Flush - Carl Hiaasen [47]
Jasper Jr. wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he knew that the stranger meant business.
“We was only jokin’ around,” he said timidly.
“That right?” The old pirate smiled in a way that caused Jasper Jr. to go pale. Bull whimpered like a puppy but said nothing.
The stranger turned to my sister. “Now it’s your turn, Abbey. How ’bout you let loose of that boy?”
My sister’s eyes got wide at the sound of her name. She released her grip on Bull’s ear, stepped back, and began spitting vigorously into the bushes. Bull straightened up and pressed a fist to his throbbing ear, trying to stanch the invisible bleeding.
“Who are you?” I asked the old man. “How’d you know our names?”
He brushed past me and went up to Jasper Jr., who looked like he desperately needed a bathroom.
“You ever bother these two kids again,” the old man warned him, “and you’ll dearly regret it. Comprende?”
Jasper Jr. nodded shakily.
Bull was actually an inch or so taller than the pirate, but it didn’t help him. The guy walked over and got square in his face. “Pretty summer day, you can’t think of anything better to do than hassle some helpless little girl? That’s flat-out pathetic, son.”
“Helpless? She nearly took my ear!”
“I’d say you got off lucky,” the stranger said with a smile.
He winked at Abbey and me, and jerked a thumb over one shoulder. “Y’all run on home. Hurry up, now.”
“Who are you?” my sister asked.
“Nobody. And that’s the truth.”
He wasn’t kidding around.
“Now get goin’, both of you,” he said. “Me and the boys are gonna finish our chat.”
Abbey and I quickly retrieved our bicycles and took off. As soon as we were out of the trees, we started pedaling for home as fast as we could.
“You ever seen that guy before?” Abbey asked breathlessly.
“I don’t think so.”
“Then how’d he know who we were? Has he been spying on us or something? He looked kind of dangerous, Noah, you think he’s dangerous?”
“Abbey, I honestly don’t know.”
Maybe I should have been creeped out by the strange old pirate, but I wasn’t. For some reason I believed everything he’d said in the woods.
Except the part about him being nobody.
It was an hour before dark when we got out to the islands called the Cowpens. They got the name because Indians supposedly kept sea cows penned up there a long time ago.
Dad tossed the anchor into a deep hole about two hundred yards from the main channel. The Tropical Rescue towboat was much bigger than Dad’s bonefish skiff, so there was plenty of room for Mom to ride along. She’d said yes, too, which was a nice surprise. She sat on the bow with her back to the sun and snapped pictures of us fishing.
Right away I got a couple of decent mangrove snappers, and Dad caught a fat keeper grouper. My sister reeled in a puffer fish that blew itself up into a spiny balloon—she said it looked just like her fourth-grade teacher.
Of course, Abbey and I didn’t mention what had happened that afternoon on the way home from Shelly’s trailer. Dad would have taken off after Jasper Jr., and Mom would have gone to the police to tell them about the strange old man.
Besides, my father liked things quiet and peaceful when he was out on the water. He didn’t go for too much talking. He said it was disrespectful to nature.
After a while we put away our fishing rods and sat down to wait for the sunset. The sky to the west was mostly clear, except for a few wispy clouds and the long foamy contrail from a big military jet. Dad took a seat up front next to Mom, who handed the camera to Abbey. I dangled my legs off the starboard gunwale, where RESCUE was painted in bright orange lettering.
A flock of pelicans floated over us in the shape of a V and kept on flying, straight toward the great Gulf of Mexico. A light breeze was blowing from the southeast, rocking the boat just enough to make us a little drowsy. Abbey nudged me and cut her eyes toward our parents, who were actually holding