Baja Florida by Bob Morris

Guess that would be her.”
    â€œYou know where Trifecta is?” I said. “Sure would like to find it.”
    â€œYou mind me asking why?”
    â€œOld friend of the family,” I said. “Just thought I’d surprise Karen, maybe buy her a drink or something.”
    â€œWorks for me,” the man said. “Hold on.”
    A VHF radio sat on the counter, tuned to Channel 16. The man picked up the handset.
    â€œBlue Sky Marina calling the Trifecta, ” he said. “ Trifecta, come in.”
    He gave it a few seconds and called again. Static and then a man’s voice: “Read you, Blue Sky. This is the Trifecta. ”
    â€œYeah, Captain. What’s your location?”
    â€œJust leaving Guana for Green Turtle. Look to be there in two-three hours.”
    â€œCopy that,” said the man behind the counter. He held out the handset to me. “You want to tell that friend of yours anything?”
    â€œNo,” I said. “I think I’ll surprise her.”

17
    Green Turtle Cay sits three miles offshore of Great Abaco. The only way to get there if you don’t have a boat, or a seaplane, is to take the ferry, which runs on the hour or thereabouts.
    I covered the twenty-five miles on the S.C. Bootle Highway to the ferry dock in less than forty minutes. A minor miracle since we had to stop twice for goats, once for chickens, and once for a truck that had dropped its exhaust system in the middle of the road after hitting a monster pothole.
    We pulled into the ferry dock parking lot just as the deckhands on the Sarah Mitchell were casting off lines. The captain kept it at idle until we’d hopped aboard.
    Two long bench seats ran down each side of the ferry’s cabin. They were filled with passengers, a mix of vacationers and locals. The space between the benches was taken up by various goods bought in Marsh Harbour—crates of groceries, cases of beer and soda, boxes containing everything from dishwashers to TV sets—along with assorted suitcases and duffel bags.
    The only place left to stand was near the stern. Aside from the occasional whiff of diesel fumes, the wind felt fresh on my skin. The sun was at our backs. The day was progressing nicely enough, although I had not a clue where it was heading. Still, there was motion and it seemed to be forward motion and I was just a big shrimp, going with the tide, crunching my way along, ass-first and mindless of any hungry beasties that might come along and make a meal of me.
    A pod of dolphins broke surface in our wake and drafted the boat for several minutes before jetting away. I took it as a good luck sign. Not that I put much stock in signs. Or luck. The good kind or the bad kind. But when dolphins present themselves—those quirky almost-human smiles, their happy leaping, that sense of a creature so attuned to its place and so utterly pleased to be there—it is hard not to feel just a little bit hopeful.
    The ferry hit a wave and jostled us around. Boggy and I held fast to the transom to keep our footing. Despite the washing he’d given his clothes, Boggy still looked a mess.
    â€œMind me asking you something?”
    â€œYou just did,” he said.
    â€œMind me asking what you were doing in that ditch at the Walker’s airport?”
    â€œI found some things there.”
    â€œWhat things?”
    â€œTaino things.”
    â€œThe Taino used to live on Walker’s Cay?”
    â€œThe Taino, they were everywhere, Zachary. On all these islands. Some called themselves Lucaya. Some Arawak. But they were all the same people—Taino.”
    He opened one of the leather pouches that hung from the drawstring of his pants. He pulled out a smooth black object, a stone of some kind it looked like, just a couple of inches long, maybe three inches wide.
    He handed it to me.
    â€œA zemi,” Boggy said.
    â€œZemi. That’s one of your Taino gods or something, right?”
    â€œYes,