He said, “We need you, Paul.”
“That doesn’t make sense. How many men work for you? Use one of them.”
“We can’t use a regular employee.”
“Why not?”
“There are reasons, believe me. I’ll get to them later.”
“You’ve got hundreds of men under deep cover. Use one of them.”
“Can’t be done.” Smile. “You’re the one we need, Paul.”
“You had your chance once. The computer said I was no good—”
“Then you weren’t. You are now.”
“No.”
“You really came alive when that pineapple landed at your feet, didn’t you? As though you’d been waiting all winter for something to happen. You finally got a chance to use yourself.”
“I’m happy here. I like it here.”
“Oh, I’ll grant that it seems to agree with you. That’s a hell of a tan you’ve got. You can come back here, Paul. Just do what we want and you can take your fee and spend the rest of your life here.”
“I can spend it here anyway. Without doing jobs for you.”
“Not jobs. Just this one job. And don’t be so sure you can.”
I looked at him.
“A man named Fenstermacher owns this island. He doesn’t even know you’re here. Someone could tell him.”
I felt muscles tightening in my arms and legs. I made them loosen up again.
“He might make a nuisance of himself, Paul.”
“I could work it out.”
“Suppose the State Board of Health decided to examine your shack. You’d be surprised how many friends the Agency has and how many people like to do us favors. If you don’t turn this trick for us, I’ve got a hunch you won’t be as comfortable here as you have been.” His voice softened. “Of course, it works both ways. Cooperation is a two-way street. Play straight with us and you’ll never have to worry about Mr. Fenstermacher or the State of Florida. We could smooth things out. Your fee for your work would probably cover the cost of buying the island outright, as far as that goes. And it never hurts to have important friends, Paul. You know that.”
He wouldn’t get back in his boat and go away forever. I should have known that. He had too much leverage, he was too well placed.
“Just one job,” I said, slowly. “Right?”
“If that’s the way you want it.”
“And then nobody bothers me again.”
“If you say so, that’s how it’ll be. You may change your mind once you’re back in action, but the choice is yours all the way, Paul.”
The hell it was. If they had a lever now they’d have a lever until hell froze.
I frowned thoughtfully. “How long would it take?”
“As little as one week or as much as three. Split the difference and call it two weeks flat. A fortnight. Two weeks from today you’ll be back on your tight little island.”
“That’s not so bad.”
“Not bad at all.”
“And I’d have my choice afterward? I could do more work or be left alone forever?”
“Right. No strings either way.”
I let my face relax. “You make it sound good.”
“It is good, Paul.”
“I’d like to know what it’s all about. “I hesitated. “Look, uh, George, I didn’t mean to pop off like that. When you go days on end without seeing another human being—”
“I understand completely.”
“I mean, no one but me has ever been out here before.”
“You don’t have to explain, Paul. My apologies.”
“Well,” I said. I headed for the shack. He was standing just to the right of the doorway. “Suppose I fix us a drink. And you’ll want to get out of that jacket. You must be roasting to death in it.”
He was shrugging the jacket down over his shoulders just as I drew even with him. His gun hand dropped and the gun pointed at the ground in front of him. I kicked the muscle on the underside of his forearm. He howled and the gun went flying, and he was still howling when the heel of my hand caught the point of his jaw.
He sagged. I grabbed him, one hand bunching his shirtfront, the other between his legs. I hoisted him high into the air and marched across the sand to the water’s edge. He was yammering like a little monkey.
I walked straight out into the water until it came almost to my knees. “My island,” I was shouting. “My island, my house, my list! My life, you son of a bitch. My life!”
I slammed him down on his back. His legs worked furiously. I stuffed his head underwater and held it there.
“No jobs for you, damn you! My island, my house, my list!”
He couldn’t hear me. He was underwater, and he was struggling, and bubbles were coming up through the water from his mouth and nose. After a few moments he went limp, and then, a little later, the bubbles stopped.
Five
He was a lot heavier when I carried him back to shore. His clothes were soaked and his lungs were full of water. It was tempting to leave him there, but I put him over a shoulder and hauled him onto the sand and dropped him face down on it.
I slipped one arm under his stomach, lifted him up a few inches, rolled him back and forth. Half the ocean streamed out of his mouth and nose. I moved in front of him and squatted with a knee on either side of his head and began artificial respiration, pressing down on his lungs, sliding my hands along his arms to his elbows, lifting the elbows, dropping, then going through the whole process again. 1, 2, press the lungs. 3, 4, reach for the elbows. 5, 6, lift the elbows. 7, release.
Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation is supposed to be something like sixty percent more efficient. The thought of applying it to Dattner made me gag. If my method worked, all well and good. If not, tough.
It was bad enough that I had to revive him at all. I couldn’t remember wanting anything as much as I had wanted to leave him underwater. He certainly deserved it. He had invaded my privacy and disturbed my life, and murder seemed a minor crime in comparison.
But once rage passed, I saw how inconvenient it would be if he died. He was no Gaines, no friendless wino with no one looking out for him. He was an Agency man on Agency business. There would be men who had known he had come here, and when he didn’t return I would have visitors. I could get rid of the boat and the body so that no one would ever be able to prove what had happened to Dattner. But I couldn’t keep them off my back. That was the real problem, and Dattner’s death would only enlarge it.
Press the lungs, reach for the elbows, lift, drop. I kept working on him, ignoring the increasing suspicion that I was respirating a corpse, and after a while he rumbled and coughed. I stopped. He breathed on his own several times, then quit on me. I started in again and got him going, and this time he stayed with it. He gasped and said something unintelligible, and rolled his head and opened his eyes.
I put my thumbs on either side of his neck and pressed firmly. He blacked out. I checked to make sure that the sudden loss of consciousness didn’t interrupt his breathing. There was a momentary lapse but then he came on strong again, nice and regular. I rolled him over onto his back and put my ear to his chest. I had stripped him to his underwear before I started respirating him, and now I realized how white his skin was. Ten minutes of midday sun and he’d be in terrible shape. The sun was on the way down now, so that was no problem.
I listened to his lungs as he breathed. It sounded as though I had gotten almost all of the water out. His pulse was weak but steady.
I went into my shack. At least he hadn’t moved anything out of place. I found my roll of twine, cut two lengths, returned to him and tied his ankles together, then put him on his stomach again and tied his wrists together behind his back.