His stock included a wide variety of boats, from small fishing craft, the type that appealed to most tourists, to sailboats of up to thirty feet, a couple of weather-beaten shrimpers, even a battle-scarred old Navy surplus LCM, military shorthand for Landing Craft, Mechanized. Why he hadn't sold that wretched monstrosity for scrap, he wasn't sure. Likely a stupid exercise in sentimentality. He had helped rescue more than one floundering landing craft as a Navy CPO in the South Pacific during World War II. There it sat on a wooden slip next to the protected inlet, waiting like a bride at the altar knowing the groom would never show. The steel ramp that had once been lowered to faraway beaches to off-load vehicles and troops clung to its sides, forming what looked from above like a bread pan fit for King Kong.
Peyton sat with feet propped on the edge of his desk in the small, paper-strewn office that occupied a corner of the main boat shed, listening to the ping, ping, ping of a hammer chipping paint. The only relief from the drabness of the place was a several-years-old calendar on the faded gray metal wall. It featured a large photo of a smiling, deeply-tanned girl in a red bikini. He wasn't dead yet, Scooter would let you know in a hurry.
When he detected the sound of a car rolling along the graveled drive, he didn't bother to get up, figuring it was just old Homer, the decrepit mail man. But when he finally looked around, there stood a stranger dressed in khaki pants, a green knit shirt and a white cap with a blue anchor stitched on the front. Dollar signs suddenly flashed in front of his bloodshot eyes.
"You Mr. Peyton?" the stranger asked. "I'm Blythe Ingram. I understand you have a landing craft for rent."
"Uh… well," Scooter stammered for a moment. "You sure come to the right place, mister. I got the only one for miles around. How long would you need her?"
A short man with a husky build and tanned face and arms, products of weekends spent on his prized toy, a powerful inboard that came close to qualifying in the yacht category, Ingram glanced at the outdated calendar. "I'd say about three weeks should do it. Is the boat in seaworthy condition?"
"Yes, sir. Been in dry dock for a while. Setting there just waiting for somebody to put her keel in the bay. Got your own crew?"
Ingram nodded. "I'm a former Marine. I've handled landing craft."
"If you don't mind my asking, what do you intend to use that old scow for?"
"I'm with PWI. I've got a couple of vehicles and some equipment to haul out to Oyster Island for a series of tests we're running." He shrugged as if it were no big deal.
A small blip on navigational charts of the Gulf of Mexico, Oyster Island lay twenty-eight nautical miles south-southwest of Apalachicola. Shaped somewhat like an oyster shell, it measured only about one mile by a mile and a half, hardly enough to produce a hiccup should the vast sea choose to swallow it up some stormy night.
"PWI. That'd be—"
"Pan West Industries. We own the island. PWI's a defense contractor."
Scooter's brow rumpled as he nodded. "Just about the biggest, ain't you? Yeah, I saw the Coast Guard Notice to Mariners. Stand clear for the next thirty days, ain't it?"
"Right." Ingram grinned. "We're having a little fireworks. Don't want anyone getting hurt."
"I thought you folks had your own boats or helicopters or planes?"
Why is the old cuss so damned inquisitive, Ingram wondered? He hadn't planned to say any more than necessary. His instructions were to keep everything low key, remain as inconspicuous as possible. But, he realized, the owner of a rental boat was entitled to know what his equipment was to be used for.
"Most of the time we do," Ingram said. "This is just a small project, though. It wasn't worth tying up the PWI fleet."
Oyster Island and the PWI fleet fell under Ingram’s jurisdiction as president of the Weapons Division of Pan West Industries. A sharp businessman with both an engineering degree and an MBA, he had early on caught the eye of Donald Newman, the elderly chairman of PWI.
"When would you want the three weeks to start?" Peyton asked.
"I'd like to get moving today. Any problem with that?"
"No sir. I'll tell the boys to be getting her ready to float, then I'll draw up the papers." He glanced at the old brass ship's clock on the wall. "Eleven be soon enough?"
Ingram nodded. "I'll be here at eleven sharp."
A wooded strip separated the section of beach from Highway 98, with only a narrow trail through the sun-baked brown sand leading out to the deserted shoreline. A small, hard-packed strip, the beach dropped off sharply beyond the high water mark. Signs warned against swimming in the area, which helped assure it would remain uninhabited.
The convoy that turned onto the access road around noon consisted of a Jeep and an oddly chopped-off white Chevy truck whose original configuration had included a fourteen-foot cargo container. The leader of the convoy, a man in his early thirties, climbed out of the Jeep and strode briskly toward the truck. He felt like a scoutmaster readying his troop for a foray into the wilds of summer camp. He had double-checked all the arrangements, inventoried the equipment and supplies. Everything was ready.
Known to others in the party simply as "Ted," he had answered to many different names during his clandestine career, including "Herr Mauser."
The scoutmaster image would not have been farfetched in earlier times. Ted's initial outlook had been shaped by the pattern of mainstream America's popular image, with respect for motherhood, a taste for apple pie, and reverence for God and country. When Operation Jabberwock came along, he had been so far weaned from his childhood concepts of propriety that worries about the scope of its destruction were swept aside. The "old man," also known as Foxhunter, assured him this was an unavoidable sacrifice to assure the lofty goal of a strong, secure America.
Both the Jeep Ted drove and the odd-looking Chevy had been purchased for cash from a used truck lot in Houston. The owner was listed as Lone Star Network, Inc. of Dallas. After its purchase, the truck had been driven to Birmingham, where a truck body customizer had made several modifications. The cargo compartment was closed off about halfway back, the rest of the roof removed, the open sides tapered downward to the rear, leaving only three-foot-high sides for the last few feet. Door panels for storage compartments lined the sides and rear. A heavy-duty, gasoline-powered generator and a hydraulic system were installed. The hydraulics maneuvered four steel feet that projected downward to raise the truck off the ground and level it. Also, a round hatch was built into the roof of the rear compartment.
Ted stopped at the driver's side of the truck. "Ingram should be here any time now. I'll go down the beach and keep an eye out for him."
The two occupants of the truck made an oddly contrasting pair. The driver was a short, wiry man with a compact frame named Gary Overmyer, a free-lance magazine writer, most recently from Memphis. More important for his current assignment, he had fought in Vietnam with Army Special Forces, receiving a field promotion to captain for his outstanding skills and leadership.