The Lotus Eaters

Punta Gorgona Naval Station, Balboa, Terra Nova

"Hang on!" Lourdes shouted over the thrum of the engine. She throttled down to nothing, letting momentum carry her craft forward while aiming the bow of the boat toward the dock but away from the five patrol boats tied up to it. She wasn't very good with the boat, no experience, after all, but that didn't matter. All that mattered was that she hit the former and avoid the latter.

Artemisia didn't move except to clutch the children tighter to her. She hadn't moved, to speak of, since the tears had dried perhaps an hour before. Her lips still whispered, "Mac . . . Mac . . . Mac," with some regularity.

A sailor on one of the boats, the stern said "San Agustin," shouted and waved for them to veer off. Lourdes was having none of it. Instead, she ducked down seconds before the yacht crashed into the dock, crumpling its own bow and splitting pole and frame of the other. Lourdes and her passengers were thrown forward.

The sailor, still shouting imprecations, jumped from his own patrol boat to the yacht's deck. "Lady, are you out of your fucking mind?" The sailor then noticed she had a submachine gun slung over one shoulder and amended, "If you'll pardon my language, ma'am."

Lourdes stood straight and answered, "Possibly. To both. My name is Lourdes Carrera. I am Duque Carrera's wife. I need to see your senior man present and I need your help."

In the dim white light of two moons, one of them now setting, and the yellow light of streetlamps, the sailor peered at this strange woman's face.

"By God you are the Duque's wife." He turned away, toward a small building just off the dock, and shouted, "Chief! Chief Castro!"

* * *

"I've got the five boats, yes, Mrs. Carrera," the chief said, once Lourdes had explained as much as she knew. His was a face burned dark by the wave-reflected sun and deeply seamed with a life of wind, and storm, and squinting against the elements. "But I've only got the crew coming off and the crew going on duty. And they're not even full strength. It's one of the downsides of being a militia." The chief shrugged, apologetically.

"Can you run a boat on half a crew?" Lourdes asked.

"Well . . . yeah . . . if we're not going to fight anybody," Castro admitted.

"All right then." Lourdes turned to Artemisia. "Arti," she said, "I need you to take your children and mine to," she leaned forward and whispered something in the black woman's ear, "and from there to wait. If what I am planning works, come back. If not, run to Hamilcar's . . . people . . . in Pashtia." She leaned forward again and whispered something else, a set of five numbers and the name of a bank, which she made Arti repeat back to her. "That will allow you and them to live well if it comes to that."

Turning back to the chief, she said, "I need you to take me to the coast, nearest where the road to Fort Cameron touches it. And I need a car to meet me there and take me to the fort."

The chief considered. "I've got a brother in law who bought a taxi with a legion loan. I can get him to meet us."

"The phones are out," Lourdes objected.

"His taxi has a radio and I know his frequency."

"Then let's do it."

Castro inhaled deeply and let out an equally deep sigh. "Yes . . . all right . . . let's. And, madam, if you've never been on a boat that can do better than seventy kilometers an hour, let me tell you that you are in for the ride of your life."

From the boat shack a voice called out, "Hey, Chief? Something's wrong with the television. There ain't no TV at all."