Chapter 34

Chuck

Yesterday's trip to St. Louis and Chicago was successful. I was able to clean out two more safe deposit boxes and take a look at the two residences. In St. Louis, there was a house in a decent subdivision not that far from Lambert field, the airport there. The branch bank was just up the street from the house in a small shopping plaza. They were very nice and were happy to see that I shaved that horrible beard.

Chicago was more of a hassle, as the lady was saying I should go to the driver's license office for a new photo. I protested as it would cost too much and that I might want to re-grow the beard, especially if I decided to hunt up in Canada again. The signature was simple, and when she watched me whip off the signature with the funky P for Peter, she was happy. The residence in Chicago was a condo near the northwest executive airport. There, a young mother answered the door and thanked me multiple times for renting for so little. I explained that I may want to sell the property and might be able to arrange the payments to be near what the rent was. I thought she was going to kiss me, but I stood my ground and didn't get close to her.

I was back in Tampa, with the goodies now filling the second safe deposit box. I wanted to begin transferring funds into the investment fund, and I wanted to do it with a computer that wouldn't be easy to trace. I would have to do it on the road through a free wireless connection or possibly through a library.

I figured that I might use my laptop in the new Starbucks that was just down the road. I personally don't like their coffee, but I like their free internet service.

On the way to the airport, I stopped at the Starbucks and carried my laptop in. With one of their giant muffins and a tall coffee, I logged onto the Huntsville bank and transferred money to the investment fund. I left fifty dollars in the account to take care of box fees for a while and logged off.

I next logged into the Las Vegas account and transferred everything there into the investment fund. When I did Miami, I only transferred the savings account so that any outstanding checks would clear. From the activity of the checking account, there was enough to handle the household account until I could get the new account open in my real name.

St. Louis and Chicago banks were branches of the same bank, but under two different account names. When those were done, I figured that I would continue to transfer funds from the various banks to the investment fund, but I would transfer the accounts only after cleaning out the safe deposit boxes.

This morning, I was heading to Cincinnati and Cleveland. I figured I could get both of those done and possibly use a Starbucks up there to transfer funds while I was there.

While driving to the airpark, the first person I called was John. I told him about the requirement for the second pilot on the Learjets and that if I were caught there could be severe penalties. I said, "Please, call the FAA and find out if some kind of waiver can be had. There are too many things I do that I can't take along someone else. You know that. What would have happened if we had showed up out west with a stranger with us? What would they have done? They might have even scrubbed the mission and you and I would be on someone's shit list. Anyway John, have the Marshal or someone big in Justice or the Secret Service lean on the FAA for some kind of waiver. If I have to demonstrate my ability to fly a Lear with one arm and one leg, I'll do it. Just get that done for me."

John said, "You do have a point about the need. I'll see what they say and use some muscle to push with. The Marshal seems to be in good with people throughout the bureaucracy. He'll help get this done."

The next person I called was the station chief in Daytona to find out what Steve wanted to know. They would be ecstatic to have a known buyer come in to evaluate the boats. After that, I called down to Miami to find out what the status of that investigation was. The Bureau agent said, "We've finished trashing that boat. Whoever buys it should get a hell of a deal, as it is a wreck after our guys took it apart."

I called the U.S. Deputy Marshal Station Chief and found out he was planning on calling Steve and me later today. I told him, "I'll be down this morning and make arrangements for the boat to be moved. We can take care of any funds transfer while I'm there."

At the airpark, where I was going to use the Phenom to fly down there, I told Steve about the deal in Daytona and the status down in Miami. He said, "You better call Mercy, she's really excited about that boat and wants to see it right away."

I called out to Steve's house and told Mercy, "I'm on my way to Miami to have the boat moved over to the Magellan dock so they can begin working on it."

Mercy squealed, "I'll be right there. You better call your girls because they want to go see the boat too. All of us need to see it."

When I called Brandy, I couldn't believe how excited she became. She said I had to tell Metarie for her. When I spoke with Metarie, she asked, "What in the world did you say to Brandy? She has the other four about to go nuts. I guess they can take off, but what's happening that's so exciting?"

"I'm getting a big sailboat, Metarie. I have an opportunity to get something special and it's something we may take a long vacation on soon."

She said, "Taking my girls from me, are you?"

"Not really, Metarie, just borrowing them for a while."

"Well, as soon as you have that boat up here, Reggie and I want a ride. I don't think he's ever been on a sailboat, and I know I haven't, so we want to go out with you."

I said, "Okay, that's an easy thing to do. We'll do that, but from what I hear, you better plan on a weekend instead of just an afternoon. It's too hard to get a big boat out in the water and bring it right back to dock."

Metarie said the girls were already on the way to the airpark.

DeDe suggested I let her use the Phenom and that I use the King Air 1900D as it was not being used today. That would work as we would have at least six people.

Well, who should arrive at the airpark, but Lisa? She came up to me wrapped her arms around me, and kissed me. She then said, "Are you going to show me your new boat?"

"How did you know?"

Lisa grinned, "Brandy called me before she even asked if she could get off. Mercy's been talking to us about going on a sailing vacation soon."

That's when Mercy showed up with Juanita. They were both very excited about the boat and couldn't wait to see it. I had to keep cautioning everyone that the feds had torn it up pretty bad while looking for contraband or money.

By the time Brandy came, I had the King Air out of the hangar and ready for the trip. I loaded everyone up and isn't it funny, neither Lisa nor Brandy wanted to do right seat today as they all wanted to talk about the boat.

Down in Miami, I visited with the deputy in charge of getting rid of the assets of the charter company there. He said all he had to get rid of at this point was the big Magellan, since the other boats were all leases that were taken back by the leasing companies.

All of us went through the magnificent Magellan. I had seen the boat only at night and while involved in the capture of the former owner, and not had the opportunity to view the magnificence of the boat. The agents had taken down panels in the master quarters and in the main below deck lounge, but had not really destroyed the boat. The crew's quarters were a little rough, but not as bad as they had led me to believe.

The deputy kept apologizing for having torn up the boat so bad, but the girls just looked right past the damage and kept poking their noses into every nook and cranny. They couldn't get over the magnificent galley and the adjoining dining room and beautiful lounge area. The guy must have enjoyed watching TV, because every where you looked was a big wall-mounted flat screen TV.

Since I didn't know how to design a boat, I told Mercy that she would have to guide the girls as to how to make the boat livable. We looked at the bottom deck and found more cabins, storage rooms, and the crew's quarters and crew galley. In the aft area of the bottom deck was the engine room. The place was huge, but spotless, with two giant engines. There was a panel on the wall that looked very complicated, but I'm sure wasn't that hard to understand if you were taught. They had a very nice maintenance and machine shop on board, next to the engine room.

On one side of the gangway was the water desalination plant. The tiny room looked like a lab with a microscope and all forms of test equipment. Next to that was a pretty big gym, with two treadmills, two bikes, two elliptical units, two four-station Nautilus machines, and two weight benches with lots of free weights. Across the gangway was the big laundry room. That was impressive, with giant washers and dryers, as well as a commercial steam presser. There was a big office that had beautiful leather furniture and a computer system that looked state of the art. The office looked like it was ready to go to work. Nothing had been disturbed in the office. I wonder why. That's the first place I would have looked for contraband.

I was looking in a cabinet door on one end of the room and my mouth dropped. Inside was enough armament to start a major war. I couldn't believe that it was untouched. In the drawers beneath the cabinet was enough ammo of all types to be very dangerous.

I went looking for the deputy and brought him back to the office. I said, "You might have missed something." When I showed him the weapons, he said, "Wow, that's a lot of weapons. You won't need to buy anything to protect this boat."

"Don't you want to take these or at least check the serial numbers?"

He said, "I'm sure they've already been checked. There's no way they didn't tear this room apart. I'd bet they were just nice and put this back together again. You can keep the weapons, as they would have pulled any full auto weapons."

I looked in the cabinet again and saw at least two Uzis. I pulled them out, along with two Mac-10s, and put them into a case that was in the cabinet. I said, "Take these with you. I don't want to be caught with them while I'm sailing in foreign ports."

The deputy just shrugged his shoulders and carried the case off.

I was looking through the desk when I found a safe behind a door that looked like two drawers. The safe door was ajar so I opened it. The damn safe was full of money and boxes. I opened a box and it was full of jewelry. This must be what the wife had wanted. I wondered whether she was free or being held as an accomplice.

Taped to the inside of the door were directions on how to change the combination. You could put in from three to six numbers. I pushed the programming button, pushed five as directed, pushed next, then entered "Chuck" on the number/letter pad that looked like a telephone number dial-pad. Anyone should be able to figure that out, but that would do for right now. I figured if they weren't smart enough to look in this cabin, they didn't need the loot. If the lady was free, I was going to find her and give her what she had been so desperate for. Hopefully, none of it was stolen property.

I caught up with the deputy up in the main deck lounge and asked, "What do I need to do to take possession of the boat?"

He went to a stack of papers and brought a sheet of paper. He said, "We had a surveyor on board that said the boat was probably worth a fortune, but we have ruined it. He estimated that if the boat were perfect it could be worth over seventy-five million, even in today's market. Another surveyor said we would be lucky to get five to ten million for it. We gave DC all the information, and that you or your buddy was buying it, and they said that you, and only you or your buddy, could buy the boat for seven million. That's seven million bucks. Can you do that?

I said, "There's an investment fund that has the money. My friend is the owner of S&S Enterprises and has money. I have some but nothing like him. Let me call the investment fund and they can transfer funds while we're on the phone."

The guy looked at me strangely. I called Ben Phillips and had a tough time getting through to him. I said, "Ben, I'm in Miami making another deal with the feds. Can you transfer funds from the new investment fund directly to their account?"

Ben said, "Yes, but you have enough to just use your debit card."

"Okay, I can do that but I thought that might be a good place to get the funds."

Again Ben said, "Go ahead and use your debit card. That way if you decide to incorporate the boat, or have it held by a separate holding company, you can just sign it over."

I said, "I just didn't think there would be enough to cover that."

Ben said, "You can't buy another one, but this one is fine. You'll have to take Beth and me out on the boat. I'm glad you're getting something for yourself."

When I offered my debit card to the deputy, he laughed and said, "Sure thing, Champ. Did someone let you use their card or what?"

"Something like that. The fund manager just said that he would have the card cover the transaction."

The deputy said, "You know what really sucks is that you have to pay sales tax on the boat when you register it. Let's see that's seven percent on the first five thousand and five percent on the rest. That's another three hundred and fifty thousand, one hundred dollars. Holy shit! Oh well, I guess the fund will have to pay that as well. I'll call your card in and you contact the boat company so they can come get it.

It took a while to find Mercy so I could get the telephone number of the Magellan people. When I called them and began telling them about the boat, the man couldn't believe the man they had built the boat for would ever let it go. I explained that the man had died in the process of not wanting to let the boat go. Mercy was whispering, "Tell them that you're Steve Sharp's friend."

When I did what she asked, the man said, "Wouldn't you know. The same guy is involved in two of the largest boats we've ever made. What can we do for you?"

"I need the boat brought to your facility as we want to have it completely remodeled to suit our needs. Steve said that only you could do the job, so I'm calling. Can you come get it today?"

The man asked, "Are you on the deck of the boat now?"

I said, "Wait a second and I'll walk out onto the deck. Okay, now what?"

"Look to your starboard and what sign do you see in the distance?"

I looked that way and saw a large Magellan sign. "You are close. Can you take the boat today? I want to have an engineer come to Tampa so several people can have some input on the remodel. I think most of the lowest deck is going to be okay but the middle deck is going to be where the work is."

The man said, "I'll send a crew to get the boat right now, and if you would, please come over to our offices before you leave town."

I said, "We'll be sure to do that. I appreciate you dealing with this right away."

"We are happy that you called. Now several people will have employment for a while longer. We were just about to lay off several men. They thank you as well."

Back inside the main lounge, the deputy handed me my debit card and said, "Let me finish putting the information on these papers and the boat is yours."

I said, "I'll be right back, I want to check something."

Back down on the bottom deck, I went into the office and opened the middle drawer where I had seen a couple of big rings of keys. It took a few minutes, but I was able to lock the drawers on the desk and also the cabinets. I figured that if the office door was locked, that might alert someone.

Up top, I found the key for the main ignition and the key to the door of the lounge. Out on deck, I found the keys for all the lockers then finally just took the keys to the cabinet and desk off the ring and put the keys for the lounge and ignition on the ring. I had the other full set keys bulging in my pocket.

While all of my ladies were standing there, I asked the deputy, "Was the lady that was on here set free, or was she a part of the problem?"

The deputy said, "She's probably going to spend the rest of her life in jail. She was implicated in a few recent murders, but they have her on selling arms to Venezuela, as well as to several drug cartels in Mexico and South America. Her husband was even worse, but he didn't last. According to the guys that are still alive, there is some big hit man that will be looking for money from that guy and the lady. They said he had been sent to do a job on some heads of Mexican cartels. The men said that their now dead boss had been pleased as his man had taken out several of his most hated enemies. The deputy said, "We haven't seen anyone hanging around looking at the boat, so he must not be back here yet. If he saw us, I suppose he wrote off his money."

I asked, "Did you get a description?"

"Yeah, we did. The guy was about six foot, one eighty or ninety, brown, blue, with a thick shaggy brown beard. They said we would know him as he smelled like smoke all the time and he would be smoking when we saw him. They said that when we saw his eyes, we would know it was him. You might see him but then, probably not."

I kept thinking that this was working out better and better. The more I heard of the guy, the more I was relieved the man was better off gone.

We soon had the boat on its way to the Magellan docks. I drove our people to the Magellan office and talked to the owners. They were very friendly and very happy to have our business.

I told them that we were probably going to totally remodel the first below deck, but leave the bottom deck with the two larger cabins, the office, the utility rooms, and the crew's quarters. The middle deck should be sufficient to handle all of the rooms needed. We probably wouldn't need the huge lounge and the huge dining room. We would do some mods in the galley, have an open area for tables, and a smaller downstairs lounge. I had to tell them, "I'm not the final say on this. Just have your engineer bring the current plans and lots of drawing paper."

The girls were far more excited about the boat than I would have expected. Brandy and Tiani told me why. Brandy said, "None of us have ever been able to brag about ourselves and that we were better off than many. This boat is a way to let everyone know that we are not living hand to mouth. This boat tells all that our family is elite and should be treated as such. All of us would like to put our noses up a little."

Frieda said, "We're really not that way, but you should hear the remarks we get about us all 'having' to live together. Those people just have never seen our house. When we get the new house built, we will show everyone pictures and even invite some folks out to see it. But the boat, let them drool, let them wonder how we hooked up with the guy that owns it."

Tiani said, "Now, Chuck can be our Captain Kidd, the peg leg pirate, taking his women as he finds them and sailing the seven seas. Our pirate captain will have his women and children, plus his best friend and his women and children, surrounding him on this gorgeous boat."

When we left Miami, I think all the women were in a state of shock that the huge boat was really going to be ours. Lisa sat with me in the right seat and brought me coffee. She said, "That boat is really something. It doesn't look like you right now, but I'll bet you'll figure out how to make it yours. What are you going to name it?"

I said, "Perhaps 'Lovely Lisa.'"

She said, "How about 'Brandy's Beauty?'"

"I'll have to have everyone's name in the whole name. We'll come up with something."

Smiling, Lisa said, "You have been so lucky lately, even when you've been in those shooting incidents. You lived. You do find trouble though. I think the boat should called, 'Lucky Trouble.'"

I laughed, "That should be on the back of a little trawler, or a boat like the forty footer Steve bought yesterday."

"We'll see," Lisa said.

Back at the airpark, all of the women headed to the patio. I found Betty in the helicopter charter office and asked if I could get a lesson. She looked at her watch and said, "Get Joy, all the rest are out right now. Let her take you up."

I found Joy working with Jimmy and told her what Betty had said. Joy frowned, but said, "Okay, we can do that. Let's get you a couple of hours work in." She turned to Jimmy and said, "I'll be back to finish that."

I said, "Hey, I don't take people away from what needs to be done. I can do this another day."

We had to argue about it for a few minutes, but I finally won. About that time, a helicopter, the Bell 210 was setting down on a rolling platform. After it shut down, Tank got out and began his shutdown inspection. I walked out and asked, "Have you had a hard day?"

Tank said, "Not at all. I flew a guy down to St. Pete and waited the rest of the day for him. He decided to send me back as he was staying the night."

I asked, "I've had several lessons, how about a couple hours now."

Tank asked, "What did you fly before?"

I answered, "Mostly the Bell 206L and the Schweizer 330."

He said, "Let's get the fuel truck and use this one. You'll like the way it handles. I'm sure you've had some Huey time as a passenger while in the military."

I smiled as I left to get the fuel truck. I was talked through refueling the helicopter before Tank led me through the preflight inspection. When we got in the helicopter, he said, "Go ahead, start it up." When I checked for the checklist, he said, "You know how to start it, go ahead. Just keep motoring the starter till you reach idle RPM — that's that little tick mark on the gauge — and your EGT (exhaust gas temperature) stabilizes. The rest is what you don't know how to do."

I did spool up the turbine and watched the gauges to make sure everything was the way it should be. Tank said, "I was told you were a natural, show me. Lift off and drift over to the center of the field. Get high enough that you can find the smaller of the circles."

I actually did remember exactly what to do. I lifted the helicopter off the ground and didn't wobble around with it. I rose to about fifty feet and went to the smaller of the two circles and asked, "Do you want me to set it down inside the circle?"

"Yeah, do that first, and keep the skids on the ground."

When the bird was planted in the center of the circle, Tank said, "Now lift off, go to the end of the field, stop, slowly turn completely around twice, then fly to the other end of the field and turn around again."

I did exactly what he had asked me to do and was hovering fairly well at the far end of the runway. Tank said, "Take me to Zephyrhills. Let's go see Sandy."

I asked, "How about a flight plan?"

"Sure," Tank said, "Do a VFR for about three thousand feet. Go ahead and put in the numbers on the GPS so you have direction control. But let's go back to the pad, and ask permission to take off using the runway."

We flew back and I set down on the tarmac between our hangars and the runway. I called in the flight plan, changed frequencies, and requested access to the runway. I flew down the runway, gaining altitude, and turned toward Zephyrhills. Tank encouraged me to get up to about a hundred knots, which quickly took us to our destination. When I called the Zephyrhills tower, the controller asked if we wanted to go to the operations building. As soon as I said yes, he directed me to land in front of the building so I wouldn't be taking up time on his runway.

After landing, Tank told me to shut down and we would go in for some water and a toilet break. Helicopters don't have toilet facilities, and taking advantage of every opportunity for a latrine break is not just one of the "Three Rules for Old Men", a la "The Bucket List" movie, but for pilots as well.

As soon as we walked in the door, Sandy came flying from behind the counter and jumped on me. She was hugging me and kissing on me for over a minute. I said, "Wow, what a welcome."

Sandy said, "This is the first time you've been back since you saved my ass. Tank, this guy shot that asshole right where we're standing, just as slick as grease on a hot day. Damn, Deputy Johnson, you are a sight for sore eyes."

Tank and I got water and chatted a few minutes, and then I said, "I'm learning how to fly whirlybirds, so I guess I should be leaving."

We went back out to the helicopter and Tank said, "We didn't do the post flight inspection, so let's do it now as our preflight."

We actually did more looking at the mechanics than we do on the preflight. Tank had me start up and request taxi information. The tower said, "Take off from there and you're cleared up to three thousand feet, due west. You're clear and fifteen, with five knots from the north, occasional gusts to fifteen."

Again, lifting off was no problem, but Tank asked me to hover right in front of the operations building. He told me, "Spin around and face the building and hold it steady, you'll get a treat."

I did what he told me and was facing the building about thirty feet out. I was holding the helicopter in a stable hover when Sandy came to the door and pulled down her top, showing her very nice chest. She was grinning and giving us a double thumbs up. I had to laugh.

Tank said, "Wave, and let's go home."

I did wave then lifted straight up and headed due west while climbing. Tank said, "Sandy used to be on a training base years ago, and promised that anyone who could hold a good hover would get a treat. I remember her from way back then. She still does it for me and some of the other chopper pilots that come around. Don't spread it around; just enjoy the inner circle secret."

I flew us home and was told to see how close to center I could set the skids on the rolling platform. Deciding to do what I had seen Joy do, I pulled up just above the platform with it on my right and slid over the top of the platform. I set the helicopter down on the platform so gently I almost didn't believe it was down. I had begun letting the blades wind down when Tank said, "You don't need me, except for learning emergency procedures, you need lots of practice. Every chance you get, take one of the Schweizers, or one of these Bells and fly. Go anywhere you want, but practice up and down. I need to teach you how to auto-rotate, so when, not if, you get into trouble, you'll know how to get down. But that's it. You know how to fly; now you know how to fly one of these. You just need lots and lots of practice. When you think you are pretty good, I'll get one of the pilots to take you up in the Sikorsky. I'll bet you'll love that. It's a totally different feel."

Tank scribbled a bunch of stuff in my logbook and when I looked at it he smiled. "You're almost rated, Kid. Just go practice. Grab an instructor and a bird and practice. Next time we're out we'll practice auto-rotating."

I said, "There's still a half-hour of fuel left, can you teach me autoration now?"

Tank said "With your natural talent, I might be able to give you the basics of autorotations in that half hour, and then I can sign you off to solo. Let's try a hovering autorotation first. Follow me on the controls. First, we take up a standard 3-5 foot hover, then roll the throttle off to idle. Notice we push the right pedal in smartly to keep the loss of engine torque from pushing our nose around to the left. As we sink, we pull the collective smoothly up to cushion our touchdown. Now you try it."

It all happened smooth as silk as Tank was describing it, with a gentle touchdown. I tried it, and overcorrected on the pedal so that the nose moved a little left, and pulled up on the collective a little fast so that the bird stopped sinking before it touched down, and then just dropped the last six inches or so. I thought I'd really screwed up.

"Damned good for a first try," said Tank. "Good enough for a sign off on hovering autorotations, but try it again anyway." My second try was better, almost as smooth as Tank's. The whole process had taken less than 5 minutes.

"Now let's get up in the traffic pattern and shoot some autorotations from altitude. I'll call the tower and tell them what we're doing." Tank had me take off and do a standard traffic pattern around the field at 800 feet above ground level, and when we were lined up with the active runway he said, "Follow me on the controls again. First, I'll roll the throttle to idle. When you're flying, instead of hovering, and the RPM goes down, the first thing you do is get the collective down, 'Keeping the rotor RPM in the green, ' and then you slow down to what's called 'minimum rate of descent airspeed', about 60 knots in this helicopter. You can vary the speed somewhat, trading descent rate for distance, to get into a good touchdown area when you are flying cross country. Look out front and see the mid-point marker on the runway. That's our target. Keep that in your 'sight picture' in the windscreen as we descend. Okay, at about 75 feet above ground — less in the 206 — start pulling back on the cyclic stick to pull the nose up and slow us down. That's called the 'flare'. Okay, great, as we pass through about 15 feet, pull the collective up smoothly and lower the nose." We touched down with hardly any bounce or slide. "Now you do it, Chuck."