Free Shark River by Randy Wayne White

condo outside Cartagena. In international politics, it’s hard to tell who really does what. But Harrington, he’s so far behind the scenes that we had trouble coming up with a fast, full dossier on him.”
    I told him, “Here’s something I may have left out. One of the guys on the dock, he was yelling in Spanish. He had a Colombian accent. They speak a very clean dialect, particularly in and around the cities. Bogotá, maybe, but I’m just guessing.”
    “Finally, you offer me a little scrap of useful information.” He chuckled, but it was a timing device, not laughter. “Colombian accent, huh? To pick out accents, you must be fluent. Spent some time down there in South America, have you Ford?”
    “Several years. Traveled all over.” Interpreting the expression on the agent’s face, I added, “It had nothing to do with the drug trade, trust me. I was studying bull sharks. I’ve been researching them for years. The work took me all over South and Central America. All over the world, really.”
    “Really? Who funded it? Who paid for all that travel and research?”
    “I got some grants. But mostly private corporations that have a financial interest and see a potential for profit in certain sea products.”
    “Fascinating.” His inflection said: Bullshit.
    “You know anything about bull sharks?” I waited for him to respond, but he didn’t. He sat there leafing through his notebook. Finally, I continued, “A bull shark will swim hundreds of miles up freshwater rivers for reasons that we still don’t understand. It may have something to do with ferromagnetic crystals in their nervous system. Directional devices built right in, or perhaps it has something to do with the way their tissues deal with salt. Whatever the reason, they’re a very unusual animal. The Zambezi River shark? The freshwater sharks of Lake Nicaragua? Carcharhinus leucas. The same, aggressive animal. Because of that shark, I spent a lot of time working in the jungle.”
    “That part of the story, I don’t doubt,” he said.
    I wondered what he meant by that, the suggestive tone, but said nothing.
    He said, “Okay, so you picked up on the Colombian accent. About six months ago, Lindsey Harrington’s father—Hal Harrington, that’s his name—attended a summit in Cartagena, along with representatives from several other Latin American countries. The U.S. has given them in excess of a billion dollars a year for the drug war—what they call a war, anyway—and the summit was to outline operational methods and long-term goals. That much is in the dossier. Maybe Harrington did something to piss them off. Maybe he bucked the Colombian establishment—it’s one of the most corrupt countries on earth. Whatever he did, he made someone mad enough to go after his daughter.”
    “That’s it? It’s really all you know?”
    “Yep. Pretty thin so far, but it’s early. You haven’t exactly been a fountain of information yourself. What I should tell you is . . . here, let me point out something that you may not realize, Ford. Something you haven’t thought much about. Right now, you’re safe. So’s Lindsey Harrington. For the next twenty-four hours, two different federal agencies are going to keep this island secured while we finish collecting evidence. We have lots of video to shoot, lots of photos to take. Where you are right now is one of the safest places in the world. But you can’t stay on Guava Key forever. Sooner or later, you’re going to have to get into your boat and go home. So what are you going to do if those punks come calling again? You really feeling that lucky? That’s why I’d like you to cooperate. If they put you on their personal shit list, it’d be nice to grab them when they come to grab you.”
    “Stake me out like a goat, huh?” I shook my head. “Sorry, the timing’s bad. I’m too busy. I’ve got several research projects going on right now.”
    He parroted my words with a flat sarcasm. “Research