When the song ended, he turned off the radio. That's when he heard the truck nearby – specifically, the grinding hydraulics of the flatbed being tilted. McGuinn raised his huge black head and barked. Hush! Twilly whispered. He slipped from the car and circled back through the scrub until he gained a clear view of the truck and what the driver was doing. As the incline of the flatbed steepened, the truck's unbound cargo began sliding off the back – assorted barrels, drums, tanks and cylinders, tumbling one after another down a gentle mossy embankment toward the banks of the Peace River, where Twilly Spree had hoped to spend a soothing, restful night.

The driver, whose name Twilly wouldn't learn until he saw it in the paper, didn't bother to watch his own handiwork. He leaned one hip against the fender and smoked a cigarette and waited until the whole load went down the slope. Then he lowered the flatbed, climbed in the cab and drove the five miles home. Vecker Darby was still in the shower when Twilly hot-wired the truck and raced back to the river to retrieve the barrels, drums, tanks and cylinders. Two hours later, when Twilly returned, Vecker Darby was sleeping in his favorite Naugahyde recliner with six empty Coors cans at his feet and the Playboy Channel blaring on the television.

He failed to awaken when one of the bedroom windows was pried open and the screen was cut, and therefore didn't see the broken-off end of a plastic rain gutter being inserted into his house by a stranger clad in Vecker Darby's own canary yellow hazmat moon suit (which Vecker Darby almost never wore but stored faithfully under the seat of his truck, in case of encountering an EPA inspector).

Nor did Vecker Darby awaken during the following ninety minutes, during which approximately 197 gallons of virulent and combustible fluids were funneled from barrels, drums, tanks and cylinders directly into the house. The resulting toxic soup contained the ingredients of xylene, benzyl phythlate, methanol, toluene, ethyl benzene, ethylene oxide and common formaldehyde, any of which would have caused a grave and lasting damage to the Peace River. The risk to an occupied home dwelling was equally dire but would prove far more spectacular, visually.

What finally aroused Vecker Darby from sleep were the caustic fumes. He arose, coughing violently and keenly aware that something was amiss. He fully intended to exit the premises, after first emptying his bloated bladder of beer. Conceivably, he would have survived a brief detour to the bathroom had he not (out of dull, brainless habit) lighted up a Marlboro on the way.

From the stark photograph in the Fort Myers News Press,it appeared that Vecker Darby's house had burned all the way to the slab. He had lived alone in what was once a small orange grove, miles out of town, so that no one became aware of the inferno until it was spotted by the pilot of a commercial jetliner. By the time the fire engines arrived, even the victim's flatbed truck had melted to a skeletal husk. The newspaper article identified Vecker Darby as the owner of a private waste-disposal firm, servicing industrial clients from Sarasota to Naples. Farther down the story, it was noted that the late Mr. Darby had once paid a $275 fine for illegally dumping used hypodermics, surgical dressings and other contaminated hospital waste in a public Dumpster behind a Cape Coral kindergarten.

Twilly Spree read the article about Vecker Darby while standing at a pay phone in the Seminole Indian service plazaon the cross-state expressway known as Alligator Alley. Twilly was waiting to call Desie Stoat at the prearranged hour. She picked up on the second ring.

"Twilly?"

It was the first time he'd heard her say his name, and it gave him an odd, though not uneasy, feeling.

"Yeah, it's me," Twilly said. "Can you talk?"

"Just for a minute."

"Did you inform your husband of the threat?"

"I did, yes."

"And?"

"He doesn't believe it," Desie said.

"Doesn't believe what – that I'll assassinate his dog?"

From Desie's end came a perturbed sigh. "Palmer doesn't believe you've got the dog, Twilly. He doesn't believe there was a kidnapping. He doesn't even believe there's a you.He thinks I flipped my wig and made up the whole story."

"Don't tell me this."

"We had a terrible fight. He wants me to see a shrink."

Twilly said, "But his dog's missing! What does he say about that?"

"He thinks I sent Boodle to my mother's."

"Jesus, what for?"

"All the way to Georgia."

Twilly said, "You're married to a jackass."

Desie said, "I gotta go."

"I'll call back in two days. Meanwhile, tell your husband to watch for a FedEx delivery."

"Oh no. What're you going to do now?"

"Make him a believer," Twilly said.

8

Desirata Brock was born in Memphis and raised in Atlanta. Her mother was a pediatrician and her father was a mechanic for Delta Air Lines. Desie attended Georgia State University with the plan of becoming a school-teacher but was sidetracked in her senior year by her engagement to a professional basketball player named Gorbak Didovlic, who stood a shade over seven feet tall and spoke no English.

Dido, as he was known in the NBA, was a rookie backup center for the Atlanta Hawks. He had spotted Desie on a tennis court and sent one of the Hawks trainers to get her phone number. Dido was considerate enough to bring a Serbo-Croatian interpreter along on their first two dates, but the third time Dido arrived alone at Desie's apartment. They went to dinner and then to a club. Dido was surprisingly garrulous, and although Desie could understand nothing he said, she sensed in his impenetrably consonanted monologues a quaint sort of immigrant innocence. It wouldn't be the last time she misread a man.

Shortly after one in the morning, Desie tapped on the face of her wristwatch to show Dido it was time to leave. He took her home, walked her to the doorstep and kissed her tenderly on the crown of her head, the only part of her body that he could reach with his lips, without dropping to one knee. Then he placed his enormous slender hands on her shoulders and began speaking in a hushed, ardent tone. Desie, who was exhausted, nodded and smiled warmly and murmured all-purpose responses like "That's so sweet," or "I know what you mean." But in fact she hadn't a clue what Dido meant, for the next morning a large diamond engagement ring was delivered to her door. It arrived with a note; two notes actually – Dido's original, scribbled in pencil on notepaper bearing the Reebok logo, and the laborious translation, which said: "I am so very happy you are to be my wife. Our life together will be full of many funs and pleasures. Thank you plenty for saying yes. Your truest love, Gorbak."

Desie was stunned to learn that Dido had proposed marriage, and even more stunned to find out she had accepted. But that's what Dido insisted had happened, and Desie took the man at his word; it seemed romantic, in a quirky sitcom way. She dropped out of college with the idea of accompanying her new fiance on the NBA tour. She imagined that traveling with Dido would be an exciting way to see the country's greatest cities; in particular, she was looking forward to New York, Boston and Chicago. But through his Serbian interpreter (whom the Hawks provided to Dido on a full-time basis). Dido explained to Desie that wives and girlfriends weren't allowed to accompany basketball players on the road. He would, however, be "plenty much happy" if she attended all the home games in Atlanta. "Is better that way," the interpreter added. "Also, you can stay in school and get smartened." Desie wasn't entirely sure it was Dido talking, but she told the interpreter she'd think about it.