Death in the Polka Dot Shoes (24 page)

“Anyway, my client hauled away the old fence, and proceeded to install a new one. But the neighbor lady didn't want a chain link. She said it was 1970s crap and she wanted a white picket, preferably plastic so it wouldn't deteriorate. My client agreed and brought in a surveyor to make sure it was installed in the right place. Naturally, the surveyor found the old fence was two inches inside her property. She started screaming about him stealing her property. My client said he was fine with moving the fence, but now he wanted a six foot stockade so he didn't have to ever talk to her again. And so it began.

“To make a long story short, my client bought a truckload of stockade fence and stacked it on the edge of the property. One night it caught fire, and my client and his neighbor started screaming at each other, so violently that the pile kept on burning before anybody called the fire department. The entire neighborhood had gathered, of course, mostly to watch the argument and then take sides as to who was at fault.

“So my client comes stomping into my office to say he had gone to a neighbor's cocktail party over the weekend, and the neighbor woman cornered him by the bar and screamed he was a ‘no good sleaze ball son-of-a-bitch.' So now he wants retribution, or maybe a restraining order. The problem with a case like this in Parkers is: it's not good for business. Everybody in town takes sides and they don't take much stock in our law school principle that everybody deserves a hearing and a defense. A more limited view of the constitution prevails. So I wrote a letter threatening legal action and listing a dozen instances of trespassing, insult, public harassment, and slander. It seemed to work. My client hasn't heard from the woman since, and I charged him four hundred dollars. I didn't even have to open Mitchie's Annotated Code book to do it.”

“Must have taken at least three hours to hear the story,” Diane said. “I'd say you earned the money.”

“I did,” I replied. “So the client you got me, CRI, is still the best income I have. Although the resort boys aren't much fun at all.”

“What's that mean? Clients aren't supposed to be friends or fun. You play, they pay, it's as simple as that.”

“I tell you Diane,” I said, “some of these cases are so weird I would take them just for the fun of it.”

“That's another thing you don't do,” Diane said. “Nothing is free. None of this
pro bono
stuff. Even if you only charge ten dollars, you have to let people know that you're in business to make money, not just to help your friends.”

“I know all that. But last week I had a waterman come in from Virginia. He drove all the way to Parkers from the lower Bay because he heard I was a waterman lawyer and he wanted the best. I loved that.”

“But what did he want?”

“He wanted tax advice. And I think he wanted the advice from a lawyer, cause he knew it wouldn't fly. And either way, he wanted to say his lawyer did it. And I don't think he wanted to deal with his hometown lawyer.”

“Did he commit a crime?” she asked.

“Not really. He wanted to deduct his wife as a business expense, because she worked as first mate a few times a year. I think he was afraid to let his wife know how much he thought she was worth.”

Diane's face broke into a knowing smile. She saw this coming.

“He wanted to deduct all her clothes, mostly blue jeans and work boots, and all of her hair cuts because one day on the water would ruin her frizz for weeks. He wanted to write off her old truck because she had written her name and phone number in spray paint on the side door. And he wanted to declare their kitchen as her office. The kicker for me was that he said all the other guys took these deductions. He just wanted to make sure they were legal.”

“That's why they pay you the big money, Ned,” she said. “Let's move to a table.”

Talking to Diane about being a lawyer was natural and easy. Not so easy was talking about my brother Jimmy, who after all, worked for the same client she did.

We slid into a booth along the wall and the bartender brought our drinks to the table. It was the perfect opportunity to start a new conversation. I looked at Diane and her eyes sparkled, or perhaps it was the diamond necklace. In any case, there was an aloofness about her that sent a slight shiver down my spine. Maybe a small realization that I wasn't in her league anymore; I wasn't in her game; talking to multiple clients, reading several papers a day, planning lunch at a fine restaurant every day. I felt uneasy.

“Diane,” I said, “let me ask you again about Jimmy and Chesapeake Resorts International. This whole thing has escalated beyond me. We now know my brother was murdered, for no obvious reason. The Captain of his boat has taken off for parts unknown. Somebody swamped my boat in the middle of the night. And my brother's body turns up wearing a woman's tennis shoe, polka dot no less. Now what the hell is this all about? I have to ask you about the Resort.”

“Fine,” Diane said with her usual certainty, “but I don't know anything about all this. I advised the Chesapeake Resorts International to cooperate in every way with this investigation.”

“I know, but I keep getting an itch in the back of my neck that CRI is involved is all this. These boys are too slick, too high powered. As the watermen would say, there's too many tassels on their shoes.”

“Ned,” Diane said, “you've been over there in the land of pickup trucks too long. These Resort boys are businessmen. They come from Florida and other places where waterside hotels are common. And they make a lot of money, so they hire fast talkers from Ivy League colleges to do their business, but they're not killers. And besides, why would they want to get rid of Jimmy?”

I thought a while, and let the conversation drop. Why indeed? Ever since Watergate, the Washington pundits always say: follow the money. And in South County, Chesapeake Resorts International was the richest guy in town. They had the money, and wanted to make more.

“Listen, Diane,” I said, “what could Jimmy know that would make him worth killing?”

“I have no idea,” she said. But she did.

“Look, he was hanging with these guys at environmental rallies, and going to town meetings, and he was making their pitch. Maybe one of the good ole boys in Parkers saw Jimmy as the leader of CRI and thought, ‘Take Jimmy out and they're gone.' You know that could happen.”

“Not really,” I said.

“Well, what about the money. You raised the issue,” she said. “What are these permits worth? What if Jimmy decided he'd had enough and decided to sabotage some permits. Maybe he decided to quit and testify against the company. Maybe join the SARP environmental folks. Maybe go the State Attorney General and rat on the developers. There's a hundred ways Jimmy could make this company mad, and they decide to take him out.”

“And me too?”

“Neddie, when you've killed one, you can kill two. You better watch your backside.”

I didn't like the way Diane had brought the subject back to me, and she hadn't really given me any new information. No names of company officials. No suspects. No examples of malfeasance. I was beginning to wonder about her involvement, or at least about the fact that she knew all the players, and yet kept herself above the fray.

It would be a distracting drive home.

Chapter Eighteen

Chumbucket Roberts approached the ladder leading to the flybridge of the
Scatback
, climbed the five steps until his eyes cleared the salon, twisted his body off the ladder and looked up to see past the other slips and out to the Intra Coastal. It was a ribbon to freedom that stretched before him until it merged with the clouds and the fog and disappeared in a silver horizon. Then he took the wheel in both hands, and the chrome surface was warm from the morning sun. It felt like pulling on a pair of soft Italian leather gloves and feeling the confidence of control. His life was never more in sync than during those first moments at the helm, even before the powerful engines roared to life, and before any unexpected problem could send fault lines through his confidence, and while his dreams and aspirations were confined to the water before him.

He wouldn't give any orders to Horace. He organized his mind to the boat so that he thought of things in sequence, the stern lines before the bow lines, the prospect of a quick reverse at the end of the pier followed by a light touch on the throttle and a forward turn into the channel. He would wait for Horace to tell him he was ready, then make a visual check of the dock lines, then be gone. He wanted so badly to be away from the dock, unrestrained, moving; it was a feeling he had known since his first canoe, and the message was always the same.

Horace arrived at the boat early and brought a last thermos of coffee from the IC Diner, a duffle bag packed with all his belongings, and a large black comb stuck in his back pocket. He wanted to feel the boat and the morning mist in total silence; to say goodbye to this briefly adopted town. He thought of New Smyrna as a rest stop, rather like the fast food cafés on the turnpike that he would probably never visit again. But in later years he might want to remember this place and this moment. He wondered how many times in life do you just throw everything in a worn out bag and move on. Horace was ready. And when it came time to cast off the lines while his new partner sat high above him at the helm, he moved with some uncertainty around the boat. He slipped the bow and stern lines off the pylons, which Chum noticed out of the corner of his eye. The low growl of the engines signaled the boat's slow movement out of the slip, and they were gone. Horace unfolded the captain's chair and set it up in the middle of the deck. Then he relaxed, stretched his legs out before him, crossed his arms, and let the morning mist fill his nostrils. He thought how lucky he was to meet this new friend, although it might conflict with his instructions, which had never mentioned a sudden departure. Horace's uncle had just said, “Meet Dave “Chumbucket” Roberts, and let me know what he's doing.”

On the bridge, Chum thought about where they might be going. He figured they could head down the coast of Florida, fill up gas at some obscure marina down near Stewart, Florida, where there were plenty of boats to hide their arrival. Stewart was a boat building area with plenty of vessels in various stages of repair, perfect for not drawing unwanted attention. As long as the weather was good, he shouldn't have to get on the radio. And if he could find a gas pump in the open harbor, the chances of getting in and out without drawing attention were pretty good.

But Chum couldn't resist thinking of the fish, of the long tranquil days he had spent with charter customers, just drawing huge circles in the ocean as they searched for fish. It was his world and he wanted it back. He turned around to see if Horace was still sleeping in his deck chair.

“Horace,” he said, “how about getting out the charts. Let's see where we are.”

Horace stirred himself, looked around at the open water, and climbed to the bridge. He noticed the chart drawers in the console near the helm station, pulled out the top drawer and read the title: Intracoastal Waterway. Chum glanced over and said, “Look further down. Maybe the bottom drawer.”

Horace pushed his hair from his forehead, bent over and reached for the drawer.

“See if you can find Mexico,” Chum said.

“Mexico!” Horace exclaimed. “I don't speak Spanish. Why Mexico?”

“Why not?” Chum said. “I'm tired of looking over my shoulder. Let's get out of here.”

Horace found a chart for the Gulf of Mexico. Maybe it would go further south. He laid it out before Chum and began turning the pages.

“Does your GPS have Mexico in it?” Horace asked. “It has to have a computer map in it to pick up the signals, to know where we're going.”

“I don't know, we'll know when we get there.”

“Are you sure we don't need a little more planning before going to Mexico?” Horace asked.

“Why? We haven't planned anywhere else. If we can get gas, we can go. Plus there's bound to be marinas down there that have charts or memory discs for the GPS. We can't do everything at once.”

Horace could see that it would not pay to argue Chum's decision. He figured to just let Chum think about it. He might choose a simpler course. Plus, he figured it would take at least three or four days to get to Mexico, and Chum might change his mind often by then. He climbed back down the ladder, moved his captain's chair to the back of boat, and propped his feet on the varnished aft railing.

Chum continued to study the charts, looking for a place to gas up. He calculated that he could get further south than Stewart, maybe even to the Keys, that string of islands stretching from Miami to Key West. And he had heard stories about some of the little harbors and marinas in the keys, so backwater that nobody lived there but druggies and vagrants looking for warm sand to sleep away the winter. In his mind, he pictured a small harbor, with a short dock in front of an unpainted and dilapidated clam shack that sold bait, tackle and gas. That's what he was looking for, all the way to Mexico.

The next afternoon, Chum started moving the
Scatback
closer to shore, closer to the island bridge that trailed down from Miami like a piece of string. In morning fog you could hardly see it. The bridge was a ribbon of concrete set on pylons that held it above the tide, and when the sun was at the exact right angle, it shimmered into the horizon so the bridge seemed to float like an exotic belly dancer swaying just above the water. Chum found it magnetic and moved closer until his depth finder registered less than six feet, and he could see into the harbors with their parking lots and palm trees and gift shops selling beach chairs and rubber rafts. It was easy to dream in the keys, but it was also lonely, perhaps because it's the end of America. Key West advertises the southern most tip of America, the last stop before Cuba. But Chum wasn't really looking to lose everything, to totally escape society and responsibility. He wanted to find a new place with new opportunities.