Cody looked at me. Naturally enough he didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. It was all there in his eyes. Rita, I said, sometimes the boys need to get away from the girls. Cody and I are going fishing in the morning. Bright and early, I said to Cody.

Why?

I don’t know why, I said. But you’re supposed to go early, so we will. Cody nodded, looked at his mother, and then turned around and walked down the hall.

Really, Dexter, Rita said. You really don’t have to.

And, of course, I knew I didn’t have to. But why shouldn’t I? It probably wouldn’t cause me actual physical pain. Besides that, it would be nice to get away for a few hours. Especially from Doakes. And in any case—again, I don’t know why it should be, but kids really do matter to me. I certainly don’t get all gooey-eyed at the sight of training wheels on a bicycle, but on the whole I find children far more interesting than their parents.

The next morning, as the sun was coming up, Cody and I were motoring slowly out of the canal by my apartment in my seventeen-foot Whaler. Cody wore a blue-and-yellow life vest and sat very still on the cooler. He slumped down just a little so that his head almost vanished inside the vest, making him look like a brightly colored turtle.

Inside the cooler was soda and a lunch Rita had made for us, a light snack for ten or twelve people. I had brought frozen shrimp for bait, since this was Cody’s first trip and I didn’t know how he might react to sticking a sharp metal hook into something that was still alive. I rather enjoyed it, of course—the more alive, the better!—but one can’t expect sophisticated tastes from a child.

Out the canal, into Biscayne Bay, and I headed across to Cape Florida, steering for the channel that cut past the lighthouse. Cody didn’t say anything until we came within sight of Stiltsville, that odd collection of houses built on pilings in the middle of the bay. Then he tugged at my sleeve. I bent down to hear him over the roar of the engine and the wind.

Houses, he said.

Yes, I yelled. Sometimes there are even people in them.

He watched the houses go by and then, when they began to disappear behind us, he sat back down on the cooler. He turned around once more to look at them when they were almost out of sight. After that he just sat until we got to Fowey Rock and I idled down. I put the motor in neutral and slid the anchor over the bow, waiting to make sure it caught before turning the engine off.

All right, Cody, I said. It’s time to kill some fish.