Mangrove Lightning

by Randy Wayne White

  Slaten wasn’t mentioned again until they’d made a U-turn and parked, with the high beams on, facing the cabin. A couple of deer they spooked explained the noise she’d heard. It made the place feel like home again.

  “Tell me about him,” Tomlinson said. “Not the sex part, just generally about him as a man. His best qualities.”

  “Well, um . . .” she said. “He’s, uh . . . I don’t know, it’s hard to narrow it down like that.”

  “Hell, throw in some sex, too, if you want. I’m all ears.”

  She chuckled, loosening up a bit, then did her best to lionize a man who had dominated her world by shrinking it until only Slaten existed.

  Tomlinson listened patiently to the fantasy she created while noting the honesty of her hands. As she spoke, her fingers moved from her knee to her throat, to the grotesque tattoos on her face and neck. Her lap became an uneasy resting area. Often, a hand lingered on the burn dressing while the other shielded her face.

  Finally, she said, “You just sit there and nod. Why don’t you say something? I can’t tell if you believe me or not.”

  “I believe in you,” Tomlinson said, swinging his seat around. “It’s too early in the game to believe anything else. How about some dessert?”

  She watched him crank the roof higher so he could stand upright, then set out bowls in what was a cute little camper with curtains. “I know what you’re doing. You think sugar will help me over the hump. Clear my head so I can think straight. That’s why they feed addicts candy.”

  “Really? No wonder I’m jonesing for mango ice cream. I usually smoke a joint about this time of day.”

  “Go ahead. It won’t bother me. Here, I’ll prove it.” She moved to a table in the back of the van and opened her purse. From it, she produced a tiny bag of crystals and a vaporizer shaped like a cigar. “This is the last of it. I haven’t been high since I got out of the hospital and I don’t want to be tempted to use this shit again. It’s yours.”

  An ounce of flakka, Tomlinson realized. “I thought we were talking about Slaten.”

  “We are.”

  Before he could slip the baggie into his pocket, Gracie gave a great shuddering sob and fell into his arms. “Please, help me. Slaten . . . I know. Everything he touches is poison, but it wasn’t him who kept me locked up. I swear. I can’t lie to the judge and say—”

  Car lights illuminated the girl’s face and spun their shadows to the front of the van.

  Tomlinson lunged for the curtains, then relaxed. “It’s my friend, Doc,” he said. “Better set out another bowl.”

  18

  Ford left his truck running because of an oddity he noticed after arriving, but told them, “I’m going to take a quick look at the pond. After all this rain, water samples should show a spike in acidity. It’s all about timing.”

  Tomlinson’s expression read Bullshit, while the girl asked, “Why don’t you let me fix you a plate first?” It was the polite, Southern thing to do—Gracie, the fragile teen, grounding herself with homemaker protocol.

  If not for that, Ford would have suggested she use his hotel room in Everglades City tonight. Instead, he took his pal aside and asked, “Were you roaming around the yard before I drove up?”

  “We heard something, that’s why I got her into the van. Turned out, it was just a couple of deer. I’m worried about her, man. She’s absolutely sure the guy who branded her, and did all that other sick shit, wasn’t Slaten. If I understood more about that synthetic drug they use—” He stopped. “How’d you know we heard something?”

  Ford produced a small gizmo with a lens at each end. “Have a look.”

  Tomlinson’s eye widened in the greenish light. “Wow. A new toy. Thermal imaging? Yeah . . . Gad, is that—” He lowered the monocular, then tried again. “I can see Gracie through the damn walls. Her shape, like an orange sort of ghost. This isn’t the same unit you had—”

  “No, it’s a new prototype. Check the outside wall near the window.”

  Tomlinson did. “Sonuvabitch,” he murmured. “Is that what I think? . . . No, can’t be. It’s too big.” On the cabin’s gray siding was a rosy splotch that resembled a massive handprint. It was where a big man would lean his weight before peeking in.

  “It’s probably a hole in the drywall leaking heat,” Ford said. “Just in case, lock the doors and stay inside until I get back. Better yet, stay in the van with the engine running.”

  “Hold on, ol’ buddy. The whole phone-monitoring thing, you’ve got me spooked. I’m thinking about Gracie. Is someone after you?”

  “I hope so,” Ford replied. “If not—” He came close to admitting that Gracie could be right. The psycho who’d abused her might still be on the loose, but that was absurd. “It doesn’t hurt to be careful,” he added.

  When Tomlinson was inside, he set off cross-country.

  —

  Vernon knew he was being followed—thanks to Walter. The old man had many faults, but weakness wasn’t among them. He’d say, “Any man can’t survive out here with just a frying pan and a knife deserves to be eaten.”

  Not referring to gators or bears, as most would. No, he’d meant killed and eaten by a better man. Walter had a taste for it, he claimed. Particularly Chinese.

  It was the way Vernon had been raised. The old man hadn’t allowed him off the property, not once, before the age of fourteen. The same with Walter Jr., which is probably why the big, bullying bastard had ended up in the loony bin. Ol’ Walter would say, “It’s ’cause you’re all mental retards and ain’t got a birth certificate.” He’d say, “Learning electricity don’t make you smart, and sassin’ back shows just how dumb you really are.” He’d say, “Not until one of you punks can put meat on the table and prove it.”

  Vernon had put meat on the table. Walter, drunker than usual, had loaded him into a boat, blindfolded him, and stopped after an hour’s ride. Sawgrass all around, except for a creek no wider than a ditch, and an island of willows nearby. “Here you go, Ching-Ching,” which is what the old man had called him, Ching-Ching, even before leaving him there, fourteen years old, with nothing but a pan, a knife, and matches.

  Turned out, Walter, crazy as he was, had a sense of humor. That sawgrass prairie was near a dead-end road frequented by hippies and other loner types.

  Food wasn’t the problem. Finding enough salt to cure meat was.

  A week later, Vernon’s nose told him Walter was returning long before he heard the boat. It was the one and only time the old man had shown a glimmer of approval. “By god, at least your knife’s sharp, shit-for-brains. Appears you might be catching on.”

  Like now. Vernon knew who was following him. It was the biologist with the wire glasses. The snoopy outsider who’d made some interesting phone calls from Key Largo. Something else was certain: the dude was using more than reading glasses to track him on a night black with rain.

  It might have been worrisome, in a sporting way, if Vernon hadn’t smoked himself to a finely honed edge. In lieu of crystal, a spoon of cheap-ass bath salts had done the trick. A head full of that shit gave a man coyote ears and vision that could penetrate brick.

  No contest.

  The guy was a slicker. They all were. Slickers didn’t know the secret of moving silently through the Glades. Barefoot was the only way to detect twigs before they snapped, and to gently fold palmettos before they rattled. The slick was unaware that subtle changes in air were important. Moist areas retained odors. A patch of dry upland cloaked them.

  The biologist was pretty damn good, though.

  Vernon put another fifty yards of swamp between them, then monitored the results from behind a cypress tree. Sound communicated the biologist’s confusion whenever he came to a stretch of water. The water didn’t have to be deep. It suggested he might have a tracking dog. Vernon knew how to deal with dogs because of the bloodhounds Walter had raised,
all of them—the best ones anyway—named Maynard. The name dated back to a deputy the old man had killed after stealing the sheriff’s dog, his bullwhip, and his .38 caliber Webley revolver.

  In Vernon’s head, the story was put on pause while he decided, Nope . . . the biologist didn’t have a bloodhound. Even a quarter mile away, he would’ve wind-scented a dog, conditions as they were. The sound was all wrong, too.

  Yet, the slicker kept coming . . . not in a straight line, as before, instead zigzagging from tree to tree in ankle-deep water, which Vernon couldn’t see, only hear.

  How the hell . . . ?

  He would figure it out, and have some fun along the way.

  To lose a bloodhound, circle a distraction such as a chicken coop—Vernon had done it as a boy. A cache of old bottles might have the same effect on an outsider, so that’s where he headed, an artesian well that bubbled up through a wall of rock. Nearby was a field cellar that had never held a potato, but there were still crockery jars, wax-sealed, that dated back to Prohibition.

  The limestone lid normally required several men to heft it. Vernon, buzzed on flake, lifted with his legs and let the stone cover fall with a crash. The result was a distant silence, then a flurry of movement.

  Yep. The slicker had taken the bait. No need to bother circling. He headed straight to the pond, moving fast through the trees but as soundlessly as the loam beneath his bare feet. Then stopped.

  Oh hell . . .

  The slicker had changed angles. He was cutting him off without pausing to investigate what was in those old jars.

  Vernon understood then. Slick wasn’t following muddy water, or a scent trail. He was tracking handprints from tree to tree. Heat. The biologist was using thermal imaging.

  Good for him.

  Vernon tasted the air with his nose, and got serious. This was fun; better than playing tag with that ball-less weakling Slaten. It wasn’t a game if you went by ol’ Walter’s rules. Early on, they’d used pellet guns and targeted the other guy’s ass. After a year or so, Slaten, being smart, or cowardly, had claimed the old man had told him in private to use a .22 rifle and shoot for the head.

  “Load up” was Vernon’s response.

  He was unbeatable out here. He knew every little hidey-hole, and there were a bunch around the pond. The limestone base was pocked like Swiss cheese, some holes large enough for a man his size. Back in the whiskey-making days, the holes had been used for storage. Later, as a place to punish some perceived screw-up.

  “I’m gonna let you soak for a while,” in Walter’s words.

  His favorite was the easiest to access—the Coolie Box, it was called, because gators had used it for ripening meat. Vernon made his way through the trees to the water, leaving handprints as he went. He waded in, aligned two familiar markers, and soon surfaced inside a chamber that was so dark, he couldn’t see his hand in front of his face.

  What he could see were a few stars through a fissure in the limestone, a gap several feet long and a foot wide, that opened to the surface. He poked his arm out as a snare and waited. Snaring game took patience. It gave him time to recall the flickering Kinetoscope and the image of a giant crocodile on the wall. Damn . . . he’d missed some fun by being born too late. The railroad, and cowboys on horseback, and all that legal killing during the Marco Island war.

  Unlike Mr. Bird, Vernon couldn’t return to the past. The next best thing? Seeing the world through the old man’s eyes, acting, reacting, and listening as if Walter were still in charge. And keep doing it over and over until the old son of bitch was gone from his head.

  It was the only escape.

  The biologist slicker, yeah, he was pretty good. A suctioning of muck, a rhythmic slosh, was the only sound he made as he drew near. The man took slow, sliding steps. When the hairs on Vernon’s wrist felt the lift and fall of water, he unfurled his fingers like a bear trap. Then the biologist was above him, a bulky shadow against the clouds, close enough to grab the son of a bitch’s ankle and snap his leg at the knee.

  Vernon wanted to. Oh god, did he. After that, it would’ve been a toss-up—do a gator roll and rip the dude’s pelvis off, or take his time and enjoy the kill.

  Yeah . . . take his time. That was better. Surface. Track the crippled bastard and really hurt him, before doing what Walter had done to Vernon that night long ago when he’d broken into the railroad car.

  Use the chains, one on each ankle. Apply outward pressure on the legs as if snapping a Thanksgiving wishbone. Next . . . use the knife.

  “Like geldin’ a hog.” Say it just as Walter had said it, while the branding iron glowed yellow. “You can either bleed to death or hold still while I put his mark on you.”

  Meaning Mr. Bird, who had yet to state his plans for the biologist. Where the hell was he? What had happened to the familiar voice?

  Frustrated, Vernon took a chance. He rapped a knuckle on the biologist’s ankle as the man slid by. The dumbass didn’t even notice. Just stood there, scanning the surface, then turned and damn near stepped on Vernon’s hand when he returned to shore. The man kept going in a noisy, indifferent way that said he was done with their game.

  Oh hell . . .

  Finally—finally—Mr. Bird came into Vernon’s head, saying, You know why.

  Yeah, he did, but that didn’t make holding back any easier.

  Mr. Bird saying as a reminder, He’s bait until I’ve tasted the tall girl, Raven.

  It was because of a phone call the biologist had made from Key Largo. No conversation, just a message that read “Let me know when you want to come down and fish. Tomorrow, maybe? I’ve got a little aluminum boat.”

  Vernon’s hunger for Hannah Smith replaced frustration. He slogged toward his utility truck, thinking about that, how to snatch the woman—and Gracie, too—but also deal with the biologist in a way that would be . . . satisfying.

  He was so lost in thought, he was at the back rim of the pond before noticing a green laser dot on his chest.

  Huh . . . ?

  A laser gun sight. Christ, how long had that been there?

  Vernon jumped away. The laser dot sailed up his chest to his forehead. He ducked, rolled, and came up on one knee. The laser beam retracted into darkness. Where had it come from? Hundreds of yards away, he guessed, possibly the top floor or roof of Walter’s house.

  If so, he was dealing with two people, maybe more. Had to be, because that’s when a man appeared from behind a nearby tree and blinded him with a white strobe.

  “Get that goddamn light out of my eyes,” Vernon hollered. A second later, the strobe went out and left floating sparks behind his eyes. “Was that a gun your partner had aimed at me? I’ll stick it up your hind end if you—”

  “A gun?” It was the biologist, his voice the same as hearing him through a phone.

  “While you damn near blinded me. Yeah.” Vernon rubbed his eyes while his brain transitioned into utility worker mode.

  “What were you doing snooping around the Barlow place? It’d better be good.”

  “Hold on there, mister, your sniper buddy just put a laser dot on my chest. Why? He’s gonna shoot me for doing my job?”

  The slicker pretended not to understand, asking, “Does your job include peeking in windows?”

  Weird, how calm the guy sounded. Not mad, just curious. Vernon changed tactics. “Wait a minute, you thought . . . Let’s not get off on the wrong foot here, sir. The power’s out and I’m a contractor sent by the local service provider. If you want, I’ve got some ID in my truck.” The polite approach should have allowed him to move a few steps. It didn’t.

  The strobe came on again, this time pointed at the ground. “That’s close enough. What’s your name?”

  “Vernon Crow, sir. I should warn you right now, local law enforcement always sides with us in these sorts of little misunderstandings. Utility access rights.” />
  “Good idea,” the biologist said, and took out a phone intending, Vernon realized, to call the police.

  He growled, and charged.

  —

  If not for seeing a human face, Ford might have thought it was an animal that charged him. A three-hundred-pound feral hog with crazed yellow eyes, or a Montana grizzly. No words, no warning, just a rumble that might have been the ground quaking beneath the guy’s speed and weight.

  The real surprise was the failings of the tactical strobe. It should’ve dropped the man within a few steps. The unit was calibrated to scramble synapse function, a dangerous piece of equipage that could cause seizures, even lasting damage to the eyes or brain. Weapon enough to stop a voyeur, or an honest utility worker, which was the problem. Until that instant, Ford wasn’t sure who he was dealing with.

  Vernon Crow was a freak. When he charged, the biologist reached for a pistol concealed in the back of his pants. Impact occurred an instant later. It was like being hit by a bus. Ford was knocked ass-backwards toward the pond and the gun went flying. Dazed, he rolled, and kept rolling, as Vernon tried to stomp him. When the timing felt right, he shielded his face with his forearms . . . caught the man’s big bare foot, and rolled again.

  Vernon made a whistling sound of pain and fell with the grace of a redwood. Over many years, and twice-a-day practices, Ford had paid his dues as a high school wrestler. Hand control skills, and the sweaty ballet of hip position, were hardwired. He scrambled atop the giant and used both legs to trap Vernon’s right knee. After that, choking the guy into submission—or unconsciousness—should have been simple, methodical.

  It wasn’t. Vernon defied the principles of technique and gravity by vaulting up on one leg and slamming Ford against a tree—something an elephant might do to rid itself of a pesky rider.

  A freak, yes he was, and Ford was no fool. He got to his feet and ran, busting through cattails into the pond. The giant mistook the tactic as fear. He followed. Then, standing in water to his waist, wondered, Where’d that dumb bastard go?