Dad folded his arms thoughtfully. “So I am a fugitive after all.”
“Congratulations,” Abbey muttered.
My mother was thoroughly exasperated. “No harm done? Are you kidding me?” she said to my father.
“Donna, all I meant was-”
He was spared by a knock on the door-the TV-dish repairman, waiting to be paid. Mom wrote him a check and returned briskly to the table.
“Paine, here's what we're going to do now,” she said, plucking the phone off its cradle. “We're going to call Mr. Shine and tell him to arrange for you to turn yourself in. Then, if the sheriff is in a generous and forgiving mood, he'll go ahead and release you-legally, quietly, and without further embarrassment.”
The word “embarrassment” hung in the air like a foul smell. Still, Dad didn't seem to comprehend how much trouble he was in with Mom.
He said, “Honey, I'm not sure I can turn myself in to these people. There are principles at stake, basic human rights.”
My mother turned to me and Abbey. “Could I speak to your father alone, please?”
Outside, a car door slammed. Dad stiffened up.
My mother put down the phone. “Noah, see who that is.”
Abbey was already at the window. “It's a cop,” she reported anxiously.
“No!” my father blurted, and hightailed out the back door.
Mom was so calm that it was spooky. She picked up Dad's plate and placed it in the sink. When the deputy rang our doorbell, she told us to stay in the kitchen while she went to talk with him.
Abbey and I quickly cleared the rest of the table and started washing the dishes. We were so nervous that we worked like robots-she scrubbed, I dried and stacked.
The deputy didn't stay long, which was a relief. I'd figured he would tear the house apart searching for Dad, but he never even stepped inside.
When Mom walked back into the kitchen, she smiled in a sad and tired-looking way. She was carrying some folded clothes, a toothbrush, and the paperback chess book that I'd brought to Dad in jail.
“The officer was simply returning your father's belongings,” Mom said. “Apparently the sheriff is delighted that he escaped and has no intention of pursuing him-as long as he goes back and gets the paperwork straightened out.”
“You want me to look for him?” I asked.
“I'd appreciate that,” Mom said. “Abbey, could you run outside and water my orchids?”
My sister eyed her. “You're trying to get rid of me. How come?”
“Because I need to speak with Noah privately.”
“The orchids died last January,” Abbey said with a smirk, “during the freeze. Remember?”
“Then go water the roses,” said my mother.
I found him at Thunder Beach. He was barefoot and hatless, sitting in the sunshine by the water.
“This is the place where you learned to swim,” he said.
I sat down in the sand beside him.
“Abbey, too,” he added. “Your mom and I used to bring you here almost every weekend. By the time you were three, you could dive to the bottom all by yourself and pick up a conch shell. You remember?”
“Not really, Dad. I was too little.”
“Know how this place got its name? A man was killed here in 1947 by a bolt of lightning. Bright clear day, not a cloud in the sky. All of a sudden-ba-boom! The thunderclap was so loud, it busted the windshield out of a dredge at Whale Harbor.”
“Who was he?” I asked.
“The man who died? I believe he was one of the Russells or maybe an Albury, I'm not sure. But he was standing right about here on the beach, cleaning his cast net, when it happened. He'd caught about three dozen mullet, and they all got fried to a crisp by that lightning bolt,” my father said. “Your Grandpa Bobby told me that story a long time ago. Why they call it Thunder Beach.”
I couldn't help but notice how unusually sunny and clear it was. Dad must have seen me squirming because he said, “Don't worry, son, it was a freak deal-what they call an atmospheric anomaly. Probably never happen here again in a million years.”
“Dad, come on home.”
“But what if it's a trap? The sheriff, setting me up.”
“It's not a trap. The sheriff never wants to lay eyes on you again,” I said.
The water boiled and a barracuda broke the surface, slashing through a school of needlefish.
“I'm right about Dusty dumping crap in the water,” Dad said.
“I know you are.” I told him that the sewage tank at the dock was broken, and how the crew of the Coral Queen had faked hooking up the hose to it.
“I figured it was something like that,” he said bitterly. “Lice Peeking knows all about that scam, I bet.”
“Dad, I've got more bad news. Lice Peeking is gone.”
“No!”
I told him about the bald guy with the crooked nose coming to Lice's trailer, and about the bloodstains Shelly found later in her Jeep.
“She thinks Dusty Muleman killed Lice, or had him killed, to shut him up,” I said.
My father looked horrified. “I can't believe that,” he said, but his voice was shaky.
“Abbey thinks we should pack up and run to Canada,” I said.
“What do you think, Noah?”
“I think it's awful cold up there.”
“No doubt,” he said quietly.
“And those snowmobiles, Dad, they're even noisier than Jet Skis.”
“That's a fact.”
“So we'll figure something out. We always do,” I said. “Come on home.”
Dad was lost in thought, staring gloomily up the shoreline toward the mouth of the basin where the Coral Queen was moored.
He said, “Dusty offered to drop the charges against me because he doesn't want the bad publicity from a trial. And he got rid of Lice as a warning to anyone else who knows the real story about the casino boat, anyone who could back me up.”
“Makes sense,” I said.
“But if Lice is really dead, it's all my fault.”
“No, Dad. If Lice is dead it's because he was greedy,” I said. “He didn't want to tell the truth unless he got money for it. If he'd gone to the Coast Guard way back when, like he should have, Dusty would've been shut down a long time ago. So let's go home. Please?”
“The water looks clean today, doesn't it? Though you can't always tell just by looking.” He got up and slowly waded in, trailing his fingers along the surface.
“Your Grandpa Bobby used to bring me down to the Keys three, four times a year,” he said. “When I was about your age, I stood right here and watched him catch a fourteen-pound muttonfish off the wings of a stingray.”
“On what?” I asked.
“A chunk of frozen shrimp,” Dad recalled. “I bet there hasn't been a mutton snapper on these flats in ages. Lots of reasons-fish trappers, pollution, too many boats. That's what people do when they find a special place that's wild and full of life, they trample it to death.”
He spun around to face me. “Noah, you understand why I sunk the Coral Queen, right? Every time Dusty empties her holding tank, it's like flushing a hundred filthy toilets into God's ocean!”
It made me sick to think about it. Still, I couldn't afford to let my father get himself all wound up again. There was something else I needed to tell him; something even more important.
“Mom wants you to come home right now,” I said. “She said it's not open for debate. No more speeches, she said, no more excuses. Just come home.”
“Aw, she'll settle down.”
It was like talking to a brick wall… so I took out the sledgehammer.
“Dad, listen to me,” I said. “Mom's thinking about filing for divorce.”
“What? No way!”
“I overheard her say something on the phone to Grandma Janet.”
My father stood knee-deep in the water, blinking and cocking his head like he wasn't sure if he'd heard me right.