Gardens of the Queen

by Nicholas Harvey

  The man leaned to the side a little to see past her but she couldn’t tell exactly as his eyes were hidden behind the dark glasses. He was really making her nervous by his words, but more by his manner.

  “My Sydney wouldn’t be mixing with the wrong crowd mister, besides she’s in Florida, she’s in the university there. My boy Thomas talked to her just the other night and he didn’t say nothing about her being in Cuba. She been there a few times I know but that’s to visit a nice boy she met at school.”

  “Is Thomas home?” the man persisted, “Maybe he knows where his sister is, kids don’t always tell their parents everything.”

  “I’m telling you she’s in Florida, you must have her mixed up with someone else,” Wilma continued, getting flustered, “And no, Thomas is at work like he is every day, he’d just tell you the same thing I’m telling you, my boy don’t lie to his mama.”

  The man softened his tone slightly. “I’m sure that’s the case ma’am but perhaps he may remember something he forgot to mention. He has a regular job then, Thomas?”

  “Of course he has a regular job,” she retorted indignantly, “He’s never missed a day of work for going on three years now since he started.”

  “And where is that ma’am? Where does he work?” he asked as politely as he could muster.

  “On the water I guess, that’s where dive boats go don’t they?”

  His politeness vanished. “A dive boat? Well which dive boat Mrs. Bodden, which dive boat does your son work on?”

  “You really don’t know nothing around here do you mister?” She glared back. “I ain’t telling you where he works same as I ain’t letting you in my house!”

  The man finally removed his sunglasses and stared menacingly at Wilma. “We have reason to believe your daughter has been party to stealing government property and illegally transporting it out of the country. It would be better for you and much better for your daughter if you’d tell me where I can find her.” He leaned in closer and rested a hand on the door so she had to strain to hold it. “You understand harbouring a fugitive is aiding and abetting and is a federal crime? I assume you don’t want me inside as I may find your daughter is here?”

  Wilma was terrified and confused by this brash stranger making all these wild claims about her baby girl, but beyond that she was getting mad.

  “Listen here fella, I don’t know who you are or what this nonsense is you’re talking about, but my girl is in Florida at school. There ain’t nobody but me in this house but I’ll be damned if I’ll let you in without a policeman I know saying you’re supposed to be knocking on my door! Hear me?”

  She shoved the door but he effortlessly resisted and glared at her for what felt like forever. Finally he eased back, glancing down at her shirt before she fell forward slamming the door closed.

  Learning all he thought he could, Mikhail stepped away and considered his next move.

  Chapter 29

  AJ’s thoughts had left Carlos and the oil fields behind as she chatted with her customers on their surface interval between dives. They’d moved the boat further south and closer to shore for the second dive, which would be shallower. Her clientele tended to be return customers or referrals from her regulars and she enjoyed building relationships over time with her divers as they visited the island time and again. Word of mouth was her best marketing and she and Reg worked together on handling each other’s overflow to make sure they never turned their folks away. AJ kept the RIB boat on the north side throughout the summer, running from the yacht club and the Newton west from Reg’s dock in West Bay. On days she had both boats running she and Thomas would split and she’d borrow a couple of divemasters from Reg to double up. Often she or Thomas would help Reg’s crew out in afternoons or night dives when Mermaid’s wasn’t going out. After a few years of running they had a pretty good system that worked for everyone.

  Thomas was on the fly bridge chatting with a young couple from Finland. They were marvelling at the starkly different climate from their home country where often diving meant cutting holes in ice. Thomas checked his dive watch and leaned down from the railing. “Been up nearly an hour if you want to get ready for the second dive, folks.”

  That triggered a flurry of activity as the divers pulled their wetsuits back up and turned their tanks on in preparation. After making sure the group was about ready, AJ gave them a quick briefing.

  “We’re tied on La Mesa for the second dive; it’s a beautiful flat topped coral head which is how it earned its name ‘The Table’ in Spanish. The really cool part about this site is the overhang that forms a channel around part of the coral head. We’ll be able to swim through that channel and it’s teeming with juvenile fish and critters. We’ll approach carefully and quietly as there’s sometimes a nurse shark hanging out or very often a cleaning station in action. You’ll see a larger fish like a grouper with mouth wide open hanging there. If you look carefully you’ll see tiny wrasses, gobies and shrimps inside the grouper’s mouth and gills, giving him a good cleaning. Free dentist trip for the grouper and free meal for the cleaners. Top of the coral head is around thirty-five feet and the base around it is maximum fifty so we’ll get a nice long dive of an hour at that depth. As usual, keep an eye on your air and let me know if you’re getting low. To finish the dive we’ll do a three-minute safety stop at fifteen feet before we surface. Any questions?”

  With no hands in the air, just smiling, eager faces, AJ continued, “Pool’s open, start getting in and I’ll meet you at the bottom by the mooring.”

  If AJ had any lingering thoughts and tensions from the mayhem topside over the past few days it evaporated entirely as she glided down through her undersea world. Everyone appeared to be excited about the storm passing, not just the divers. The fish hurried about the coral head refamiliarising themselves with their territories after hiding out from the rough seas. A large school of young horse-eyed jacks circled mid-water over the reef, calmly making laps en masse.

  AJ gathered her group and started a slow, easy lap around the large coral head. Picking up a hawksbill turtle off to her right she pointed him out to the group and they waited and watched while he pulled himself their way with his prehistoric-looking front flippers. The lens effect underwater made him seem five feet long as he approached and nearing he appeared to shrink rather than grow, closer to his actual size of maybe two feet. Ignoring the divers, who held no interest for him, he continued over the coral head and out of sight on the other side. AJ returned to the tour and finding the entrance to the channel, she carefully floated down below the overhang and leisurely finned her way forward. Sure enough, as she’d hoped, there was a big fat grouper with his mouth gaping open, getting a good cleaning from his little friends. The grouper eyed AJ suspiciously but she halted right away and stealthily ushered the diver behind her to come alongside and take a look. Carefully rotating the group through got them all a glimpse into the daily life of the reef before the grouper decided he was clean enough and with a quick flare of his gills the little cleaners scattered and the big fellow moved on about his day.

  No luck with a nurse shark but plenty of other sights made the hour pass swiftly. Reluctantly they headed up and, after performing their safety stop, climbed back aboard the boat. AJ and Thomas hustled around helping people get out of their gear and stowing tanks away, but AJ could tell right away Thomas was not his usual chipper self. When they ended up next to each other hauling up the ladder she whispered, “What’s up? You seem agitated.”

  Thomas nodded his head towards George Town, about a mile to their south. “I’ll show you through the binoculars up top.”

  Anxiously curious, AJ finished getting everyone squared away before dashing up to the fly bridge, where Thomas handed her the glasses. “Look just outside the port, not as far out as the cruise ships.”

  AJ trained the binoculars on the crane in the port and then tracked them across the water until a large trawler came into view. Her first thought was how strange to have
a trawler here at all, there was restricted fishing all around Cayman and nothing a trawler would catch in the deep waters. Then she noticed the flag flapping lazily in the breeze.

  “Holy shit! That’s under the Cuban flag.” She dropped the glasses down and looked at Thomas, stunned. “Carlos wasn’t kidding about these guys.”

  Chapter 30

  Mikhail and Anatoly sat in their rented mid-size with the windows up and the air conditioning cranking. They’d both been in Cuba for more than a year but still couldn’t get used to the heat and humidity of the tropics. They were positioned in the diminutive car park by West Bay dock facing Reg’s dock next door. They’d ditched the jackets but were still cooking in their slacks and button-down shirts as they sipped on jumbo-sized sodas they’d picked up from the petrol station. Such decadent extravagances were hard to come by in Russia or Cuba. They’d been waiting for about forty-five minutes and so far one of Pearl Divers boats had returned to Reg’s dock and a couple of other outfits were unloading customers and tanks on the main West Bay dock.

  Anatoly jumped when someone knocked on his passenger window. Smiling at them was a young divemaster in shorts and a tee shirt. Anatoly powered down his window and the guy leaned in and talked with an Australian accent, “Hey fellas, would you mind moving your car so we can pull our truck in to load these tanks?”

  Anatoly glanced over at Mikhail who turned his head slowly towards the guy until he got a reflection of himself in the Russian’s aviator sunglasses. “This is a public dock, yes?”

  “Yeah mate, but we go in and out of here every day, if you could just move over there it’d be a big help.” The Aussie pointed to the other side of the car park.

  “So this is the public car park that goes with the public dock, yes?” Mikhail’s voice was as monotone as usual.

  “Well yeah, but mate, just asking a favour here to help us out, gotta bunch of tanks to move.” Normally the tourists are happy to oblige so the guy couldn’t understand why these two were being so difficult.

  Mikhail held the button and the window started back up, sending the kid back in surprise. “Not my problem,” Mikhail replied and turned back to concentrate on the other dock.

  “Jeez, what a dick,” could be faintly heard from outside as the window closed and the young man left to figure out another place to put his truck.

  Mikhail’s mobile rang and he hit receive on the car’s screen in the centre console to play the call through the Bluetooth system, answering in Russian, “Hello?”

  The voice on the other end was the man he spoke to earlier, not sounding any happier, “The Cayman police are retrieving the cargo from the plane this afternoon; we have told them you are acting as a representative for the Republic of Cuba. You should go to the crash site now. Your contact will be a policeman, Detective Whittaker. I will text you his mobile number when we hang up.”

  “Okay,” Mikhail replied flatly.

  “The Caymanians suspect the pilot is dead, they are searching for the body which they have yet to find.”

  Mikhail was tiring of the conversation. “We are proceeding on the presumption the pilot survived.”

  Anatoly nudged Mikhail and pointed across the water as a boat approached looking similar to the first one that pulled up to Reg’s dock. Except this one had ‘Mermaid Divers’ on the side.

  “I don’t need to tell you how important it is to verify the hard drive and maps are part of the recovered cargo,” the man on the phone continued sternly.

  “Then why are you?” Mikhail retorted, becoming more irritated.

  “Why am I what?” the official asked, confused. Anatoly stifled a laugh.

  “I will go there now.” Mikhail hit end on the screen. “Idiot,” he muttered under his breath.

  AJ brought the Newton alongside the dock and Thomas hopped off the boat and tied into the cleats. The two Russians watched every move.

  “The girl with the tattoos and purple in her hair is the Bailey girl, she runs the boat. The dark-skinned guy tying up the boat must be Thomas Bodden. Follow him – if his sister’s alive he may take us to her,” Mikhail directed Anatoly, who looked around confused.

  “Are you taking the car?” Anatoly asked.

  “Of course,” Mikhail replied.

  Anatoly shifted uncomfortably in his seat, “Sir, how do I follow him without a car?”

  Mikhail turned and stared at Anatoly. “I chose you over the other moron because you appeared to be more intelligent. You’re a trained Russian agent, figure it out. Without trying, I see ten cars and six bicycles around me, now get out.”

  Anatoly blinked a few times while he processed this, before realising he should be moving and scrambled out of the car.

  “Anatoly,” Mikhail spoke before the agent closed the door, “be inconspicuous.”

  With that he backed out of the parking spot and drove off.

  Anatoly stood in the middle of the car park. Be inconspicuous, he thought, standing here in slacks and a shirt on a stinking hot day by the beach about to steal a vehicle of some sort to chase this local kid all over town. At best he was about to look like a partnerless Mormon roaming the island streets for new converts. He looked around. The Australian guy was stacking dive tanks in the back of the truck and paused to look over at Anatoly standing alone. Anatoly smiled, figuring he needed to fit in. The Australian flipped him the bird and carried on stacking tanks.

  “Fucking great,” Anatoly mumbled.

  Chapter 31

  Reg and George had two large bags of gear they’d retrieved from the storage locker at Reg’s dock in West Bay. They lugged them down the pier at the yacht club and loaded them on the police boat, readying to head back to the wreck site. According to the police officer driving the boat, Roy had told him they had another passenger coming. Reg looked up and saw a tall, athletic man in slacks and nice white shirt approaching. He looked and carried himself like a military man, short cropped hair, neatly shaved, polished shoes and a confident stride without appearing hurried. He wore aviator sunglasses and remained expressionless, even when he introduced himself.

  “Mikhail Gurov, I represent the Republic of Cuba, I believe you are expecting me?”

  The policeman acknowledged and waved him aboard. Reg extended a hand. “Reg, and George here, we’re the divers.” Reg smiled but eyed the man carefully, “That accent nor that name sound very Cuban.”

  “Russian,” was all Mikhail offered as they found a seat and the policeman moved the boat off the dock.

  “Are you an accident investigator?” Reg persisted, hoping to get something from this guy.

  “No.” Mikhail retorted, uninterested in talking with a police diver. Thinking about it some more, he decided maybe this diver could have some information on the plane, after all he’d apparently dived the site that morning.

  “You have dived the plane wreck already today?”

  Reg looked at him squarely. “Yes.”

  George chuckled as Reg moved seats away from the Russian and the boat picked up speed, leaving the no-wake zone of the marina. Mikhail watched the Englishman walk away and sit next to his fellow diver. He may have grinned slightly, but it was hard to tell with Mikhail.

  Chapter 32

  Anatoly was sweating profusely as he pedalled hard to keep Thomas in view up ahead. The bike he’d grabbed was a cheap mountain bike and he hadn’t had time to adjust the seat which was clearly set for a much shorter person than the Russian’s large frame. It did have an Australian flag sticker on it and another claiming ‘Aussie Rules’ so he was content he’d stolen the right bike. They’d started up Town Hall Road, then turned left on the ominously named Hell Road and since then they’d made several turns on small streets that if they’d had signs he missed them. He was becoming convinced he’d never find his way out of this warren and his agent training sparked alarms ringing that he was being led on a goose chase. But Thomas had never even glanced behind him and now his beach cruiser turned right into the driveway of a nice-looking bungalow
with small trees and shrubs surrounding it. Anatoly stopped a hundred yards short and pulled over to the side.

  He shoved the bike between some bushes and carefully walked along the edge of the road under a scattering of Pimento and Ironwood trees. The bungalow was the only home on this part of the narrow street so Anatoly felt concealed staying close to the trees and bushes lining the road. He reached the corner of the front garden and could see a Jeep in the driveway and Thomas’s beach cruiser leaned against the wall just inside the open door of the garage. The Jeep had decals on the doors and a spare tyre cover with Pearl Divers logos on them. He paused a moment to check for sounds and movement but picked up nothing, so moved closer to the building, staying hidden by the flora. He was about to move closer to the house when he heard a vehicle approaching on the road. Anatoly crouched down a little lower and waited for it to pass. It didn’t pass. The van slowed to a stop right in front of the house and peeking around the bush he saw the tattooed girl from the boat hop out and walk towards the house. The front door opened and Thomas came out to meet her; now Anatoly had two people not more than twenty feet in front of him with only the shrub between them.

  The blonde girl and Thomas greeted each other and she handed him a mobile phone.

  “Thanks, sorry for leaving it, appreciate you bringing it over,” he heard Thomas say.

  The girl began her reply, “No worries, how’s Sy…” when something moved under the bush and startled Anatoly, rustling the shrub loud enough for the conversation to stop. Anatoly stumbled backwards, dropping to his backside on the ground as a large blue iguana scuttled out from under the bush, high-stepping towards refuge in the next tree. AJ and Thomas turned to look and saw the iguana fleeing. Anatoly held his breath. He couldn’t see the two of them and prayed they couldn’t see him.