“Right turn,” Bones called out as they approached the opening in the reef. Maddock lifted his paddle from the water while Bones dug his in, and the cumbersome model swung to the right.
“Straight ahead!” Bones relished his role as rowing captain; he’d been a leader in that area back in BUDS, and he called out directions with gusto, leaning into his paddle strokes, giving it everything he had. Maddock knew that he somehow had a good sense for how to control the ungainly craft, and he followed orders, doing his best to keep them off the reef. And then they were shooting through the cut, flying into open ocean, the breakers spraying off the sides of their boat-plane that had just delivered them from the atoll.
“We made it!” Bones yelled. He turned around to look back at the distant beach. “Screw you guys!”
Maddock stared at his friend, resting. Bones saw that Maddock wasn’t sharing in his enthusiasm.
“Now what?”
“Do you know where we’re going, Bones?”
The burly Cherokee stared out to sea, at the largest body of water on the planet, the Pacific Ocean. “I guess not.”
Maddock reached into his backpack and brought out the digital camera. He activated the screen while they floated there, just beyond the reef. He scrolled through the images he’d taken, seeking the ones he’d snapped during their helicopter flight in.
“Here.” He held the camera’s small screen so Bones could see it. “This is the nearest island to here that had any kind of civilization on it.”
Bones squinted at the picture, which showed a white sandy beach fringed with palm trees, with a row of over-water bungalows stretching out over an aquamarine lagoon. “Oh, I remember that. But geez, Maddock, by helo that place was like ten or fifteen minutes away….in this thing it could take…days.”
“Then we better start rowing.”
Bones looked out to sea. “Which way?”
Maddock oriented them with the photograph, pointing off into the distance. Bones looked up at the sky and fixed their position against the rapidly fading stars. “I learned celestial navigation as a kid to honor my ancestors. It’s getting light out now but I can fix our position by the stars to get underway on the right course and then hopefully it won’t be cloudy when the sun comes out and I can use that.”
“Well then — hey, look!” Maddock pointed off to their right, where a sleek, dark shape moved slowly along the surface.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Bones slapped his forehead. “Shankey! We can’t take any hits in this thing, Maddock, if he—”
“Hold up, look. He’s not coming at us.” The pilot whale stopped and spyhopped, sticking its head vertically out of the water. It looked at Maddock and Bones, made some clicking noises, then turned and swam off in the opposite direction.
“He’s not going to attack us? No freaking way!”
“Nope. Just wanted to say thanks for getting him out of that tank, I guess.”
Bones called after the whale. “Later, dude. Hope you find yourself a hot porpoise babe or two.”
Laughing, the two SEALs paddled out to sea, the sun rising off to their right.
Chapter 34
“I never want to look at another coconut as long as I live. No pina coladas, either.” Bones stepped from the model Electra onto the sun-dappled, sandy bottom in front of a picturesque, palm-studded beach. “Well, maybe a pina colada. I’m not an unreasonable man.”
Maddock eased the old crate down to him and then got out next, wearing his backpack and splashing into the waist-deep water. They hauled the heavy crate to shore and laid in the soft sand.
“Check it out.” Bones pointed at a cluster of grass huts off to their left. “Where there’s grass huts, there might be scantily-clad ladies.”
“Hold up. We should do something with our trusty steed here.”
“Do something with it? Like what?”
Maddock shrugged. “It’ll attract a lot of attention if we just leave it here. We should sink it.”
“Sink it?” Bones hefted the crate.
“Yeah, just rip a hole in the bottom and sink it right here, so it’s out of sight and probably won’t be found by anybody until after we’ve left.”
“Good idea. It’ll keep the historians busy, too, whenever it’s finally found and they say, ‘Hey, look. It’s an old Electra! Must be Amelia Earhart’s!”
Maddock grinned. “Let’s get her out to deeper water and sink her.” He ignored Bones’ grumbling as they took Electra away from shore.
“Mind if I do the honors?” Bones asked. “I’ve got my coconut opener right here.” He unsheathed his dive knife and gashed a hole in the plane’s thin, sheet metal side just below the water line. He ripped another gash and then another. A few more hacks and water began filling the craft. They watched as the plane settled lower in the water, then swam back to the beach where Bones kissed the sand for dramatic effect.
When Maddock looked back at the plane, it was almost entirely submerged.
“No way am I lugging this damn thing all the way over there.” Bones prodded the crate with his toe and cast a tired glance down the beach toward the cluster of buildings.
Maddock pointed at some scrub brush at the top of the beach. “We can hide it here until it’s time to go.” They obscured the crate under the brush and then set off down the beach. At the far end they saw sunbathers lying out on lounge chairs, even a couple of kids playing ball. They took a manicured path up off the beach through a landscaped area to a thatched hut. A faded wooden sign reading “Tiki Bar” hung from the thatched roof.
“Score!” Bones looked the happiest Maddock had ever seen him. An elderly gentleman of Pacific Island descent tended bar for a smattering of customers, but there were plenty of open seats. Maddock and Bones, shirtless and shoeless and more than a little sunburned after their marathon open water paddle, didn’t look all that out of place as they took two barstools. Maddock thought the bartender might question whether they were staying here, but he simply asked if he could get them something to drink. He told them that he was running a special on coconut rum drinks and Bones grimaced.
Both of them ordered waters, draft beers and meals of fried fish. As they drank the delightfully cold beverages, Bones lowered his voice and said to Maddock, “You have any cash in that backpack?”
Maddock frowned and scratched his head. “Let me think. I’ve got a digital camera, my address book, and a bunch of old pictures that Amelia Earhart took.”
Bones nodded and took another sip from his beer. “So how are we going to pay for this?”
Maddock grinned. “Oh yeah, and a little spare cash. Drinks are on me.”
“Did I ever tell you you’re my best friend?” Bones raised his beer in salute.
Maddock took the address book from his pack and opened it. “But if we’re lucky, we can get Uncle Sam to pay.”
He asked the bartender if he could use the telephone, having no idea if there was one. The man smiled and brought out an old, corded, push-button phone from under the bar and set it in front of Maddock before turning back to another customer. Maddock lifted the handset from the cradle and put an ear to it. He nodded. Dial tone. He consulted his book and placed the call to the encrypted military line.
Maddock grinned as he pressed the buttons, entering the code to access the military satellite network. They both knew it was not that simple, of course. The pickup had been carefully prearranged and discussed during the military helicopter flight from the destroyer en route to San Diego International. From the time they made the call, a complex chain reaction of logistical events would be put into action that culminated in an unmarked, high-speed, long-range helicopter landing on the beach approximately six hours later.