The Double-Crosser
Trace stepped quietly up the companionway steps.
“I haven’t run into an iceberg or anything,” Kelsey said.
“You’re coming along nicely,” Trace quipped. “You may have a second career in the Australian Navy.”
“I’m through with the ocean,” Kelsey said. “I feel like I’m perpetually about to chunder.”
“Some people are made for the sea, and others fill the sea with chum,” Trace said.
“Did you find what you were looking for?” Kelsey asked.
“I did.”
“And…?” Kelsey said.
Trace lifted up on his toes and looked down at the instrument panel. “…And we drop our sails and wait. We are at the coordinates sent to the Navy.”
Trace grabbed the phone and called Sage’s and Tom’s cabin to get up and drop the sails.
He asked Kelsey to contact the Royal Australian frigate for an ETA. It was two hours.
He called Makani and told him to have breakfast ready in an hour.
Sage unchained Franks and Paul and led them to the salon. They had plenty of questions, but nobody answered them.
The Tramp Islander sat quietly on a calm sea. The crew sat at the table eating breakfast. Makani sat on a stool in the galley. Idle chatter bounced around the table.
“There’s been something that has troubled me the last couple of days,” Trace said.
There were a couple of curious responses.
“We kind of outdid the plane,” Trace said. “We changed course, and if the plane was sent up, it didn’t find us.”
“What troubles me is how they found us?” Trace said. “ It is a very big ocean. Dumb luck? Maybe they figured us out and knew what we would do? Then I wondered, is there any way for them to track us?”
The consensus between Sage and Tom was luck.
“Makani!” Trace said back toward the galley. “You want to get in on this?”
“I go with Sage and Tom,” Makan said. “It luck.”
“Yeah,” Trace said, “that’s what I settled on.”
“What about you, Kelsey?” Sage said.
“It’s like they say, mate, it’s better to be lucky than good.”
“Kelsey will attest to this,” Trace said. “If you settle on one reason, you owe it to yourself to eliminate the others. If you don’t, they will nag at you and keep you awake at night. There’s something about the sea: because there’s so much nothing, your mind isn’t cluttered, and you can really think. You can solve about any problem. You can even figure yourself out, not to mention figuring others out as well.”
“He’s right,” Kelsey said.
“I began to wonder,” Trace said, “to qualify being found by luck, the other ways would have to be eliminated, and it might mean we had to be tracked somehow. But how?”
“Some sort of tracking device?” Tom asked.
“And it would have to be hidden, right?” Sage said.
“Exactly,” Trace said. “So I looked. And guess what I found? A tracking device.”
“Where?” Kelsey asked.
“Sage,” Trace said, “Scoot over, and Tom open the seat.”
Sage moved over, and Tom lifted the seat.
“Go ahead, take it out,” Trace told Tom.
Tom held up a small black box slightly larger than a pack of cigarettes. A D cell battery was attached to it.
“I’m no expert,” Trace said, “but my money is on it being some sort of tracking device.”
“Where did you find it?” Sage asked.
“That’s where I found it,” Trace said.
“Not a good place to hide it,” Sage said. “That doesn’t even qualify as a hiding place for anything.”
“You’re right, Sage,” Trace said. “It was hidden and in a pretty clever place. I’ll get to that in a minute.”
“So,” Trace continued, “it wasn’t luck. I toyed with the idea that it may have been planted. But as you said, Sage, who would plant something that could be easily found? It didn’t square with me.”
“It’s one of the crew,” Sage said.
“That’s right,” Trace said. “I examined everybody. I hate to say this, but it could have been anybody. Doesn’t everybody have a price? At least, that’s what they say. And I kinda went under that assumption, no matter how uncomfortable it made me feel.”
“Which one?” Kelsey said.
“There’s no such thing as a perfect crime,” Trace said. “There are always clues. If a crime is never solved, it’s not for the lack of clues. They are there. It’s just not finding the ones that are there.”
“And what clues did you find?” Sage said.
“You look for things that are out of place,” Trace said. “But if somebody is intent on hiding their intent, they make sure things are not out of place. My dad told me that people try to lie, but always slip up. I tried to recall things that were said and seemed strange, but you know, it just didn’t register at the time.”
Sage leaned back in his seat. “Trace, ole buddy, you’re hopin’ somebody will say it’s me, and jump overboard and start swimming for New Caledonia.”
Makani walked out of the galley. He leaned against the doorway to the mess.
“Have a seat, Makani,” Trace said.
Makani sat next to Trace.
“It’s you, Makani,” Trace said. “It crushes my heart. I’m sick in the pit of my stomach.”
Makani’s face tightened. He stared at Trace.
Trace stared back and said. “I not staying here much longer. I was going to give, give The Tramp Islander to you.”
“It mean nothing,” Makani said.
“A few weeks ago,” Trace said, “somebody said, ‘How do you make instant mashed potatoes taste like real potatoes?’ And Makani, you said you never use instant potatoes. And somebody said they had to be instant because there are no lumps. You replied that you really take the time to make them creamy.”
“I remember that conversation,” Sage said.
“This morning, I dug through our food invoices,” Trace said, still staring at Makani. “We order a lot of instant mashed potatoes in cans. This morning we had a case with six cans. Over the last three months, we’ve ordered eighteen cases of instant mashed potatoes. The funny thing is that our bills don’t reflect it. We were only charged for a can, but we got a whole case. So what happens to all the cases? We leave you alone on the boat a lot. I think you use that time to get rid of whatever is in the cans labeled instant potatoes.”
Makani looked away. He stared out the porthole.
Trace continued. “A couple of hours ago, I went to our food supply room. There, I found a case of instant potatoes. I didn’t open them in the galley. I didn’t want to wake anyone, so they were taken to the engine room. I opened them there. Guess what I found? Instant powdered mashed potatoes! I emptied one can, and guess what? A sealed plastic bag of white powder. Who guesses baby powder?” Trace looked around the table. “Nobody.”
Everyone moved uncomfortably in their seats.
Trace moved forward and attempted to look into Makani’s eyes. Makani turned his head further away.
“You’re smuggling drugs, Makani,” Trace said quietly. “You put your crew, your friends, and yourself at risk.”
Makani turned his head to face Trace.
“I’m not done,” Trace said. “When Sage needed an empty beer can to make an explosive device, you insisted on getting it for him. You wanted to make sure Sage didn’t go into the galley and grab the first beer can he saw. That can had been sitting on a shelf for several days. Nobody goes in the galley but you, so you felt comfortable with where it was sitting. It had the tracking device that was under Sage’s seat. When you removed it from the can, you didn’t have time to find a proper hiding place. How am I doing so far?”
Makani lifted his head. He stared above the portholes.
“I pulled back the curtain to the porthole in the galley. On each side was a sticky, glue-like substance. I looked in the drawers and cabinets. And guess what I found?’ A mirror with a sticky glue-like substance, matching what I found on the porthole. The tracking device will get you in the right neighborhood during the night, but finding the right house, that’s the trick, and if there’s no light on, the next best thing is a mirror. A ship with a spotlight from a distance could be missed, but if it had something to reflect, it would stand out.”
“You not prove nothing,” Makani said.
“I don’t care if I can or not,” Trace said. “I know, and now we all know. Go over there and sit with Franks and Paul.”
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