The Mexico Run (16 page)

    The
Rosita Maria
was the only vessel in sight. I went below and got the.45 from under the pillow of my bunk and then, back on deck, fired twice into the air. The signal Angel and I had agreed upon. A moment or two later, I heard the sound of two shots fired in return.

    We were in luck. No other craft came into sight, as dusk began to fall. Angel kept the
Rosita Maria
at anchor and I started my engines and not turning on my running lights, gradually edged closer and closer to him as. darkness came on. He turned on his mast light just before it was totally dark, and I slowly approached. He called out when I was within hailing distance.

    "Come in on the port side,
amigo,"
he said.

    Twenty minutes later, the boats were securely tied together, separated only by heavy bumpers, and he had doused his light. We had a drink together on the tall rail of the
South Wind
and then made the transfer. While we were working, I told him about Sharon. If it upset him, he was too polite to show it.

    "Do not worry,
amigo,"
he said. "I will pick her up. Picking up girls is one of my favorite occupations. There will be no problem. I have friends, my sister-in-law's cousins. They live out of town and they will be glad to take care of her until you return."

    "Be very careful, Angel," I said. "If you have the slightest suspicion that you are being observed, forget it. Take no chances."

    "Do not worry," he said. "I will be most careful. But if by any chance we are stopped or questioned, well, it will be a simple thing. I have merely picked up a girl, and she has decided to go somewhere with me. Once we are on the main road there will be nothing to worry about. It will be impossible for anyone to follow me without my knowing. And if I am being followed, I will merely take her back to La Casa Pacifica. But I am sure that I will be able to keep her secure for you until you return."

    We transferred the marijuana into the dufflebags, which I had loaded into the forward cabin, and a few minutes later, Angel cast off the lines and we parted, he to return to Ensenada. I waited until he had plenty of time to make some distance and then I turned on my running-lights and charted my course north by northeast. I wanted to be off of Santa Barbara by the following morning.

    I set the throttles at a medium cruising-speed, and put the boat on automatic pilot and went into the galley and put some coffee on.

    Navigating blindly on -a compass course, I reached a point which I estimated to be due west of Santa Barbara an hour before daybreak, and I lay off shore drifting until I was able to pick up landfall with the binoculars. I had been able to see the lights of the town earlier, and my reckoning had not been too far off. I was somewhat north of the channel entrance, but by seven-thirty I had passed between the entrance buoys and found my mooring.

    I reported to the dockmaster and then went back to the
South Wind,
put on a pot of coffee and made myself some scrambled eggs and bacon. After breakfast, I set the alarm clock for noon and fell exhausted on the bunk.

    

    

    The first thing I did when I got up was to find a public phone-booth on the dock and call Monahan, the owner of the
South Wind,
in San Diego. I didn't want him worrying about his vessel. Reaching him on the phone, I told him where I was moored and that I liked Santa Barbara and thought I would stay there for three or four days and just fish off shore now and then.

    He seemed satisfied. In fact, he seemed downright happy that I had decided not to go into Catalina. For some reason or another, he hadn't liked the idea of Catalina from the very beginning. Santa Barbara was far enough away from San Diego for him not to come nosing around, which made me just as happy.

    After I hung up the phone, I called a cab and went to the truck-rental place to take delivery of the pickup. The dockmaster was standing next to the
South Wind
when I returned and pulled up several feet away from my mooring to park the pickup truck.

    We talked for two or three minutes, and I told him that I had chartered the boat for some fishing out of San Diego and planned to spend a few days around Santa Barbara. I explained that I was leaving for a couple of days, but would be back. I mentioned that I'd picked up a nice thirty- or forty-pound albacore which I had gutted and had in my fish box. I told him I really didn't have any use for it, so if he could use it, it was his. He seemed rather grateful. We got out the fish, and he left with it.

    I went aboard and I got two of the dufflebags from the forward cabin and hauled them out on the dock, and then tossed them into the back of the pickup truck. I made no effort at all to conceal them. As far as anyone knew they could have contained laundry, or almost anything.

    I locked the cabin on the
South Wind,
climbed into pickup and drove out on the municipal pier where there was an excellent sea food restaurant. I picked up a copy of
Time,
found a table and had a couple of drinks. Then I ordered a mixed seafood grill.

    It was delicious.

    I took my time, and it was around seven o'clock when I returned to the dock. There were very few people around, and I again went aboard the
South Wind.
I brought out two more dufflebags and tossed them into the back of the pickup and pulled a canvas tarp, which I had purchased previously, over them. I went back on board and got myself a two-hour cat nap.

    By ten o'clock I had the rest of the cargo transferred from the boat to the pickup. I carefully tied down the tarp. Returning aboard I checked over the boat, secured the cabins and left a couple of ports open for ventilation. Then I climbed into the pickup and headed for Route 101, going north.

    I drove for two hours and found a quiet motel and checked in for the night. I was up before daylight and again heading north on 101.

    I pulled into San Francisco just before noontime, without trouble, without incidents. I drove down through town to Fisherman's Wharf and checked into a motel a block away from the docks, parking the pickup where I could see it from the window of my room. Then I walked down to the little tourist gift shop which I had visited some three weeks previously.

    My heavy-set friend the Eurasian, who was wearing what appeared to be the same Hawaiian shirt, which could have stood a bit of laundering, remembered me at once, and he did everything but put his hand out for the hundred-dollar bill that I already held folded in my palm to give him.

    I told him where I was staying, gave him the room number of the motel and asked him to pass the information along to Mr. O'Farrell as soon as possible. He wanted to chat, but I wasted no time. I left him and returned to the motel. I didn't want that pickup truck out of my sight any longer than necessary.

    This time there was no waiting. It was more like thirty-six minutes than thirty-six hours. They didn't arrive in a Continental limousine, and there was only one of them. It was the slender boy who had given me a cigarette from a gold case in O'Farrell's room.

    He came alone and he came in a taxi cab. He didn't call from the lobby, but came directly to my room. There was a soft, mouse-like knock on the door. I opened it, and he stepped quickly inside.

    "You wanted Mr. O'Farrell," he said.

    I nodded. "Yes, I have something for him. Something we discussed at our last meeting."

    "Excellent." He seemed to have all the answers, all the information. "You are ready to make a delivery?"

    "I am."

    "When?"

    "Any time, and the sooner the better," I said. "I would like to talk to Mr. O'Farrell."

    "It will not be necessary," he said. "Ten o'clock tonight is all right with you?"

    I said that it was.

    "You know Sausalito?"

    I nodded my head.

    "All right, cross the Golden Gate Bridge and go into the main section of the town."

    He gave me an address.

    "This is a Chinese restaurant," he said. "Go in and sit down. Be there at ten o'clock. How much have you brought in?"

    I gave him the figure.

    "Be very careful you are not followed, and come alone."

    He turned and left.

    

    

    At nine-thirty, I passed over the Golden Gate Bridge and turned into Sausalito. I had no difficulty in finding the address. It was a well-lighted, apparently quite popular Chinese restaurant, - just off the main business-section, down near the waterfront. There was an alley running beside the restaurant and I turned into it and then took a second turn and came toward what was obviously the delivery entrance. I parked the pickup, got out and walked around and entered the restaurant through the main entrance. A hostess took me to a table and I was in the process of ordering a Cantonese dinner when he slid in beside me.

    "Everything is all right?"

    I nodded.

    "Go back to the delivery entrance," he said. "I will join you there."

    I called the waitress and told her I would be back in a few minutes and went out and circled the building. He was standing beside the pickup truck.

    "This is yours?"

    I nodded and looked around. There was no one else in sight. I reached over and undid the tarp and lifted it back.

    "This is it," I said.

    He pulled the tarp back to cover the dufflebags and indicated I was to follow him. He opened the back door to the restaurant with a key and we walked through into what was obviously a storeroom. He told me to sit down and wait and then disappeared.

    A few moments later, the door again opened, and two men carrying dufflebags over their shoulders entered and dropped them on the floor. No words were spoken, and when all the dufflebags had been assembled he waited until the men who had carried them in had departed and then asked me to open one of the bags. I did.

    He very carefully examined the contents and then drew the drawstrings closed on the bag and asked me again to wait. He left the room and the overhead lights went out.

    I would have been nervous but for one thing. No one had patted me down as they had done when I had first met O'Farrell. Obviously, they were not worried about anything I might be carrying. I sat quietly for at least ten minutes, and then was aware of the door opening and a slit of light as someone slipped into the room. A dim light went on, and I was able to distinguish the features of Mr. O'Farrell."

    "Congratulations, Mr. Johns," he said. "You seem to have lived up to your word, and if all the other bags are like the one that my man has examined we should have no difficulty at all."

    He wanted to know how many kilos I had brought in, and I told him. I was slightly amazed that he seemed to accept my word for it and accept the fact that the dufflebags all lived up to the reputation of the first one which they had examined. On the other hand, I realized it wasn't completely trust. I was hardly in a position to doublecross him.

    The dickering took almost no time at all. I named my price, and he gave a counter offer, and five minutes later we had agreed on terms. The price we agreed on gave me a gross profit of approximately $55,000 before expenses.

    There must have been some sort of a signaling device in the room, because a moment after we had agreed on terms, the door again opened and this time a second light went on, still leaving the room in half darkness.

    The youth who had met me at the motel took a canvas bag that he was carrying and emptied the contents on the table next to where I was sitting. He counted out the money. They were fresh bills, tens, twenties, fifties, and hundreds.

    I didn't bother to check his counting. When he was through, he put the money back in the canvas bag and handed it to me.

    O'Farrell was either a very good psychologist or was extremely bright. The boy had brought in the exact sum upon which we had agreed. He handed me the bag arid left the room.

    "A very successful trip, Mr. Johns," O'Farrell said. "Congratulations. But tell me something, why do you waste your time?"

    "I beg your pardon?"

    "I asked why do you waste your time? You are obviously a man of talent, a man of imagination. Why deal in garbage when you can deal in caviar?"

    "I don't believe I understand you, Mr. O'Farrell?"

    "Well, so long as you are bringing things into the country, there are far more valuable commodities than these dufflebags contain. With your talents you should have no difficulty in dealing in goods of much greater value and much less bulk."

    "I'm a man of limited ambitions, and so I take limited risks, Mr. O'Farrell," I said. "It is not a matter of morality. The government frowns on the importation of this particular commodity. If I understand what you're talking about, and I'm quite sure I do, I would not be interested in that more valuable and precious commodity. In the case of a rumble, the government not only frowns, they get downright hostile."

    He shook his head, smiled thinly. "But surely," he said, "a man of your brains shouldn't have to worry. Why make thousands when you could make hundreds of thousands?"

    "I am satisfied," I said.

    He slowly stood up.

    "Give my regards to Captain Morales," he said. "And now please enjoy your dinner. This is a very good restaurant. I happen to own it, so I know."

    A moment later he had left the room.

    I didn't enjoy my dinner. Instead, I tucked the canvas bag with the money into my shirtfront and went out and got into the pickup and started back for the Golden Gate Bridge. I was somewhat shaken.

    "Give my regards to Captain Morales."