Envy Mass Market

“Evenin’, sir. I’m Deputy Dwight Harris. From the sheriff’s office over in Savannah.”

The man leaned forward slightly and glanced past him toward the golf cart parked at the end of the path. To discourage tourism and unwelcome visitors to the island, there wasn’t a ferry to St. Anne from the mainland. Anyone coming here came by a boat they either owned or chartered. When they arrived, they either walked or rented a golf cart to get around the island’s nine thousand acres, give or take a few hundred. Only permanent residents drove cars on the narrow roads, many of which had been left unpaved on purpose.

The golf cart wasn’t as official-looking as a squad car, and Harris figured it diminished his authority a bit. To stoke his self-confidence, he hiked up his slipping gun belt.

The man behind the door asked, “How can I help you, Deputy Harris?”

“First off, I apologize for disturbing you. But I got a call earlier this evening. From a gal up in New York.” The man waited him out, saying nothing. “Said she was trying to track down somebody who goes by the initials P.M.E.”

“Really?”

“That’s what she said. I didn’t let on like the name registered with me.”

“Did it?”

“Register, you mean? No, sir. Can’t rightly say it did.”

“Nevertheless, you’re here.”

“I’ll admit she got my curiosity up. Never knew anybody to go only by his initials, you see. Don’t worry, though. ’Round here, we respect a person’s privacy.”

“An admirable practice.”

“St. Anne has a history of folks hiding out on her for one reason or another.”

The moment it was out, Harris wished he hadn’t said it. It smacked of an accusation of some sort. A long silence ensued. He cleared his throat nervously before continuing. “So anyhow, I thought I should oblige this lady. Came over in the department’s motor launch. Asked around at the landing and was directed here.”

“What did this lady from New York want?”

“Well, sir, I don’t rightly know. She said it wasn’t a legal matter or nothing like ’at. Just that she had business with P.M.E. I thought you might be a big winner in one of those sweepstakes, thought Ed McMahon and Dick Clark might be looking for you.”

“I’ve never entered a sweepstakes.”

“Right, right. Well, then…”

Harris tipped his hat forward so he could scratch the back of his head. He wondered why in hell the man hadn’t invited him in or, short of that, why he hadn’t turned on any lights. Pussyfooting hadn’t gotten him anywhere, by God, so he bluntly asked, “You P.M.E. or what?”

“Did she leave her name?”

“Huh? Oh, the lady? Yeah.” Harris fished a piece of notepaper from the breast pocket of his uniform shirt, which he was embarrassed to discover was damp with sweat. However, the man seemed not to notice or care about the dampness as he took the sheet and read what Harris had written down.

“Those’re her phone numbers,” Harris explained. “All of ’em. So I figured this business of hers must be pretty important. That’s why I came on out tonight.”

“Thank you very much for your trouble, Sheriff Harris.”

“Deputy.”

“Deputy Harris.”

Then, before Harris could blink, the man closed the door in his face. “Good evenin’ to you, too,” he mouthed as he turned away.

His boots crunched the shells of the path. The evening had deepened into full-blown darkness, and it wa

s even darker beneath the canopy of live oak branches. He wasn’t afraid, exactly. The man behind the door had been civil enough. He hadn’t been what you’d call hostile. Inhospitable, maybe, but not hostile.

All the same, Harris was glad to have this errand over and done with. If he had it to do over again, he might not assign himself this duty. What was it to him if some lady from up north was successful or not with her unspecified business?

When he sat down on the seat of the golf cart, he discovered it had been dripped on from the tree overhead. His britches were soaked through by the time he reached the landing where he’d tied up the boat.