The Honorable Knight

by Patrick John Donahoe

  “Good sailors can figure out most of what happens as events unfold,” the XO said.

  “They do, but the fewer people who know what we have to do, and the less they know, the better. I’ll debrief those who require debriefing and have them sign confidentiality papers when it’s all over. For now, tell them this is a special training operation and they’re not allowed to talk about it when it’s all over. Good sailors understand what that means. I’m leaving right after you brief the Ward Room. My team and I will helo back aboard just prior to COMEX. By the way, the exercise is Top Secret SCI code named Storm Drain,” added Ian.

  “Understood. Let’s get started, XO. We have our work cut out for us,” Captain Duncan said.

  Thirty-Seven

  Kurt piloted the yacht in to the pier in Havana. Exhausted from the day’s work, navigating the yacht, tying up at the pier, furling and packing the sails, supervising the attachment of shore power and potable water, and pumping the bilge, Kurt hit the rack before dark.

  A light sleeper, Kurt was awakened at 10:30 P.M. by noises in the galley. He watched his father and grandfather remove the coolers from their secret compartment and take them to the shore. Even though they had ordered him not to leave the yacht alone while in port, he was not going to let them control his every waking hour. Havana was too enticing for his adventurous 26-year-old spirit. He would catch one of the ever present taxis at the end of the pier and ask the driver to take him to one of the classier bars with dancing. He should be safe enough for a couple of drinks.

  Ian, on stake-out on the Havana piers, watched Karl and Rolf carry the two coolers from their yacht to a rental car. The driver exited the car and helped the two men put the coolers into the car trunk. Once the coolers were loaded, Karl took shotgun, Rolf got into the back seat, and the driver drove away. Ian snapped as many photos as he could with his Canon EOS 5D digital SLR camera with telephoto lens. From the dossier Serena had obtained from Alicia, Ian recognized Karl and Rolf, but not the driver.

  Ian called Serena and Jacques on secure satellite telephone and gave them a ‘heads up’ that the men carried suspicious containers off the yacht. Before he finished his calls he spotted a young man leave the yacht. He took a number of photos of him walking to a taxi waiting at the end of the pier. Ian slipped on his noise cancelling earphones and aimed a parabolic microphone at the taxi.

  Kurt felt some trepidation when he asked the driver to take him to a local bar recommended by a line handler working the piers. The driver was malicious looking in the dark, but the interior of his 1954 Chevy taxi was comical looking with its faded Naugahyde upholstery, fringe balls sewed around the perimeter of the roof lining, red fuzzy dice hanging from the rear view mirror, and the plastic Madonna glued to the dash. So, undaunted, Kurt told the driver, “Rumba Bar. Let’s go.”

  Ian called Serena back and said two words, “Rumba Bar.”

  The Rumba Bar was within walking distance of the Hotel Terral, so Serena dressed in a clingy red dress and hurried to fake a serendipitous meeting with Kurt. She had worked her connections to find out when Karl Brandt’s yacht would be arriving in Havana and where it would pier up. She was already tired from observing the yacht’s activities from the time it tied up to the pier until dark, when Ian took over for her, but she couldn’t miss out on an opportunity to ply Kurt for information about his father and grandfather.

  Jacques, feeling bored on stake-out duty, considered the port of Mariel to be an anomaly in Cuba. Many millions of dollars’ worth of Cuban convertible pesos had been spent to build a modern harbor in the event that Cuba could become the trading nation that it should have been had Castro not taken power sixty years before.

  From what Jacques had seen of Cuba, it had become the stagnated ghetto of the Caribbean. Sixty-year-old cars and taxis dripped motor oil on the streets of Havana, poverty ruled the barrios, the Cuban people turned beggars on an island that could have been the center piece of Caribbean tourism, but its rundown hotels, police state policies, and American embargoes reduced the tourist trade to a trickle of what it could have been. Jacques saw Mariel, a modernized port of call, being minimally utilized.

  No one from any nation or organization had visited the Iranian ships since their arrival. Serena had asked the Intel organizations, who supported their efforts to get to the bottom of the peace tour, to let Ian, Jacques, and Serena lead the investigation in Cuba so the terrorists would not be spooked. Her insight was almost always correct. If they were captured and questioned, they each had their own cover story for their activities.

  Jacques had a great view of the Jamaran and the Kilo from inside the flat black 1950 Mercury coupe he had rented for the week to use on stake-out. If he had this car at home he would trick it out like a real 1950’s hot rod, if he ever had the time to do so. He’d replace the original flathead V8 engine with a 283 cubic inch Corvette engine, paint the exterior midnight blue with yellow and red flames, install chrome wire wheels and a floor shift, and cover the interior in tuck and roll black and white Naugahyde.

  His hot rod fantasy was interrupted when he noticed a rental car pull up to the Jamaran. Ian had tipped him off that Karl and Rolf were headed this way. The driver got out of the vehicle and retrieved two coolers, configured like airline pilot cases, out of the trunk and carried them up the Jamaran’s gangplank. Rolf and Karl followed the driver. The sentry on duty performed what appeared to be a thorough identification check, then picked up the cases the driver carried onboard, and had Karl and Rolf follow him across another gangplank connecting the Jamaran to the deck of the Kilo.

  The driver walked back down the gangplank, returned to the rental car and parked it on the pier in the closest empty parking spot to the frigate and lit a cigarette.

  The sentry on the Kilo checked Rolf’s and Karl’s ID again, and when he was satisfied, lowered the cases down the hatch into the submarine, then Rolf and Karl climbed down the ladder.

  Jacques took as many high resolution telephoto pictures of each of the men as he could in the few minutes he observed their boarding the frigate and passing across to the submarine. He was able to get several almost posed shots of the driver. He waited to see what they do next. He noted the time on his iPad and wrote a short description of everything he saw for the record. He called Serena and said, “Bingo,” meaning the two men had shown up at the frigate with the two cases. Serena had provided Ian and Jacques with a short list of code words in case the Cuban secret police had some way to eavesdrop on their secure Iridium satellite phones.

  Serena entered the Rumba Bar and surveyed the customers. Kurt had already arrived and was sitting alone nursing a beer at the bar. Dance music played, but no one was dancing. The night was young for still sober foreign tourists. Serena took the barstool two stools away from Kurt, crossed her legs seductively, and ordered a Bacardi and Coke with a twist of lime, known as a Cuba Libre everywhere in the Caribbean except Cuba. Cuba wasn’t free.

  She knew Kurt, a lonely 26-year-old male, wouldn’t be able to resist giving her a look over and probably wished he could talk to an exotic creature like herself. He would get his chance on her terms. She took her time and sipped her drink patiently, timing her approach.

  She hated smoking, and observed that Kurt wasn’t smoking either, so asking for a light wasn’t an option. An obvious hooker slid up to Kurt and asked if he would buy her a drink. He became flustered, so Serena whispered to her in impeccable Spanish, “Leave my fiancé alone or I’ll rip your face off.” The woman backed off, but gave Serena an ‘I’ll scratch your eyes out’ look as she left.

  Kurt faced Serena and said, “I speak German and Portuguese, and some Spanish. Did you tell that woman I was your fiancé?”

  “Yes, I could tell she made you uncomfortable, so I thought I would help you. I hope I didn’t interfere too much. Many of these hostesses are infected with STDs, and the medical treatment in Cuba is poor at best.”

  “Thank you. I’m a little out of my depth. Can I buy you a drink in apprecia
tion?”

  “Of course. I was on my way home from work and intended to have only one drink to relax, but my manners won’t let me refuse your generosity.”

  Kurt, seemingly pleased with himself, waved at the bartender and ordered, “Whatever the lady is drinking and I’ll have another beer.”

  Serena moved to the stool next to Kurt and let her long left leg rub against Kurt’s leg as though it wasn’t intended. She settled in for her stealth interrogation knowing this man-boy would be like putty in her hands. “My name is Serena.” After all, there was no harm in using her actual first name, one of the many she had used over the past 900 plus years.

  “My name is Kurt,” he replied.

  “You don’t look local. Where are you from?”

  “Brazil. I’m here on vacation with my father and grandfather.”

  Serena sipped her rum and Coke and pretended to be only semi-interested in what he had to say.

  Kurt continued, “We sailed our yacht from Sao Paulo, and I did most of the piloting and all of the navigating.”

  Turning slightly toward Kurt and looking him in the eyes, she slowly uncrossed and re-crossed her legs, allowing him to gain a grand view of her long lithe legs, but kept silent.

  Kurt’s face flushed slightly and he stammered, “We . . . l mean I . . . like to sail every summer when I’m home from university, but we’ve never taken such a long voyage before. My father had a delivery here so he mixed business and pleasure. . . I guess.”

  “What line of work is your family in?”

  “Oh, well, we own a large pharmaceutical company in Brazil. You may have heard of it, Trident Pharmaceutical.”

  “No, I can’t say that I have. Why are your father and grandfather not here with you tonight?” She leaned in a little closer to Kurt, intimidating him.

  “I don’t know where they went. I think they may have made a delivery.”

  Serena knew if she pressed him too much on this line of questioning he might get suspicious, so she switched the conversation to herself, to keep him off guard. “Well, my life is not as exciting as yours. I’m just a lowly secretary for the harbor authority. Everything here requires a permit, so I issue and file permits all day long. It’s boring. I’ve never been anywhere outside of Cuba and probably never will be since I can’t issue myself a ‘white card.’” She continued to sip her drink as though he were not there.

  “You’re so beautiful. You could be a model or a movie star. You could do anything you wanted.”

  She down casted her eyes and pretended to be flattered, took another sip of her drink, then laid her left hand on Kurt’s forearm and said, “Kurt, I will probably live and die right here on this island. There is not much hope on this island for someone like me. What do you plan to do with your future? You seem capable and intelligent.”

  “I graduated from college as an electrical engineer and completed med school. I’m currently working on my internship. My father finagled a month off from my internship so we could sail the Caribbean.” Kurt paused.

  Serena looked at him indicating she was paying attention.

  Kurt continued, “My father donates money to the University Medical School, so he can pull favors.”

  Serena squeezed Kurt’s forearm and said, “How wonderful. You must be very intelligent to become an engineer and a doctor.”

  “Well, I’m not a doctor yet.”

  “But you will be.” Serena took her hand off Kurt’s arm, adjusted her bottom on the bar stool, sipped her drink, and feigned a slight loss in interest again.

  Kurt added, “I probably won’t be a hospital doctor. My father wants me to become the CEO of his pharmaceutical company, eventually, and specialize in virus and bacteria research.”

  Serena turned to face Kurt. “Viruses seem like an odd interest for an engineer doctor.”

  “Not so odd. Our pharmaceutical company develops medicines for bacterial and virus infections. I will be able to do research with my father . . . and my grandfather. It’s good for our company.”

  Serena held back her excitement at this last revelation, continued to feign disinterest, sipped her drink, and finally asked, “Would you like to dance?”

  Kurt stammered, “Ye . . . yeah, yes, I would.”

  Serena led him out to the dance floor, wrapped one arm around his back, and pressed close to him. She led him in a slow waltz-like step to the song, Cuando Caliente El Sol. She pressed her breasts against Kurt’s cotton short-sleeve shirt. She had purposely worn a silk blouse with no bra, and put on her most intoxicating perfume.

  Kurt stopped dancing and said, “I think I’d better go back to the yacht. It’s getting late.”

  Not wanting to kill the goose that laid the golden egg, Serena led Kurt back to their bar stools after the song was over and said, “I have some personal items to take care of and need to get home, also. Thank you for the drink. Maybe we can meet here another night.”

  Kurt replied, “I hate to see our time together come to an end, but maybe we can meet here again tomorrow. I’ll buy dinner. A dock worker told me they make some of the best seafood Tapas here.”

  “It’s a date then. Tomorrow at six, here.” Serena wanted to keep the lines of communication open with Kurt. She wanted to extract more information.

  “I’ll try to be here at six.” Kurt called out to the bartender, “Can I settle the bill?”

  While Kurt paid the bill, Serena asked, “How will I know if you’re going to stand me up?”

  Kurt’s face flushed with obvious embarrassment. “I’ll call the bar and leave a message if can’t make it.”

  “It’s a date then. I hope you don’t disappoint me.”

  “I’ll try not to. Can I call you a cab? I’m going to the Havana piers.”

  “Thank you. I’ll walk out with you, but I’m going in the opposite direction.” Serena noticed the prostitute sitting in a corner table glare at her as they walked out to the taxi stand.

  “You shouldn’t walk home alone in the dark streets.” Kurt opened the door to the first taxi in line for Serena. She climbed into the back seat. “’Till tomorrow then,” he said, closed the door, handed the driver several pesos, and waved her goodbye.

  Serena looked back at Kurt. He was watching as the cab drove away. She doubted she would ever see him again.

  Jacques looked for things about the Jamaran and the submarine to keep himself awake. With his telephoto lens he studied the sentry, deciding he was a young sailor with a side arm who probably had no idea of the nature of the peace tour’s ultimate mission.

  He studied the Iranian flags on the two vessels, with their tricolor, green, white and red stripes and the symbol of Iran in red in the middle of the center white stripe. He focused on the takbir, or lines of Kufic script, written on the flags’ green and red stripes. The light breeze occasionally unfurled the flags so that he could read a portion of the script through his telephoto lens. The Kufic script said ‘God is great’ repeated 22 times. The symbol of Iran in red looked like an artist’s stencil of a tulip and signified the red tulip which legend said grew on a young soldier’s grave when he died for his country.

  Finally, Karl and Rolf exited from the Kilo. They had been onboard the Kilo for over three hours. They walked across the gangplank to the Jamaran and down the shore gangplank to the pier without the two coolers. Their driver drove the rental car to them at the foot of the gangplank. They got in and drove away. It was 3 A.M.

  Jacques waited until they had departed the pier and followed them from a distance. There was no other traffic on the roads, so he had to follow at a distance. He figured they were going back to the yacht in Havana harbor. He called Ian and gave him a heads up. The forty-mile drive from Mariel to Havana took about fifty minutes. Once their car took the Harbor Entrance road, Jacques headed back to the Hotel Terral to give Serena his report.

  Ian noted when Kurt arrived back at the yacht at 1:16 A.M. He hoped Serena had been able to gain some valuable Intel from Kurt. Although he wasn’t su
re why he had any doubt she would. If anyone could find out what Kurt knew about his father’s activities, Serena could. Ian noted Karl and Rolf’s arrival back at their yacht at 3:57 A.M. Once they were onboard their yacht, Ian drove back to the Hotel Terral to give his report to Serena.

  Thirty-Eight

  The USNS Valiant crew had lowered their stern port side high frequency antenna so the Sikorsky MH-60R Seahawk helicopter could drop Jacques onto the deck in the clearest space possible.

  The Seahawk crew had added extra fuel tanks to ensure there would be enough fuel reserve to safely make the drop and return to its home base in Jacksonville, Florida.

  Although the helicopter pilot had turned down Jacques request to help fly the aircraft, Jacques still enjoyed the noisy rush of the flight. The pilot politely insisted it was his job to get Jacques onboard the Valiant safely, period.

  The Seahawk hovered over the stern port quarter of the Valiant while a crewman lowered the basket with Jacques’ personal belongings. The static line man on the Valiant touched the end of the basket cable with a shorting rod to harmlessly spark the static electricity from the cable. He then extracted Jacques’ baggage from the basket and motioned for the helicopter crew to reel the basket back. Once the basket was back onboard the Seahawk, the crewman lowered the ladder and Jacques clambered down. The pilot maintained an almost fixed station over the drop point while the Valiant maintained a steady five knot headway into an eight knot wind. Jacques was impressed with the pilot’s skill.

  One two-foot drop to the deck and Jacques waved the helicopter off, gathered his baggage, and headed for the galley with CWO Dave Cantrell, who had been standing by.

  “It’s good to see you again,” Jacques shouted over the thrumming blade noise of the departing Seahawk.

  Dave didn’t attempt to reply, but led the way to Jacques’ assigned cabin. Jacques retrieved his box of Good Seasons Chamomile Tea and covered cup, and threw his bag onto the bunk next to the stack of clean linen and a pillow.