Ready to go. So far, so good.
John had mounted a GPS display on the starboard side of the boat, near the stern. Farris could easily face this direction as he maneuvered the tiller with his right hand. The GPS unit displayed a detailed course through the shallows. Farris eased the gear shift into forward. Watching both the water ahead and the GPS, Farris tried to keep the boat on the displayed course.
"Don’t look ahead, Farris. It will be almost completely dark when you do this for real. Navigate using only the GPS."
Farris focused on the display. This was actually easier, more like a video game. He had played plenty of those during his indoctrination to western culture.
John had charted this course several days ago. It should be perfect. But things change on a river, sometimes unexpectedly. Best to be sure.
Farris continued following the green line on the display. Turning to port here, to starboard there. Always moving at a bare idle. After about thirty minutes, Farris reached a point on the display where the green line ended and a red ‘X’ appeared. Here he shut off the motor and dropped the anchor, securing the anchor line to a cleat on the top of the bow.
When Farris finally looked up, he saw that he was in the middle of the river valley, almost equidistant from the bluffs on the Minnesota and Wisconsin sides. There was no river current here, at least none that Farris could detect. The boat seemed to swing with the light breeze. He was in the middle of one of the mud lakes that filled the river basin. More importantly, he was within radio transmission range of the dynamite-rigged dams.
On the way back to the landing, Farris followed the same GPS line in reverse. All went well.
Praise Allah! This was easier than he had feared.
He did it! Thank God! The know-it-all can follow directions.
They secured the boat back onto the trailer and returned to the staging area.
Mission accomplished for today.
CHAPTER 45
Saturday’s air show continued with more of the same. Nothing remarkable. There were plenty of strange people, to be sure. But no obvious security risks. Until… just after the B25 Miss Mitchell bomber made the last scheduled landing of the day, a man suddenly broke from the end of the throng of spectators and trotted parallel with the runway, away from the terminal and toward a patch of woods. I was maybe 150 feet behind as I started to jog after him.
He was wearing a khaki green T-shirt, green camouflage baggy shorts and black athletic shoes. As he neared the woods, I caught a glimpse of Bull running through the trees just inside the edge of the foliage. He was on an intercept course with the runner. I began to walk. If the man saw me running after him, he might panic and do something stupid.
As he approached a particularly thick area of brush, the man slowed to a walk. Then he came to a complete stop, still partly in my view.
I stayed quiet and remained vigilant.
Oh shit! He was taking a leak.
Probably figured, no doubt correctly, that with the show ending, the lines for portable johnnies would be long. I stayed where I was and watched, just to be sure. I could no longer see Bull. After about a minute, the suspect zipped up his shorts, found his way out of the brush and started jogging back to the crowd.
Some security guard! Pee patrol. We go where others went. Or is it vice versa?
I turned and walked back toward the exiting herd. A plane tractor was pulling the now silent B25 to its parking space on a taxiway just south of the runway. All three bombers — B17, B24 and B25 — were positioned for maximum effect. 45 degrees toward the runway. Facing the spectator area. Ready to ‘fly and defend,’ or whatever their motto had been in the Big War.
I stayed at the airport until it was nearly dark. The crowd was gone. The air crews had left for their hotels, or beers, or whatever they did on Saturday night of a two-day show. The only people remaining at the airport that I could see were the three Red Wing cops (now stationed at various locations around the airfield), the airport employee inside the terminal behind the counter, Gunner and me. One of the city cops had a German Shepherd on a leash. The airport employee would be finishing up flight summaries for the day. Then he’d be gone, too.
I approached the Chief Deputy.
"Long day?" I asked.
"Another one tomorrow. But so far we’ve thwarted the evil terrorist cell plotting to destroy freedom and all that is right and good in this world."
The last was delivered with no small amount of sarcasm.
I couldn’t really blame Gunner. If it weren’t for me, he would be home with his wife playing cribbage or something.
"I’d call it a successful day. No incidents," I replied.
"What about the unauthorized urinator?"
Gunner did not miss a thing!
"You saw that, huh? I collected a sample. You can give it to the Feds to analyze. He seemed pretty suspicious to me."
Gunner smiled a tired smile.
"We’ve already had one shift change on the patrols. Another one comes on at midnight. Go home. Get some sleep."
"Thanks, Doug. You, too."
Across the river, near Red Wing, one of the strangest terror cells in recent history waited for its chance.
CHAPTER 46
Sunday morning I slept in until 6:30. Saturday had been a long, slow day. Today promised more of the same.
I showered, put on some khaki shorts, a white pique golf shirt and my Adidas running shoes. Before leaving, I leaned over the bed and kissed Beth on the cheek. "I love you."
"You, too, Babe. Be safe."
When I arrived at the Red Wing Airport, it was 7:45. Things were noticeably less busy than the day before. Fewer cars in the lot. Fewer spectators milling around. I showed my admission ticket at the ‘gate.’ No hand stamp today. I guess the ‘All Access’ badge would have gotten me in free. Too bad I didn’t know that yesterday.
I displayed my badge toward the rent-a-cop in the terminal. He examined it and allowed me inside. Gunner was behind the counter talking with a uniformed City cop. I waited for the conversation to end. The cop passed me on the way out of the terminal. Gunner was examining an air show flyer as I approached him.
He looked up.
"Just refreshing my memory on today’s schedule. A little different than yesterday’s," he said.
"Yeah. No fly-bys from remote airports. But there are plane rides this afternoon," I noted. "Any special security before those passengers get aboard?"
"The passengers must check in for their flights at least one hour ahead of time," Gunner recited. "A city cop will be there to check IDs. She’ll run every name through the BCA and FBI databases to make sure we don’t have felons. She’ll also check the FAA ‘no fly’ list. Any red flags and they’ll have to take a ride another day.
"Right before boarding, one of my deputies will check handbags and such. And everybody will need to pass a handheld metal detector scan."
Gunner looked at me for a response. "Does that work for you?"
"I assume all the law enforcement folks have seen pictures of the missing lab assistant?"
Gunner gave me annoyed.
"All right. Sorry. Just trying to be thorough."
"Beck. If someone plans to fly a plane into the nuke plant, they’re not going to be able to do it from this airport — at least not today."
"Okay. I trust your judgment."
"I can’t tell you how relieved I am," said Gunner, dramatically wiping his brow. Whew!
"I’ll stay out of the way. As a special favor, I’ll also make sure no one tries to pee on your unmarked car. I have recent on-the-job training in urinator apprehension."