Free To the Manor Dead by Sebastian Stuart

evil.”
    “Was she Daphne’s dealer?”
    “I don’t know Daphne,” he said quickly, looking away.
    “Well, Esmerelda seems to. Do you know where she lives?”
    Mad John took my hand—his palm was solid callus—and led me through thick underbrush. We came to a small hidden inlet on the riverbank, muddy and overgrown. A tree grew out over the river and a raft was tied to it. It was constructed of old planks of lumber, straw, reeds, driftwood—and looked about as seaworthy as a pet rock. Mad John grabbed the rope and pulled the raft close to shore. He stepped on board. “Come on.”
    “I’m not so sure about this.”
    Sputnik was—he leapt onto the raft, his tail going a mile a minute.
    Mad John jumped up and down to show me how sturdy his craft was. What the hell, I knew how to swim. I stepped on board, the raft wobbled but felt pretty solid.
    Mad John untied the rope, picked up an oar, and pushed us off. The sun was peeking over the Taconics, giving the dawn mist a pearly glow. When we were about fifteen feet from shore, Mad John steered us south and we headed downriver. This was a whole new perspective on the river, it was like being in a watery green dream or maybe one of those lurid old technicolor movies—the bank a vivid riot of trees, reeds, vines, all of it accompanied by birdsong and enveloped in the iridescent mist.
    “We can’t stay out long, gotta get back before the sun rises, gotta stay secret,” Mad John said. He was a deft raftsman, an athletic little guy, all muscle and sinew. Almost sexy in a weird way— if he spent a week in one of those Romanian baths where stout women scrub you so clean your skin bleeds.
    We came to a lawn fronting a small 1950s house and he paddled hard to get us across the open space and back into the sheltering gnarl. Sputnik was in dog heaven, racing from one side of the raft to the other, ears cocked, nose twitching, eyes scanning. The sky was growing lighter. We came to a small peninsula. Sitting at the end of it was a ragtag ramshackle house that looked like it took a wrong turn on its way to Appalachia.
    The muddy riverbank in front of the house was home to a half-submerged supermarket cart, the lawn littered with car parts and rotting furniture. Mad John grabbed hold of a low-lying branch. “That’s where you’ll find her,” he whispered.
    “Esmerelda lives here?”
    “Sometimes.” He looked over to the east. “We gotta get back.”
    The current was with us and we made quick time back to Mad John’s mooring. He helped me off the raft like a regular little insane gentleman.
    As he was tying up the raft he spotted something in the muck. “Aha!” He cupped his palms, reached down, and scooped it up. “Look at this!!”
    There was a small green thing squirming around.
    “What is it?”
    “It’s a newt!! The newt we need to stop the mothafucka!”
    “Could you back up a bit?”
    “This little loverboy is endangered.” Mad John leaned down and actually nuzzled the slimy little thing. “Oh, das-a-baby, das-a-baby.”
    “Shouldn’t you leave it where it is then?”
    “No! Come on.” I followed him back to his crib. He pointed to an empty jelly jar. “Can you open that?”
    I did and Mad John slipped the mucky newt in. It immediately tried to climb the sides.
    “Look how beautiful!” Mad John said, holding the jar up to my face. The newt was a shimmery green with red and yellow spots.
    “Very pretty. But how is he going to stop the motherfucker, and who is the motherfucker?”
    “It’s verbotenski to mess with this little guy’s habitat—and the mothafucka is Vince Hammer.”
    “Wait … so you’re going to release the newt at River Landing?”
    “ Hot-cha-cha-cha! ” Mad John said, going into his little jumping up and down routine. “I gotta get a few more first. Then George is going to call the state’s herpetologist.”
    “You guys are brilliant.”
    “Well, I am.”
    “I’ve got to get moving. Thanks for showing me where