Molly reached for the cast-aside video. “Let’s watch it.”
So went the next thirty-six hours. The honeymoon finally ended but not the endurance test. Serge moved into Molly’s apartment, and life turned into a Pink Panther movie. Serge would stroll out of the kitchen with a sandwich and — wham! — Molly diving from a closet, pinning him to the ground.
The staff at the Big Pine library didn’t recognize Molly when she returned to work. Hair down, clothes fitting. She looked them in the eye and even talked! Good heavens, they thought, I need sex like that. The transformation was so stunning that her female colleagues involuntarily pictured Serge’s manhood in scale next to a Polaris missile, an old-growth redwood and the Statue of Liberty.
29
THE NO NAME PUB’S screen door flew open.
“I’m Gaskin Fussels! And I rule!”
Hearts sank around the bar.
Fussels was holding a large box with both arms. He marched up and set it on the counter. “Y’all come over and take a gander at this!”
Nobody moved.
“Okay, stay where you are. I’ll take it out of the box and show you.” Fussels reached in with both arms and carefully extracted the contents. He proudly placed it on the bar.
The pub went silent. Mouths agape.
“I knew you’d be impressed,” said Fussels. “This’ll teach him to fuck with me!”
They hopped off their stools and crowded around Fussels.
Bud looked at Sop Choppy. “I hope that isn’t what I think it is.”
“Uh, where exactly did you get that?” asked Daytona Dave.
“Just up the street,” said Fussels. He formed a vicious grin. “At the home of that dick-head who owns the motel.”
“What motel?” said Bud.
“Lazy Palms. The one that ripped me off.” Fussels nodded to himself with satisfaction. “We’ll see about that fucking refund policy.”
“Where exactly was this house again?” asked Sop Choppy.
Fussels waved an arm east. “Right across the bridge on No Name Key. Down one of those back roads.”
“That’s not where the owner lives,” said Bud.
“What are you talking about?” said Fussels.
“I know the owner. His place is up on Cudjoe.”
“Then who lives out there?” asked Fussels.
It slowly began filtering back to Sop Choppy through the haze of the other night’s boozing. “Oh, no.” He looked at Bob the accountant, who was just beginning to remember himself.
“What is it?” asked Bud.
Bob had his hands over his face. “Us and our stupid practical joke.”
Sop Choppy looked at the object on the counter. “How could we be so dumb?”
“Because we were drunk!” snapped Bob.
“This is a major fuck-up,” said Sop Choppy.
Jerry the bartender started shaking. “I-I-I thought it’s what you wanted me to tell him.”
Bob ran his hands through his hair. “We have to think.”
They became silent again and stared at the bar.
Fussels looked around at everyone. “Will somebody tell me what the hell is going on?”
Nobody answered. All eyes on the magnificent, scratch-built model of a nineteenth-century British schooner.
“I’m starting to get pissed off!” said Fussels.
“Shut the fuck up!” yelled Sop Choppy. “You didn’t steal from a motel owner. You stole from a drug kingpin. He’s going to kill you, okay?”
“What are you talking about?” Fussels pointed across the bar. “Jerry said—”
“Jerry lied!”
“Why would he do that?”
“So we’d like him!”
“This is so bad,” said Daytona Dave.
“We gotta get it out of here,” said Bud.
“I don’t understand,” said Fussels. “Why would you want Jerry to—”
“Because you’re an asshole!” said Sop Choppy. “We were trying to get rid of you!”
“Get rid of me? I thought we were friends.”
Five guys: “Shut up!”
“He’s got to take it back right now,” said Sop Choppy.
“I’m not taking shit back,” said Fussels. “Not until I get my refund.”
“Aren’t you listening? Jerry was fucking with you!”
“You really are serious about this, aren’t you?”
“Yes! The guy’s had dozens of people killed!”
Bud grabbed the empty box. “You have to pack it back up and return it right now before he discovers it’s missing.”
The color left Fussels’s face. “No way. I’m not going back anywhere near there.”
“You have to!”
Fussels looked like he might faint.
“Hold on,” said Sop Choppy. “We might be missing something here. How do we know there’s any way to connect him to this?”
“Think hard!” said Bob. “Did anybody see you go in the house? Did you leave any clues?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
“What does that mean?”
“I left a ransom note.”
“You what!”
“How was I supposed to get my refund?”
“It’s still okay,” said Sop Choppy. “It’s just a ransom note. They’re anonymous.”
“I sort of signed it.”
“You idiot!”
“What did the note say?” asked Bob. “You’d be calling him or something?”
“No, I said I’d be waiting at the No Name Pub. Just bring my refund here.”
The guys jumped back and spun toward the door.
“Oh, my God!” said Bob. “They could be coming in here any second with machine guns!”
“You have to take it back right now!”
“I can’t!”
“You have to!”
Fussels’s legs got rubbery. “I need to sit down.”
“Jerry, get him a beer.”
Fussels upended the draft in one long guzzle. The others quickly packed the ship back up and pushed the box into his stomach. “Get going!”
