Carl Hiassen

Native Tongue

ONE

On July 16, in the aching torpid heat of the South Florida summer, Terry Whelper stood at the Avis counter at Miami International Airport and rented a bright red Chrysler LeBaron convertible. He had originally signed up for a Dodge Colt, a sensible low-mileage compact, but his wife had told him go on, be sporty for once in your life. So Terry Whelper got the red LeBaron plus the extra collision coverage, in anticipation of Miami drivers. Into the convertible he inserted the family – his wife Gerri, his son Jason, his daughter Jennifer – and bravely set out for the turnpike.

The children, who liked to play car games, began counting all the other LeBarons on the highway. By the time the Whelpers got to Snapper Creek, the total was up to seventeen. "And they're all rentals," Terry muttered. He felt like a fool; every tourist in Miami was driving a red LeBaron convertible.

"But look at all this legroom," said his wife.

From the back seat came Jennifer's voice: "Like, what if it rains?"

"Like, we put up the top," Terry said.

His wife scolded him for being sarcastic with their daughter. "She's only eleven, for heaven's sake."

"Sorry," said Terry Whelper. Then louder, over his shoulder: "Jenny, I'm sorry."

"For what?"

Terry shook his head. "Nothing, hon."

It started raining near Florida City, and of course the convertible top wouldn't go up; something was stuck, or maybe Terry wasn't pushing the right button on the dash. The Whelpers sought shelter at an Amoco station, parked near the full-service pumps and waited for the cloudburst to stop. Terry was dying to tell his wife I-told-you-so, sporty my ass, but she wouldn't look up from the paperback that she was pretending to read.

Jennifer asked, "Like, what if it rains all day and all night?"

"It won't," said Terry, trying hard to be civil.

The shower stopped in less than an hour, and the Whelpers were off again. While the kids used beach towels to dry off the interior of the convertible, Gerri passed around cans of Pepsi-Cola and snacks from the gas station vending machine. In vain Terry fiddled with the buttons on the car radio, trying to find a station that played soft rock.

The Whelpers were halfway down Card Sound Road when a blue pickup truck passed them the other way doing at least eighty. Without warning, something flew out of the truck driver's window and landed in the back seat of the LeBaron. Terry heard Jason yell; then Jennifer started to wail.

"Pull over!" Gerri cried.

"Easy does it," said her husband.

The convertible skidded to a halt in a spray of grass and gravel. The Whelpers scrambled from the car, checked themselves for injuries and reassembled by the side of the road.

"It was two guys," Jason declared, pointing down the road. "White guys, too."

"Are you sure?" asked his mother. The family had been on guard for possible trouble from blacks and Hispanics; a neighbor in Dearborn had given them the scoop on South Florida.

"They looked white to me," Jason said of the assailants.

Terry Whelper frowned. "I don't care if they were purple. Just tell me, what did they throw?"

Jennifer stopped crying long enough to say: "I dunno, but it's alive."

Terry said, "For Christ's sake." He walked over to the convertible and leaned inside for a look. "I don't see anything."

Jennifer cried even harder, a grating subhuman bray. "You...don't...believe...me!" she said, sobbing emphatically with each word.

"Of course we believe you," said her mother.

"I saw it, too," said Jason, who rarely took his sister's side on anything. "Try down on the floor, Dad."

Terry Whelper got into the back of the LeBaron, squeezed down to his knees and peered beneath the seat. The children heard him say, "Holy shit," then he leapt out of the car.

"What is it?" asked his wife.

"It's a rat," said Terry Whelper. "The ugliest goddamn rat I ever saw."

"They threw a rat in our car?"

"Apparently."

Jason said, "Too bad we didn't bring Grandpa's gun."

Gerri Whelper looked shaken and confused. "Why would they throw a rat in our car? Is it alive?"

"Very much so," Terry reported. "It's eating from a bag of Raisinets."

"Those are mine!" Jennifer cried.

The Whelpers stood there discussing the situation for fifteen minutes before a highway patrol car pulled up, and a young state trooper asked what was the matter. He listened sympathetically to the story about the rat in the rented LeBaron.

"You want me to call the Avis people?" he asked. "Maybe they'll send another car."

"Actually, we're on a pretty tight schedule," explained Gerri Whelper. "We've got reservations at a motor lodge in Key Largo. They said we had to be there by five or else we lose the rooms."

Jennifer, who had almost stopped crying, said: "I don't care about the motel, I want a different car."

Terry Whelper said to the trooper, "If you could just help me get rid of it."

"The rat?"

"It's a big one," Terry said.

"Well, I can probably shoot it."

"Could you?" Gerri said. "Please?"

The trooper said, "Technically, it's against regulations. But since you're from out of town..."

He stepped out of the patrol car and unsnapped the holster strap on his .357.

"Wow!" said Jason.

Jennifer put her arms around her mother's waist. Terry Whelper manfully directed his brood to move safely out of the line of fire. The state trooper approached the LeBaron with the calm air of a seasoned lawman.

"He's under the seat," Terry advised.

"Yeah, I see him."

The trooper fired three times. Then he bolstered the gun, reached into the convertible and picked up what remained of the creature by what remained of its tail. He tossed the misshapen brown lump into some holly bushes.

"Thank you so much," said Gerri Whelper.

"You say it was a blue pickup. You didn't happen to see the license plate?"

"No," said Terry. He was wondering what to tell Avis about the bullet holes in the floorboard. When the kids climbed back in the rental car, their mother said, "Don't touch any of those raisins! We'll get more candy when we get to the Amazing Kingdom."

"Good, I want a Petey Possum Popsicle," Jennifer said, nearly recovered from the trauma. Jason asked if he could keep one of the empty shell casings out of the state trooper's revolver, and the trooper said sure.

Terry Whelper grimly contemplated the upcoming journey in the red, rat-befouled LeBaron. He felt fog-headed and emotionally drained. To think, just that morning he'd been safe and sound in his bed back in Michigan.

"Don't forget to buckle up," said the trooper, holding the door open.

Terry said, "This ever happen before?"

"What do you mean?"

"This rat business."

"I'm sure it has. We don't hear about everything."

The trooper smiled as he closed Terry Whelper's door. "Now, you all have a nice vacation."

In the blue pickup truck, still heading north, Danny Pogue said, "That was the damnedest thing I ever saw."

Bud Schwartz, who was driving, said, "Yeah, that was some shot. If I do say so."

"There was kids in that car."

"It was just a mouse, for Chrissakes."

"It wasn't a mouse, it was a rat." Danny Pogue poked his partner in the shoulder. "What if those was your kids? You like it, somebody throws a fucking rat in their laps?"

Bud Schwartz glanced at the place on his shoulder where Danny Pogue had touched him. Then he looked back at the highway. His bare bony arms got rigid on the steering wheel. "I wasn't exactly aiming for the kids."

"Were too."

After a few strained moments, Bud Schwartz said, "You don't see that many convertibles anymore."