The Hound of the Sanibel Sunset Detective (27 page)

“You wanted a story, this is the story,” Tree said.

“Yes, but where is the Chicago angle?”

“I guess I am the Chicago angle. Did you take a cab here?”

“Just like you told me,” she said.

“Good, I’ll drive you back. Get in.”

Kelly opened the passenger door and saw Clinton. “I don’t think this dog is doing very well,” she said.

He looked back at Clinton, and felt his stomach tighten. “It’s all right, boy. It’s going to be all right.”

Kelly said, “I think you’d better have a vet take a look at him.”

42

A
story about a dog, a gangster, and an invaluable lost Rembrandt.” Kelly’s eyes gleamed with excitement. “This isn’t local, Tree. This is network. This is Scott Pelley and
Sixty Minutes
.”

“As long as you make sure the police get a copy of the video you just recorded.”

“I can’t believe you pulled this off,” Kelly said. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“All I’m concerned about is the dog,” Tree said. “That’s the only reason I did any of this—for Clinton.”

“All this for a dog,” Kelly said. “Who would believe it?”

Anyone who ever owned a dog, Tree thought. They would believe.

_________

Tree dropped Kelly off at the Chamber of Commerce Visitors Center, amid promises to get the video and the story to CBS as well as to Sanibel Police Detective Cee Jay Boone.

As he drove, Tree reassured Clinton it was going to be okay.

And it was. It was going to be okay.

Not to worry.

At Dayton’s, he found Freddie in the midst of a meeting. The fleeting relief on her face disappeared as soon as she saw his grim expression. She told the others they would have to continue this later.

“Are you all right?”

“No,” he said. The word choked in his throat.

“What do you need, my love?” Gentle words from wonderful Freddie—the words that just might get him through.

She followed him out to the parking lot. When she saw Clinton, her eyes welled with tears. Then she caught herself, took a deep breath, and got into the back with him. Clinton managed to lift his head so he could lay his snout on Freddie’s lap.

Tree started up again. He could hear Freddie on the phone, calling a veterinarian she knew. Her voice was calm. They had to see him right away. Tree tamped down his rising sense of panic, forced himself to concentrate on the road.

It was going to be all right, he said to himself for the umpteenth time.

But then it wasn’t all right at all.

Suddenly, the rear window shattered, sending a spray of glass through the interior. Clinton yelped in alarm. Freddie cried out as Tree hit the brakes and fought to keep the Hellcat on the road. Another bullet thumped into the side of the car. Tree, fighting with the wheel, glanced in his rearview mirror and saw the black and yellow of the Ducati Streetfighter. Shay performing one last hit before departing South Florida. Apparently, Sonny Trinchera had no faith in the promise of Tree’s silence.

Shay swung her bike into the passing lane so that it came abreast of the Hellcat. Shay twisted to face him, a black robot with a gun. Tree took his foot abruptly off the gas pedal and the Streetfighter sped past. Shay swerved the bike back into Tree’s lane, ahead of him now. Tree hit the gas, speeding up, intending to run into her. But Shay, realizing what Tree was trying to do, rocketed ahead. Freddie called out: “Tree, what’s happening?”

“Hang on!” was all he had time for. There was too much traffic in the other direction so that he couldn’t pass. From behind him, he heard an impatient horn.

A break in the oncoming traffic and Tree stomped on the gas. Once again the Hellcat lived up to its name, as it sprang into warp speed, no valet mode on this baby, seven hundred race horses, the Hellcat unleashed. It flew abreast of the Streetfighter. But then—and not even Hellcat horses could defeat this—an oncoming car and looming head-on disaster. Tree hit the gas and turned the wheel, thrusting the Hellcat smartly back into the right lane, a hair before the oncoming car flew past, angry horn at full blast. But now, the Hellcat once again was in the wrong place—fronting the Streetfighter.

And Shay had him in her sights.

Tree glanced at the speedometer. The Hellcat galloped comfortably along at over one hundred miles per hour, Periwinkle Way a passing blur. Despite the speed, a glance in the rearview mirror showed Shay in ominously close pursuit—the Streetfighter living up to its name.

The traffic cop at the corner of Periwinkle and Causeway Road jumped away in alarm as Tree braked, throwing up dust into the intersection, a breathtaking left turn—a turn he could not have ever previously imagined.

He hoped against hope that Shay would not be able to match that turn, but as he headed onto the causeway off the island, there was the Streetfighter, veering into the passing lane.

Tree caught another glimpse of the helmeted Shay, taking her time, aiming the gun. Abruptly a rusting pickup with what looked like a refrigerator strapped to its metal bed, materialized, as though the gods had thrown this groaning impediment in front of him to challenge the mighty Hellcat. He slammed the brakes, the Hellcat fishtailing wildly to show its disdain for such an unexpected maneuver. With Shay crowding him on the left, there was no way of escape. Imagining Shay beginning to squeeze the trigger, he could only cry out, “Freddie!”

Then, just as suddenly as she was there, Shay was gone in an explosion of metal as a big garbage truck, headed onto the island, smashed into the Streetfighter. In his sideview mirror, Tree could see the motorcycle lift into the air, so much twisted, gleaming yellow and black carbon fiber against the stark blue of the sky—and Shay, a black-clad rag doll still attached to her machine as it sailed in slow motion over the protective bridge railing.

“What was that?” Freddie, breathless in the back.

“It’s all right,” Tree said, slowing. “Everything is okay.”

“Quit saying that,” Freddie snapped, an uncharacteristic show of frustration and anger. “Because it’s not.”

He said, “Just hold on. We’re almost there.”

Not very reassuring, but closer to the truth.

43

S
omehow, they were in the parking lot at the Bob Riggs Veterinary Clinic. Tree carefully lifted Clinton out, holding him in his arms, a limp, heaving body, completely, utterly trusting in his arms.

Tree murmured something to him, words, more reassurances, following Freddie into a reception area that featured paintings of cute dogs and cats. Two anxious-looking young women in green hospital smocks were ready to usher them along a hallway and into a tiny room containing a medicine cabinet and a stainless steel table.

“I need a blanket for him, something,” Tree said in a strained voice. “I can’t put him down on that metal.”

One of the women rushed away and returned with a padded blanket that she placed on the table. Tree lowered Clinton onto it. The dog looked up at him with pleading eyes. Freddie was right there, stroking Clinton’s coat.

Bob Riggs entered, iron gray hair, tanned face, the picture of the middle-age runner in perfect health. “Okay, let’s see what we have here,” Riggs said.

A stethoscope was brought into play, along with gentle prodding. Yes, Tree thought. A doctor with a stethoscope. A professional who knew what he was doing. Clinton was in good hands. He was going to be okay. Tree was certain of that.

Riggs stopped and looked up at Freddie and Tree, his features glum. Tree felt his stomach drop. Cold fear rose in him.

“I would have to do tests to be certain, but it looks like he’s suffered a stroke,” Riggs said.

“What does that mean?”

“I’m afraid there’s not a whole lot I can do for him,” Bob Riggs said.

“There must be something,” Tree said. The words sounded hollow and clichéd.

Riggs looked helplessly at Tree. “Letting him go. That’s probably the biggest favor we could do for him at this point.”

“Just like that?” The anguish caused his voice to break.

“I don’t know what else to tell you,” Riggs said.

Freddie held Clinton close and said, “He’s in pain, Tree. I can feel his whole body trembling.”

The tears streamed down Tree’s face. “I told him everything was going to be all right. I told him that. I promised him I would keep him safe—that I would protect him.”

“You’ve done that, my love,” Freddie said. “You’ve done all that and more.”

“So, now I kill him? After all we’ve been through, I kill him?”

“You don’t kill him,” Freddie said quietly. “You help him.”

She nodded at the doctor. He left the room. Tree took Freddie’s hand. “I can’t believe this,” Tree said.

“I know, darling, I know.”

Riggs returned with a syringe. Tree and Freddie held Clinton and took turns stroking his head. They told him how much they loved him. They told him again and again.

Riggs leaned over Clinton. He slipped the needle into the dog’s side.

When the final moment came, Clinton lifted up his fine head as if hearing something far away. Tree was certain he could see Clinton’s spirit rise out of him. Then Clinton’s body relaxed and his head dropped to the table. His eyes became lifeless.

And he was gone.

________

Freddie wrapped herself around Tree as they approached the car. “There are bullet holes in the Hellcat,” he said. “Rex is going to kill me.”

“Rex will understand,” Freddie said.

“Not when I tell him the rear windshield is also missing.”

The causeway was closed. They heard the news on the Hellcat’s radio as they sat in the vet’s parking lot. A terrible accident involving a motorcycle and a garbage truck. The truck driver was okay, but the female driver of the bike was reported dead. The name of the deceased had not been released by Sanibel Island police.

Tree turned off the engine and said he was in no shape to drive, anyway. They got out of the vehicle. Tree studied a huge dent in the side of the Hellcat. Where did that come from, he dimly wondered.

There was a park bench not far away. Freddie and Tree sat together and held hands and wept. Tree could not remember crying so hard. He was amazed by the depth of his grief. Freddie, as usual, was the stronger of the two; this was life, things happen. They had done their best. At least Clinton was with the people who loved him at the end. Think of that.

That only brought more tears. What a blubbering fool he was. Gangsters, crooked cops, female assassins, corpses—they all defeated him, left him feeling alone at the edge of a darkening world.

“There is light,” Freddie said, holding his hand tight in hers. “We’re the light, the two of us; what we have—the getting through bad stuff like Clinton’s death together.”

“I know,” Tree said. “But right now I feel like I’m on a road lined with tombstones.”

She reached out and took his hand and said nothing.

“What’s more,” Tree continued, “I’m afraid that when you hear the whole story of what happened you’ll be so angry you’re going to be finished with me.”

“My love,” she said, “I may get angry with you. But I am never finished with you.”

“There’s going to be a mess to deal with.”

“That’s okay. We’ll deal with it together. We stick together. We see it through—that’s our deal, and nothing breaks that deal.”

She stood and held her hand out to him. “Come on, Tree,” she said. “Let’s go home.”

He took her hand and stood. “Yes,” he said. “Let’s do that. Let’s go home.”

Afterword: The Real Clinton

Writing
The Hound of the Sanibel Sunset Detective
was an experience filled with joy and sadness. On the one hand, the novel allowed me to bring back to life Clinton, the beloved family member we lost at the age of fourteen in July 2013. To have him running happily on the beaches of Sanibel and Captiva Islands, loved and loving again, was an unexpected delight.

On the other hand, I was reminded constantly that this was only a story, that Clinton really was gone and even the most artfully fashioned words could never really bring him back. In the past five years, I have lost my mother and several of my dearest friends, people who were close and played an extraordinary role in my life.

But I must say, the loss of Clinton, our French hound, hit me harder than the loss of just about anyone else. He was my baby boy, the friend I had with me day in and day out, the one certainty in an uncertain life, always welcoming at the door with a shoe in his mouth, his recurring present for returning friends.

As he does for Tree and Freddie, Clinton brought us untold amounts of joy while he was alive. I have said many times that my wife, Kathy, and I would not have had a social life in Toronto, Montreal, or Milton, Ontario, without Clinton. Thanks to him, we met people and made friends who are still in our lives.

Clinton even slept with us. Try as we might to be firm, and not have him on the bed, we soon gave up trying to resist the irresistible. I don’t believe he ever recovered from his inability as he grew old to climb the stairs and be with us. The last year of his life, I never slept through the night, slipping constantly downstairs to console an upset dog who only wanted to be with his pals.