who lives down in the Everglades. Tuck had an old gator-poaching and drinking partner by the name of Joseph Egret. It was Joseph who once told me that life was scary enough to make a sled dog shiver. How an Everglades Indian knew anything about sled dogs is impossible to say. But Joseph was right. I couldn't relate to Janet's account of psychological problems—Tomlinson often claims that emotion is the only quality I lack as a human being. However, I could relate to her sense of loss, and I was impressed by her determination. The good ones do not always die young; neither do they ever, ever quit. They keep finding ways to create and construct, struggling all the while to endure, because we are, above all else, a species of builders—though it seems that more and more aberrant destroyers live among us.
Janet was one of the good ones. The good ones always find a way.
When we got to the truck, I leaned down and kissed her on the top of the head. Told her, 'Just don't be late for work in the morning.'
Chapter 12
It was a little after eight p.m. when Hannah Smith arrived to get Tomlinson's gear. I was in the lab, futzing around with a box of old slide plates that I had collected over the years. Some people keep scrapbooks; I acquire slides. One of my favorites is of a newly hatched tarpon that is still in the eellike leptocephalus stage. Beneath the lowest power of my Wolfe stereomicro-scope, the tarpon resembled a thread of translucent ribbon that was attached to a set of dragon jaws spiked with needlelike teeth.
If tarpon continued to grow in that form, if they did not metamorphose into an entirely different animal, no human being would have the courage to go near the water.
I had the goose-necked lamp on, clamped to the stainless steel lab table. In the next room, I had a new selection of Gregorian chants on the stereo. As I tinkered with the slides, I also |J deliberated over my decision to provide Ron Jackson with whatever information I could gather. I had agreed to help him, of course. I am not the Rotarian type; one who attends meetings, then volunteers for good causes. Nor am I a political animal. My previous work left me cold on politics. But I do believe that if you live in a community, you are obligated to contribute what you can. Jackson's offer was an opportunity to play a small part. Maybe I could help, maybe I couldn't, but I would try.
I had already spoken with Felix and Jeth about their armed patrols. They were tired of doing it anyway, they said, and agreed that it was a bad idea. They said they would try to talk some sense into Nels, and the other guides around the island.
Other than that, I had provided Jackson with the first names of the two troublemakers I knew about: Julie and J.D., whereabouts unknown. Gave him the name of a Sulphur Wells man that I remembered Hannah mentioning in association with boat thefts: Kemper Waits. Also told him about the sportfishermen in the big-wheeled truck who, presumably, had tried to vandalize my aquarium.
It wasn't much; I told him I would try to do more. In return, Jackson had promised to ask the Sanibel police to keep a close eye on my place.
So I was sitting there mulling over different methods I could use to gather information. Legal methods, I had to keep reminding myself. I was so involved with the novelty of that, plus my slides, that I had almost . . .
I turned on the big deck spotlight, pushed my way out the screen door . . . and there was Hannah. She was wearing yellow Farmer John-style rain pants and a damp green T-shirt. The pants bib was cinched up with suspenders. Her black hair was frazzled by the wind, and she had used a red ribbon to tie it back into a ponytail. She stood toward the bow of her little boat, one arm thrown lazily over the PVC tube she used to steer it, and was grinning up at me: wind-burnished skin, dark eyes, white teeth, creases of dimples running from cheek to chin.
'Tell you the truth,' she called up, 'I liked the way you were dressed better last time.' Referring to my outdoor shower.
'Are you always so dirty-minded, Hannah? Or just with me?'
'Not always,' she answered wryly. 'And not just with you.' She was tying her skiff to the pilings; using a very simple quick-release knot that very few boaters seemed to know anymore. Stood there for a moment, hands on hips, before saying, 'I've already had a pretty good night. You want to see?'
I clumped down the steps and swung onto her boat. She kept things neat. There was a wooden push-pole stowed along the plywood-thin gunwale, a bailing can, and a couple of bottles of outboard motor oil wedged into the stringers so they wouldn't bounce around while she was running. An orange gas can was placed out of the way, just behind the tunnel of engine well. Pretty new engine: ninety-horsepower Yamaha. Toward the stern was a big fiberglassed icebox. Astern of the box was a bundle of nylon gill net. The net's brown foam plastic floats were buried among the folds of translucent nylon, like Christmas ornaments.
'I caught a pretty good mess,' she told me as she hefted up the lid off the icebox. 'About eighty head of blacks, and maybe a dozen silvers.'
I looked into the box to see a slag heap of cobalt-silver fish, most of them close to a foot and a half long. The black mullet—known around the world as the striped mullet—is a strange-looking creature. It has a blunt, bullet- shaped head and big saucer eyes. It is as aesthetically pleasing as an old Nash Rambler automobile. Because a mullet feeds mostly on detritus and other vegetable matter, it has a gizzardlike stomach that pre-grinds food before passing it into a freakishly long digestive tract.
Earlier in the century, a Florida court once ruled that the mullet, because it had a 'gizzard,' was actually a bird—thus freeing a commercial fisherman who was charged with fishing out of season. The incident is but one measure of what a strange fish the mullet is.
As I peered into the box, Hannah said, 'I did a strike off Cape Haze and did okay. You know that point just before you go into Turtle Bay?'
That was a little north of my normal cruising area, but I was familiar with it.
'I took most of them there. Then I struck this little sandbank I know near White Rock and got the rest. I'd have more, but I know Tommy needs his things, so I run down here to see you.' Big smile. 'Didn't want to get here so late I had to haul you out of bed. That wouldn't be polite.'
I told her, 'We don't want to keep Tommy waiting. I've got his stuff sacked, ready to go.'
'You going to invite me in?'
I hesitated, then said, 'Sure.'
She closed the ice locker and followed me up the stairs to the house. Oohed and aahed at my fish tank. Asked me questions about the telescope—'That planet with the rings around it. Can you see those?'— then focused her attention on the bookshelves. Because I have the volumes arranged alphabetically, by author, she had to get down on hands and knees to search. I knew what she was looking for—one of Tomlinson's books. But instead of helping, I stood there and watched. It was hard not to watch: big woman in slick yellow pants, haunches poked up into the air, the pendulum swing of loose breasts against damp T-shirt. She seemed to fill the room; filled it with her size, and with a musky odor of girl-sweat, fish, strong soap, and salt water. Felt the urge to change the music on the tape player—get rid of that damn Gregorian chant stuff—and offer her some of that finely aged wine in my refrigerator. i
'Here's one!' She had one of Tomlinson's books. Was opening it as she stood. 'Even got his picture in the back. Isn't he a cutey?' Now she was leafing to the front. 'Whew, this one's a little
'Not what you would call easy reading,' I agreed. 'It has to do with the concept of infinity ... I think. Something about all motion and change being an illusion. That reality is actually static and immutable.'
Hannah had an index finger to her lip, trying to follow along. Said, 'That's why I like you two guys. You're smart, both of you—not that I'm not. I'm probably just as smart, only sometimes I wished I'd gone to college.'
'With Tomlinson, a college education is no help. I'm just repeating what he told me. It's like . . . if you drop a
