousand-acre preserve of wet prairies, cypress marsh and pine flat woods.” Serge reached. “I need a map for my files. How’s our ghost orchid?”
“You’re in luck. Just got a new bloom.”
“Not the one I saw on the Internet?”
He shook his head. “The orchid they reported in the press fell off the tree a few days ago in the middle of the night. And wouldn’t you know we got a ton of people the next day.”
“Must have been a full-scale riot,” said Serge. “Flower people torching the gift shop and tipping over police cars.”
“No, they just left.”
“What about this new bloom?”
“Sometimes when one drops from the tree, another takes it place. Sometimes not
. That’s why I said you’re in luck.”
“Where is it?”
“Take the boardwalk south.” The man gestured out the back door. “It’s way off the trail about fifty feet up the tree. You can’t see it with the naked eye, so there’s a photo and arrow attached to the railing showing where to point binoculars.”
“Can I pretend to be Nicolas Cage?”
“What?”
“From the excellent Florida movie Adaptation, based on The Orchid Thief, which was inspired by true events at the nearby Fakahatchee Strand.” Serge turned sideways. “Check my profile. People always say I look like Cage. Wait, I got that wrong. They always don’t say it, but who’s going to stop me? Right? You look like someone I can trust. Do you have coffee?”
“You okay?”
“Super-duper! I totally rededicated my life in the parking lot: ghost orchids or death! . . . Mikey! Mush!” The child pulled Serge out the door.
They clomped down the winding boardwalk, bend after bend, until the bus people appeared.
Silent reverence. Cameras and binoculars. Others sat in their stadium chairs while a high-definition TV camera filmed from a tripod, and someone else held a directional boom microphone over the railing.
Serge and company quietly slipped behind. Coleman tugged his shirt. “There’s way too many people to beat off. Maybe if we hang around until there’s just a few left, and I can stand in front of you . . .”
“Coleman, I was being facetious.”
“Is that where you put your finger up your ass?”
“Keep your voice down!”
Another tug. “I don’t see it.”
“The man said you need binoculars.” Serge raised his. “Wow. It’s incredible. It’s awesome. It’s taking my breath away.”
He handed the binoculars to Coleman. “It’s a flower.”
Serge opened a book on the railing.
“What are you reading?” asked Coleman.
“River of Grass.”
“What’s that?”
Serge showed him the cover of a white heron gazing out over the landscape. “Groundbreaking preservation work by Marjory Stoneman Douglas, first published in 1947. A lone voice back when everyone else just saw dollar signs and a swamp that needed to be drained. But not Marjory! She single-handedly launched popular appreciation for one of our state’s prized treasures, earning her the nickname ‘Grande Dame of the Everglades.’ ”
“But what’s the river part of the title?”
“Because the Everglades actually is a river. Except you wouldn’t know it because it’s fifty miles wide and the flow is too slow to notice since the land only slopes a couple inches per mile. Douglas was barely five feet tall and lived to be a hundred and eight, but even at the end she was, pound for pound, the deadliest political street fighter in the state. Even won the Presidential Medal of Freedom except, surprisingly, no action figures of her with eyes that shoot laser beams and a purse covered with poison-tipped spikes. Imagine what they’d be worth today in the original box with all the accessories.”
Out front, the parking lot filled fast with a rush of vehicles led by a Crown Vic and trailed by a tour bus pounding Metallica.
“Sure hope you’re right about this hunch,” said White. “This was another long drive to nowhere.”
Lowe wiped his forehead. “And hotter than hell.”
Mahoney fanned himself with his hat. “Parlay lock. Flower hit the papers.”
Chapter Thirty-five
Corkscrew Swamp
Three state agents arrived at a ticket counter.
White continued his unending routine of holding up a badge and mug shots. “Seen these guys?”
“Not sure. We had a lot of people just come through.” He put on reading glasses. “Maybe this one, but I could be wrong.”
“Do you remember anything in particular?” asked White. “Think hard. A minor detail that might seem unimportant could be crucial to our case.”
“Well, there was one thing, but it didn’t make any sense.”
“What was it?”
“He asked permission to be Nicolas Cage.”
“Pay dirt,” said Mahoney. “The Orchid Thief.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Tail me.” He headed out the back door.
They reached the boardwalk, and Agent White unfolded his park map on the railing. “It’s a big oval with no escape but a swamp full of gators . . . Mahoney, you go that way and Lowe and I will head the other. If he’s out here, we can’t miss him.”
The trio split up . . .
A mile west on the boardwalk, a crowd of seniors watched with rapt attention. Serge’s obsessive picture-taking blended in. Celebratory wine bottles sat empty on the planks. Some had cell phones out, texting fellow aficionados across the country.
Then, in silence, a flower silently fell off a tree and helicoptered down into the water.
Gasps
“Son of a bitch! . . .”
“Motherfuck! . . .”
“Bullshit root structure! . . .”
They angrily threw their gear together, preparing to hike back to the nature center.
“Perfect,” said Serge. “Excellent chance to test my latest ‘Out.’ ”
“You never told me what that was,” said Coleman.
“Near the top of the fugitive’s arsenal is camouflage.” Serge pulled the brim of his hat down. “And the best camouflage is to hide in plain sight. Whenever there’s a large, homogenous group all dressed alike, the human brain processes it as a single unit, not as individuals. And fugitive hunters are looking for an individual.”
“But how are you going to test it?”
“See those two guys in white dress shirts coming toward us? Let’s have fun and pretend they’re state agents on our trail.”
“Okay,” said Coleman. “But I’ve been wondering. You’ve done a lot of stuff over the years. How do you know you’re not really being tracked.”
“The Law of Shit Happens: If you’re worried about a specific problem like getting strangled in the food court, it never happens while you’re thinking about it—only when you’re daydreaming about sports cars or Totie Fields . . . Here they come. Keep your head down.”
Two state agents approached an oncoming procession of surly orchid enthusiasts. White flipped open his cell and dialed. “. . . Mahoney? White here . . . Any sign of Serge?”
“Snake eyes.”
“Mahoney, that doesn’t put me any closer to a yes or no.”
“No.”
“Keep looking.” He hung up and nodded politely at the passing visitors. “Where on earth can he be?”
“Up ahead,” said Lowe. “It’s the picture on the railing marking the ghost orchid site. But nobody’s there.”
“Maybe around the bend . . .”
Ten minutes later, Lowe saw movement through the cypress. “Look! Someone’s coming on the boardwalk.” He reached for a shoulder holster.
The person appeared.
White sagged. “It’s just Mahoney. Let’s call it a day and head back . . . Mahoney! We’re going!”
Mahoney just gazing into murky water. A turtle surfaced.
“We covered the whole boardwalk from opposite directions,” said White. “If he was here, you know we would have intercepted.”
Mahoney continued gazing off the railing at the lettuce lakes and rubbed his two-day stubble. “Dizzy tiggle gashouse yegman biscuit-town.”
White put a hand on his shoulder. “I have absolutely no idea what that means, but I want you to realize that despite my occasional annoyance, I sincerely appreciate your dedication . . . Now we all could use a little rest.”
They made it back to the nature center and reached the doors to the parking lot.
“Oh, detectives?”
They turned around. The ticket man.
“That guy in the picture you showed me? Is this him?”
“Where?”
“On my security monitor. I rolled the tape back.
”
White ran over. “How long ago?”
“Fifteen minutes, tops.” The man looked up. “Camera got him on the way out.”
The trio raced around the desk for a view of the replaying footage.
On the black-and-white screen, Serge and Coleman strolled away in the middle of a pack of seniors.
“I’ll be damned,” said White.
“Where’d he get the kid?” asked Lowe.
“We’ll ask when we catch him.”
They ran out the door.
White started up the Crown Vic and looked over his shoulder. “Mahoney, where to now?”
“The Big-H 29 shimmy-sham.”
Everglades
A ’69 Barracuda sped south on Highway 29.
“Roadkill,” said Coleman. “Armadillo.”
“Got it.” Serge swerved as vultures took off.
Mikey pasted his face to the window. “Squishy guts!”
“I think he’s going to be a doctor,” said Serge.
Kid Rock blared as they crested the overpass across Alligator Alley.
“. . . Singing ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ all summer long! . . .”
“I didn’t know you liked the Kid,” said Coleman.
“I didn’t,” said Serge. “Or I was indifferent, until I heard he got in brawl at a Waffle House after a gig. Anyone with that kind of money who still goes to Waffle House, I’m down with.” The song ended. Serge picked up his iPod and spun the click wheel. “This trip needs fugitive tunes or swamp music, and preferably both . . . Here we go . . .”
“Where are we going?”
“If you’re a fan of studying maps and looking for the most remote dead ends at the edge of nowhere, you can’t do better in Florida,” said Serge. “I know a spot at the very bottom of the state where nobody but nobody will find us.”
“Roadkill. Opossum.”
The Barracuda slalomed around baked remains on the pavement.
Serge reached under his seat for a small shopping bag. He removed an item, peeled off the covering over its adhesive base and stuck it in the middle of the dashboard.
They passed a couple of places on the map called Jerome and Copeland, but what were actually just a few reclusive homes. Some had driveways off the highway, across dubious wooden bridges over a drainage canal.