Free Terminal Island by Walter Greatshell

squirm loose.
    Where do you think you’re going? the detective asked.
    My hand is getting hot , Henry replied.
    Oh, you’ve got hot hands all right , the fat detective had said, relishing the quip. You’ve got hot little hands .
    Henry was touching the money when he heard a faint shout:
    “Hey! You there! Hey, kid!”
    Henry jumped in raw terror, nerves whipcracking as he searched for the source of the voice.
    “Yes, you! Over here! I’m out here! Out here !”
    Now Henry saw that the voice was coming from a boat. It was a man on a sleek white sailboat anchored offshore.
    Henry dropped the purse. “What?” he called.
    “Stay there!” the man shouted. “Please wait there until the police arrive!”
    Henry’s heart shrank with dread. “I didn’t do anything!” he cried.
    “No,” the man said, waving his arms dismissively. “Not you! Them! ” He pointed vaguely under the platform. “They did it! They got her! I saw everything!”
    Henry was at a loss, paralyzed with confusion. “Got who?” he said.
    “Just stay there! Please!”
    Henry wavered, wanting to do nothing except run for his life, but the man sounded so anxious he said, “Okay…I guess so!”
    “Good! Good boy! I have to go below right now, but don’t move, okay? I’ll just be gone for a second!”
    “Okay!” Henry said.
    The man disappeared from view.
    Feeling trapped, Henry waited. At first he tried to look nonchalant, just an innocent bystander, but as the minutes passed and the man didn’t reappear, he began to fidget. Panic set in. What was taking so long? I’m just a kid! Whatever might have happened, it was stupid for him to stand there waiting to be tangled up in it. He couldn’t afford to get into trouble. It would destroy his mother.
    The man was still out of sight below deck. Was he on the phone to the cops or what? Henry looked longingly at that open purse, some rich person’s purse, its fat leather billfold in plain sight. They probably wouldn’t even notice if part of that money was missing. Just a little, not all of it.
    He thought of his mother, probably packing their things right now. Unless a miracle happened he would never see a place as nice as this again. By tomorrow they would be back in the land of welfare motels with hourly rates.
    This was it…now or never.
    Clumsy with terror, Henry turned his back on the boat and clutched the purse to his stomach, awkwardly removing the wallet and stuffing cash into his pocket.
    As he was hurriedly returning the billfold to the purse, Henry saw that someone was coming: a red-haired and red-faced man in gloves and a dirty butcher’s apron. He looked as if he had been interrupted in the middle of work and was furious about it. Henry suddenly felt like a worm exposed to the harsh light of day. There was nowhere to run.
    Trapped, holding up the handbag as the man descended on him, he said, “Here.”
    The Butcher snatched it from him. “I’ll take that!” Grabbing Henry by the shoulders, he shouted into his face, “What do you think you’re doing?”
    Hot alcoholic breath flecked with spittle blasted Henry’s hair back; his entire field of vision was filled with the Butcher’s alarming features: curled-back lips white with rage; nostrils flared and flushed bright red; enormous bloodshot eyeballs almost bugging out of their sockets; cigarette-stained teeth like uneven pickets, bared to the gums. Henry thought the man looked totally insane, and thus capable of anything.
    “Nothing!” Henry said, nearly peeing his pants with fright. “I just found it laying here! That guy out there said he called the police. He said he saw everything.”
    “ Saw what? What guy? ”
    “On that boat right there.”
    “That one?” The Butcher’s maniacal glare fell on the sailboat. Henry noticed with dismay that there were smears of blood on his own shirt from the man’s disgusting apron.
    “Yeah. He went inside.”
    Letting go of Henry, the Butcher started feverishly digging