Don't Explain: An Artie Deemer Mystery by Dallas Murphy Page A

any…paranormal shit go down hereabout?”
    “No, but I haven’t been here long.”
    “Yeah…Maybe it was
Compton
Kempshall’s ghost.”
    “People have seen a ghost around here?” People other than him?
    “Locals, mostly. Don’t trust a local. Fuckers will hurt you. Have you seen a dog come by here?”
    “A pack of them went up the hill a little while ago.”
    “A pack? Christ! Fucking locals see some dogs playing in a group, and it gets them nuts. They get into some kind of crazed caveman head, competing predators, or some bullshit. They’ll shoot the dogs.”
    “They will?”
    “Fuck yes, they think the dogs are running deer. I say, ‘You inbred lout, there
are
no deer on Kempshall Island.’ And you know what they say to that? They say, ‘See, that proves it.’ Island wit. Have you met the cop?”
    “No.”
    “Nazi.” This guy was ardent, waving his hands before his face as if troubled by swarming insects. “That cop subscribes to
Skinhead Nation
. I’ve seen it folded in his back pocket. Kind of fucker who’ll beat you senseless, then ask for ID. I’ve seen it happen, but only to people from away. He’ll never beat a local. You know why? Because he married a Self. The Selfs are dangerous people, I’m telling you.”
    “Where are you from?”
    “Central Islip, Long Island. Not that that’s any paradise. You?”
    “New York City.”
    “Yeah. I like New York, weird kind of postapocalypse head to New York I dig.”
    “What do you do here?”
    “Here? I’m on the run. I’m underground. I’m hiding out from the FBI. They want me for sedition. Back in seventy. I’m Dickie the Red. Maybe you heard of me? No? Well, I got to get my dog before some inbred Natty Bumppo smokes her. Speaking of dogs, that one looks a lot like the R-r-ruff Dog. Maybe I’ll see you at the launching. Are you going to the launching?”
    “What launching?”
    “This guy built a submarine. I mean, a
real
submarine. Up scope, like that.”
    “When is the launching?”
    “I don’t know. You’ll hear. There ain’t all that many conflicting activities out here. When did you come?”
    “Just now.”
    “Then you were in town when it happened? The murders.”
    “Murders?”
    “Weren’t you there? A whole family got hacked to bits. These Christians are a dangerous element. They’ll hurt you.”
    Dwight rounded the point going fast with a big white wave at his bow.
    “Dwight Reed. Don’t trust him. He ain’t a Self, but he’s pussy-whipped by one. One of the
head
Selfs. The tribal leaders are always women, savage Brunhilda twats.”
    Dwight docked against the flat rock.
    “Hey, Dwight,” called Dickie, big smile. “What say? Long time.”
    Dwight completely ignored Dickie. “I think I found you a pretty good boat. I used to own it when I first got married. It’s over in the Crack right now.”
    Jellyroll and I climbed aboard. So did Dickie. Dwight asked him where he was going.
    “Over the Crack.”
    “What about your dog?” I asked, but Dickie didn’t answer.

TEN

    E verybody around here calls it the Crack for obvious reasons,” said Dwight at the helm as we neared the entrance. “Nobody ever calls it Kempshall Harbor.” He wrinkled his lip as if the words tasted metallic in his mouth.
    The Crack. I’d already seen it from the air, but airplane dimensions had softened its effect at water level. Sheer pink-granite faces rose three stories straight up out of the water. The walls rose so steeply and the rock was so smooth that a swimmer could not have climbed out and would have drowned like a turtle pawing against the glass in a flooded terrarium. At the mouth, the walls spanned fifty feet of water, but inside they narrowed steadily to an acute angle, then to nothing. Brown, leathery kelp clung to the rock and undulated in the swell as if beckoning us to watery death. This was a primal place.
    Some unimaginable force had cracked this island nearly in two. Did it crack gradually, eon by eon, or did it