"Get your a.s.s down here," Barnett shouted.

"In a second, please." The driver held up a small brown pharmacy bottle for Barnett to see. "I'm waiting for my pills to work."

"Get down here!"

"It's angina," the driver said through gritted teeth. "These are heart pills. I was having an attack back there on the highway-"

"Gimme your license," Barnett said. A conspiracy, that's what it was; a man can't even get laid anymore. Murders, riots, pansy lunatic truck drivers. A conspiracy.

The truck driver handed down his driver's license.

"Your name is Calvin Mo ... Mo-something here."

"Moriel."

"Whatever," Barnett said impatiently. "Calvin, I'm not going to give you a ticket, but I'm ordering you to stay off the f.u.c.king highway with your bad heart. You're gonna kill some taxpayer, the way you drive."

"I had an attack. I'm sorry, officer, really. I'm feeling better now." Calvin inhaled deeply, as if testing his chest for pain. "I'll call the company and have them send another driver down from Miami."

"Excellent," muttered Huge Barnett, stomping back toward the squad car.

"Chief! Come here." It was Laurie, calling from the doorway of a small convenience store that adjoined the service station.

"It's gettin' late, darlin'."

"Just for a second, come here," Laurie implored.

The Exxon attendant stopped Barnett on his way across the parking lot. "Want me to fill it up, chief?"

"Just give me ten bucks of high test and check the radiator. Make it fast, too."

Barnett found Laurie in the aisle where the cosmetics were displayed. She pulled him close and pointed to a small lavender bottle. "I'm going to buy this," she said mischievously. "For us."

"What is it?"

Laurie removed the cap and held the bottle to his nose. Barnett winced.

"Oh, come on," she said. "It's cranberry oil."

"Yeah?"

"It's a lotion."

"What kind of lotion?"

Laurie smiled shyly. "You know ..."

Barnett suddenly realized that the back of his Western shirt was drenched. He shivered in the air conditioning.

"You use that stuff? Really?"

"It tastes wonderful. Very sensual," she said. "You can spread it all over." She felt his ham-sized hand drop heavily from her waist to her b.u.t.tocks.

"Well, then," Barnett said. "All right."

Outside, the gas station man worked swiftly. He lifted the hood of the police car and pulled the radiator cap. Then he crouched down, out of view of the grocery store, and crabbed to the driver's side of the car. In a matter of seconds, the keys were out of the ignition and the trunk was open.

Inside the grocery, Huge Barnett pulled a Michelob from the six-pack under his arm and cracked it open.

"Three bottles of Venetian Cranberry Oil," remarked the cashier, a red-haired girl of high school age. "I don't think we've ever had anybody buy three bottles."

"A little's got to go a long way," Barnett said with a leer. "Now, how much do we owe you?"

BARNETT JAMMED a ten-dollar bill into the gas station man's hand and squeezed his bulk into the Chrysler. a ten-dollar bill into the gas station man's hand and squeezed his bulk into the Chrysler.

"Where'd that d.a.m.n truck go off to?"

"Who cares?" Laurie said, moving close. "Let's just go."

Barnett acceded with a grunt and wheeled back on the Overseas Highway, heading east toward Marathon. At the Exxon, the gas station man went to his CB radio and pa.s.sed a brief message.

As the police car crossed the Bahia Honda bridge, Laurie pressed a soft hand to Barnett's crotch.

"You're sweet to buy me that lotion."

"It's for both of us, right?"

Laurie smiled. "My, my. This must be how you got your nickname." She played with Barnett's cowboy shirt until it came out of his pants. She struggled to unhitch the belt buckle, a bra.s.s star with his name embossed in the center.

"What are you doing, darlin'?"

"Don't mind me."

"I'm trying to drive here ... Lord!"

Laurie rubbed Barnett's marbled belly with both hands. She leaned over and traced circles with her tongue, lower and lower on his midriff. With one hand she unzipped his trousers.

"Lord Jesus!"

Laurie sat up. "You want me to stop?"

"No, honey. Don't stop." Barnett hooked her around the neck with his arm and pulled her back down, but not before Laurie got a glimpse of the sign which announced the Seven Mile Bridge.

Huge Barnett's head spun euphorically; he felt himself grow achingly hard as Laurie kneaded him gently. The disasters of the day-Boone's murder, Tom's disappearance-dissolved with his own tumescence. Barnett kept one meaty hand on the wheel, the other on the back of Laurie's neck, guiding, encouraging. Her tongue tickled and teased, but would not go where he wanted.

Barnett navigated the narrow, pitted bridge with only half a mind to the task. Campers, tanker trucks, and tourist cars flew at him, a hairbreadth away. Barnett's squad car domineered the roadway, listing to port, weaving as he throbbed. The occasional horn of a terrified southbound car barely disturbed his trance. Twenty feet below, a stippled carpet of water stretched out to all horizons.

"Be careful, hon," Laurie whispered from the folds of Barnett's trousers, realizing all that lay between certain o.r.g.a.s.m and certain death were the peeling, corroded railroad ties which const.i.tuted the sole guardrail. Laurie fought back her revulsion. It wouldn't be long now.

"Come on darlin'," Barnett urged huskily. "I think he wants to come out and play now."

Three miles ahead, in the bridge tender's house a friend of Councilman Bobby Freed received a radio call. From his perch, the bridge tender could see a lobster boat in Moser Channel, waiting to pa.s.s from the Gulf side to the Atlantic. He pressed a b.u.t.ton and bells rang along the Seven Mile Bridge; two sets of red-and-white barrier gates descended on each side of the turntable bridge. Slowly, the c.u.mbersome iron span began to pivot. The bridge tender looked toward the line of traffic approaching from the south. The lead car was a big white Chrysler with a bubble on top. It appeared to be carrying only one person.

Huge Barnett watched the gates come down through half-closed eyes. Laurie heard the warning bells and sat up, brushing the hair from her face.

"Oh, no," the police chief groaned. "Don't stop now, it's just the bridge."

The Chrysler stopped three feet from the red-and-white gate. A green sign said: Mile Marker 45. Barnett clutched himself and started to rub.

"Chief, look," Laurie said anxiously. Her eyes flashed toward the rearview mirror. "You better stop."

Barnett gave an irritated glance at the mirror, and his houndlike eyes turned cold. Directly behind the Chrysler was a gray-over-black Chevrolet Blazer. On its roof was a blue police light, flashing at the precise rate of one per second.

"What's going on?" Barnett mumbled, to no one in particular. He retrieved his l.u.s.t-dented Stetson off the floor but made no move to get out of his car.

Until he heard the siren.

"What the f.u.c.k!" With an anguished roar, Huge Barnett uncorked himself from the driver's seat and swung onto the pavement.

At the side of the Blazer stood Mark Haller in his crisp Marine Patrol uniform and black cap. He wore a pair of amber Polaroids that made him look like a tomcat when he smiled.

"How's it goin', bubba?" Haller said pleasantly.

"What's with the f.u.c.king light and siren?" Barnett demanded.

"Chief, why don't you, ah, arrange arrange yourself a little bit. There's a church bus from Macon about three cars back, and I got a feeling they didn't come all the way down the Keys just to see your skinny d.i.c.k." yourself a little bit. There's a church bus from Macon about three cars back, and I got a feeling they didn't come all the way down the Keys just to see your skinny d.i.c.k."

Barnett said, "Jesus Christ." He spun away from the long line of traffic and tucked his flaccid organ out of sight. He hoped that Haller hadn't noticed the drip spots on his trousers. In front of Barnett, the turntable bridge now was fully open, and the wobbling antenna of the crawfish boat marked its pa.s.sage under the span.

"Chief, I'm going to ask you to open the trunk of your car," Haller said smoothly.

"What the h.e.l.l for, Haller?"

"Please."

"You got a G.o.dd.a.m.n warrant?"

Haller patted his pockets. "Yep, right here. And I also got a crowbar."

"f.u.c.k you." Barnett produced the key. "This is gonna cost you your phony little job, Haller. Ride around in a f.u.c.king motorboat all day catching crawfish thieves and poachers. A real f.u.c.king Eliot Ness, you are."

"Bubba, you best open the trunk. Now."

Barnett scowled. "OK, Mr. Grouper Trooper."

The Chrysler's trunk contained a peculiar inventory: two spare blackwall tires (the left side always seemed to blow out in tandem), an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle; five p.o.r.nographic video ca.s.settes; a scarlet bikini; a two-pound box of chocolate cookies; a deep-sea fishing rod; fifty feet of nylon rope; a s...o...b..x with approximately three thousand dollars inside; and, finally, a large rectangular package, wrapped neatly in brown paper and postal twine.

The package was the only item Barnett had not expected to see. It was the only item in which Mark Haller expressed an interest.

"What is it?"

"Never saw it before."

"Never?"

"Somebody put it there." Barnett was sweating from a thousand nervous little faucets. "Somebody must have put it there."

"I see." Haller wrestled the parcel out of the trunk and lay it on the pavement of the bridge. Pa.s.sengers and children from the other cars had emerged to form a curious half-circle around the little ceremony.

The crawfish boat was now safely through the channel. Barnett wondered why somebody didn't close the bridge.

Mark Haller pointed the toe of his boot to the lettering on the brown paper. "Who is Rella P. Barnett?"

The chief said, "My mother."

"And does your mother happen to live at Four-seven-seven Sailfish Drive in Homestead, F-L-A?"

Barnett leaned over and examined the address. "So help me, I have no idea what the h.e.l.l this is, or how it got in-"

"Let's see." Haller smoothly ran a pocketknife down the length of the package. He inserted both hands in the wound and held the pungent contents up for Huge Barnett to smell.

"Your momma like to smoke, does she?"

"f.u.c.k you, Haller."

"She knows her blend, that's for sure."

A few persons in the crowd began to laugh. A man with stork legs and a "Southernmost Sunset" T-shirt stepped forward to snap a picture with his Instamatic.

"Get back in your f.u.c.king cars!" Barnett yelled. The tourists retreated, eyeing the police chief as if he were rabid.

"You on your way to Homestead?"

"No, d.a.m.nit. I was just going up to Marathon for a drink. Ask the lady." Barnett waved his Stetson at the car.

Haller peered. "What lady is that, chief?"

The Chrysler was empty. Barnett surveyed his squad car with a simple, disbelieving expression.

"She was was here," he offered faintly. here," he offered faintly.

With a screech, the turntable bridge finally began to close again. Across the chasm, near the bridge tender's house, southbound cars had begun to honk. Huge Barnett had nowhere to run.

"Chief, would you please turn around?"

"f.u.c.k you."

Haller went to his Blazer and withdrew a small short-barreled shotgun. He walked back to Barnett, pulled the hammer, and held the gun to the chief's cascading midsection.