They shook hands as friends.
At twilight Rafferty was alone in his hospital room when Alice Taylor popped in with a big bouquet of flowers, which she placed on Rafferty's lap.
"How you doing, beautiful?"
Rafferty smiled. "Better and better."
"Have you ever made love atop a volcano?"
Rafferty was amused and skeptical.
"Is it dormant or active?"
Alice reached under his blanket.
"It's not dormant," Alice said.
"Oh, I wish I could do more."
"Then I’ll do it."
Exhausted, Sheriff Hartman was trudging through the hospital and met one of his deputies interviewing one of the doctors.
"What are you doing here?" Hartman asked.
The deputy said, "Some medical supplies are missing from the hospital."
Sheriff Hartman found this very interesting.
At that same hour of night Paula Grayson answered her back door and found Jimmy Quint outside. Paula was concerned. "Jimmy! Where've you been?"
"Mauka. I had some problems I had to get straightened out."
Paula coaxed Jimmy into the kitchen. There she set some instant coffee in front of them. He pushed away the cookies she offered.
Jimmy asked, "Do you know about the money?"
Paula nodded. "Do you know where it's hidden?"
Jimmy nodded. "Paula, I'm going to use it as bait. If it's okay with you."
"To get the killers?"
"They're going to come back, and I'll be waiting for them."
"They were there last night," Paula said.
"But they didn't find it." He was defiant. "And you can't stop me or talk me out of it."
"I'm wondering if maybe I shouldn't join you. I've got about the same hatred that you have."
Jimmy said with difficulty, "This isn't hatred. This is ... my duty, maybe. Maybe the first step in how I come back from where I've been."
"Rafferty wants to see you again."
Jimmy was surprised. "What’s he up to these days?’
Rafferty awoke in his hospital room in the middle of the night and found Jimmy Quint fingering and poking the blood bag hanging down into Rafferty's arm. Jimmy saw Rafferty awake and with a guilty look stopped poking the bag of blood.
"Hi, Terry, it's me."
Rafferty was bleary-eyed. "Jimmy?"
As Rafferty turned on the bedside light, Jimmy jumped back and now sat in the chair by the bed.
Jimmy said, "How are you?"
"I'll be fine by morning," Rafferty said.
"That's what Paula told me. I can't stay long. I got to get back up to my brother's place."
"You can't go back up there, Jimmy. It's no good brooding like you're doing."
Jimmy was surprised. "Oh, I'm on my way back from all that."
Rafferty said, "Jimmy, you're in trouble with the law. You took a potshot at me in the kitchen, then you disappeared into the woods. Then you took a potshot at the deputies at your brother's garden. Resisting arrest, too."
Jimmy was defensive. "I can explain -- "
"You have to explain it to the Sheriff."
"First I got to get their killers."
"You know who they were?"
Jimmy shook his head. "I got there too late. But I know why."
"The eight hundred thousand dollars Jeremiah got for selling his crop."
"Terry, they were after the money. They didn't get it. That's why they'll come back for it. Oh. Who told you?" With haunted eyes, Jimmy added, "Well, they'll have to pay for it."
"Are you going to try to kill them?"
"Terry, I came to this island because I lost the love of my life." Jimmy left his chair. "And since then I've lost the only other people I've ever loved."
"You can't do it, Jimmy."