Rocky Island (10 page)

“If it does,” grumped Staff Sergeant Kellerman.

“Well,” continued the Inspector, “if we know when they go out, we’ll have a better chance of catching them with a load of coke, if they get it, or maybe the sub can run them down before they get back to shore and arrest them for conspiracy to smuggle drugs.”

“Anything’s worth a try. I know Sergeant Harrison in charge down there,” said Kellerman. “I’ll phone him and bring him up to date on what’s happening.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Howard Messenger, the owner of the general store at Port Saxon was surprised, to say the least, to get a call from the RCMP at Barrington asking him to allow a couple of officers to spend the evening and as much of the night as necessary at his store. He was even more surprised to be asked to keep the information to himself, but he agreed. This was high drama for the quiet little hamlet and he was right in the middle of it. About eight o’clock, an hour before his normal closing time, two officers drove up in a 4x4
van and parked behind the store. They knocked on the rear door of the building, where Messenger’s living quarters were located and were quietly admitted. When the store closed, and the lights were turned off, the two policemen moved up to where they could see the waterfront and the fishing boats tied up at the wharf. The fog had lifted and visibility was almost back to normal.

Nothing happened until about eleven o’clock. Howard Messenger had gone off to bed, leaving the police to their vigil. He had to be up early in the morning, and curious as he was, business came first. When three cars came down the road from the direction of Highway 309 and turned into an old house about a quarter mile back from the shore, the officers made a mental note to get the licence plate numbers. Shortly afterward, nine men dressed in cold weather gear walked down the road, and boarded the three newest Cape Island fishing boats, three to a boat. Almost of the stroke of midnight, the boats cast off and headed out to sea, appearing for all the world like ordinary fishermen getting a very early start on the day’s work; but ordinary fishermen would not have needed to begin work that early to reach the fishing grounds.

Constable Hamlin, the lead officer, used his cell phone to alert the Duty Officer in Barrington. “Stay put,” he was told, “and see what happens. I’ll tell Halifax. The fog has lifted enough that they’re getting ready to send the chopper to Rocky Island.”

The vigil paid off once more. About three o’clock, a cube van came down the road and the officers watched it turn off on an old road that, according to their map, ran east across the peninsula for about ten miles to a spot noted on the map as Round Bay. That old road was in terrible shape. Neither officer had ever driven it because there was nobody living in that section of the county. Round Bay was a name only, with a long disused jetty and a crumbling fishing shack. They knew about that only because somebody had once told Hamlin about it and he passed it on to his partner, a young constable named Harvey Meeker. Meeker was from the prairies and after nearly a year was still amazed to find himself stationed in a sparsely populated area on the South Shore of the province of Nova Scotia.

The officers gave the van about a ten-minute head start and then left the store by the front door, locking it behind them. They got into their van and after pausing to jot down the numbers of the three cars they had seen earlier, they drove without lights, slowly following the old road the cube van had taken. Hamlin, behind the wheel, cursed as he hit pot-holes and small drifts of snow as well as unexpected turns in the trail, which was about all anyone could really call this excuse for a road. He was following the tracks of the van ahead of him and that took up his total attention. Constable Meeker kept watch for the van to make sure that they didn’t get too close to it.

After about half an hour, most of it spent in second gear on a bouncing, jolting drive, Meeker called out, “Better stop, Len. He’s just up the road there. He’s stopped.”

Sure enough, just ahead, the cube van, a dark blue one with New Brunswick licence plates, was stopped. It wasn’t lighted, either, but they could see somebody digging in the snow just ahead of it. “Looks like he’s stuck in a snowdrift and he’s shovelling his way out.”

Hamlin halted the 4x4 nd the two officers got out. The startled van driver stopped his shovelling and headed for his van. “Hold it right there,” commanded Hamlin. “Police.”

The man stood still, about five feet from the driver’s door of his van.

“Anyone with you in the van?”

“If there was, he’d be out here shovelling this damn snow with me,” replied the driver with a snarl.

“Okay. Let’s see some ID.” In a quiet aside, Hamlin told his partner, “Harve, check out the van, but be careful.”

Meeker opened the rear door of the van, saw nobody, and moved to the passenger side.

“My ID is in the van. I’ll have to get it.”

“Exactly where in the van is it?”

“In the glove box in my wallet.”

“My partner will check. Look in the glove box, Harve.”

Meeker had jerked open the passenger door, stepping back immediately, and then cautiously peering around the doorframe. He found nobody in the van, as the driver had claimed. Before he could reach the glove box, the driver called, “I’ll get it. I know right where it is”, and started toward the van.

“Stay right where you are,” Hamlin ordered, drawing his gun, but not pointing it. The man saw the gun and stopped, his shoulders dropping in resignation.

“Well, well,” Meeker called. “Look what I found, Len, a handgun, and there’s a rifle like I’ve not seen before on the back seat. Looks like we’ve got an armored car here.”

“Stand against the side of the van with your hands on the roof,” ordered Hamlin, now pointing his gun at the driver. The man hesitated momentarily, then complied.

“Leave the guns there for the moment Harvey, and come pat this guy down while I keep him covered.”

Meeker checked out the driver, finding a knife with a six-inch blade in a sheath strapped to the man’s left leg.

“You’re well armed, aren’t you. Put your hands behind your back—slowly.” He complied slowly. “Cuff him.” Meeker did so. “Get in the back of the police car there while we check this out.”

The driver was safely in the rear seat of the 4x4 with the rear door locked and no inside handle on it or the sliding side doors and a metal grill separating him from the front seats. He had not said a word during the procedure.

The two officers entered the cube van and checked it out carefully. In the cargo compartment they found three large wooden boxes, empty, but obviously meant to be filled with something. The guns were loaded; both had full clips of ammunition, safeties on. The rifle was an AK47, a strange weapon for that part of the country. The only papers were the lease agreement from an auto leasing company in Fredericton and the accompanying insurance form. They confiscated the guns, took the papers and the keys, and returned to their own vehicle.

“What’s your name?” asked Hamlin.

“I’m not saying anything until I have a lawyer present.”

“You can tell us your name.”

“Not until my lawyer is with me.”

“Okay, that’s obstructing police. Who’s your lawyer?

“Haven’t got one.”

The two officers looked at each other but said nothing. Hamlin radioed the station and reported what they had found. “We’ll take him right through to Shelburne and lock him up until we get this checked out. Can you send a tow truck for the cube van? He won’t have any trouble finding it, but he’ll have a helluva job getting it towed back. Right now it’s stuck in a snowdrift. I’m going to have just as big a job getting our van turned around.”

As it turned out, Len Hamlin was correct on both counts. The towing company driver was displeased at being wakened so early, and even more unhappy when told what the call was for.

“Whyntcha leave the thing where it is ’til spring? How’m I s’posed to get down that God-forsaken road to tow out something that big stuck in a snowbank?”

“You got a contract, Chucky. Better take somebody with you to help. Bring the thing in here to the station. Have fun.” The Duty Officer was grinning as he hung up the phone.

Hamlin was not grinning as he struggled to turn the police van around. After twenty minutes of small turns and back and forth movements, almost getting stuck five times, he was finally headed in the right direction on the road. Reaching Port Saxon was a real relief, and to be able to shift into third gear and two-wheel drive for the half-hour run to Shelburne was almost real joy. There they deposited their prisoner in the county jail, charged him with illegal possession of loaded weapons, obstructing police and operating a motor vehicle without a license, assured the Duty Officer there that somebody would be back later in the day to question him, and went home to bed.

*

Sometime after one-thirty, Allison phoned the number Corporal Brock had given her and after a couple of minutes of waiting, she was transferred to another number where Brock came on the line.

“Jason, it’s Allison. I’ve been picking up some messages on Channel 88 from what sounds like fishy fishing boats if you’ll pardon the pun. I’ve got a tape of the calls.”

“Good work, Allison. We’re just about ready to take off for Rocky Island. What have you got?”

“Apparently three of them calling themselves Fish One, Fish Two and Fish Three. They seem to be hove to and have given each other their lat and long. Fish Three keeps calling
Helen of Troy
, but he doesn’t get any answer
.
Fish One just said they should wait another two hours.”

“Great. Just what we want. Give me the lat and long and I’ll pass it on to the sub commander.”

Allison gave him the three different latitude and longitude positions the fishing boats had stated. “I plotted them on the chart. They’re less than ten miles apart,” she said.

“Wonderful. You’ve done a great job. Stay with it. The number you called is the duty desk at Maritime Naval Command headquarters. If you get anything more, ask for Lieutenant Commander Aylwine—that’s A-Y-L-W-I-N-E—and he’ll know what to do with it. How’s Toby doing?”

“Jason, I haven’t seen Toby for hours. He hasn’t slept all night or all day unless he’s been dozing down on the shore. He’ll be frozen.”

“He’s tough, Allison. Don’t worry. We’ll be there in an hour and he can go to bed and sleep the clock around.”

“Not likely. You don’t know my husband.”

Toby
had
napped off and on, and he was fairly comfortable, out of the wind behind his big boulder. He was actually asleep when he was suddenly jolted awake by the sound of the lifeboat being lowered from the davits once again, only this time he could see what was happening. There was no sign of the submarine. He figured that it must have submerged when the fog began to lift. In the lifeboat he could see a man wearing what appeared to be an officer’s uniform and four rowers. The officer was carrying a rifle. As he watched, they cast off and started rowing in a direction that was going to take them to the west, but then they turned, following the shore line.

“They’re going around the island,” he thought. When they disappeared from sight, he crawled out of his hiding place and ducking low, he scuttled along the pathway to follow the boat, taking pains to keep out of sight. After an hour of following the lifeboat’s slow progress around to the northwest side of the island, he understood that they were planning to come ashore not far from the house. He left the trail and ran to hide himself in the small shack that housed the Zodiac. He took the safety off the shotgun, checked to make sure there was a shell in the firing chamber, and waited.

*

The instructions the First Mate had received from Captain Braun were to go ashore and see whether anyone lived there and if so, kill him and bring the body to be dumped overboard when the
Helen of Troy
freed itself from the reef. The Captain was certain in his own mind that such an eventuality would happen. He had no idea that the whereabouts of his ship was known, that a Canadian Naval submarine was within a mile of him or that his vessel was irretrievably grounded on one of the most notorious reefs in the area. He did know that he was on Rocky Island. When the fog lifted and he could see the lighthouse beacon flashing the Morse signal RI, the Second Mate had finally figured out the location.

The First Mate had set off on his manhunt with some misgivings, but he knew better than to disobey Braun’s orders. He finally made out the landing place and instructed his crew to go as quietly as possible into the small cove. There they beached the boat and got out, cautiously looking around. He decided to attack the house, figuring that at such an early hour, anyone there would be sleeping. He had no idea that the whereabouts of the ship were known or that a man with a shotgun was tracking his own location. He carried his rifle in both hands, ready to lift and fire if necessary.

When they had passed the shack, Toby stepped out behind them and in a loud voice commanded, “Drop the gun and raise your hands.”

All five whirled in surprise and the Mate lifted the rifle as though to shoot. Toby, already aiming for the man’s legs, pulled the trigger and a load of buckshot tore into the legs of the man with the rifle. He fell hard, screaming, the rifle flying off to one side. Toby pumped the shotgun, ejecting the cartridge and moving another into the chamber.

“Anyone else want a load of buckshot?” he asked in a hard voice.

The four Filipino crewmen stood with their hands in the air, obviously frightened. The First Mate continued to scream in pain.

“Lie down on your faces, hands behind your back,” commanded Toby. “Now! Quick!”

The four responded as fast as they could.

Allison had heard the gunshot and came flying out of the house.

“Toby!” she yelled.

“It’s okay, Allie. One man’s shot, I need some rope to tie up the other four. I’m okay. Can you get some rope, please? Fast?”