Beats hell out of me.
Karly Altman stood at least a head taller than Mr. Huggable, and she was beaming at me.
“Congratulations,” she said.
“Thank you,” I said. “What did I do?”
“Why, it’s your carossier,” she said. “It has fruited.”
“Hmmm,” I said.
“Aren’t you excited?” she said.
“Mere words can’t express,” I said.
I looked at Boggy. He nodded at the tall scraggly palm.
“That’s the carossier,” he said. Then he turned to Karly. “Zachary, he just own the place. About palm trees, he does not know shit.”
Karly looked at me with unmasked pity.
“You mean to tell me you don’t have a clue what it is you have here?” she said. “No wonder you can’t grasp the immensity of the occasion.”
“Clueless, graspless, don’t know shit. That’s me,” I said.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I tend to lose sight of the fact that not everyone’s a palm nut like I am.”
She wiped dirt from her hands and rapped her knuckles against the trunk of the palm tree.
“Attalea crassipatha. One of several species of the American oil palm. Native habitat, southwestern coast of Haiti. Number of specimens known to exist in the wild, no more than thirty. Number of specimens successfully propagated in private nurseries, zero,” she said. “But we’re about to change that.”
“We are?”
“Oh, yes. Just look at those,” she said, pointing to the top of the palm. A yellow stalk protruded from the tree’s crown. It was studded with dozens of tiny white flowers. Bees were buzzing around them.
“The blossoms should fall off in the next week or so, and I’ll bag the stalk in plastic mesh after that,” she said. “Otherwise, we run the risk of losing the fruit to birds.”
“Can’t have that,” I said.
“Then it will take four to five weeks for the seed pod to mature and be ready to plant,” said Karly Altman.
She grabbed one of the jars of dirt.
“It’s critical that I analyze the soil. I’ll need to set up a small lab to do that. I was hoping to use a portion of your kitchen,” she said. “Is that OK?”
“Sure,” I said. “I won’t be needing it. I’m getting ready to leave for . . .”
“Great,” said Karly Altman. “And would it be OK if we built a potting house? We can probably make do with the scrap lumber and screen that’s in the storage shed. Boggy said he could slap something together.”
“That’s fine. I’d offer to help you, but I’ll be . . .”
“Oh, this is so exciting. Thank you, thank you, thank you,” said Karly, giving me a hug. “Now I have to go send out some e-mails. This is big news. A carossier fruiting in Florida. Who could have ever imagined?”
“It’s really that big a deal, huh?”
“Omigod, it’s giant,” she said. “Wait until the International Palm Society finds out. There will be all kinds of people swarming in here to get a look.”
She gathered up the jars of dirt, put them in a cardboard box, and hurried off toward the house. Boggy and I watched her go.
“Woman’s got a lot of enthusiasm,” I said. “Didn’t know it was possible for someone to get that excited over a palm tree.”
“She has a big spirit,” Boggy said.
I looked at Boggy.
“So, you and her . . . ?”
Boggy didn’t say anything. And his face gave up nothing. It never does.
“Aw, c’mon,” I said. “What’s the deal with the two of you? Is it serious?”
It sounded stupid the minute I said it. With Boggy everything is serious.
So we stood there atop the bluff, enjoying the view. To the west the lagoon sprawled out like a giant jigsaw puzzle, a dazzlement of curlicue islands and snakelike sloughs. From the east came the Atlantic’s low grumble. The surf was choppy and the water was the gray-green it gets after a summer’s worth of hard rain and outflow from the lagoon.
Minutes went by. Neither one of us spoke. Boggy is one of exactly two people in the world with whom I can feel comfortable in the quiet. Barbara is the other one.
Finally, Boggy said, “Barbara, she wants me to go with you.”
“So you know what’s going on, about me heading down to Jamaica?”
Boggy nodded.
“Barbara found me as she was leaving and told me about it,” he said. “She is much troubled, Zachary.”
“Funny, she didn’t act much troubled when I last saw her.”
“Sometimes she puts on a face for you because she knows that is the face you want to see.”
“And what? She puts on another face for you?”
He shrugged. He didn’t say anything.
“Well, she’s got nothing to worry about,” I said. “I’ll be back before she knows I’m gone.”
“So you do not wish me to go with you?”
“I can handle it,” I said.
Boggy turned and faced me. He looked long and hard into my eyes. His gaze seemed to bore into some deep core of me that not even I can penetrate. He does this every now and then. It is more than mildly creepy.
Then he turned away and said, “It will not be quite so easy as you expect, Zachary.”
“That a fact? Or is this one of your hunches?”
“It is what it is,” he said.
“You know, it really ticks me off when you say crap like that. You might as well be writing newspaper horoscopes. Nothing is ever as easy as anyone expects. And everything is what it is. Tell me something I don’t know, how about it, instead of all the mumbo jumbo.”
Boggy didn’t say anything. He folded his arms above his little potbelly and looked west across the lagoon.
“No way,” I said. “It doesn’t work like that. You don’t just throw stuff like that out there and then clam up and let it hang. Give up what you’ve got.”
But I didn’t get anything else out of him. When I walked away he was still standing there, gazing into the distance at something I couldn’t see.
11
Monday morning I got up long before sunrise and drove to Orlando and caught a flight to Miami. I was glad to be flying early, well ahead of the afternoon thunderstorms that close in from the coasts and collide with a fury and make flying in Florida such a come-to-Jesus experience.
The pilot banked the plane east, took us out over Port Canaveral, and we cruised south along the condo corridor. An hour later, the Miami skyline poked itself out like jailbait in a bikini and drew us thither.
Miami International has two redeeming features. One is a killer Cuban cafeteria, La Carretta, on Concourse D. I grabbed a stool at the take-out counter and ordered café con leche and a crab relleno. Then I sat there admiring the airport’s other redeeming feature—a steady stream of Latina lovelies from the Caribbean basin and beyond.
Had Barbara been with me, we would have rated the contenders as they walked past and speculated about where they came from.
“Pink tube top with the black capris. An eight-point-five. Puerto Rico.”
“What is it with you men and tube tops? She’s slutty. Barely a six. But those shoes of hers, they’re darling. Brazil. She’s definitely from Brazil.”
I ordered a pastelito, filled with sweet guava paste and cream cheese, and another café con leche. Someone had left behind a copy of the Miami Herald. I flipped through it.
The Herald’s news staff had been caught short in its coverage of the bomb in the skybox for Sunday’s edition, but had more than made up for it in Monday’s paper. There was a flashy piece stripped across the top of the front page under the headline: “Resort Mogul No Stranger to Danger.” It portrayed Darcy Whitehall as a consummate risk-taker both in business and in his personal life. It told how he had beaten the odds as a music producer, then cut his own path as a renegade hotelier. And it showcased his penchant for adventure—trans-Atlantic sailboat races, diving with whale sharks in Beliz
e, hot-air ballooning across the Andes.
The story jumped to a full page inside with lots of photographs of Whitehall from over the years—palling around with Peter Tosh and Mick Jagger backstage at a 1980s-era concert, soaking in a hot tub at Libido with a bevy of fetching babes, dancing with a pair of leggy supermodels at a South Beach nightclub. There were quotes from various people who knew him, but nothing in the way of explanation, or even reasonable speculation, as to why someone might have planted the bomb.
A paragraph near the end of the story, however, caught my attention.
“While Whitehall has never taken an active role in Jamaica’s often-bloody political arena, his son, Alan, is no stranger to public life. Having founded a high-profile relief program that provides low-income housing throughout the Caribbean, the younger Whitehall has set his sights on a seat in the Jamaican parliament and was recently nominated by the ruling People’s National Party to stand as a candidate in the Trelawney Northern district.”
My “Ah-ha!” moments are few and far between, but this was one of them. I thought back to the scene in the skybox, the little incident between Alan Whitehall and his sister. She’d blamed Alan for the jam their father was in. Then she’d stormed away and left him with Darcy.
“If this is my fault, I’m sorry,” Alan had said. “I’ll quit. I’ll drop out.”
Had he been referring to his budding political career? Did someone want him out of the race? And was that dud-of-a-bomb their way of underscoring the seriousness of their intentions?
All questions I could ask Monk DeVane soon enough.
12
A half hour later I was at the gate for Air Libido. It was part of Darcy Whitehall’s empire, a charter operation that flew guests to the islands on which his various resorts were located.
And what an operation it was. Instead of the typical airport hellhole of molded plastic seats and crummy carpet, the Air Libido waiting area resembled a beachside tiki bar. There were comfy divans, rattan chairs, and even a couple of hammocks strung between fake palm trees.
Perched on a stool by the boarding gate, a guy in dreadlocks was strumming the guitar and singing Bob Marley standards. The check-in counter resembled a little grass shack by the sea.
All in all, it was a masterful piece of marketing. Air Libido stood out like an orchid in a sandspur patch. Vacationers on their way to other airlines walked past Air Libido and thought: Man, next time I want some of that.
The flight to Montego Bay was already boarding. A young man and a young woman were working the check-in counter. Both looked like catalogue models ready for a frisky day at the beach.
The young man wore his flowered shirt open, all the better for displaying his pecs and abs. The young woman wore a gauzy blouse over a halter top and shorts, all the better for displaying her everything.
I handed the young woman my ticket and she gave me a boarding pass. Then she held up a tray and offered me my choice of rum punch or a bottle of Red Stripe beer. Not even ten o’clock in the morning and on Air Libido it was already time to cut loose.
I reminded myself that I was heading to Jamaica on a serious mission, a possible matter of life and death, a situation in which it might be a good idea to keep my wits about me.
I took a Red Stripe.
Boarding the plane was like walking into a party that had started long before I got there. The buzz was lively, the cabin speakers were blasting reggae, and several people—including a couple of the flight attendants—were boogeying by the bulkheads. The island vibe was so pervasive that I halfway expected the copilot to step out of the cockpit and pass around a giant spliff.
The crowd was about what I expected. The women wore a little too much makeup, the men a few too many gold chains. All of them were laughing just a little too hard and talking just a little too loud and straining just a little too much to have a good time.
It was like spring break for grownups, which made it slightly pathetic. Everyone seemed to be checking out everyone else, maybe deciding who they would pick when it came time to choose sides for naked volleyball.
My boarding pass said A-14, the window seat. A woman was sitting in it. Another woman sat next to her. Both were in their early thirties, I’d guess. Both had bottle-blond hair, lots of it, done up in a way that ought to be illegal outside of Texas or Tennessee. And both had devoted much time and consideration to their travel outfits, which were tight and revealing. They were pretty enough, if you like that over-the-hill-Hooter’s-girl kind of look.
“I hope you don’t mind I took your seat,” said the woman by the window. “We wanted to look out on all the pretty water.”
“Not a problem,” I said. “I can use the extra room to spread out.”
They gave me the once-over.
“Well, I guess you can,” said the one in the middle seat. “You’re a long tall one, aren’t ya?”
I’ve been hearing that all my life, and I’ve never been able to come up with a suitable reply. So I just smiled and strapped myself in and sat back with my Red Stripe.
“Yoo-hoo, over here, hon,” said the woman by the window as she waved down a flight attendant carrying a tray full of rum punches. They each took one and passed over half a dozen empty cups in return.
The woman in the window seat leaned forward and looked at me and said: “So where you from?”
“Florida,” I said.
“Well, we’re from Knoxville . . .”
Knew it.
“You ever been there?”
I nodded my head yes. I didn’t bother telling them how I had been there twice when the Gators played Tennessee. We’d won one and lost one and I’d blown out my knee for the first time in the one we’d lost.
They talked. A lot. They both worked in “the financial industry,” which I took to mean they were probably bank tellers. Lynette and Darlene, that was them.
Darlene leaned closer to me.
“You traveling by your lonesome?” she asked.
I nodded.
“Well, I hear there isn’t no one who gets lonesome at Libido,” she said.
I shrugged.
“I hear things can get really wild and crazy,” she said.
I nodded.
“But that’s why we’re going there, isn’t it? To get wild and crazy.”
I wasn’t sure if I should shrug or nod, so I did a little of each.
Darlene looked at me.
“What’s a matter? Cat got your tongue?”
I shrugged.
“That’s OK,” she said. “I like the strong silent type.”
She snuggled up against me. Lynette elbowed Darlene.
“Girl, just cool your jets,” she said.
Then she leaned across Darlene and patted me on the knee.
“Just never you mind her,” Lynette said. “Darlene, she just got divorced a while back. And she’s hornier than a trumpet. Isn’t that right, Darlene?”
“Toot-toot,” said Darlene.
The two of them laughed.
I closed my eyes. I pretended to sleep. The plane took off. Pretty soon I didn’t have to pretend anymore.
13
Monk DeVane stood waiting for me on the curb outside customs at Sangster International. He was easy to spot. He wore a bright pink Libido polo shirt and white pants. He saw me and gave a big wave.
The sidewalk was hot and loud and thick with people. Dozens of cab drivers and hustlers worked the crowd with typical Jamaican zeal and rat-a-tat spiels. Several of them were in my face before I was halfway to Monk.
“Welcome to Jamaica, mon. You need a drivah? I got da wheels, mon, I got da wheels,” one said, falling in step with me. “Where ya be needing to go?”
“Sorry,” I said. “I’ve already got a ride.”
Another one tapped my elbow and spoke low.
“Welcome to Jamaica, mon. You need ganja? You need crank? I be ya pharmacy, mon.”
I pulled away and reached the curb where Monk was grinning at me. I was still getting us
ed to his gone-tropo appearance—the shaggy hair, the untrimmed beard. He looked like a particularly hirsute Jeff Bridges, a big guy with a big jaw and broad shoulders.
“Welcome to Jamaica, mon,” Monk said.
“What are you selling?”
Monk laughed.
“Misery and heartbreak,” he said. “Not sure exactly what I might have gotten you into here, Zack.”
“That bad?”
He wiggled a hand—so-so.
“Still hard to tell,” he said. “Afraid it might be one of those calm-before-the-storm things.”
“You figured out who’s creating the storm?”
Monk glanced to either side, cautious. It seemed a tad melodramatic, but what did I know? Maybe the bad guys were watching us. I had to get into the bodyguard mind-set, be suspicious of everyone.
“Not now,” Monk said. “We’ve got plenty of time to talk about that on the way to the resort. I’ll fill you in on everything.”
Just then a familiar trill shattered the sidewalk chatter.
“Hey, you! Over here . . .”
I turned to see Darlene and Lynette, watching us from alongside a big pink bus. The Libido Resorts logo was emblazoned down its side and the other passengers from our flight were filing onto it.
Darlene put her fists on her hips and gave me a cute little pout.
“Aren’t you coming with us?” she said.
“I’ll be along,” I said.
Lynette wagged a finger at me and winked.
“Alright, but don’t you forget about us,” she said. “We’re gonna party.”
They giggled and waved and got on the bus. Monk turned to me and cocked an eyebrow.
“Looks like you’re about to get lucky, my friend.”
“Believe I’ll pass, thank you.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve turned into a one-woman man, Zack.”
“Sad but true,” I said. “Think it suits me, actually.”
“That’s great. I’m happy for you.”
“Like hell you are,” I said. “Where’s your car?”
Monk smiled.
“Man, you know I always follow the Chasteen rules.”
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