He went back to his paper. I went back to my coffee. We both let the truth sit there for a while.
"Y-You th-think it's done?" he finally asked. "The killing?"
"It's officially done," I answered. "Sometimes that's enough."
"Enough f-for who?" he said, looking at me like a lawyer who knows too much about his client to let it pass. He let me stare at the ocean. But his patience had limits.
"What are you d-doing with the knife?"
I shouldn't have underestimated Billy's ability to put the signs together.
"He's a hunter," I said. "Knows the wilderness. Knows animal tendencies. Thinks like one himself."
"Yeah?"
"Bait," I said.
I could feel Billy's eyes on the side of my face.
"Hunters use it, and they are also susceptible to it," I said. "They'll bait their quarry, but they'll also enter into places they know their quarry is, even if it's dangerous, because that's where the goal is. It baits them."
"So w-what's the b-bait. The knife, or you?"
I wasn't sure of the answer. My hunch was the knife. But I needed to be attached to it. The killer was too afraid of the cops. He might be an animal, but he wasn't a stupid animal. Even a brash hunter won't expose himself too much. But this one had already been bold enough to come into my space, creep my shack, leave a violent piss marking on my territory by smashing my canoe.
Billy's eyes were still on my face.
"S-So you d-don't think it was Ashley?"
"Maybe."
"S-So why not let Hammonds have it?"
"Hammonds won't flush him. He can't get close," I said finally turning to Billy with what I knew was that stupidly confident grin we used in the patrol car in Philly.
Billy met my eyes and said: "Let me show you s-something."
I followed him into his study and while he went into a file room I wandered to the floor-to-ceiling corner windows that looked out on the city. Billy loved high views but the thing about South Florida from a height was its complete lack of borders; no mountains or hills or even small rises, nothing but the horizon to hold it in.
"I know you're fighting with the idea of this thing being done," Billy started, talking from the filing room and out of sight. "But your comment about someone having the capacity to kill started me thinking about your known band of Brown's 'acquaintances,' so I dug a little deeper into the case I handled for Gunther when he was being sued by one of his fishing clients. He had told me it involved a family and he mentioned that he and Blackman often partnered up on trips. But when the case was suddenly dropped by the complainant, I never went much more into it."
"And now?" My attention had wandered to a museum- quality Renoir hanging on an interior wall under its own spotlight.
"S-So I p-pulled the whole f-file," Billy said, coming back into the room and placing a stack of files in the middle of his broad, polished walnut desk. The attorney for the family had taken depositions from the father and mother.
"Hers is m-most interesting," he said, pushing the bound transcript across the desk.
The trip had been a fishing excursion into the waters of Florida's Ten Thousand Islands on the southwest coast. The family, including a ten-year-old boy and a thirteen-year-old girl, were from Michigan and wanted an overnight wilderness trip. They hired Gunther to be their outfitter and guide. He in turn brought in Blackman, who knew the twisting waterways of the mangrove islands better than he. Many of the so-called islands were little more than a mass of mangrove roots that clung to the bottom of Florida Bay. It took an experienced guide to get through the confusing spins and fingers of shallow water and to find those few small islands dry and high enough on which to camp.
The tarpon fishing had been excellent and all were satisfied until evening when they made camp on a narrow sand beach on a small shell mound. They'd cooked dinner on camp stoves and the odor of pan-fried fish attracted a resident raccoon.
"The children thought he was cute and tossed a bit of fish to him to eat," the mother stated in her deposition.
"It seemed harmless enough but Mr. Blackman became very angry. He snapped at the kids and told them to stop. He said they were turning the creature into a garbage hound."
"Did his demeanor bother you?" read the question from the attorney.
"Well, I certainly don't like other people yelling at my children, especially hired help. But I told them it might not be such a good idea."
"And did they stop?"
"I believe Mathew tossed one more piece. You know, to spite us both. You know how boys can be."
"And then what happened?"
"Well, my God. The raccoon came out to get the piece and, well, it was a blur. I've never seen a human being move so quickly.
"Before we could turn to see it, Mr. Blackman had the creature by the back of the neck and had cut its throat with a knife."
"Did the animal squeal?"
"It never made a sound. But my daughter and I certainly did. It was appalling and I told Mr. Blackman so."
"You registered your displeasure?"
"He said the animal was useless now for anything but a hat. Then, in front of us all, he held the poor thing up and sliced it open like a wet bag."
"He skinned it? In front of the children?"
"Exactly."
As I read, Billy had gone out and refilled my coffee and set the cup in front of me. I took a substantial swallow but did not look up.
"And then what happened?" read the attorney's question.
"Well, my husband came back into the campsite with Mr. Gunther and when he saw this, this, atrocity, he confronted Mr. Blackman."
"And what was Blackman's reaction?"
"He pointed his knife at Henry."
"At your husband?"
"Yes."
"In a threatening manner?"
"I thought so."
"Did Mr. Blackman say anything threatening?"
"He said something about how the children ought to learn about the real wilderness instead of pretending. Then Mr. Gunther stepped in and calmed everyone down."
At that point in the deposition the attorney steered the woman away from any more talk of Gunther's peacemaking efforts and went on about the children's mental anxieties and recurring nightmares and other bullshit to bolster his case. I closed the folder and took another long swallow of coffee.
"W-Want to g-guess what the sk-sk-skinning knife m-might have 1-looked like?" Billy said, leaning back in his chair.
Brown, Ashley, Gunther, Blackman, I thought. One moved in and out of the world like a ghost. One was dead. Another I had saved from dying. And last turned out to be as odd as any of them.
"G-Gunther n-never t-told me the details. He said the clients w-went after him because he w-was the owner of the b-b-business.
"I tried to call this f-family but the wife r-refused to talk. She said her husband told her to f-forget it."
Billy said he'd tried to call Gunther but he was out of the hospital and his business and home phone had been disconnected. The pilot had apparently made good on his vow to leave the state.
"So you've been busy, counselor," I said, smiling at Billy.
"Only 1-looking up alternatives," he said. "In case y-you were the only suspect they s-settled on and p-pushed into an indictment."
And they'd had enough to get their indictment. But the most recent target was now on a slab. It was neater that way. Maybe it was over. Maybe they got all they needed.
"M-maybe you could s-second guess the bait thing?"
"Kinda late," I said. "Right now, I'm going to get in a beach run and then go shopping," I said. "You game?"
"I w-will drive."
I finished my coffee and went running. The tide was out and the sand was packed but nothing like the South Jersey shore beaches where the tide could run out and leave a swath of hard brown sand thirty yards wide on the barrier island beaches of Wildwood, Cape May and Ocean City. I'd tried for months to run Lavernious Coleman's dead face out of my head on those beaches. But his ghost was always waiting for me back on the city streets.