"MacDonald, John - Travis McGee 06 - Bright Orange for the Shroud" - читать интересную книгу автора (MacDonald John D)

"The simplest thing in the world. Crane Watts happened to mention him. Watts won't ever be sure he didn't. Let me see. Watts said Waxwell might know where to locate the woman they'd used last time."

"But if he does, that's no good. Wilma knows you." "I have a feeling he won't take me at face value." "He'll get in touch with Watts, won't he?" "And raise hell. Hell conditioned by the idea that maybe there's another pigeon to be plucked. Anyway, it never works to line it all out ahead of time. It's better to stay loose. And go in any direction that looks good." 'Tomorrow?" "I'll run over to Goodland in the reliable Ratfink. Alone."

I

the milky early mist of Sunday morning, the Gulf was placid, so I went out the pass. I looked back as The Busted Flush dwindled, looking smaller and smaller against the beach, blurring into the mist. Her lines are not lovely. She is a burly lady, and she waddles. But she has, on some intensely festive occasions, slept more than I bothered to count. In fact I have a treasured memory of one leisurely trip up the IntercoastalЧ destination, a big birthday binge for an old friend at his place at Fernandina Beach. On the third morning out I came across a sandy little girl up on the bow, sunning herself in a cute little suit, painting her toenails, whistling with great precision a series of riffs I recognized as Ruby Braff improvisation. She had a great figure, and an ugly charming buggy little face, and I had never seen her before in my life. She looked up at me in pert inquiry and asked me who in the world happened to own this darling boat, because she had just decided to buy it.

There was a crowd aboard again. A crowd of two, and I had left Chook to brief Arthur when he got out of the shower.

I turned south, running a half mile off shore, watching the

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day brighten as the mist began to burn off. I again had the clothes and gear of the fisherman and almost became one when I saw an acre of water being slashed white ahead of me and further off shore, birds working over it. I ran at it, killed the motor at the point where momentum drifted me to the outer fringe of the activity. I peered down into the green and saw, a few feet below the surface, a combat squad of big bonita wheeling to hit back into the bait school. School bonita run all of a size, and allowing for the magnification of the water, and my momentary glimpse of them, they had to be upwards of six pounds. All they would do would be tear up my light spinning gear on the chance of boating something inedible. They are the great underrated game fish of the Gulf coast. On light gear, a six pound bonita is the equal of a twenty pound king mackerel. There is one thing they all do. Work them, with great effort, close to the boat, and they give you one goggle-eyed stare, rum and go off in a run every bit as swift and muscular as the first one. And they will keep doing that until, on light tackle, they die in the water. It seems a poor reward for that much heart in any living thing, particularly when the meat is too black, bloody, oily and strong to make edible. Bonefish quit. Barracuda dog it. Tarpon are docile once they begin to show their belly in the slow rolls of exhaustion. But the only way you can catch a live bonita is to use gear hefty enough to horse him home before he can kill himself.

I continued south, past Big Marco Pass, and put on dark glasses against the increasing glare. I have ample pigment in my hide, but a short supply in the iris. Pale eyes are a handicap in the tropics. I passed what was Collier City once upon a time, then cut inside around Caxambas. The dozers were working even on a Sunday morning, orange beetles making expensive homesites upon the dizzy heights of the tallest land south of ImmokaleeЧbluffs all of fifty and sixty feet above sea level. I checked my chart, went around the indicated islands, and came in view of the mild and quiet clutter of Goodland, houses, trailers, cottages, shacks spread without plan along the protected inner shore, beyond a narrow beach of dark sand and rock and shell.

I cut to idle and went pooling in toward a rickety gas dock.

Q7

Beyond it was an improvised boat yard with so many pieces of elderly hull scattered around the area, it looked as if they had spent years trying to build a boat by trial and error and hadn't made it yet.

I tied up. The pumps were padlocked. A gnarled old party sat mending a gill net with hands like mangrove roots. "Do any good?" he asked.

"All I saw was bonita outside. Didn't mess with them."

He looked at the sky, spat. "Won't be much now till near sundown. Big snook came in right under this here dock last night, popping loud as a man slapping his hands. Joe Bradley, he got one upwards of eighteen pound."

"That's a good snook."

"If'n you don't know how it used to be around these parts. You want gas? Stecker don't unlock till ten Sundays."

"There's a man here I was told to look up. Will my gear be okay if I leave it right there?"

"Sure. Who you looking for?"

"A man named Waxwell."

He grunted, pulled a knot tight, spat again. "There's Wax-wells spread all the way from here to Forty Mile Bend. There's Waxwells in Everglades City, Copeland, Ochopee, and, far as I know, a couple way up to La Belle. When they breed it's always boy babies, and they breed frequent."

"Boone Waxwell?"

His grin was broad, showing more gum than teeth. "Now that one is a Goodland Waxwell, and he could be to his place, which isn't too likely of a Sunday morning, and if he is at his place they's a good chance he got a ladyfriend visiting, and if he's there and he don't, it's still a time of day he could get mean about anybody coming to visit. Come to think on it, there isn't anything he won't get mean about, one time or another."

"I won't let him hurt my feelings."

"You look of a size to temper him down some. But be careful on one thing, or size won't do you no good atall. What he does, he comes smiling up, nice as pie, gets close enough and kicks a man's kneecap off, then settles down to stomping him good. A few times he's done it so good, he's had to go way back into the Park until things quieted down. A couple times