Chapter Twenty Five
As they entered the cut, Karl began to talk loudly, pointing out roiling water that indicated underwater obstacles, upsurges and back-eddies that marked rocks protruding from the banks and several other important markers as they moved along the cut. When they neared the slide area, he slowed the boat to a crawl, actually running the motors in reverse to hold them against the current as he pointed out where the highest rocks were and how to avoid them.
Then he headed on through, only to astound the others by spinning the little boat around once they were past the rough water. He then headed back in the opposite direction while pointing out the difference in the way the flowing water looked and what to avoid. Well past the rapids once more, he turned again and they went through a third time, now once more on their outbound journey. After that bit of showmanship, the rest of the trip down the narrow gorge seemed almost tame to the others. When they got out on the ocean, he asked one of the men to take over the wheel and moved to sit beside the Commander.
"There, I can't show them much more." He said quietly.
"You were just having fun, weren't you?"
"Pretty well, I think an inflatable with lots of power is a perfect way of running the cut but it wasn't just for fun, I was pointing out how to avoid danger too." Karl grinned. "It's no different than lots of other things, once you know how to avoid problems, it becomes second nature. By the way, there's lots of depth for the dive boat right now but we are going to be fighting the outbound tide. We're running late."
"Sorry about that, scheduling was tight and I was quite busy this morning."
"I saw that." Karl said quietly. "You sure have a different approach than Greene did."
"Yes, I do." Davis said shortly. "Actually, one of my jobs here was to check out some of his actions. I'm afraid I'm sending him back to Esquimalt. He's not really suitable for this sort of situation. However, I'd like to forget that predicament for now, I'm more interested in the job at hand. We're not really too late to get in through the cut with the dive boat are we?"
"Well, I think we can still make it." Karl said quietly.
"Good, because here comes the boat."
What Karl saw coming was a large flat-bottomed boat with a derrick fitted near the bow end. The derrick had been spun around to hang toward the stern and it overhung a large cabin that sat amidships. One look told him that whoever had brought that boat around in this weather had to be a very good sailor and right now was probably an extremely tired one too. The waves would have been hammering against that flat hull for hours and it would have been like riding a shingle, every wave would have tried to toss that flat sided boat around.
"Where the hell did the Navy get that monstrosity?" He snorted, shaking his head in disbelief.
"Now don't put it down. That's an extremely good boat when it's in its element and doing what it was designed for. Out here in open water it's rather ungainly but in calm water it does a tremendous job. It's not a Navy vessel though, even if we do use it a lot. We lease it from a private firm for special jobs."
"Sure, put it in dead calm water and it'd be fine. Why power it though? Just tow it where you need it, then you don't have to ride the silly thing."
"Oh, but by having it under power we can take it over sand bars where we couldn't tow it easily and then we can move through shallow water for long distances. It's good at what it was meant to do."
"Well, it certainly isn't designed for open water." Karl said gruffly. "Anyone aboard that thing right now must be sick as a dog. It's bobbing around like a cork. What does it steer like?"
"It steers very well actually. It's got swiveling jets on all four corners, so there really isn't a bow or a stern to it. Actually it can move sideways almost as fast as it moves forward or astern."
Karl just shook his head. The closer they got to the boat, the more unseaworthy it looked. Since it had the crane hanging overhead, Karl was surprised at how stable it seemed to ride and once he was aboard it, he actually had to adjust his assessment of what it would be like. It wasn't quite as bad as he had thought.
"Morning Jackson." Davis returned the man at the helm's salute. "Meet Karl Larson. He'll be taking over to pilot your boat into the bay where you'll be working."
"Morning sir. Morning Mr. Larson."
"Make it Karl would you Captain Jackson. I'm not a very formal sort of man."
"You live on that rock Karl?" The captain pointed ahead at Gull Island.
"Yes." Karl grinned. "It's a lot nicer than it looks from here. Do you suppose you could show me the controls of the boat? If I'm going to run her through the cut, I'd like a chance to learn how she handles."
"Well, she's really sluggish right now, we were waiting to pump the bilges until we were in calm water." The captain looked at him strangely. "She'd be quite skittish if we pumped her out in this sea, in fact she'd be almost unstable."
"Well, we've got a problem then, there isn't any calm water to pump her out in until we get where we're going." Karl laughed softly. "What's her draft, right now?"
"Oh, must be almost four feet."
"How much better does she steer with enough ballast to ride between two and three feet?"
"Oh, quite a bit. Do we have to turn some tight corners?"
"Probably the tightest you've ever seen this thing taken around." Davis spoke up.
"Damn, I wish I'd have known that, we'd have unshipped the derrick. But we can't do that out here. Having the derrick on top makes her a bit tippy on tight corners."
"I'll bet it does." Karl laughed softly. "How long does it take to pump water in and out of the bilge?"
"Oh, only minutes. We've got some quite big pumps on board."
"Right then. Well, show me the controls for speed and steerage and I'll let you handle the rest for now. Don't do any pumping yet, I've got an idea of how we can do this, but to do it we need to get there quite quickly. If we take too long, we'll be in trouble because the tide is dropping and we'll run out of water to float us over one big obstacle."
So for the next few minutes, Karl took lessons on how the dive boat was controlled. Once in the little bay that opened into the cut, he had the captain of the boat start the bilge pumps, and warned him to halt pumping when they were drawing about two feet of water, if he hadn't called for a halt before that. He hardly had any time to appreciate the looks on the faces of those around him as he headed for what seemed like a solid wall - only to have it appear to open up before them into a steep walled canyon. Usually he had the time to enjoy those expressions, but with this boat, he needed to keep his attention on the controls.
Once he had actually entered the cut, and found what sort of power and steerage he had against the current, he had the crew halt pumping the bilges so he could maintain as much stability as he could. He'd hardly given that order when they were into the first sharp bend. The gasps and hoots of the crew as they nearly clipped the walls didn't surprise him, but the reaction of his friend, Commander Davis did. Considering that they had been through this same area only such a short time before, Davis' exclamations took him by surprise. He imagined it was the difference in the size of the boat that influenced his friend's reaction.
As they travelled along the cut, he had little time to think about that though. As far as handling was concerned, this boat was a scow compared to the 'Skolka' and Karl was forced to compensate far more than he was used to. In fact as they traversed the area of boiling water over the rock slide, Karl felt the boat actually bump and slide sideways as they touched the submerged rock wall for an instant. After that point though, he was able to increase his speed slightly and control became slightly easier, but he still heaved a sigh of relief when they broke out into the bay.
"Captain, this boat is all yours again." Karl sighed deeply, stepping back from the wheel.
"Well, I certainly hope you'll take us back out when we're done." The Captain said quietly, shaking his head. "If I hadn't been along, I'd have said that was bloody well impossible. I think we left my stomach back at the first bend and I damn near lost my breakfast on that rough section"
"Well, another half hour, and it would have been tougher. In an hour, well we simply wouldn't have made ii through." Karl smiled. "As it was, the current in there was just about bad enough that I was wondering myself when we hit the slide area. "
"I'll be damned if I know how you did it."
"Luck, and familiarity." Karl grinned, then he turned to Commander Davis. "We were well over half an hour later than we should have been!"
"Well, we had to wait for the helicopter, besides, I would have thought that if you'd felt it was going to be touch and go, you would have gone for safety."
"I did." Karl said quietly. "If you were listening to the weather radio, they're predicting fairly high winds out of the south east. There isn't a harbour close by where this boat would have been able to ride it out, except in here. The only way this boat and crew were going to be safe was to bring her through the cut. Now, do you need me for a while?"
"Not really, not until low tide anyway, but we expected you would want to be here. Why, did you need to do something?"
"Well, since I've got a little time, I'd like to get over to the 'Skolka'. If we need anything hauled in or out through the cut by water, I'd prefer to use a boat that reacts properly to her helm and unfortunately she needs a bit of work to get her in running order."
"You don't want to be involved in the hunt for the wreck?" Davis asked in surprise.
"What, ride back and forth cramped up in a little inflatable watching a sounder screen? Not much, I don't." Then he grinned widely and made a counter offer. "Instead give me a couple of good workers and in a couple of hours, then we'll steam over with the 'Skolka' and use a stable boat to find the bumps in the bottom of the bay. She won't be in perfect working shape by then, but she'll find a wreck easy enough."
"Well, we have the dive spot pretty well established from a helicopter overflight. We're going to anchor this boat right over the center of a fifty-foot area where we think it is and have divers check it out."
"From a helicopter search?" Karl asked in surprise.
"Yeah, we have some very fancy hardware and we had a special overflight this morning. They used something called Lidar, it's a laser detection system that works like radar but uses two colours of light. They only had time for that one overflight this morning on their way to another job but we think they found the boat in about forty feet of water." Davis grinned, grabbing a drawing with an expanded view of the bay and pointing to a spot on it, then pointing as well as to a small buoy floating on the water. "That's where the guys on the helicopter think it is."
Karl just frowned.
Davis grinned at his friend's frown. "Karl, technology is wonderful. I know this is well outside of the area you thought it would be in, but the technology that they used shows that as the most likely site, so that's where we're going to moor and where we're going to send divers down."
"Well, if it's just divers working, I'd find that fairly boring and I'd just as soon spend some time on my boat." Karl said quietly.
In truth he doubted the helicopter survey's results because he didn't think the boat could have stayed afloat as far as the point the survey showed. On top of that he knew that as murky as the water was right now, the divers would be working almost by feel and all the people on the dive boat could do was wait for them to come back with results. His feeling was that the first dive area they had picked was simply going to be a waste of time.
"We'll have one of the inflatables run you over to your boat then." Davis said quietly.
In fact he waved over the little boat that had been following them through the cut and Karl hopped aboard it.
"Hi guys, did you have fun coming back the other way?" He asked as soon as he was settled aboard.
"Yeah, we made it okay." The Seaman acting as pilot answered sharply. "It feels like I clipped a rock with one prop though. I'd still like to see you take that boat through there." He pointed at the 'Skolka'. "If I can clobber a rock with this toy, how do you manage to do it with that boat?"
"Mostly, with a lot of luck." Karl grinned.
"Yeah, and I believe horses can fly too." The other sailor chipped in. "We watched you from about a hundred feet behind that stupid barge. Watching you take that thing through the rock slide area was why Brian clipped the rock. He was trying to follow where you went most of the way, but when we got to the place where you got thrown against the wall, he tried to stay closer to the other side."
"Yeah, we found out why you didn't go there. Feel the vibration?"
"See, I told you, it's mostly luck, that's where I wanted to go, but the boat just wouldn't obey orders. It like it had a mind of it's own."
That brought a laugh from both of the sailors and it coincided with them pulling up at the dock by the 'Skolka'.
"Damn, that's a pretty boat." One of them said.
"Well, sometime when I'm aboard and you're not in a hurry to get things done, come around and I'll let you check her out. Thanks for the ride." He said as he clambered onto the dock.
"Well thank you for the ride this morning." One of them called, already backing away.
When Karl looked around, he realised that the dock had been cleaned and when he looked at the boat, her decks were clean and all the outside was washed clean as well, even the brass looked polished.
"What the hell, do we have good fairies around here now?" He said softly.
"Oh I wouldn't say they was fairies, not if I wanted to keep my teeth." Winchester grinned, as he suddenly appeared from behind the stack where he must have been waiting. "We just sorta wanted to give you a present before we left, so we cleaned 'er up for you. Springfield had the other fellas clean 'er up while they had nothin' better to do. Sorta as a thank you for all your help. Marlin was raised around steam and he was gonna put your burner back, but Springfield said you'd probably want to do that yourself. So Marlin just rebuilt the burner as best he could to the specs he found on a drawing down in the boiler room."
"Well, I'll be damned." Karl said quietly. "Where are these guys you're talking about? I'd like to thank them."
"Oh probably in Esquimalt right now, they took L C Greene in. By tomorrow they'll be off on another job I imagine."
"You arrested Greene?"
"Not really arrested, it's more like the guys escorted Greene back to town so he wouldn't run out on the investigation that Springfield and Davis got started. They still gotta figure out exactly what he did but they know his hands was dirty. He tried to bull-shit a lot of people into believin' he'd got a big inheritance from an aunt who died. Trouble is when folks checked, all his aunts is alive and kickin'. An' 'en it seems he spent some time in Russia too, 'bout eight - nine months ago, which's s'pposed to be when his imaginary aunt died."
"Well, what do you know?" Karl shook his head in surprise.
"Yeah, you know Able Seaman Archer? He's bein' checked out too. The two guys workin' for you now are okay. We figure Greene had 'em pulled onto this crew though, 'cause then he could probably work out a way to catch 'em in a compromising position. Then he'd be gettin' 'em workin' for him too, out'a fear of bein' exposed sorta thing."
"So Springfield is gone then?"
"Oh no, him and me, we've been assigned to keep an eye on the goin's on here, until they recover that box at least. We wasn't expectin' that though an' after everyone findin' out that we was checkin' on 'em, the camp ain't 'zactly a friendly place. I hope you don't mind, but with that cast on his foot, Springfield can't get around so good. So this boat gives us a perfect spot to use as a base to see what's goin' on out there in the bay. We can use the tool shed if you'd rather us do that."
"Like hell, you guys stay aboard. Well, unless I need to take the boat out that is, then I might ask you to hide out in the shed while I use it." Karl grinned at him. "Just as a question, does Davis know you two are here?"
"Maybe, he's the Commander after all, and he is a damn smart cookie. I dunno, why?"
"Because he did a pretty good job of trying to discourage me from coming over here to work on the boat." Karl grinned. "I'm just suspicious, that's all."
"You know, Springfield is right, you woulda done good in JTF2."
"Hey, you're not supposed to tell me that." Karl grinned as he finally boarded the boat. "I might say something."
"Haha, an' I s'pose you got a bridge to sell me too."
"And what do you mean by that?" Karl opened the wheelhouse and headed below decks.
"Nobody with your IQ would have one damn bit o' trouble figgering out who we was." Winchester answered, following behind him.
"Well, nobody with an IQ like yours would have much trouble sounding like an uneducated country hick either, so we're even."
"Now why would you say somethin' like that?"
"Because occasionally you fuck up, like saying 'him and me, we've been assigned' instead of 'him and me, we was assigned'." Karl laughed.
"He's got you Charlie." Springfield grinned as he looked up from a seat in the galley.
"Hi Springfield, you bored?" Karl asked him.
"Why?"
"Well, there's a great set of binoculars upstairs if you want to watch a bunch of divers make fools out of technology."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, they sent a helicopter over with some new fangled sort of laser powered sonar or radar on it and they're diving on the scan they got from that."
"So?"
"So, if you look, what they're diving on is probably a hunk of rock. I'm fairly sure that it's one more part of the ridge that runs all the way across the bay. Part of that ridge shows up as that little island near the cut but it does pop up underwater in a few places. Besides, the chances of the boat settling all the way out there are slim to none. It's about two, maybe three hundred feet too far from the cut. Hell, that's past where the standing wave forms when the water rushing down the gorge meets the incoming rip tide and no derelict hull would float past that."
"Did you tell them that?"
"Last night, but not today. Do you think I'm foolish enough to get into a fight with a man who believes in his technology?"
"So what are you going to do?"
"Well, if I'm right, inside of an hour they're going to know that there's no boat there but by then the wind that's forecast will be here. They won't be able to get a good depth reading from the inflatables or that scow they had me bring in because the waves are going to bounce things around way too much. Of course by then, if I work like a bugger, I might have the burner back in the boiler. Particularly since I've been told your buddy rebuilt it. If I do get it ready I could probably be talked into going out and dropping a buoy on the spot where a combination of familiarity and common sense, as well as a reading or two from my depth sounder tell me the wreck of that boat has to be."
"And if you're wrong, what if they do find the boat where they're looking?"
"Then I shrug my shoulders and admit I'm wrong. It's no big deal, I've been wrong before and the world didn't end."
"Well, do you want a hand putting that burner in?"
"Can you handle a wrench?"
"He's supposed to stay off his foot for a day or two." Winchester offered. "I made him use his crutches to walk down here."
"Oh, you mean S O B." Karl grinned. "How are the armpits after walking that far on crutches Springfield?"
"Sore."
"Well, go upstairs, sit on the stool and watch the divers for me. If they come up with the box, we can all celebrate."
"If they find the box, they have orders to put a marker buoy on it and get away as fast as possible. A haz-mat crew has to come and handle disposal." Springfield said. "Once the divers find it, then we move in and keep anyone back a couple of hundred yards, even the guys that are there now. The guys on the boat now will move back and keep anyone from coming any closer than about five hundred yards. You and your family may be confined to your house again until the box is flown out of here, at least that's regulations."
"Oh, that's just wonderful news." Karl said sarcastically. "Just what I and my family would love to hear."
"Oh, I think in your case, local command decisions might change that." Springfield chuckled. "Now, why don't you and Charlie go down and fix your boiler or whatever you're supposed to be doing and I'll sit up in the wheelhouse and watch the divers. You've got me curious now."
"Five bucks says Karl's right." Winchester teased.
"No damn bet." Springfield laughed. "His batting average is too high to bet against."
Karl just shook his head and sighed as he headed for the engine room. Winchester turned out to be a mechanical marvel, almost instantly realising what Karl was doing and why he was doing it. On top of that the man who had worked on the burner had taken the old badly worn parts that Karl had left out on the workbench and rebuilt them until they looked like new. Karl explained how the fuel and water filters went in and while Winchester did that, he worked on replacing the burner. Even being exceptionally fussy, it was still under an hour when they were ready to test fire the boiler.
Karl flipped on a switch and they both grinned as the pumps brought the fuel line up to pressure, then the burner fired up. Karl did a quick check for leaks and to be sure everything looked right, then hurried up top to the main controls at the wheel.
"You done already?" Springfield questioned.
"Yep." Karl flipped a thumb to point at a tiny cloud of smoke and water vapour drifting on the breeze. "Boiler's still cold though, showing smoke."
"That's smoking? Christ, you should see the smog from one of our ships when they're started."
"Mm hmm." Karl was busily adjusting controls just a bit. "Well, I've got more smoke than normal, but like I said, everything is dead cold. I'm going to take a while to bring her up to operating pressure. Gimme half an hour at least."
"I can't believe that's it. What are you burning for fuel?"
"Mostly furnace oil, some diesel." Karl said shortly. "I can burn nearly anything, but I don't usually use anything but one of those two if I can help it."
By now both Springfield and Winchester had realised that Karl was so deeply involved in checking and double checking his 'baby' that they simply watched. They were ready to offer assistance if he needed any but mostly tried to stay out of his way as he worked. About twenty or twenty five minutes later they watched in surprise as Karl went outside and walked slowly around the deck of the boat. Then he got down onto the dock and walked to the bow, looking at the water, then back to the stern, checking there as well before coming aboard and grinning at them. Still tied firmly to the dock, he eased the engine into action, first running it in forward, then in astern. Finally he simply returned the throttle to neutral and reached down to adjust two or three controls and he sighed deeply.
"There, it's on standby now." He grinned. "You can tell your buddy he does good work."
"It's ready to go?"
"Well, I never took it up to full steam to test the safety, but it's all warmed up and could be steaming in fifteen minutes at full pressure." Karl smiled. "I should go below and check everything there, top up the oils and such, but yeah, it's pretty well ready to go at any time now, thanks in several ways to you guys."
"Well, whatever we did, you're welcome." Winchester frowned. "But I don't see that we did much."
"Huh, I know what this boat and the dock must have looked like. I hate tying up under this cedar tree but the boat is safest here if it has to sit for a while at the dock. Cripes, I'm looking around and even the brass is polished. If it sits for a while, everything gets to look old and corroded."
"Yeah, we noticed." Springfield snorted. " Just a glance and we knew it hadn't been used for weeks. One of our guys, Marlin, almost cried. He'd started cleaning up before I even mentioned that it would be nice of us to return the favours you'd done for us."
Mentally Karl had to kick himself several times so he wouldn't grin, ". . . we knew it hadn't been used for weeks." He repeated that to himself, thinking that he had to remember the line to tell Ely and David. He was thinking about David running around only a few days ago and spraying things with vinegar.
"So, what have the divers been up to?" Karl asked changing the subject.
"Well, up until a few minutes ago, they were all down in the water, but I see all four of them are on the boat now and it looks like they're stripping off their gear." Springfield said quietly. "Either they've found the box or they found the rock you mentioned. Since my cell phone hasn't rung, I'd say it was rock."
"So Davis knows that you're here?"
"Oh yeah, it's not a secret."
"So, if all the divers are out of the water, want to cruise over and ask for sure?"
"In this?"
"Well, I'm not taking the damn dinghy, not with the stiff breeze that's starting to blow."
"Since you said you offered to help, let's wait." Springfield grinned. "To be honest I'd rather that you let Davis come to you for once."
"Pardon me."
"Well, usually you just seem to show up at the right time to haul everyone's butt out of the fire. I'd like to see someone actually come and ask for help once." He chuckled.
"Okay, I think I'll put on a pot of coffee then." Karl grinned.
"Let me get it, I'll use our supplies, then it's on the government's chit." Winchester grinned. "By the way Karl, where the hell is your fridge? Not that we've really needed it, but we wondered."
"Check the floor in the galley." Karl laughed softly. "There's a cooler under the floor boards. You'll see the tabs."
"Should'a known." Winchester sighed. "You're using the water temperature to cool stuff most of the time."
While Winchester made coffee, Karl oiled up the engine and pumps, then they sat and talked, watching the antics of the smaller boats out in the bay for almost an hour before the cell phone rang. Springfield answered.
"Springfield . . . yeah, I saw . . . Rock huh?" He grinned and winked at Karl. "Yeah, he's still here . . . oh yeah, it's working . . . well, we'd cleaned up a lot for him . . . Oh, probably, you want to ask? . . . Oh, okay."
He flopped the phone closed and fit it into his pocket then grinned at Karl. "How long to get this thing up to steam pressure?"
"Oh, maybe ten, fifteen minutes." Karl chuckled, reaching down and adjusting the burner. 'It'll take longer to get all these ropes untied and out of the way."
By the time they had the spring lines untied and led forward, leaving them on the dock so that they could use them later to retie the boat, they could see Commander Davis and the Captain of the dive boat approaching. Winchester stayed on the dock to cast off the mooring lines and Karl climbed back aboard to wait for them. They climbed out of the inflatable carrying a marker buoy and line.
"Welcome aboard gentlemen." Karl called.
"Thanks Karl." Don grinned. "We thought we'd let you show off for us and let you have a try at putting down a marker buoy where you think the wreck would be."
"We can give it a try." Karl shrugged.
Two minutes later they were slowly backing off the dock and swinging slowly to move out. To everyone else's surprise, Karl headed for the entrance to the cut and when he was there he swung the boat, then eased the throttle back to just stem the outward current so that their stern was toward the cut.
"Anything swept out of the cut on an incoming rip is forced toward that little island in front of us." He pointed, then he increased the throttle slightly to get them moving. "Now something as big as a forty-foot boat has a lot of momentum and it would get carried damn close to the island."
He was steering carefully, trying to follow the path the wreck would have followed. He'd already asked Springfield and Winchester to make note of any sudden changes in depth on his sounder, so only part of his attention was on that.
"From what I read in that confession by Bonetti, the wreck went down fairly fast, but with the current flow that we get here on a rapidly rising tide, it would have still travelled a fair distance, even underwater as it was sinking."
They were past the end of the little island and Karl was heading almost parallel to the dive boat but well short of it, when Springfield yelled. "Something there."
"Yep." Karl slipped the engine into reverse and increased the throttle, literally stopping the boat on a dime, then turned to Don. "If you throw that marker off of the bow on the port side, I think that's what you want. At least, that's my guess. But you'd better hurry, we're drifting a little."
The Captain of the dive boat ran forward and tossed the marker buoy overboard, then waved at the men on his boat. Coming back inside he looked at Karl with a smile.
"Would you mind running me over there and I'll shift the dive boat?"
Ten minutes later, the 'Skolka' was again heading for the dock and inside of half an hour, she was tied up again. This time though, Karl decided he wanted to tie her on the other side of the dock, a bit further away from the cedar tree. He wasn't surprised that Winchester sighed in relief.
"I was not looking forward to cleaning all that shit off her decks after every storm." He explained.
"I know what you mean." Karl laughed.
Commander Davis thanked him profusely which Karl tried to slough off as nothing. They agreed that since low tide was still three hours off, Karl was going up to the house for a while and Don was going back to watch the divers. With a final wave of his hand to Springfield and Winchester, Karl headed slowly up the hill and back to the house.
The walk felt very strange to him and he had an urge to hurry when he came to the place where he had first shot Karpichov. Instead he actually forced himself to stop and look around. He didn't see anything but in a strange way that made him feel better. The rest of the climb up the hill seemed to pass quickly or perhaps he was hurrying to get there. When he got to the little shed at the top, he forced himself to take the time to look around there too. He was planning to try to find and destroy any signs of the attack if he could, but he really didn't know what to look for. After a few minutes of futile searching, he started on toward home in a sober mood.
He paused on the bridge over the gorge, finding that someone had repaired the handrail and he took the time to check out what they had done. It hadn't been done quite the way he would have repaired it, but he nodded his head in appreciation, it would certainly do for now. His mood had lifted again as he entered the last section of the path toward home. He found he was actually relishing the feel of walking under the trees because the sun had been quite warm when he had been out in the open.
Coming out of the trees, his first impression was of surprise. George was actually outside and sitting in his wheelchair in front of Karl's old cabin. At the moment he was calling up to David, who was doing something on a ladder leaned against the front porch roof. Mary-Beth was carrying something in her hands from the main house. Someone was up on the roof itself and he could hear people inside. As well as that, there was someone working on building a roofed over enclosure near the goat shed and he could hear Ely singing somewhere. Looking for her, he realised she was out at the garden.
"Hey, Karl's back." He heard Lyle Elgin call. Then for the next few minutes he was the center of attention as everyone came over to try to tell him all about their morning. The problem was that most of them were talking at once and he just grinned and held up a hand.
"Guys, I'm sorry but I need a break." He said quietly.
To his surprise, those quiet words seemed as effective as if he'd shouted, everyone slipped away leaving him alone. Feeling astounded by that, as well as a bit tired from his walk, he slowly made his way to the porch of his cabin and sat down in one of the chairs.
"Are you okay Karl?" Ely said as she came up the steps from her trip to the garden.
"Oh, I'm fine, just a bit tuckered from the walk up the hill and I forgot to take one of Fran's pills this morning." He said quietly. "Damn, is everyone working on our stuff? There are uniforms everywhere."
"Pretty well." She laughed softly. "Just a minute, I'll get you a pill and a sandwich. It's time that you ate something."
Karl just nodded, satisfied for the moment to sit quietly in the strong breeze and warm sunshine. It couldn't have been more than a moment or two before Ely came back with a sandwich and the pill he wanted, along with a glass of water to wash it down.
"I've put the coffee pot on." She said quietly. "How did your morning go?"
So he told her about what had happened to him and made sure to include the tidbit of information that Springfield and Winchester had given him about perhaps being forced to stay in the house when the box was found.
"It will be worth it to get the damn thing out of here." She said vehemently. "Now, do you want the good news?"
"What's the good news?" He asked.
"Well, there's a whole bunch of it." She smiled, almost radiantly. "First; Keri is clean. They didn't find any sign of HIV or any other form of STD in those blood tests. Second; Fran is okay and she's taken Trudy and Keri into Victoria to have those x-ray and ultrasound tests done. Third; L C Greene and Able Seaman Archer flew out on the same chopper, supposedly on transfer orders, but Springfield told me after they were gone that they were under investigation for involvement in a smuggling ring."
"Yeah, he mentioned that to me too." Karl grinned. "That sounds like a stunt Don would pull, make a guy think he was just getting transferred and have him go somewhere so he could be caught easily and be investigated."
"It could just as easily have been Springfield who would do that." Ely grinned. "Actually two guys that took orders from Springfield did fly out on the same chopper so they could have been guards."
"Yeah, I guess. What else happened?"
"Well, Keri and Linda had a heated discussion and then hugged each other a lot. After that Linda gave Trudy a short massage and Trudy said she felt wonderful. Keri was so envious that Linda was going to do something for her when Fran showed up to take Keri and Trudy away. Then Lyle and Raymonde showed up at the door wanting us to show them where to start on cleaning out the old cabin. Do you know they'd already cleaned all of the manure and stuff out the old goat shed and even washed the floor with a hose before they came to get us?"
"Well, Elgin told me that they were both farm boys, I guess a bit of goat shit didn't faze them much."
"I don't think anything fazes those two." Ely laughed. "Daddy called them a pair of poofs and Raymonde looked him square in the eye and said "Mais oui, je suis un pouff. Et puis alors. An' w'at ees wrong wiss zat?" then waved his hand with a limp wrist and giggled. It was so damn funny that even Daddy laughed."
"Oh man, your dad must have been in a good mood, otherwise he'd have eaten him alive." Karl rolled his eyes.
"Oh, I think he'd have had quite a job. I've never seen two guys work like those two do and they're quick on the uptake. Actually, they're like machines for work, they just go, go, go. And Linda has worked just as hard, especially after Daddy told her that he and Trudy would rather stay here with us until their own house is repaired."
"Whoa. That's a surprise." Karl stared at her
"Not really, can you see Daddy getting far from a radio?" Ely giggled. "And he knew darn well you wouldn't let him move your radios out of your house."
"He's right." Karl chuckled.
"Anyway, Linda has been pushing people like mad to try to have the old cabin all fixed up for her and Keri to spend the night there. Raymonde had a look at the cow and he said she's ready to calve in just a few days, so he said we had to have a barn of some kind. Which meant that he and Elgin started to work on that once they got all the heavy stuff done in the old cabin. It's only taken them a couple of hours and they've got a dirt floored lean-to made up where the cow can have some shelter. As soon as that's done, they're going over to Dad's to see what needs to be done there."
"Wow. Everyone has been busy." Karl grinned. "And all I've gotten done is . . ."
"Oh, listen, helicopter." Ely interrupted. "I'll bet its Fran, with Keri and Trudy."
"With all the military here, it could be anything."
"Bets?" She grinned.
"You know I don't gamble." Karl snorted.
"No, I guess you don't do you? Funny, I never realised that before, you play the odds in real life but you don't wager on anything at all on a bet do you?"
"Nope, I learned early that I was better off not trying to outguess anyone else for trivial stuff. You never know what you'll end up with when you win something that way. Look at Keri's damn pigs."
"Oh, oh, oh!" Ely almost jumped out of her seat. "Fran has sold our pigs for us, as many as we want to sell. Naval supply will buy them and come get them. All they need is a rough number and Dave Peacock said he can give you that from the infrared scan. The only thing is, the navy doesn't want any little tiny ones."
"So that still leaves us with the weaners and they may be small but they're still pigs." Karl sighed.
"Sure, but now we have a buyer who comes here and gets them when they're big enough. Besides, if we fence them in the bottom they almost look after themselves. We sure can't use that swampy place for much else." Ely laughed. "And look, here comes the helicopter. I was right. I can see Keri waving out the window."
"See. I told you it doesn't pay to bet."
"Hah, I'd have won." She laughed. "I'm going out to meet them. Are you coming along?"
"Nope, I'm going to go get a cup of that coffee that you said you'd made. Then I'm going to sit here and think a bit before I get swamped with more information."
"Stick in the mud." She teased, then hurried off.
Karl watched the chopper land and then stood up and went inside to get that cup of coffee he wanted. When he came back out, he was surprised to see that the helicopter had been powered down and the pilot was walking away from it along with the passengers who had been on board. He couldn't understand why, but forced himself to wait patiently while the whole group walked up toward him.
Suddenly Keri broke away from the rest and came running to him to plop herself on his lap and hug him tightly.
"Hiya Daddy. The baby is fine and so am I." She announced with tears running down her face.
"That's great." Karl wrapped her in a tight hug. "Ely told me about the results of the blood tests."
"Umm, I had a bunch myself today." She pointed to a small piece of white adhesive on her arm. "Fran thinks she knows what sex the baby is, but I told her not to tell us, okay?"
"Oh, I knew that already, we didn't need any test for that." Karl grinned. "Remember, my granny was a medicine woman, she told me how to tell."
"Well, don't tell me! You'd probably be right and I'd rather be surprised. Now, I have to go see Linda, I thought she'd be here to greet me."
"She's probably trying to get one last little thing done in your new house." Karl grinned. "Maybe making the bed for tonight or something?"
"Oh, we have a place of our own." She squealed, diving off of his lap and running madly to the old cabin.
"Slow down." Fran called.
"Later, Boss. When I have to waddle." Keri called and it looked like she ran all the harder.
By now Karl could recognise everyone that was in the group approaching, even the pilot. He had been the pilot on the day that Karl had been forced to shoot Karpichov. As well as him, Dr. Fran was there, Trudy, and even Gillian Mathews, the girl who had been hurt that day. She was walking very stiffly and standing very upright and as Karl looked at her, he remembered that she had broken ribs.
Since everyone was coming his direction, he moved to get up and Ely ordered him to sit down again.
"This fellow is going to have you busy enough in a little while, you just sit and rest." She ordered.
"Ed Koch was our pilot Karl. This is Karl Larson, the fellow you were talking about Ed." Fran spoke up. "And Karl, I imagine you remember Gillian Mathews, one more of our walking wounded."
"Hi and hello." Karl greeted them both. "Welcome to Gull Island, again."
"Yeah, last time I was here, I didn't feel too welcome." Ed said with a wry grin as he sat on a step and gazed around. "Quite the place."
"We like it." Karl responded.
"Yeah, I can see why."
The women all went inside leaving the two men on the porch.
"So, how are you going to get me busy Ed?" Karl asked.
"Well . . ." The pilot glanced at the watch on his wrist. "In about a half hour or so, I'm supposed to load you and a couple of helpers in the helicopter and take you for a ride to look at trying to lift a tree off of the other house. It seems Springfield thinks that would be the only way to get rid of it without doing a bunch of more damage to the house. I'm supposed to leave the other two guys there working on getting it ready if necessary. That's because about an hour from now, at low tide, you and I are supposed to fly over a cliff and a pile of rocks down in that damn cut of yours. Then I'm supposed to land you down at the lower camp so you can go by boat to have a look at the rock slide up close. If we didn't get that tree shifted before, which I doubt we can do, I'm to go back and see if the two guys we left behind have got it ready for me to lift out of their way."
"Sounds like a lot of work for you to do and not much for me." Karl grinned.
"Yeah, well, I do have one other job." The pilot grinned. "Your lady said when I was all done with that, I was to go pick you up from down below again and bring you back up here. Oh, and while I was along with you, if I saw you so much as pick up a hammer, I was to hog tie you and sit on you. She said you'd been working too hard lately and needed to conserve energy."
"Well, is Ely getting you a cup of coffee for now?" Karl asked quietly.
"I certainly was." She said from behind him as she came back outside.
Then she called David over, telling Karl that she needed to talk to Lyle Elgin and asking David to run get Lyle and Raymonde. When they came over, she had coffee for them as well, then the pilot explained what Springfield had suggested. Talking it over, the four men decided that all they needed to take along from Karl's place was a chain saw and a short section of cable that had two loops on the end which he used to shift logs and heavy weights. As soon as they were done their coffee they climbed into the chopper and flew over to the other house to land close by.
Raymonde grabbed a long ladder and climbed to the roof of the house to see if anything had to be done there, as well he pulled Karl's lifting cable up and wrapped it around the upper trunk of the tree. At the same time Ed and Lyle dragged one end of a fifty-foot length of cable toward the house after rigging a clevis through one of the loops on the end. While they manhandled that end up the ladder and Raymonde fastened the clevis through the loops of Karl's lifting cable, Karl started the chain saw and made two small cuts in the trunk of the tree near the base. One cut was on the upper side of the trunk and nearest the base. The other cut was on the lower side of the trunk and several feet farther up the trunk. Neither cut was deep enough to seriously weaken the trunk as it sat now, but hopefully when the strain of the lift came onto it, the trunk would split between those two points.
By working the way they had, it only took moments and they were ready to try to lift the tree clear of the house. Karl and the pilot climbed into the chopper and lifted off, dropping a cable toward the ground at the far end of the fifty-foot cable that was hooked to the tree. Karl leaned out the door and when Lyle signalled that they had the cables linked. He signalled the pilot to give it a try.
To Karl's surprise, the pilot flew very slowly and carefully around the house until he thought they were almost above the base of the fallen tree and then he began to reel in the cable. As the cable came tight, Karl was able to see the stub of the branch that had punctured the roof lift right back out of the hole and when the tree was standing well clear of the house, he saw the trunk actually split. He shouted and waved at the pilot, who flew the tree sideways until they were in the clearing before releasing the cable again. They hovered there until Lyle had released the lifting cable, then the pilot reeled it in and they landed once more.
The whole operation had taken less than a half hour and even the pilot seemed impressed. Karl certainly was and the other two were ecstatic. After Lyle and the pilot had retrieved his shorter cable, the pilot rushed Karl aboard the chopper. He wanted to hurry so they could go take photos of the rock slide and the cliffs at dead low tide. Once they were in the air, it seemed only a moment and the pilot was easing them down toward the cut and flying along toward the rock slide area.
"I hate it down low around one of these cuts that lead to the sea." He shouted. "Feel the wind gusts?"
"Well, don't get so damn low then." Karl shouted back.
"Gotta be fairly low, using the radar to try to get an idea of water depth." The pilot shouted back. "In addition I want big pictures for you."
"I don't need big pictures. I just need good ones." Karl laughed loudly.
"Well, there's your rock pile, what do you think?"
"Holy cripes, most of what's bothering us is one big slab of rock."
"Sure is. I'll bet there's a lot more underwater though."
"Damn, how the hell did I get a boat by that so easy this morning with a tide running?"
"You went through this cut with a boat? Are you fucking nuts?"
"No, you're the nut with this damn machine, now get us up out of here. I want to die decently either on land or water, not burnt to a crisp in a crashed helicopter."
That seemed to tickle the pilot, but he lifted out and swung the chopper over to land it on the temporary landing pad on the edge of the lowland area. Don was there to meet Karl when he climbed out. To his surprise the chopper flew off again, going right back to the cut.
"Well, what do you think of the rock slide or did you see it?" Don asked.
"It's a bloody mess and the worst part is, it's mostly one big slab of rock." Karl answered.
"Well, let's go look at it from water level. Two of my divers are waiting for us in the inflatable. You want to play pilot again?"
"Do you want me to?" Karl asked.
"Please." Don grinned. "I'd probably sink us."
"No guarantee I won't." Karl grinned back. "I haven't been in the cut at low tide since that rock fall either."
"Well, our two divers can kneel on the bow and keep an eye out for rocks as we get close." Don said, helping Karl aboard. "Meet Sam, our head diver and Dave, his 2IC."
"Hi fellows, everyone ready?"
"Take us out Cap'n." Don smiled.
So once more Karl headed them out across the bay, this time skirting close by the dive boat and waving at the crew as they passed.
"No more diving today?" He asked.
"No more dive time." Sam replied. "Navy diving regs say we can only be down for a certain number of hours before we rest up and we've used up our time for the day."
"Oh yeah, how deep are you working?"
"About sixty feet, it'd be a great place to dive if we could only see further."
"I see, did you find the wreck?" Karl asked as he slowed to go into the cut.
"Yep, your marker was about four feet from the bow. It's upside down and faced back the way it came. She turned turtle and she's on her head."
"Gee. I was really lucky this time."
"Yeah, I've heard about your luck." He leaned close and spoke quietly. "By the way, your marker was about six feet the other way from a box."
"What? You found it?"
"Keep it real quiet, sound carries too well on the water, but yeah, we think so. We were out of dive time for the day when we found it but both Don and I figured you deserved to know. We plan on taking down Geiger counters tomorrow morning and if they start clicking, we'll let the powers that be take over that job."
"Wow." Karl just stared at him and then at Don, who winked and gave him a thumbs up sign.
Karl had to pay attention to the boat at that point because they had entered the cut and he slowed down to lower speed.
"Better ease up, we're getting close." Called the man on the bow after a few minutes more.
"Holy shit, hard reverse." He squawked an instant later.
Karl slammed the engines into hard reverse, almost losing the man into the water even though he was the one who had called the warning.
"Damn" Don complained, after having been dumped by the sudden stop. "There sure as hell ain't anything wrong with your reaction time."
"Bloody near put me over the bow." Dave laughed. "And what's funny is I was the one who should have been braced for it."
"Wow, look at this." Sam said quietly, pointing over the side. "We blow this baby and half of that pile will slide this way."
"You think?" Dave questioned.
"Well, look at the rest of them, even that big one up top, they're lined up like dominoes. We drop this one and they all come tumbling down."
"Well, you've got more blasting experience than me. I wish now we'd have brought along a big charge of blasting gel. We could set it now."
"Oh I think we need to look it over a little more than that before we blast." Sam laughed shortly. "Karl, hit the lift on the engines will you please. I want to get out on the rock and climb around a bit."
"You be careful." Don ordered.
"Yes Commander." Sam smiled, saluting crisply. "I intend to be careful as hell."
Both Sam and Dave were soon crawling around on the top of the slide while Karl and Dave stayed in the inflatable. The water had started to come in quite strongly by the time the two divers were satisfied. By then they had used a waterproof marker to put X's on several spots and as they climbed back into the boat, Karl asked about the X's.
"Those are key points." Sam said quietly as they pulled away. "We'll be blowing those a few milliseconds before we blow off the big one at the base. Then this thing is like a house of cards, I think we'll even get a mini-tsunami when we blow it. I'll bet it rolls right over that little island there." He pointed as they cruised out of the cut and past it.
"At low tide or high tide?" Don asked quietly.
"Oh shit, we will be blowing it at low tide won't we?" Sam laughed. "If it was at high tide it would be big enough, but not at low tide."
Karl just grinned and was in a great mood as he steered them back to the area near the helicopter pad so that in only minutes they were all ashore again. The chopper was idling and waiting for him and Don to climb aboard and in a very short time Karl, Don and Ed were walking toward Karl's cabin.
"You're sure I'm invited to eat with you?" Don asked Karl.
"If you weren't before, you are now." Karl smiled. "Ely won't mind at all."
And she didn't. Actually she had invited Fran and Gillian Mathews as well as Lyle and Raymonde, but since Linda and Keri had asked George and Trudy as well as David and Mary-Beth to eat in their new house, there were only eight people who sat down at the table. She had done a pork roast and everyone had high praise for her cooking.
Karl declared that during the meal no one could talk about anything that had happened in the last two weeks and at first that caused considerable consternation. But once he had told a tale about himself as a young man that even Don had never heard and then Don had countered with a tale of his own, they each dug into their past and told something about themselves that no one else knew. After they had eaten, Fran, Gillian, Lyle and Raymonde insisted on helping clean up and the rest retired to the front porch to relax so Karl could have his evening cigarette.
"First one of the day." He said quietly.
"What?" Ely sat up in surprise.
"Yeah, I had three yesterday." He grinned at her. "So I skipped the one this morning and I've been missing it all day, I can't seem to think straight."
"Oh sure." Don laughed. "I didn't notice that this morning when you had us drop that marker four feet from the wreck."
"Oh, you found the wreck?" Ely asked.
"Karl found the wreck. We just dove on it. Unfortunately we ran out of dive time, but we do know that the box isn't on the wreck itself and it isn't at or even near the rock pile. Tomorrow we plan to dive early in the morning, then if necessary the divers will have recovered enough to dive late in the evening." Don said quietly. "Now, if we find the box and confirm that it's the right one with a Geiger counter, the bay and the lower area will be closed to access for anyone but military personnel, and even our access to the area near the box will be greatly restricted. Actually the only people allowed within a hundred yards of that box will be Springfield, Winchester, and the haz-mat crew."
"That would be a sight." Karl had to grin.
"What?" Don asked in confusion.
"Well, JTF2 wears a black uniform, haz-mat dresses in white, so there will be no one in coloured clothes near the box."
"Karl, sometimes you have a weird sense of humour." Ely shook her head.
"Anyway, back to my lecture." Don sighed. "If we find the box we'll be setting off a loud klaxon and the whole of the military will be deployed to prevent anyone from entering the area until the box is removed. We'll then radio for the haz-mat crew to attend and they'll arrive in a large helicopter which will remain onsite until the box is placed in a safe containment. After that, the haz-mat crew and the box will be flown to an undisclosed location for disposal of the object and any contaminated material."
"So will you people leave here then?" Karl asked.
"Some of us will leave very soon after that. However, there will be several people who will remain behind for a few days. Because we discovered several automatic weapons strewn around near the wreck, it will have to be gone over thoroughly. On top of that, if it's discovered that the box itself isn't secure, the divers will have to try to retrace the path it may have travelled, just to check and see if there was any spillage. Then too, we're committed to do some blasting at your rock slide."
"Well, this is all very interesting." The pilot spoke. "However I need to return this chopper to Esquimalt, so I'm off. I believe Miss Gillian is returning with me?"
"Just a second, I'll ask her." Ely said hopping to her feet and hurrying inside.
"Thanks for the great work this afternoon Ed." Karl stood and held out his hand. "Come back another day and I'll give you a ride in a steam boat to pay you back for the thrills you gave me."
"And go down that friggin' gully on a boat? No damn way, not while there's a perfectly good chopper to fly over it." Ed grinned. "Mama didn't raise her kids to get drowned."
"You and I may never agree on what's safe." Karl grinned in return. "But I do think you're a damn fine pilot and you certainly did a good job today, so thanks again."
"It was my pleasure Karl. I owed you. Now goodnight folks." He started to walk away.
Ely came out of the house at that moment and called to him. "Gillian is staying here tonight Ed, but she says thanks for remembering."
"Okay, goodnight Ely and thanks for a great meal."
"Goodnight Ed."
"Well, it's time for me to go do some more work before bedtime." Don rose to his feet. "Thank you both for your hospitality. Karl, thanks for your work today, and Ely that was a very good dinner. Have a good evening both of you."
"Goodnight Don" Both Karl and Ely spoke, almost in unison.
He waved a hand over his shoulder, but didn't turn around.
Karl and Ely stood there for a moment and then decided they should go inside with their other friends. The four of them were getting along very well. The guys were washing and drying the dishes. Fran was sitting at the table while Gillian was standing near the freestanding counter, leaning a hand on it and trying not to laugh too hard at the antics of the Lyle and Raymonde. They were obviously talking about helping pull the tree off of the roof of the other house.
"And Karl just picked up the chain saw and sort of dropped it, suddenly it was running, so he went buzzzzz on the top side of the trunk, walked over a couple of steps and lifted it up again, buzzzzz on the bottom side and shut the chain saw off. So when we got the cables all hooked up and the pilot lifted it, the tree lifts straight out of the hole in the roof. Then neat as you please, a crack starts at the top cut Karl made, goes crack-pop really loud, and snaps off at the bottom cut, clean as a whistle."
"So zee man, 'ee ees leaning out zee door of zee chopper and 'ee signals wis 'is 'and, like zis and zee pilot pulls zee tree to zee one side and drops eet, kerplop. Zjob done. Zjust like zat."
"And meanwhile these two monkeys were climbing and hauling and doing all the hard stuff to make it easy for Ed and me to do our jobs." Karl added, making both of the guys jump. "That pilot sure knows his stuff."
Then before anyone could comment anymore, he asked if they'd all like a coffee or tea. To Karl's surprise everyone wanted tea, so that night was one of the rare ones when he had tea before bed. While they were having their tea, it seemed as if they wanted to hold on to the idea of not talking about the happenings of the last while, as if they wanted this to be a break from all their recent troubles and problems. It wasn't long before Fran yawned, which brought sympathy yawns from Lyle and then Ely. After that it was only moments before the four Navy people excused themselves and went off to bed.
"Guess what?" Ely turned to Karl and smiled.
"What?" Karl asked quietly.
"Well, David is big enough to put himself to bed for once and we have the upstairs bedroom to ourselves."
"Are you suggesting an early night?"
"I sure am."
Just then however there was a noise on the front porch.
"Oh shit." Ely laughed sardonically. "Everyone's back I'll bet."
The door opened and David was the first one inside.
"Look who we found" He crowed, holding Evinrude the cat in his arms.
"Hey, he didn't run off, I haven't seen him since the day we got back." Ely squealed, reaching for him. "He sure hasn't starved."
"Probably living off of the rodents around here." George snorted as he came inside. "We were quietly eating our meal and had opened the door to allow the cabin to cool off slightly when he marched in and walked to David's side, demanding attention as if he were the resident royalty."
"As far as I'm concerned he is Dad." Ely chuckled, hugging the cat close and letting him lick her face. "He and I get along."
"Well, I would suggest you take your feline companion and retire. The rest of us certainly are going to do so. We've all had a very full day and from the number of yawns I have counted in the past hour, I think we will all be in slumberland soon."
So to Karl and Ely's surprise, the return of the others didn't really hold back their bedtime. In only moments they were upstairs and for the first time in days, they were alone. After the day that he had been through, Karl wanted a shower though, so while Ely snuggled under the covers, he slipped into the bathroom. Karl showered hurriedly but even though he rushed, by the time he got to bed, Ely was sound asleep.
Chuckling to himself at the fact that she had fallen asleep on him, Karl crawled into bed at her side and snuggled close, only to be surprised to feel Evinrude jump onto the bed and snuggle at his feet. While he was pondering the question of whether the cat would make a decent living hot water bottle, he drifted off to sleep himself.