“You all know what we’re about to do,” he said. “We’ve gone over that enough times. I have no doubt we will accomplish our part of the operation, and be able to carry out the subsequent parts as well. I have no doubt. I have no doubt, men, because I know that what we’re about to do today will change the history of the United States and the world. That is how important I feel our mission is.”
Jason cleared his throat again, and then paused.
“We are the sentries of freedom,” he said, his voice low. A man near the back of the truck coughed. “We are the sentries of freedom, and we are standing on the bulwarks of a great nation and defying the world to challenge our greatness, defying the world to abandon its opinion of the United States as a weak and compromising nation instead of the great and powerful nation it is. That is what we are doing here today in Ocho Puertos. That is exactly what we are doing here today.”
He strapped on the gun, letting the holster hang low on his right thigh. There was an air of excitement in the truck now, and the men began to murmur when Clay turned on his seat in the cab and knocked on the small rear window. Clay pointed dead ahead to indicate they were coming off the bridge. Jason nodded.
“I want that town,” Jason said. “There are seven houses in that town, all on the beach, really eight if we want to count the Westerfield house across the main highway — but that’s empty until December, so we don’t have to worry about it. Seven houses and a diner and a tackle shop and a marina, and that’s it, and that’s our objective. I want that town, and I want it by eight A.M.”
They heard the smoother rumble of the truck wheels as they came off the bridge and onto Little Duck. The inside of the truck went still all at once. They waited, and suddenly the wheels made a brief thudding sound and they knew they were crossing another short bridge, the smooth rumble once more, they were on Missouri Key, they waited, another bridge, there, they were on Ohio now, they held their breaths, it took forever to cross Bahia Honda, the truck tires whined, any moment now, they were crossing another bridge, and then the sound changed again, there was the feel of solid land beneath them.
“Ocho Puertos,” Jason whispered.
2
From where Luke Costigan stood on the deck of the catamaran, he could see the red truck turning off U.S. 1 and rolling past the sign advertising the diner and its good food and drink. The truck came out of the rising sun, almost as though a small red section of the sun had slipped free of the horizon and somehow spilled onto the highway and bounced off onto the dusty cutoff leading to the town. The truck took the turn faster than it should have, but then began slowing almost at once, not quite stopping outside the diner, but dropping speed considerably, and then immediately picking up speed again until it was just abreast of the white shanty that was Bobby’s Bait and Tackle Shop. There was a great deal of dust behind the truck, and for a moment Luke was not quite sure he had really seen two men in the road behind it, both wearing blue. Then the truck was in motion again, and there was a great deal more dust obscuring his vision as the truck gained speed and headed for the marina. Luke watched the truck coming down the road, his eyes squinted, one hand resting on the deck rail. The truck slowed again, just outside the marina, and, as Luke watched, two men carrying rifles dropped from the rear of the truck, bent at the knees as they hit the dusty road, and then sprang erect almost immediately and began running toward the marina with their rifles at the ready. The truck was picking up speed again, heading for the first of the beachfront development houses. Luke glanced only briefly at the moving truck, and then quickly turned back toward the two men, both of whom were wearing dungaree trousers and blue chambray shirts, watching them as they came across the lawn toward the pier, where he was clearly visible on the boat’s deck. He was not at all frightened, not even apprehensive, about the appearance of two men with rifles on his lawn. He was curious and somewhat puzzled, but a part of his mind told him this was only some sort of Navy drill, probably some sailors from the base in Key West.
The first man stopped some four feet away from the boat and slowly lowered his rifle so that the barrel was level with Luke’s midsection. In that same moment Luke caught movement on his right and turned his head only briefly, really turned only his eyes, and saw that two other men in dungarees and chambray shirts were breaking in the door to Bobby’s shop not two hundred yards away. The truck was moving off up the road, raising dust behind it; two men in blue were rushing across the lawn of the Parch house, heading for the front door. Luke Costigan suddenly smelled danger and immediately reached for the socket wrench lying near the ladder.
“Hold it,” one of the men said. He was redheaded and had a crew haircut, and he could not have been older than twenty. He held the rifle steady, his finger inside the trigger guard.
“What is this?” Luke said.
“Just you keep your hands away from that wrench, mister,” the redhead said. “Raise ’em up over your head, go on.”
“What is this?” Luke said again.
“Mister,” the other man said, “this is pretty damn serious, whatever it is. So just pick up your hands, like Benny told you, and put them up over your head.”
“Come on,” Benny said.
Luke hesitated another instant. Curiously, and seemingly without reason, he thought abruptly of Hurricane Donna in 1960, and how she had destroyed the marina he had owned in Islamorada. And then he remembered Omaha Beach and the bullet that had caught him in the right calf, and suddenly the two memories merged, France in June of 1944 and Islamorada in September of 1960. He looked at these two men with rifles in their hands and all he could think of was that he had been hurt twice before.
“Mister, you want me to shoot?” Benny asked.
“No,” Luke said. “No, don’t shoot.” Slowly he raised his hands over his head.
“Anybody here yet?” the man with Benny asked.
“No. I was moving some boats into the cove,” he explained. “There’s a hurricane supposed to be coming.”
“Bobby and Sam ain’t arrived yet, huh?” Benny said, and he grinned at Luke, and for the first time since they had entered his yard, Luke felt a shiver of dread. “We better get inside, huh?” Benny said. “We’re gonna have company soon.” He gestured at Luke with the rifle. Luke began limping toward the side door of the marina office. Beyond his buildings he could see the two other men in blue entering the bait shop, and he suddenly wished that Bobby would not be drunk this Sunday morning.
The battering on the door of the shanty had not awakened him, and neither had the splintering of the wood on the jamb, or the rasp of the lock screws ripping loose. He had blinked only partially awake when he heard the sound of heavy work boots on the loose floor planking, but now a man stood over him, shaking him, and Bobby Colmore squinted up at him and then thought he was having a bad dream, and tried to roll over against the wall. The man’s hand was firm on his shoulder and he could not turn. He opened his eyes wider.