“Did he give you a name?”
“Tim is what he said.”
Stranahan said the only Tim he knew was an ex-homicide cop named Gavigan.
“That’s it,” the fishing guide said. “Tim Gavigan is what he said.”
“Skinny redhead?”
“Nope.”
“Shit,” said Stranahan. Of course it wasn’t Timmy Gavigan. Gavigan was busy dying of lung cancer in the VA.
The captain said, “You want me to hang close today?”
“Hell, no, you got your sport down there, he’s raring to go.”
“Fuck it, Mick, he wouldn’t know a bonefish from a sperm whale. Anyway, I’ve got a few choice spots right around here—maybe we’ll luck out.”
“Not with this breeze, buddy; the flats are already pea soup. You go on down south, I’ll be all right. He’s probably just some process-server.”
“Somebody’s sure to tell him which house.”
“Yeah, I figure so,” Stranahan said. “A white Seacraft, you said?”
“Twenty-footer,” the guide repeated. Before he started down the stairs, he said, “The guy’s got some size to him, too.”
“Thanks for the info.”
Stranahan watched the yellow skiff shoot south, across the flats, until all he could see was the long zipper of foam in its wake. The guide would be heading to Sand Key, Stranahan thought, or maybe all the way to Caesar Creek—well out of radio range. As if the damn radio still worked.
By three o’clock in the afternoon, the wind had stiffened, and the sky and the water had acquired the same purple shade of gray. Stranahan slipped into long jeans and a light jacket. He put on his sneakers, too; at the time he didn’t think about why he did this, but much later it came to him: Splinters. From running on the wooden deck. The raw two-by-fours were hell on bare feet, so Stranahan had put on his sneakers. In case he had to run.
The Seacraft was noisy. Stranahan heard it coming two miles away. He found the white speck through his field glasses and watched it plow through the hard chop. The boat was heading straight for Stranahan’s stilt house and staying clean in the channels, too.
Figures, Stranahan thought sourly. Probably one of the park rangers down at Elliott Key told the guy which house; just trying to be helpful.
He got up and closed the brown shutters from the outside. Through the field glasses he took one more long look at the man in the Seacraft, who was still a half mile away. Stranahan did not recognize the man, but could tell he was from up North—the guy made a point of shirt-sleeves, on this kind of a day, and the dumbest-looking sunglasses ever made.
Stranahan slipped inside the house and closed the door behind him. There was no way to lock it from the inside; there was no reason, usually.
With the shutters down the inside of the house was pitch-black, but Stranahan knew every corner of each room. In this house he had ridden out two hurricanes—baby ones, but nasty just the same. He had spent both storms in total darkness, because the wind knifed through the walls and played hell with the lanterns, and the last thing you wanted was an indoor fire.
So Stranahan knew the house in the dark.
He selected his place and waited.
After a few minutes the pitch of the Seacraft’s engines dropped an octave, and Stranahan figured the boat was slowing down. The guy would be eyeing the place closely, trying to figure out the best way up on the flat. There was a narrow cut in the marl, maybe four feet deep at high tide and wide enough for one boat. If the guy saw it and made this his entry, he would certainly spot Stranahan’s aluminum skiff tied up under the water tanks. And then he would know.
Stranahan heard the Seacraft’s engines chewing up the marly bottom. The guy had missed the deep cut.
Stranahan heard the big boat thud into the pilings at the west end of the house. He could hear the guy clunking around in the bow, grunting as he tried to tie it off against the tide, which was falling fast.
Stranahan heard—and felt—the man hoist himself out of the boat and climb to the main deck of the house. He heard the man say: “Anybody home?”