Honey Santana was crestfallen. “You work there, too?”
“Next time just hang up the phone. End of story,” Eugenie said. “They won’t call back. The list of numbers we got, it’s a mile long.”
“This is awful.” Honey pressed her knuckles to her temples. “I’m talking about basic old-fashioned civility and respect. The man told me to go screw myself. He called me a dried-up skank.”
Shreave stiffened. “After you insulted my mother.”
“I did no such thing!” Honey discarded the apology she’d rehearsed. Shreave didn’t deserve it. “All I did was ask a simple, very reasonable question: Did your mom raise you to be a professional pest? Did she bleed and suffer through your birth, Boyd, so that you could grow up to be a nag and a sneak? My guess would be no. My guess is that your folks had higher hopes for you. And what about Lily?”
Shreave wobbled, exposed once more.
“The real Mrs. Shreave,” Honey went on. “Tell me she’s happy that this is how your career has peaked. Tell me she’s proud and content to be married to a telephone solicitor.”
Eugenie Fonda broke in. “Okay, sweetie, we’re all on board. Boyd’s real sorry he called and bothered you. He’ll never do it again. Now can you please get us outta here?”
“No, I don’t believe he cares one bit.” Honey scrutinized Shreave for a shadow of remorse. “He definitely does not get the point.”
Shreave confirmed this by saying, “I get it, all right: You’re as crazy as a shithouse rat.”
Eugenie glowered at him. “Very smooth.”
“She fucking kidnapped us!”
Honey said, “I thought you’d enjoy it out here. Be honest-did you ever see any place so amazing?”
Shreave hooted. “Only every week on Survivor.”
“His favorite show,” Eugenie said, whacking a spider on her ankle. “That and Maury Povich.”
Honey was lost. She felt like a sap.
“You can go now,” she said, digging into the stash of Cheerios.
Boyd hopped up and plumped his Indiana Jones hat. Eugenie Fonda said, “Don’t be ridiculous. We’ll get lost in five minutes without her.” She turned to Honey. “Come on. You’ve had your fun.”
“Keep heading east and you’ll be fine.”
“We won’t be fine. We definitely will not be fine.”
“Then stay with me.”
Shreave growled, “Fuck that. Let’s go.”
Honey watched them hustle down the path toward the creek. She rested her head on one of the duffels and hoped, against all odds, that they’d find their own way back to Everglades City. She truly didn’t wish to see them again. Her speech had bombed, and now the whole plan seemed depressingly misguided. She hated to give up, but it appeared that Boyd Shreave was a hopeless cause.
The sky had changed color, and Honey felt a cooling shift in the wind. She didn’t mind spending the night alone; poachers typically operated in secret, and the ones with the gun were probably long gone. She’d make a fire and, before sunset, go for a skinny-dip in the creek. In the morning she would return to the mainland and then wait for Fry after school. She planned on finding her way back using Perry Skinner’s GPS, into which she had programmed several waypoints while leading the Texans through the islands.
Far away she heard an airplane, and soon the drone of its engine turned into a light chorus of humming. The tune, though pleasant, was unfamiliar. She tried to hum along but couldn’t nail the key. There was a rustle nearby and Boyd Shreave reappeared, silky strands of spiderwebs trailing from both earlobes. He stomped into the clearing and said, “Okay. Get your ass in gear.”
Honey sat up. Genie emerged from the trees and said, “You win. The joke’s on us.”
“What joke? You said you were going back.”
Shreave said, “Oh, and I guess we’re supposed to swim.”
Honey got a knot in her gut. “The kayaks are gone?”
“Surprise, surprise,” Eugenie said thinly.
Boyd Shreave whipped out a stubby pistol and leveled it at Honey’s heart. “Don’t just sit there all innocent. Tell your pals to bring back our goddamn boats.”
Honey said she didn’t have any pals on the island. “I don’t know who stole the kayaks. Honest to God.”
Eugenie Fonda skeptically eyed the gun in Shreave’s hand. “I don’t know, Boyd. In the daylight it sure looks like a toy.”
He laid it flat in his palm for examination. “It’s not a toy,” he said, with no abundance of confidence.
“Whatever. Put the damn thing away,” Eugenie told him. “She’s tellin’ the truth.”
“Great. Now you’re takin’ sides against me.”
“I know where he got it-from under my bed,” Honey Santana said. “And he’s right, it’s not a toy.”
Shreave smirked at Eugenie. “Told you. Ha!”
Defiantly he shoved the weapon back into his pants, which lit up with a dull crackle. Shreave yowled and pitched backward as if he’d been clipped by a freight train. For what seemed like half a minute he flopped and shuddered on the ground, clutching his groin with curled, bone-white fingers.
Eugenie Fonda watched the spectacle without comment. Honey explained, “Actually it’s not a gun, either. It’s an electric Taser.”
With a sigh Eugenie said, “What a fucking pinhead.”
“I wouldn’t touch him just yet.”
“Oh, don’t worry.”
With the stolen kayaks in tow, Sammy Tigertail relocated to the southeastern leg of the island. He built a new campfire while Gillian amused herself with Dealey.
When she pulled the crumpled socks from his mouth, he asked, “Who are you?”
“Thlocko’s hostage.”
“I guess that makes two of us.”
“No, you’re just temporary. Like a POW,” she said. “He also goes by ‘Tiger Tail.’ That’s a Seminole chief.”
“Don’t I get a chance to explain?”
“Doubtful. He’s hard-core.” Gillian opened one of the Halliburtons and began tinkering with the Nikon.
Dealey said, “Don’t do that.” When he reached for the camera, she swatted his hand.
Sammy Tigertail looked up from the fire and threatened to throw both of them in Pumpkin Bay, which he had misidentified as the nearest open body of water. It was, in fact, Santina Bay, an error of no immediate consequence.
“Ten thousand islands and these assholes had to pick this one,” the Seminole said.
Retreat had fouled his mood. The place was being infested by white people and white spirits. Two rifle shots had failed to scare off the kayakers, forcing Sammy Tigertail to abandon the shell-mound campsite upon which he had hoped to commune with the ancient Calusas. Now the three tourists were settling in, and Sammy Tigertail was stuck with both the college girl and the spirit of the dead white businessman.
“I’m not a goddamn ghost!” Dealey protested, displaying his bloody feet as evidence of mortality.
Gillian snapped a few close-ups and set the Nikon down. The Indian handed his guitar to her and told her to play something soft. She slowly worked into “Mexico,” by James Taylor, which Sammy Tigertail recognized and approved. It would have sounded better on an acoustic but he couldn’t complain. For the first time he noticed that Gillian had a lovely voice, and he feared it would add to her powers over him. Still, he didn’t tell her to stop singing.
When the number was over, Dealey stated that he was thirsty. Gillian told him to join the club. “We’ve been living for days on cactus berries and fried fish. I’d blow Dick Cheney for a Corona,” she said.
“What do you want with me?” Dealey asked the Seminole, who took the Gibson from Gillian and began twanging the B string over and over.
Gillian leaned close to Dealey and whispered, “Thlocko won’t talk to you because he thinks you’re a spirit. He says he’s done hassling with dead white guys.”
“Then tell him to let me go.”
“Go where?” Gillian smiled. “Please. You are so not getting out of here. Hey, who was that jerkoff with the Band-Aids on his hand?”
Dealey said he didn’t know the man. “Some freak named Louis who’s stalking a woman from the trailer park. He clubbed me with that shotgun and made me go with him.”