Destiny's Pawn

by D. A. Keeley

  “It must’ve taken weeks for him to get here. And then Halifax is several hours’ drive from Garrett.”

  She nodded. “This looks carefully planned.”

  “And well executed.” Stone sipped his beer. “Being gluten-free isn’t easy,” he sighed.

  “If anyone can do it”—it was her turn to smirk—“I’m sure it’s you, big guy. We’re hoping for answers tomorrow. The boy already asked for political asylum.”

  “He sounds well aware of the immigration mess in Texas and wants a piece of the pie.”

  “This is different,” she said. “He’s not asking for amnesty. Political asylum has been granted to people for a long time. The policy exists for cases like this one. Aleksei’s mother needs constant care. According to the boy—who, by the way, cried when he told us the story—his father fears for his son, sent him here to live with his aunt in Garrett.”

  “Sounds like the boy’s father thought this through,” Stone said.

  two

  Tuesday, March 4, 7:50 a.m., Garrett Station

  This office had probably begun life as a child’s room when the building was a three-bedroom ranch. Sunlight shone into Patrol Agent in Charge Mike Hewitt’s small office. The office was packed. Susan Perry, from the Maine Department of Health and Human Services; Peyton; and Bill Hillsdale, from the US Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Portland, all sat in metal folding chairs across the desk from Hewitt.

  Peyton was surprised by Hillsdale’s demeanor. The top USCIS official in the region had come to Garrett on routine visits and usually couldn’t go two minutes without adding a dry one-liner to any conversation. Now he looked like he was facing a root canal.

  “Good to see you again, Susan,” Hewitt began.

  She smiled. “You don’t mean that, Mike.”

  “You’re right. The last time I saw you we were looking for the mother of an abandoned baby.”

  “This isn’t that bad,” she said.

  “Not yet,” Hillsdale added.

  “You’re cheery,” Susan said to Hillsdale, who shrugged.

  “Susan, a woman from the State Department called here today,” Hewitt said. “She says Washington is worried that this might set a precedent.”

  Hillsdale cleared his throat. “We just want to make sure this is handled correctly.”

  Susan said, “Do you mean ethically?”

  “Not necessarily.” Hillsdale shook his head. “I mean correctly.”

  Hewitt shifted in his leather chair.

  “The USCIS people have had lots on their minds over the past couple years,” Hewitt said. “We can all understand why they would be jumpy, given what they’ve been dealing with on the southern line.”

  “Bill,” Peyton said, “Washington sent you to this meeting to make sure the northern border doesn’t turn into south Texas in 2014?”

  “Ukraine is bad, getting worse, and this kid took a boat from Hamburg, Germany, to Halifax. Stowaways have been doing that for years. But we’ve never had a thirteen-year-old show up here before. We think this could happen again and possibly escalate.”

  “The northern border will never become what we saw in Texas. We’re not going to see fifty thousand kids walk across the border up here.” Peyton shifted in her seat several times, then finally reached to her service belt, unclipped the pepper spray canister digging into her lower back, and dropped it into her pocket. “This is isolated. The kid wants—and qualifies for—political asylum.”

  “The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, in conjunction with the State Department, will determine if he qualifies for it,” Hillsdale said.

  Bill Hillsdale was all of 150 pounds, ran 5Ks, and did a lot of hiking—a makeup typical of many Border Patrol agents. But Peyton got the feeling Hillsdale didn’t mind pushing paper as much as he did confrontation. So, she figured, given the choice between Border Patrol and immigration work, he’d made the right career choice.

  Hewitt smoothed his shirt front. The silver oak leaf pinned to his lapel designated him PAIC, patrol agent in charge. He wrote something on his legal pad.

  “Are those UGGs?” Peyton asked Susan.

  Susan smiled. “You always notice my shoes.”

  Peyton raised a black, ankle-length trail boot. “See why?”

  “Ouch,” Susan said.

  “My boots are Timberland,” Hewitt said and grinned, “if anyone cares.”

  “Can we move on?” Hillsdale was staring at the floor.

  “Lighten up, Bill,” Hewitt said.

  Susan flipped through some notes. “The boy will speak to you this morning. His English is not great. Russian is his native language. Most people in Donetsk speak it. The foster parents should have him here by nine. They told me Aleksei woke in the middle of the night screaming about the explosion that injured his mother. And I’ve asked his aunt to come as well, to provide emotional support for him and to translate, if needed. Then he’ll go home with her afterward.”

  “I haven’t approved that,” Hillsdale said.

  “You don’t need to,” Susan said. “The boy is a minor, he has relatives here, and, as far as we know, his father consents to having the boy with his sister, the boy’s aunt.”

  “What his father wants might not be relevant.”

  “I see,” Susan said. “I can rationalize this situation another way for you: His aunt is the only person in this region who speaks the boy’s native language. We feel he should be with her.”

  “Cute,” Hillsdale said.

  “I can see that you want to make this difficult for the boy,” Susan said. “But the fact is, putting him with his aunt is pretty standard.”

  Peyton shook her head. “If Washington honestly thinks this kid, who you say took a boat from Germany to Halifax, is going to set a precedent, then Washington is even more out-of-touch than I thought. I mean, Ukraine is landlocked, Bill. The kid made two long land journeys as well—first to Germany, then from Halifax to here. This isn’t going to happen often, if ever again.”

  “Don’t shoot the messenger. I’m just doing what I’m told, Peyton.”

  “Well, someone has an agenda,” Peyton said. “For God’s sake, I’ve had friends I worked with, agents who dedicated their lives to doing what we do, get shot and killed in the line of duty, so I’m also against letting thousands of illegals walk into the country. But this is an isolated situation. The boy’s mother requires constant care, which the father is providing.”

  “And when she’s well?” Hillsdale asked. “Will they follow him here then?”

  “Given the severity of her injuries,” Susan said, “that could be years, Bill.”

  “Have some compassion,” Peyton said.

  Hillsdale looked at her. “You sound more like a mother than an agent.”

  “Don’t insult my agent,” Hewitt said.

  But it was too late. Peyton had turned to face Hillsdale.

  “First off, Bill, I am a mother, a single mother, and proud to be a working mother. But I was speaking as an agent. And as such, I know what the hell I’m talking about. Don’t ever accuse me of getting my two roles mixed up, because you have no idea what it’s like to be in the field or, for that matter, to raise a child alone.”

  Hillsdale sat looking at her. Hewitt centered his legal pad. Susan was staring at the floor.

  Hillsdale finally shook his head. “This is going to take months to iron out. There’ll be lawyers and Washington officials involved, I’m sure.” He stood. “Tell the boy he can go with his aunt temporarily. But be clear that this isn’t permanent.” He looked at Hewitt and nodded, then walked out.

  Hewitt looked at the two women across from him. “Peyton, you’re the first person Aleksei Vann met. I’d like you to interview him this morning.”

  She nodded.

  “Obviously,” Hewitt continued, �
��Bill’s report will most likely recommend the boy return to the Ukraine. If I were you two, I’d anticipate Washington sending a bigger gun the next time we meet about this.”

  Both women stood.

  Peyton said, “You think the comparison to Texas is crazy, too, don’t you, Mike?”

  “I don’t get paid to express opinions on political situations, Peyton.” He shifted his legal pad again. “And, frankly, neither do you.”

  With that, the meeting was over.

  9:15 a.m., Garrett Station

  Aleksei Vann didn’t look thirteen. Not up close.

  Up close, he looked even younger than Tommy. He was in clean clothes, his blond hair had been washed, his blue eyes were clear now, his cheeks were no longer red, and his hands weren’t grimy. For all its flaws, the foster care system, Peyton thought, at least in this case, had done its job—the boy looked rested, clean, and even well fed.

  Peyton was sitting across the breakroom table from him, her bag at her feet. This wasn’t her typical interview. No jingling handcuffs, no lawyers. Her iPhone lay between them on the table, ready to record the conversation. Next to it stood three bottles of orange juice, two apples, and two jelly donuts. Susan Perry was to meet with the boy afterward, and, eventually, Hillsdale would return. Or, based on what Hewitt said at the end of their meeting, Washington would send someone else to meet with Aleksei.

  “Aleksei, do you remember me?”

  He nodded and looked at the orange juice. “Coca-Cola today?”

  She smiled. “Maybe later. It’s only nine in the morning. I’m Agent Cote. You can call me Peyton.”

  “Peyton?” he said, his accent drawing her name out in two long syllables—Pee-tone. His eyes fell to the iPhone, its red recording button glaring.

  “Yes. That’s my first name.”

  “Are you record what I say?”

  “Not if you don’t want me to.”

  He looked from the iPhone, to her, and back to the phone, his tongue licking his chapped lips.

  Casually, she reached forward and picked the phone off the table and slid it into her pocket. “You’ve taken quite a trip. Want to tell me about it?”

  He shrugged, his smile vanishing. He turned to stare at the floor and picked at the cuticle of his thumb, his hands dancing as if independent from his body.

  Clearly the question made him uncomfortable. Had he been told not to tell anyone how he’d gotten here? If so, by whom? His father? She hadn’t asked Bill Hillsdale where he’d learned the boy took a ship from Germany, but she assumed Hillsdale had questioned Aleksei Vann himself. And if that was the case, and the boy had spoken freely to Hillsdale, why was he balking now? She’d long existed in a male-dominated and militaristic professional world. Meeting men who saw her as weak and who were less cooperative because she was female was nothing new. But she’d never had that reaction from a thirteen-year-old before.

  “Aleksei, you are thirteen?”

  “Yes.” He bit into a jelly donut. She’d asked Miguel Jimenez to prepare the room. Leave it to Jimenez, who played the same games on his phone that Tommy did, to consider donuts an appropriate breakfast for a teenager.

  “I have a son a little younger than you. I couldn’t imagine him making the trip you made. Were you alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did you get from the Ukraine to Germany?”

  He shrugged.

  “Has anyone asked you that?”

  “No.”

  “Did you meet with a man yesterday?” She described Hillsdale to him.

  “Yes. I tell him.”

  “Did you tell him how you got from Ukraine to Germany?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “He did not ask,” he said, turning did to deed.

  She had the iPad on her lap and had been typing notes on the virtual keyboard, but stopped. Had Hillsdale been so quick to have his theory proven—that the boy had made it from Eastern Europe to the northern US border (and, thus, it could happen again)—that he failed to learn any details of Aleksei’s trip? She wanted to give Hillsdale more credit than that.

  “Well, I’m asking,” she said. “How did you get from the Ukraine to Germany? That’s a long way.”

  Aleksei pushed away from the table and looked down at the floor.

  She would try something else. Asking a specific question based on his recent experience meant he’d be more likely to confirm or deny, and thus less likely to shut down.

  “Did you fly to Hamburg, Aleksei?”

  “Fly?” he asked.

  “Yes. Did you take a plane?”

  He shook his head. “Car. Then walk a long time.”

  “To Hamburg, Germany?”

  He nodded.

  She’d done her homework: it took nearly thirty hours to drive (or seven to fly) from Donetsk to Hamburg.

  “Tell me about it. When did you leave?”

  “February third, my mother birthday.”

  “Your mother’s birthday?”

  “Yes. My father say sending me was promise to her. And he keep it.”

  “He promised to send you here, so he did so on her birthday?”

  He nodded and finished his orange juice. “Coca-Cola now?”

  She smiled. “Soon. Your mother—”

  “She was hurt by the fucking bastards.”

  Peyton was taken aback by his anger. Thirteen. Looked even younger. His words came from someplace deep inside him, from a place only someone with his life experiences knew. He’d seen death and destruction up close at a young age. Tommy would never know that anger. Neither would she. They were lucky, and she knew it.

  “The ‘bastards’ are the pro-Russians?”

  “Yes. Putin want take back all the land.” A smile formed on his face then—not one of humor, but one of pride. “But Father will not let that. He staying to fight.”

  “Your home is in Donetsk?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me about driving and walking to Hamburg.”

  The boy picked up the second donut and stared at it, holding it without taking a bite.

  “You don’t want to talk about it?”

  “My father leave me at boat.” Overcome with sudden emotion, his pale face flushed quickly. “He go back …”

  “You thought he was making the trip with you?”

  He nodded. “But then say he stay to fight.”

  “And you were on the ship a long time?”

  “Yes, long time.”

  “Who knew you were on the boat?”

  He looked at her, puzzled.

  She realized he wasn’t a stowaway. And she thought briefly of Bill Hillsdale, of his concerns.

  “Your father paid someone to take you to Halifax?”

  He nodded. “He not nice. Not like this.” The boy pointed to the door, indicating the agents beyond it who had immediately cooked a meal for him and found fresh clothes for him when he arrived.

  “What was his name?”

  He shook his head then.

  “You won’t tell me?”

  “Cannot.”

  “He told you not to say?”

  “He kill my father if I say.”

  “If you tell me who he is, I can work to be sure that doesn’t happen.”

  He made no reply, but his expression told her he simply would not say.

  “Okay. That’s fine. Did you stay with him on the ship?”

  “No. I was alone, locked in room with”—he searched for the word —“bed. Very sick.”

  “Seasick?”

  He shrugged, then nodded.

  “What was the ship carrying?”

  He looked at her, uncomprehending.

  “Were there cars on the ship, or fish, or …?”

  He looked do
wn, embarrassed by questions he couldn’t answer. “It dark when I got on, and I come out of room only at night.”

  “Were you locked in the room?”

  Again, he nodded. “I taken out for air, like … like dog. Then, when we land, took me in car. Drove all night. Then stop. Tell me to walk, then wait. Then I see you.”

  “Was the man who transported you Ukrainian?”

  Aleksei looked at her but didn’t answer.

  He wasn’t going to jeopardize his father’s well-being, but she’d learned one thing: Whoever had taken Aleksei Vann from Hamburg to the Canadian border knew what he was doing. He’d known an agent would be patrolling the land near McCluskey’s Processing. The drop of the boy, on the heels of a month-long journey, had been timed and executed perfectly. Whoever had gotten Aleksei into the US was every bit a professional and not unlike the coyotes on the southern border.

  She knew why the kid made Hillsdale nervous.

  11:35 a.m., McCluskey’s Potato Processing Plant

  McCluskey’s Processing was Garrett’s largest employer, the region’s lone potato-processing plant. And it was owned by Kyle McCluskey, who, ten years earlier, inherited the facility from his father.

  The guy wearing a dark knit cap and gloves in the gatehouse waved Peyton through the entrance.

  As she crossed the lot, dirt and melting chunks of snow and ice beneath her feet, she thought of a poem she’d read years earlier at the University of Maine. “April is the cruelest month,” it began. T.S. Eliot had never lived in Aroostook County. Up here, March was the month that could never be trusted: it was forty-two degrees this day, and sunlight felt warm on the back of her wool field jacket, but the next day’s forecast called for eight inches of snow, which would push the season’s total near one hundred inches.

  She entered the sprawling facility, told one receptionist she was there to see the plant president, was pointed to another receptionist, and walked a long corridor to the administrative offices, which, given the decor and ambiance, seemed a very long way from the plant’s floor where men sweat and hustled.

  “You look familiar,” McCluskey’s personal assistant said. “Did you attend Garrett High?”

  Peyton told her when she graduated and introduced herself.