Watch Your Back!

It also felt hungry. What with one thing and another, events had conspired to keep him from thinking much of his need for sustenance for some little time, but now all at once he remembered he hadn't eaten a thing since breakfast, and he was starving.

"Porfirio," he said as they walked along toward the end of the pier, "the first thing I am going to need is food. I can't go into a restaurant, I know that, not like this, but surely we can find a hamburger somewhere."

"How you figure to pay for it?"

"You will pay for it, of course, and I will reimburse you."

"We gotta talk about that reimburse," Porfirio said, trying to sound tough. "It's down this way."

The ground was stony and not kind to bare feet. Hopping along, Preston said, "Why were you gone so long? You were gone two hours, Porfirio."

"They had me out on that boat." He sounded bitter, as though his memories were more than usually unpleasant. "They wanted to know all about you."

"The cigarette boat?"

"Yeah, that drug boat. Here it is, get in. I don't lock the damn thing."

Neither would Preston. The passenger door squeaked loudly when he opened it, and again when he closed it.

"Food, Porfirio," he reminded him.

"You know," Porfirio said, as he started the asthmatic engine, "for a man ain't got shit on him, you bossy as hell."

"I'm just very hungry. Why did they have you on their boat?"

This was a parking lot of some sort. Driving out of it, the headlights sweeping over the unlovely scrub flora of southern Florida, Porfirio said, "They want to know where I let you off, what you say to me, all kinds a shit. When you're not in the boat, they got real pissed off."

So the rotten man had tried to sell Preston out, as anticipated. "So you took them to the boat, did you?"

"I had to, man, they were leanin on me. You heard me talking loud, didn't you? That's why you got outa the boat."

"No, Porfirio, I did not hear you talking loud."

"Well, I did," Porfirio said, sounding sulky again. "To warn you. Shit, man, it was me they was givin kidney punches."

Good, Preston thought, but didn't say. In fact, for the moment he decided to say nothing. They had come out onto a serious road and turned right, which would be south. Traffic was thin. They passed stores, marinas, gas stations, all closed, even the gas stations. Then up ahead on the other side, a Burger King appeared, brightly lit and sparsely patronized.

"Burger King! There!"

"I see the damn thing, that's where I'm headed for."

They pulled in and Preston said, "I'll have to wait here. I'll want a hamburger."

"You already said that."

"And a Coke."

"Is that right? You want dessert, too?"

"No, just a hamburger and french fries and a Coke."

"Fries. Son of a bitch."

Porfirio slammed the pickup door on his way out, but he did come back with the burger, the Coke, and the fries, with a similar assortment for himself.

It was the first time in his life Preston had ingested a fast-food hamburger — something else his ex-wives would pay for, someday. Talking around a mouthful of food, he said, "What I need now is a Holiday I

"A Holiday I

"I need a chain," Preston explained. "I need an organization with a computer system large enough to verify me. Where can we find a Holiday I

"I du

Preston bit off more burger and talked around it. "I better not go to Key West," he said. "They'll probably be looking for me down there, looking in cars going by, with streetlights. It's too small and too brightly lit. Porfirio, there's got to be a Holiday I

"I know there's one up at Key Largo," Porfirio said, "but that's gotta be eighty miles from here, way up at the top of the Keys."

"Perfect," Preston said, and some time later he and Porfirio stepped into the Key Largo Holiday I

"Gentlemen?"

"I don't have any identification on me," Preston began, "nor money, but I need a room."

The young man's smile was pitying. "Sir—"

"Just a moment. Paper and pen, please."

As usual, the lower orders did Preston's bidding whether they wanted to or not. Preston took paper and pen, wrote his name in large block letters, and said to the young man, "Image Google me."

"I'm sorry?"

"Your computer," Preston said, and pointed to it in case it had slipped the young man's mind. "Go to the Google search engine. Go to their image collection. Type in my name. You will find many news and social page photos of me over the years, all more presentably dressed, but all clearly me. Please do that."

The young man shrugged. "Okay."

He turned to his computer, and Porfirio gave Preston a grudgingly admiring look. "You're something else, man," he said.

"Of course."

"Okay," the young man said. "That's you, all right. But I don't see—"

"Hush," Preston said. Surprised, the young man stiffened into silence and Preston said, "The reason I am here, process servers attempted to waylay me. This gentleman Porfirio assisted me, for which I very much thank him—"

"And that ain't all," Porfirio said.

"Of course not." Preston turned back to the young man. "I need a room. I need to phone an associate of mine in the Caribbean and tell him to fly up here in the morning. I will phone collect, of course. He will bring my wallet and clothing and all the rest of it. In the meantime, I have to hide. Those people are still searching for me."

"They are, man," Porfirio told the young man. "And they are mean sons a bitches, let me tell you."

"Check me in," Preston said, "under my associate's name. Here, I'll write it down." And he wrote Alan Pinkleton beneath his own name, then said, "When he gets here tomorrow, all this will be made right."

"Sir, I don't think I can—"

"Son," Preston said, "I happen to know several of the directors on the board of the corporation you are employed by. If you wish to say good-bye to any hope of working for corporate America ever again, just turn me out into the night. I'll find help elsewhere, but, trust me, you will not."

"He's," Porfirio told the young man, "as tough as those other guys."

Sounding pained, the young man said, "Sir, you don't have to threaten me."

"I'm glad of that."

"I can see you are who you say you are, and you've had some trouble, I guess, so I think I can take a chance on helping you out here. Will you both be staying?"

Preston and Porfirio gave a loud "No!" together, and then Preston said, "But before Porfirio goes, we must do something to reward him for his assistance."

"I been wondering," Porfirio said, "when we'd get to that part.

"Including," Preston said, with a nasty smile into Porfirio's face, "his talking loud while leading those people back to the boat."

"Saved your bacon, man."

Directing the smile at the young man, Preston said, "Please give Porfirio one hundred dollars in cash, and put it on my bill."

Outraged Porfirio cried, "A hundred dollars? I saved you from them people, man! I drove you all the way up here! I bought you a burger and french fries and a Coke! I pulled you outa the ocean, man!"

The young man said to Preston, "Did he do all that?"

"In fact, yes," Preston said.

Opening his cash drawer, the young man said, "I will add five hundred dollars to your bill, sir," and started counting it on the desk in front of Porfirio.

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