Safehouse operation |
You will wait for a phone call. It will tell you where your guests are and how to pick them up. You must be ready for this call anytime, day or night. You will get a phone call a day or so in advance to let you know when you need to be on watch. The getaway team will make the call when they know how they are going to deliver your guests. The phone call came at 11:00 pm on Thursday. Our guests were waiting at the truck stop, but not inside it. They were the shadows near it. They could wait there in the darkness and watch the parking lot. When your Taurus arrives they will walk towards it. There will be two of them, one man and one woman. They won't look like much, their clothing will probably be pretty dirty and worn. They will be dirty, and tired. They will have the first names Ted and Susie. Your first names have been given to them as Henry and Peggy, and their ability to name both of you will serve as recognition words. You must say both their names and they will say both of yours. It went without a hitch. The glare of the lights over the pumps and the parking area made it very difficult to see into the shadows. We couldn't see much of them in the darkness. We parked the car furthest out on the parking lot, so that there were no cars between us and the street. We waited. After about 60 seconds, two people got up from the ground and slowly walked our direction. "We're Suzie and Ted", the man said. "We're Peggy and Henry." That was all we said. We put them into the car as quickly as we could, then left the parking lot. They didn't say much on the way home, and we didn't try to talk to them either. When we got home we pulled into the garage and closed the garage door before we opened the car doors. We went into the house by the lights of the garage door opener. Once inside, we got our first good look at them. They were tired, scared, dirty, and young in that order. We've thought of this ahead of time. Ted bathes downstairs and Susie bathes upstairs, then food, then bed. No discussion until tomorrow. They were so tired they literally stumbled on their way to the bathrooms. Peggy took Susie and I took Ted. I had underwear, sweats, towels, soap, shaving stuff all laid out and he appeared 20 minutes later slightly damp but looking much better. It was only superficial, however. He declined anything to eat, saying he was too tired, so I led him to his bedroom and put him to bed in it. Just before I closed the door, he thanked me for not insisting on him telling his story right now. He was really exhausted. On my way back up the stairs I saw Peggy leading Susie in the same direction towards the bedroom facing ted's. I did not stay downstairs, and in a very short time Peggy was back up stairs. The last thing before we went to bed we checked the car for anything of theirs that they might have left there, but they came literally with nothing but the clothes on their backs, which were now in heaps on the bathroom floors. The next morning early we bundled their clothes in the washer and then hung them out on the line. There were houses across the valley that could see our clothes line if they knew where to look. By using binoculars to see the clothes on the line they would know that our guests were were safely to ground, at least for now. The morning was clear and cool, promising a very bright and wonderful day later on. Around noon our guests appeared again upstairs, first him, then her a minute afterwards. They were dressed in the clothes we had for them, which were too big, because we had no idea what sizes they were, and bigger was better than smaller. Peggy started breakfast. It was to be the farmers special with lots to eat. Suzie told us that the last time they had eaten was two days ago in jail. She showed us her wrists. They were cut and bruised. She said it was from the shackles. Ted had the same. The wounds did not look serious and probably didn't need medical attention, but they would mark them as fugitives for a week or so. The demonstration had gone as expected, they said, and they were arrested blocking the street with about 40 others. All had been roughed up and jailed, all had refused to give any name at all, and they were released three days later. They only saw the lawyer once, on the way out of the jail. They were picked up by supporters and were, of course, followed. They were now on their way back home. They could not be kept where they were, too many of the people who would help them were known to the police. The first of many hand-offs occurred later on that day, outside of town. At a pull-out on the highway an exchange was made with two local activists who took their places in the get-away car while they hid in the bushes and waited for a second car. From their hiding place behind a hedge they actually saw the following car, with four young looking well-dressed occupants drive through the parking lot. It had not been a full minute. The surveillance car slowed down, but did not stop, and continued out the other side of the pull-out. They hoped it would follow the get-away car, now with two different passengers, all the way back to Seattle. The next thing was clothes. We had hung theirs out on the clothes line as a signal, but they couldn't wear them again. Not where they were going. Their transportation plans called for much better clothes. Peggy brought out the brand new JC Penney catalog. As we looked through the pages of the catalog, Peggy said, "I don't know if we will find those clothes in the store, or even if we will buy the clothes in the store, but it will give us an idea of what you like and what size to buy. We didn't even know how many of you there would be, much less your sizes and preferences." For Ted it was simple. New jeans and nice shirts would do him with the socks and shoes that went with it. For Suzie it was a lot harder, but Peggy really got into it with her and in a half-hour everything had been decided. They knew they couldn't go shopping for the stuff themselves, not only might they be recognized, but we would have to explain who they were to people we might meet. We live in a small town. Living in a small town decreases the FBI presence, and makes spooks stand out better from the locals, but it also prevents anonymity for us. We are known in this town. "Peggy, what about shoes?", I suddenly thought. "We can't buy shoes that don't fit us?" "They will want to fit us wherever we go. What size do you wear?", she asked Suzie. Suzie said that she was a size 8 usually. Ted said he was a size 10-1/2 but could wear a larger size in a sport shoe. We decided that a self-serve shoe store would have to do. I knew of a shoe store where I could buy shoes that didn't fit me, but the store clerk would remember me, and I didn't want that. I'm not the type to buy new shoes every month or so. I was looking ahead to when we could do this again. So we came to a rather more elaborate solution. I would go to the Air Force Base in a nearby city and buy shoes at the base exchange. There seemed something poetic in that, but I wouldn't be recognized in the Exchange, and wouldn't notice if I fit the shoes properly before I bought them or not. It would take time, traveling there and back, but we couldn't move again until our guests' wounds had healed, so they were pretty much house-bound for a week anyway. It was a cinch. There were name brand shoes, in all sizes, and all self serve. I even called Peggy on the cell phone from the shoe department for the final go-ahead on Suzie's shoes. These things are important and they must match the dress, after all. Yeah. The checker never looked past the bar code. I showed her my military ID and my credit card and that was it. I bought some underwear and socks while I was at it, for them and for me. It was the first time I bought ladies underwear without feeling self-conscious and silly doing it. While I was gone, the kids, as I had begun to call them, had been writing letters home, saying that they were OK, and being pretty vague about everything else. The letters were to go at least part way by courier, but you never knew. We were expecting a call from the courier any day now. The call came. We were to meet him in the local coffee house at 8:00 pm to exchange packages. I am well known there, and known to meet people, and known to know a lot of people there, and some of those people look pretty strange. The baristas, even if they noticed, would not say anything about it. The baristas might even be involved in the next event, they were that type, but I couldn't tell them anything because they simply didn't need to know anything. The meeting went smoothly. We met, exchanged packages, and he left. I stayed for my weekly meeting and went home at my usual time. I was getting pretty used to this by now, and I can disappear in a crowd of one anyway. The package that left with the courier contained the letters to home. They would be mailed far from here, several states away, in fact, on the courier's way home. The package received contained identification and money for our guests. It also contained Amtrac tickets for a trip to New Orleans. I was to get them to Amtrac and put them on a train headed east. The tickets were first class for a private compartment all the way to New Orleans. They would know each other very well by the time they got there. They seemed excited by the prospect. The day they were to leave dawned clear and sunny. That made no difference whatever since their train didn't leave until midnight, but it made for a nice drive. 8 hours later Peggy and I saw them off and checked into the local motel, using our military discount, of course. The next afternoon we went home. The next day we cleaned up the house thoroughly and dropped all the things left behind into somebody else's dumpster. |