Prisoners of the Williwaw

by Ed Griffin

  Villa got on top of him, face down. "Use your head man. How the hell am I going to get my fly open? That's a sign of hypothermia, you ain't making any sense. Talk to me."

  Gilmore heard a bottle crash against a rock outside the boat, but it sounded far away. Villa felt heavy and warm on him. He wanted to sleep.

  "Talk to me, Gilmore." He felt Villa's chin dig into his back.

  "That's my booze, Villa. Those guys are drinking my booze."

  "The last thing you need, Gilmore, is booze."

  "You took my woman."

  "I didn't take her and she's not your woman, she's not my woman, she's her own woman."

  Woman. Latisha. They were lying together in the bed, and he wanted to sleep. Sleep.

  Again he felt Villa's chin in his back. "Talk to me, Gilmore."

  "You're weird, Villa. Just a little nap now."

  "Count, Gilmore, count."

  "One, two, three, four…fuckin' fuckin' fuckin' Duke is a fucking animal. Five, six…" now for sleep.

  The chin dug into his back.

  "Eight, nine… Does this mean I owe you, Villa, if you save my life? Ten, eleven…."

  "Keep counting, God damn you."

  "…twelve, thirteen, fourteen…"

  When Gilmore woke up, he saw daylight through the hole in the overturned boat. He remembered making it to five hundred something. Villa lay next to him, asleep. He felt miserable - fever, severe cold, aches and pains. But his worst problem was a need to relieve his bowels. "Villa," he pushed him with his foot, "I need help. Loosen my pants."

  How humiliating to have to ask someone to loosen his pants and then to take a crap with another person tied to him. He could never forgive the Duke for this.

  Villa made it easy by indicating he needed the same kind of help. When they were finished, they sat next to each other and leaned against the side of the overturned boat.

  "How we gonna get out of this, Villa?"

  "It looks bad. Maybe convince the Duke that our people won't shoot if he puts us at the point."

  "Yeah, but one problem. Look." Gilmore pointed to the hole in the fiberglass bottom. Thick, soupy fog hovered over the hole and wisps of it drifted inside. "Nobody can see anybody in that soup."

  Villa nodded. They sat together in silence. The wind picked up and whistled under the edges of the boat and through the hole in the top. Rain pelted down on the boat and yet Gilmore could still see the dense fog through the hole. Where else in the world could you have heavy rain and wind, yet still have fog?

  Villa sat quietly, staring at the hole. What, in God's name did a fun-loving woman like Latisha see in this straight dude? Well, maybe she was just having a little fling. Women were like that - they were always falling in love with a priest or a minister or in this case, an idealist. She'd get over it and then she'd come back to him for some good old sex and a lot of laughs.

  Still the guy was a mystery. Why would 254 people vote him in as leader and only 225 vote for him? He had run a campaign that would have done a Kennedy proud, while Villa had done little but levy more taxes. What went wrong?

  Maybe there was real wisdom in the organization saying, "Let someone else front for you in the public arena. You pull the strings behind the scenes."

  "I've got an idea," Villa said. He crawled over to the hole, pulling Gilmore along with him. Then he stuck his face into the hole and bit down on a piece of fiberglass. Jesus, Gilmore thought, he's losing it.

  Villa bit a piece of jagged fiberglass off and sat down again behind him. He started to work on the rope between them. By damn, Gilmore thought, they might get out of this yet. Villa sawed away.

  What if they did escape? Number one, the Duke would die, but what about Villa? Surely a boss could not let a wife-stealer off? Did it count that Villa had saved his life? That he was saving it again? Were they even? What if he let Villa run the government and control all the Duke-type cons that came to the island? Then he could run the Sea Otter and open a bank and…there were endless possibilities. Of course, he would have to keep control of the prisoner council in order to keep Villa in check, but instead of getting his own muscle, why not use the muscle Straight Frank had already established? All he had to do was get the council to ban things he didn't like and Joe Britt would have to enforce them.

  Gilmore congratulated himself for having these insights as Villa sawed away. But it occurred to him that business leaders had been using the existing government for years. He realized his thoughts were not new.

  For crime to prosper, a stable, honest government was necessary. He remembered how the organization had once sent him to Panama to explore some business opportunities, but he recommended against any investment. The government was in the hands of bigger crooks than the people he worked for.

  "Pull, Gilmore," Villa said. He did and the rope between them broke. "Now I'm going to work on your rope, Gilmore."

  He could feel Villa sawing away. "What's that liquid?" Gilmore asked.

  "Blood. My hand's cut up from the fiberglass."

  Once Villa had freed him, what was to prevent him from taking off, leaving Villa to the Duke? Nothing. Villa was a trusting man.

  The wind seemed to increase in intensity, rattling the boat. Villa kept cutting his ropes. "What did you think of my bank idea?" Gilmore asked.

  "Not much. I've been busy with your aborted take over."

  "Hey, don't blame me. I'm tied up, just like you. You got to have a bank here. People want to start businesses, they want to build things, they want to ship new cars from Seattle."

  "I can't think of a worse bank official than you, Gilmore."

  "Hey, Villa, you don't get to pick your bank officials. The job of the government is to provide a safe environment for banking."

  Villa snorted. "Like we have to stop drug-crazed guys from robbing Gilmore's bank so they can go to Gilmore's Sea Otter and get a fix?"

  Suddenly Gilmore felt the rope snap. He pulled his arms in front of him and rubbed his wrists. Villa's blood covered his hands. He untied his leg bonds and then untied Villa. Today the enemy was the Duke, not Villa.

  The wind shook the boat again, bouncing it up and down. He couldn't wait to get back to the Sea Otter, get in some dry clothes, eat a hot meal and then plan the death of the Duke.

  Somebody looked into the hole and then quickly turned the boat over. It was the Duke. "Hey, Larson, come here. These two got free."

  Villa nudged him as the boat bounced right side up and they both sprang for freedom, Villa going to the right and he to the left. But he had to slow down - the fog was thicker than the day the Aleut came, if that was possible. Gilmore stuck his arm out and tried to walk fast. He hit something. It was Larson.

  "Shit."

  Larson grabbed him and stumbled back to where the Duke and his men were breaking camp. "Should I kill him?" Larson asked.

  "Naw, we may need some cannon fodder," the Duke responded. "Where's the other one?"

  Larson shrugged and proceeded to tie his hands and feet. Gilmore felt a terrible sick feeling in his stomach as his hands were tied behind him again. His wrists were still swollen and red from the last bonds. Despair filled his mind - he would never make it back to his warm office at the Sea Otter where he could examine the reports from the bar and the firewood business and the prostitution and think about setting up a bank.

  The Duke gave orders as Larson tied him up. "Pavel, you climb that cliff and act as lookout. Pavel left, muttering about not being able to see anything in the fog. "You guys," the Duke ordered four others, "pick up that tarp and give me some shelter, so I can study the map. Larson, get over here and show me where we are."

  Larson jerked the rope on his hands even tighter than last night. Gilmore wanted to throw up, but there was nothing in his stomach. Larson joined the Duke under the tarp and pointed to the map. Although the tarp was only ten feet by twelve and four men held it by ropes passed through grommets at each corner, it flapped noisily in the wind. Duke shouted out at the men, "Hold that
god-damn thing still, will you? I can't hear a fuckin' thing."

  Suddenly it was quiet outside. The rain continued, but the wind died. Anticipation rode on the quiet air.

  Duke came out from under the tarp. "Big wind, shit! It ain't even blowin'. Where's this fuckin' williwozzle? Time to get moving up to . . . "

  For a second the wind stopped completely. It seemed as if all the air was sucked off the beach. Their campsite became a vacuum. The fog thinned. Gilmore felt that something terrible was about to happen. He remembered what Straight Frank had said once about a williwaw, how dangerous they were. This was the wind the Duke was dissing.

  The williwaw hit.

  The tarp over the Duke's head flapped violently. One man lost his grip and the rope tied to his corner slashed about wildly, lacerating the other three men. The Duke and Larson tried to get out from under the tarp, but they were knocked over. On the other corners two men let go of the tarp, but the last man got his arm caught in the rope. The tarp flipped all the way over and pulled the man into some rocks. His arm was stretched forward while his body was wedged in. Gilmore watched as the wind flapped the tarp up and down until the man's elbow was a bloody pulp.

  The williwaw knocked Gilmore off his feet onto his stomach. He crawled to the boat which one of the Duke's men had turned over again. The man was under it. Gilmore scrunched back under it.

  The boat rested on uneven ground, allowing the wind to get under one corner and bounce it up and down like a seesaw. "Hang on to the sides," the other man yelled, "so it won't blow away."

  "Untie my hands."

  But the boat began to rock so violently, the man grabbed for the center support. As he reached up, the boat bounced the wrong way and the man's hand went right through the gash in the fiberglass. Before he could get his hand out, the boat bounced again and his lower arm was a mass of cuts and blood.

  The williwaw found the hole in the fiberglass and ripped a whole section off and sent it flying. Gilmore imagined what it would do to someone in its path.

  The boat seesawed back and forth. The man with the injured arm cried in pain. Gilmore tried to hook his feet onto the support, but the williwaw pulled the boat away, turned it on its side, and blew it across the beach into a pile of rocks.

  Grass and small stones, thorny little shrubs, and pieces of dirt flew through the air. The black plastic bag was ripped off his upper body and in a millisecond he was soaking wet. He crawled to the shelter of a rock, near another rock where the Duke hid.

  Gilmore heard a terrifying scream and looked up. On the cliff near him he saw Pavel, the watchman, falling off the cliff. Above him a fierce American eagle spread its wings in anger. Pavel must have accidentally invaded its nest. Pavel bounced against the cliff as he fell and loosened some stones which fell around a man at the base of the cliff. Gilmore had heard the others refer to this man as 'The Dummy.' The williwaw drove the stones into the man. Apparently he thought he was being shot at, because Gilmore heard him click the safety off his machine gun. Gilmore fell to the earth. 'The Dummy' began firing, rotating in a semi-circle.

  And then, as suddenly as it had started, the williwaw disappeared and a normal storm wind returned. Dead bodies littered the beach, most of them mowed down by 'The Dummy.' Of the Duke's three dozen men, half were dead.

  A few paces away from him the Duke lay on the ground clutching his eye and howling in pain. One of the Duke's men, his forehead bloodied by a large gash, stood with his boot on Villa's neck. There was no hope now that Villa could rescue him.

  Gilmore began to shiver. He looked up the valley from where the williwaw had come and shook his head in a gesture of admiration and respect.

  Chapter 39

  Frank knew that if Doc did what he said he was going to do, he, himself, would die within the hour. They had agreed on a plan, whether he came back from the Sea Otter or not. "I'm gonna make our stand at the fuckin' airport," Doc said, "and I'm gonna shoot the first motherfucker I see."

  He, Frank, was the first one Doc would see and Gilmore was the second. All the way up from Shagak Bay they had led the way, their ropes tighter and their clothes wetter than before. Gilmore was shivering again.

  About noon they neared the airport. Only three feet of rope separated him from Gilmore, yet sometimes even Gilmore disappeared in the fog. Behind them Frank heard the curses of the Duke's weary, wet, cold band.

  Doc's plan was simple. Frank had heard it many times, maybe the only military plan Doc knew. It started as a movie Doc told him about in the prison yard. "See, the Indians retreat in front of the white guys, the white guys chase them, then the Indians move in from the side and the rear." That's what Doc was going to do - suck the Duke and his men down the middle of the runway, then move in from the sides and the rear.

  Doc bragged about his own role. "I shoot the first motherfucker, then I run like hell down the runway. I'm right in the middle."

  In this fog no one could distinguish anyone. Doc would be the one to shoot him.

  Frank stumbled on something and looked down. He was on the runway. Not long now. A snatch of a poem from high school started reciting itself in his brain:

  Into the valley of Death

  Rode the six hundred…

  Into the jaws of Death

  Into the mouth of Hell…

  It wasn't a valley and he wasn't riding, but the slaughter ahead seemed the same.

  So much undone. This prison, this dream of his, was only three months old. It could be wiped away the minute Alexander Duban found someone who would assemble products cheaper. And if there were any negative press, Senator Murphy would move faster than a williwaw.

  Frank Jr.. His son. Someday, somehow he wanted to spend time with him, talk to him, tell him how sorry he was he wasn't there for him. Maybe it wasn't too late to be a father. And Latisha. Was there a future there? How exciting she was, how independent, how much a person in her own right. How sad that he might die before he got to know her.

  He heard someone running off to the side and ahead of him. That would be Doc's early warning announcing that the enemy was coming.

  Larson jabbed a rifle into his back. "Faster, Villa."

  He tried to make his hobbled legs go faster.

  What is death like, Rudy?

  A bullet zipped by from the front. Then another. Then two shots from the Duke's forces. He and Gilmore were in the middle of a crossfire. Gilmore ducked and fell to the concrete, but Larson kicked him up. "Forward," he ordered.

  He would miss teaching. Taking men through the door of knowledge. What a wonderful way to spend the rest of his life. Get this island established, then get a branch of the University of Alaska restarted.

  More shots from the front. The Duke yelled, "Charge." Doc's plan was working. The white guys were getting sucked down the middle. Any second now the Indians would close in from the sides and the back.

  The fog thickened. He turned his head. The rope behind him extended into fog. "Gilmore?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Nothing."

  More bullets. Doc had to be shooting blind. Larson and the Duke pushed them on.

  Then three quick shots from the front and some fire from the sides and the back. It did not sound, however, like a whole band of Indians, but like one gun on the right, one on the left and one behind. Doc's army, his army, was pitifully small.

  From behind him and to the left he heard the Duke. "You lost them, Larson."

  "Keep your shirt on."

  Suddenly, in front of them, he heard Hanna's voice. "You dumb little prick, I tell you that's Frank." A hand from out of the fog grabbed him and pulled him to the side. But whoever grabbed him, didn't realize he was tied to Gilmore.

  "What the fuck?" It was Doc.

  "Doc! Thank God. Cut us loose."

  "Him, too? Gilmore?"

  "He's sort of on our side."

  "And the devil is polishing wings," Doc muttered as he cut their ropes.

  "What kind of force do we have?" Frank asked.

&n
bsp; "Me and Hanna, Nelson, Sam Wong and Joe. Every other ass-hole on this island cried about all the damage the williwaw did and how they had to fix it."

  "Latisha, Maggie and Jeannie?"

  "I sent them to Finger Bay. Maggie wouldn't go. She's with Joe."

  Frank looked at Hanna.

  She pointed to herself. "Me? Why am I here? Doc tried to send me off, but I'm staying close to him with the mouth tape."

  "Where can I get a rifle?" Frank asked.

  "The Air Terminal," Doc answered. "Take Gilmore with you. He's shivering. I think he's in trouble."

  Before Frank could move, five men came out of the dense fog. It was the Duke, Larson and three others. "Well, look what we got here," the Duke said. "The fuckin' doctor has freed our two prisoners, Larson. What do think about that? Drop your weapons. You too, bitch."

  Larson raised his rifle. "Kneel down, all of you."

  They all knelt, the Duke's men circled around them. Here it comes, the end, Frank thought. Was he right to have broken his pledge of non-violence? He had set up a gang war and now he had lost.

  The williwaw medallion on the Duke's neck caught Frank's eye. The thing had come to mean something special to him. It didn't belong where it was.

  Larson motioned to the Duke, "Let me finish 'em."

  Doc stood up right in the Duke's face. "Yeah, sure, Duke, tell him to go ahead. You know how to take out a ruptured appendix, don't you? You don't? Then what are you going to do without a doctor and a nurse? And when your little pricks start to rot off with venereal diseases, what then?"

  Suddenly Gilmore shivered his way back onto his feet. "A…A..And if the Feds don't hear Villa's voice every night, you better be ready for an invasion of the United States Army."

  Frank listened to this in amazement. It wasn't true, he didn't even have a phone, but maybe Gilmore was paying him back for saving his life. What could he ever say to protect Gilmore?

  One of the Duke's men brought Sam Wong into the circle. His leg was bleeding. As soon as he saw Larson he broke away from the man holding him and lunged at the big man. Larson had his rifle in his hand, waiting for the Duke to give the order to execute the others. When Sam leapt, Larson fired. Sam was hit in the chest and fell immediately to the ground. He jerked for a second and then lay quite.