Persuader

corners at the foot.
    The rain plastered my hair to my head and ran into my eyes. It stung. Harley squatted and straddled the bag and humped the head end farther out into space. I went with him, inch by inch, small steps on the slippery rocks. The next wave came in and eddied under the bag. It floated it up a little. Harley used the temporary buoyancy to slide it a little farther into the sea. I moved with it. The wave receded. The cleft drained again. The bag drooped down. The rain thrashed against the stiff rubber. It battered our backs. It was deathly cold.
    Harley used the next five waves to ease the bag out more and more until it was hanging right down into the cleft. I was left holding empty rubber. Gravity had jammed the body tight up against the top of the bag. Harley waited and looked out to sea and then ducked low and pulled the zipper all the way down. Scrambled back fast and took a corner from me. Held tight. The seventh wave came booming in. We were soaked with its spray. The cleft filled and the bag filled and then the big wave receded and sucked the body right out of the bag. It floated motionless for a split second and then the undertow caught it and took it away. It went straight down, into the depths. I saw long fair hair streaming in the water and pale skin flashing green and gray and then it was gone. The cleft foamed red as it drained.
    "Hell of a riptide here," Harley said.
    I said nothing.
    "The undertow takes them right out," he said. "We never had one come back, anyways. It pulls them a mile or two, going down all the way. Then there's sharks out there, I guess.
    They cruise the coast here. Plus all kinds of other creatures. You know, crabs, suckerfish, things like that." I said nothing.
    "Never had one come back," he said again.
    I glanced at him and he smiled at me. His mouth was like a caved-in hole above the goatee. He had rotten yellow stumps for teeth. I glanced away again. The next wave came in. It was only a small one, but when it receded the cleft was washed clean. It was like nothing had happened. Like nothing had ever been there. Harley stood up awkwardly and zipped the empty bag. Pink water sluiced out of it and ran over the rocks. He started rolling it up. I glanced back at the house. Beck was standing in the kitchen doorway, alone, watching us.
    We went back toward the house, soaked with rain and salt water. Beck ducked back into the kitchen. We followed him in. Harley hung around on the edge of the room, like he felt he shouldn't be there.
    "She was a federal agent?" I said.
    "No question," Beck said.
    His sports bag was on the table, in the center, prominent, like a prosecution exhibit in a courtroom. He zipped it open and rummaged inside.
    "Check this out," he said.
    He lifted a bundle onto the table. Something wrapped in a damp dirty oil-stained rag the size of a hand towel. He unfolded it and took out Duffy's Glock 19.
    "This all was hidden in the car we let her use," he said.
    "The Saab?" I said, because I had to say something.
    He nodded. "In the well where the spare tire is. Under the trunk floor." He laid the Glock on the table. Took the two spare magazines out of the rag and laid them next to the gun.
    Then he put the bent bradawl next to them, and the sharpened chisel. And Angel Doll's keyring.
    I couldn't breathe.
    "The bradawl is a lock pick, I guess," Beck said.
    "How does this prove she was federal?" I asked.
    He picked up the Glock again and turned it around and pointed to the right-hand side of the slide.
    "Serial number," he said. "We checked with Glock in Austria. By computer. We have access to that kind of thing. This particular gun was sold to the United States government about a year ago. Part of a big order for the law enforcement agencies, 17s for the male agents and 19s for the women. So that's how we know she was federal." I stared at the serial number. "Did she deny it?" He nodded. "Of course she did. She said she just found it. Gave us a big song and dance.
    She blamed you, actually. Said it was your stuff. But then, they always deny it, don't they? They're trained to, I guess." I looked away. Stared through the window at the sea. Why had she picked it all up? Why hadn't she just left it there? Was it some kind of a housekeeping instinct? She didn't want it to get wet? Or what? "You look upset," Beck said.
    And how did she even find it? Why would she even be looking? "You look upset," he said again.
    I was beyond upset. She had died in agony. And I