Bad Monkey

The drive back from Miami had been more nerve-grinding than usual because he’d had to tilt sideways behind the wheel, in order to keep weight off his mangled left buttock. It was worse than one of Bonnie Witt’s nutty yoga positions. Contorted for nearly three hours, his brain pounding from the smack on the concrete, Yancy had emerged like an arthritic crab from the Subaru.

The next morning he’d phoned Rosa to tell her what had happened at Eve Stripling’s house. She said she’d come straight down as soon as she finished the final autopsy on her schedule, a routine suicide. Yancy passed the time on his feet, because sitting was too painful. Liquor helped somewhat. He also distracted himself by initiating a useful conversation with a pair of Norwegians who were waiting to tour the monstrous spec house next door.

Rosa looked irresistible as she walked up Yancy’s front steps, but he was in too much discomfort to make a move, even after she changed into a devastating sundress.

While she inspected the knot on his skull, he said, “Know what? We’d make a great crime-solving duo.”

“How much have you had to drink?”

“Have mercy, woman. I ran out of Advil.”

“Well, I don’t sleep with drunken guys. Period.”

Yancy sighed. “So many rules.”

She took notice of the shotgun propped in a corner, and Yancy told her restaurant inspections could be dangerous. She informed him that for dinner she was doing blackened grouper with mashed sweet potatoes and a grilled Caesar, and that he was going to finish every bite or never see her again.

“I also stopped in Key Largo and got some homemade carrot cake,” she said.

“From where?”

“What’s the difference?”

“Rosa, you don’t understand. I see all the health reports. I know the dirt on every kitchen.”

She ordered him to be quiet while she sewed up his gnawed butt cheek. To take his mind off the intimate unpleasantries, Yancy told the story of how he was conceived during side one of Abbey Road.

“You mean side two,” Rosa said. “The medley.”

“No, side one. According to my mom, the big moment happened during ‘Maxwell’s Silver Hammer.’ ”

“It’s all starting to make sense,” said Rosa.

After trimming the last suture, she made Yancy stand up and drink an entire pitcher of cold water. When his head began to clear, he told her about the seaplane parked behind Eve Stripling’s house.

“I ran the tail numbers on a flight-tracking website. It’s a Cessna Caravan that’s leased from a company in Boca Raton. Flew in from Congo Town the day before and cleared Customs at Opa-locka, all legal and proper.”

“Where on earth is Congo Town?” Rosa asked.

“Bahamas.” Yancy jerked a thumb toward the east. “Andros Island.”

“Andrew, you’d make a darn good cop.”

“That dog bite still stings like hell. You sure you know what you’re doing?”

“My other patients never complain. They are, however, deceased.”

That’s when she kissed him. It was a good one, bordering on unforgettable.

“Only because you’re injured,” she said, and kissed him again.

He pulled her close. “How’s this going to work with all these stitches? Do I have to keep standing?”

“Well,” whispered Rosa, “I suppose you could kneel.”

Yancy lifted her sundress. “You’re the doctor.”

The Dragon Queen asked, “How much you take fuh dot pink boy?”

Neville said he wasn’t for sale.

“Too bod.”

“And dot’s a monkey, madam, not a boy.”

“He got a name?”

“Driggs.” Neville opened the brown bag. He handed her the fresh bottle of rum and a box of cheroots. “Dot woo-doo dint woyk on Chrissofer,” he said. “He supposa be gone but he ain’t.”

“Wot!”

“Mon tore down my house!”

“Maybe den he drop dead.”

“No, madam, he come in again dis morning. Got offa plane wit his woman and drove ’way.” Neville had received the upsetting information from a cousin who worked at the airport.

The Dragon Queen struck a match on her bare heel and lighted one of the cigars. She assured Neville that she’d put a hideous, unshakable curse on the white devil. “Juss you wait. He be gone from Andros in due time.”

“I cont wait fuh due time,” said Neville. “Soon dot fella gon start puddin’ up his damn hotel.”

Neville had been hiding in the pines while Christopher’s workers had replaced the fuel filter on the backhoe into which Neville had pissed. He asked the Dragon Queen what type of voodoo she’d used on the white American.

“Dot piece a shoyt you brought tuh me. Any minute now, his skin be fallin’ off his body. Maybe his balls, too.”

She twisted open the rum and took a husky slug, careful not to dribble. Then she sprang up from her wicker throne and began to dance, clapping her hands and swirling her long red-and-yellow dress. Neville glanced anxiously at the door, which he’d left ajar in anticipation of a speedy exit. Driggs bared his yellow teeth and bounded onto Neville’s shoulder. It was the middle of the afternoon, broiling hot and not a murmur of breeze. The windows of the woman’s shack were open and the doctor flies buzzed throughout, targeting the bald patches on the monkey’s hide.