by Tom DeMarco
The touch of lumbago was a minor annoyance. But that had been with him for years. His feet were hurting too, from being on them all day in his other job. Aside from that, he had no complaint. Sometimes a noise would break his concentration. Interruption, however, was not a cause for complaint. The United Services Company paid him to be interrupted. D.D. Pease lifted his head now to listen to the whining of a car that wouldn’t start in the parking lot. The would-be driver continued to crank the engine optimistically, without pause. The pitch of its whine was winding down as the battery got weaker and weaker. Soon it would stop altogether.
The stars were clear and lovely in the darkness that comes to the modern world only with a power failure. He turned off his little light. There was a faint pink at the horizon, reminding him of the Aurora he had know as a child in Minnesota. He leaned back in his chair. With the city power off, there was a peaceful quiet (now that the whine of the starting motor had finally quit). The roar of air conditioning units in the hotel was gone, as was the zapping noise of the bug lights. There was, for the moment at least, no traffic. He wished idly that there might be a power failure each night.
Behind him a pair of lights was approaching. They seemed to be the lights of a car, but he could not hear the engine. There was also a slight shuffling noise of feet on the pavement. With his eyes closed, he tried to reconstruct from the pattern of sound alone what might be going on. People were pushing the car, he thought, that would explain the shuffling. If they were pushing it, then he ought to hear some grunting; people always grunt as they push heavy objects. He listened, and there it was. There were four people he thought. Now he heard some low voices, at least one female voice among them. The lights of the car were too bright for this to be the vehicle whose battery had been worn down. So this was another vehicle. Curious coincidence, that: two cars not able to start on the same night. Or maybe there was some other reason for people to be pushing this one, since he hadn’t even heard them try to start it. Why push a vehicle with a perfectly good battery? He sat up and put his books and notebooks away in the canvas bag.
Pease had guarded this marina six nights a week for the past four years. Nothing much ever happened. There were the occasional groups of college kids during spring recess who would happen by, all tanked up, and want to get up onto the yachts. He had never had much trouble convincing them to go elsewhere. There was another marina, he would say, with no armed guard, just a half mile down the road. That was usually enough. If not, he had his night stick and even the pearl-handled gun to show them. There had only been one theft of a boat that he could recall, and that had been an owner who had stolen his own boat for the insurance.
He approached the lights of the vehicle. It appeared to be a van, like a bread truck. The people who had been pushing it were invisible behind the glare. The van was settled in against the curb with its lights playing over the line of tied up yachts. He heard a female voice saying, “It’s the red canvas bag, like a big shopping bag.” There was a mumbled response from inside the van.
“Evening, folks,” said Pease.
An unintelligible exclamation from behind the van. Then there was a tall bald man in middle age approaching him from one side. He had one hand behind his back. The man looked a bit shy. He paused to push his glasses back, still keeping the left hand out of sight. Pease relaxed. From 18 years as a city cop and then an armed guard, he knew that this kind of fellow was not much of a threat. A young man, very dark in coloring, perhaps Hispanic, appeared from the other side of the truck. He seemed, if anything, even less threatening. To Pease’s elderly eyes, he was just some mother’s particularly comely child. The young man was carrying a red canvas shopping bag. He had one hand down inside the bag.
“Evening,” said Pease again.
“Look, this is just terribly embarrassing,” said the tall man. “But we are quite obliged to steal some of these yachts. Twenty of them, to be exact.”
“Oh really?”
“Really. I can only assure you that it would all make perfect sense to you if only you understood. But we have to. That is the long and the short of it.” I work for the State Department, by the way. If that would make any difference.”
“I see. The government is requisitioning twenty yachts.”
“Well, not exactly. What’s really happening is we’re stealing them.”
“Oh.”
“Yes. I hope you’re not going to make any trouble. We’re armed, you see.” He held out his left had to show the pistol he was holding. “Show him your gun, Loren.”
The dark young man drew a black handgun, what seemed to be a semi-automatic, out of his bag. He pointed it at Pease.
“Well. Guns and theft. That’s quite a combination. Guns and theft and maybe a bit too much to drink.”
“We haven’t had a thing to drink.” The bald man was indignant.
There were two young women now visible and a third man, lanky and aged about 30, with a reddish beard and long hair in a pony tail. They looked like a group of college-age kids out for a walk with one of their fathers. Pease gave them a bemused smile. “Five people to steal twenty yachts. What are you going to do with so many stolen yachts, if I could ask?”
“Well, that doesn’t really concern you,” said the bald man. “I mean, we could explain, but it would take forever. The key thing is that we’ve got these guns. And we’ve got the drop on you, I think that is the expression.”
“Now look,” said Pease. He held up his two hands and moved slowly toward the man.
“Hold it right there, D.D. Pease! This is no joke.”
Pease stopped, surprised that the man knew his name. “You have the advantage on me, sir. I don’t know your name.”
“I’m Albert Tomkis.”
“Well, Albert. Let’s just talk this over. A little talk and some clear thinking can’t hurt anyone. It could even be a big help in keeping you and these young folks out of trouble.”
“Step back. Or I’ll shoot. I really will. This is a serious matter.”
“But I’m not going to let you steal these yachts. Don’t you see that? I am a guard. Guards guard things. So I’m not going to let you get near my boats. The United Services Company has paid me all these years and I have never really done anything for the money. And this is my chance. If I don’t protect these boats now, I may not have another chance for another decade. So, you see, it will be quite impossible for you to steal any of these vessels. That’s just all there is to it.”
“But we have guns!” Albert was obviously distressed at the thought of being resisted.
“Now it’s funny you should talk about guns, Albert, because I have one too.” Very slowly, Pease pulled the pistol from its holster and pointed it directly at Tomkis. “You see?”
A long moment to consider the standoff, the almost comical scene. Finally, Albert said, “This is ridiculous. Your gun is useless against us.”
“Oh really? Well, I think exactly the opposite. I think my gun is the only one that matters, because it is in the hands of a man who knows how to use it, a professional. I am a fellow who has come to peace with himself on the subject of using a gun. I don’t think any of you could pull the trigger on a poor old man like me, but I feel quite different about it. I could shoot any one of you because you’re armed and you’re trying to steal the properties that I am charged with defending. That is the difference.”
“You’re taking a terrible chance.” Albert gestured nervously with his gun, holding it out even further from his body and pointing it directly at Pease’s head.
Pease faced him squarely, his own gun pointing at Albert’s midriff. “You see, Albert, you’re not going to shoot that gun. If you had any intention of doing so, you would have when I pulled out my own. So now it’s all over, this silly adventure. Because you folks just aren’t the type that shoots guns.”
The one called Loren, put his gun back into the bag. “Well, he’s certainly got us figured right on that one, Albert.” He was ferreting around in th
e bottom of the bag. “We’ll have to use the cattle prods. They’re our only real weapon. He pulled out two long black sticks and passed one to the bearded young man at his side.
So far, neither of the two women had spoken. Now one of them, the very dark haired one, stepped forward and lifted an arm to restrain the young man who was moving forward toward Pease. “Hold on, Loren. Those things really hurt. Maybe there’s a better way.”
Pease looked at her in the reflected light. She appeared to be in her twenties, very beautiful, exotically dark with black hair and dark eyes. As he watched, she bent down to the dock where there was a long coil of line, the bite of a docking line attached to one of the smaller sailboats. She tied a small loop in one end, then a larger loop through the first on. Now she stepped toward him, beginning to twirl the loop over her head, a lasso. Pease looked up nervously at the loop. It formed a perfect circle in the horizontal plane. As he looked at it, it was rising higher and higher. He stepped backward one step. He looked down at the woman, whose eyes were locked on his. Then he looked back up at the loop. He prepared to jump to his left if it began to descend toward him. When he looked back down, the woman had moved sharply to the side. He jumped automatically as he had planned, but she was a step ahead of him. She jerked hard on the line and the noose leapt after him, settling over his shoulders. She had it tightened instantly and was on him. He went down in a heap. The woman had one knee on his chest. There were suddenly two more turns of the line around his ankles. He flailed out at her, but she was too quick. In another moment, he was hog-tied. None of the others had moved. They were staring down at him, open-mouthed. The woman was kneeling astride him, lifting her hair behind her neck and untying the scarf that was tucked into the throat of her shirt. He realized too late what was about to happen. He took a breath to shout for help, but the dark young man was suddenly on him, covering his face with both hands. He turned his head wildly, trying to get free. The woman had the ends of the scarf in her hands now. She waited for her moment and then lunged with it, pushing the young man aside. Pease had the material in his teeth. He clamped down hard to keep her from tightening any more. Now she was knotting the scarf behind his neck. She pressed against him with her upper body to restrain him. He could feel the warmth of her breast against his cheek. He stopped resisting.
The five of them stared down from above at his helpless form. There were others arriving now, several dozens of feet and legs moving through the light. D. D. Pease moaned with frustration.
The next two hours had the quality of a nightmare or an incomprehensible horror film for Pease. There were aliens all around him, two hundred or more of them. They looked just like ordinary people, male and female, young and old, even children, but they were all aliens, all intent upon the incomprehensibly alien goal of stealing twenty sailing yachts. How could this thing make any sense at all? How could so many normal looking people have convinced themselves that it made sense? The city cops would be by in their squad car at any moment to put an end to the fiasco. They would arrest the leaders and let the others off with a tongue-lashing, and then what would the whole comedy have accomplished? Or even if they did manage to sail the boats away, how did they hope to avoid the coast guard cruisers that would be dispatched shortly afterward to round them up? They couldn’t hope for more than an hour or two of a head start. What use was that in a sailboat?
His back was killing him. Pease hated to be lying flat on it, even in bed he propped himself up with pillows. Now he tried to turn himself onto one shoulder to change the strain on the lower back. The tall, yellow haired girl looked down at him. He thought she might be worried about him trying to get away, though tied as he was there was no chance of that. She pondered his changed position for a moment, then put her clipboard down and stepped up into the cockpit of the Irena, the nearest of the large yachts. She took one of the dark blue cockpit cushions from behind the wheel. This she placed in front of utility box beside Pease. Then she levered him into a sitting position against the cushion. “Better?” she asked. He nodded.
From this vantage point he watched the aliens go about their strange business. They seemed to be extraordinarily organized. The five he had first encountered were clearly in charge. They had clipboards and gave muted instructions to the others. As he watched their dynamic, Pease formed the impression that the comely young man they called Loren seemed to be their leader. The other four turned to him often for direction. He seemed the most sure of himself. Then with the arrival of two elderly men and an astonishingly pretty elderly woman, Pease changed his mind. There were signs of deference on all sides toward the older of the two men, the one dressed in a tee shirt and khakis and, for some reason, bedroom slippers. He gave no instructions, but it was obvious that he was their leader. The old man looked positively bushed. He settled wearily into Pease’s lawn chair and closed his eyes.
The majority of the group seemed dazed as they followed orders. They had a second truck now, pushed into position along the ramp. Long lines of people moved from the trucks to the row of boats, carrying boxes of supplies. There were cases of food, lots of electrical gear, seemingly dozens of car batteries, and box after box of D-batteries and AAs, still sealed as shipped from the manufacturer. Pease noted all these things to be able to respond to the inevitable police investigation when it finally began. The twenty yachts had been picked out and marked. They were all sailing vessels, all of fifty feet or more. Supplies moved down the dock to the boats and were stowed below. The aliens had brought a pair of bolt cutters along to break into the boats. They used this too on the rack of windsurfers to cut the security cable. The windsurfers were carried onto the decks of the yachts and tied down. That was a particularly curious element of the whole curious matter to Pease. What use did aliens have for windsurfers?
A little girl had come up to Loren as he stood not far away from Pease’s position. She had a serious air about her, a frown and furrowed brow.
“What’s up Stacey?”
“I imagine that you’re the one, Loren, who’s making up the crews to take charge of the various vessels.”
“Uh huh. I’ve got you and your folks on the Kiruna. It’s the pretty red one, second in the line. I’ll be in the Irena with Kelly, bringing up the rear. And I’ve assigned Claymore to take out the lead vessel; I think he’s probably our best sailor. Does all that meet with your approval?”
“Yes.” The little girl smiled mechanically. “Fortunately there are lots of good sailors in our group. Because we all come from such over-privileged backgrounds.”
Loren looked down at her, repressing a grin. “I guess so.”
“You might think that the Senator, who also comes from an over-privileged background, and who professes to be a great yachtsman, you might think that he would be a logical one to take charge of one of the vessels.”
“Yes. I’ve got him in charge of the Kiruna, in fact.”
“I thought so. Well, you might like to know that the Senator is subject to seasickness. I don’t like to tell stories out of school, but that is the truth of the matter. He is only good for an hour or so. After that, he is too busy spitting up to run a boat. I say this with all due respect. Because he is my father, and a very good man. I hope you don’t think I’m acting out of line.”
“Stacey, you’re a wonder. Thank you for that information. I’ll put the Senator on Homer’s boat. That will flatter his ego and also give him a graceful excuse for not having a command of his own. He can hardly feel bad about being second to Homer.”
“That will be excellent. It’s my mother who is the real sailor in the family, by the way, but she’ll be far too involved with the Senator to take a command on this trip. Now one person who doesn’t come from an over-privileged background is Mr. Williams. But it turns out that he is an excellent sailor. He was, in point of fact, captain of the sailing team at Ann Arbor before he had to drop out. You might not have known that.”
“I didn’t. Thank you again, Miss Hopkins. I will put Mr. Williams in
charge of the Kiruna.”
“That will be excellent. I’m looking after Curtis, by the way. That’s the job I’ve been given by Kelly. It’s quite an exhausting job, because, boys, being boys, he is just full of devilment. I handed him over to my mother for a few minutes so that we could have this important conversation.”
“Good move. But I’ve got a job for the two of you. We’ll keep Curtis busy under your supervision and that will keep him out of ‘devilment’ and let both of you lend a hand.”
“That would be most appropriate.”
“Get Sonia to give you the supply of Dramamine capsules and the package of paper cups. Then I want you to go around to everyone and make sure each person takes one tablet, half a tablet for children. Don’t let anyone tell you they don’t need it, Stacey. Everybody, everybody has to take some Dramamine. You have to be very firm. Curtis can carry the cups of water they’ll need.”
“OK Loren.”
She scampered off toward one of the boats where a handsome well dressed woman was entertaining a little boy. The one she had referred to as ‘the Senator’ could only be Chandler Hopkins. Pease had thought he looked familiar when he had passed earlier. And the rather striking woman he had arrived with was undoubtedly his wife Candace, the former Candace Fournier. Her photo had often been in the paper and in the feature magazines around the time of their marriage. A U.S. Senator (now president of some university, if his memory served him right) was a part of this highjacking. Curiouser and curiouser. He turned to watch Stacey, with the little boy in tow, as she approached the very dark young woman who had lassoed him. The woman opened a backpack from a pile by her side and handed Stacey a large jar and a package of paper cups. So she must be ‘Sonia.’ Pease was trying to get all of their names straight for the police.
