299 Days: The 17th Irregulars

Chapter 183 The Rental Team

“What about a ‘rental team’?” Grant said.

“A ‘rental team,’” He repeated, letting that sink in. “We’ll say that we, the Team, are training up a second team.” People looked puzzled.

Grant smiled and continued. “Pierce Point will rent out the second team to a neighboring community in exchange for food and gas. They’ll be a rental team.”

Grant looked at Ted and grinned. “This will explain all the increasingly large food and other supplies the Patriots will be sending out here, right?”

Ted chuckled. Already, Grant was leveraging Ted for more supplies. That was what a good leader does for his men, and Ted respected that.

“Here’s what we’ll tell need-to-know people in Pierce Point,” Grant said. “The rental team will be working to guard some neighboring community’s crops and livestock, stored food, and their people, of course. We have to keep the training secret, we’ll tell people, because the community hiring the rental team doesn’t want people to know they have food worthy of guarding. Also, the Loyalists might get uptight about a second group of well-armed men out here. And we can say that we are keeping the ‘rental team’ secret because we don’t want the gangs in Frederickson or anywhere else to know we got guys with valuable guns out here. Whaddya think?”

Ted had been smiling as Grant first started describing the idea. Maybe it wasn’t so bad to have a lawyer out there. He never thought he’d say that. But then again, lawyers were trained in deception. Ted’s ex-wife’s lawyer was a good example of that.

“Fabulous idea,” Ted said before anyone else could.

“Very nice,” Sap said. He was kicking himself that he hadn’t thought of it.

Ted, wanting to give Rich the respect he deserved as the de facto leader out at Pierce Point, said to him, “Sound good to you, Rich?”

Rich nodded and said with a grin, “It’ll work just fine. It covers all the bases: a reason for the secrecy, an explanation for why strangers are here, and an incentive for Pierce Point to have them out here and to keep quiet about it. I love it.”

“Oh yeah,” Rich said. Not wanting to leave Dan out, he said, “Whaddya think, Dan?”

“Works for me,” Dan answered. Dan was understating himself. It more than worked for him; he thought it was brilliant.

“OK, then, we have a cover story for Pierce Point’s guerilla unit,” Ted said. “By the way, I’m going to bring that cover story back to HQ and suggest we use it elsewhere. I’d like you to come with me, Grant, and meet some people.”

Grant felt a rush of enthusiasm and pride. Ted wants me to come to HQ?

“Hell, yes,” Grant blurted out, just like the excited little boy he was at that moment.

Ted smiled and said, “That way you can correct me if I start to take credit for this idea.” Of course, Ted really wanted to get Grant out to Boston Harbor, have all the brass tell Grant how wonderful he was, and then have Grant commit to the unique mission they were planning to ask Grant to undertake.

“I’ll keep you honest,” Grant said. He knew he was being wooed to get him even more firmly committed, and to get Pierce Point’s support. He didn’t care. He wanted to do it. He knew this was part of the plan for what he was supposed to do. He was getting that weird feeling again where he could see the pathway of what the future held. Not all the details, just the basic pathway. He knew he was supposed to do this.

With the cover story taken care of, they moved onto the next big topic.

“What kind of facilities have you got out here that we could use?” Sap asked. A long discussion ensued between Rich and Dan about some of the local properties. They settled on the Marion Farm. Grant laughed out loud when he heard the name. He thought of Francis Marion, the “Swamp Fox” in the Revolutionary War who led rebels against the British and hoped to replicate that.

The Marion Farm was a recently abandoned farm in one of the most remote parts of Pierce Point. It was near the very end of Peterson Inlet so there was a beach landing about a quarter mile from the property. The farm had been foreclosed on about two years earlier, but Ken Dolphson, the realtor, told Rich that he was still trying to sell it and that it still had electrical and water service. The utility companies weren’t even trying to shut off service anymore, which was a blessing. All the livestock and crops were gone, but the farmhouse and a big barn remained. There was a large machine shop and several outbuildings. It didn’t look very pretty after two years of abandonment, but that was actually good. No one would think anyone would be living there.

The Marion Farm had one little road in and out. There were not many houses on that road. The people in the houses along the road would be key; they had to be trustworthy.

“Would this place work?” Rich asked Ted after he had described it.

“Probably,” Ted said. “We’ll need to see it, of course, but it’s a good start.”

“How are we gonna feed a hundred fighters?” Chip asked.

“This is why it’s nice to be in the Patriot supply system,” Sap said with a smile. “We steal it. Lots of it. We have quite a few ‘requisition teams’ out hitting Loyalist semis. Trust me, you’ll eat well.”

“So this place is near a beach landing?” Ted asked. “That’s how we could get supplies there. And then move them along the quarter-mile, did you say, road to the compound?” Ted was thinking. This might work, depending on what the place looked like. He at least had a solid proposal to take back to headquarters. They had done a tremendous amount of work so far tonight. They got the Pierce Point leaders on board and might have a facility.

Ted looked at his watch. He wanted to start acting on the plans before Rich and Dan had time to rethink their decision to participate.

“Hey,” Ted said, “you guys mind if Sap and I go out and get a quick tour of the Marion place? We have a boat here. I want to see how the beach landing is and how far it is to the place. We won’t be able to see much of the place in the dark, but it’s better than nothing. I mean, we’re already out here. We might as well make the most of it.”

The guys were tired. But they all said, “Sure.”

Dan said, “Rich, you can take them. I’m tired. And I’ve learned what I needed here tonight.” Ted and Sap were hanging on Dan’s every word to make sure he was on board.

Dan looked at Ted and Sap and said, “I’m OK with you guys coming out here with the conditions I set out: no poaching and keep it totally secret.” He said this knowing that there was no way Ted and Sap could abide by these terms, but he wanted them to succeed out there. He was glad they showed up and would make Pierce Point even better than it was.

“How many spots you got in the boat?” Scotty asked. The Team had been virtually silent for about two hours, which was unusual. Everyone on the Team wanted to hang out with the Green Berets.

“Four,” Sap said. “So, with Rich showing us the place, we can have one passenger.”

“Paul,” Grant said. “He’s your most valuable passenger. He knows the tides out here. Knowing whether you can use the beach landing will be critical. Paul will help with that.”

Ted had met Paul now twice when he came ashore and didn’t want even one more person to know about the Marion place than was necessary.

“Could we keep Paul at the landing so he doesn’t see the place?” Ted asked.

“Sure,” Grant said. “It is a good idea, but he’ll figure it out.”

Rich got up to leave with Ted and Sap. “Well, I think we’re done here this evening, gentlemen,” Rich said, like he had been on board with this idea the whole time.

It was past Grant’s bed time. He would have fallen asleep if it wasn’t for the extremely important topics being discussed. He said goodnight to everyone and made sure to thank Ted and Sap for coming out. He left the yellow cabin and headed home, waving at Gideon as he passed his post.

Grant was a liar. He had to tell his family that nothing was going on. He had to lie. Lives literally depended on it. He thought about how Lisa would react when it was time for him to ship out with the guerilla unit and she found out that he had been lying to her for months. His marriage would be over. “Never go off to a war that you don’t have to,” he heard his Grandpa saying. But Grant had to…didn’t he?

He spent the next few minutes in his bedroom with a sleeping Lisa as he tried to get undressed quietly so he wouldn’t wake her. He was also silently debating with himself about whether he really needed to do this Ted project thing. His brain was back in the loop of debating whether he should join up and fight a war.

Grant fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow. That was his body’s way of telling him that he had made the right decision.