Tupplemeyer had a lot of nervous energy and it showed. She stopped me by interrupting, “I get shitty assignments sometimes. That was one of them, so just drop it, okay? There’s something going on around here that stinks, that’s what I’m telling you.”
“Just the Indian mound or Sulfur Wells?” I asked.
“Definitely one,” she said, “maybe both.”
“That wouldn’t surprise me,” I replied, which kept me neutral but willing to listen. I did.
“Do you have any idea how many agencies had to look the other way when the Candors dug up that mound? Either that or people in charge weren’t paying attention. There’s a long list, including that dweeb who came about your mom’s garden. Plus county zoning and planning departments-the woman in charge of historical sites has a reputation for being an incompetent ditz. She’d be useless if I went to her.” Tupplemeyer made a fluttering sound of frustration while her eyes flitted around as if she was eager to get moving.
“Are you saying the Candors paid bribes?”
The deputy read my tone correctly. “I know, I know, I don’t believe it either. I work for county government, and it would be damn near impossible-too many people involved-to keep something like that quiet. But the Candors have money, and they know how bureaucracies work. They had a big health care business in Ohio. Bought two rehab clinics that were in trouble, then four hospitals in Indiana, and kept expanding until they screwed up and had to move out of the state.”
You’re shitting me? I nearly said but caught myself in time to ask, “That’s why they came to Florida?”
The redhead shared the details she’d uncovered. Within a few years after buying the rehab clinics, the Candors had created the largest private, for-profit health care company in the Midwest. Dr. Alice Candor had the medical background and the brains. Her husband was a CPA, but she was the one who had been chairman of the board. Four years ago, their company had owned more than a hundred hospitals, but then it had all fallen apart. Investigators from the FBI and the Department of Health and Human Services had served search warrants at their main office. An investigation followed, during which the Candors struck a deal. They pled guilty to fourteen charges, all felonies, after admitting their employees had fraudulently billed Medicare and other state and federal programs. They also admitted to giving doctors partnerships in their hospitals as a kickback for referring patients. The kickbacks included free rent, fully furnished offices, and free drugs from hospital pharmacies. After plea bargaining, the company had paid out more than a million dollars in fines, but the Candors walked away free.
“My lord,” I said, “most people would have gone to prison.”
“Read up on Florida’s governor, if you believe that,” the deputy replied, then looked at the house again. “You’ve never been inside that place? What do you call it?”
I was still pondering her remark about the current governor when she pursued the question, saying, “Tasteless architecture is usually given a nickname by locals. You know, like McMansion, Garage Mahal. A name like that.”
“Oh,” I said. “The Bunker, for a while. Walmart, early on, but nothing really stuck.”
The deputy, unimpressed, shaking her head, tried a few others-Bondo Condo, Slab-a-Lot, Plaster Disaster-but couldn’t quite nail it, so she got back to her point about what it was like to be inside with the couple who had built the house.
“Creepy,” Tupplemeyer said. “They’re like two mushrooms who live in artificial lighting. Lots of pink tropical décor, Christ, even some replicas of wooden masks the Indians wore, but it’s all fake.”
“Instant Floridians,” I said. “I didn’t know for sure she really was a doctor. Neither one of them comes outside much.”
“What they did was change the name of their company and moved here after they bought out a chain of rehab clinics-Tampa, Arcadia, Belle Glade-all low income areas with a lot of traffic. I’m guessing the clinics have a contract with the state or they bill Medicaid, but I’m not sure. She’s licensed to practice in Florida, and makes rounds at some of the clinics, but doesn’t actually practice, I don’t think. There’s a lot to find out.”
“What kind of doctor is she?”
Alice Candor was a specialist in psychiatric medicine, Tupplemeyer said. When she added that Dr. Candor had done psychiatric research as well, I felt a chill. At the same instant, Levi Thurloe appeared from behind the cement house, pushing a wheelbarrow, his coveralls sweat-soaked. When he saw me, Walkin’ Levi bowed his head to avoid eye contact but nonetheless watched me as he plodded toward the road.
“Let’s go somewhere else to talk,” I said to the deputy. “On my phone, I’ve got video I shot of them bulldozing the mound. They used a backhoe, too, for the landscaping. Want to see it?”
“Those pompous, destructive assholes,” the redhead muttered, meaning Yes, she did.
WE WERE SITTING on my skiff, drinking diet RC Cola, which was getting hard to find and which the off-duty deputy had never tried before, while she explained why she had run a background check on me after checking out the Candors and a few other locals, too.
“How else would I know you can help?” she said, referring to the reason she had returned to Sulfur Wells. The former archaeology major was determined to find the tons of earth, shells, and artifacts that had been hauled away by trucks. Seeing my video of a bulldozer and backhoe destroying what had once been a pyramid had only fired her resolve.
“What sold me, Hannah, is you’re licensed to knock on doors, ask nosy questions, the whole private detective deal. And collect information on civil matters.” The woman paused and took a sip of her drink. “It is Hannah, right? Or do your friends call you something else? Like me, Liberty is so bullshit and butterfly sounding, I go by Bert or Bertie-but I hate Libby, so don’t call me that.”
I wondered if I had misheard. “Birdy as in bird?” I asked. It was a name that fit a skinny woman who wasn’t pretty in the typical way but who had an interesting face and was in good shape.
“Sure, that’s fine, too. But back to what I was saying… If we find human bones in the fill they hauled away, there’s a state law against transporting human remains, even antiquities. You think that’s possible?”
“That we’ll find bones, you mean?”
The woman’s impatient expression told me Of course that’s what I mean!
“In a shell mound, well… Yeah, it’s possible,” I said. “Last year, Loretta gave permission, and a group from the University of Florida found the teeth and jaw of a young girl near our carport, just eighteen inches under the surface.” I pointed to the house, which was yellow clapboard with a chimney poking out of the tin roof. “Just to the left of the porch-I’ll show you later. They carbon-dated one of the teeth, then put the bones back and left everything just they way they found it. That ended the dig, of course.”
Fascinated, Birdy Tupplemeyer listened a while longer, then said, “You’re shitting me!” when I told her the girl had probably died in her teens and had been buried more than eight hundred years ago. Then glared at the cement three-story again. “Okay, human bones, that’s the part I wasn’t sure about. See… even if they didn’t destroy an actual burial mound, there could still be burials in the stuff they hauled away. Once we locate it, we can dig around and see what’s there-contextually, the fill’s ruined anyway. If we do find bones, you can file suit, or get someone else to file, but the thing is”-the woman became thoughtful and lowered her voice-“we’ve got to leave the archaeologists out of it-for now. Even if you know some of them personally.” She looked at me. “Do you?”