bomb blew, Ceepak's Humvee gunner went ballistic. Did some horrible stuff to several civilians. I think that's when Ceepak decided to rotate stateside when his tour and bounce-backs ended. Decided he'd pack up his medals and say so long to the army, which, up to that point, had been his whole life.
I hear him suck in some night air.
The way Ceepak squints up at those balconies and widow's walks? I know he's seeing bad guys with rocket-propelled grenades and AK-47s. He lost a lot of buddies back in the “sandbox.” Every now and then, he talks about it.
Every now and then.
“Come on,” he says. We start working our way up the sand. “The midnight gang's assembled and picked a rendezvous for the night.”
Now he's mumbling Springsteen lyrics. It's one of Ceepak's auto-focusing techniques. He remembers every song the Boss ever wrote-even ones Bruce has probably forgotten.
“They'll meet ‘neath that giant Exxon sign that brings this fair city light.”
This one's a classic. “Jungleland.” But I don't see any Exxon sign. The only light is off in the distance, about a half block up Tangerine. One of those orange-ish street lamps, its hazy beacon a dance club for the big flappy bugs that only come out at night.
We reach the dunes and seagrass. Ceepak crouches in front of a bench made from pressure-treated two- by-eights. It faces the ocean right where the beach ends and the rolled-out dune fencing starts. Nothing special. Just a place to sit and shake sand out of your shoes.
“See something?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“What?”
“Too many footprints.”
Ceepak stands up and dusts some sand off his pants.
People stop here to put on their sneakers or flip-flops or whatever before walking down to the street. You walk barefooted on hot asphalt in August, your feet are going to talk to you about it. Ceepak realizes it's such a high-traffic zone there's no way we're going to pick up any usable footprints or clues.
“We need to talk to some people.” He nods at the dark houses. “Find out if anybody saw or heard anything besides your music.”
“Right.” We had the radio blaring pretty loud, especially during the dance number. Mook was sending up his own personal noise pollution long before that. I'm sure some of the neighbors would give me an earful if they knew it was
We crest the dune and walk down the short stretch of planks to the street. Ceepak hunkers down again. I do the same thing. Sometimes, it's like we play Simon Says.
He pulls a magnifying glass out of one of the pockets in his cargo pants. All I have in my shorts is a beer- bottle opener.
“Same story here.”
“Tire tracks?”
“Dozens,” he says.
He points to the sweeping arcs of tread marks and I see what he sees: Car after car drove down the dead- end street, dropped off the kids, unloaded all the beach stuff-much of which also had wheels: little red wagons, rolling ice chests, beach carts. We've got tire tracks on top of tire tracks.
“Nothing.” Ceepak bites his lip, shakes his head. TMI. Too Much Information. Nothing stands out. It all blends in.
“I don't believe paintball weapons expel shell casings.” Ceepak pulls out a notepad and jots something down. “I believe they act more like a cannon, propelling the ball out of the chamber. The ball stays intact until it strikes its target.”
“Yeah.” As one of the targets, I know how it strikes. I also know how it hurts.
“I need to do some research. But first, we need to knock on a few doors.”
It's almost one A.M. I'm sure the neighbors are going to
“What about the q.t.?” I ask.
“Come again?”
“You know. The chief told us to keep this thing quiet. If we start asking questions, people will wonder what happened.” I point to my yellow-green chest.
Ceepak nods. Slow. Up and down, up and down. He's thinking.
“You make a valid point, Danny.”
“We'd have to tell them something.”
“Yes. But, I am disinclined to disseminate misinformation.”
The Code. He will not lie. If we want witnesses, now is probably the best time to talk to people-while memories are fresh. But if they ask us questions and we truthfully answer them, this thing could spin out of control fast.
“Perhaps we should do a little legwork first. I suspect the chief and Santucci are correct. This is most likely the work of teenagers who pose no imminent threat.”
“Right. The kind of guys who play mailbox baseball.”
“Excuse me?”
“You know-you drive around, lean out the window, and whack people's mailboxes with a baseball bat.”
“You've done this sort of thing?”
“Me? No. I've, you know … heard about it.”
“I see.”
I'm not lying. If I was, Ceepak would know and then he'd never trust me again. That's how The Code works.
“I'd like to visit this paintball arcade you mentioned,” he says. “On the boardwalk?”
“Sure. No problem.”
Ceepak punches the digiglo button on his Casio G-shock watch.
“Let's regroup at oh nine hundred hours.”
“Pancake Palace like always?”
“Perhaps some place closer to the boardwalk.”
“How about The Pig's Commitment? You know, over on Ocean and Oyster. Catty-corner to King Putt Golf.”
“Roger that.”
Suddenly, he turns around and walks a few steps back toward the beach. I do the same. We walk up the half-buried planks, reach the crest of the dune, and stand behind that shoe-changing bench. Down on the beach, our little circle of chairs is still there. The trash barrel. In my mind, I can see Katie dancing.
Ceepak crouches one more time.
He looks at the back of the bench. We didn't think to do that when we came up from the other side. We were just staring down at all those footprints that weren't going to help us.
Ceepak fishes out his flashlight and shines it on the back of the bench.
There's a splat of green-yellow paint, like somebody slammed a neon egg against it with their palm, smooshed the shell and let all the yolk dribble down.
“Any prints in the paint?” I ask.
“Negative. The perp wore gloves. See the blurring here? The smudging?” He swings his light to the right.
Next to the paint splotch there's this pushpinned plastic sleeve with something inside it. It looks like a baseball card. Only, when I look close, I see it's not. It's a trading card that shows a superhero in a purple diving suit with a black mask over his eyes.
The Phantom.
