by G A Chase
He agreed, but saying so wasn’t likely to give her confidence. “We’re just on a scouting mission. I’d hate for Cheesecake to miss dinner.”
“I asked my neighbor to check in on her, just in case.”
The loud ship’s horn preceded the rumbling of the engines that shook the cement bench. This was as alone as they were as likely to be. Only the security guard in the terminal, reading her romance novel, was left behind. “Let’s do this thing.”
He followed Kendell as she snuck around the side of the sculpture of Louis Armstrong like a drunk tourist looking for a quiet place to barf. The grass quickly gave way to sandy silt as the riverbank sloped down toward the water. He ducked behind the cement retaining wall that buttressed the small parking lot. In a matter of only a hundred feet, he’d gone from respectable urban dweller to the world of the underclass. She took his hand as they walked along the pilings that supported the terminal. “He’s kind of disreputable looking, but he was kind to me.”
I’ll bet he was. Myles didn’t think beautiful young women would often find their way to the river rat’s daytime lair.
She turned toward a shadowy corner of the cement foundation. “Whit, is that you?”
“My Mississippi mermaid returns. I wondered when you’d show up. And you’ve brought protection this time?”
She hunkered down next to the pile of blankets. “It’s not like that. He’s my boyfriend.” Myles’s heart instantly felt like it was about to burst. She’d used the word so casually it sounded natural and obvious, but it was the first time he’d heard her confess their relationship to someone else. “Did you happen to make contact with our friends?”
The stack of brown wool blankets started separating. A short, dirty, muscular man in his thirties emerged. “I did. They’re okay, or at least they were last night. Are we going after them?”
That was the real question. “We’re a little light on a plan and resources.”
“Then you’re in luck. I assume Ariel told you I was in the military.”
Kendell helped him gather his things. “It’s Kendell. Kendell Summer. And this is Myles Garrison. I’m sorry I lied last time, but I didn’t know you.”
“No need to apologize. Are you still on the run, or can we take an easier path to the camp?”
Myles surveyed the path they’d taken. “I didn’t see anyone following us, but we’re no experts when it comes to surveillance.”
“Right. Grab a blanket, and throw it over your shoulders. They stink a bit, but no one will bother looking you in the eyes if you appear homeless. We’ll stick to the batture.”
* * *
The camp was smaller than Myles had imagined. There couldn’t have been more than a dozen people milling around the fire and makeshift kitchen. As Kendell shed the mud-encrusted blanket, a matronly woman dropped her ladle into the pot and rushed up to embrace her. “My river angel.”
Kendell pulled out of the embrace but kept her hand on the woman’s waist. “Mary, this is my boyfriend, Myles. I’m afraid we need your help again. But before I ask, I have something for you.” She pulled out the yellowed deed to the property. “I doubt it’s enforceable, but it does prove your oral history.”
The woman carefully unfolded the document. Tears filled her eyes. “At the very least, they won’t be able to kick us out of our Cottonwood grove again. I won’t ask you where you found it. That would only lessen the magic. We would have offered you our full support anyway, but with this, we’re now in your debt.”
“This deed belongs to you whether you can help or not. I need to rescue my friends, but I don’t even know where to begin.”
Whit began drawing in the dirt with a stick. “I located your friends at the edge of the bayou. A river approach would be too easily noticed, but I have a friend with an airboat that can get us over the water-hyacinth bogs. It’s too noisy to get close to the warehouse, though, and it’s not that great navigating the cypress grove that borders the river.”
Mary inspected Whit’s crude map. “We have relationships down there among the alligator hunters. They use flatboats. Some even stick to paddling them for the versatility.”
Myles suspected Mary’s connections might not bother with such mundane government restrictions as hunting tags. To pass quietly along the bayou often meant hiding more from people than wildlife. “So we use the airboat to get over the marshy section then switch to the flatboats to get close to the warehouse. How do we get our people out?”
Kendell started tapping out a beat with a stick against a rock by the fire’s edge. “Can anyone in the camp do an imitation of a nightingale or some other bird that sings in the swamps at night?”
A boy not much into his teenage years let out a lovely whistling song. Myles wasn’t much into birdcalls, but he’d have been hard pressed to imagine the sounds coming from anything but a bird.
Kendell looked intently at the boy and started tapping out her beat while humming a phrase. The boy had the notes almost perfectly on his first try.
It took Myles a number of renditions before he remembered the song. “‘Take a Chance on Me’? Seriously?”
“It needs to be an ABBA song as a response to Lynn’s playing of ‘SOS.’ What do want me to use? ‘Waterloo’?”
“No, you’re right,” Myles said. “That would be worse. Just promise me when this is all done you’ll play me something to get the earworms out of my head.”
With remarkable attention to detail, Whit drew a rendering of the warehouse raised on stilts. “If no one’s looking, or your friends can create a distraction, we can sneak under the structure with the flatboats. There’s a trapdoor used for hoisting the gators up out of the boats. It’s our best access point.”
Myles knew he’d be useless in a fight. “Then comes the hard part. How do we get our friends out? Even if we can open the trapdoor from outside, there’s sure to be someone keeping an eye on them.”
“Even if I had two arms, I swore off the use of guns when I left the army,” Whit said. “Our best shot is to go late at night and hope one of the guards is sleeping. I’d suggest two boats. I’ll take Myles in one. It’ll be a surprise attack. Once everything is secure, Kendell and Hawk can come in and help transport everyone away.”
Myles knew all too well what Kendell was playing with in her pocket. Two cursed items had been custom fit for her use. Fortunately, she kept her weapons a secret.
27
Even with Mary sending her messengers downriver to deliver her request, Myles wondered if it wouldn’t have been a better idea to wait a day or two. But the need to keep Kendell from enduring another night with Madam de Galpion, and their friends from spending another night in captivity, convinced him to proceed with the plan. Mary and Whit assured him that help would be forthcoming.
They made their first rendezvous as the last light faded from the cloud-covered sky. As Whit had promised, his friend waited at the river’s edge. “We shouldn’t have any trouble getting through the bayou so long as the rain holds off. We’ll meet members from the Prejean clan at a summer hunting cabin I use for storing my gear.”
Myles didn’t have a chance to ask what that equipment might be as the roar of the eight-cylinder Chevy engine that powered the six-foot propeller drowned out even his contemplations. With one hand around Kendell’s waist and the other holding tight to the side of the seat, he held on for dear life as the boat swung from side to side through the thickening mat of plant life. In daylight, and without the dangerous mission, the trip might have been a lot of fun. But in the pitch-black night with only the small light at the front of the boat, he feared he was about to lose his dinner—or become someone else’s.
He tried focusing on the small beam of light ahead of the craft. Scenes of open water and the telltale reflective eyes of gators were interspersed with plants so dense he was sure the lightweight airboat would tip over as it hit the berm of greenery. By the time the pilot shut off the spinning propeller at the back of the boat, Myles’s ears were ringing
.
Whit was the first one out of the boat and onto the small dock. “You didn’t by chance find some of the items I requested?”
The pilot secured the boat to the dock. “Upstairs on the porch. Though how a one-armed man is going to shoot a bow and arrow is beyond me.”
“It’s not for me. You once told me you could teach anyone to fire off an arrow in five minutes. I’m calling your bluff. Show my friends how to shoot by the time the Prejeans show up, and let us borrow your gear, and I’ll pay you for a full bow-fishing excursion.”
Myles declined the offered weapon. Though silent, the large bow and quiver of arrows wasn’t exactly stealthy to carry around. Once they’d reached their destination, there would be those providing cover and those more directly risking their necks to perform the rescue. Not one for violence, he opted for the latter.
The teenage boy took to the bow immediately. On his fifth shot, he landed a decent-sized bass.
Kendell didn’t have as easy of a time with it, but then, it wasn’t a guitar. From the way she pulled at the string, he suspected it wasn’t tuned to her liking. “Maybe I should have learned to play the violin. At least those use a bow instead of an arrow.”
Whit’s friend wrapped his powerful arms around Kendell to show her how to handle the weapon. His sinewy forearms made easy work of pulling back the bowstring. “Aim along the arrow, and let her fly. Nothing to it.”
Myles imagined the rugged outdoorsman didn’t have much trouble landing women. He suspected Kendell had the same thought as she wiggled out from under his educational embrace. “I’ll probably be busy helping my friends into the boat anyway.”
The light from the cabin didn’t extend far into the bayou. Myles tried to stay alert. He failed. It wasn’t until he turned to the other side of the dock that he noticed the two tall shadows that hadn’t been there when they’d tied off. “I sure as hell hope you’re from the Prejean clan.”
“Just watching the spectacle. City dwellers firing bows is a hoot.” The stockier of the two men lifted a battered rifle. “But if things get dicey, you really want something a little more definitive.”
“Good to see you made it, Hoyt,” Whit said. “Myles and I will be in your boat. Kendell and Hawk will go with your boy. Did you have any thoughts about getting into that warehouse?”
The man slung the rifle over his shoulders as if it were a baseball bat. “My boy and his friends use that place to go drinking during the off season. We’ll get in, no problem. But we’d best get moving. The missus will have my hide if I keep him out too late.”
Once everyone was aboard, Hoyt stood on the shallow boat’s transom and swung the long oars in graceful arcs that barely broke the water. The long, blunt leading edge of the boat helped it skim over any submerged obstacle. Myles had to really focus to hear the other boat off to their left.
Within minutes, both craft were deep into the cypress grove. Ghostly Spanish moss hung so low Hoyt had to brush it away from his face. Standing might not be the most stable way to operate a boat, but Myles could see it gave the older Prejean a unique perspective on their course. With the engine noise blessedly gone, the sounds of swamp nightlife filled the air. Myles couldn’t identify most of the animals and didn’t even know if some of them were in the water or the trees.
The fear of crashing in the airboat was replaced with anxiety about the glowing eyes that met his gaze. Every bump of the water against the thin plywood hull had him searching the deck for a possible snake that might have fallen from a tree or a gator that might have swum aboard. As he looked around, he realized he couldn’t identify the way back to the airboat. All around were thick tree trunks, downed logs, Spanish moss, and eerily black water. “No wonder the Laroques picked this place. No one in their right mind would try to get through it without a guide.”
“Shh, we’re getting close,” Whit whispered. The man might have forgone his military training with guns, but his instincts were sharper than Myles would have expected from someone who appeared homeless.
It was still five minutes of complete darkness before Myles made out the soft glow between the shadowy tree trunks. Off to his left, he heard a nightingale singing. Again, it took him a moment to realize it was the refrain of ABBA’s “Take a Chance on Me.” He doubted they were close enough to the dilapidated structure for anyone to hear the quiet birdsong.
To his surprise, he heard Polly Urethane begin singing “Up On the Roof.” She was quickly joined by a male voice for an a cappella duet. She might not be much with an instrument, but she had a lovely singing voice.
Whit lifted the long grappling hook from the deck and pointed it toward the top of the structure. A light puff of smoke indicated someone was up there, taking a break. Myles grimaced at having missed the musical message indicating the location of their adversaries.
Hoyt gave one final hard push with the paddles then sank to the deck, pulling the oars up into the boat after him like a bird landing on a log. They drifted right under the wooden warehouse. It took Hoyt only a couple of quick movements to have his boat tied off. “My boy says there’s a key stashed under the fish-cleaning sink. I’ll wait down here with my rifle. Anything gets jinky, and I’ll hammer on the dock.”
The wood planks that served as a ladder squished under Myles’s grasp. He was never a fan of ladders. The idea of falling into gator-infested waters didn’t help his disposition. The lock took a bit of work to open. Fortunately, Polly and the unidentified man sang with such gusto that Myles doubted anyone would hear his activities.
He jiggled the hatch, hoping that Polly would change her song if he was about to step into danger, but “Up On the Roof” continued unabated. He’d barely pushed against the hinges when the door flew open. Two members of the Mutants at Table Nine, along with Lynn Seed and Scraper, stared down at him from the opening. He gestured to the four to join him in the flatboat.
The quartet of musicians moved down to the boat without making a sound while the three remaining captives did their best to fill out the song. Myles wanted to remain behind to make sure they made it out too, but he needed to stick with the plan.
He’d barely made it into the flatboat before Hoyt pushed off from the dock. Hoyt’s son pulled in, taking the place of his father’s boat before it had completely left the dock. The Prejeans were like a pair of well-choreographed dancers. Myles watched Kendell scamper up the ladder to let the rest of the captives know the time had come for their escape.
Hoyt wasted no time in getting back among the trees. The song slowly faded away as if the musicians were lulling their audience to sleep. As Hoyt’s son pushed off, Myles hoped the music had done exactly as intended.
Unfortunately, as the second boat skimmed over the surface of the dark water, a voice rang down from the roof of the processing facility. “Sing ‘Under the Boardwalk.’ I love the Drifters.”
Scraper hissed in a barely audible voice, “Moron, ‘Up On the Roof’ was written by Carol King. The Drifters were just the first ones to make it famous.”
Myles looked back along the shallow wake left by the skimming flatboat to make sure her voice hadn’t carried to the guards. “Do you want to escape, or would you rather provide some musical education to your abductors?”
“I’m just saying it doesn’t take a musician to know a Carol King song,” Scraper said. “Listening to those guys’ stupidity for the last few days has been the hardest part of being held captive.”
Myles kept as low in the boat as possible. “Row faster. They’re going to be onto us any second.”
But the flatboat was built for maneuverability and stealth, not speed. “We’ll be deep in the trees in no time.”
As Myles feared, that wasn’t fast enough. The guard’s voice boomed across the swamp. “Get up. I think something’s wrong. I’m not hearing anything from down below. Get on the searchlight while I go check it out.”
The second boat was still a good twenty feet from being deep enough in the cypress grove to be undetected. A brig
ht beam of light scanned the tributary of the Mississippi before swinging toward the bayou. “I see ’em. Get the boat! The boss is going to kill us if they escape.”
Hoyt swung the flatboat into a parallel path between the irregularly shaped tree trunks and roots. “They won’t catch us. It’ll take them a couple of minutes to get that motor skiff across the berm from the river to the bayou. That’s when the fun will really start.”
Myles thought having fun with an adversary was an unnecessary risk. As Hoyt swung into a large opening between the trees, the searchlight landed full on his boat. His son was just at what appeared to be the main opening to the grove. Two flashes of reflected light shot out from the flatboat in opposite directions toward the trees.
“Not bad shooting. Those bows can be a handful the first few times.”
As both boats skimmed toward the far end of the small section of open water, Myles heard the cranking and roar of their pursuers’ outboard engine.
“This is where it gets interesting,” Hoyt said. “Everyone stay low in the boat. Whit, have that gun ready just in case. If I drop the oars, hand the weapon up to me. I can get a reasonable shot from up here if I need to.”
Even paddling a boat loaded down with passengers, Hoyt made the shallow draft hull slide across the water like an Olympian rower. But in the contest with his son, Hoyt was definitely the old man. The second boat flew past Myles like a bird skimming the water. They were securely back in the trees by the time he heard the outboard engine strangle to a stop.
“That’ll be the rope your friends strung between the trees. Leaving it dangling just below the water’s surface makes it impossible to see in the dark. They’ll be some time untangling it from the prop. We’re not out of the cypress forest yet, but by the time they’re moving again, we’ll be as hard to spot as a black panther moving in the trees.”
Myles scanned the overhead limbs again, seeking yet another creature that might want to kill them. “I didn’t think there were black panthers in North America.”