Page 10 of Camino Ghosts

“When can I read some?”

“Later, not now.” The waitress poured wine and they clinked glasses.

When it came to his writers, Bruce was famously nosy. He wanted to know what they were working on and pushed them to write more. A notoriously undisciplined bunch by nature, they usually lied and said they were making more progress than they really were. He was always ready to jump in and read their latest drafts, which, of course, meant they had to listen to his editorial comments. He wanted them to write hard and well, and get published, and enjoy the writing life. If necessary, he would call agents and editors and give his unsolicited opinions about the manuscripts. And they listened. He had built his store into a powerhouse on the independent bookstore circuit, and it sold a lot of books. He networked nonstop and could deliver as much in the way of gossip as in gross sales. He knew the writers, agents, editors, publishers, executives, book reviewers, critics, and many other booksellers, and he made certain they knew him.

He and Steven ordered seafood salads and sipped wine. It was June and the sun was hot, the tourists had arrived, and the harbor was busy with fishing boats and small craft.

And the bookstore was packed. The summer season was Bruce’s favorite.

He said, “I saw where you popped off in the paper about Panther Cay.”

Steven smiled and shrugged. “Popped off? I thought I offered my usual learned and reserved legal opinion.”

“Well, it was certainly the usual. I assume you’ll be involved.”

“Not yet but we’re watching closely. If Tidal Breeze gets approval, then all hell breaks loose.”

“You file suit?”

“Oh yes. We’ll unload all the heavy artillery, or as much as my little operation can handle. It’ll be expensive, though.”

Bruce and Noelle were generous to many local nonprofits and gave Steven’s $5,000 a year. He operated on a tight budget and worked his contacts in the environmental world.

Bruce said, “I’m sure you can round up a nice litigation team. The big guys should be all over this.”

“We’ll see, but I’m worried. The big guys, especially in the Southeast, are stretched pretty thin right now. A lot of irons in the fire, a lot of development. Money has been so cheap for the past ten years that everybody is expanding. Theme parks, superhighways, offshore drilling, subdivisions. There are not enough tree-huggers like me who know how to litigate and win. It’ll be a war.”

“You’ve already done your homework?”

“Yes. We got word about a year ago that the developers were sniffing around. As you know, Leo changed the seascape. Dark Isle was there for centuries and nobody wanted it. Leo hits and within hours the reefs and currents are radically different. Suddenly, a bridge is feasible, and of course the highway boys are always looking for a new one to build.”

“What about Lovely Jackson’s claim of ownership?”

Steven shook his head and drank some wine. The waitress poured water and asked if they needed anything else. They did not.

Steven said, “I’m not a property lawyer, that’s another specialty, but if she plans to fight the development, she has to go to court and prove ownership. Frankly, that’s the easiest way to stop Tidal Breeze. I assume the company’s legal squad will argue loud and long that she has no ownership interest. Therefore, the land belongs to the state, subject to local property taxes, and is wide open to development.”

Bruce swallowed a fat shrimp, chased it with Chablis, and asked, “What’s the legal principle called—‘adverse possession’? Something like that?”

“That’s it and it’s pretty basic stuff we covered in the first year of law school. If you squat on property that’s not yours for at least seven years, then you can claim ownership by adverse possession. According to Lovely’s book, slaves settled Dark Isle almost three hundred years ago and kept it to themselves. By the 1950s they were all gone. She was the last one and she left when she was fifteen, if you can believe her story.”

“You don’t believe it?”

“I don’t know. I’m not much for voodoo and black magic and such. But regardless, she needs a lawyer, Bruce, and now. Can you contact her?”

“I’ll try. As I said, she likes to come to the store occasionally. I keep copies of her book up front on the ‘Local Authors’ shelf. We’re selling about three a year. I get the impression that she rarely gets out.”

“How’s her health?”

“Not sure, but she appears to be in pretty good shape, very spry. I’ll reach out.”

“The sooner the better.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

3.

Two years earlier, in the aftermath of Hurricane Leo, a crew from the Florida Department of Natural Resources was probing the waters between Dark Isle and the mainland, a distance of roughly one mile. Satellite images revealed a remarkable shift in both the landscape and seascape due to the storm. The northern end of the island had been sliced off and now sat three hundred yards away by itself, even more secluded. The main section was still intact but long swaths of its Atlantic-side beaches were gone. The amount of sand that had been displaced was beyond estimation, and the crew was in the early stages of gathering information. The three scientists were taking hundreds of photographs and measurements. Using sophisticated underwater cameras, they were filming the reefs and currents and sending the data back in real time to their lab in Tallahassee. The day’s weather forecast was typical for August—hot, humid, with an 80 percent chance of late afternoon thunderstorms, some possibly severe.

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