“You talked to him?” I asked.

“He was quite polite and hid his confusion.”

“Confusion at what?”

“You favor Mama, looks-wise, I favor sweet old Da … but there is a resemblance between us, n’est pas?”

“He recognized you?”

“He’s never met me. He saw a ghost in my cheekbones, my jawline. We both have rather sturdy jaws, right? And dazzling smiles, like the one I’m wearing now.”

44

I called Harry’s cell phone. He answered on the sixth ring. “You don’t usually call when working, so I expect you have the day off.”

“Nope, I’m working. Tell me what you see.”

“Uh, what?”

“What you’re looking at, Harry. Your vista.”

“Is this a game?”

“It’s dead serious, accent on dead, which is why I’m so serious.”

“What’s going on, Carson?” His turn to be serious.

“Are you in Key West, Harry? I know you were there a few days ago. Something to do with that old preacher who’s giving up the ghost – Schrum.”

A pause. “How do you know that?”

“My crystal ball. And if you don’t ’fess up I’m going to send the flying monkeys after you.”

“I’m not in Key West, Carson. I’m in Central Florida.”

“How are things at Hallelujah Jubilee?”

A perplexed pause. “OK, Carson. What the hell is going on?”

“Remember what Clair used to say about synchronicity?”

“There are no coincidences,” he recited, “because everything links in a fantastical web so far beyond human knowledge it’d be like an ant walking across Einstein’s calculations on special relativity. The ideas are supporting the insect, but so far beyond the ant’s comprehension that—”

“We’ve got a freaky situation here, brother, and you being at Hallelujah Jubilee has dropped another ant on the calculations. Wanna get together for a drink in a few minutes?”

“Where are you?”

“Miami.”

“A few minutes? We’re two hundred miles apart.”

“Where you want to meet?” I looked at my watch. “Let’s say in forty-five minutes.”

I’d banked on luck and got it: the departmental chopper was free and twenty minutes later I was watching the Everglades sweep past a half-mile below, green and blue and blazing with reflected sunlight. In no time I was over farmland and roads and clusters of housing developments, close enough to earth to see heads crane upward as we roared northward in the Bell chopper.

Harry had suggested a bar-restaurant in St Cloud, about ten miles from where he was staying. There was a small airstrip in town, and I jumped from the chopper, jogged fifty paces, and was in the mighty bear hug of my amigo.

“You’re on a case that has to do with the park? Jeez, Carson, what the hell—”

“First let’s get somewhere I can grab a brew and a burger. A nap would be nice, too, but I don’t think that’s in the plan.”

We jumped in a big bright Hummer and five minutes later were in Joker’s Lounge, a single-story block building with knotty-pine walls, tables steadied by matchbooks, a television playing sports over a Formica-topped bar, swiveling stools that creaked, a pinball machine beside a jukebox … Plato’s original form for the American roadhouse. The grilled cheeseburgers were in the concept, too – thick and dripping and if you ate more than two a week you’d need your veins flushed with muriatic acid.

When beef and grease and beer had refreshed my brain, I laid out the details to Harry.

“Stoned?” he said, eyes wide. “Jesus. You mean like—”

“Pelted with rocks large enough to break bones, crack skulls. The pain would have been excruciating.”

“All of the women worked at Hallelujah Jubilee?”

“We have proof, though the head dog lied about two of them. I think he would have lied about all three, but we were ahead of him on one vic.”

“What did the women do, Carson?”

“Part of the park’s schtick is having actors in period costume. Robes and sandals and whatnot. People take pictures … a lot of them.”

He popped a fry in his mouth and nodded. “The phones and cameras never stop. But how do you know?”

“Some of it came from a guy named Hayes Johnson. For the rest Belafonte and I took a trip on the Google express.”

“Johnson? Never heard of him.”

“Johnson’s the CEO of the network and seems awfully camera-shy for a business leader, but Belafonte dug up a shot from an annual meeting three years back.”

I pulled my iPad and called up a photo of a big guy behind a podium, smiling like his racehorse just cinched the Kentucky Derby.

“Saw the guy once.” Harry nodded. “But was never introduced. He was present when I first dropped Owsley off in Key West. How’d you know I was there, by the way?”

I’d never told Harry about Jeremy’s Byzantine trip to semi-normalcy in Key West; as far as he knew, my brother was still hiding in Kentucky. Now wasn’t the time to get sidetracked.

I said, “That’s one I’ll have to hold close for a bit.”

Harry looked into my eyes and nodded, knowing I’d have a reason. “What do you need from me?” he asked without losing a beat.

“You seeing anything, or are you always behind a wheel?”

“I’m seeing stuff that doesn’t make a lot of sense. There’s a building, about five stories tall, lashed together quickly. Owsley goes there every day. I think it’s some form of religious gig.” Harry told me about the Owsley guy’s talking-in-tongues act with the big box.

“Weird. What’s in the building … you know?”

A grin, but only in Harry’s eyes. “I’m not supposed to.”

“You creeped the place, right?”

“Last night. It was too much to resist.”

“You found something interesting?”

He shook his head. “Nothing but parts for a ride, some streamlined thing. Track. Usual construction equipment.”

“Owsley’s doing all that ritual stuff for a damn ride?”

Harry closed his eyes and held his hands together as if in prayer. “May God in Heaven fulfill abundantly the prayers which are pronounced over you and your boats and equipment …”

“Ah,” I said. “Got it.” Harry was reciting from the Blessing of the Fleet, an annual event in Bayou La Batre, Alabama, the shrimp boats gathering for an invocation against harm, the blessing delivered with much pomp and majesty by a Roman Catholic priest. Harry was saying different strokes for different folks, just in his own inimitable way.

“I also saw a bit of curiousness a couple days back,” he said. “There’s a park worker named Tawnya – you only get first names here – who’s all smiles and sunshine and happy days forever, but I saw her bitch-slap a low-level worker and dole out a mean-ass cussing.”

“Low-level like what … janitor? Landscaper?”

Harry leaned forward, his voice low. “No, brother … get this: the person she was kicking around was one of the role players.”

I stared. “Like my three victims.”

“Seems so.”

“Can you keep your eyes open, Harry? Maybe even get a little, uh, proactive.”

“I don’t have the shield,” Harry said, meaning no law-enforcement membership, and thus no protection from getting caught in places he shouldn’t be. Still, he followed his final bite of burger with a wink. “But I’ll do what I can.”

“Amos nearly went outside, Hayes.” Uttleman pinched his thumb and forefinger a half-inch apart. “It was that close.”

The pair stood on the back porch of the Schrum house, the security guard sent to fetch sandwiches, more to keep him away than for hunger.

“You said he was drunk?”

“Plastered. He wanted to confess.” Uttleman closed his eyes. “He said he was burdened.”

“Andy stopped him?”

“He stood there in his little-boy pajamas and convinced Amos to stay inside.”

Johnson shook his head and watched a gull flick through the blue sky above.

“How?”

“You ever see how the kid’s eyes light up when Amos steps into the room? Andy worships Amos.”

“So do a lot of people,” Johnson scoffed. “Donations are up thirty-seven per cent.”