by Dan Simmons
Saul nodded. “How close in can you get us?”
Meeks grinned. “They’re real picky out here. Technically the north part of the island’s a big wildlife refuge, major coastal flyway and all that, so airspace is restricted. The fact of it is that big Heritage West Foundation owns the whole thing and guards it like it was a Russian missile base. One flyover and when you land anywhere near the coast you get your ass chewed and your license pulled by the CAB as soon as they verify your registration numbers.”
“Did you do what we discussed?” called Saul. “Yep,” said Meeks. “Don’t know if you noticed, but a lot of them numerals is made of red tape. Tape comes off, we have us a different registration. OK, look there.” He pointed to a tall-masted gray boat moving slowly northward a mile east of the island. “That’s one of their picket boats. Radar. They got fast patrol boats scooting up and down and if any poor fool thinks he’s going to put into Dolmann for a picnic and some bird-watching, he’s got a big shock waitin’ for him.”
“What about in June when the camp thing is going on?” asked Saul. Meeks laughed. “Coast Guard and navy gets into the act then,” he said. “Nothing gets close to Dolmann by sea, unless it’s got an invite. Rumor has it that the company’s got armed jet turbine he li cop ters flying off the airstrip I’ll show you on the southwest side. Friends tell me they’d force down any light aircraft tryin’ to get within three miles. OK, there’s the north beach. That’s the only stretch of sand except for the swimmin’ beach around by the Manse and the summer camp.” Meeks swiveled to look at Natalie. “Hope you’re ready, ma’am. This is going to be a one-time excursion ’long this side.”
“Ready!” called Natalie. She began snapping pictures as they flew in at four hundred feet, a quarter of a mile off the beach. She was grateful for the autowind and oversize filmpack, although normally she would have had little use for them.
Both she and Saul had studied Cohen’s maps of the island, but the reality was more interesting, even if it did flash by in a blur of palmettos, shoals, and half-glimpsed details.
Dolmann Island was typical of the barrier and sea islands more commonly found closer to the coast; a crudely penned L extending almost perfectly north and south, the island ran 6.8 miles lengthwise and was 2.7 miles wide at its base, narrowing to less than a half mile just above where the land curved northward from the base of the L.
Beyond the long white beach on the north tip of the island, its eastern coast showed glimpses of the sea marshes, swamps, and wild subtropical forests that filled the northern third of it. A frenzied flash of white wings rising from palmetto and cypress confirmed that egrets were bountiful in the ostensible wildlife refuge. Natalie shot film as fast as the autowind would advance it, catching a glimpse of burned stone ruins in the underbrush just south of a rocky point.
“That’s what’s left of the old slave hospital,” shouted Saul, making a mark on his map. “Forest swallowed the Dubose Plantation behind it. There’s a slave cemetery somewhere . . . look there’s the security zone!”
Natalie raised her eye from the viewfinder. The land had risen as they approached the base of the L, the forest still so thick as to look impenetrable but given over now to live oak, cypress, and sea pine as much as palmetto and tropical growth. Ahead there was a glimpse of low, half-buried concrete buildings looking like pillboxes along the Normandy coast, an asphalt road running black and smooth between palm trees, and then an area a hundred yards wide between tall fences, a slash totally devoid of any sort of vegetation, cutting full across the island. It looked as if the ground was paved with sharp-edged shells. Natalie swung the long lens and took photographs.
Meeks pulled off his earphones. “Jeez, you should hear the things that radar picket boat guy is shouting. Too bad my radio’s busted.” He grinned at Saul.
They were approaching the east-west segment of the island and Meeks banked hard to avoid flying directly over it.
“Higher!” called Saul.
As they gained altitude, Natalie had a better view. She switched cameras, lifting the Ricoh fitted with the wide-angle lens and shooting manually, advancing film as quickly as she could, lunging to the left window to get a few shots of the long coast extending back the way they had come.
The north side of the base of the L looked like a different island: oak and pine forests south of the security zone, the land rising gently to wooded hills two hundred feet above sea level on the distant south side, and signs of careful construction. The asphalt road continued along the coast, just back from the beach, a perfectly smooth ribbon of asphalt shaded by palm trees and ancient live oaks. There were glimpses of green rooftops among the trees and a circle of benches in a grassy clearing near the center of the island became visible as they leveled off at five hundred feet.
“Summer camp dorms and the amphitheater,” called Saul. “Hang on,” said Meeks and they banked hard left again, out over what looked like a purple scythe of reef, in order to avoid flying directly over the artificial harbor and long concrete dock at the southeast corner of the island. “I don’t think they’d shoot at us,” said Meeks with a grin, “but what the hell.”
Beyond the harbor they banked steeply to the right, following the high, rocky eastern coast. Meeks nodded toward a rooftop farther south just visible above a canopy of ancient oak and colorful magnolias at the highest point of the island. “That’s the Manse,” he said. “Used to be the Vander-hoof Plantation. Old minister married into money. Built around 1770 outta cypress weatherboarding. There’s twenty-one dormers up there above the third floor . . . suppose ta be more’n a hundred twenty rooms. Thing’s survived four hurricanes, an earthquake, and the Civil War. Heli-port this side of the trees . . . there, in the clearing.”
The Cessna banked right again and lost enough altitude to be roaring along parallel to the tops of white cliffs that fell two hundred feet to a rough surf. Natalie shot five pictures with the long lens and got two with the wide angle. The Manse was visible down a long green corridor of oaks; a huge, weathered building with a quarter mile of manicured lawn leading to the vertical drop of the cliffs.
Saul checked his map and squinted at the rooftops of the Manse as they disappeared behind the tall oaks. “There’s supposed to be a road . . . or avenue coming to the Manse from the north . . .”
“Live Oak Lane,” said Meeks. “Over a mile, straight from the harbor to the base of the hill on the other side of the Manse, where the gardens are. But no road. It’s a grassy lane, thirty yards wide, between live oaks a hundred feet tall and two hundred years old. They got soft lights like Japanese lanterns up in the trees . . . seen ’em at night from ten miles out . . . they drive the VIPs up Live Oak Lane to the Manse at night when they arrive. There’s the airstrip!”
They had flown two miles west along the base of the L and the cliffs had dropped to a low, rocky shoreline and then to a broad white beach when the airstrip came into sight: a long, dark slash heading northeast into the forest.
“They come in by plane, still get the Live Oak Lane tour,” said Meeks. “Just not as much of it. Thing can handle private stuff up to the executive jet level. Probably land a seven-two-seven in a pinch. Hang on.”
They pitched steeply to the right as they came around the southwest corner of the island, the swimming beach disappearing behind them.
Ahead, the straight line of the L was ruined by a jagged inlet with the fenced security zone extending inland across the isthmus. The hundred yards of nothingness looked shocking amid the tropical lushness: the Berlin Wall transposed to paradise. North of the security zone along the west side of the island there was no sign of any man-made objects, not even ruins, and the profusion of palmetto, sea pine, and magnolia ran all the way to the water’s edge.
“How do they explain the security zone?” asked Saul.
Meeks shrugged. “S’posed to separate the wildlife refuge from the private land,” he said. “Truth of it is, it’s all private. During their summer camp— stupid name, isn’t it?�
� they got prime ministers and ex-presidents up here by the bushel. They keep the important folks south of the line to make their security jobs easier. Not that the whole island isn’t secure. That’s the western picket boat out there.” He nodded to his left. “Three more weeks an’ there’ll be a dozen more ships, coast guard cutters, the whole mess. Even if you got onto the island you wouldn’t get far. There’d be Secret Ser vice an’ private security forces about everywhere. If you’re doin’ a piece on C. Arnold Barent, you must know already that this man likes his privacy.”
They were approaching the northern end of the island. Saul pointed to it and said, “I’d like to land there.”
Meeks turned his sunglasses toward him. “Look, friend,” he said, “we can get around filin’ a false flight plan. We might not even get caught cutting the corners on Barent’s airspace. But if I set a wheel down on that airstrip, I’ll never see my plane again.”
“I’m not talking about the airstrip,” said Saul. “The beach on the north end is straight and hard-packed and looks long enough to land on.”
“You’re crazy,” said Meeks. He frowned and adjusted something on the controls. Ocean was visible beyond the north end of the island.
Saul removed four five-hundred-dollar bills from his shirt pocket and set them on the instrument console.
Meeks shook his head. “That won’t come close to buying a new plane or paying hospital expenses if we hit a rock or some soft sand.”
Natalie leaned forward and grasped the pilot by his shoulder. “Please, Mr. Meeks,” she said over the engine noise, “it’s very important to us.”
Meeks shifted so he could look at Natalie. “This isn’t just a magazine article, is it?”
Natalie glanced at Saul and then looked back to Meeks as she shook her head. “No, it’s not.”
“Does it have something to do with Rob’s death?” asked Meeks. “Yes,” said Natalie. “I thought so.” Meeks nodded. “I was never satisfied with any of the goddamned explanations about what Rob was doin’ in Philadelphia and what the hell the FBI had to do with it all. Is this billionaire Barent involved somehow?”
“We think so,” said Natalie. “We need to get more information.” Meeks pointed toward the beach passing under them. “And landing there for a few minutes’ll help you figure somethin’ out?”
“Maybe,” said Saul. “Well, shit,” murmured Meeks. “I suppose you’re both terrorists or something, but terrorists’ve never done me any harm and bastards like Barent’ve been screwin’ me over for years. Hang on.” The Cessna banked hard right until they came around again to pass over the north beach at two hundred feet of altitude. The strip of sand was only ten yards across at its widest and heavy vegetation came right to its edge. Several streams and inlets cut deep swaths through the northwest end of the beach. “Can’t be more than a hundred an’ twenty yards,” called Meeks. “Have to set it down right at the edge of the surf and pray that we don’t find a hole or rock or something.” He checked the instruments and looked down at the white lines of surf and the swaying tops of trees. “Wind’s out of the west,” he said. “Hang on.”
The Cessna banked hard right once more and they came around over the sea, losing altitude. Saul tightened his seat belt and braced himself against the console. In the backseat, Natalie secured her camera gear, tucked the Colt automatic under her loose blouse, checked her own seat belt, and braced herself.
Meeks throttled back so that the Cessna dropped in so slowly that it seemed to hang over the waves east of the island for a full minute. Saul saw that their trajectory would take them into the surf rather than onto the sand, but at the last second Meeks gave the Cessna a burst of throttle, sideslipped over a cluster of rocks that grew alarmingly to the size of boulders as they dropped toward them, and set the light aircraft down firmly on wet sand ten feet beyond.
The nose came down fast, saltwater whipped across the windscreen, Saul felt the left wheel slew to one side, and then Meeks was very busy as he seemed to work throttle, rudder, brakes, and ailerons all at the same time. The tail came down and the plane was slowing but not quickly enough as the tidal inlets that had seemed so far away on the northwest corner of the beach rushed at them through the blurred disk of the slowing propeller. Five seconds before they tumbled over the banks of the ravine, Meeks brought the right wheel down low enough to throw spray onto Saul’s window, burped the throttle and brakes to bring the tail up and around as they skidded in a broad, sweeping turn that lifted the left wheel off the ground and brought the right wheel within inches of inlet and dunes before the aircraft stopped, prop turning idly, windscreen looking due east back along a strip of wet beach sand marked with three parallel lines that were not straight at all.
“Three minutes,” said Meeks, already pulling back the throttle. “I’ll be at the east end of the beach and if the wind dies or I see their boat comin’ around Slave Point, adios. Lady stays in the plane to help me lift the tail at the turnaround.”
Saul nodded, clicked off his belt, and was out the flimsy door, his long hair blowing in the wind and propeller blast. Natalie shoved out the long, heavy bag, wrapped in plastic tarp with leather handles protruding.
“Hey!” yelled Meeks. “You didn’t say anything about . . .”
“Go!” yelled Saul and ran for the edge of the forest near where the tidal inlet disappeared under thick palm fronds and tropical blossoms.
It was a swamp. Saul was up to his knees within ten yards of the beach, the fringe of magnolias and palmettos giving way to ancient cypress and gnarled oak draped with Spanish moss. An osprey exploded from a large nest six feet from Saul’s head and something swam away ten feet to his right, leaving a large V in its wake and making Saul remember what Gentry had said about catching snakes in the dark.
Saul’s three minutes were almost up when he took his compass reading and decided that he was far enough in. He was carrying the heavy bag on his right shoulder and now he looked around and saw an ancient cypress scarred by fire or lightning, its two lower branches extending over the brackish water like the charred arms of a screaming man. He waded toward it and was up to his waist before he reached the massive trunk. The lightning strike had ripped open a jagged cleft on this side, exposing the rotted interior.
Mud and currents tugged at Saul’s left pant leg under the water as he jammed the long bag into the cleft, pushing it up and out of sight, wedging it securely with pressure and a cross brace made from short, dead limbs snapped from the gray trunk. He waded back ten paces, satisfied himself that the heavy bag was invisible, and began memorizing the shape and location of the old tree in relation to the inlet, other trees, and a patch of sky visible above between hanging moss and contorted limbs. Then Saul turned and tried to hurry toward the beach.
The mud held him, tried to pull him down, and threatened to pull his boots off or snap his ankles. A layer of brackish scum coated his shirt, the dead water smelling of sea and corruption. Fronds and ferns batted at his head while a swarm of stinging insects hovered in a thick cloud around his sweaty face and shoulders. The vegetation seemed immeasurably thicker going out, the struggle endless. Then he was through the last barrier of branches and stumbling across the sandy, shallow inlet, struggling up the deep ravine onto the beach and realizing that even with the compass he had come out thirty yards farther west than he had entered.
The Cessna was gone.
Saul stopped in a second of throat-filling disbelief and then ran forward fifty feet, seeing the glint of sunlight on metal and glass where it sat a seemingly impossible distance away around a curve of low dunes. He could hear the engine pitch rising even as he sprinted toward it down the wet sand, noticing with an almost detached sense of detail that the tide seemed to be coming in; it already covered the seaward wheel track and was quickly narrowing the usable expanse of sun-baked beach. Two-thirds of the way there he was panting so loudly that he did not hear the higher drone of a speedboat before he saw it, white spray flashing, arcing around the northeast
point of the island. At least five dark figures with rifles were visible. Saul ran faster, his boots kicking up water as he sprinted to the edge of the surf directly in front of the Cessna. If the aircraft started its takeoff run now, Saul would have the choice of diving into the water or being cut in half by the propeller.
He was ten yards from the plane when three small plumes of sand leaped up under the left wing; a strange sight, as if some burrowing creature or giant sand flea was stitching its way toward him. He heard the sharp crack-crack-crack of shots a second later. The speedboat was two hundred yards out, well within rifle range. Saul assumed that only the rough chop of the surf and the boat’s speed had ruined the marksman’s aim.
The left door opened as Saul sprinted the last twenty feet, jumped from the strut to the passenger seat, and collapsed, soaked with sweat. The aircraft leaped forward even as he came through the opening, pitching and slewing its way down the narrowing strip of wet beach while Natalie struggled to secure the banging door. There was a heavy thunk of a bullet striking metal behind them and Meek cursed, did something with an overhead control, pulled the throttle full back, and wrestled with the vibrating control yoke.
Saul sat up and looked through the windscreen just as the Cessna reached the end of the beach, still not airborne, and roared off the sandy ramp over the saltwater inlet and narrow streams. Sharp rocks and low foliage faced them on the western side.
The three feet of air under them made the difference. The right wheel splashed spray once and they were airborne, clearing the rocks by less than a foot, banking right over the waves as they climbed to twenty feet, then thirty. Saul looked right and saw the speedboat still coming, bouncing wildly. Muzzle flashes flared directly at Saul’s eyes.
Meeks kicked hard at the pedals and pulled the yoke back and then forward, sending the Cessna into a strange, skidding arc and left bank that left them five feet above the waves and accelerating, lunging to put the wall of the western point and its screen of trees between them and the patrol boat.