Niceville

then looked up at Nick.
    “Thing is, she was a nice lady. People, they have their ways, Nick. This trio thing was theirs. The two of them. Mr. Teague, his thing was he liked to watch.”
    “This was at the house in Garrison Hills?”
    “Yes. Always at the house. Only safe place.”
    “How’d they explain you to the neighbors?”
    “They didn’t,” he said simply. “You know Garrison Hills, that big house of theirs. That wall of cedars and the drive goes way back from the street. Behind the house there’s that ravine and then the forest and then the bluffs going up to Tallulah’s Wall. It was a private place. They had no people, staff or gardeners. Miles always picked me up in the Benz—all that tinted glass—and he always drove me home. No cabs, ever. We’d talk, both ways, about life, or work, whatever came up, which sounds weird, but if he was okay with it, so was I. They paid cash, treated me well.”
    “How’d you meet Sylvia in the first place?”
    “The Pavilion. Couple years back. She was with some friends. One of the ladies knew me, called me over. We all had something to drink. I liked her right away. I could see she was in pain.”
    “How?”
    Featherlight flashed a tentative smile.
    “In my line, you get to think like a doctor. Somebody comes to see you, they’re hurting, you don’t even have to ask for what. With Sylvia it was around her eyes. She left after a glass and her friend told me about the ovarian cancer, about her needing something for the pain.”
    “Something her doctor wouldn’t give her?”
    Featherlight shrugged.
    “She wanted not to have to ask him all the time. She wanted her own. It was a control thing.”
    “So it was just sex and painkillers?” said Nick, with an edge.
    “No. At first it was just the Demerol and the OxyContin. We met a few times, talked some. The other thing, she brought that up. I think her friend said I was available. Next week we had drinks with Miles—with her husband. We all got along. It moved on from there.”
    “Were you still involved with them when the boy was taken?”
    “Yeah, but it stopped the day Rainey was taken. I never heard from them again. They were both dead within two weeks. That whole thing … the security tape at Uncle Moochie’s … the barrow … you guys never worked it out, did you?”
    “No. Maybe we should have looked at you. Tony Branko told me you were going to see Rainey in the hospital.”
    “Yes. I tried to go every couple of weeks. He was a good kid. Sometimes I got the idea he could even hear me talking to him.”
    “So what was it? Guilt? Maybe you had something to do with the disappearance and now you’re feeling a little sleazy about it?”
    Featherlight flared up at that, but kept it under control. He looked straight at Nick, a flat, challenging glare, and then shook his head once.
    “No. That could
never
be me. I
liked
that kid. He was really into football. Before the Corps I was a walk-on for the Gators. We used to talk about how Saint Mary’s was going to do this year. He wanted to play linebacker for Saint Mary’s and then maybe go on to state. Nobody who knew him could hurt that kid. And if anybody had tried around me, I’d have killed them.”
    He spoke with heat and a tightness in his throat that was convincing.
    “And I asked around, Nick, when it happened. I don’t think anybody on the street had anything to do with it. I talked to a lot of people—about Uncle Moochie, if anybody on the street had ever heard anything—I got nothing but that he was a pretty good fence. I looked up that Alf Pennington guy from the Book Nook, figured maybe he had done something back in Vermont and that was why he was down here—”
    “You didn’t figure we had already done all that?”
    “I wanted to find him myself, if I could … but nobody knew anything.Not even the short eyes and the bicycle seat sniffers. I sweated a few of them, but no, whatever it was, it came from … outside.”
    Nick thought
outside
was an interesting word to use in this connection. He had used it himself, when trying to work it all out.
    Outside
.
    “Any thoughts on who did it?”
    He looked up at Nick.
    “Can I ask you something?”
    “Sure.”
    “How long did it take you to get Rainey out of that grave?”
    “About an hour. I was only in at the end.”
    “Why so long?”
    “The grating was rusted shut and the barrow was mostly buried in the earth.”
    “And the bricks?”
    “Hadn’t been