Because of what Ford had told him—and other hunters, too—Arlis knew that many strange and exotic animals had escaped into the Glades—particularly after hurricanes. He himself had seen photos of a python that had busted open and died after killing and swallowing a six-foot gator. That damn snake had to have weighed three hundred pounds!
Did the orange eyes belong to a python? Arlis couldn’t remember ever seeing a snake’s eyes glow at night, but maybe some did. Or it could be an anaconda—those things lived in the water, he had read, and they grew to be thirty feet long.
Arlis tried to picture an anaconda with a head so big that its eyes were a foot apart, and the image settled it in his brain.
Stunned, Arlis began walking fast toward the limestone mound, seeking higher ground, without even thinking about it. As he hurried, he barked, “Get away, stay away from me!,” hoping the tactic would work again.
From a black opening in the rocks, a voice too clear to be a hallucination shouted a faint reply. “Arlis? Arlis, are you up there?”
The old man felt dizzy—so many strange things were happening all at once. He stuttered, “Yeah, sure! I’m here!”
The voice came from beneath rocks and brush, Arlis realized, at the base of the mound. The voice said, “It’s us—me and Will-Joseph. Come closer, keep walking. I thought you’d gone off and left us!”
Arlis, beginning to recover, said in a loud voice, “Leaving a partner ain’t something I would do!,” which was now true. He would never again go off and leave a friend.
He hadn’t been hallucinating, which was a relief, and now Arlis felt better about himself than he had in a long time.
It was Tomlinson’s voice. There was no doubt about that now.
Tomlinson was alive—maybe the boy, too.
TWENTY-THREE
THE NIGHT WAS COOL, NOT COLD, BUT PERRY HAD used a towel to wick gasoline out of the generator and built a deadwood fire at the edge of the lake while he bickered with King about who was going into the water to help me with the jet dredge.
They were both afraid, although King was better at hiding it. And he had the fake leg injury to use as an excuse.
“Don’t blame me, blame yourself for trusting Jock-a-mo,” he had told Perry more than once. “I’d handle the hose if I could—hell, I’ve done it! But I can’t, so it’s up to you.”
They had left me facedown at the edge of the lake, hands and ankles tie-wrapped again, while they collected wood. It didn’t take long because they were in a hurry now that there was a chance that Arlis would hike to the dirt road and flag down help. They decided it would take the old man at least two hours to make it to the road, then another half hour to get to the highway, which left them with some time to help with the salvage work before they had to get in the truck and try to intercept him.
“We can give it an hour, but not a minute more,” Perry had finally agreed—one of the few things that he and King hadn’t argued about since Arlis had escaped.
I wasn’t so sure. Arlis was too smart to follow the trail we had cut. There was too much risk of King and Perry catching him, plus it would be shorter to hike cross-country, through swamp that was too soft for the truck.
Arlis Futch and I had had our differences over the years—the most serious having to do with a woman the old guy had had a crush on—but I didn’t doubt his courage or his skills as an Everglades hunter.
When the fire was going, the cons finally cut me loose, then tossed me the remains of an open MRE. I hadn’t eaten anything but the crackers they’d given me, so I ripped open a foil pouch and had vegetarian chili as the men continued bickering. I would need the energy before the night was done.
King and Perry were a painful pair to watch. If some scientist had melded prison genetics with random bad luck, the two could have served as a template. Backdropped by flames and sparks that soared starward, the men resembled absurd rodents, their silhouettes becoming more animated and their voices louder as they squabbled, until Perry finally said, “Okay, okay! I’ll get in the goddamn inner tube. But I known damn well you’re faking!”
“I wish that was true,” King replied, sounding suddenly pleased. “I can barely walk ’cause of that son of a bitch, which is all your fault and you know it.”
“Oh . . . bullshit,” Perry yelled. “But don’t think the cut’s gonna still be fifty-fifty because it’s not. The cut has to be sixty-forty if I’m doin’ extra work. What do you think about that, smart-ass?”
Unperturbed, King said, “Perry, you drive one hell of a hard bargain! I guess I got no choice, now, do I?” He didn’t bother to hide the sarcasm, and there was a smile in his tone when he turned toward me and lied, “We’re discussing our part of the take—not yours, of course.”
I didn’t bother answering. I was watching Perry, who had begun pacing. With the rifle angled over his shoulder, he resembled a toy soldier now. Maybe the man had run out of amphetamines or possibly he had recently swallowed a few more, because his voice was quivering when he spun toward King and screamed, “You always get your way, don’t you, you son of a bitch? Well, at least I won’t screw up the job like you did. But you’ve got to agree to one more thing before I do it. And you’re not gonna weasel out of this one.”
“I’d do anything I could to help you, you know that,” King replied. “Just name it.”
“If I go in that goddamn water, I get sixty percent, which we already agreed on, plus you’re going stand right there by the generator ready to haul me back to shore if I say the word. You promise?” He was talking about using the power cord as a towline.
King said, “Afraid something’s gonna swim up and bite you on the ass, Perry?”
“I mean it! Unless you promise, I ain’t going in that goddamn lake. If I say the word, you’d better by God haul me in quick.”
King had been limping unconvincingly—it was his way of teasing Perry with the truth—but now that he’d won the argument he stood on two straight legs and said, “You know you can trust me, old buddy. When have I ever let you down?”
I crumpled the aluminum pack and tossed it next to my gear. “Let’s go,” I said. “You two have wasted enough time.”
All I cared about was getting back to the tunnel and finding Will Chaser and Tomlinson. I no longer had Arlis to worry about, which was freeing. When I was out of bottom time, whether I had found Tomlinson and the kid or not, I would surface quietly and then drown the man on the inner tube—Perry, apparently. If King tried to shoot me, I would submerge and crawl out on the other side of the lake. After that, I would play it by instinct.
I buckled on my BC, checked my regulator, then picked up the night vision mask. I noticed that Perry was unbuckling his trousers. He wasn’t in a hurry, but he was going through with it, which surprised me.
“Leave your clothes on,” I told him. “The water will seem cold at first, but your clothes will add some insulation. You’ll warm up faster. Hey—there’s a jacket in the truck. You should wear it.”
“A jacket?” Perry asked.
I said, “It’s mine. You’re welcome to use it.”
“You’re serious.”
I was tempted to say,
“Like dressing for cold weather, huh?” Perry said. “I never heard of that working in water.” As I looked at him, I was struck by his expression. Illuminated by the fire, the man’s face was pale, his eyes wide. He resembled a frightened child. Maybe the children he had murdered had exhibited similar reactions.
I said, “We’re in this together, right?,” as I carried my fins and the extra gear into the water.
Nearby, King was starting the generator.
King had the rifle now, I noticed. The man had been right about Perry.
Perry wasn’t very smart.
Fifteen feet was only three strong strokes with my fins, but the world beneath the
