Peter Johnson came in to Cap-Haitien International Airport on a twin turboprop out of Ft. Lauderdale. It was a toss-up between that or flying into Port-au-Prince and taking a puddle-jumper north from there. Fat chance after the quake, he correctly concluded.
He renewed his passport at the Federal Building the morning after Mas took off to Haiti, on the off chance that she might need him to fly down, and now here he was. She had no idea he was coming. What he had to tell her wouldn’t go over very well on the phone, so he hadn’t even bothered to try. She probably wouldn’t believe him, anyway. He scarcely believed it himself.
The lady at the Hertz rental car desk recommended the Land Cruiser. She warned him that the roads to the Citadel weren’t like the ones in Louisiana. Her cousin lived in Lake Charles and she knew all about Louisiana, and Haiti wasn’t Louisiana. She used a yellow marker to trace the route on the courtesy map, from the airport all the way to the Citadel, and then she recommended a nice hotel near the beach. The drive to the Citadel was about three hours, she told him. He could get a good night’s sleep and be at the end of the road by lunchtime, where he could ride a rented mule the last few miles up the mountain. The guides were very nice and spoke good English.
Johnson thanked the woman, accepted the hotel brochure, and glanced up and down the line of parked cars. He had driven a Land Cruiser for decades, and he just recently tooled around in Kaddouri’s new one. As much as he loved them, he had a taste for something different.
The agent saw the look in his eyes and knew he was reconsidering her suggestion. She smiled at him, and used the famous company phrase on him from their old TV commercials. He’d appreciate it, given his age.
“And how may we put you in the driver’s seat, monsieur?”
He grinned back at her, and scanned the offerings, his steely Eliot Ness eyes finally landing on a convertible Mercedes G550 SUV. It was the most popular vehicle on the island, if you could afford one. But he didn’t know that. He just always wanted to drive a new Mercedes, and now was his big chance.
“I’ll take the Benz,” he told her with a killer Robert Stack smile.
He tossed his carry-on in the passenger seat and buckled up, then re-folded the map and pinned it under the edge of his luggage. It showed the first part of his journey, out of town and into the foothills. He probably could have punched it into the GPS, but he didn’t want to take the time to learn how. He was itching to roll.
He tossed the hotel brochure in the courtesy wastebasket, fired up the engine, and zoomed out of the lot. With God’s blessing and a full tank, he guessed that he could be there before midnight, if the weather held.
He turned out of the airport gate and drove cautiously, blending in with the flow of traffic and glancing ahead to the dark range of mountains south of town. The moon was rising in the east, which was a big help. He was glad they had the G550. It was a bit smaller and narrower than the Land Cruiser, which would come in handy since he was about to go barging up a mule trail in the dead of night. The rooftop off-road lights would probably be a big help, too. And if he ran out of trail, he would call Mas and continue on foot. The moon would be up for several more hours.