"Hello there."

Krimmler stiffened, his eyes opening to a leery squint. "Who're you?"

It was a young man with a deep weathered tan and sun-bleached hair. He wore a navy sweatshirt and jeans, but no shoes. His feet were caramel brown.

"Just a tourist," he said.

"You don't look like a tourist."

"Really. Then what do I look like?" The young man gave a grin that put Krimmler on edge.

"All I meant," said the engineer, "was, you know, the suntan. Any darker and you'd be speaking Jamaican. Whereas most of the tourists we see around here are white as a fish belly."

"Well, I'm what you call a professional tourist," the young man said, "so I'm out in the sunshine all the time. What're you guys doing?" He jerked his chin in the direction of the surveyors. "Is this for that big golfing resort everybody's talking about?"

Krimmler said, "You play golf?"

"Where do you think I got this tan?"

From the young man's air of casual confidence, Krimmler sensed that he might be living off a trust fund, or possibly socked-away dope earnings. Krimmler began to address him not as a scruffy pest but as a potential customer and future member of the Shearwater Island Country Club.

"We're building two championship courses," Krimmler said, "one designed by Nicklaus, the other by Raymond Floyd."

The young man whistled, turning to gaze at the island. "Two golf courses," he marveled. "Where you gonna put 'em?"

"Oh, there's plenty of space," Krimmler said, "once you rearrange a few trees."

"Ah." The young man looked back, again with the odd weightless grin.

"We'll have condos, town houses and custom estate homes," Krimmler went on. "The fairway lots are selling like Beanie Babies. You're interested, they've got some color handouts at the sales trailer."

"Raymond Floyd, you say?"

"That's right. He's doing the south course."

"Well, I'm impressed," the young man said. "And all this?"

"For the new bridge," said Krimmler. "Four lanes. Sixty-foot clearance."

"But isn't this the one I read about in the paper?"

"Naw."

"The one the governor just vetoed?"

"Forget what you see in the news," Krimmler told the young man. "The bridge is a done deal. The resort's a done deal. We're good to go."

"Is that right."

"Soon," Krimmler said, with a wink. "Real soon."

He heard a cry and, wheeling, saw one of the surveyors huffing after a big black dog. The dog somehow had gotten its leash caught up with the instrument tripod and was dragging the thing across the pavement like a crippled mantis.

"Hey, stop!" Krimmler yelled. "Stop, goddammit!"

The tan young man stepped away from Krimmler's side and broke into a run. He chased down the dopey dog and untangled the tripod, which he returned with its broken Sokkia transit to the slow-footed surveyor. Krimmler got there in time to hear the young man apologizing, and to watch him press a crisp wad of cash into the surveyor's palm. Then off they went, the black dog at the young man's heels, crossing the old wooden bridge toward the island.

"Hey!" Krimmler called brightly after them. "Don't forget to swing by the sales office and pick up a brochure!"

18

When Krimmler returned to the travel trailer, he was alarmed to see lights in the windows. Approaching the front door, he heard a throb of excited voices.

She's stabbing me! The crazy ... ugh! ... bitch is ... agh! ... stabbing me!!!

Calm down. Please try to calm down.

Stay calm? There's a fondue ... ugh! ... fork in my ass! HELP!

Sir., we've got units on the way.

No, Debbie, not there! You promised, NOT THERE! Yaaaggghh – Jesus, look whatchu done now! You crazy damn bitch!!

Krimmler was turning to flee when the trailer door flew open. In a blur he was tackled, dragged inside and heaved like a sack of fertilizer onto the sour carpet. He expected to behold chaos, a deranged harpy with a bloody cheese fork poised over a dying boyfriend ...

But the only person in Krimmler's Winnebago was a powerfully built man with blond hair, which had been moussed into peculiar white-tipped spikes. The man wore a houndstooth suit and brown leather shoes with zippers down the ankles, like Gerry and the Pacemakers might have worn in 1964.

The interior of the trailer showed no evidence of a savage stabbing. The cries and shrieks of crazed Debbie's victim had come from Krimmler's stereo speakers. The spiky-haired stranger twisted down the volume knob and positioned himself in a captain's chair, which he spun to face Krimmler.

"I work for Mr. Clapley," the man said. He had a deceptively gentle voice.

"I work for Mr. Clapley, too." Krimmler began to rise from the floor, but the spiky-haired man produced a handgun and motioned him to be still.

"You were talking to a guy this morning. Barefoot guy with a dog," said the stranger. "Over by the bridge, remember?"

"Sure."

"I was watching. Who was he?"

Krimmler shrugged. "Just some tourist. He wanted to know about the new golf courses. I sent him to the sales office."

"What else?"

"That's it. Why'd you bust into my place? Can't I get up now?"

"Nope," said the man in the houndstooth suit. "Did he ask about the new bridge?"

Krimmler nodded.

"Well?"

"I told him it was a done deal."

"Why'd you tell him that?"

"Because he acted like he had money," Krimmler said. "Mr. Clapley isstill in the business of selling property, isn't he?"

The stranger popped a cassette out of Krimmler's stereo console. He placed it in an inside pocket of his suit jacket, all the time keeping the gun on display in his other hand. Krimmler wondered why Robert Clapley would employ such a thug. Possibly the stranger was lying about that, though it didn't really matter at the moment. Krimmler was unfailingly respectful of firearms.

"I never saw this goddamned guy before," he told the spiky-haired stranger. "He didn't say his name, and I didn't think to ask."

"Is he with a woman?"

"I got no idea."

"Yesterday I saw a couple in a Buick station wagon crossing to the island," the stranger said. "They had a dog in the car."

"Anything's possible," Krimmler said restlessly. "Look, I told you everything I know."

"Well, he acts like a troublemaker. Didn't he strike you as a troublemaker?" The man went into Krimmler's refrigerator for a beer. "Was he pissed when you told him about the new bridge?"

"Not that I could tell," Krimmler said. "Why the hell would he care about a bridge?"

The man with the gun was silent for a few moments. Then he said: "It's a helluva sound system you got in this cozy little tin can."

"Yeah. Thanks."

"You can actually hear the people out of breathon those tapes. You can hear them wheezing and gasping and shit. It's just amazing what's possible on a first-rate sound system."

"The speakers are brand-new," Krimmler said. "From Germany."

The spiky-haired man opened the beer and took a swallow. "So. This troublemaker with the black dog – where would he be staying on the island?"

"If he's not camping out, then he's probably at Mrs. Stinson's bed-and-breakfast."

"And where's that?"

Krimmler gave directions. The man holstered his gun. He told Krimmler it was all right to get up off the floor.

"Can I ask your name?"

"Gash."

"You really work for Clapley?"

"I do. Ask him yourself." The stranger turned for the door.

"That tape you were listening to," said Krimmler, "was that for real? Was that you on there, calling for help?"

The man laughed – a creepy and unsettling gurgle that made Krimmler sorry he'd asked.