Adrift on St. John (24 page)

Just past the wooden park sign at the top of the hill overlooking Cruz Bay, a truck taxi turned into Pesce’s gravel driveway to let off a passenger in a flower-print sundress. Hannah Sheridan climbed gracefully out of the truck’s back bed and paid the driver. Then, she skipped past a long black limo parked in the road’s easement and continued up the stone steps leading into the restaurant’s Mediterranean stone building.

The hostess nodded immediate recognition as soon as Hannah gave her name and directed her through a mahogany-walled bar to the dining area on the flat landing spanning the restaurant’s oceanfront side.

The tables were, predictably, filled with several out-of-town real estate types. With so many patrons sporting casual business attire and numerous leather-bound portfolios scattered about, the occasional tourists mixed into the crowd looked almost out of place.

From the elevated perspective of Pesce’s verandah, the town of Cruz Bay took on a far more pristine glow than its reality deserved. A neat and tidy collection of shops and restaurants skirted the edge of the peaceful harbor. The clutter
of dust, debris, and vagrant poultry disappeared beneath the colorful canvas of low lying trees and brightly painted buildings.

To the west, St. Thomas benefited from a similarly glamorizing gloss. Distance and the span of the Pillsbury Sound hid its hordes of humanity. The twinkling lights that had begun to pop on across the island’s low shadow were the only evidence of their existence.

Hannah wandered through the dining area, drawing a few curious glances as she made her way to the edge of the balcony and looked down on the harbor. Several brown pelicans swooped low across the water, diving in and out among a collection of small bobbing sailboats.

She stood, silently watching the feeding frenzy, as she listened to the murmurs of the other diners.

“…we’re putting together our bid this weekend…”

“…still some questions to resolve…”

“…fear the price may be too steep for us…”

Taking in a deep breath, she straightened her shoulders and approached the open chair next to her patiently waiting dinner companion.

“…striking girl…”

“…something familiar about her…”

As Hannah circled to the opposite side of the table, she glanced up at the sky where a streaming bank of clouds led the front edge of an advancing storm. The air was so thick with moisture, she could almost taste it.

The rains are coming, she thought as she leaned over the table to plant a kiss on the cheek of her beaming relative. Her face curved into a sly smile as she hooked a blue nylon satchel over the back corner of her chair.

“Hello, Uncle.”

29

I returned to the resort that night carrying half a fish sandwich still in its take-out container.

As I walked along the ground-lit path to my condo, pondering my meeting with the formidable Hank Sheridan, the wind began to bellow in from the ocean, summoning the forces of nature to this tiny speck of earth that had dared to rise up out of the sea.

A rabid confluence of seething energy swirled above my head. The sky that most days seemed so vast, so voluminous, was now crowded with rowdy boisterous characters, bumping and elbowing each other for space, edging their way closer and closer to the ground.

Inside the condo, I turned off the lights, the air conditioner, and the small rotating fan plugged into the wall. I didn’t want any artificial inputs distracting my thinking. I crawled into bed, lay on my back, and listened as the long-awaited storm finally arrived on St. John.

Rain began pattering against windows and splashing into gutters. Across the island, water catchments opened wide, drinking in the downpour. The little concrete wading pool
on my back porch that had been empty all summer started to fill with runoff.

In my mind’s eye, I saw Fred and his iguana friends inching slowly across the glistening grass, moisture beading up on their thick leathery skins, their lizard mouths munching in peaceful robotic bliss. As my head sank into the pillow’s comforting cushion, I could almost hear their happy ruminating stomachs through my bedroom walls.

A strobe of lightning flashed across the nearest window, momentarily illuminating the condo’s interior.

Even after four years of residence, there was little to show in the way of personalization. The unit was sparsely appointed with decommissioned resort furniture. The pictures on the walls, along with the knickknacks on the dresser, were all generic island chic.

Through the angle of my open bedroom door, I could see the back of the living room couch, whose faded tropical pattern was decorated with too many stains to count. In front of the couch stretched a glass-topped coffee table, inlaid with seashells and pebbles from a beach—probably not one that was anywhere near our island.

Opposite the table sat a wicker chair, whose rattan wrappings were peeling away from the frame. Many of the spines threaded into the chair’s back were missing, and the lumpy discolored seat cushion had been soaked endless times by wet swimsuit bottoms.

Beyond the living area, the curve of a tiled counter marked the edge of a small kitchen. It was equipped with a mismatched collection of rudimentary appliances: a microwave, a micro-fridge, several mugs, a few shot glasses, a toaster, and a rusted-out oven I had never attempted to turn on much less cook with.

The lightning-lit scene returned to darkness as a wave of thunder rocked the building, more evidence of the tempest brewing above. A tiny popping sound followed by the hum
of the resort’s reserve generators gave the subtle indication that the island’s power had just gone out.

In the weeks since I’d first met Hannah Sheridan in the corridor outside my office, I’d spent a great deal of time wondering whether her appearance was a signal my time on the island was drawing to a close. I’d worried for countless hours that the man from Miami would be coming to relieve me of my post.

But now that he was here, now that I knew at least a portion of the next phase of this journey, my focus had turned to a different issue.

In the four years since I’d hopped that flight to St. Thomas, I had deliberately avoided thinking about the
real
Penelope Hoffstra, the woman whose life I had stepped into, whose identity I had assumed.

In my head, I’d convinced myself that if I didn’t ask about her—if I didn’t know what had become of her—I could somehow limit my culpability in her disappearance.

Now, lying in my bed beneath the storm, Hank Sheridan’s cryptic words were all I could think about.

I have several Pens…

How many of us were out there, I wondered, living under this pseudonym?

What had happened to the original Pen? Had she ever even existed?

The front door creaked open, letting in the rain.

Wet feet squished against the living room’s tile floor. After stopping in the kitchen for a glass of water, the footsteps circled behind the couch and crossed the threshold to the bedroom. Then a damp shadow crept through the darkness toward my bed.

I set aside my concerns about the fat man and his other Penelopes as the intruder leaned over my pillow and kissed my forehead. All notions of Hannah, her bouncing curls,
and her silly spinning sundresses left me as I drank in the smell of his skin, a wild, wet essence of the sun and the sea.

As I reached up my hands to run my fingers through the nest of his thick tangled hair, all I could hear was the twittering of bananaquits.

30

Saturday morning, Manto sloshed through the puddles along the resort’s front drive as he headed toward the designated parking spot for the flatbed golf cart he used when working with the grounds crew. The rain from the night before had yet to let up, and the floppy hat crammed onto his head was already damp from the drips accumulating on its brim and seeping through its worn cotton fabric.

With a groan, Manto climbed into the cart’s wet front seat and plugged the key into the ignition. A moment later, he turned off the main driveway, steering the cart down a narrow brick path that curved behind a fence of bushes to a shed attached to the south side of the reception area. After unlocking the shed’s door, he began loading the morning’s gardening tools into the cart’s back bed.

First went a plastic bucket full of hand clippers, quickly followed by a collection of larger limb-lopping hedge trimmers. The long wooden handles of several pointed hoes and rakes were stacked in next.

As the shed emptied out and the golf cart filled up, Manto leaned back and placed his hands on his hips.

He stared at the pile of tools for a moment; then he pulled
the soaked hat from his head and used it to wipe a coating of moisture from his face.

Raising a crooked finger in the air, he counted the poles laid out on the cart.

“Dahg, blast it,”
he muttered with consternation.
“Some-mun’s run off with a rake.”

Jeff had long since left the condo by the time I stumbled through the living room, intent on seeking out a fresh pot of coffee from the resort’s breakfast bar. Almost as an afterthought, I grabbed Hank Sheridan’s file on my way out the door.

My sleep-soaked brain had yet to devise a plan for getting the fake memo “into circulation,” as Hank had put it, but, I reasoned, you never knew what kind of opportunity might present itself after a waking cup of coffee.

Five minutes later, I wandered into the breakfast pavilion by the beach. After sniffing at the coffee container on the buffet line, I sidled through the doorway to the busy kitchen area.

As I had suspected, a fresh pot was percolating in the pavilion’s industrial-sized coffeemaker. I grabbed a foam cup and diverted the stream to fill it.

Sipping on the energizing liquid, I looked out into the dining room. The majority of the resort’s guests had already wrapped up their morning meal, but one remaining table contained a few easily identifiable real estate types chatting over the last bites of an omelet and a Belgian waffle.

With a quick glance at the folder tucked under my arm, I flagged one of the passing waitresses, an older West Indian woman wearing a GLENNA name tag.

“Excuse me,” I said conversationally. “Uh, Glenna.”