Rescue

a stagnant body of water called LAKE SURPRISE, then another sign that said KEY LARGO KEY.
    The map I’d gotten at the rent-a-car agency showed Key Largo as the first, or most northeasterly, of the Keys, as Justo had said. The rest of the islands arced more or less southwesterly from there over more than a hundred miles of U.S. Route 1, the bay to the Everglades themselves to the north and west, the ocean to the south. A small sign on the shoulder showed “103“ in vertical white numbering on a green background tacked to a short white post. Soon after, I saw “102“ and so on, the mile markers getting lower as I drove south. I wondered if Key West’s marker would be “0.“
    Key Largo seemed pretty developed, a lot of consumer shops and hotels along both sides of the road. On the ocean side, there was a marquee by a shielded driveway, indicating that Kmart, Publix, and the public library were there, the last in the smallest print. I guessed people should be happy the library got any billing at all.
    I. passed some other curiosities, like a four-story building on a median strip at mile marker 99 that had one of its sides painted entirely as a tropical reef, with a diver and fish and the kinds of coral Caryn talked about in the scuba class. Mostly, though, the buildings were one or two stories, with flat roofs, probably for ease of installing and maintaining air-conditioning systems. The predominant construction looked like cinder block under stucco, maybe with reinforcing bars in the blocks against hurricane force winds. Or waves. Everything looked about six inches above sea level, though from the road there was no water visible on either the ocean or bay side. It was oppressively hot every time I stopped for a traffic light, but there was a certain brightness to the air, as though you’d just taken off sunglasses.
    At the south end of Key Largo was a bridge rising over what a sign called MERCY CREEK. Crossing the bridge, I saw MERCY KEY MARINA painted in large red letters on the aquamarine walls of a hangarlike building. Then another sign identifying the next land mass as MERCY KEY.
    On the map, Mercy looked like most of the other Keys. Longer than it was wide, the island tapered like a loin lamb- chop for seven miles southward before another creek sepa rated it from Plantation Key. But that was on the map. From the road, you could see that Mercy Key was higher than Key Largo, fifteen, even twenty feet of elevation seeming pretty constant from the glimpses of water both oceanward and bay ward. What’s more, there was far less development, and a kind of restraint about what there was, especially after the median strip, now all trees and shrubs, resumed to separate north- and southbound traffic. I passed only three motels that seemed of any size, most names suggesting instead small motor courts or trailer parks. Two thirds of the way down the island, there was a road to the right with an arrow saying TENT GROUND.
    As the median strip narrowed and ended, I crossed over the bridge to Plantation Key, another marina directly on my right. The median strip never started up again, Plantation appearing more developed than Mercy, a kind of suburban shopping center feel to it. Further on, I crossed a few more causeways, seeing a sign for ISLAMORADA that was either a Key or a town, I couldn’t tell which, and seemed like a part of the New Jersey shore transplanted, bars and restaurants and neon intact. When I reached mile marker 80, I made a U-turn.
    I hadn’t seen anything of the Church of the Lord Vigilant, and I thought I’d best find it before choosing a place to stay. Driving back north through Plantation and over the bridge to Mercy, I realized why I’d missed the Church. First, it was on the north side of the road, hidden by the forested median while I was driving south. Second, it wasn’t a church. Or at least, it didn’t look like one. What it looked like was the office complex from the newsletter photos I’d seen in Lonnie Severn’s trailer.
    I just drove by, noting the mile marker near it for future reference. The complex itself was two stories high, with the typical white stucco finish. There was some navy blue trim around the narrow, vertical windows, the kind that colonists used to notch into the walls of their forts for shooting outward without getting shot themselves. The rest of the place didn’t look defensive, though, with several cars parked comfortably in the shade of spreading, full-leafed