Page 111 of Deadline

“Stupid name. No wonder he remembered it.”

Flora had suggested the boat be named CandyCane because they had acquired it on a Christmas Eve. They’d used it to escape following the burglary of a church after its midnight mass when the coffers were full.

The owner of the boat, an embittered veteran of the Vietnam War, and a devotee of Carl’s, was also an atheist. He’d been so delighted over the theft of a church, he had graciously offered his boat to convey them far away from Maryland. He’d taken them all the way down to the Florida Keys.

When the need arose for a boat, the embittered vet, now suffering several forms of cancer, had been willing to oblige h

is hero again. He taught Jeremy basic boating and navigational skills, enough so that he could get himself to Saint Nelda’s from other islands and marinas along the coasts of the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida. Marina slips were rented under assumed names.

“That guy on Saint Nelda’s might be able to describe me,” he said now, “but he can’t identify me as Jeremy Wesson. Besides, I told you, the boat has been wiped clean. They won’t find any trace of me onboard.”

“One hair is all it would take.”

“That’s a worry, but a minor one. They’re still looking at Dawson Scott.”

“He was released.”

“Yeah, but the investigators are ‘reconstructing the time line,’ making me think he hasn’t been altogether cleared.” He gestured to the plastic bags he’d dropped on the table. “I bought a newspaper. The murder has been demoted to page five.”

Carl found the newspaper in one of the bags, opened it to that page, and scanned the text. Jeremy turned on his tablet PC. “If you’d ever learn to navigate the Internet, you wouldn’t need a newspaper anymore.”

“I don’t like computers.”

“By the time you read a newspaper, it’s old news. You get continual updates on the Internet.”

They’d had this conversation many times before. With the exception of firearms, Carl loathed gadgetry. He was leery of anything he saw or read on the Net.

According to the newspaper story, the sheriff’s office was being tight-lipped about the progress of its investigation. Deputy Tucker was quoted. He used the same hackneyed phrases that every law enforcement officer in the country uses whenever what he is saying, basically, is that they don’t have jack shit.

Dawson Scott had cooperated with the investigation. They hadn’t made an arrest, but were analyzing evidence. They were following a new lead. Blah, blah. Carl knew that whenever a lead petered out and cops were stuck, they always lied and said they had a new one to follow.

Jeremy had been reading aloud off the newspaper’s website, and the write-up on it more or less matched what Carl had just read. “So much for constant updates,” he said snidely.

“But here we get a color photo, too. The newspaper didn’t even have a black-and-white.”

Carl glanced at the tablet from over Jeremy’s shoulder. “Tucker is a tub o’ guts,” he remarked, pointing to the potbellied deputy pictured standing in the foreground of a group of uniformed officers.

Then, in the motion of turning away, he said, “Wait! Give me that.” Roughly he snatched the tablet out of Jeremy’s hands. “How do I enlarge the picture?”

“Tap…”

The photograph filled the screen. Carl looked hard at a man standing in the background. Although a deputy in a cowboy hat was blocking one half of his face from the camera, instant recognition suffused Carl with feverish heat. He clenched his teeth and sailed the tablet across the room like a Frisbee.

“Hey! What’s the matter?”

“I knew it! I sensed it! Didn’t I tell you something was out of joint?”

“What? What do you see?”

With unmitigated hatred, Carl said, “FBI Special Agent Gary Headly.”

Diary of Flora Stimel—Christmas Day, 1993

I’m so blue, I can barely stand it. We stole from a church last night, which I’m pretty sure means I’ll go to hell. Of course I already knew I would, because I’ve killed people. Well, helped kill people. I’ve been there when Carl killed, and I think that’s the same as doing it myself.

Carl had me go into the church before the midnight service started. I watched people as they came in. Mommies and daddies and grandfolks. Some of the children were sleepy, being as the service started at 11:15, way past their bedtime. Others were excited and couldn’t sit still. I guess they were anxious to get home and into bed so Santa Claus could come.

It just made my heart ache, because I never got to spend a Christmas Eve with Jeremy and play Santa for him, and now he’s too old. He’s a senior in high school! I wish that just once I could have watched his face on Christmas morning when he found his presents under the tree.