“But it’s a fantasy,” Keyes said.
Tommy Tigertail smiled handsomely, his caramel face brightening. “Of course it’s a fantasy. Of course it is!” He laughed softly, a laugh full of irony. “Ask anybody,” Tommy said. “Florida is the place where fantasies come true. Now, lie down, Mr. Keyes, and we will go.”
With that the Indian cranked the propeller and the two of them were drowned in noise. The airboat rocketed out of the sawgrass, and the wind shocked Brian Keyes to the spine. He huddled down, cheek to the cool aluminum deck, and counted out the miles in his pounding head.
Shortly after noon on the ninth of December, the head nurse of the emergency room at Flagler Memorial Hospital was notified by a policeman that “a school bus with serious injuries” was on its way to the hospital.
Assuming the worst, which is the only sane way to function in Miami, the nurse immediately declared a Code Orange and scrambled every available surgeon, anesthesiologist, scrub nurse, and lab tech in the hospital. The other patients—miscellaneous gunshot victims, drug overdoses, and screeching teenagers in labor—were shuffled out of the way and told to manage as best they could. Flagler Memorial braced for full-scale carnage and catastrophe.
In no time the E. R. filled with TV crews, newspaper reporters, photographers, and personal-injury lawyers. After about an hour of waiting, everyone got cranky and wanted to know what was the damn story with this busload of mangled orphans. Where were the choppers? And the ambulances? Where the hell were the grieving parents?
The head nurse was getting baleful glares from the orthopedic surgeons (“It’s Sunday, for Chrissakes!”) when the bus finally clattered up to the emergency-room door.
It was not a school bus, though once it might have been. And in fairness to the cop who radioed it in, the bus had the right colors, yellow and black; the yellow being paint and the black being rust.
The driver, a phlegmatic fellow with a Budweiser in one hand, seemed extremely surprised to be met by bright lights and Minicams and an army of tense-looking people dressed in white. Drunk as he was, the driver could sense their collective disappointment.
For the bus was not packed with seriously injured children, but perfectly healthy migrant workers—Jamaicans, Haitians, Dominicans, and Mexicans, all sweaty and dusty and peeved that their day in the tomato fields had been cut short.
“I don’t understand,” the nurse said, scanning the dark faces. “Where’s the emergency?”
“There’s your fuckin’ emergency,” the bus driver said, waving a stubby arm. “Up top.”
The nurse stood on the tips of her white shoes and saw what the driver was talking about: a young man strapped to the rack on top of the bus. He looked damp and half-conscious, his clothes soaked with blood. For some reason a briefcase had been placed under his lolling head.
“Hmph!” said the nurse, turning to face the throng. “Relax, everybody.”
A pair of orderlies clambered atop the bus and untied Brian Keyes. As they placed him on a stretcher and carried him into the hospital, the emergency room emptied with a groan. Only one reporter hung around to ask questions, and that was Ricky Bloodworth.
Nobody bothered to retrieve the briefcase from the top of the migrant bus. Miraculously it remained there, unsecured, almost halfway back to Immokalee, until the bus accidentally struck an opossum crossing Route 41. The jolt launched the briefcase—containing all Skip Wiley’s vital evidence—off the roof of the bus into the Tamiami Canal, where it sank unopened into a gator hole.
Al Garcia was in a bellicose mood. He hated the night shift if he couldn’t be out on the streets, and he couldn’t be on the streets if he was running the motor pool. The motor pool was a terrible place for a detective; there was nothing to investigate. The highlight of the evening was when one of the K-9 guys drove in with chunks of dead cat all over the backseat of the squad car. The cop said the cat had gone crazy and attacked his K-9 German shepherd and the dog didn’t have a choice but to fight back—it was just a terrible thing to see. Garcia said sure, pal, and wrote it up anyway, musing over the sick possibilities.