He sets off on the little path he has beaten over the years. He will check the dune on the other side, where the sand is beach-fine instead of stony and shelly, and then he will return to the kayak and drink his little jug of cold tea. He may doze awhile in the morning sun (he dozes often these days, supposes most nonagenarians do), and when he wakes (if he wakes), he’ll make the return trip. He tells himself that the dune will be just a smooth blank upslope of sand, as it is most days, but he knows better.

Goddam buzzard knew better, too.

He spends a long time on the sandy side, with his age-warped fingers clasped in a knot behind him. His back aches, his shoulders ache, his hips ache, his knees ache; most of all, his gut aches. But he pays these things no mind. Perhaps later, but not now.

He looks at the dune, and at what is written there.

Anthony Wayland arrives at Beecher’s Pelican Point estate bang on seven o’clock p.m., just as promised. One thing the Judge has always appreciated – both in the courtroom and out of it – is punctuality, and the boy is punctual. Judge Beecher reminds himself never to call Wayland boy to his face (although, this being the South, son is okay). Wayland wouldn’t understand that, when you’re ninety, any fellow under the age of sixty looks like a boy.

‘Thanks for coming,’ the Judge says, ushering Wayland into his study. It’s just the two of them; Curtis and Mrs Riley have long since gone to their homes in Nokomis Village. ‘You brought the necessary document?’

‘Yes indeed, Judge.’ Wayland opens his big square attorney’s briefcase and removes a thick document bound by a heavy clip. The pages aren’t vellum, as they would have been in the old days, but they are rich and heavy just the same. At the top of the first, in heavy and forbidding type (what the Judge has always thought of as graveyard type), are the words Last Will and Testament of HARVEY L. BEECHER.

‘You know, I’m kind of surprised you didn’t draft this document yourself. You’ve probably forgotten more Florida probate law than I’ve ever learned.’

‘That might be true,’ the Judge says in his driest tone. ‘At my age, folks tend to forget a great deal.’

Wayland flushes to the roots of his hair. ‘I didn’t mean—’

‘I know what you mean, son,’ the Judge says. ‘No offense taken. But since you ask … you know that old saying about how a man who serves as his own lawyer has a fool for a client?’

Wayland grins. ‘Heard it and used it plenty of times when I’m wearing my public defender hat and some sad-sack wife abuser or hit-and-runner tells me he plans to go the DIY route in court.’

‘I’m sure you have, but here’s the unabridged version: a lawyer who serves as his own lawyer has a great fool for a client. Goes for criminal, civil, and probate law. So shall we get down to business? Time is short.’ This is something he means in more ways than one.

They get down to business. Mrs Riley has left decaf coffee, which Wayland rejects in favor of a Co’-Cola. He makes copious notes as the Judge dictates the changes in his dry courtroom voice, adjusting old bequests and adding new ones. The major new one – four million dollars – is to the Sarasota County Beach and Wildlife Preservation Society. In order to qualify, they must successfully petition the state legislature to have a certain island just off the coast of Pelican Point declared forever wild.

‘They won’t have a problem getting that done,’ the Judge says. ‘You can handle the legal for them yourself. I’d prefer pro bono, but of course that’s up to you. One trip to Tallahassee should do it. It’s a little spit of a thing, nothing growing there but a few bushes. Governor Scott and his Tea Party cronies will be delighted.’

‘Why’s that, Judge?’

‘Because the next time Beach and Preservation comes to them, begging money, they can say, “Didn’t old Judge Beecher just give you four million? Get out of here, and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.”’

Wayland agrees that this is probably just how it will go, and the two men move on to the smaller bequests.

‘Once I get a clean draft, we’ll need two witnesses, and a notary,’ Wayland says when they’ve finished.

‘I’ll get all that done with this draft here, just to be safe,’ the Judge says. ‘If anything happens to me in the interim, it should stand up. There’s no one to contest it; I’ve outlived them all.’

‘A wise precaution, Judge. It would be good to take care of it tonight. I don’t suppose your caretaker and housekeeper—’

‘Won’t be back until eight tomorrow,’ Beecher says, ‘but I’ll make it the first order of business. Harry Staines on Vamo Road’s a notary, and he’ll be glad to come over before he goes in to his office. He owes me a favor or six. You give that document to me, son. I’ll lock it in my safe.’

‘I ought to at least make a …’ Wayland looks at the gnarled, outstretched hand and trails off. When a state Supreme Court judge (even a retired one) holds out his hand, demurrals must cease. What the hell, it’s only an annotated draft, anyway, soon to be replaced by a clean version. He passes the unsigned will over and watches as Beecher rises (painfully) and swings a picture of the Florida Everglades out on a hidden hinge. The Judge enters the correct combination, making no attempt to hide the touchpad from view, and deposits the will on top of what looks to Wayland like a large and untidy heap of cash. Yikes.

‘There!’ Beecher says. ‘All done and buttoned up! Except for the signing part, that is. How about a drink to celebrate? I have some fine single-malt Scotch.’

‘Well … I guess one wouldn’t hurt.’

‘It never hurt me, although it does now, so you’ll have to pardon me for not joining you. Decaf coffee and a little sweet tea are the strongest drinks I take these days. Stomach woes. Ice?’

Wayland holds up two fingers, and Beecher adds two cubes to the drink with the slow ceremony of old age. Wayland takes a sip, and color immediately dashes into his cheeks. It is the flush, Judge Beecher thinks, of a man who enjoys his tipple. As Wayland sets his glass down, he says, ‘Do you mind if I ask what the hurry is? You’re all right, I take it? Stomach woes aside?’

The Judge doubts if young Wayland takes it that way at all. He’s not blind.

‘A-country fair,’ he says, seesawing one hand in the air and sitting down with a grunt and a wince. Then, after consideration, he says, ‘Do you really want to know what the hurry is?’

Wayland considers the question, and Beecher likes him for that. Then he nods.

‘It has to do with that island we took care of just now. Probably never even noticed it, have you?’

‘Can’t say that I have.’

‘Most folks don’t. It barely sticks up out of the water. The sea turtles don’t even bother with that old island. Yet it’s special. Did you know my grandfather fought in the Spanish-American War?’

‘No, sir, I did not.’ Wayland speaks with exaggerated respect, and Beecher knows the boy believes his mind is wandering. The boy is wrong. Beecher’s mind has never been clearer, and now that he’s begun, he finds that he wants to tell this story at least once before …

Well, before.

‘Yes. There’s a photograph of him standing on top of San Juan Hill. It’s around here someplace. Grampy claimed to have fought in the Civil War as well, but my research – for my memoirs, you understand – proved conclusively that he could not have done. He would have been a toddler, if born at all. But he was quite the fanciful gentleman, and he had a way of making me believe the wildest tales. Why would I not? I was only a child, not long from believing in Kris Kringle and the tooth fairy.’

‘Was he a lawyer like you and your father?’

‘No, son, he was a thief. The original Light-Finger Harry. Anything that wasn’t nailed down. Only, like most thieves who don’t get caught – our current governor might be a case in point – he called himself a businessman. His chief business and chief thievery was land. He bought bug-and gator-infested Florida acreage cheap and sold it dear to folks who must have been as gullible as I was as a child. Balzac once said, “Behind every great fortune there is a crime.” That’s certainly true of the Beecher family, and please remember that you’re my lawyer. Anything I say to you must be held in confidence.’