“Wes, these are perfect for—”
“No question,” I say, finally getting caught up in her excitement. Still, that doesn’t mean I’m putting her at risk. Checking to make sure we’re alone, I turn left, toward the center of the lot, where a glowing white flagpole is lit up by floodlights and serves as the graveyard’s only light source. But from where we are, surrounded by trees in the corner of the far end zone, all its pale glow does is cast angled shadows between the branches and across the path.
“You’re slowing down,” she says, grabbing the umbrella and tugging me forward.
“Lisbeth, maybe you should—”
“I’m not going anywhere,” she insists, doubling our pace and glancing to the right, where a skinny bone-white military headstone has a crest that reads:
CPL
TRP E
13 REGT CAV
SP AM WAR
1879–1959
“He’s buried near people from the Spanish-American War?” she whispers. “You sure he’s not in the new section?”
We’d seen it when we first drove up. On our far left, past the floodlit flagpole, past the thousands of silhouetted crosses, crooked headstones, and family crypts, was a wide-open field dotted with flat ceremonial markers. Like most Florida cemeteries, Woodlawn learned the hard way what happens when a hurricane hits a graveyard. Nowadays, the newly dead get only flat markers set flush into the earth. Unless, of course, you know someone big enough to tug some strings.
“Trust me, he’s not in the new section,” I say. The further we go down the path, the more clearly we hear a new sound in the air. A hushed murmur, or a whisper. Dozens of whispers — coming and going — as if they’re all around us.
“No one’s here,” Lisbeth insists. But on our left, behind a 1926 headstone with a marble set of rosary beads dangling from the front, there’s a loud scrape like someone skidding to a stop. I spin to see who’s there. The headstones surround us. The rain continues to dribble down our backs and soak our shoulders, its mossy smell overwhelming the stench of wet dirt. Behind us, the rumble of thunder starts to — no, not thunder.
“Is that…?”
The rumbling gets louder, followed by the deep belch of an air horn. I wheel back toward the meatball shrubs just as the ding-ding-ding of the crossing gate pierces the air. Like a glowing bullet through the darkness, a freight train bursts into view, slicing from right to left, parallel with the low fence that runs along the back of the graveyard.
“We should keep going!” Lisbeth yells in my ear, leading us deeper down the path. The train continues to rumble behind us, taking all sound with it, including the rustling and scraping that would let us know someone’s coming.
What about in there? Lisbeth pantomimes as we pass an aboveground crypt with stained-glass double doors. The crypt is one of the largest here — nearly as big as a dumpster.
“Forget it,” I say, yanking her by the elbow and taking the lead. She doesn’t realize how close we are to our goal. Three graves down from the crypt, the path dead-ends at the trunk of the enormous banyan tree, which, during the day, shields every nearby grave from the battering sun. That alone makes this one of the most select areas in the entire cemetery. President Manning made the call himself and personally secured the double plot of land that now holds the imported Italian black marble headstone with the slightly curved top and the stark white carved letters that read:
RONALD BOYLE
TREASURED HUSBAND, FATHER, SON
WHOSE MAGIC WILL ALWAYS BE WITH US
“This is him?” Lisbeth asks, spotting the name and almost crashing into me from behind.
It was Manning’s last gift to his friend — a final resting place that kept Boyle out of the land of flat markers, and instead put him next to a general from World War II, and across from one of Palm Beach’s most respected judges from the 1920s. It was vintage Palm Beach. Even in death, honchos still want the best seat in the house.
Behind us, the train fades and the sound of crickets returns, engulfing us on all sides. I just stand there, staring at Boyle’s grave in the dim light.
“Y’okay?” Lisbeth asks.
She thinks I’m afraid. But now that we’re here… now that I know there isn’t a body underneath this stone… and most important, that I never put him there… My fists tighten as I reread the epitaph. Like everything in their lives, it’s polished and pretty — and a festering tumor of lies. For eight years, Manning — my boss, my mentor — for eight years, he knew I was eating shit, but he never once took it off my plate. He just served it. Day after day. With a perfect presidential grin.
My fists clench. Then I feel Lisbeth’s hand on the small of my back. She doesn’t say a word. She doesn’t need to.
I take one last look around the empty cemetery. For eight years, I’ve been afraid. That’s what death does when it haunts you. But right now, as I stand here in the soft rain and bleeding darkness, I’m ready to meet my ghost. And so is Lisbeth.
We take our separate places, just like we discussed. Lisbeth looks down at her watch. All we have to do is wait.
100
Outta there! Now!” the guard yelled as he gripped the back of Rogo’s shirt.
“Get off me!” Rogo shouted back, tugging free and running deeper into the poorly lit room. Two steps later, motion sensors kicked in, flooding the room with the buzz of fluorescent light. On Rogo’s left was a single bed with a beat-up oak headboard, immaculately folded white sheets, and a Bible sitting on a fuzzy, olive-green wool blanket. Rounding out the cheap motel decor was a mismatched white Formica side table and a faux-wood dresser that held a pile of old magazines and a ten-year-old twelve-inch TV. To the right, oak double doors opened into what looked like a conference room, complete with a long mahogany table and half a dozen modern black leather chairs. None of it made sense. Why’s a public bathroom connect to a separate bedr—?
From behind, Rogo felt a sharp tug on his shirt. He again tried to pull away, but this time, the guard was ready, yanking him backward toward the bathroom.
“Y’know how much trouble you just got me into?!” the guard shouted.
“I was just — the door was open—”
“Bull… shit,” the guard insisted, whipping Rogo around and sending him smashing face-first into the room’s half-closed door, which slammed into the tile wall as he shoved Rogo into the bathroom.
“Are you nuts?!” Rogo screamed, twisting to break free. The guard held tight, marching him back through the men’s room and toward the door to the hallway. A full head taller than Rogo, he gripped Rogo’s wrists and held them behind his back.
“I’m a lawyer, you stupid monkey. By the time I’m done suing, I’m gonna own this place and turn it into an Arby’s!”
As Rogo stumbled from the bathroom into the salmon marble hall, the guard shoved him to the right, back toward the lobby’s white frosted-glass doors.
“Dreidel, tell him who you are!” Rogo called out, his voice echoing up the hall.
“W-What’d you do?” Dreidel asked, already stepping backward, away from the check-in desk.
“Don’t move!” the guard warned Dreidel.
Panicking, Dreidel spun around and took off for the sliding doors.
“No… don’t!” the guard shouted.
Too late.
Before Dreidel even registered the words, his foot hit the sensor mat. But it wasn’t until the doors started to slide open that Rogo noticed shadows on the other side of the frosted glass.
With a hushed swoosh, the doors yawned open, revealing a thin bald man with chiseled cheeks and a crusted-up bloody nose. Slumped over his shoulder was a fit blond man whose head was drooped down, unconscious. His shirt was soaked with what looked like blood.