When he put down the empty cup, the guide said: “Mick, you expecting company?”

“No.”

“There was a man this morning.”

“A tthe marina?”

“No, out here. Asking which house was yours.” The guide glanced over the railing at his client, who now was practicing with a fly rod, snapping the line like a horsewhip.

Stranahan laughed and said, “Looks like a winner.”

“Looks like a long goddamn day,” the captain muttered.

“Tell me about this guy.”

“He flagged me down over by the radio towers. He was in a white Seacraft, a twenty-footer. I thought he was having engine trouble but all he wanted was to know which house was yours. I sent him down toward Elliott Key, so I hope he wasn’t a friend. Saidhe was.”

“Did he give you a name?”

“Tim is what he said.”

Stranahan said the only Tim he knew was an ex-homicide cop named Gavigan.

“That’s it,” the fishing guide said. “Tim Gavigan is what he said.”

“Skinny redhead?”

“Nope.”

“Shit,” said Stranahan. Of course it wasn’t Timmy Gavigan. Gavigan was busy dying of lung cancer in the VA.

The captain said, “You want me to hang close today?”

“Hell, no, you got your sport down there, he’s raring to go.”

“Fuck it, Mick, he wouldn’t know a bonefish from a sperm whale. Anyway, I’ve got a few choice spots right around here-maybe we’ll luck out.”

“Not with this breeze, buddy; the flats are already pea soup. You go on down south, I’ll be all right. He’s probably just some process-server.”

“Somebody’s sure to tell him which house.”

“Yeah, I figure so,” Stranahan said. “A white Seacraft, you said?”

“Twenty-footer,” the guide repeated. Before he started down the stairs, he said, “The guy’s got some size to him, too.”

“Thanks for the info.”

Stranahan watched the yellow skiff shoot south, across the flats, until all he could see was the long zipper of foam in its wake. The guide would be heading to Sand Key, Stranahan thought, or maybe all the way to Caesar Creek-well out of radio range. As if the damn radio still worked.