Beachbound Read online

  Danish flopped down onto the sand, and Nina sat beside him. Razor tentatively joined them.

  Fuzz shimmied up a nearby coconut tree, his biceps and quads straining, machete in one hand. He hacked half a dozen green nuts loose, and they fell to the sand with soft thumps. Warren picked one up and bounced it in his hand a few times, shook it, then took the machete from Fuzz and sliced the top off. Fuzz reached into his knapsack and came out with a box of plastic straws. He took the green coconut from Warren, stuck a straw in it, and handed it to Nina. Warren hacked open another one for Razor.

  “When you done drinking, you can eat the jelly,” said Warren to Razor. “Here, I show you.” He took the machete and chopped the top off another green nut. He lifted it to his lips and threw his head back, drinking the water inside in several long gulps. When it was empty, he split the coconut in two with one powerful swing of the machete and held half of it out to Razor. Fuzz reached into his knapsack again and fished out a couple of spoons. He gave one to Razor and one to Warren.

  “See here,” Warren said, scooping the soft, white flesh out of the green husk with a spoon. “You eat it just like this. Mmm-mmm. Coconut is a miracle food. It got everything, man. Electrolytes, vitamins, antioxidants. That’s why I look so good.”

  Razor scooped out some jelly and took a small spoonful, chewing it tentatively.

  “Yes, yes. It’s good. I like it,” he said.

  “That’s right, man. Nature’s Viagra. It keep you at twelve o’clock all day. Not nine o’clock. Twelve o’clock all day,” said Fuzz, demonstrating the hour hand of the clock using his bent forearm as a visual aid.

  Razor stopped chewing and swallowed quickly. He set the coconut gently on the rock next to him. “That’s fascinating. I didn’t know that piece of local lore,” Razor said, scribbling in his notebook.

  “I said no tourist crap, Fuzz,” said Danish.

  “That’s not tourist crap, man,” said Fuzz. “A genuine coconut demonstration like that cost you ten dollar easy at some fancy hotel on the big island.”

  “Let’s go for a walk,” said Warren, heading down the beach. Nina slipped off her sandals and followed the group. It was midmorning, and the sand was hot underfoot, so she veered down to the water’s edge and splashed along in the surf.

  Warren stopped beside a tall, leafy tree on the edge of the forest. The others gathered around. Nina joined them, her feet now coated in wet sand. That was always the issue at the beach. Whether to trudge through the sand in street shoes, wear sandals and get sand inside them, or go barefoot and wade in the refreshingly cool water, knowing that eventually you’ll have to stuff your sandy feet back into your shoes. Someone should have invented a fix to that by now, Nina thought, brushing sand from the soles of her feet.

  “This is what we call a Tourist Tree,” Warren was saying. “See how its bark is peeling, leaving red patches on the trunk and branches, just like a tourist who stay in the sun all day drinking margaritas.” He snickered. “Gum Elemi, Latin name, Bursera simaruba.”

  “And what did your ancestors use this tree for?” asked Razor earnestly.

  “Yes, this tree is very valuable in our culture. If you get stung by a bee or a wasp, you make a poultice from the leaves and put it on the sting to get the poison out and relieve the pain. Also good for cuts, burns, rashes, and measles. The old people boil the leaves and add the liquid to their bathwater. It relieves rheumatism,” said Warren. “If you got another kind of problem, you can drink the tea instead. The men use it to make a bush tea called Twenty-One Gun Salute. Nature’s Viagra.”

  “Fascinating,” said Razor, nodding his head vigorously.

  “Yeah, we’re going to follow this bush trail now. I want to show you something,” said Warren, starting along a narrow sandy path back into the forest behind the beach. Nina sighed and slid her feet back into her sandals, feeling grains of sand push under her toenails and rub uncomfortably between her toes. She heard her grandmother’s voice in her head, could see her in her flowing red tie-dyed dress and chunky necklace of wooden beads, gesturing with a highball glass in her hand. “That’s what we call champagne problems, darling. Don’t sweat the small stuff. And it’s all small stuff.”

  “Listen. You hear that?” said Fuzz. “We call it Woman’s Tongue, because it never stops chattering.” He laughed loudly at his joke.

  “Poinciana,” said Warren. Nina listened. She could hear the faint rattle of the long seed pods in the treetops around them, and she realized she’d seen the same trees along the road in town. They walked on, following the path as it wound around dense stands of trees and coral rock outcroppings.

  “This here, this is Love Vine, also known as Dodder,” said Warren, gently lifting the tender green leaves on a wiry orange vine wound round and round a tree so many times that it seemed to be smothering it.

  “Let me guess,” said Nina.

  “It is a traditional cure for backache. You have backache, you cut the vine and tie it around your waist. Your backache will go. That’s what my grandmother says,” said Warren.

  “Cool,” said Razor.

  “Also an aphrodisiac,” said Fuzz. “You boil it and drink the tea, it get you in the mood.”

  “Oh, brother,” said Nina. “And what if I’ve just got a headache? Is there any plant on this island that can cure that?”

  “Sure, mama,” said Fuzz, holding out a coconut. “You get your man to eat the jelly of a coconut, and your headache be gone, no problem,” he said. “Best cure there is, know what I’m sayin’?”

  “Good one, Fuzz,” said Danish, high-fiving him.

  Nina rolled her eyes. They walked on.

  The path reemerged on the beach. They turned and walked back in the direction they had come from in the shade of the fringe of trees bent over the dazzlingly white sand. A short distance along, Warren stopped abruptly in front of a tall, leafy tree with a broad, dense canopy.

  “All right, look here, man,” he said forcefully, pointing at the tree and looking at Razor. “Stay away from this tree, right? This here is manchineel. If you stand under it, it drip poison sap on you. If rain drips off a leaf into your eye, you can go blind. If you brush against it, it will burn your skin raw and red. No joke. Hurts like nothing you have ever experienced, man. Also, don’t eat the fruit. The death apple. They taste sweet at first, like a woman, but they will blister the inside of your mouth, close up your throat so you can’t breathe. Then you die.”

  Nina looked at the tree. It looked harmless. Small, bright-green fruits littered the sand beneath the tree. They did look fresh, juicy, and tempting in the heat.

  “Definitely not an aphrodisiac,” said Danish.

  “Wait. What?” said Nina. She thought of the red blotches all over Philip’s body. Blotches and blisters. Maybe it wasn’t a sunburn, which didn’t make any sense. He went missing after dark, and was discovered unconscious on the beach shortly after sunrise. Maybe it was a rash, maybe from a manchineel tree. Maybe he ate the fruit for some reason.

  “This one no good for starting a fire, if you follow,” said Fuzz.

  “Are there many of these trees on the island?” Nina asked, turning to Warren.

  “Here and there. They grow along the beach, and close by the mangrove,” he said.

  “If they’re so poisonous, why aren’t they cut down?” she asked.

  “Well, they were here first. Also, the large root system keeps the beach from eroding,” said Warren.

  “Are there any manchineel trees near the inn?” she asked.

  “Yeah, there’s a big one, a ways down from the inn, away from town,” he said.

  “Huh,” said Nina. They started walking back to the van. Fuzz was lecturing Razor on Pineapple Cay culture. Danish fell in beside Nina.

  “What are you thinking?” he asked her. “You got something? Do you think someone fed Philip Putzel a death apple?”

  “No. Maybe, I guess. But I was thinking about the red rash all over his face and chest. He said he was drag
ged down the beach. What if his attacker left him under the manchineel tree down the beach from the inn? That could be how he got the rash. After his attacker left, Philip could have revived, staggered up the beach toward his bungalow, and collapsed again on the sand in front of the guest bungalows. Then the tide came in, washing away the footprints of both Philip and his attacker.”

  “Yeah, I can see that,” said Danish. “So, we’re looking for a sadist. Or at least someone who really, really hates Putzel. Other than Victor Ross, does anyone spring to mind?”

  Nina looked ahead at Razor Hudson’s hunched shoulders, braced under the weight of his knapsack containing a computer, a notebook, and who knew what else. He was nodding his head eagerly as he listened to Fuzz.

  Surely not, thought Nina.

  “I really don’t know,” she said aloud to Danish. “Let’s just hope it was a one-off random act of craziness and that whoever did it has gotten whatever they have against Philip out of their system.”

  They had reached the van.

  “Everyone in,” said Fuzz. “We’re going to Rosie’s for lunch. It’s a local place, down in Sandy Point. You’re going to try her conch salad,” he said to Razor. “It’s the best in the islands.”

  A short while later, they were sitting on the outdoor patio at Rosie’s Restaurant in Sandy Point, at the very southern tip of the island. Nina had been there once before with Ted. The setting was spectacular: turquoise water all around and a view of the Diamond Cays trailing off over the horizon. A couple of sailboats were anchored in the sheltered cove below the restaurant, and a table of jovial yachties had already built up a collection of empty beer bottles and cracked lobster shells.

  After eating, Danish, Fuzz, and Warren wandered off on some mission of their own. Nina was sitting with Razor at a table by the railing, listening to him rant about the cutthroat world of academia. Razor was peeling the label from his beer bottle in tiny pieces, making a little pile of them on the table in front of him. Nina was fighting the urge to reach into her bag, pull out her sunscreen, and squirt some on the top of his head, which was starting to glow red.

  “The sun is pretty intense here,” she said. “Do you have a hat? Would you like some sunscreen for your . . .” She gestured to the top of her own head and face. She didn’t know how to reference his shaved head. Some men were so sensitive about baldness. Razor just batted her question away with his hand as if it was a mosquito buzzing around his face.

  “I mean, you wouldn’t believe some of the lame-o project proposals they accepted this year. Another study of how backpackers rejoin the workforce after bumming around the world for a year. I mean, that’s already been done to death!” he said. For the past half hour, he had complained bitterly about not winning a grant for his latest project—research into how business travelers behaved on airplanes.

  “I mean, I was going to spend a total of one thousand hours in the air, observing business travelers on both international and domestic flights. It was going to be groundbreaking.”

  He grabbed a french fry off his plate and chomped it angrily. He picked up another and jabbed it at Nina as he spoke.

  “And then! And then! Guess what I hear through my contacts? It was Philip who recommended that the committee reject my request for project funding! According to my sources, he called my project amateurish. But I know what’s going on. He feels threatened by the cutting-edge research I’ve been doing on hot-tub etiquette at ski resorts, the participant observation stuff that he’s too old and lazy to do, and so he used his position to kill my project!”

  Razor munched his fry as he looked out at the water and the small islands trailing off over the horizon.

  “He knew that I need that funding to do the project so that I can get tenure in my department. Without it, my career will screech to a halt, and if I am lucky, I’ll grind out my remaining days on earth teaching Sociology for Engineers for what amounts to minimum wage as a contract instructor. So, if he should have an unfortunate accident, good riddance, I say, and I don’t care who knows it!”

  Razor grabbed the sweating bottle of beer in front of him by the neck and chugged it in what Nina could only describe as an aggressive manner. When he was done, he slammed it down on the table, rattling the salt and pepper shakers. Danish, Fuzz, and Warren had settled at a nearby table for a game of dominoes, and they looked over in unison at the bang. Seeing nothing but a very intense, thin-lipped small man with a shaved head picking at the label on his beer bottle, they turned their attention back to their game.

  “Excuse me,” said Razor, rising quickly and stalking away toward the restaurant, presumably to find the restroom.

  Wow, thought Nina, watching him go. He really hates Philip. Forget about not speaking ill of the almost-dead.

  But in the world of academics, it’s all about tenure. You get it, and you’ve got it made. A well-paid job for life, prestige, autonomy, a sabbatical every few years so you can rent a villa in the South of France to “write a book” or live in a yurt in Mongolia to study local handicrafts—whatever. If you don’t publish, or you don’t publish in the right journals, you don’t win research grants, and you don’t get tenure. Game over. No doubt people have killed for less. Could Razor really have done it? she wondered.

  When Razor returned, they settled up with Rosie and piled back in the van. Fuzz flared up a postprandial hooter, and the vehicle filled with weedy smoke. Nina cracked the window, but that let the hot, sunbaked air of midday inside, so she closed it again and rested her head against the back of the seat, her eyes closed. Fuzz, Warren, Razor, and Danish were talking about the strategy behind dominoes. Razor was peppering the others with questions about the significance of dominoes in local culture. His questions were urgent, their answers unhurried and amused. Nina tuned them out.

  By the time they passed the WELCOME TO COCONUT COVE, POP. 3,000 sign on their way into town, she was feeling very drowsy and more than a little buzzed. She pictured her hammock swaying in a gentle breeze and a cold glass of iced tea in her hand. With any luck, she’d be in it very soon. Still, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she should tell Blue Roker what Razor had said about Philip ruining his chances at a prestigious grant. She felt sorry for Razor. He seemed like a fish out of water, uncomfortable even in his own skin. But despite any personal feelings about Philip or Razor, it was her duty to pass on any possibly useful information to the police.

  They dropped Razor off at the inn.

  “Warren, man, just drop me at Nina’s,” said Danish drowsily from the back seat. “We’ve got some work to do before my shift at The Redoubt.”

  Nina swiveled her head around to look at him. He was leaning back against the headrest with his eyes closed. She let it pass.

  Without asking directions to her house, Warren drove through town and slowed to a stop in front of Nina’s yellow cottage. She didn’t bother asking him how he knew where she lived. She assumed now that everyone on Pineapple Cay knew not only where she lived but also that she had bought the cottage off the Internet in the middle of the night not long after walking in on her husband and his paralegal in flagrante delicto on the living room sofa. That was several months ago now. Old news.

  Nina heaved herself out of the van at her front gate.

  “Thanks, guys. That was very educational,” she said to Warren and Fuzz.

  “Respect, sister. Anytime you need a sachet of my special Twenty-One Gun Salute bush tea, give me a call. I’ll fix you up. That fisherman’s getting old and rusty,” said Fuzz, snorting laughter at his own joke. She could hear Warren join in as they drove off.

  Does he mean Ted? Nina wondered. Did everyone except her know everything about everyone else around here? She pushed open her unlocked front door and went inside. Danish followed her into the cottage, opened the fridge door, and started rooting around inside for something to eat or drink. Even though she was still feeling woozy from the ganja smoke, she went to the phone. Better call Blue and say what she had to say before she lost her
nerve.

  The phone rang twice before he picked up.

  “This is Roker.”

  Nina told him what Razor had said. There was silence on the other end of the line.

  “I wasn’t interrogating him, Blue. We were eating lunch together, and he brought it up,” Nina said. Another second of silence.

  “All right, Nina. I’ll look into it. Thanks for the call,” said Blue. Nina hung up the phone and sighed. Distasteful duty done.

  “Was that Blue you were talking to?” asked Danish from the kitchen.

  “Yup,” she said. She stepped out onto the veranda and stretched her arms above her head and breathed in deeply. The steady rhythm of the surf was making her even sleepier. She’d get rid of Danish and curl up in the hammock for a nap this afternoon. But just then, a screechy metal guitar riff assaulted her eardrums.

  “Oh, come on! Not again!” she exclaimed.

  Les was on his back deck barbecuing in the altogether. His stereo was blasting Guns N’ Roses. He set a platter of raw meat by the grill and disappeared back inside his house. With her hands on her hips, Nina stood glaring at his deck, waiting for him to reappear. Danish burst through the door onto the veranda and flopped into a deck chair. He was carrying the last bottle of beer from her fridge.

  “What is it they use to house-train puppies? A squirt gun. I need a squirt gun with a very long range,” Nina said, still staring at the deck, where Les had reappeared with his condiments.

  “I’ve got a paintball gun,” said Danish from his reclined position.

  “Really?” she said, turning to look at him with interest.

  “Yeah. Two, actually. The Supershot IV and the Rainbow Dynamo 500. Both rated to a hundred and fifty yards.”

  “I knew you were the man for the job. Listen, I’m trying to train Les to keep his clothes on in my line of sight. As soon as his bare bum strays off his deck, I want to land a fluorescent green blob on each cheek. Punishment must be delivered as soon as the offense is committed, or the puppy never learns. Are you in?”