Scout’s Honor: Chapter 10

Nothing to Declare

On his way north to Tijuana, Eddie eased into Rosarito, squinting after a jail down each of the small streets off Calle Benito Juarez. The town was little more than a hotel and a few strips of huddled shops. He found it hard to believe it even had a jail. A couple streets were cobbled, but most were dirt. He saw a dust-yellow dog dead in the middle of one street and wondered how long it would lie there. He wrinkled his nose at the village’s raw sewage oozing into the sea. 

Farther north, an abandoned, half-built concrete house reminded him of crazy old Mrs. Doyle and her underground bomb shelter in Lemon Grove. He had been cutting her lawns for a few months before he chanced upon its entry hatch while trimming her bougainvillea. The rusted lock fell open, revealing spider webs and shallow pooled water inside the bare room. The house had stood vacant after her death, and he guessed the buyers never found the shelter. He could approach it from the hillside behind, slip over the back fence, and stash the drugs. No one could connect him with fifty kilos there.

He refined his plan as he idled along, deciding to stop first at the Inn and cram the duffel bags in Roy’s trunk before heading to Lemon Grove. He could deny any knowledge of the car’s contents if he were stopped by the police. 

“I’m so fucked,” cried Eddie again, six cars out from crossing lane seven, as he spied the middle-aged inspector leaning from the booth. With madly darting eyes, he realized Tommy was neither in Lane 6 or 8. Even if he was, it was too late to jump lanes without drawing suspicion. His heart hammering, Eddie reached for another Marlboro, took a half-dozen quick drags, thought he glimpsed Tommy in Lane 11 and swore anew. Reasoning that border guards were likely suspicious of nerve-calming tobacco, he hit the cigarette one last time, then tossed the butt. If only he were that red-tailed hawk he’d imagined himself in Antelope Valley, if only he could soar to Coronado. Then he remembered the panic he’d felt that day when the glider nosedived after his father had dropped the stick, barking at Eddie to fly it himself, to tough it out. He’d lost a couple thousand feet of altitude and stalled it just once before realizing he could level the plane if he just stayed calm, if he was gentle with the damn stick. Now, he inhaled deep, held his breath for a sixty-count, telling—no, begging—his heart to slow.

“You a California resident, son?” The lean inspector had noticed the crumpled hippie van when it was five cars out, thinking it held more promise than the sedans and pick-ups. He looked ex-Army, a retired sergeant in his early forties working on a second government pension. Suspicion came to him naturally.

“Yes sir.” 

“You really in the Navy?” Dubious. 

“Not yet, sir. I’m enlisting as soon as I finish school. This was Dad’s.” He touched the brim of his Fightertown USA hat in a near salute. “He was a Navy pilot.” 

“You have anything to declare?”

“No sir, nothing to declare.”

“What were you doing in Mexico?” He glanced past Eddie toward the back of the van. 

“I was surfing, sir, with my buddy from Pendleton. He got lucky with some girl on the beach, and I’m stuck coming home alone.” 

“What’s all that back there, son?” The inspector nodded toward the rear, but kept his hard gaze on Eddie.

“Sir, after Dad got shot down in Vietnam, my mother… she passed too, and I’ve been living in my van to save money for school. I work at the Riviera Inn in—”

“Your daddy got killed flying in Vietnam?”

“Yes, sir. He was awarded a posthumous Distinguished Flying Cross. Would you like to see it?” Eddie pulled the small box from his glove compartment. To this point he was rehearsed, but as he handed over the red, white, and blue ribboned medal, tears welled up. He wiped his cheek, he said, “I’m sorry, sir. He was a great man.”

“That’s all right, son.” After admiring it, the inspector handed the medal back to Eddie. “You just get in the Navy and do right by your country. Sorry about your folks,” the tough inspector added in a kindly voice that would have shocked his co-workers. “Take care in that war, boy.”

“Thank you, sir.” Eddie slipped the long stick shift into gear and drove off, keeping his eyes straight ahead as he passed the secondary area. He stroked the medal box as if for luck, then tucked it inside his sweatshirt.

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