“A contact of his came up with a name, probably one of the hit man’s aliases, and rumor has it that he might be heading back to Florida for another assignment. Speaking of which . . .” Serge pulled a disposable cell phone from his pocket and hit a number on speed dial.
On the other end of the line: “Name’s Mahoney, flap gums.”
He did. He closed the phone.
“What’s going on?” asked Coleman.
“Mahoney can’t tell me over the phone because he’s getting paid to have it tapped. So we set a clandestine meeting for tomorrow. Clandestine meetings come in two species: secluded dark alley or extremely busy public place.”
Their food arrived.
“Cooter is turtle?” said Serge.
Coleman grabbed a fork. “I’m saving the shell to clean my dope in.”
Chapter Six
THE NEXT DAY
Legos!” yelled Serge, cheerfully clapping his hands like a small child seeing clowns.
Coleman lowered his beer. “You mean like those little toy blocks we had as kids?”
“What else would they have at Legoland?” Serge swung the Firebird through the main gates of the theme park in Winter Haven.
“I don’t remember any Legoland,” said Coleman.
“It’s new.” The muscle car found a parking space. “And usually I hate new, but this used to be Cypress Gardens, the state’s first theme park that opened on January second, 1936. No crazy rides or people dressed up like cartoon characters. Just hundreds of lush botanical acres showcasing the area’s natural flora, plus southern belles in hoop skirts and water-ski shows that populate the reels of my View-Master collection. Not to mention the sacramental pool that was built in the shape of Florida sixty years ago by the movie people for an Esther Williams splash fest. Then horror!”
“What happened?”
Serge headed toward the ticket booth and pulled out his wallet. “Like many of Florida’s majestic early attractions, it fell on hard times because people can no longer enjoy natural beauty unless they’re zooming through it on a log flume or inverted roller coaster.” Serge handed Coleman his ticket and unfolded a glossy park map. “This way.”
“Where are we going?”
“Miniland!” Serge’s finger tracked a path on the map as they made another turn. “Miniland is the best!”
“Never heard of it.”
“Cypress Gardens was limping along and even closed for one terrifying year. Then the Lego people stepped in and saved us from another tragic roadside extinction. I figured, okay, sometimes you have to make a deal with the devil, and I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt, as long as they weren’t going to plow under the old park and just add a few Legos to a new section. It could be a worse devil, like the Hasbro toy people.”
“Fuck Easy-Bake Ovens,” said Coleman.
“But instead this place turned out beyond my craziest dreams.” Serge followed his map around a final corner. “There it is: Miniland! The coolest part of all is its replica of the state of Florida. And totally unexpected: I’d thought the era of high-concept attractions died with early Disney World, when they made that exhibit of robot presidents that nobody ever went to see, and I’d have the whole place to myself, but would never watch the president who had the spotlight on him for the Gettysburg Address. Instead I’d monitor the other commanders in chief in the dark, and they’d be blinking and making slight gestures. And I said to myself, ‘Now this is quality. I would have come in here anyway; they didn’t have to go through all the extra robot expense of Grover Cleveland removing an eye booger.’ And then I went back to the attraction again right after Nixon resigned, thinking, ‘Cool, the shit’s really going to fly!’ Other presidents ganging up: ‘Yo, get the fuck out! You know what you did.’ ”
“What happened?” asked Coleman.
“Apparently they felt sorry for him and took the high road,” said Serge. “But you could still see Disney’s trademark attention to detail in Nixon’s shifty eyes that said, ‘I sure hope this goes well. It’s my first gig since leaving. Maybe I should open with a joke.’ . . . Now Legoland is carrying the torch.”
“Nixon is like Legos?”
“In more ways than one.”
Coleman turned toward the elaborate panorama in front of him. “That’s pretty intense. Some of those Lego buildings are twice as high as my head.”
“At least.” Serge trotted around the perimeter pointing. “There’s the capitol in Tallahassee, the Spanish fort in St. Augustine, the Daytona 500 with little Lego people in the stands, and the massive Vehicle Assembly Building at Cape Canaveral . . .” He sprinted faster and faster past other visitors with strollers and throwaway cameras. “. . . An eight-foot-tall Bok Tower, the mind-blowing skylines of Tampa and Miami’s South Beach down to intricate details like the facade of the Colony Hotel and one of the flying-saucer lifeguard stands. It even has Key West and ‘Sloppy Moe’s’ bar instead of ‘Sloppy Joe’s,’ which I’m thinking was the lawyers’ idea.”
“It’s everything you say!” Coleman exclaimed. “So I need a joint to dig it completely.”
