‘Back in Sacramento, from the sound of things,’ said Richard.
‘That’s as may be, sir. But my orders are to make them available to the authorities here in LA, and at the moment I can’t even move them west out to Fort MacArthur or east back inland to the National Guard HQ at Los Alamitos. They’re stuck on the docks now. Holding everything else up, as far as I can ascertain.’
‘Then you need to get them moved, Major!’ intruded Captain Sin abruptly.
‘Or you and the governor will be looking at a series of crippling lawsuits,’ added Antoine. ‘Not just from Heritage Mariner but from half the people here, as far as I can reckon.’ This turned one or two heads nearby, Richard noted. Lawyers hearing the word lawsuit almost subliminally, like Great Whites scenting blood.
‘OK, Antoine,’ said Richard. ‘Let’s not rush to judgement here.’
Major Guerrero was opening his mouth to add his two cents’ worth. But whatever he was about to add was cut off by the harassed-looking official who had invited them all in here. He was standing in front of a huge schematic of the Long Beach docks overlain with pictures of the chaos Richard had observed from Nic Greenbaum’s helicopter. ‘Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen,’ he began, pulling off his glasses and beginning to polish them with the tip of his tie. ‘My name is Kurt Carpenter, terminal manager for the section your freight is snarled up in. I’m aware of the problems you are all facing,’ he gestured widely to the big picture on the screen behind him, ‘but in order to get them sorted out most quickly and efficiently, we’d be best to start with individual cases …’
One of the solid-looking men in Day-Glo yellow stood up. ‘Problem’s simple, Mac,’ he said. ‘We got more TEU boxes on the dockside than we can move. Twenty- and forty-foot equivalents both, as a matter of fact. We got nowhere to put them. No one’s willing to freight them out from under our feet — not on trucks or railcars or ships. Everyone’s wanting to bring shedloads more stuff in — no one wants to take anything out. Until the dockside is cleared of some of this stuff, it’s total gridlock. There’s nothing we can do.’
‘I know the governor’s ordered emergency supplies,’ Carpenter answered. ‘But I don’t know where he wants it put. Or who he wants to move it.’ The room was silent for a moment, with everyone looking at everyone else. Richard was looking at Major Jose Guerrero, his expression thoughtful.
‘Is there anyone here who knows what the governor has actually shipped in?’ asked Carpenter. ‘All I know is it’s in nearly one-hundred-and-twenty-foot TEUs.’ He waved a flimsy piece of paper, clearly some sort of manifest.
The major stood up. ‘Major Jose Guerrero, Sacramento Division, California National Guard,’ he said calmly. ‘I reckon a lot of the stuff you’re worried about is to do with me and my guys. I can give you a detailed inventory for each container and all, but I guess we really don’t have the time. Overall, it’s just emergency equipment. Hospital supplies, emergency rations, bedding, chemical latrines, generators, the gas to keep them working and so forth. The sort of stuff we need in place if the health and welfare infrastructure of the city starts collapsing. My orders were to get it to a National Guard base for unpacking and distribution, but somehow it’s ended up on the dockside here. I suppose someone must have thought this was the nearest freight yard. Maybe it is, I don’t know; I wasn’t briefed on that aspect. But the fact is I want to shift it all out to Fort MacArthur or inland to Los Alamitos as soon as I can. They’ve both been briefed to take some of it. But Los Alamitos would be the best bet for me if we can get it all up on to I710, which is supposed to be a five-minute drive away from the dock. Then across town. Only, as far as I can tell, my consignment is stuck on the waterfront. And it’s at least part of what’s holding things up, like a cork in a bottle. I’ve called for trucks and trailers to come down but apparently the guard’s got nothing that’ll handle twenty-foot containers. The army’s got all sorts of stuff, from tank transporters to trailers, but nothing they can spare immediately. Certainly nothing that’s actually designed for containers — or to be able to shift a hundred of them.’
‘Couldn’t get trucks into them even if they did have,’ said the man in the Day-Glo vest. ‘And sure as shit not tank transporters! Not through the gridlock we have here.’ He gave a bark of dry, humourless laughter. ‘Roads are blocked. Quayside’s clogged. We even have trouble moving our cranes up and down on the dock. That’s why we stopped unloading everything.’
‘So I can’t move my stuff?’ demanded the major, frowning.
‘Nope. And if it don’t get moved, then it looks like nothing gets moved,’ shrugged the man in the Day-Glo vest. ‘But there’s no way you’re going to freight it out of there, even if you had the trucks. Not with everything from the Pacific to the Interstate snarled up. Like I say …’ He gave a brief, unexpected grin. ‘… What you might call a Mexican standoff …’
‘Put it on a ship,’ said Richard mildly. His voice was not loud but it carried across the silence that followed the longshoreman’s less-than-tasteful joke.
‘What?’ asked the longshoreman, swinging round to face the new idea and the man who had proposed it.
‘Put it on a ship out of the way,’ Richard persisted. ‘Clear the blockage, free up the harbour and the Interstates, then take it off again and freight it out when everything else is clear. MacArthur, Los Alamitos, wherever.’
‘What ship?’ demanded Kurt Carpenter, his voice wavering between hope and doubt. ‘We’d need permissions from here to Thanksgiving. We’d need clearance from the relevant captains … Agents … Owners … Christ …’
‘I can’t speak for the Almighty or his Son,’ said Richard, rising to tower beside Major Guerrero as every eye on the room became fixed on him. ‘But I’ve got all the rest covered. My name is Richard Mariner. I’m the CEO of Heritage Mariner and owner of Sulu Queen, the container ship docked in the middle of this mess and half laden. I have my captain and my agent’s lawyer here.’ He paused, aware that he was stretching a point about the lawyer. But Antoine wisely stayed silent. ‘And I’m telling you,’ he continued smoothly, ‘if you can get Major Guerrero’s containers to Sulu Queen’s berth you can load them aboard her with my blessing and leave them there until the docks are clear — she can accommodate more than four thousand TEUs and she has plenty of room to spare. Then you can take them off again when everything’s running smoothly on the docks and freight them out. No problem. That way we’ll maybe get the rest of Sulu Queen’s old cargo off and her new cargo on, and perhaps even get her back out to sea before the bad weather hits too hard.’
‘Sounds like a plan,’ said Carpenter. ‘Is this something you can do, Mr Molloy?’
‘I guess,’ answered the man in the Day-Glo vest. Then he seemed to make up his mind. ‘Sure. I know Sulu Queen. My team’s been unloading her since the port officials gave us the all clear this morning. We can get some of the TEUs aboard her and see how things go from there. Good plan, Mr Mariner. Thanks.’
‘OK,’ said Richard, his bland gaze skating over Antoine’s uncertain expression and Captain Sin’s outraged one. ‘Let’s get to it.’