"How proud?"
Desie felt her chest tighten. She locked her eyes straight ahead, as if watching the traffic.
"Proud enough for a little you-know-what?"
"Palmer." But she was leaden with guilt. Of course she'd have sex with him tonight—after what he'd done for the dog, how could she say no?
"It's been a couple of weeks," he noted.
"I know. A rough couple of weeks."
"For both of us, sweetheart. So how about it? Lilac candles. A bottle of French wine—"
"Sounds nice," said Desie.
"—and maybe a spoonful of rhino dust for some extra-special excitement."
"No!"
"Des, come on."
"No way, Palmer. No way!" She removed his hand from inside her panties and told him to mind the road. It took three traffic lights for Stoat to compose himself and rally for the salvage operation.
"You're right," he said to Desie. "Forget the rhino horn, forget I even mentioned it. I'm sorry."
"Promise me you'll throw it away."
"I promise," Stoat lied. Already he was thinking about the intriguing call girl he'd met the other night at Swain's, the one who fucked only Republicans. Certainly she would have no liberal qualms about aphrodisiacs harvested from endangered species. Nor would Roberta, the free-spirited, prodigiously implanted blonde who was Stoat's occasional travel companion. For the promise of a new and improved orgasm, Roberta would've killed the rhinoceros with her own bare hands.
But to his wife, Palmer Stoat declared: "I'll toss the stuff first thing in the morning."
"Thank you."
With a sly sideways glance, he said: "Does that mean we're still on for later?"
"I suppose." Desie turned her head, pretending to scout the bikinis in the display window of a beachwear shop. She felt the spiderish return of Palmer's fingers between her legs. He left them there after the light turned green.
"You look soooooo gorgeous tonight," he said. "I can't wait to see the pictures!"
Lord, Desie thought. The shutterbug routine again.
"Palmer, I'm not really in the mood."
"Since when? Come on, darling, learn to relax."
Stoat stopped at a convenience store, where he purchased three packs of Polaroid film. He compulsively tore them open inside the truck, throwing the empty boxes into the parking lot.
Desie got out and retrieved each one, much to her husband's consternation.
"What's gotten into you?" he demanded.
"Just drive," she told him. "Just take me home."
So we can get it over with.
That night Twilly Spree was pulled over by a policeman on Route A1A in the snowbird community of Lauderdale-by-the-Sea. Twilly thought he knew why: There had been another incident of anger mismanagement, this one involving four college students, two personal watercrafts and a large volume of beer.
It had happened after Twilly returned the rented Chevrolet Corsica and transferred McGuinn to the black pickup truck. Twilly was minding his own affairs, waiting in traffic on the Commercial Boulevard drawbridge, when he noticed two Jet Skis racing at break-ass speed down the Intracoastal Waterway. One Jet Ski was white with bright blue stripes; the other was white with red stripes. Each carried a matching pair of riders—a young stud at the helm with a young babe behind him, arms locked around his waist. They were jumping the wakes of yachts, buzzing the sailboats, spraying the bait netters and otherwise announcing their drunken idiocy to the world. Such brain-dead antics were so commonplace among water bikers that it was hardly noteworthy, and Twilly Spree would have paid no further attention except that the drawbridge was still up and he was stuck for entertainment. Besides, there was a better-than-average chance that the bozos would crash their noisy toys head-on into the seawall at fifty miles per hour—and Twilly was always eager to see Darwin vindicated in such cinematic style.
Back and forth the Jet Skis went, bitch-howling like runaway chain saws. A frightened pelican took off from a piling, and instantly both water bikes lit out in a deafening pursuit. Twilly jumped from his truck and ran to the bridge rail. McGuinn poked his snout out the window and whined.
It was over in less than a minute. At first the bird flew low to the water, struggling to gain speed. The Jet Ski riders came swiftly from behind, the afternoon rays Clinting off their beer cans. All four kids let loose at the same time, just as the pelican began its ascent. Three of the cans missed the bird, but one struck the crook of a wing. The exploding cartwheel of gold mist told Twilly the beer can was full, as heavy as a rock. The pelican went down in an ungainly spin, landing backward with its beak agape. The water bikers circled the splash once and then sped off, up the Intracoastal in a frothy streak. They were too far away for Twilly to see if they were laughing, but he chose to assume they were. He watched a river taxi retrieve the injured pelican, which was flogging the water with its good wing, trying to lift off.
Twilly got in his truck and turned up the radio and scratched McGuinn under the chin and waited for the bridge to go down. Then he shot free of the traffic and drove north like a psychopath along the waterfront, searching for the marina where the water bikers had put in. At dusk he finally caught up with them, at a public wharf in Pompano Beach. They were winching the Jet Skis up on a tandem trailer that was hitched to a black Cadillac Seville coupe, new but dirty from a long road trip. The expensive car, which bore Maryland license tags, probably belonged to somebody's father. The kids obviously were on spring break from college, and even more obviously drunk. The two young studs had put in some serious gym time, and they wore mesh tank tops to advertise the results. Their girlfriends were both slender and brunette, possibly sisters, and too cadaverously pale for the neon thongs they wore. Their bare bike-wrinkled butt cheeks looked like pita loaves.
Twilly's initial impulse was to ram the Cadillac so hard that it would roll in reverse down the boat ramp. That way he could sink the car and the Jet Skis and all cash and valuables therein. Unfortunately, the Caddy substantially outweighed Twilly's pickup truck, making such an impact problematic. Twilly didn't give a hoot about himself, but there was McGuinn to consider—the last thing the poor dog needed was whiplash.
And besides, Twilly reasoned to himself, what would be accomplished by petty property destruction? The insurance company would replace the luxury coupe and the Jet Skis, and no important lessons would have been learned. The water bikers would fail to see any connection between the vandalism against their belongings and their cruel attack on the pelican. To Twilly, that was unacceptable. Vengeance, he believed, ought never to be ambiguous.
So he clipped McGuinn to the leash and got out of the truck. The two tipsy college girls spotted the huge dog and scampered over, their sandals flopping on the asphalt. They knelt beside McGuinn, cooing and giggling while he licked their salty sunburned faces. This, Twilly had counted on, as Labrador retrievers were magnets for children and women. The beefy college boyfriends wandered up with an air of sullen, incipient jealousy; as trashed as they were, they still resented not being the center of attention. While the girls fawned over the dog, Twilly struck up a conversation with the boyfriends about their nifty water bikes—how fast they went, how much they cost, what kind of mileage they got. The two guys loosened up quickly and started to brag about how their Jet Skis had been illegally modified to go much faster than the factory recommended. Twilly asked if he could have a close-up look. He told them he'd never ridden one before, but said it looked like a blast. And the boyfriends said sure, come on.
Twilly asked the girlfriends if they'd mind keeping an eye on the dog, and they said: Mind? We wanna take him home to Ocean City with us! What's his name, anyway?
Beowulf, said Twilly.
Aw, thass adorable, said one of the girlfriends.
As Twilly followed the boyfriends across the parking lot toward the Cadillac with the tandem trailer, he asked if there was an extra beer in the cooler. And that was the last thing the girlfriends remembered overhearing until Tw
illy returned a few minutes later and took the dog by the leash. The college girls hugged "Beowulf" and crooned their smoochy goodbyes. Then they wobbled to their feet and glanced around for their boyfriends, at which point Twilly Spree lowered his voice and said: "I saw what you dipshits did to that pelican."
"Uh?" said one of the girlfriends.
The other grabbed her elbow and said, "Whadhesay?"
"Don't ever come back here," Twilly advised. "Not ever. Now go call the fire department. Hurry."
The trunk of the Cadillac was open. So was the cooler inside. The boyfriends were stretched out on the ground, faceup at a forty-five-degree angle to each other; like the hands of a broken clock. One had a fractured cheekbone, denoted by a rising purple bruise. The other had a severely dislocated jaw, also festooned with an angry raw contusion. Nearby lay two misshapen Budweiser cans, fizzing beer bubbles on the pavement. The drunken girlfriends began to wail, and from the cooler they frantically scooped bare handfuls of ice cubes, which they attempted to affix on the lumpy wounds of their drunken boyfriends. The college girls were so absorbed in first aid that they didn't notice the two water bikes smoldering ominously on the trailer, soon to burst into flames.
As much as he would've enjoyed it, Twilly Spree didn't wait around for the fire. Later, when the flashing blue police lights appeared in his rearview mirror, he concluded that the two girlfriends hadn't been quite as intoxicated as he thought. He figured they'd taken note of his pickup truck, perhaps even memorizing the license plate. It was a dispiriting turn of events, for Twilly couldn't afford to go back to jail. Not now anyway; not with the Toad Island mission unresolved. The timing of his outburst against the young pelican molesters couldn't have been worse, and he was mad at himself for losing control. Again.
The Lauderdale-by-the-Sea police officer was a polite young fellow not much older than Twilly. He stood back from the truck, peering into the cab and shining a powerful flashlight on McGuinn, who started barking theatrically. The officer seemed relieved that it was a dog and not a large dark-skinned person sharing the front seat with Twilly. He asked Twilly to step out and show his driver's license. Twilly did as he was told. He easily could have disarmed and outrun the young cop, but he couldn't abandon McGuinn. No, they were going down together, man and beast.
The policeman said: "Sir, I noticed you were driving erratically."
Twilly was elated—a routine traffic stop! "Yes. Yes, I was driving erratically!"
"Is there a reason?"
"Yes, sir. I accidentally dropped a Liv-A-Snap on my lap, and the dog went for it." This was the absolute truth. "At that moment," Twilly said, "I'm sure I began driving erratically."
"It's a big dog you got there," the officer allowed.
"And rambunctious," added Twilly. "I'm sorry if we alarmed you."
"Mind taking a Breathalyzer?"
"Not at all."
"Because I definitely smell beer."
"I didn't drink it. It got spilled on me," Twilly said, without elaboration.
He passed the breath test with flying colors. The young policeman got on the radio to check for outstanding warrants, but Twilly came up clean. The officer walked back to the truck and gave it a once-over with the flashlight, the beam of which settled upon an old steamer trunk in the cargo bed.
"Mind if I look inside?" the policeman asked.
"I'd rather you didn't," Twilly said.
"Whatcha got in there?"
"You'd never believe it."
"I can call in a K-9 unit, Mr. Spree. If you want to do this the hard way."
"K-9s in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea," Twilly marveled. "What are they sniffing for, bootleg Metamucil?"
A second squad car brought a trained German shepherd named Spike. Twilly and McGuinn were ordered to stand back and observe. Twilly spied the Labrador looking up at him querulously. "You're right," Twilly muttered to the dog. "I'm an asshole."
The young cop lowered the tailgate, and the trained German shepherd sprung into the bed of the pickup. One whiff at the steamer chest and Spike went white-eyed—yapping, snapping, scratching at the locks, turning circles.
"God Almighty," said the K-9 cop.
"I got the trunk at a yard sale," Twilly said. "They said it came over on the Queen Mary."' True enough.
"The hell you got in there, son?"
Twilly sighed. He approached the pickup and said, "May I?"
"Do it," said the younger cop.
Twilly flipped the latches and opened the lid of the chest. When Spike the drug-sniffing shepherd saw what was inside, he vaulted off the tailgate and bounded, whimpering, into the cage of his master's squad car. Both policemen trained their lights on the contents of the steamer trunk.
The K-9 cop, trying not to sound shocked: "What's the story here?"
"It's dead," said Twilly.
"I'm listening."
"That's just ice, dry ice. It's not dope."
"What a helpful guy," said the K-9 cop.
"There's no law against possessing a dead dog," Twilly asserted, although he wasn't certain.
The officers stared at the roadkill Labrador. One of them said: "Happened to the ear?"
"Vulture," replied Twilly.
"So, why are you driving around with this... this item in your truck?" the younger cop asked.
"Because he's a deeply twisted fuckhead?" the K-9 officer suggested.
"I'm on my way to bury it," Twilly explained.
"Where?"
"The beach."
"Let me guess. Because Labs love the water?"
Twilly nodded. "Something like that."
The younger cop said nothing as he wrote Twilly a ticket for improper lane changing. Nor did he reply when Twilly asked if he'd ever lost a beloved pet himself.
"Look, this is not what you think," Twilly persisted. "He got hit by a car. He deserves a decent burial."
"Whatever." The young policeman handed him the ticket. "You can pay by mail."
"I don't blame you for being suspicious."
The K-9 officer said, "On the off chance you're telling the truth, don't try to bury this damn thing on the public beach."
"Why not? Is there a law against it?"
"I don't know and I don't care. Understand?"
The younger cop bent to stroke McGuinn's neck. "If I stop your truck again," he said to Twilly, "and there's two dead dogs inside. I'm going to shoot your ass. Law or no law."
"Your candor is appreciated," Twilly said.
After the policemen left, he drove south along A1A to Fort Lauderdale, where he parked across from Bahia Mar. He hoisted the steamer trunk out of his truck and, walking backward, dragged it along the sand. He stopped behind the Yankee Clipper Hotel and dug for more than an hour with his bare hands. No one stopped to ask what he was doing but around the steamer trunk a small crowd of curious tourists gathered, many of them Europeans. They acted as if they anticipated entertainment; a magic act, perhaps, or a busker! Twilly opened the lid to show them what was inside before he covered it up with sand. Afterward one of the tourists, a slight gray-bearded man, stepped up to the fresh grave and said a prayer in Danish. Soon he was joined by the others, each murmuring reverently in their native tongue. Twilly was deeply moved. He hugged the Dane, and then each of the other tourists one by one. Then he stripped off his clothes and dove into the ocean. When he got out of the water, he was alone on the beach.
He picked up Desie on Federal Highway, at the south end of the New River Tunnel. "A really super idea," she remarked when she got in the truck. "They think I'm a hooker, standing out here on the corner. I had a dozen guys stop and ask how much for a blow job."
"What did you tell them?"
"Very funny."
"Well," said Twilly, "you don't look like a hooker."
"Aw, what a sweet thing to say."
"Aren't we the sarcastic one?"
"Sorry," Desie said, "but I had a shitty day. And a fairly shitty night, too, come to think of it. Where's my dog?"
&nb
sp; "Someplace safe."
"No more games, Twilly. Please."
"I had to be sure you came alone."
"Another vote of confidence. What're you staring at?"
"Nothing."
"Blue jeans, sandals and a Donna Karan pullover—is that what streetwalkers are wearing these days?"
Twilly said, "You look great. That's what I'm staring at."
"Well, don't." Self-consciously she pulled her hair back into a ponytail, tucking it into a blue elastic band. This gave Twilly quite a lovely angle on her neck.
"What's in the shopping bag, Mrs. Stoat?"