The Raft (26 page)

“So, there you have it, Special Agent. You
have your killer, you have your motive, and you have complicity in
the whole plot, running all the way up from the Seattle PD to the
Senator himself. Gandalf is lying dead on the deck above us, his
debts paid in full. There is no legal system that can extract from
him one more ounce of retribution. But you, Special Agent... and
the Senator. You still have a lot to lose, should the events of the
last few days leak out...”

Chapter 30

“That's it?” Special Agent Galahad said,
shaking himself back to attention. “That's all you have to offer?
In exchange for your precious Raft? Blackmail?”

“No, no... one more thing,” Maggie
smiled.

“This better be good...”

“It is: Gandalf isn't dead,” Maggie said
flatly.

“What?” Galahad replied in surprise.

“Err, Maggie...” Rachael hedged.

“No, there was an exchange of gunshots, but
no one was hurt. Gandalf is, at this moment, in custody. Charged
with the murder of Joanna Church. In a few minutes, you're going to
uncuff me and I'm going to return to the Raft and let everyone know
what transpired. Gandalf is guilty of Meerkat's death, and I turned
him over to the authorities.

“And a good thing, too. If Gandalf had been
senselessly cut down by a government bullet... well, the Rafters
would all be beside themselves with bloodthirsty rage. They might
arm themselves, then might forget about running your blockade and
attack it. Head on. That would be unthinkable, of course. Six
hundred – a thousand Rafters, armed to the teeth, with years of
experience in maneuvering between small vessels, against... what,
Special Agent? Two-hundred green Coast Guard recruits? With two or
three hours of weapons training apiece? A shame you don't have any
of the hardened Iraq War types left, but so few people go career
military nowadays. What do you have? Ten, fifteen NCOs with any
experience.” Maggie nodded at the two goons guarding the doorway.
“Up against a small army of men and women who've slept every night
for the last decade with a gun under their bunks. Spent weekends
training for just this sort of conflict against just this kind of
foe. Yeah, a small army of men and women with little to nothing
left to lose, fighting for survival, fighting for their way of
life, fighting for their friends and family.”

Special Agent Galahad cleared his throat. He
uncrossed his legs and crossed them the opposite way.

“No, I think for all concerned it would be
best that I returned to the Raft and informed them all of Gandalf's
guilt. No mention of Meerkat being a police informant, of course,
and no mention of the Senator. No mention of really very much of
anything at all, truth be told. The fact that a suitable resolution
to Meerkat's murder has convinced the Coast Guard to allow the Raft
free passage to attend the Freaky Kon-Tikis will speak
volumes.”

Maggie cleared her throat, giving everyone in
attendance a chance to keep up. “After the races, of course, after
the holiday, there'll be a need to decide on a new leader. Someone
with closer ties to the dryland, someone who can negotiate with the
dryfoots. Someone with a solid reputation on both land and
water.”

“Someone like you?” Galahad grinned. He
hadn't fallen behind.

“Exactly,” Maggie said without mirth. “The
old Gray Beard council is a sexist anachronism. If the Raft is to
survive, it will have to change. The Raft can no longer serve as a
shelter for all the mainland's thugs and killers. The Raft has to
grow, blossom into a vibrant community. But it can't grow in a
vacuum.

“The Raft might be detached, but it is wholly
dependent on the mainland. So many Rafters make their livings
working for dryfoot companies, we're dependent on the mainland for
food and resources. The days when we can pretend we're a
self-sufficient entity are over. We have to extend the hand of
friendship to the mainstream world, begin to reintegrate with
society. And the first step down that road will be acknowledging
the burden the Raft exerts on the communities that surround it –
how our actions affect those that border the Raft. What small
recompense that can be made financially to alleviate this burden
the Raft imposes...”

Maggie paused again, let her words sink in.
Kid Galahad sat across from her, watching her intently. He was hard
to read, both bemused and concerned.

“There will have to be a presence,” he
finally said. “Aboard the Raft. Authority.”

“No,” Maggie replied flatly. “Not in the
beginning. It would be too provocative.”

“Then, at least a census. Really... legal
names.”

“Perhaps,” Maggie nodded.

“Perhaps? That's the best you can do?”

“I'm not the leader of the Raft, Special
Agent. Not yet.”

“And all this talk about the Senator? And
Meerkat's connections...”

“Forgotten. Right, Rachael?”

“I have no idea what you're talking about,”
Rachael said on cue. It was the correct time to appear bewildered.
Luckily, she genuinely was.

“And if I say no?” Galahad crossed his
arms.

“You want to risk a conflict with the
Raft?”

“I was ready to ten minutes ago.” Galahad
watched Maggie through half-closed eyelids.

“You were ready to engage in a fight that you
might win. But there's no winning this fight, Special Agent, I'm
sure you're intelligent enough to see that. Let me go free and
you'll have peace, a foothold in the administration of the Raft,
all your skeletons quietly locked away in the proverbial closet,
and nothing more to do for the rest of the day but to enjoy the
Kon-Tiki Races. Keep me cuffed up here and what will you get? An
all-out shooting war? More bodies in the Puget Sound? Meerkat's
murder still unsolved, and the pressing need to cover your
involvement in an increasingly botched investigation? No, Special
Agent, you're too smart to start a fight that you can't win.”

Galahad sat in silence. Possibly some inner
conflict was raging inside him, but externally he seemed almost
serene.

“It all begins when you let me go,” Maggie
said, tugging on her shackled wrists, showing the shiny steel cuffs
to Galahad.

Chapter 31

“I'll need Gandalf's gun,” Maggie said as she
rubbed at her wrists and limped up a steep flight of stairs. In all
the ruckus, one of the seamen had stomped on her bare foot.

“Absolutely not,” Galahad said adamantly.

“I'll need the pistol, or none of this will
work. You can keep the bullets.”

“What is it with Rafters and their guns?”

“Do I get the hog leg?”

“Alright, alright,” Galahad shook his head in
resignation. He waved a hand at one of the armed sailors following
them, who peeled off. “I hope I'm not going to regret cooperating
with you, Ms. Straight.”

“Now that we're colluding, you can call me
Maggie.”

“Maggie. You're trying to juggle an awful lot
of balls at once, are you sure you can handle it?”

“You'll have to trust me, Special Agent.”

“And if there's any gunfire, my men will
respond...”

“Just tell them not to shoot unless shot at,
and we'll all live to see another day.”

Maggie hobbled out onto the deck, back into
the cold, rainy Puget Sound morning. The fog was thinning and the
mass of congregated Raft vessels south of the blockade had grown to
an almost uncountable size.

Ships of all shapes and sizes were turning
this way and that, adrift in the current. The people aboard the
boats appeared as little black dots from Maggie's high perch, but
she was sure each and every pair of eyes would be watching her,
waiting for the
Soft Cell
to pull away from the gargantuan
James.
Everything rested on her shoulders now, the whole
deal. How things played out in the next ten minutes would decide if
a dozen people lived or died.

Maggie groaned. She was still hungover. She'd
been smacked around and thrown up against bulkheads. She'd been
talking nonstop for the last hour, making up most everything she
was saying. She might have outwardly appeared calm and collected,
but inside she was a whimpering mess. She wanted to climb aboard
the
Soft Cell
and curl up in her warm bunk, let the day play
out as it would.

But she knew that hiding wasn't even remotely
an option. She had a plan – a sort of plan, a fly-by-wire,
fill-in-the-big-details-later kind of plan – and she had to stick
to it.

The sailors with their body armor and black
rifles escorted Rachael and Maggie to the rope ladder dangling down
to the
Soft Cell.

Gandalf's blood still stained the deck. His
body was gone, but the red pool mixing with the dripping rain
remained where he'd fallen.

“What do we do with him?” Galahad said,
noticing Maggie and Rachael looking down at the pool.

“You have him in custody, remember? Keep him
on ice. Then in a few days or a week, when everything has calmed
down, schedule a suitably harrowing prison cell hanging. No one
will ask too many questions. I'll make sure of that.”

“Well, Maggie.” Special Agent Galahad held
out a hand. “It's been interesting.”

Maggie took his hand and shook it. “Thank
you.”

“You know, if any of this blows back,”
Galahad kept shaking her hand, long after Maggie tried to pull her
hand away, “I'll deny everything. This conversation never
happened.”

“Of course, Special Agent.” Galahad finally
let go of Maggie's palm. “I'd expect nothing less.” A seaman in
body armor came jogging up to Galahad's shoulder. He held out a
ziplock bag containing a large revolver, which Galahad took. He
held it out to Maggie, who accepted it. “Thank you, again,” Maggie
said and she turned, pulling herself wearily over the gunwale. She
started down the rope ladder, holding the ziplock bag in between
her teeth.

“Ms. Bigallo,” Galahad nodded at Rachael.
“Our apologies for the inconvenience.” Rachael tried to smile,
realizing she was showing her dried, bloody teeth, and followed
Maggie over the gunwale.

They descended slowly, the rope ladder
dancing in the breeze. The
Soft Cell
was waiting at the
ladder's bottom, bouncing on the waves. As soon as Maggie's bare
toes touched the deck, she collapsed heavily across the roof of the
cabin and groaned in pain.

“Untie the mooring lines, would you?” Maggie
asked Rachael. Rachael had only a limited comprehension of what
that meant, but she felt the need to help out in any capacity that
she could. She found the bow line and unraveled it from the cleat
in the side of the larger vessel. She did the same from the stern
line. The
Soft Cell
bobbed slowly away from the mighty
Joshua James.
Drifting.

“I can't believe it, it just doesn't seem
real,” Rachael said, coiling the mooring lines away as she'd seen
Maggie do many times.

“What's that?” Maggie groaned.

“Everything. Gandalf's dead. He murdered
Meerkat.”

“Oh, yes...”

“And now you have to go back and tell
everyone... tell Tiger Print...”

“Yes, as to that...” Maggie rolled off the
cabin roof and swung her bare feet down into the cockpit. “Let's
keep that between the two of us for now, okay?”

“What?” Rachael said, confused. “You told
Galahad -”

“I told Galahad whatever I thought he'd
believe. If we sail back over there now and start talking a whole
hell of a lot of nonsense about Gandalf and Meerkat... well, best
just to let that lie for the time being.”

“But if we go back without Gandalf, people
are going to talk.”

“You're right,” Maggie said, flipping
switches on her control panel. The
Soft Cell
engine came to
life and she turned the helm hard over, bringing the prow about.
“So, we'd better not sail back.”

“Then what are we going to do?” Rachael
looked back to the mass of the Raft, milling in the fog to the
south.

“Lead by example,” Maggie said, pointing the
bow towards the Raft and opening the throttle.

“Oh, I don't like the sound of that,” Rachael
worried.

“No, neither do I. But if the Rafters see one
craft clear the blockade, they'll be apt to follow. It's just a
question of who's going to run the blockade first.”

Maggie kept a southerly course until her
electric inboard had brought them almost equidistant from the
Joshua James
and the Raft. She cut the motor, turned the
helm and brought the bow around to the north. Then, still limping,
she began to winch down her sails.

“Lets just hope that Galahad keeps his word.
'Cause if that thing,” Maggie pointed at the 57mm Bofers on the
foredeck of the
James
, “goes off, it'll be lights out for
both of us.”

“Maggie, are you sure about this?”

“No, not really.”

Rachael turned and fixed Maggie with an angry
look. “Maggie, for once could you lie to me and tell me that you
have everything under control?!”

“Don't worry, Rachael.” Maggie had the
mainsail in place and the
Soft Cell
was catching a good
measure of the choppy breeze. “I got this. Just sit back and
relax.”

“Never mind.” Rachael turned back to watch
the decks of the Coast Guard ships. “You're a terrible liar.”

“Yeah, sorry.” Maggie climbed back behind the
helm. The
Soft Cell
was charging forward, Maggie wrestled
with the tiller to keep the craft pointed between the two largest
ships in the blockade. “Thanks again, Rachael. Thanks again for
your help. I'm sorry I got you into all this trouble.”

“You owe me a trip to the dentist,” Rachael
said, flashing a bloody sneer back at Maggie.

“Send me the bill,” Maggie said, her eyes
fixed on the high decks of the two ships that were rapidly
approaching. Sailors were charging back and forth, rifle barrels
pointing over the sides. There were orders being yelled, lost in
the thunder of the wind in the sails. Rachael climbed down from her
perch on the deck and slipped down into the relative safety of the
companionway. Only her head popped up cautiously, her red hair
snapping in the breeze. They were ten yards out now, five, four,
three...