Double Whammy

"I'm an expert," Decker said, "it's what I do." It was true about cars: there was no better clue to the total personality. Any good cop would tell you so. Decker hadn't thought much about the psychology of automobiles until he became a private investigator and had to spend half his time tracing, following, and photographing all kinds. On long surveillances in busy parking lots he made a game of matching shoppers to their cars, and had gotten good at it. The make, model, color, everything down to the shine on the hubcaps was a clue to the puzzle. Decker's own car was a plain gray 1979 Plymouth Volare, stylistically the most forgettable automobile Detroit ever produced. Decker knew it fit him perfectly. It fit his need to be invisible.

"So you think I belong back in Miami," Lanie was saying sarcastically. "Who can you picture me with, Decker? I know—a young Colombian stud! Rolex, gold necklace, and black Ferrari. Or maybe you figure I'm too old for a coke whore. Maybe you see me on the arm of some silver-haired geezer playing the ponies out at Hialeah."

"Anybody but Bobby Clinch," Decker said. "Steve and Eydie you weren't."

Of course then the tears came, and the next thing Decker knew he had moved to the bed and put his arms around Lanie and told her to knock off the crying. Please. In his mind's eye he could see himself in this cheesy scene out of a cheap detective movie; acting like the gruff cad, awkwardly consoling the weepy long-legged knockout, knowing deep down he ought to play it as the tough guy but feeling compelled to show this warm sensitive side. Decker knew he was a fool but he certainly didn't feel like letting go of Lanie Gault. There was something magnetic and comforting and entirely natural about holding a sweet-smelling woman in a silken nightie on a strange bed in a strange motel room in a strange town where neither one of you belonged.

A Bell Jet-Ranger helicopter awaited the Reverend Charles Weeb at the Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport. Weeb wore a navy pinstriped suit, designer sunglasses, and lizard boots. He was traveling with a vice-president of the Outdoor Christian Network and a young brunette woman who claimed to be a secretary, and who managed to slip her phone number to the chopper pilot during the brief flight.

The helicopter carried the Reverend Charles Weeb to a narrow dike on the edge of the Florida Everglades. Looking east from the levee, Weeb and his associates had a clear view of a massive highway construction site. The land had been bulldozed, the roadbed had been poured, the pilings had been driven for the overpasses. Dump trucks hauled loose fill back and forth, while graders crawled in dusty clouds along the medians.

"Show me again," Weeb said to the vice-president.

"Our property starts right about there," the vice-president said, pointing, "and abuts the expressway for five miles to the south. The state highway board has generously given us three interchanges."

Generously my ass, thought Weeb. Twenty thousand in bonds to each of the greedy fuckers.

"Give me the binoculars," Weeb said.

"I'm sorry, sir, but I left them at the airport."

"I'm going to go sit in the helicopter," the brunette woman whined.

"Stay right here," Weeb growled. "How'm I supposed to see the lake system without the binoculars?"

"We can fly over it on the way back," the vice-president said. "The canals are almost done."

Vigorously Weeb shook his head. "Dammit, Billy, you did it again. People don't buy townhouses on canals.'Canal' is a dirty word. A canal is where raw sewage goes. A canal is where ducks fuck and cattle piss. Who wants to live on a damn canal! Would you pay a hundred-fifty grand to do that? No, you'd want to live on a lake,a cool scenic lake, and lakes is what we're selling here."

"I understand," said the vice-president. Lakes it is. Straight, narrow lakes. Lakes you could toss a stone across. Lakes of identical fingerlike dimensions.

The company that OCN had hired was a marine dredging firm whose foremen were, basically, linear-minded. They had once dredged the mouths of Port Everglades and Government Cut, and a long stretch of the freighter route in Tampa Bay. They had worked with impressive speed and efficiency, and they had worked in a perfectly straight line—which is desirable if you're digging a ship channel but rather a handicap when you're digging a lake. This problem had been mentioned several times to Reverend Charles Weeb, who had merely pointed out the fiscal foolishness of having big round lakes. The bigger the lake, the more water. The more water, the less land to sell. The less land to sell, the fewer townhouses to build.

"Lakes don't have to be round," the Reverend Weeb said. "I'm not going to tell you again."

"Yes, sir."

Weeb turned to the west and stared out at the Glades. "Reminds me of the fucking Sahara," he said, "except with muck."

"The water rises in late spring and early summer," the vice-president reported.

"Dickie promises bass."