Rescue

I’m all set.“
    “But the Sheriff’s Office has your name, right?“
    “They have a name. John Francis.“
    Howard nodded. “And you have real—what, ‘credentials,’
    I guess—in Miami?“
    “And a friend to help me get north again.“
    “A friend?“
    I grinned. “Another friend.“
    “That’s better.“
    I didn’t ask Howard how he planned to get out, and if he noticed I didn’t, he gave no indication of it.

    Doris said, “Are you sure you have everything?“
    “Positive, sweetheart.“
    “You look awfully good in that outfit. Like Lloyd Bridges used to on his TV show, remember?“
    I tried to give them some privacy, but the boat was too small for me to move very far off.
    Howard said to her in a businesslike voice, “You can get behind that island without running lights?“
    “After seeing it again today? Piece of cake.“
    I looked to Little Mercy, a mile from where we were now. The whole Key seemed dark, my watch showing one a.m. As We got to the half-mile point, a faint glow was visible behind the courtyard walls.
    Howard took a compass reading on the shoreline near the courtyard. “You figure everybody’s asleep?“
    “It would help.“
    We got our gear and moved to the starboard side of the boat, me slinging the boom box over my shoulder on a double layer of Howard’s electrical tape, him responsible for the lariat-looped rope and his “diversion“ materiel. I climbed over the side first, holding on to the ladder as the slow-moving boat dragged me through the water. I heard Doris say, “Good-bye, Howard,“ as he came over to join me. We adjusted masks and snorkels, then the decoys over them, Doris looking down at us, Howard and I both let go of the boat and began to kick slowly, the fins never breaking the surface, the current and perhaps their own webbed feet just carrying two lazing gallinules toward Little Mercy Key.
    We avoided lobster pot floats and the trailing lines to the pots themselves on the bottom. Nothing big swam near us as far as I could tell. After about fifteen minutes, the bottom started to shoal up, and I had to be careful not to splash my fins on the surface. Another five minutes and we were less swimming than crawling along the bottom, the shoreline of Little Mercy Key fifty feet ahead, a small stand of mangrove at the water’s edge and the wall two hundred feet farther up the slope.
    We moved on hands and knees quietly, using the stand of trees to protect us from the courtyard wall and anybody walking outside it. No sounds other than our own, and they were minimal.
    On shore, we took off the hollow decoys and masks, waiting for our breathing to normalize without the snorkels in our mouths. Listening some more, hearing nothing. Then we unzipped the wet suits, taking out the weapons, which we unwrapped before the boom box. I’d just laid my revolver, a Dan Wesson .38, on top of the waterproof wrap when, from the other side of the trees, a voice grunted in exasperation. Cody’s.
    “Come on, Ax, this here is stupid.“
    “Cody, don’t you be getting on me, now.“
    “But I’m the one’s gonna get eaten alive out here by the skeeters, and you know it.“
    “I also know you’re the one who wouldn’t let me keep shooting till we knew that goddam asshole was dead.“
    “And what if you did? Those Marine Patrol people would’ve had us for supper.“
    “But we’d know the bastard was dead.“
    “Ax, he’d have to be dead, wouldn’t he? I mean, otherwise, he’d have told them what we did, and we’d have the whole damn police force of the state of Florida down on us.“
    Severn said, “Who told Big Guy and Lutrice we drowned that asshole—who still probably killed my brother—and fed him to the sharks?“
    “Well, hell, Ax, what was I supposed to tell them?“
    “Cody, look. We said we killed him, and the sharks ate him- Even if he was dead when the Marine Patrol got there, what if they didn’t see him, and didn’t wait for him to float up to the surface?“
    “I don’t get you.“
    “It wouldn’t exactly do to have him come washing up on the shore here, now, would it?“
    “Oh, Ax, by now the creatures must’ve eaten him all up.“
    “Yeah, well, the way the current works, he’ll be here if they didn’t He shows up, you just haul him in and come get me. I’m taking the key to the door back, too, just in case you get any ideas of quitting early.“
    I heard the squeaking of sneaker against sand, getting quieter as nothing else