Some Die Nameless

by Wallace Stroby

  He reached Green Turtle at dusk, tied up at a marina. There were darkening clouds to the east. He refueled, wanting to keep the tanks full in case he had to leave quickly. He ate sandwiches on board, stood on deck, and watched the squall blow in. When the rain started, he went below, closed the hatch and door.

  As the boat rocked lightly in the swells, he went into the bow, pulled out the bottom drawer, retrieved the leather shaving kit he’d hidden there. Inside was the Glock he’d taken from Farrow’s man, along with the extra magazines.

  He ejected the magazine, cleared the chamber, worked the slide, and then dry-fired once to test the trigger tension. He seated the magazine again, jacked a round into the chamber, lowered the hammer.

  And just what will you do with it? he thought. When the time comes, will you be able to use it, do what needs to be done?

  He put the gun away again, fit the kit back into the space behind the drawer, slid it closed. Then he crawled into the bunk, listened to the rain on the cabin roof, let the sound lull him to sleep.

  Lukas looked out over the blue water, watched a gull dive-bomb the surface, fly off with a fish in its bill. The bow of the speedboat rose and fell, spray flecking the windscreen.

  The Lear had landed at the airport at Treasure Cay, and he’d taken the ferry over to Green Turtle, where Winters and Bishop had met him in a Land Rover. They’d driven to a private dock where a third man waited with the boat. All three were dressed the same, loose tropical shirts over jeans.

  Lukas sat on the rear bench, the duffel at his feet. Inside were clothes and first aid supplies. The gear bag with the guns was in the Lexus, in the airport’s long-term lot.

  From his seat alongside the driver, Winters turned to look back at Lukas. “Saw a tiger shark out here yesterday.” Speaking loud over the engine noise. “Big fucker. Ten feet, at least.” Lukas could see the butt of the gun holstered beneath his shirt.

  Next to Lukas, Bishop swallowed, closed his eyes, opened them again, and looked at the horizon. Seasick, Lukas thought.

  The boat bounced along, picking up speed, the inboard engine churning up the water behind them. Lukas flexed his left arm. His side was stiffening. He’d have to change the dressing again soon.

  They passed a buoy bobbing in the water, a black box fixed to its side. There was another a few hundred feet away.

  “Sensors,” Winters said. “All around the island. No one gets close without us knowing it.”

  The wind felt good. Lukas pulled his sweat-slick shirt away from his chest, let the air cool his skin. When he lifted the tail of his shirt, he saw the gauze was dark again.

  Winters pointed to it. “Farrow give you that?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Landscapers showed up this morning, found the mess you left. Fortunately they called the Unix office before anyone else. Call got routed to me. I never liked Gordon much myself. But he had a long history with the company, I’m told.”

  Winters faced forward again. Now Lukas could see the island, a blot on the horizon that grew larger as they neared it. There was a dock out front, with another, bigger, boat moored alongside it. A wooden stairway ran up the rock face, with a landing every fifteen feet or so. At the top, a peaked roof emerged from thick foliage and palm trees. The north and south sides of the island were sheer cliff.

  They neared the dock. Lukas could see NO TRESPASSING signs on the pier, and a gate that led to the stairway. He turned and looked back toward Green Turtle, almost out of sight now.

  The driver slowed, and the blue of the water lightened as it grew more shallow. Lukas could see coral below the surface, darting fish.

  Bishop was first out of the boat. He looked relieved. Lukas threw his duffel onto the dock and followed him. Winters came up last. The driver stayed at the wheel.

  Lukas looked up at the stairway, the rock face, the house at the top.

  “Let’s go,” Winters said behind him. “Time to see the wizard.”

  The two heavy entrance doors were dark wood with leaded glass. The guard in front of them wore camouflage pants and a black T-shirt, had an M-16 slung in front, muzzle down. He nodded to Winters and Lukas as they passed.

  Inside was a wide, marble-floored area. Corridors on each side, a staircase in the center. Lukas followed Winters up to a room that took up the entire second floor. The east wall was a triptych of floor-to-ceiling windows. Kemper stood at the center panel, looking out. When he heard their footsteps, he turned and smiled.

  “Lukas, you’re a welcome sight. I was worried.”

  Lukas let himself be embraced. Kemper looked older than he’d ever seen him, with deep worry lines around the eyes. All this is weighing on him, Lukas thought, aging him.

  “Downstairs if you need me,” Winters said.

  “Thank you,” Kemper said. “Take that to his room, Val, will you please?”

  Lukas looked at Winters, held out the duffel. He could see the resentment there. Winters took the duffel, went back down the stairs.

  “The accommodations aren’t much,” Kemper said. “No real furniture yet. Hope you won’t mind roughing it for a few days, until we’re better equipped.”

  Lukas looked around. There were sawhorses scattered about, piles of block and tile on tarps to protect the parquet floor.

  “It’ll be a while before it’s finished,” Kemper said. “But I thought you might be safer here with us for now. I’ve been concerned about you, with all that’s going on. Now I see my concerns were warranted.”

  “I was concerned too, if I’d be welcome here.”

  “Of course you are. Why would you not be?”

  Lukas walked up to the windows. From here there was a view of the entire east side of the island. A flagstone verandah was one level beneath, with two stairways branching off it. One ran down to a helipad built out over the water, the other to a boathouse farther below. A black two-seater helicopter was parked on the helipad, next to a prefab hangar. An air sock fluttered on a pole.

  “Impressive,” Lukas said.

  “This is going to be the music room,” Kemper said. “We’ll put the piano here, by the windows. We’ll be able to watch the sunrise. I think Isabella will love it here.”

  “I’m sure she will.”

  Kemper touched his elbow. “Let me show you around outside.”

  They went down a set of stairs, and out a sliding glass door onto the verandah. At the front of it was an observation deck supported by steel beams sunk into the rock. Kemper walked out to the railing. Lukas followed. Far below, the water changed from a light blue around the island to a darker hue beyond.

  “I’m not much for boats anymore,” Kemper said. “Never was, really. The local environmentalists aren’t happy when I use the chopper. They say it disturbs the wildlife. With what I’m spending down here, though, I’ll do as I please.”

  “Don’t you always?”

  Kemper smiled. “You like it here?”

  “It’s beautiful. Will it ever be finished?”

  “Hopefully soon, now that I’m here to keep an eye on the contractors. The ones who were dogging it will be sorry when it comes time to get paid. That’s when we renegotiate, whether they want to or not.”

  “That won’t make you very popular.”

  “I’m paying well, so I deserve to get what I’m paying for. They haven’t even mounted any of the house security cameras yet. They say the electrician I sent down from Lauderdale last month botched the wiring. I have a Unix team coming in next week to finish the installation. All that’s working right now are the wireless sensors on the buoys. That’s our first line of security.”

  “I guess you don’t get many visitors.”

  “The locals know not to come out here for the most part. One did a few months back when I was here, tried to tie up down by the boathouse at night. Probably hoping he could climb up to where the construction was, steal some copper piping or scrap metal. He’d tripped the sensors, so we were watching him the entire time, though he didn’t know
it. Winters put a few rounds over his head with a rifle. That turned him around quick.”

  Lukas heard the growl of an engine, watched the speedboat come around the side of the island. The driver slowed near the boathouse, reversed, then backed and filled into the slip inside, cut the engine.

  “I was building this place for when I retired,” Kemper said. “I think that time is coming soon.”

  “What about all your projects, contracts?”

  “They’ll go through. What’s happened in the last two weeks is an inconvenience, nothing more. It will pass. I still have plenty of friends in the States with their hands out. I’ve been funding some of them for years. Time they earned their keep.”

  “And Senator Harlin?”

  “Him most of all. He knows he needs us on board. Or rather, he needs to be on board with us.”

  “You sound confident.”

  “If there are repercussions, we’ll ride them out, stall and deflect as necessary. This will all be forgotten by Election Day. It’ll be a distant memory by the time our major contracts are finalized. We have one last foreign venture coming up soon. Winters is organizing it. Then we’ll shut down that part of the operation for good.”

  Lukas rested his elbows on the railing, looked out at the water.

  “What happened at the house,” Kemper said. “Was that just you?”

  “Yes.”

  “What about your Arab friend?”

  “He’s gone.”

  Kemper looked at him. “How do you mean that?”

  “Gone,” Lukas said.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “The way it fell.”

  “I always knew Gordon was working on his own thing. He was ambitious enough. Already planning for a future when I wasn’t around, when he ran Unix. But he thought too highly of himself. He was a soldier, not a businessman.”

  “Then you’re fine with the way it went down?”

  “I’ve got my people—through an intermediary—floating another narrative for what happened at the house. Gordon was a disgruntled and criminal employee, there to rob the place in my absence, thought I had money hidden in the house. There was a falling-out between him and his fellow thieves. Winters sent some people over to adjust the evidence to reflect that. It’s a solid story. One you needn’t be part of at all.”

  “We still have another issue,” Lukas said. “Devlin.”

  “Forget about him. He’s not worth the effort. He can’t touch us, and there’s no one left to support any story he might tell. We can stonewall any investigation. At some point down the road, if he’s still a problem, we’ll address it then. Maybe offer him some stock after we go public.”

  “And if that doesn’t work?”

  “Then we’ll deal with him however we have to. We still have a few teeth left, don’t we?”

  The sky was growing darker, dusk coming on.

  “You must be hungry and tired,” Kemper said. “We’ll rustle up something from the kitchen for you, then you can rest. Life here is a little spartan for the time being, I’m afraid. Cots and air mattresses. We should have some furniture next week.”

  “I’ll be fine.” He felt the last forty-eight hours catching up with him, weighing him down.

  Kemper put an arm around his shoulder, squeezed. “This is our future, Lukas. Here. Now. Don’t worry about anything that happened before. We ran into trouble, some issues from the past that came back to haunt us. But we faced them down. They’re over. And you know something?”

  “What?” Lukas said.

  “We won.”

  Forty

  Devlin woke late the next morning, took a taxi into the town, such as it was. He walked around until he found what he was looking for—a downscale bar on the water, away from the marinas and hotels. Pickup trucks and Mini Mokes in the dirt lot. On the dock beside the bar, a shirtless black man wearing a Giants cap was cleaning fish on a wooden table, tossing the guts out into the water. Gulls squawked above him.

  Not yet noon, and the bar was already crowded, the TV on the wall showing a soccer match. There were about a dozen men inside, in what seemed like every shade of skin color, but with the same rough look about them, one Devlin recognized. They were men who made their living on the water.

  He got a Kalik Gold at the bar. The bartender—a black man in his sixties with snow-white hair—was happy to take his U.S. dollars. Devlin asked if he knew a man who would hire out his boat for a sightseeing trip.

  “The hotels, they have plenty guides,” the bartender said. “Anything you want, fishing, sightseeing, diving. You ask at the desk, they fix you up.”

  “I’m looking for something a little more unofficial,” Devlin said. “The smaller the boat, the better. And someone who doesn’t mind going out at night.”

  The bartender looked at him for a long moment, then nodded to the open back deck, where there were a half dozen spool tables with wooden chairs. “You go sit. Maybe I ask around.”

  Devlin carried his beer out of the dimness of the bar and into the harsh sunlight. He wore a T-shirt and shorts with sandals, but was already sweating. He took a table at the far end of the deck.

  A dog, some sort of shepherd mix, came trotting out of the bar, sniffed him.

  “I got nothing for you, buddy,” Devlin said. The dog looked up at him, tongue hanging. Devlin put out his left hand, let him smell it. The dog gave it a tentative lick, then sniffed the air again, got up, and went back into the bar. There was something cooking inside, the scent of wood smoke drifting out.

  Devlin looked out over the railing. Casuarina trees and poisonwood grew right up to the pebbled shore, in the shadow of the untrimmed palm trees. Blue water stretched out to the hazy horizon.

  He was almost finished with the beer, feeling slightly light-headed, when a man came out of the bar carrying a Kalik. He was skinny and tall, wore painter’s pants, a polo shirt marred with bleach spots, and a khaki baseball cap that read MERCURY MARINE on the front. Sunglasses hung from a lanyard around his neck.

  He pointed to the seat across from Devlin, waited for him to nod before he sat. Up close, Devlin could see he was in his midthirties, but with wind-etched lines in his face and a deep tan. “How’s it going?” the man said.

  Three words was all it took. “You’re American,” Devlin said.

  The man extended his hand. “Chase.”

  Devlin shook it. “Ray Devlin. Chase a first name or last?”

  “Only one you’ll need. But if you insist on a last name, make it Manhattan.”

  “Got it.”

  “Spencer said you were looking for a sightseeing guide, possibly at night?”

  “Sound like something you might be interested in?”

  He set the beer on the table, lifted his cap and pushed back thinning blond hair, pulled it back down again. “Depends.”

  “You know these waters well?”

  “Been guiding here nine years, so well enough.”

  Devlin took the folded chart from his back pocket, opened it on the table. He pointed to the red mark he’d made based on Farrow’s description.

  Chase turned the chart around, pulled it closer to him.

  “You know an island, right about there?” Devlin said.

  “Hardly an island. Mainly just a house on a piece of rock. Not even finished yet, though they’ve been shipping materials over there for about a year. Some American with money to burn is the word going around.”

  “Anyone there now?”

  “I see boats go back and forth once in a while. A chopper went over a couple days ago. There’s a helipad there, on the Atlantic side.”

  “Could you get me there, on that island, at night?”

  “Why?”

  Devlin didn’t answer.

  “You know the people that live there?” Chase said.

  “The man who built it, yeah.”

  “You can’t just ask for an invitation? They’re particular about their privacy. A friend of mine got a little too close a while back, and
someone at the house took a couple potshots at him.”

  “Hit him?”

  “No, but I assume they could have if they’d wanted to.”

  Chase scratched his elbow, and Devlin saw the mottled flesh on the outside of his left forearm, blotchy patches of pink and white hairless skin that stood out against his tan.

  On a hunch, he said, “You get that overseas?”

  Chase turned his arm to look at the skin there, as if he’d forgotten about it. “Yeah, Anbar Province, ’04.”

  “What unit?”

  “Second Battalion, Fourth Marines.”

  “The Magnificent Bastards.”

  “You know your stuff.”

  “How’d it happen?” Devlin said.

  “Hit an IED on the airport road near Ramadi. Humvee got blown to shit. I was the only one walked away.”

  “I’m sorry,” Devlin said.

  “You ever serve? You look like you might have.”

  “Eighty-Second Airborne. Long time ago. Nothing like what you went through.”

  “I was lucky. I got sent home with a fucked-up arm and hip, but that’s it. Lot of guys I knew over there never made it back. And some who did had bad things happen to them after they got home. A few by their own hand.”

  “Where was home?”

  “Bar Harbor, Maine.”

  “So you know boats.”

  “Since I was a kid. Wasn’t much work when I got back there, though, and I’d had enough of that weather. So once I healed up, I decided to fuck off down here for a while. It was supposed to be temporary, first stop in a longer journey. But here I still be, so go figure.”

  “You married? Kids?”

  “Negative.”

  “Any family back home?”

  “Not anymore. So no reason to go back.”

  “There enough work down here?”

  “If you know the right people,” Chase said. “It helps if you have a fast boat, and can keep your mouth shut.”