by Ed Teja
“We have another area near the docks where we run operations,” Hank said, pretending not to notice the tension in the room.
“Is that where all the computers are?” I asked.
He led us into the inner office where a larger desk (Hank's) filled much of the space. “What computers?”
“The computers you used to collect all your intel, monitor transmissions, do all the high-tech spying.”
He shook his head. “This is the age of inter-agency cooperation. We put in a request and the people in the high-tech centers go to work. We can request satellite photos and such of specific areas, and the listening rooms send us traffic relevant to our operations.”
“Stuff they decide you have a need to know?”
He grimaced. “Sometimes the delays do tie our hands. Everything is delayed and the smugglers are one step ahead and stay that way. We still tend to use our own informants, and we have a helicopter that takes photos of ships, installations, anything suspicious.”
“Handy.”
“But if I can get my hands directly on the intelligence—”
“Such as squeezing this Dutchman?”
“That would put us ahead of the curve. We'd know routes and carriers. Even if they were aware we'd grabbed him, a lot of cargo would be en route, and they wouldn't be able to keep us from shutting that down.”
Hank slumped into a seat behind his desk, and I took a seat facing him.
Bill stood in the doorway. “Been a long time since I was on Exuma,” he said. “While you two catch up on the fine old times we are going to have, I'd like to scout around, see how Georgetown has changed.”
“I doubt it's changed much since you were here last,” Hank said. “Not in any big way.”
Bill shrugged. “It's local knowledge stuff. I need to get the feel for important shit, like the best place to grab a rum.”
“We won't be long,” Hank said. “Hang on a minute and I'll have you settled into your rooms.”
“I thought we were in a rush,” I said.
Hank scowled. “Things are in flux. You know how missions go.”
“Apparently, I have no idea how this one is going.”
“After we talked yesterday, I found out that the man we are after—”
“Vermeer?”
“Right. He left the country the same day I went to St. Anne. He is currently having business meetings in London.”
“That sucks. So much for grabbing him. I guess we go home now.”
“It's just a minor SNAFU—a delay. He will be back in a couple of days, and we need the time to plan, anyway. We don't want you going in unprepared.”
“And you are certain of where he is?”
“Sure of it.”
“You have eyes on him?”
He looked deflated. “I don't. Amy called and gave me the news. She has people actively tracking his movements.” He hated admitting her resources were better than his own.
“I guess her people let her operate without adult supervision,” Bill said.
“We can meet tomorrow. Amy said she will come in at 0800.”
“In the meantime, where is all this great intel you promised us?” I asked. “I forgot to pack a novel.”
“It isn't here,” he said. “It's stored in a secure vault at the ops center.” He spread his hands. “I couldn't very well leave it sitting on my desk while I was in St. Anne. You go check out your rooms and I'll find out if there are any updates. I’ll give you the complete package tomorrow.”
“Why not tonight? Bring it to the hotel.”
“I've requested new satellite recon photos of Vermeer's installations. They won't be available until around midnight tonight. And most of the stuff won't make sense unless I explain it to you. We can go through everything in the morning.”
“You said he has a private island?”
“Lee Stocking. Very near here.” He pointed to a wall map that showed the area of The Bahamas around Grand Exuma. “That's this little island right here, right off Adderley Cut.”
“Have you got maps of the island?”
“Maps of the island, photos of the installations, and charts of the waters. We happily provide full-service support for our contractors.”
At least his sense of irony was intact. Hank hated playing a support role. He was champing at the bit and probably would like nothing better than to grab his crew and assault the island. Plunder and pillage, in the best sense of the terms. All those petty and pesky sovereign-nation issues, and the fact that he'd be crucified for doing it, ruined all the fun.
“Happily, everything on the island is part of Vermeer's operation. There is no chance of collateral damage.”
He meant there were no civilians who weren't part of the vast conspiracy. I didn't find that reassuring. A small fishing village would provide cover. Hank was still thinking in terms of a full-on attack, not a subtle, sneaky covert abduction.
“Okay then. Show us to our rooms and we will take the rest of the day off. We can unwind and spend some time looking around.”
Hank called out to Petty Officer Roberts, who came in with an expectant look. Probably hoping Hank would ask him to take us out and shoot us.
“Take these men to the hotel. Ken is expecting them. Then come back here directly.”
“Yes sir,” he said.
“We all meet here at 0800,” Hank said. “I'll bring it all—everything. We can go over everything then.”
That suited me fine. At least as anything about this situation could suit me.
13
“It's not far. Close enough to walk,” Petty Officer Roberts said as we left the office.
“Nice day for it,” Bill said. And it was.
The walk did me good. At first my confused thoughts about the situation, about Amy and who she really was, jumbled around in my brain to no good end. I didn't have enough information to process my doubts or manage to fit together my concerns about her agenda with my growing appreciation of her as a clever operative and a woman. There was always the danger of letting those mix together.
Even Roberts seemed to soften out in the fresh air. I put away my own chaotic thoughts and tried to pump him for a little information. “So, this hotel—the Navy owns it?”
He nodded. “I don't know if it is the Navy, or a larger operation, but the government. Not directly. We use a couple of local companies as resources and one of them owns and runs the hotel.”
Bill laughed. “I wonder what they do if it turns a profit?”
“A source of dark money,” I said.
Roberts didn't seem to get the point, but that was fine. He was acting human. Still, he wasn't thrilled at being our tour guide.
“It's not a fancy hotel, just a place to house people who are visiting the island or coming through to run missions.”
“Posing as tourists?” I asked.
“Sometimes. It's a perfect cover,” Roberts said. “All tourists look suspicious, so none of them do.”
That made a certain amount of sense.
“Do the staff know what the deal is, or do we have to watch what we say—keep our tourist cover story?”
He shrugged. “The manager is in the loop, and other than that, there is just a night watchman and a maid. I wouldn't think they are in the know.”
“Not an all-inclusive resort we are headed for, then,” Bill said.
“There isn't much of anything included at all,” Roberts said. “It's a small place and doesn't need much staff.” Bill's sense of humor seemed to aggravate an underlying sourness that undermined the casual manner he was trying to put on. Acting didn't come naturally to him.
We arrived to find that Roberts' observations about the place proved to be overstatements. Not that I care much about housing. I'm not all that comfortable in pretentious palaces, but even I thought 'hotel' was a generous term for this place.
The Georgetown Lodge was an older building sitting on a narrow, quiet
street that was mostly residential, with rows of small concrete-block homes painted in bright colors. The lodge itself, a nondescript wooden-framed two-story building, only looked like a hotel when you stepped inside and found yourself in a small reception area that doubled as a sitting room. Off to the side, worn wooden stairs led up to rooms. I rather liked it.
“It's a couple of smidgens smaller than Gazele's guesthouse,” Bill noted.
I agreed. It blended into its environment, though.
A smiling older man looked at us from behind the desk. “Welcome,” he said.
“This is Ken. He runs the hotel,” he said. “He'll fix you up.” Then, having done his part, Roberts left.
“Is he always that abrupt?” I asked.
Ken grinned. “That Roberts flunked charm school,” he said. “Of course, from what I heard, he might have a reason not to be pleasant to you boys, anyway.”
“He has reasons not to be asking to be assigned as our tour guide,” I said.
“I wouldn't turn my back on that boy, if I were you,” Ken said. “He and that chief of his have some kind of attitude, a sense they are special. It makes them act like real assholes. The dangerous kind.”
“I appreciate that,” I told him. “We have no intention of letting them get behind us.”
Bill took a hard look at the man. “As for you, Ken—somehow you don't look or sound much like a local. I'm guessing you are an American. A happy expat?”
“Retired Army expat,” he said. “Sort of retired. I guess this job counts some, although as a far as the US government is concerned, I'm working for a foreign company. At least I don't have to pay US takes on the money.”
“Every silver cloud has a strange lining,” Bill said. “So how did you get into this? Did you train as a hotel keeper in the Army?”
“Twenty years in the infantry,” he said. “Although toward the end it seemed more like nursemaid duty. I transferred to an admin job and was stationed in Puerto Rico for my last two years. By the time I got out, I decided I liked the Caribbean. Someone saw I was retiring and asked if I'd like a part-time job here. I liked that too. I came over and chatted with old Hank and he hired me.”
“What's not to like?” Bill asked. “Of course, I can't figure why any person would willingly go much north of Key West, much less live there.”
“To each their own,” Ken said. “Besides, you wouldn't want everyone crowding in down here, would you? They'd be building Starbucks and shit.”
“Good point.” Bill said.
He led the way up the narrow wooden stairs to a landing. “We got four rooms,” he said. “There's the kind with a window that gives you a view of the sea and the ones that let you see the street.”
“Sea view for me,” Bill said. “Junior can watch the street.”
Ken grinned. “Expecting visitors?”
“Possibly the twins you mentioned might get uncivilized ideas,” Bill said. “Who can tell about Tweedledee and Tweedledumber? Although Sullen-Faced Roberts tried to act civilized for the entire walk, the stench of smoldering desire for revenge filled the air.”
“Sullen-Faced Roberts?” I asked. “I thought it was Jose.”
“Sullen-Faced is his Indian name,” Bill said.
Ken nodded. “If you boys crossed them, well, they are ornery enough bastards to want payback.”
“Our magical protection is that their boss needs us,” I told him.
“I suggest you remain essential to whatever scheme he's hatching, then. Of course, you still gotta watch your back. You never know if Chief Sullen Face will go off the reservation.” He chuckled.
“Chandler is the chief,” I said. “Roberts is just a petty officer first class.”
“But ambitious,” Ken said.
He led us down to rooms at the end of the landing, opening the doors and watching us for our reaction. I poked a head in and found they were somewhat threadbare, just this side of shabby. But they were fine. “These will do us nicely,” I said.
That made him chuckle. “I'm real glad, seeing as it's all we got.”
“I don't think we will be here long, anyway.”
“In case you got any ideas of talking to Hank, pulling strings to get an upgrade”—he chuckled—” these two are the VIP rooms.” Then he snickered. “Just like the other two.”
The joke seemed to please him, but I'm betting that even for Ken it wasn't near as funny as it had been the first four hundred and fifty times he'd told it.
“So there aren't any other guests?” I asked.
“Not a soul. This is what you call our low season,” he said. “You two are all we got. That's why you get such special treatment.”
“Who deserves it more?” Bill asked, walking into one of the rooms and tossing his bag on the bed.
Ken found that funny, too. I began to think Ken was the kind of person who could laugh himself to death on his way to the dentist for a root canal. No wonder he'd made it to retirement.
“I'll leave you boys to settle in. If you need anything, well—you'll probably have to get it yourselves. I better get back to my perch downstairs.”
Glad to have him leave, I tossed my bag on the bed and went to look out the window. As advertised, it gave me a view of the street—your basic Caribbean postcard street scene. All it needed to be a cliche was a girl with a basket of fruit on her head and a bright floral skirt.
“There's no coffee machine in my room,” Bill said, wandering in and glancing around. “None here either. Bad times ahead.”
“According to the online reviews, the valet service in this place sucks too,” I said.
“We should write a serious and rather literary letter of complaint to the Pentagon when we get back,” Bill said. “They should be made aware that having to do without the basic amenities is an unbearable hardship. And having to put up with such abuses when we are forced to rely on government resources to execute an unsanctioned, probably illegal mission on their behalf—it makes a grown man feel like crying.”
“What accounts for such travesties?” I asked. “We must take action.”
“We must. But rather than cry, albeit justifiably, over these injustices, this grown man would prefer to drown his sorrows in rum and a decent meal. I propose that we set locating a good eating establishment as our prime time. It is a worthy quest. This being the Caribbean, I feel we can safely assume that rum will be plentiful.”
“Ken might be able to recommend a suitable restaurant,” I said.
Bill blinked in disbelief. “Didn't you hear him say he was in the army for twenty years? After a career spent eating army food, it isn't likely that Ken would recognize anything edible, much less grub that is suitable for my delicate palate. Besides, in matters of food, I must follow my nose.”
“Then I will follow the bulk attached to that efficient and well-trained nose,” I said.
Bill headed for the stairs. “Junior, that is a wise choice for a stranger on a strange island.”
And so, with Bill sniffing the air, we headed out. It would be a short night. A meal, a few drinks and turn in early. After all, we had a kidnapping to plan.
14
Bill and I arrived at Hank's office the next morning to find him already there and looking bright-eyed, eager to go. As we sat down in front of his desk, Petty Officer Sullen-Faced Roberts came in handed us each a mug of black coffee. Roberts' plastic tourist-guide smile didn't seem to work in the office. Maybe it was against the uniform regulations, so we were treated to the sullen face.
Hank, however, gave us a huge smile. Beaming with pride, he shoved a monstrous stack of papers at us and watched our expressions. “Here it is.”
Bill held the mug in both hands and sipped his coffee. “Those must be for Junior,” Bill said. “I don't do paperwork.”
I stared at it. “What is all this?”
“The intel you wanted—all of it, you said. Well, here it is, all the traffic we've collected on Vermeer and
his operations. It includes emails we intercepted, radio chatter about his businesses, plus some slightly redacted reports from informers.” Seeing I was starting to interrupt, he held up a hand. “Nothing is held back about Vermeer. The only information that is redacted refers to other topics.”
“Double-spoken like a true bureaucrat,” Bill said.
Hank's scowl deepened and I half expected him to let out a low growl.
“You see,” I said, “a statement like that takes us back to my basic trust issue. I have to take your word for that—that nothing is omitted. Worse, you admit that you don't have first-hand knowledge; we have to take the word of whoever sent you this crap,” I said. “Even if they think that's the case, even if they are sincere, we don't know what assumptions they used in making the redactions.”
“In short,” Bill said, “Junior and I don't think this shit is reliable.”
“This,” Hank said, indicating the stack of papers, “is as close to source material as we can get. With the budget cutbacks and new government regulations, we've lost much of our direct access. That leaves us at the mercy of whatever pencil pushers process the data. I requested everything they had, and this is what I got.”
His protest seemed heartfelt. “I suppose it will be better than nothing.”
I flipped through it and whistled.
“Something good?” Bill asked.
“Garbage,” I said. “This consists of a bazillion trivial emails, invoices for routine stuff, and observations from various agencies about movements. There isn't anything flagged or any rhyme or reason to the mess.” The lack of organization had to be deliberate, but who did that? Hank knew we had no time or resources to process this mess and yet he wanted the mission to happen more than anyone, as far as I could tell. “Is there a cheat sheet for all this, some kind of Cliff Notes for spies?”
“I can give you my summary, but it only says what I've told you. And you two wanted as much source material as possible. I don't want anyone giving me shit about holding back stuff down the road.”
