Feta Attraction

by Susannah Hardy

  A pair of young children dressed in their adorable beads and pirate hats, curly mustaches drawn on their little faces with their mom’s eyebrow pencils, ran around excitedly, fencing with their plastic swords. I felt a twinge of nostalgia as I remembered bringing Cal here when she was little. I think I still had the black skull-and-crossbones bandannas we had tied pirate-wise around our heads. The atmosphere was palpable with fun and excitement, the unmistakable air of a tourist town where people come to get away from their normal lives, where cares and troubles are left behind for a few days. It felt good to be a part of that in some small way, providing meals that tasted great and didn’t have to be cooked or cleaned up after by the consumer. A vacation, I mused. A vacation would be so nice. Of course, most people would consider spending a few months on a Greek island every winter a pretty nice vacation. But I was thinking about doing some real traveling after we closed up this season. With e-mail and the Internet and cell phones, I could leave all the after-season paperwork and closing up to the accountant.

  Where would I like to go, I wondered. Maybe California. Well, maybe not. I might run into my mother. Not that I’d recognize her after so many years. How about Hawaii? Or Peru? Or Copenhagen? Cal would be in school, so she wouldn’t be able to come with me, but maybe I could convince Liza to take a month off for a girlfriends’ tour. Or, I allowed myself to fantasize a bit, maybe Keith could come with me. I blushed and sipped the cold soda, bringing myself back to the present.

  My watch read a quarter to eleven. No one around me seemed to be my contact. Captain Jack would not show up to do this job himself. He’d send somebody else. The entire park was filling up with pirates of varying ages, sizes, and degrees of costuming. Nearly everyone had a bandanna tied around his or her head, and lots of brightly colored plastic beads around their necks. Two of my evening waitresses were hanging out over in the far corner of the pavilion, but I didn’t think they noticed me. They’d better be sober when they get to work tonight, I thought.

  A man with a pair of binoculars pointed across the river to the Canadian side. “They’re leaving port! I can see them!” The crowd pushed toward the river side of the pavilion and spilled out into the park. I couldn’t help myself and stood up, craning my neck. The energy level all around me was building and I was feeling it too. The distinct boom of gunfire blanks sounded over the buzz of the throng. I went up on my tiptoes to try to get a better look, and I could just see the masts, each flying the Jolly Roger, coming into view. It wasn’t a long trip across the river and they’d be here soon. The noise of the crowd intensified as the ships approached. Children waved their flags and danced excitedly. By now only a few stragglers like me were left behind at the pavilion. I screwed the cap onto my soda and stowed the bottle in my big bag.

  The tall ships glided up and dropped anchor about a dozen feet from shore, where the water was deep enough to hold them. A voice, amplified by a decidedly non-period bullhorn, advised: “Citizens of Bonaparte Bay—surrender or be taken with no mercy!” Squeals and shouts went up from the crowd as two dozen pirates descended rope ladders into prams that had been unlashed from the sides of the ships. They continued to whoop as they rowed into shore and began to mingle with the tourists, pausing long enough for photos snapped with digital cameras and cell phones. They dropped more beads over the heads of the children as they passed.

  I spotted my waitresses over by one of the barbecue grills. One of them had her fingers tangled up in the strand of beads around the neck of one of the pirates and was boldly planting a kiss on him. He pulled back, then gave her a look that pretty clearly said that the kiss might be repeated and extended later on. I hoped she was having fun.

  I was so engrossed in watching the spectacle that it came as a surprise to me when someone came up behind me and put a string of beads around my neck. I whirled around and was greeted by a black eye pencil coming toward me. Before I could protest, two lines had been drawn under my nose into what I assumed was a mustache. I looked into a face I did not recognize, brown eyes rimmed with black liner, a long ratty wig held in place by a red bandanna. The face was young, sprinkled with a few reddish blond hairs that tried to pass for a beard. “Come on now, and come quietly.” The voice was soft and urgent with just the hint of a crack. I punched out to push him away, but he grabbed my wrists and held on. He was surprisingly strong for someone as young and skinny as he was.

  “Now, smile and get moving. Look natural.”

  “Where are we going?” He didn’t answer, but transferred both my wrists into one of his very large hands and deftly wound a piece of clothesline around my wrists with the other. My shoulder bag was now dangling from the crook of my elbow.

  “I have a gun, and I will use it on you if I have to.” He marched me down the steps of the pavilion, waving and smiling at the tourists and other pirates as he did so. A couple of thumbs went up, accompanied by catcalls. These pigs think I am enjoying being carried off. Well, maybe if I’d been the age of my waitresses and the pirate was cute, I would have. The forced march halted when we got to the beach and stepped over the side into a small rowboat, where another pirate was waiting. We shoved off and he started rowing out toward the ships. I considered going over the side. It was daylight and the swim to shore would be short and doable even for me, but I did not want to take the chance of being shot. And of course my hands were tied, which would make swimming next to impossible. There were also those lurking muskellunge and sturgeons to consider too. I shuddered.

  Add one more bad decision to the mountain I’d already amassed in the last few days. Why had I thought I could do this? I should have brought somebody, anybody, with me. I could even have gotten one of the rent-a-cops in the crowd to sit with me. But I’d thought I’d be safe with all these people around, that by pretending I had the treasure in my oversized bag and telling the go-between I’d only deal with Captain Jack directly, I could draw him out. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

  “Now get moving. And don’t try anything, or I’ll shoot you.” His voice cracked again and I thought furiously for a means of escape, but the cold metal cylinder of a gun pressed into the small of my back convinced me not to try anything. He prodded me and I began to ascend the rope ladder, not an easy feat with my hands tied together. “Hurry up!”

  “I’m going as fast as I can,” I shot back. “It would help if you untied me.” He might have a gun, but there was a limit to what I could take from this brat who was young enough to be my son.

  “Shut up and go.”

  I reached the top edge of the boat and swung my legs over. I’d never been on one of these ships before and if circumstances had been different, it would have been pretty cool. The wood all around me was polished and beautiful. The masts rose up to magnificent heights, covered in yards and yards of billowing snowy sails. I could picture myself sailing up the river in one of these. It would be so nice at sunset, maybe with a cocktail and some handsome sailor to snuggle up to. Instead I had Junior here poking me again with a pistol.

  “Down here.” He opened a hatch in the deck and forced me down the narrow dark stairs. He switched on a light—electric? The romance dimmed a bit. I’d expected the flickering chiaroscuro of an oil lamp. We were in some kind of holding area. Wooden barrels encircled with shiny bands lined the walls of the ship. The kid pushed me forward and opened a short door toward the front of the boat. “Get inside,” he ordered.

  I complied because there didn’t seem to be any other choice. I found myself in a cramped little room with a low ceiling. “Now, stay here. Oh yeah.” He laughed. “I’m gonna lock the door behind me, so you can’t go anywhere.”

  “Does your mother know what you’re doing?” If he shot me, he shot me. My limit had been reached today.

  A look of sadness crossed his face, replaced by anger. “You shut up about my mother,” he snapped. “Just shut up!”

  He stormed out and slammed the door behind him. The metallic grating of the
key in the lock proved he’d kept his promise to lock me in. Now what, Georgie? I began to twist and turn my wrists in an attempt to loosen the knots binding my hands, but the rope stayed tight. The kid would never pass for a Boy Scout, but he could apparently tie a square knot. The room around me was empty, the walls bare.

  My shoulder bag was still looped over my arm, though. The boy genius had neglected to take that away from me. I was more convinced than ever that I was dealing with a bunch of amateurs. Of course, I’d been abducted and was stuck here, so they knew something. I reviewed what I’d put in the bag. No pocketknife, not even a nail file.

  I examined the ropes again. Definitely cotton clothesline, the kind sold in any grocery or hardware store and the same thing that was still strung between two trees out back of the Bonaparte House, though it hadn’t been used in a long time. I pictured Cal’s little purple bathing suit, the one with the polka dots she had loved so much as a little girl, hanging next to her big flowery beach towel. The line in my memory sagged from the weight of the wet fabric. Cotton clothesline stretches when it’s wet. I maneuvered the purse down my arm so that its handle lay across both wrists. The zipper was partly open and it was just possible to get my fingers inside to grasp the cap end of the bottle of Diet Coke.

  Holding the container between my feet and extending my bound wrists, I managed to twist off the cap. My intent was to pour the liquid onto the ropes, but I succeeded only in spilling it on my hands. The bottle fell onto the floor of the ship and formed a large brown puddle. So I simply dipped the ropes directly into the puddle. The smell of the soda wafted up to me, and in this small room it was intensified to a sickly sweetness. I let the ropes absorb as much of the liquid as they would take, then tried to pull my hands apart.

  The clothesline stretched. Not enough. Only the undersides of my wrists were wet, while the tops remained dry. I needed these ropes fully soaked if this was going to work. It proved impossible to turn my wrists over so my palms were facing up. Perhaps for a double-jointed contortionist, but not for me. Think, Georgie, think. Yes! I lay down on my back on the floor, and stretched my arms out above my head into the pool. No telling what, other than soda, was on this floor. I’d be showering until I was pruney when I got out of here. I laid my hands in the liquid, which was by now breeding all sorts of bacteria, I just knew, until the ropes wouldn’t wick up any more. My arms were stiff from being in that unaccustomed position so long, and soda dripped onto my face as I brought them back to the front of my body. I spat and sat up, arming the sticky yuck off my face. I was going to call Dr. Phelps and get myself on some antibiotics right after the shower.

  With my legs tucked up under me, I began to work at the ropes. This time they expanded, and by twisting and maneuvering I made progress. A deep vibration began to rumble all around the walls of my prison. My jaws rattled, like a pair of chattering teeth in a joke shop window. It was loud as hell in there. A metallic grating noise—a chain scraping in its housing?—sent shivers up my arms. The anchor. Unless I was mistaken, we were under way.

  TWENTY-THREE

  I swallowed down the lump of panic that had risen to my throat. Where were we headed? These tall ships were supposed to be anchored in the Bay overnight and not leave until midafternoon Sunday, so as to allow the maximum number of tourists to see them. My plan, such as it was, was to escape Houdini-like from this locked room, then make my way out a porthole or over the side into the water, where I would swim for shore. This was still possible even if we were moving, but it was a lot more dangerous if the engines were running. The farther downriver we got, the deeper the water would get and the wider the river, making the swim much more difficult for me. It would take a crew of at least four or five to run this tub, I figured, so there would be that many more pairs of eyes watching me too.

  I worked frantically at the ropes and finally managed to extricate one hand by squeezing my hands together and then pulling them apart parallel to each other. My wrists stung, rubbed red and raw from the ropes, but I was free.

  Not exactly free, I reminded myself. The engine was so loud there was no way to tell whether someone was stationed on the other side of the door. I gingerly twisted the knob and found it locked, just as I had suspected. Lock picking was not part of my skill set. If Dolly had been here, she could have lent me a bobby pin from the depths of her coiffure. Not that I would wish this situation on anyone.

  My usual purse contained a metal nail file, but that was sitting in the Morristown police station waiting for me to retrieve it. Dismantling the pen in the bag I had with me might work, but would be messy. Ah, this was better. A small wirebound notebook, which read, “MacKenzie Motor Lodge, Bonaparte Bay, NY,” in gold foil letters on the cover. I began to uncoil the thin metal. Beads of blood appeared on my hand where I scraped the sharp end against my skin, and I winced. When the last coil pulled free, the papers fluttered loose to the floor in a shower of white, lined rectangles.

  The wire was thin and floppy, and it surely wouldn’t work in its current state. I bent it in half and twisted it around itself, creating a two-ply rod that was much more rigid. I gave it a little wave like a movie swashbuckler. A giddy laugh escaped my lips. Who was I kidding? I was in way, way over my head. But the need to put an end to this giant fiasco, the need to keep my family safe, overrode my insecurities and forced me to press on.

  Poking the wire into the keyhole, I felt resistance and tried again in another spot. Again and again, different angles produced no results and I bit my lip in frustration. This was not turning out to be as easy as I had hoped. Where was Inky with his early-life-of-petty-crime skills when you needed him? Something clicked. My heart leapt and I wanted to give myself a high five. But not only had the lock released, the doorknob was turning as well.

  I yanked out my ersatz pick and leapt backward, into the puddle of soda. My feet went out from under me on the slick surface and I fell hard on my behind. Yelping in pain, I whipped the tool behind me just as my young pirate friend opened the door. He snickered as he saw me sitting there and I wanted to slap that snarky little smile off his adolescent face. “I see you’ve been busy untying yourself,” he commented. “Well, it doesn’t matter. The captain wants to see you.”

  The captain? I knew it. That damned Captain Jack was behind this. If he really was Coast Guard (not for long, if I had anything to say about it), he could handle a ship like this. What his motive was, and how he thought he was going to get away with it, I did not know. We weren’t inconspicuous in this replica sailing ship, and there must be faster boats than this out there that could catch us. I was ready to rip into him, and I didn’t care what he did to me. Although, letting me live would be ideal.

  “Follow me,” he said in a sonorous monotone, then cracked up. “Get it? I’m Lurch!” He was so young, he must have been watching that old show on the classic TV channel late at night.

  “Funny.” I picked up my shoulder bag and exited behind him, my bottom uncomfortably wet. I’d be a sticky mess when I started to dry. We threaded our way through the maze of barrels. He put his black-booted foot on the bottom rung of the stairs to the hatch on the upper deck.

  Here was my opportunity. He took a few more steps up. I slipped my wire around his ankles and pulled back as hard as I could, jumping to the side as he fell. He hit his head on one of the barrels, and tipped it over. He lay there stunned as I dragged him across the floor by his feet. He was awkward because of his gangly height, but he was skinny and didn’t weigh much. Should I try to immobilize him? No time for that, and he was out cold. And he wasn’t in charge. Maternal guilt squeezed my heart as I considered whether he needed medical attention. The kid was young, and he was somebody’s son. What if he had a concussion? I was sorry, but there were bigger fish to fry.

  I maneuvered around the barrel the boy had tipped over. The top had come loose. Out of curiosity I looked inside. It was filled to the top with plastic bags. Each plastic bag was filled with a dry
, grassy substance. I’d bet anything it was the same stuff I’d discovered out at Sunshine Acres. There must be hundreds of packages in a barrel this size. A quick look around showed at least fifty barrels in here. If all of them were filled with these little bags, the amount of marijuana this ship was carrying was staggering. And we could be headed anywhere. Anywhere. With enough supplies and a competent crew, this ship could sail all the way down the St. Lawrence and out across the Atlantic, I thought. Or, if we were sailing in the other direction, we could be on Lake Ontario in less than an hour and making our way through the rest of the chain of the Great Lakes to some Midwestern port.

  I shouldered my bag and took a deep breath as I ascended the ladder. The kid had left the hatch open and I poked my head up cautiously. Seeing no one, I came up onto the deck, squinting into the bright sunshine, and considered. Where would I find the captain? He could be driving the ship, or he could be anywhere on board while he left the driving to some underling—what were they called? Right, mates. The wheel of the ship must be up front. I hadn’t seen any kind of raised bridge from which to navigate. The shores were whizzing past me at a pretty good clip, too fast for me to get a good look at any of the houses or other landmarks on either side. We hadn’t come about, so I figured my first guess was right: we were headed out to the open sea, not inland.

  I moved toward the bow of the boat, doing my best to keep my balance as the boat rocked and swayed. A little wave of nausea rose up and I closed my eyes and took a deep breath to quell the queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. What a time to get seasick. I kept my eyes straight ahead and not on the passing shorelines to either side, and made my way to the bow. There was, in fact, a ship’s wheel there, but the helm was empty. Huh? What was this, some kind of ghost ship? Who was driving us? Another glance around showed a little glass-windowed cabin I had missed before. A figure stared out at me, but the facial features were indistinguishable. I squared my shoulders, adjusted the bra strap that had fallen onto one upper arm, and headed for the structure.