Authors: Tom Wright
My apprehension grew as the seconds passed. The men just stared at me. Finally, one of the men said something, and they all laughed. This further agitated my already frayed nerves. I wondered if anyone would come to my aid as these men—kids really—beat me to death. How long would it take for the Range to notice my absence and come looking for me? The skin around my testicles tightened as I remembered telling Bill that I was leaving. He might think I left and never come to look for me on Ebeye. Even if he knew, what could he do? Ebeye was sovereign Marshallese soil. Those kids could kill me, dump me in the ocean, and go back to their strip show. I reassured myself that all would be fine—Denver said so. I didn’t think he would put me in danger for two hundred bucks. Actually, I knew he wouldn’t do so intentionally, but he didn’t always have the best common sense.
Finally the kid re-emerged from the door with a gun. Two uniformed Marshallese police officers filed in behind him—the fat one from before and another skinny one.
The kid walked over and offered the gun to me. Everyone watched as I hesitated. I looked at the police officers, and they stared back. The fat one smiled, and his gold front tooth gleamed in the light. He nodded his head as if to encourage me.
“Go on, all you have to do is take it,” the leader said, in perfect English.
I pictured the mud floor of the Ebeye jail. I thought about men like this waiting for me there, all naked, and deprived. I knew Denver would bring me food and water in the jail, but that was the least of my concern.
I turned and ran.
I had barely made it to the hallway before someone got hold of my shirt and nearly tore it from me. It would take more than that to stop me.
I bolted down the hallway and pulled over a shelf as I neared the mid-way point. The man immediately on my tail fell, and the others tumbled over him.
I reached the stairs and bounded them three at a time. As I neared the top, another hand got hold of me. I burst through the door and ducked as a metal pipe swung toward me. The pipe went over my head and hit the man behind me square in the face. He sprawled backward down the stairwell, taking all the others with him.
I turned and watched as Denver dropped the pipe and took off down the alley way.
I suddenly realized that I had nowhere to go. It would take them about ten minutes to find a white guy anywhere on Ebeye.
I had only one hope. I sprinted toward the pier.
Half-way down the road, I snuck a peek behind me. The men were less than fifty yards back and closing.
I made a wide turn onto the main road and caught sight of the pier. An LCM was just beginning to pull away. Marshallese children pointed and laughed as I rumbled down the street at my top
speed, three-quarters of my shirt flapping behind me.
Just as I was nearing the pier, three security guards stepped out in front of me. I looked back, and my pursuers had yet to round the corner. The guard I had spoken to earlier yelled for me to sign out. I ignored him. Another guard laughed as I passed and yelled: “You’ll never make it.”
The LCM edged away from the dock as I scampered onto the boards of the pier. The guards, who suddenly noticed that I was being pursued, set out after me as well. Now beginning to tire, I ambled along the pier and felt the boards shaking under me as the guards closed. I reached the edge of the pier, and with one last thought about the Ebeye jail, leapt toward the LCM.
The tide was lower, and the drop felt like a hundred feet. In reality, it was about ten. I cleared the rail of the departing LCM and landed face-first among the assembled luggage—to the shock of the people onboard. The captain in the wheelhouse didn’t notice the commotion until all the men came to a screeching halt at the edge of the pier and began yelling. The English-speaking, schedule-conscious captain pointed to his watch, waved, honked, and gunned the throttle for Kwaj.
The gang leader stood and watched us pull away. He smiled mockingly as he held up my envelope. He opened it and began counting. It contained over a thousand dollars.
8
8 P.M., WEDNESDAY MAY 30TH - KWAJALEIN, MARSHALL ISLANDS
When I got back to Kwaj, I rode straight to Jeff’s quarters so we could brainstorm some other way to get a gun.
A note stuck to his door read: “Matt, We’re ready to play, so meet us at the usual spot a.s.a.p. Jeff.”
My mind raced. When did this happen? What’s wrong now? I was suddenly sick with the thought of them leaving without me. I told myself that they wouldn’t.
I rode as fast as I could to my quarters, avoiding eye contact with anyone I encountered. I raced to the door and found an identical note from Jeff taped to my door. I raced inside, grabbed my duffle bag, and took one last look at our quarters. I knew we would never return. Even if things worked out, we’d probably not be allowed back. The girls would never laugh and play with their friends in our living room again. I’d never tuck Lee into his bed in his room again. Kate and I would never hold hands and watch another sunset over the rocks behind our quarters again. We’d never make love to the pitter-patter of tropical rain on our fiberglass dome again. Kate loved Kwaj and I hated making that decision without her.
Just as I was about to leave, I rushed back over to the box on the floor and retrieved the photo album
I’d found earlier. I decided that there had to be room on the boat for one photo album.
I bolted through the door and turned to lock it out of habit. In the hesitation, I spotted Lee’s bike again. It was still leaning against a pole. I noticed rust forming on the wheel.
The emotion I felt was startled out of me as someone rode by. I collected myself and left in a rush.
It took only a few minutes to reach Bill’s quarters. He lived in one of the many bachelor’s quarters on Kwaj—which amounted to a glorified hotel room. I bounded up the steps to the second floor and found Bill’s door. I knocked quietly at first, then more loudly, and finally I pounded on the door. Bill did not answer. I waited, pounded again, and then jiggled the handle. It was unlocked.
I walked into Bill’s darkened quarters and flipped on the light switch. He was not there. His quarters were tidy, almost clinical. Except for the boxes of toothpicks stacked on a desk, there was hardly a sign that he lived there. A thought crossed my mind, but I quickly dismissed it knowing that no cop, especially not Bill, would ever leave an unsecured gun in an unlocked room.
I left Bill’s quarters as I had found it and took a less than direct route to the boathouse
so I could go past the police station one last time. The lights were on at the station, so I slowed as I passed and scanned the bike rack. Bill’s green and yellow huffy was not in the part of the rack labeled “Deputy Chief.” I sighed and rode on knowing it was over—I had failed and we would have no gun.
I arrived at the boathouse and found Jeff and Sonny loading the last of a pile of supplies into the dinghy.
“What’s going on?” I asked. “Has something else happened?”
“The commander is going to close the base at midnight,” Sonny whispered.
“Did you get anything from Bill?” Jeff asked.
“No.”
“Fuck.”
I slung my bag into the boat and grabbed my corner as we began to carry it toward the water. I glanced over my shoulder at the weather station across the runway. Even though I knew they would understand, terrible pangs of guilt erupted in my gut at the thought of abandoning my employees without so much as a word. I knew that they would be all right though.
We ambled quietly across the dirt road that ran along the lagoon. Just then a pair of headlights came around the corner about a half mile down the road. We scrambled up over the rocks and onto the beach. We dropped the dinghy on the sand and hid as best as we could.
A searchlight beamed out through the trees onto the water. We were almost certainly going to be seen.
“It’s the police van,” I whispered to Jeff.
“If he spots the dinghy, you guys stay where you are. I’ll make up a story,” Jeff said.
The van slowly crunched along the gravel road, its radiator fan whirring away. The light scanned out onto the water, just inches above our heads. The light flickered on by without touching us, and just as the glare receded, I saw a toothpick bobbing up and down in the driver’s side window.
I stood up.
“Get down,” Jeff pleaded. “He’s almost gone.”
“Bill!” I shouted.
The van lurched to a stop. The light swung around to me, then down to the dingy, and then back to me again. Then the light went out with a clink.
I climbed up the rocks as Bill got out of the van.
“Have you found anything yet?” I asked.
“I talked to a couple of guys, but, of course, they aren’t willing to part with their guns now—at any price.”
I glanced at the sidearm on Bill’s belt.
“Come on Matt. I might as well just go with you if I did that.”
“I know,” I said. “I just got back from Ebeye.”
“No luck?”
“Worse than that. I almost got myself killed.”
The bob of Bill’s toothpick increased, and he rubbed his forehead as he grappled with the gravity of our predicament.
“Speaking of running out of time, you had better get the hell out of here,” Bill said. “The commander has doubled our patrols. The shit is about to hit the fan around here.”
I extended my hand to Bill. He grabbed it and pulled me to him in a half hug.
“God damn it,” he whispered. “I’m really sorry.”
I nodded and punched him in the chest. “I’m gonna beat your ass at hoops when I get back,” I said.
Bill started to say something but couldn’t.
Jeff, Sonny, and I slipped into the dingy and paddled quietly out into the lagoon toward Jeff’s boat. Bill resumed his patrol. The light beamed back and forth across the lagoon, carefully avoiding us.
Suddenly, someone dashed across the road through Bill’s headlights. Bill barely avoided hitting him. The van’s lights reflected off the shiny new jogging suit. Randy stood next to the driver’s side door and looked out over the lagoon in our direction.
Randy’s annoying voice carried across the water. “What’s that out there?”
We froze in place.
“Nothing. Just a stingray,” Bill said. “It’s ok, I already checked it out.”
“Are you sure?”
Bill turned the spotlight into Randy’s face, causing him to shield his eyes.
“Why don’t you get in, Randy? I’ve been wanting to talk to you.”
His ego suddenly massaged, Randy happily complied. Bill kept the light on him until he got in the passenger’s side and then he drove off in a hurry. I considered Randy’s luck at being in the only place on earth a person like him could hope to survive given the kind of adversity our species suddenly faced. Survival of the fittest did not always hold true.
We quickly transferred our supplies from the dinghy to the sailboat. Once aboard, Jeff began issuing orders which we obeyed without question. Within a few minutes, we had untied from the buoy and began sputtering quietly northward through Kwajalein Lagoon. We cruised silently past the north end of Kwajalein Island and watched a couple of lights flick off as people retired for the night. A woman jogged down lagoon road. All looked normal.
Much of the rest of our trip to Bigej Pass entailed a furious race to organize and stow all the supplies and pull gasoline tanks out of the hold and lash them to the deck before we hit the open ocean. Jeff gave Sonny and me quick, basic sailing lessons. We tied knots, learned the names of various ropes and sails, and were told over and over again to walk on the high side of the deck.
At 2:00 am we crossed Bigej pass into the Pacific Ocean. Half an hour later, we lost sight of land—no more lights, just pitch black. I was already becoming desensitized to the emotion of leaving, but as the adrenaline wore off, I noticed a fear of the unknown creeping up on me. The constant movement of the boat wasn’t helping either. I immediately fell into a restless sleep on the hard deck.
I awakened to the sound of a siren. I sat up and rubbed away the confusion. The sun was up, but it was still early. A siren sounded again, and I stood up to take a look.
The police boat roared up from behind us, blue lights flashing. Bill stood on deck with two other officers that I recognized but didn’t know well. Bill rested his right hand on his gun and nervously worked a toothpick around in his mouth.
A voice belted from the loudspeaker: “Prepare to be boarded!”
Jeff hesitated. “What do we do now?”
“It’s Bill. Take it easy,” I replied.
“Maybe they’ve been ordered to bring us back,” Jeff worried.
“What purpose would that serve?” asked Sonny as he emerged from below decks. “It’s just three more mouths to feed.”
In less than a minute, the police boat was alongside the RY. Bill jumped aboard and landed awkwardly on the slippery, wet, rocking deck. I grabbed hold of his vest to steady him.
“You’re a little far out for a day sail, aren’t you?” asked Bill, smiling.
“Don’t tell me it’s time to come home already!” I replied.
Bill drew two handguns, one a standard police issue Glock 19 9mm and the other I couldn’t identify, and held them at his side.
I flinched involuntarily, startled by the normally undesirable action by a police officer.
With a flick of his wrists, Bill flipped the guns over and held them by the barrels and extended the handles toward me.
“I changed my mind,” he said.
I took the guns.
I glanced at the other two officers—both young, slender, and tan. They shielded their eyes from the rising sun but said nothing. The wind pushed at the boats, and the tide pulled which drew them ever closer. One of the young officers shifted the police boat into reverse and goosed the engine to avoid a bump.
“The thought crossed my mind that you had come out to bring us back,” I said, looking back at Bill.
He considered his answer as he took off a black backpack and lowered it to the deck.
“We did. But it’s a big ocean, and we couldn’t find you,” Bill said as he winked at us. “If I didn’t think this was the safest place on earth, I’d have come out here to force my way aboard so I could go with you!”
“Thanks, man,” was all I could muster.
“I just hope everything is cleared up by the time you get home, but I am not holding my breath. Say hello to Kate and the kids for me, would you?”
“I sure will,” I said.
“What about the daily inventory,” I asked, motioning to the Glock.
“Already filled out the paperwork this morning,” Bill said. “The safety strap on my holster must have come unbuckled somehow, ‘cause when I got out of the van on the dock last night, it slipped out and went into the drink. Probably divers down there looking for it right now. I don’t guess they’ll find anything. “
Bill smiled.
“What about the other one?” I asked.
“It’s the darndest thing. I’m driving Randy home this morning, and I start grilling him over this story I heard a while back about how he has a gun he got from Ebeye. It didn’t take five minutes and he’s singing like a canary. That son of a bitch practically begged me to take it from him.”
Everybody laughed.
“Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy,” said one of the officers.
“You’re a life saver,” I said to Bill, not realizing at the time how true that was.