Night Moves (Doc Ford) - By RandyWayne White Page 0,18

existence on Sanibel Island. The region was a self-sustaining biota, an indifferent force. Life was more precariously balanced here. The landscape had an edge. I had yet to see a boa, large or small, nor had I mentioned the possibility, but that was part of the edge. So was our near-miss plane crash. And, as I had to admit to myself, so was the possibility that someone was trying to kill me, Tomlinson, Dan, or all three of us.

Churchill said it: There is nothing so invigorating as being shot at without result.

We all dodge a few bullets in our lifetimes, and I’ve ducked my share. After each narrow escape, I’d felt energized, never more lucid and alert. Now, standing on the low ridge surveying wild country, I was enjoying that cleaved sense of awareness when Tomlinson broke into my thoughts, saying, “The hunter is being hunted. That’s why you’re in such a jolly mood. Your drug of choice, man. Yet they demonize my gentle friend marijuana.” He shook his head. “And if losing my toenail puts a smile on your face, this should make you positively goddamn giddy. See here? A chunk of my ankle bone’s missing, too. I stepped in one of those holes back there. Your little fish buddies are probably feasting, having a grand time. Filet of primate. Yum-yum.”

I hadn’t been smiling, but I did now. “The Zen guru wanted oneness with nature?” I said. “Keep feeding the locals, it’ll happen.” Then I bent to open my backpack.

In a ziplock bag, I’d packed antibacterial cream, Band-Aids, gauze, surgical tape, two military QuikClot compresses for serious trauma, plus a few other basics. I lobbed him the bag, then returned my attention to the airplane, which had banked a few degrees northeast and would soon make a low-level pass overhead. Either the pilot had spotted us or his sudden course change was coincidental. Or . . . something else nearby had caught the pilot’s attention.

Into my head came Dan Futch’s voice. I spotted two snakes so big, I could see them from the air.

5

I LIFTED MY HEAD, SNIFFED THE AIR, THEN STOOD ON the balls of my feet and did a slow three-sixty. Yes . . . Tomlinson and I were not alone. To leeward, fifty yards away, a slow sawgrass trail was being tunneled, blades collapsing under the weight of something sizeable. A southwesterly breeze blew noise and odors away from me, but, even in a gale, I would have heard telltale sounds if it had been hikers or an ATV.

No . . . the thing approaching us was alive . . . and big enough, possibly, to be spotted from low altitude.

“Get your shoes on,” I told Tomlinson.

“Huh?”

“You heard me.”

My tone trumped the man’s injuries and his natural aversion to authority. Immediately, he pulled on one red Converse, saying, “Geezus, what’s wrong? Are those cops?”

He meant the plane, which was now descending. A Cessna 182, it looked like, a model I’d flown while logging most of my air hours. The propeller whine was closing the distance, and I could see two people in the cockpit, details shielded by the silver sheen of Plexiglas.

“Maybe Danny radioed someone to keep an eye on us,” Tomlinson suggested.

“Hurry up,” I told him and turned to concentrate on the approaching animal. Sawgrass was still funneling toward us in a slow riverine swath that created switchbacks. The zigzag path was suggestive. Meat eaters follow their noses, casting back and forth as they close in on their quarry. So do big snakes. I picked up a limb I’d been using as a walking stick, stepped off the ledge into the water, and began to circle away, hoping to intercept the animal.

Behind me, over the whine of the approaching Cessna, Tomlinson raised his voice to say, “Hey . . . where you going? Why you think there’s no door on that plane?”

I didn’t reply. I was choosing my footing, trying to move fast while the plane masked my noise. I wasn’t worried about what I would find, despite Dan’s warning—I was intrigued. The list of potential attackers was not particularly long nor formidable: a Florida panther, a gator, a black bear, coyotes, feral hogs, or a hellishly big snake. Those were the most likely candidates, and I wanted to get a look at the thing before it got a look at us.

Tomlinson called, “What’s that guy doing? Is that a camera? Jesus Christ, Doc . . . I think he’s trying to . . .”