"Mr. Walker the bone-fisherman," Ordell said, "he take me all the way to the other side of the island where you see jes rocks there and sand and the waves coming in. Nothing. He say to me, Here. I say, Here what? He say, Here is some place else. Here is as far as some place else is ... You understand what I'm saying?"
"That's wild," Melanie said. She saw Cedric Walker shake his head. "Didn't believe me, did you?"
"Wasn't I didn't believe you," Ordell said. "I had to satisfy my mind. You understand? Now put your top on, we gonna go some place."
They drove over to Lucaya in Cedric Walker's '72 Vega, Ordell looking at the hotels and the gambling casino and the cars driving on the wrong side of the parkway, Melanie looking down at the way Cedric Walker's leg filled out his light-gray pants and the vein that popped in his forearm when he worked the gearshift.
At the marina, walking along the cement to Mr. Walker's 20-foot Boston Whaler, Melanie said, "There isn't any place around here you have to get to by boat."
"To get out in the ocean you do," Ordell said.
He and Melanie sat aft on green life-preserver cushions while Mr. Walker stood amidships at the wheel, his face raised to the spray, enjoying it, the square bow of the Whaler slapping through the waves as they headed out Bell Channel, passing the charter boats coming in for the day. Melanie didn't say anything until Ordell stood up and took her by the arms. She said, "What the fuck--hey, come on, don't!" as he threw her over the side.
Cedric maintained his heading for a hundred meters or so, then brought the whaler around in a wide arc, into the sundown sky beyond Pinder Point, cut the revs to a low rumble and let the boat drift toward the head of hair glistening in the water.
When the boat was close, Ordell, leaning on the gunwales, said, "You want to tell me where the man's at?"
In the car, driving back to Freeport, Melanie sat in the back seat with Ordell. He said he didn't mind, she could get him wet. She was a good girl. She was a nice big girl, all clean and shiny from her swim in the ocean. Yes, she could take them to this friend's house where Mr. Dawson was spending the day, sort of getting away from everything. Or, Ordell offered, they could go back to Mr. Dawson's place and call him, tell him to come home, huh? That sounded like the way to do it, instead of walking in somebody's house not knowing who was home. At Fairway, Mr. Walker waited in the car while Ordell and Melanie went up to the beige-and-white top-floor apartment with the playpen sofa.
Ordell looked around while Melanie put on her caftan and pulled the string bikini out from under it. "Like magic," Ordell said. "Go ahead, call him."
"I've got something to tell you first," Melanie said, "I think's gonna mess up your scam, but don't blame me, okay? It's the timing."
"What's the timing?" Ordell said.
"He filed for divorce two days before he came down."
Ordell waited. "Yeah?"
"And you tell him he'll never see his wife again?" Ordell didn't move or say anything.
"He doesn't want to see her again," Melanie said. "You're doing him a favor. You're saving him about a hundred grand a year in alimony."
"He say that?"
"He doesn't have to, I know him. He's telling himself right now there's nothing he can do. If you kill his wife it won't be his fault. You told him not to go to the cops; that's one out, he can say he was worried about her safety, right? And legally, he can tell himself he's not supposed to deal with extortionists. So if he does nothing he's free and clear."
"The man come right out and say he want his wife dead?"
"He won't say anything. He wants it to happen without his thinking about it."
"Now wait a minute"--Ordell had to slow it down--"what if we let her go?"
Melanie shrugged. "He goes home and gets his divorce." She paused. "But where does that leave you? He won't involve the cops, for reasons you undoubtedly know. But she'll call them in a minute. Then where are you?"
"She hasn't seen us."
"Come on," Melanie said, "you don't know what she's seen, or what she might've heard. You've got guys working with you--maybe she identifies one of them, and if the cops've got any kind of sheet on you I'll bet you're picked up in two days."
Ordell kept staring at her. "You ever been busted?"
"Just dope a couple of times. Possession."
"But you know a few things, been there and back, huh? And what you're wondering most," Or-dell said, "is what's gonna happen to you."
Melanie smiled, giving him an easy shrug, and moved to the marble-top bar. "It passed through my mind You want a drink?"
"Something with rum," Ordell said.
"Rum and coconut and pineapple," Melanie said and got busy, pouring ingredients and crushed ice into a blender. Ordell came over next to her, put a hand on her hip and let it slide over her nice young fanny.
"So where are we? Seeing how you're way ahead."
"Well, I presume you've looked into simple extortion," Melanie said. "He pays or you report him to the IRS."
"I don't see we could prove anything."
"No, but you could probably dump a shitload of trouble on him and some very bad publicity." "What's that worth?"
"Well, first of all you're out of your skull asking for a million bucks. He may have it, but there's no way in the world you could get that much transferred without the Bahamian government getting involved. I mean somebody in the government, in finance. They'll tie you up so tight with authorizations and fees, you'd be lucky to get a few thousand off the island, if that."
"It's snowing out," Ordell said.
"Hey, you're not getting it anyway, you might as well quit dreaming and be realistic. So okay, it looks like a bummer. But maybe--and that's all I'm saying--maybe you can still get something out of it. I mean you're this far, it'd be a shame if you didn't."
Ordell rubbed her nice can gently. "Is this my new partner I'm talking to?"
"I'd just as soon keep it you do your thing and I do mine," Melanie said. She handed him a frothy drink in a brandy snifter the size of a bowl. "I don't know what my thing is yet. It may be long term, I may settle for a little scratch and move on, I don't know. But I'm willing to cooperate with you because I like you and because I don't want to end up in the fucking ocean. It's that simple."
"Cooperate how?" Ordell sipped his drink, leaving a trace of white froth on his mustache. Melanie wiped it off with the tip of her finger and licked it.
"I was thinking something like--how about if you disappeared for a hundred grand? I think I could talk something around that figure and get him to think it's his idea. For his peace of mind."
"Isn't a million, is it?" Ordell said.
"No, it isn't a sack of wet shit either," Melanie said.
"I got a partner, few others, have to pay them their wages."
"Well, how you handle that, it's up to you. You could pick up the money--you could be in Paris the same day, let your friends collect unemployment. That's up to you," Melanie said. "The only thing he would have to be sure of before, I mean Mr. Dawson, he'd have to be sure he's never gonna see his wife again."
Ordell put the drink down on the marble top and passed the back of his hand over his mouth, taking his time.
"For the hundred grand," Ordell said, "you're not saying disappear. You're saying kill the man's wife."
"Unh-unh. I'm saying, when he learns his wife's dead, you get a hundred grand. Maybe even a hundred and a half. I'm not saying you have to do it," Melanie said. "Isn't there someone you could call?"
Chapter 16
THURSDAY MORNING, the first couple of times Ordell phoned Richard's house, Louis answered and Or-dell hung up hearing his voice. The third time he called, by then about twelve-thirty, Richard answered. This was the Freeport-Detroit conversation:
Ordelclass="underline" Finally. Where's Louis?