5

At school, Mickey kept her eyes open for Shane West. But the morning passed without seeing him in the hall or classrooms, or even while she was getting lunch—she scanned the noisy and crowded cafeteria as she pushed her tray along the metal rails with her good hand.

“Who are you looking for?” Jenna asked when they reached their table and Mickey was still looking.

“That kid,” Mickey said. “Shane. The one who was there at the beach when I fell off my bike.”

“Shane West?” Tripp Livingston asked. “Surfer-slacker-loser? He’s suspended.”

“For what?” Mickey asked.

“He’s a criminal,” Tripp said. “He got caught screwing with the wrong guy, and now he has to pay for it.” He laughed, shaking his head, looking across the table at Josh Landry. “I wouldn’t want to mess with your dad.”

“Yeah,” Josh Landry said. “You’re right about that.”

“What did he do?” Isabella Janus asked.

“Nothing. He just thought about doing something, and my dad pressed charges,” Josh said. “He’s out of school for the rest of the week, and they’re making him do community service. My father wasn’t about to let him skate.”

Mickey ate her sandwich, not saying anything. She knew that Josh’s father was a famous golf course and real estate mogul. They had lived in San Diego until last year, when the family had moved to Rhode Island. Mr. Landry had tried to buy a lot of land near Kingston, with the idea of building a new country club and fancy houses. When that fell through, he’d gotten interested in the U-boat. Mickey knew all this because every time Mr. Landry did something, he seemed to call the local paper. She knew that the heavy equipment parked by the beach belonged to him—she just wasn’t sure exactly why he was involved with a project concerning a U-boat that had sunk so long ago.

“What’s your father doing that for?” Mickey asked.

The whole table looked at her as if she’d asked something terrible. It made her nervous—even Jenna seemed horrified. Josh was the richest kid in school. He lived in a mansion on the water, and famous people who golfed visited—Mr. Landry had his picture taken with Tiger Woods just last week; it had run on the front page of the sports section.

“Doing? Other than teaching a little shit criminal a lesson? What’s the problem?”

“Nothing,” Mickey said. “Except Shane didn’t actually do anything. He was…just trying to make a point, that the U-boat should be allowed to stay at the bottom of the ocean.”

“What good’s it doing there?” Josh asked. “Besides, it’s a fucking German U-boat. We’re Americans, get it?”

“Yeah, my grandfather fought in World War II,” Tripp said. “He’d be the first to say ‘good riddance’ to that thing. They were here to bomb our coastline!”

“It’s part of our history,” Mickey said, looking at Jenna for help.

“That’s true,” Jenna agreed.

Last year, Mickey and Jenna had made care packages for soldiers overseas. They’d also attended the peace rally in Providence. Mickey cared about the world so much, every person and creature, and sometimes it seemed that Jenna was the only other person who got it. If the U-boat left, people might forget how horrible war was. She looked at Jenna, hoping for solidarity, but Jenna laughed.

“Part of our history fighting Germans,” Jenna said. “Nazis right here on our shores!”

“Damn straight,” Tripp said.

“Besides,” Josh said to Mickey, his voice soft and his eyes looking as if they wanted to melt her, “it’s just an old wreck covered with barnacles, snagging fishing nets, attracting sharks. All those surfers who claim it creates a great surf break? They’ll thank us when it’s gone and the sharks leave the area. Bad news: there won’t be any big waves. Good news: there won’t be any fins either.”

“I hate sharks,” Jenna said, giving a pretend shiver. “They’re so scary.”

Scary? Mickey tried not to react. She felt sad her best friend was acting this way, all damsel-in-distress in front of her boyfriend, who just happened to be Josh’s best friend.

“What do you mean, ‘when it’s gone’?” Mickey asked. There’d been rumors, but suddenly this sounded real. “You’re talking about a U-boat—it’s not going anywhere. The periscope and hardware, maybe, but not the submarine itself…”

Josh chuckled. He was small and compact, and he wore clothes that looked as if they belonged in a magazine: designer jeans that didn’t come from anywhere in Rhode Island, a blue shirt with an Italian name across the back.

“Whoa, dude,” Tripp said. “What’s going on?”

“No comment,” Josh said.

Jenna giggled. “You sound just like your father when that golf course thing was happening, and the papers kept trying to get him to talk. Every time I read the front page, there was Mr. Landry saying ‘No comment.’ ”

“You learn to say it,” Josh said, “when you live a high-profile life.”

Mickey wanted to gag, but she had to find out what he had meant, so she asked again. “You said ‘when it’s gone.’ Do you mean your father really plans to take it away?”

“Which part of ‘No comment’ don’t you understand?” Isabella asked.

“Look, Mickey,” Josh said, his gaze softening again. “This is going to be huge. The whole world will be watching. I want you to come down to the beach, and I’ll make sure you’re on camera.”

“On camera, woo-hoo!” Jenna said.

Mickey felt the ground shift beneath her, but she steeled herself to hear what Josh was about to say. “Why will there be a camera?”

“Because we’re going to raise the dead.”

“The dead?” Mickey asked.

“That’s just a saying…. Listen, I shouldn’t be talking about this. My father would kill me. You guys have to swear to keep this secret. An announcement will be made any day, but my father wants to control the way the media handles it.”

“Okay, we swear,” Tripp said. “Now tell.”

“My father’s going to raise the U-boat,” Josh said.

“I thought that was just a story,” Mickey said, her skin prickling.

“No. It’s the truth. We leaked some stuff to the press, to get a reaction. Mostly, it seems as if people don’t care. We didn’t want the natives getting restless before, but now I can tell you for sure. My dad has access to heavy equipment you can’t believe. There’s this crane he’s bringing over from France—it works on the Chunnel…the tunnel that goes under the English Channel. Man, this crane would take up an entire city block in New York. And he’s bringing it to Rhode Island.”

“How’s he getting it here?” Tripp asked.

Josh smiled. “One of his divisions is a shipping line. So, by freighter, then by barge. I mean, this barge will be so big—to hold the crane—you’ll think Block Island has somehow floated into the harbor. My father’s company can do anything.”

“And what’s he going to do with the really big crane?” Mickey asked, thinking he sounded like a brat, bragging that his toys were bigger than anyone else’s.

“He’s going to haul the U-boat up and out.”

“Cool, man,” Tripp said, and Jenna smiled. Mickey felt hollow inside.

“He’s going to televise the whole thing, and when he’s finished, he’s going to take the rusty old wreck to Cape Cod and turn it into a museum. There’s one like it in Chicago, and one in England—U-boats open to the public—but nothing here on the East Coast. He says it’ll be the biggest tourist attraction since the Intrepid, in New York City,” Josh said.

“What’s the Intrepid?” Jenna asked.

“A big fucking aircraft carrier where you charge admission and let corporations throw huge parties.”

“He can’t disturb it,” Mickey whispered, feeling the others staring at her. “Not the U-boat.”

“Why not?”

“Because…” she began. Because it’s ours; because it’s here; because your father doesn’t understand why it matters so much. Those were Mickey’s thoughts, but she couldn’t say any of them out loud.

“Who cares about it, anyway? This is America—it’s not as if the sub was one of ours,” Josh said. He had bright golden-brown eyes and short curly hair, a smile that curved up just at the outside corners; his look should have been cute, but Mickey saw a shadow of meanness, right behind his eyes and smile.

“Yeah,” Tripp said. “Good riddance to it. Hey—let’s go down to the beach and have a send-off party. Our navy sank it, and now Josh’s dad is going to raise it. Party on the beach Saturday night?”

“Definitely,” Josh said. “We have to get into shape for Washington—that trip will be one big party.”

“I’m in,” Jenna said.

“Me too,” Isabella said.

They all looked at Mickey. She cradled her broken wrist and thought of the snowy owl. It was roosting right on the beach that fronted the sea where the U-boat had gone down. She closed her eyes, thinking of how the party would disturb the owl, hoping maybe the bird would have flown north by Saturday. If it hadn’t, she had to be there to protect it.

“Mickey?” Josh asked, looking straight into her eyes.

“Sure,” she said, holding her arms close so her friends wouldn’t see she was shaking. “I’ll be there.”

                  

Operation Drumbeat began after the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, when German U-boats were sent across the Atlantic to attack American ships. Admiral Karl Dönitz had been planning this assault for years, turning his sea wolves loose on the east coast. His U-boats were manned by expert, veteran crews, patrolling the eastern seaboard from Cape Hatteras to the Gulf of St. Lawrence. During the first two weeks alone, five U-boats sank twenty merchant ships, giving the United States a hint of the massacre Dönitz had planned.

Tim O’Casey had volumes of history books and journals on the subject, and he sat at his desk reading one now, trying to figure out the best way to deal with what was going on. He knew that Cole Landry had U-823 in his entrepreneurial sights, with a plan that seemed a combination of Raise the Titanic! and “U-Boat Theme Park.” Landry had set up a foundation to raise money to fund the project, and his board was a who’s who of retired senators, current members of Congress, and U.S. naval officers.

As ranger of the Salt Marsh Refuge, Tim’s duties included protecting all wildlife along the barrier beach. But he also held himself accountable for other aspects of the beach, including the reefs and rock formations, the salt marsh itself, the intertidal zone, and the several shipwrecks just offshore—U-823 first among them. He and Frank had dived on the U-boat countless times.

He had a pen and legal pad out, carefully making notes to aid in his presentation, and was so distracted, he didn’t even see the car pull into the parking lot. He heard footsteps on the porch and looked up—totally shocked to see Neve Halloran coming through the door.

“Hello,” he said, pushing his chair back, standing up. She looked hesitant, mistrustful—but as beautiful as ever, with translucent skin and dusky blue eyes. She wore jeans and a thin navy parka over a sage green cashmere sweater, a camera case slung over her shoulder. He was fifty-five, and although she had to be about ten years younger, her bright eyes and enthusiastic spirit made her seem like a college kid.

“Hi,” she said, glancing at the paperwork. “Sorry to disturb you.”

“You’re not, I promise,” he said. “It’s a relief to see you.”

“A relief?” she asked.

“Yes—I was drowning in textbooks,” he said, but that wasn’t what he’d meant. And as he stared at her now, he wanted to tell her that he knew he’d said the wrong thing again when he’d brought the book to Mickey; he wanted to explain everything to her. Yet he found himself unable to go into it—he was trapped in a memory of last night, gazing at her across the beach, both of them watching for the owl. Their eyes had locked and held, and in that moment, he’d felt something for her that went beyond explanations or apologies. “What brings you here?” he asked.

“I closed the gallery for an hour,” she said, “to come down and try to get some pictures of the snowy owl—but it seems to have relocated.”

“Really?” he said. “You looked by the log? Just beyond the jetty?”

“Where we saw it last night,” she said, nodding. A few seconds passed, and in the silence, Tim sensed her remembering the moment as he was: twilight, soft red sky, silver stars just starting to emerge, the rugged old jetty, the owl taking flight. “I saw you there. But the owl’s gone now.”

“It was there this morning,” he said. “I watched it fly in, after a night of hunting. We could go look for it….”

“I don’t want to bother you,” she said. “I see you’re really busy. I really just wanted to get some shots before the owl disappeared for good.”

“You’re a photographer?”

“Not really,” she said. “But Mickey is so excited about that owl. She loved that book you gave her, by the way. So much so, I thought she’d really like a picture of ‘her’ snowy owl. That’s how she thinks of it…as if it flew down from the Arctic just for her.”

“Maybe it did,” Tim said, smiling, closing the history book he’d been reading from. “Come on—let’s go find it so you can get a picture.”

Neve hesitated.

“Come on. I promise not to say anything about court or lawyers.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I swear. Let’s go get a picture for Mickey.”

Neve finally nodded, and Tim guessed it was the “for Mickey” that convinced her. Tim grabbed his jacket, and they walked out to his truck. She climbed in, and he handed her the binoculars to hold. Backing out of the sandy lot, he drove southeast, toward the stretch of beach the owl favored.

They passed the interpretive center, closed for the winter, and Tim glanced over to see Shane West nailing new boards over one of the windows. The last nor’easter had torn the shutters and some shingles off. Cole Landry’s trailer and equipment were parked alongside. As much as Tim had resisted the idea of having the kid assigned for community service to the very area he’d planned to vandalize, it was a big help to have him helping. He was glad he’d reconsidered the idea of having Shane reassigned.

“What are you researching?” Neve asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Back at your office. Your desk looks just like mine when I’m trying to research paintings for a new catalogue, so I assume it’s a big project.”

“I’m just trying to come up with ways to stop Cole Landry from going forward with plans to move the U-boat.”

Neve glanced across the seat. “I’ve read about that in the paper…they can’t possibly do such a thing, can they?”

“Cole Landry can do just about anything—at least that’s what he’ll tell you. I hear he wants to do it this spring. He has an enormous crane with steel slings to lift the vessel from the sea bottom; he’s got a location picked out on Cape Cod where he plans to put it.”

“I wasn’t talking about technology,” Neve said quietly. “I mean, it’s just wrong for him to even try.”

Tim drove in silence. She had no idea of how much he agreed with her, and why. “Why do you think that?” he asked after a minute.

“At this point, it’s such a part of our lives,” she said. “Part of Rhode Island. I grew up here, and it’s always been part of our legends and lore.”

He thought of those words, legends and lore. They seemed so magical, out of a fairy tale. But the U-boat was real, a warship that had come across the sea to attack and sink American ships. It had been manned with a top-notch crew, the very best that Dönitz had under his command. They were hunting American ships, and many lives had been at stake. Tensing up, hands on the wheel, Tim stared at the road ahead as his mind spun with how he was going to make his case.

“Now I’ve said something wrong,” she said, watching him.

“No,” he said. “I’m just thinking.”

“About the U-boat?”

“Yes. It’s not a legend at all. It’s an IXC-class submarine, 252 feet long, 23 feet abeam. She’s made of steel, displaced over a thousand gross tons, carried three antiaircraft guns as well as a deck gun, and has six torpedo tubes, nearly brand-new at the time she was patrolling our coast. She crossed the Atlantic to attack us.”

“I know that,” Neve said.

“She’s more than a legend.”

“It’s just a figure of speech.”

By the tone of her voice, Tim could tell he’d offended her. He glanced over, wanting to tell her that as tender a subject as divorce was for her, the U-boat was equally sensitive for him. How much would he have to divulge to get her to understand? He tensed up, getting ready to try, when just then they reached a wide-open stretch; the beach and open ocean were visible out the left side. When he turned his head to look, straight out at the old jetty, he saw the owl right there, nestled beside the log.

“We’re in luck,” he said, pointing.

“Good,” she said, following his gaze, and she opened the truck door so fast, he could tell how eager she was to get away from him. He didn’t even blame her. He’d heard the bitterness in his own voice, just as he’d heard it the other times he’d met her. First about court, now about the U-boat. The details of each situation were completely distinct, but they blended together in his heart and emotions—because they were so connected. The past and the future colliding right here, right now.

He followed her to the beach, where she was already snapping pictures. Staying a good thirty yards away from the owl, she used a long telephoto lens. The sun was behind her, and she was a lean, dark silhouette, perfectly still. Somehow he could tell, with just a glance, that she was more than competent—she was an artist. He found himself wanting to see the pictures.

He stood close beside her, but she worked as if he weren’t even there. A gust of wind blew across the stretch of sugary white sand, furrowing the owl’s feathers. The owl moved slightly, shifting position by just an inch or so. The small movement delighted Neve, and she turned to see if Tim had seen. He nodded that he had, taken off balance by her radiant smile.

Two minutes ago she’d been upset with him, but right now she was glowing. Her smile relaxed something in his chest, and he stood a little closer. Watching wildlife was a serious, intimate act. You couldn’t do it with just anyone.

Tim remembered times, early in his marriage, when he’d taken Beth to some of his favorite places: Hanging Rock, the Monninger Ravine, Mount Lovejoy, and right here at Salt Marsh Refuge. He had wanted to share with her his love of not just birds and animals themselves, but the beautiful habitats in which they lived. Even in their charged silence, his father and uncle had instilled it in him—and Tim had wanted to share it with Beth.

Turned out Beth didn’t like being outdoors much. He’d dug her a garden, and it never really took hold. He hung a bird feeder from the maple tree, but she never seemed to watch the birds. He’d loved her so much it shouldn’t have mattered, but it sort of did. He knew that now, but only after a long struggle with himself. People who don’t like doing things together probably…well, probably shouldn’t be married.

Gazing at the owl, winter sun in his eyes, he felt his heart pounding in his chest. Caring for nature was his job now—he got paid for it. But standing here beside another human being—inches away from Neve—felt like more than he had signed on for. It felt like too much to figure out, so he did what Beth had always told him he did: shut down. After a few seconds more, he turned and walked back toward the truck.

His attention was drawn out to sea, and he looked over his shoulder, at the spot where so much of his life had been formed. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Neve swivel toward him, heard the camera beep. She’d taken his picture.

Tim climbed into the frigid cab. Instead of watching Neve and the owl, he turned his gaze seaward again, toward where the breakers were rolling in, over U-823. He knew exactly where it was—he could tell by where the waves broke—where they reared out of the sea in perfect, transparent sheets of water, then curled and smashed in on themselves in a single long, furious streak of white foam.

The U-boat had been stationed just off the coast, waiting for a convoy of merchant ships heading out of Long Island Sound from New York City. It would have followed them into the deeper Atlantic, joined by other German U-boats, if not for one man. They’d called him the Gray Goose, and even now he had more to do with air and flight than water and submarines. Staring at the surf break, Tim wondered what he would have to say about all this.

A few minutes later, he saw Neve cross in front of the truck, climb in on the other side. He’d been sitting in the cold, so the engine wouldn’t disturb either the owl or her in her work, but he turned the key now, fired her up.

“Looks as if you might have gotten some nice shots,” he said.

“I did,” she said. “I even got one of you.”

“That’s one you’ll want to delete.”

“Thank you for bringing me here.”

“Well, you said it was for Mickey,” he said.

She nodded. “It is. You’ve been very nice to her—thank you….”

Tim started to back out of the sandy lot, but she put her hand on his arm, and he looked at her. The weight of her hand was so light, but he felt electricity running from her fingers into the tendons of his arm.

“You don’t like me very much,” she said.

“It’s not that,” he said. “Not that at all.”

“Then what?”

“Nothing,” he said. Then, because it seemed rude to just stop there, he cleared his throat. “Just, did you ever make a mistake that was so bad, you want to keep everyone else from ever doing the same thing?”

“What did you do?” she asked.

“I followed in my father’s footsteps,” he said.

And then, because there was nothing more to say, he shifted into reverse and pulled out of the parking lot. The waves kept crashing in, one line of breakers after another, without beginning, and without end.