by Darrel Bird
Between Havana and The Deep Blue Sea
By
Darrel Bird
Copyright ©2010 by Darrel Bird
Between Havana
And
The Deep Blue Sea
Jim Grady walked hurriedly back and forth, hauling supplies from his old pickup to the dock on the Intracoastal Waterway, which snakes around St. Petersburg, Florida. He methodically loaded the supplies onto the deck of his 36-foot Morgan sailboat, Dancer. Most of it was water in gallon and liter jugs. When he made the last trip, he climbed on board the fiberglass boat and started stowing the supplies away. He had purchased enough supplies for a month. He had not had time to plan all that well, and he knew what he was preparing to do was about as insane as one can get; yet he knew he had to try.
After stowing the supplies, he made himself some hot tea and sat at the dinette, which served as a chart table. There was a fold-down chart table by the radio equipment, but it was not big enough to be comfortable. Jim sat sipping his tea and thought about the events that led up to this.
His older brother, Randy, was a missionary, and it looked to Jim like he would die a missionary. If Randy thought it was God leading him, he would walk into the gates of hell with a smile on his face. Jim was afraid he had done just that. Randy had “felt the call” to go to Cuba, when half of Cuba was trying to get to Florida anyway they could.
They come in on inner tubes tied together, fer Pete’s sake, Jim thought, as he pondered his brother’s predicament. And in on boats that take two to sail and six to pump the bilge, fer cryin’ out loud! With women layin’ in the holds, pukin’ their guts out. And Randy just had to pick Cuba! He could have gone to the pigmies in darkest Africa and been safer than Fidel Castro’s Cuba, Jim grumbled into his tea.
Randy had left his wife, Linda, at their home in Clearwater, and sailed on a freighter from Tampa to Havana. Jim was off on a diving trip when Randy left, or he would have tried to talk him out of going. The trouble was that Randy saw everybody as being innocent, and he had a heart for all people. Jim was different. His friends said he was hard as nails and mean as an alligator if he was riled.
Jim had heard, through the Cuban grapevine in Tampa, that Randy had been stuck in a prison near the northwest coast of Cuba. So he went down to Little Havana and found someone who could explain just where Randy was, and what his chances were of getting out. According to the local Cubans, his chances were zilch. They said the Cubans imprisoned him for subverting the internal order of the nation and destroying its political, economic, and social law. Basically, that meant that they could throw you in prison for breathing.
The prison was described as a hellhole. Randy didn’t weigh 150 soaking wet, and Jim knew his brother had little chance of surviving in those conditions. The Cuban refugees he spoke with corroborated that. The only human who might survive that prison, was a tough Cuban who has spent his life on the streets of Havana, eating rat meat and living off hookers. That was a dangerous game, and Jim knew that Randy was not that ruthless. Jim had to go after him, and that was all there was to it.
His brother was a good man. He don’t even own a TV, and they pray three times a day fer Petes sake! thought Jim. He knew that many of those prayers were for him. If he went to Randy’s house to visit, he prayed when they prayed, but he got right down to what was on his mind. He figured if the Lord had anything to say to him, it wouldn’t take all day and half the night to “gitt’er said.” So no sooner did he pop down on his knees, than he was ready to pop back up again and get on with whatever he had planned for the day.
Jim knew the Lord, but he did not have the capacity to be anything other than what he was. He had felt no call on his life like Randy had, and he knew he was rougher than a cob around the edges. He went to church when he felt like it. But his was the life of a vagabond, and always had been, ever since he had left home as a young man. He sailed where he wanted, when he wanted.
His brother was different, but Randy never got on him or criticized him. After their parents died, the brothers grew closer. They had a younger brother, Jerrod, who grew a beard and moved to Oklahoma. He lived in a cabin so far out in the sticks; they had to pump sunshine back in to him.
He had thought about calling Jerrod, but then thought better of it. He was dangerous and foolhardy, and Jim couldn’t risk the possibility of one of Jerrod’s outbursts blowing what little chance he had of getting Randy out. Jerrod was stubborn, and Jim knew if he took him it would be trouble; his every sense rebelled against it.
He walked over, snaked the AR-15 assault rifle from under the forward berth, and started taking it apart. He cleaned it, oiled it, and put it back in the canvas bag. He also checked the four clips taped together back-to-back with black duct tape. He had 200 rounds of ammo for both the AR-15 and a Glock 9 mil automatic pistol he had brought as well. He knew that by the time he shot all that off, they would both likely be dead anyway, and he wouldn’t need any more. In fact, it probably wouldn’t take 50 rounds to get them both killed.
He got out the plastic explosives, the detonators, and the little electronic sending unit he had stolen from the National Guard Armory. His conscience bothered him about having to break into the Armory, but he didn’t see that he had any other choice. He had to have plastic explosive, not dynamite. You couldn’t shape a charge with dynamite without drilling, and he didn’t figure they would let him just waltz in there and drill a hole in their prison, without some powerful objections. Besides, he would have to steal the dynamite anyway, because you needed federal permission to buy the stuff.
That night about nine, he threw his sleeping bag on the forward berth. He fell asleep with the boat gently rocking back and forth, as if she couldn’t wait to be loosed of the mooring lines. He slept, but awoke at every sound, no matter how slight. About one o’clock, he woke up and made a trip to the head to relieve his kidneys.
He awoke again at dawn to the mournful sound of an outboard motor, and he knew that someone was heading out for a morning of fishing. He popped his head above the hatch just in time to see the boat’s stern light round the bend and disappear under the causeway.
“Well, I might as well take a run up to the restaurant and get some breakfast, and then get this show on the road,” he muttered to the surrounding air. He hopped in his old Ford. She started with a groan, and he wheeled his way toward the nearest restaurant. He sat and drank coffee as he waited for his food. His mind was a mile away, on the job he had set out to do.
Over a round of beers with the Cubans in Little Havana, he had learned that the prison lay on a group of islands just a little offshore, and that there was an inlet through it called Arch de Camaguey. The prison lay in a hole, with low hills to the west, and some jungle running out to sea to the north. There was a smaller lagoon where he planned to hide the boat. They had drawn him a detailed map of the island inlet, and of the terrain surrounding the prison. If the information was accurate, he had a good mental picture of the place.
The prison was no more than three acres in all. It used to be a small military outpost, and then was turned into a prison. The place didn’t exist on any map, but it was there, all right. His plan was to hide the boat and sneak through the jungle to the prison, and scout it out before trying anything.
The locals said he might be able to succeed, but then they looked at him somberly and made the sign of the cross. One said, “Mama mia!” And Jim said, “You got that right.”
He had taken another swig of beer and sat looking at the Cuban refugees, and they at him. Then the toughest of them all crossed himself and raked his fing
er across his throat, saying something in Spanish. Jim knew every Cuban at that table was meaner than a junkyard dog, and the guy looked at Jim as if he was dead already.
The waitress finally arrived with his food, and he wolfed it down. He took a last swig of coffee, and got up to leave. He knew he wouldn’t be drinking any more coffee the whole trip, just water; he needed to arrive there with his body clean and alert. He walked to the counter to pay, and the waitress who had waited on him came to take his money.
She gave him a come-on smile from behind the register, but he just looked at her straight-faced. She turned away from him, looking a little miffed. He figured she was from one of the colleges in the greater Tampa-St. Pete area. To his mind, most of those women were in college just waiting to marry and have babies, and he wasn’t interested.
Jim Grady had a handsome face, although there was a jagged scar above his left cheekbone, a souvenir from a bar brawl. Years of sun and salt-water had whitened his blonde hair and tanned his face a deep brown. Some of his friends said all he had in his veins was pure salt water. He weighed 185 pounds and had laugh lines around his eyes. Most women were attracted to him. The problem was that he lived on a sailboat and was never in one place for long; at least not enough to get into much of a relationship.