nod in return; the defenses still up. Someone touched him on the back, and Ford turned to see Harvey Hollins. Harvey was five years older than Rafe, just as tall and much wider, but without Rafe's grace and good looks. Harvey had always been the plodder. Bright, but slow in speech and deed. He had a thick pug nose, the Hollins cleft chin, and dark, dark eyes set beneath a heavy brow, and Ford could see that his eyes were red. He was taking Rafe's death hard, looking like a big, sad child in the black suit a size too small for him.
Harvey said, 'He woulda sure wanted you here, Doc,' taking Ford's hand in his, shaking it warmly. 'Boy, you two were a pair. Never saw one without the other, and those jokes you used to play made me so damn mad. Like when you melted down that Ex-Lax and slipped it into my candy bar. Man, I coulda killed you two—' And caught himself, realizing what he was saying.
Ford said, 'It's okay, Harv; I know. I'm sorry we had to meet like this. You need any help? I'll take over if you want.'
'You already helped, Doc. That bitch of a funeral director cornered me when I first came in. Wanted to know where my friends got off questioning her ethics. I didn't even have to ask what friend; knew it was you right away. You and your double measure of gall. Too much, I used to think. But I figure your questioning her ethics cut four maybe five hundred off the bill, which will go to little Jake when we find him.
Ford said nothing, just stood there looking into the big man's red eyes.
'Rafe didn't kill himself, Doc.'
'I know, Harv.'
'There's only one reason my brother woulda killed himself. That's if he'd let something happen to Jake.'
'I'm sure Jake's fine. Like you said, Rafe wouldn't let anything happen to his own son. He'll show up.'
'He loved that boy more than anything. We didn't talk that much after I moved. People move, grow apart . . . even brothers. I've been asking myself why in the hell I didn't call him more. When we did talk, it was young Jake this, young Jake that. I have two daughters, so I know how a man feels about his children. Rafe wouldn't have killed himself. I'd bet my last dollar on it.
'I think you're right, Harvey.'
'Do you, Doc? Do you really?' His expression was so filled with gratitude that Ford had to glance away. Harvey said, 'I told all the other guys that, and they just sort of stared at me, feeling bad but not believing it. I told Les Durell and he acted like he didn't even care. And we played ball together.'
Ford said, 'Durell has to act like that. He's a professional with a conflict of interest: You guys are friends. He can't show favoritism, even if he's interested. He's got to be tough on himself and doubly sure of his facts. He heard what you said, though, you can be sure of it.'
'You really think so?'
'You knew him better than I did. What do you think?'
'Well . . . Les was always smart. And not too easy to read. Mostly I asked him to help find Jake. Rafe's dead; there's no bringing him back. But we've got to find that little boy. You know what Les said? He said he'd make sure all the proper authorities had been contacted. The proper authorities. Even when I told him I'd offer a five- thousand-dollar reward, my whole savings, that's all he would say.'
Ford said, 'I'm sure everything possible's being done,' feeling like a jerk for not being able to say any more.
Harvey didn't even seem to hear him. 'Just the thought of it, Doc. . . . The idea of a Hollins child out there all alone, no one to look after him, not even knowing his daddy's dead, maybe waiting for his daddy to come back—' Harvey turned suddenly, looking at the wall until he regained control. He cleared his throat and said thickly, 'We better get in there. The service is about to start.'
The funeral director—out of spite, probably—had put Rafe into a green glass vase. The kind for long-stemmed roses, but with a lid on it. They'd put the vase on a rostrum between two candles, and Ford sat in the back row, wondering what a really cheap urn looked like. Organ music was being piped into the room, seemed to be seeping in through the walls with the smell of refrigerated flowers and thick drapes. There was a man in a dark suit sitting beside the rostrum. Ford hoped it wasn't a minister, but it was. The Reverend Somebody from the Sandy Key Baptist Church. He looked like a television evangelist with his chubby face and sprayed hair. The minister kept glancing at Harvey and smiling, as if to reassure.
Rafe had been raised as a Baptist, Ford remembered, but hated church and organized religion by the time they met in high school. It seemed unlikely that he had changed during the intervening years, so it seemed just as unlikely that the Reverend Somebody had known Rafe at all, let alone well enough to memorialize him. Just so long as he didn't give a sermon. But he did.
Ford settled into his seat, ready to tune out the slick, shallow performance to come. But, surprise, surprise, the sermon was neither slick nor shallow. The Reverend Somebody turned out to be a thoughtful man and an honest speaker. No, he hadn't known Rafe. But he knew about pain, and he knew about loss, and he spoke about the things he knew with sincerity, a clarity, and a sense of humor that had every man there sitting up, listening. By the time he was done, Ford felt better about Rafe and better about funerals, but foolish for having stereotyped the minister so glibly. Presupposition was a disease of the lazy or terminally oblivious, and he had been showing symptoms of both lately.
When the minister finished, the men milled around talking, pretending to be unaware that no one seemed to know exactly what to do next. Harvey stood in the corner, staring at the urn: a
'Yeah, well . . . that would be nice, only my plane home leaves Naples at four. I can't afford to take any more time off work, and it's a pretty long drive back to Sanibel.' Harvey looked at him. 'You could take them, Doc. You were his best friend.'
'I will if you want.'
'Or, I was thinking, with all these guys here, it might be nice to take care of it right now. While they're still around. They all played ball with him, they knew him better than anybody else.'
Ford said, 'The beach is only about three blocks from here—'
'I was thinking maybe North Cut. That's only a mile or two, and the tide rips through; carry him right out to sea. One night, when we were kids, Rafe caught a thirty-pound snook there using a white bucktail tipped with shrimp. Man, was he happy. '
'I'll tell the guys to follow us.'
'Doc? There's something else you can do ... if you don't mind too much.'
'Name it, Harvey.'
Harvey was looking at the floor, uneasy. 'Could you carry that . . . that vase with you? My nerves are all messed up today, and I just know I'll drop the damn thing and break it.'
'I could drive you both.'
'Naw, I feel like being alone for a little bit. If you don't mind.'
'We'll meet you at North Cut,' Ford said. 'I'll take care of everything here. Take your time.'
He told the other men where to meet, then found the funeral director. On the phone, she had sounded as if she was in her fifties with blue hair and a sour, pinched face. She was actually in her late thirties, had the hair of a Woodstock groupie, and a sour, pinched face. Ford said, 'I'd like to take care of the bill now,' taking cash from his pocket.
The woman was standing behind a plastic desk and her expression told Ford that she recognized his voice. 'The deceased's brother has already made arrangements for that,' she said primly.
'He's made arrangements to pay, or to make payments?'
'Mr. . . . Ford was it? I really don't see—'
He said, 'Dr. Ford,' cringing at the childishness of demanding the prefix, but dealing with a woman like this seemed to require it.
'I really don't see that it's any of your business,
'Let's pretend you don't have any say in the matter.'
'He's already signed the papers. Arrangements have already been made—'
Ford leaned over the desk a little. 'He's made arrangements to pay off the bill in monthly installments at— what?—twenty percent interest? But now I'm going to give you cash, and you're going to mark the bill paid and you're going to give me a receipt. You have to accept cash, lady, for any outstanding debt. It's the law. Even if it
