"The totem I took from Dorothy. That's why it was so new-looking, it'd been treated?"
"No, the totem's different. It was never touched. What she found is so darn rare. The wood it's made from, it's harder than most metals. Lignum vitae wood, you heard of it? It's so hard and heavy, it won't even float. Who knows how they carved it. Oh… God, look at this."
She had knelt near the sluice screen over a pile of what appeared to be shells and calcified wood. As I got closer, I could see that I was mistaken.
"These are bones. Human bones. Thrown away like trash because it's not what they're looking for. It's not gold. It's not something the son-of-a-bitches can sell."
I watched her touch the bones with a care that approached reverence: a piece of mandible, molars worn flat, presumably from chewing food in this sandy environment. A length of femur scarred with a black fissure: a leg that had broken and healed badly. There were cranial chunks the size of coconut shell, though no intact skulls. There were bones from fingers and feet and scattered rib cages, all dumped in a pile.
The size of some of the bones was distinctive.
I said, "These are the remains of more than one person. The pelvis, the narrow opening, that's an adult male. A pretty big guy. But there're also two, maybe three children."
She was touching the bones one by one, trying to put them into some kind of order. The indifference with which they'd been thrown into a heap seemed to offend her. "That's not normal. It's not common. They could've done something like that, but they would've needed a reason."
"For adults and children to be buried in the same grave?"
"They did it for royalty. Children to serve them in the afterlife. But underwater? A water burial, that's what's not common. Maybe if the guy who died was really powerful and his people feared him, it might make sense. They kill his children and bury them all together. They want to get rid of the whole line forever. I'm just guessing. There's nothing we've found to back me up on this. We'd have to do DNA to make sure." She'd stopped to inspect something. "Oh, shit, look at this-"
What she was holding looked like a chunk of skull, but she told me it was actually something she called a a little god all the way from the Bahamas. Then she added, "You know what these bastards may have found here? They may have stumbled onto the evil guy himself. I think they've dug up Tocayo."
I wasn't amused now.
She didn't say anything for awhile, but kept digging through the mud with her fingers. "That's what makes me so damn mad. If there's a connection between the Caribs and the Calusa, it's not going to be something obvious. There's not going to be a sign that reads, 'Look here!' It's going to be little bits and pieces tied together. Exactly the kind of subtle stuff these jerks stomp on and destroy. They're a type, they really are. It's like they got a sneaky gene."
It took me a moment before I realized she was back on the subject of looters again.
"They've got contempt for everybody and everything but themselves. Bastards like that are ruining our chances of connecting the travel routes. Out of pure selfishness, too." She took up the potsherd again and studied it for a long moment, stuffed it into her pocket. "Goddamn them. Goddamn them all to hell." She looked at me, looked at the excavating equipment. "You know what I'm going to do?"
Some of the color had drained from her face. She was that angry.
I said, "Nope. I know what you should do. Get on that cell phone of yours, call your colleagues at the museum and tell them you've got an emergency situation, get down here. Have them notify the sheriff's department, maybe send a fax. Put it on a formal basis to make certain they light a fire under the right people."
She had an odd expression. It reminded me of a petulant child, the way her lips were pursed, but it was more than that. There was a quality of cold fury. "Oh, that's exactly what I'm going to do. You can bet on that, Marion. But first, I'm going to show them what it's like to be violated. That pile of bones, it used to be a person. A person who lived and breathed, not something to be treated like garbage."
An adult male with children who'd been buried beneath water-I didn't remind her of the implications of that.
I said, "Exactly why we need to get the law involved. Detective Parrish. he'd be the guy. The people who did this are the same ones who used the backhoe on Dorothy. Count on it."
She said, "There you go. All the more reason to give them a taste of their own medicine."
I watched her step carefully over the pile of bones. Watched her take one of the shovels and walk to the front of the backhoe. Then watched her swing hard from the heels and bash out a front headlight. She got a new grip on the shovel, swung just as hard and broke the second one, too.
The vacuum explosion of glass spooked birds in the high tree canopy. Caused them to shriek and chatter as they took flight.
She took a step back, as if savoring her handiwork. "What do you think?"
"I think that was bad judgment. I think it was a very unfortunate thing to do."
"Really."
"Yeah. There's a chance you just tipped them off. They'll shut down the operation, which means the cops won't be able to catch them in the act."
"I didn't think about that. But it's too late now, that's what you're saying?"
"I think they'll notice a couple of smashed headlights."
"In that case, I might as well keep going. As long as I shut the assholes down, why not do it right?" Without waiting for a reply, she walked to the generator and started hammering at it with the shovel. It took her awhile, but the cowling finally flew into pieces.
By now she was breathing heavily; sweating, too, but she had a nice little smile on her face. "All through high school, I played fast pitch softball. Number three hitter. Can you tell?"
"Oh, it shows, it shows. Pretty nice stroke, yeah. I still think you're making a big mistake."
"Know something, Marion? You actually seem almost human when you smile."
I'd never met a woman I'd so immediately disliked, but who, in the space of a few hours, had completely transformed my opinion. I liked her quirky sense of humor and her fierceness. Tomlinson had once described a woman I loved as an "extreme person." Nora reminded me of that. Style and lots of spirit.
"Something about kooks, you people make me smile."
"Weirdo. You keep getting it wrong. I said weirdo." She dropped the shovel and backed away from what was left of the generator. "So tell me something. Are you going to just stand there like a big goof or are you going to help me tear that trough thing apart?"
"Flume. That's what it's called."
"See? The bookish type. You know what it's called, but do you have the balls to help?"
Someone was coming…
We'd been at the dig site for half an hour or so when I heard the distant garble of voices and rhythmic snap of branch that told me people were approaching; walking and talking loudly, which suggested that they didn't know we were on the island. They seemed confident they were alone; were used to having the place all to themselves.
No telling why they hadn't heard the crash of metal and wood as we destroyed their equipment. Probably because they were making so much noise themselves.
Coming at us from the west, the cove closest to Marco, which is why they hadn't seen my boat. They seemed to be traveling along what may have been a path, because they were moving a lot faster than Nora and I'd been able to navigate the island. Probably the path created to transport the equipment. Moving so fast they were almost on us before we had time to react.
When I heard them, I cupped my fingers around Nora's bony arm, pulled her close to me and said, "We've got company. Probably the looters."
She'd heard them in the same instant. Her amber eyes had widened and become rounder, the characteristic reaction of fear as her brain tried to gather sensory data. It is a primitive response, signaled from deep beneath the cerebral cortex, an atavistic reaction. The brain seeks a quick answer so that it may make an ancient, ancient decision: Should we fight? Should we take flight?