Curds and Whey Box Set

by G M Eppers

  “Not bad for a first run,” Bobby said, as he helped pry the spray skirt off. I lifted myself out of the boat and stretched my legs. The spray skirt had kept them perfectly dry, and the warm air had reduced my formerly soggy upper half to merely damp.

  As I did some lunges to stretch my cramped leg muscles a squad of Marines came jogging by deliberately circling near me as they recited the cadence led by their sergeant:

  And here you have our friends from CURDS

  Can’t distinguish them from turds

  We’re a branch and they’re a twig

  Their forces really aren’t that big

  If Uber hits the Seven Seas

  CURDS will tell you just say cheese

  Marines are the best branch by far

  We’re the ones who raise the bar

  Coast Guard, Army and Nav-ee

  Can’t rhyme a word to save their ass

  With a superior look, the sergeant saluted me, marching away with a different cadence that seemed to say something about Captain Dergunderhoeven. “Is that acceptable?” I asked Bobby. “It seemed awfully mean-spirited.”

  He waved it off. “That’s nothing. You should hear some of the ones I learned in boot camp.” His head tilted as he thought back through the years. “Let’s see, there was one that started ‘I really think I’m out of luck,’” he suggested.

  “I get the idea.” I didn’t need to hear the rest.

  We took a break from the kayak and he gave me on board direction regarding rowboats and canoes, then had me try each of them in turn, again engaging the helicopter to take me out to the water and bring me back. I managed not to capsize either of those, but some sizeable waves created by nearby motorboats got me just as wet., this time all the way down to the cuffs of my jeans. Rowboats and canoes don’t have spray skirts. I saw Evan behind the wheel of a cabin cruiser, smiling from ear to ear and faking a yawn as he steered it around the outside of the buoys. This was old news to him. He grew up on the water. Later I caught a glimpse of Rachel, somewhat less comfortable, with one hand on the rudder of an outboard motorboat. As the sun reached its zenith and the humid air lost its ability to dry us off in between runs, we broke for lunch.

  I spent the entire day on those three small boats and managed to capsize the kayak only once more, though this time it was not a surprise wave but my own poor coordination trying to make the kayak spin in place. I was still using the inflated life vest, but Bobby told me I’d get a new one every day. They were much more comfortable uninflated, so there was an incentive to avoid doing anything to make them deploy because you’d be stuck with a balloon around your neck the rest of the day. Finally, the sun was dipping below the western horizon and Bobby told me we were done. We went to the mess for a dinner of pork chops with a side of baked beans, took turns in the shower, then Bobby told me he was going to an instructor meeting and I could have the quarters to myself for about an hour.

  Rather than wait for the twins to call, I took the chance and dialed Avis’ number. “Hey there, Muffin,” she said.

  “Muffin?”

  “I’m trying out pet names. Married people should have pet names. Originally I was going to go with ‘my better half,’ but Agnes voted against it. Do you like it?”

  Sometimes diplomacy is almost impossible. “Not particularly. My parents never had pet names. It’s not a requirement.”

  “Maybe that’s why their marriage didn’t work out,” she said hesitantly.

  It was kind of a sensitive subject, but married people shouldn’t be afraid of sensitive subjects, either. “Their marriage didn’t work out because my Dad is criminally stupid,” I told her. “Pet names wouldn’t have fixed that. But if you really want to sound one out, go ahead. You never know.” I paused, trying to think of a pet name for her if for no other reason than to show her gently why it was a bad idea. “Cuddle Buns.”

  “Ew.”

  “I’ll take that as a no. Are you still in Alabama?” I’d decided to move on to the Fill Each Other In portion of the call.

  “McGrone is checking us into a hotel on the shores of Apalachee Bay, just south of Tallahassee in the Florida panhandle. We’ve been tailing the smugglers all day. Miss Chiff said not to catch them, though. We’re to follow them until they make contact with their supplier. Should be soon. They certainly don’t seem to have any product to sell. They do hang around the harbors a lot. We think they are looking to hire or steal a boat. They must be looking for something specific, because they keep coming back inland for the night. Oh, and Roxy caught a bug.”

  “Gee, I hope she feels better.”

  Avis laughed, and in the background I heard Agnes giggle. I knew I’d been had again. “Okay, so what’s the deal?”

  “Roxy nabbed The Grasshopper back in Pensacola.” I’d heard of him. He used to deal with marijuana back when it was still illegal. The South took forever to legalize weed, of course. Once it went legit, he jumped over to Fentanyl, which is serious stuff. I guess it was too hot for him, because he dropped that and started pushing Uber. Once we learned his history, the nickname The Grasshopper just seemed natural. “She ducked into a hobby store to get, what was it, Agnes?”

  Agnes, her voice slightly muffled due to her distance from the phone, said, “A crochet hook. She lost hers on the plane.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Avis continued. “She has about fifty hooks it seems like, but she wanted an H.”

  “Why an H?” Because my grandmother had been crocheting as long as I’ve known her, I was aware that crochet patterns often called for a certain size hook and the hooks were generally sized by letters of the alphabet. “Since when does she follow the pattern, anyway?” I asked. Roxy’s crochet style was fairly fast and loose. She followed a pattern about the same way water traveled. The path of least resistance.

  “You’re asking me? I barely know the woman,” Avis said. It was beginning to feel like I barely knew any of them. I wouldn’t have been surprised to find out that Nitro had married someone and fathered a child while I’d been gone. It felt like an eternity.

  In the background, Agnes said, “It was missing. She has all the other letters but was missing the H and she couldn’t rest until she filled the empty slot in her hook case.”

  “Anyway,” Avis continued, “she went in to buy an H and spotted The Grasshopper filling the front of his cart with Ziploc bags and toothpicks. Store security helped her and held him until the authorities got there. There’s a reward, but Roxy says she’s not allowed to take it.”

  “She’s right about that. And you know it.”

  “Yeah,” she admitted, still sounding disappointed. “But gratitude doesn’t buy flowers. Do you know how much those things cost? I wonder if Knobby could grow what we need. Hey, I just thought about that. Agnes, remind me to call Knobby.” Without skipping a beat, she continued, “What’s up with you, Sweet Cheeks?”

  “Um, that’s a no on the Sweet Cheeks, too. Keep trying, though.” I told her about my wet day and after some brief concern for my safety they had a nice laugh about my misadventures.

  The way the class was structured, we rotated through the boats, but not by order of size. Bobby said the rotation had been figured out for five students and only having four kind of scrambled things up, which was part of the reason for the instructor meeting the night before. We’d be spending the weekdays on the boats, and then on the weekends we would do submersibles and pop quizzes.

  My education moved on uneventfully, except for the usual minor mishaps along the way. But I watched Evan literally sail through the entire program, even on craft he hadn’t been familiar with, like the submersibles. He was so comfortable on and in the water, seemed to know exactly how it would move at any given time, that I have to admit I was jealous. I don’t think his inflatable vest ever deployed. By the time we started the second week, I was thoroughly tired of being wet. The only excitement I really had was a call from Avis on Tuesday when she told me about another encounter with the counterfeiter. We were only days
away from a new Team C joining the active forces and the cheese ban taking effect. My news feed was filled with articles calling out President Glenarrow for her act of tyranny and warning of her impending impeachment if she didn’t rescind the ban immediately. For every article lamenting the end of American democracy, there were two or three hailing the ban as a move long overdue. The White House didn’t respond directly to any of the complaints, but had put out a statement at least weekly explaining the details again and how it differed from the Prohibition era. To me it seemed almost like no one was listening.

  Tuesday night, after a harrowing day alternating between a catamaran and a speedboat (on the latter I managed to tangle up the anchor chain in the propeller and caused actual damage, but I was told these were thought of as disposable boats and they were insured accordingly), I took my nightly call from Avis while Bobby was down the hall taking a shower. I kept my free hand on the bag of Mom’s ashes. I hadn’t seen Mom since that first night on deck and worried about what my handful deposit into the water had done to her.

  “Hey, Billy Willy,” said Avis. She still hadn’t settled on a pet name. “I’ve got something to throw at you.”

  “Go ahead,” I told her.

  “Don’t tell McGrone,” she started. I didn’t see how I could, but I said nothing and let her continue. “Miss Chiff told us about an assignment Team B had gone on. They got sent to a little town in France called Etain last week. A seafood restaurant called Nestor’s Nook had received a shipment of what was supposed to be haddock fillets. According to Nestor Kourakis, the owner, they really looked like haddock filets when they took them out, preserved in crates of ice just like usual. But when they put one on the griddle, the darn thing melted into a white puddle. Their chef recognized that it was some kind of cheese and they called the Chembassy in Paris to report it. The Chembassador was already there when Team B arrived and they had determined that it wasn’t Uber. It was a type of cheese called Bianca. There’s no ban in France, so they wrote it off as a practical joke, sort of like we did originally with the green cheese moon rocks at the Museum of Natural History. Sir Haughty says Bianca is made with both goat and sheep’s milk in a region of Washington State.”

  “Exported to France?” I asked. “Maybe someone is trying to avoid the ban in the U.S. by sending cheese to other countries in disguise. Once it’s there, it could be sold normally.” An idea came to me that I thought the team might find useful. “It might be all these cases are trial runs. Some inside the States, some outside, looking for a channel that works best.”

  “That’s as good a theory as any, I guess,” Avis said. “We had no idea. I was hoping maybe something would occur to you. If we can get a lead, Miss Chiff might let us follow it, no matter what McGrone says. She thinks it is someone trying to circumvent the upcoming ban and would really like to get him, or her, or them, into custody. She’s going to need more than a theory. Something that connects them all together.”

  I gave it a moment to swirl around in my already busy brain, but nothing coalesced. “Sorry, I’ve got nothing.” Bobby opened the door quietly and bent down to get through the oval doorway, stepping over the high threshold. “Sorry, Avis. It’s lights out here. I have to go. Love you!”

  The next morning, after breakfast, Bobby and I got out on deck in the pinkish orange light of dawn. I was wearing a second set of new clothes I’d purchased at the ship’s store over the weekend. The selection was limited, but I’d been desperate for new clothes. Wearing one set of clothes while washing the other every day was getting old. Besides, the long pants were really too warm and heavy when wet, so I replaced them with black twill shorts and a tan tank top, and I was much more comfortable. I accepted a new inflatable life vest from a crewman and put it on, securing the straps as I’d been taught. I was scheduled for my second run with the biggest craft, the trawler. As I prepared, Bobby quizzed me on technique and safety procedures.

  Daily, the squads of military personnel continued to jog past to rib me with new, clever cadences while I stretched. Everything had gotten to be very routine.

  Before Bobby could signal the winch crew to lower the boat, an announcement came over the speakers. “Captain to the bridge, please. Perimeter alert. Captain to the bridge. Perimeter alert.”

  Bobby stopped speaking and his head spun around, his gaze toward the horizon in all directions. His eyes were huge when he turned to me. “Perimeter alert?” I asked.

  “Unidentified craft approaching. Must be on the radar.”

  I noticed people moving out of the way and saw Captain Dergunderhoeven in full uniform racing toward the Island. “Is that bad?”

  He shrugged it off, but I could tell he was still worried. “Probably just some yachters not paying attention.” He made some hand signals to other officers around the deck, who acknowledged and passed it on. “We have to get everyone off the water. This area is marked for training for a five mile radius. We don’t want anyone hit if some nut comes in too fast.” The Coast Guard cutter was out placing the buoy lines for the small boats, saw the signals and abandoned the incomplete lines, coming back toward the ship to be winched up to deck level.

  “So we wait?”

  “We wait.” There had only been a few people out on the water, and they were back on the deck in about five minutes. Bobby exchanged more hand signals, checking with other instructors to make sure everyone was accounted for. He looked up toward the top of the Island, shading his eyes from the rising sun. A long cable stretched between the top deck of the Island and the tip of the antenna array. Toward the top of the cable was a U.S. flag, waving rapidly in the wind. Several feet below that was another flag which identified the Ike as a training vessel, and below that a flag was just going up that was dark blue with a yellow stripe at the top and bottom. “They’re flying Delta. Telling the ship to change course.”

  “Can they see it?” It looked very small.

  “If they look for it. Depends on what they use to search.”

  “How far away do you think they are?”

  “Radar range out here would be about twenty miles.”

  “Seems like plenty of space to me.”

  “The radar tech doesn’t think so. It’s either very large or moving very fast. Or both.” He paused. “We’re coming about.” I felt it, too. The vibration of the deck was just a little different as engines engaged to turn the Ike in the water. “Cap is trying to make us a smaller target by turning our bow toward it. Reduces the chance of a collision. We’re too big to run out of the way.” He scanned the horizon in the direction to which the bow now pointed. Straight ahead there was a tiny black triangle just visible. Bobby put his binoculars to his eyes, then lowered them. “Still too far. What’s that?” His head cocked a little as he listened intently.

  Again, his senses were just a bit faster than mine. Through the noise of the wind, there was the hum of a motor. Had someone miscounted? Was someone still out on the water? Bobby trotted to the edge and looked in both directions. I followed, hoping to see it before he did just once.

  Some distance aft of us a deck boat, about thirty feet in length, was chopping its way through the waves parallel to our position. I was shading my eyes, trying to see, when Bobby tapped me on the shoulder. He had procured a pair of binoculars for me. Nearly everyone on the deck of the Ike had either binoculars or a telescope by now, switching from fore to aft views to catch the action. I slipped the strap over my head, noticing that Bobby seemed intent on the black triangle. He hurried to a position closer to the bow before putting his binoculars to his eyes. Great for him, not so much for me, as I, following him, swung my binoculars the other way to see the motorboat. It would miss the Ike by several yards, I guessed.

  “Vavava,” said Bobby under his breath.

  “Are you cold?”

  He pulled my shoulder around and pointed to the other boat. “No. VAVAVA. Take a look.”

  I found the triangle in my sights, adjusting the focus for the greater distance. “What’s VAVA
VA?” As it came into focus, I saw they were flying a flag. It was still very tiny and flapping madly in the wind, but it was also familiar. It featured a dark blue cross, sitting on its side, with a white outline on a red background. I lowered my binoculars and looked at Bobby incredulously. “Norwegians?”

  “Not just Norwegians,” he shouted at me. “VAVAVA.”

  Again with the VAVAVA, I thought. “What’s VAVAVA?”

  “Rogue group. Radical faction. Vikings Again, Vikings Always, Vikings Anonymous.”

  More of the approaching ship crept over the horizon. It was not moving very fast, but it did seem to be very large. There were masts everywhere with large gray sails strung from stem to stern. “How do you know they aren’t just Norwegians?”

  “We’ve dealt with them before. They’ve been poking around these waters for about five years now. Damn, I wish we hadn’t been decommissioned.”

  “Why?”

  “No weapons. Not even a torpedo. Whatever they’re up to, we can’t do a thing about it.”

  I was still having trouble seeing the problem here. “But what do they do? Are they dangerous?”

  Again, Bobby was communicating with other ship’s officers through hand signals. “They’re pirates, Montana. You should get below deck.”

  “No,” I said. “I want to help.”

  “By getting shot?”

  I decided to just ignore his suggestion of running to hide. If I openly defied him, he could try to pull rank on me. He had no grounds, since I wasn’t under his command, just under his tutelage, but he could be very insistent and this was no time for a sparring match. He started running around the deck, putting out the call to get civilians below deck. I just kept following him. “What are Norwegian pirates doing in the Caribbean? Aren’t they pretty far from home?”