He smiled. “Nothing to worry about. I have sensors that flash if there is the slightest unexplained break anywhere in the line. Even on your end.”
“Good,” Carol replied. She pulled out her notebook and scanned a handwritten list. “ As far as Arnie Webber knows,” she said, looking up at the video camera, “there are no legal prohibitions against salvaging any U. S. government property, provided it is returned to its rightful owner very soon after its retrieval. So I wouldn’t technically be committing a crime if I pull the missile up.” She checked the first item off her list.
“But, Dale, I thought about something else on the flight down here from Miami. This thing is, after all, some kind of guided missile. What if it blows up? Am I crazy to worry about such a thing? Or is it somehow incapacitated or what-ever by sitting down there in the sand and salt water for several days?”
Dale laughed. “Sometimes, Carol, you’re divine. I am fairly confident that the new missile is designed to operate either in the air or in water. And I don’t think that the sand would be able to foul up its critical parts in a short period of time. However, the fact that it hasn’t exploded yet suggests to me that it probably wasn’t armed in the first place, except possibly for a small destruct device that may or may not have already failed. You are taking a calculated risk in retrieving that missile. I still strongly suggest that you make your dive, obtain the photographs, and then go public with the story. Dredging the missile up for display purposes seems to me to be more of a stunt than journalism. Besides, it’s dangerous.”
Carol was curt. “As I said in the car, you are entitled to your opinion. The Navy could make a case that I faked the pictures somehow. But they cannot argue with a missile that has physical presence and can clearly be seen by a nationwide television audience. I want maximum impact for the story.”
She checked another item off the list in her notebook. “Oh, yes, I forgot to mention this morning that I met another boat captain down here, a bit of a creep actually, an older fat man named Homer. He seemed to recognize me almost immediately. Wealthy, big yacht and all that. Strange crew — ”
“Was his last name Ashford? Homer Ashford?” Dale interrupted her.
Carol nodded. “So you know him?” she asked.
“Certainly,” Dale replied. “He was the leader of the expedition that found the Santa Rosa treasure in 1986. You’ve met him too, although it’s obvious you’ve forgotten. He and his wife were guests at the MOI awards banquet early in 1993.” Dale stopped to think. “That’s right. I remember now, you were real late coming to the party because of that threat made against you by Juan Salvador. But I’m surprised you forgot them, the wife especially. She was a great big fat woman and she thought you were the cat’s pajamas.”
Slowly but surely it all clicked in Carol’s memory. She recalled a bizarre evening right after she first started going with Dale. She had run a piece in the Herald on cocaine trafficking and had suggested that the Cuban city councilman, Juan Salvador, was deliberately inhibiting the police investigations. At noon that day, a usually reliable source had called her editor at the paper and told him that Senor Salvador had just purchased a contract on Carol’s life. The Herald had assigned her a bodyguard and recommended that she alter her normal schedule so that her whereabouts would always be uncertain.
The evening of the MOI banquet Carol was in a fog. The bodyguard had been with her for only three hours and already she felt confined and restricted. But Carol had been genuinely frightened by the threat. At the banquet she had scrutinized every face, looking for an assassin, waiting for someone to make a move. As she sat in the hotel communications room fourteen months later, she did vaguely remember meeting Homer (he had been dressed in a tux) and some jolly fat woman who had followed her around for twenty minutes or so. Damnit, Carol thought. It’s my memory again. I should have recognized him immediately. How stupid of me.
“Okay,” Carol said to Dale, “I remember them now. But why were they at the MOI awards banquet?”
“We were honoring our leading benefactors that night,” Dale replied. “Homer and Ellen have been big supporters of our underwater sentry effort. In fact, he has field tested many of our prototypes at his facility there in Key West. Real solid test data too. Best compilation of sentry/intruder responses that anybody has catalogued. Why? it was Ashford who showed us how the MQ-6 could be fooled — ”
“Okay, Okay,” Carol said, realizing that her tolerance threshold was still extremely low. “Thanks for the information. It’s now a quarter till four. I’m going to go down to the marina to meet Nick Williams and make arrangements for tomorrow. If anything new comes up, I’ll call you at home tonight.”
“Ciao,” said Dale Michaels. trying without success to sound sophisticated, “and please be careful.”
Carol hung up the phone with a sigh. She wondered if she should spend a minute or two figuring out where she and Dale were going. Or not going. As the case may be. She thought about all the things she needed to do. She closed her notebook and rose from her chair. Not right now, she thought I don’t have time now to think about Dale. But as soon as I have a break in this crazy life of mine.
Carol was really fuming when she walked back into the marina headquarters the second time. She approached the information desk with fire in her eyes. “Miss,” she said nastily to Julianne, “as I told you fifteen minutes ago, I had an appointment here at four o’clock with Nick Williams and Troy Jefferson. It is now, as you can see, after four-thirty.”
Carol pointed at the digital clock with an impatient, sweeping gesture that commanded Julianne to look. “We have both established independently that Mr. Williams is not home,” Carol continued. “Now ate you going to give me Mr. Jefterson’s phone number, or should I make a scene?”
Julianne did not like Carol or her obvious attitude of superiority. She held her ground. “As I told you, Miss Dawson,” she said politely but with a biting overtone, “marina policy prohibits our giving out the phone numbers of the independent boat owners or their crew members. It’s a question of privacy. Now if you had a formal charter through the marina,” Julianne continued, enjoying her moment of glory, “then it would be our job to assist you. But as I said earlier, we have no record — ”
“Goddamn it, I know that,” replied Carol furiously. She slammed the envelope of photos that she was carrying down on Julianne’s counter. “I’m not an imbecile. We’ve been through this before. I told you I was supposed to meet them here at four o’clock. Now if you won’t help me, I want to talk to your superior, the assistant manager of whatever.”
“Fine,” said Julianne, her eyes firing darts of contempt at Carol. “If you will just take a seat over there, I will see if I can locate — ”
“I will not take a seat,” shouted Carol in exasperation. “I want to see him now. This is an issue of extreme urgency. Now pick up the phone and — ”
“Is something wrong here? Perhaps I can help.” Carol spun around. Homer Ashford was standing right behind her. Just to the right, toward the gate in the direction of the jetties, Greta and a big heavy woman (That’s Ellen. Now I remember her, Carol thought) were talking quietly. Ellen smiled at Carol. Greta looked right through her.
“Well, hello, Captain Homer,” Julianne said sweetly, “it’s nice of you to ask. But I think everything’s under control. Miss Dawson here has just indicated that she does not accept my explanation of marina policy. She is going to wait for — ”
“Maybe you can help,” Carol interrupted Julianne defiantly. “I had an appointment here at four o’clock with Nick Williams and Troy Jefferson. They have not shown up. Do you by any chance happen to know Troy’s phone number?”
Captain Homer gave Carol a suspicious look and exchanged a knowing glance with Ellen and Greta. He turned back to Carol. “Well, it is certainly a surprise, Miss Dawson, to see you back here again. Why we were just talking about you this morning, saying that we hoped you had a good time on your free day in Key West.” He paused for effect. “Now I wonder why you’ve come back here again, the very next day. And did I hear correctly, you need to see Williams and Jefferson on an issue of extreme urgency? It couldn’t possibly have anything to do with all that equipment you brought in here yesterday, could it? Or the little gray bag that Williams has been guarding since last night?”