The Russian Takedown: Chapter 12

As I watched the boat I pon­dered how I might be able to use their habi­tat to my advan­tage.  It was rea­son­ably seclud­ed here in the har­bor, and there was very lit­tle activ­i­ty among the oth­er boats.  I decid­ed to try to rent a boat myself.  If I could find one avail­able in the right loca­tion, it would allow me to keep watch on our two friends more eas­i­ly than sit­ting in a car in the mid­dle of a park­ing lot, espe­cial­ly when the weath­er cleared and there would be more peo­ple about.

I start­ed the car and drove over to the club­house, hop­ing to find some­one there who could pro­vide a lead for rent­ing a boat, if one were avail­able.  I parked direct­ly in front of the club­house and rushed in, shield­ing myself as well as pos­si­ble from the rain.  Shaking off in the spa­cious lob­by, I spot­ted a sin­gle indi­vid­ual cross­ing the space and hailed him to inquire about rent­ing a boat.  He informed me where the office was locat­ed and went on about his busi­ness as I walked down the hall to the des­ig­nat­ed space. 

The door was open, the room spare but clut­tered, with a mid­dle-aged gen­tle­man behind a mod­ern wood desk, work­ing at a com­put­er.  The room’s walls were filled with pho­tos of yachts of every descrip­tion, from sleek pow­ered beau­ties whose prices no doubt ran into sev­en fig­ures, to six­teen-foot cata­ma­rans with filled jibs, angled over onto one pon­toon, rac­ing through the waves.

“Yes, sir, can I help you?” he asked as he looked up from the com­put­er screen.

“I hope so.  I’m vis­it­ing the area for a cou­ple of weeks from Massachusetts and thought I’d pre­fer to stay on a boat rather than a hotel.  I have a boat of my own at home and find stay­ing on it much more com­fort­able than being on land all the time.  Is it pos­si­ble that you might have some­thing avail­able to rent for a short period?”

“I’m sure we do,” he replied pleas­ant­ly, obvi­ous­ly pleased that he would have some­thing to do on this rainy day rather than just warm his chair.  “I’m Dennis Willows,” he said, extend­ing his hand.

“Michael Tallent,” I respond­ed, offer­ing an over­ly firm hand­shake and using one of the alias­es I had assumed for this mission.

“A good num­ber of our slip own­ers allow us to rent out their craft for them in the off-sea­son,” he said, regain­ing his seat.  “We prob­a­bly have fif­teen or twen­ty to choose from at the present time.  Do you have a par­tic­u­lar size in mind?”

“Well, I’d like some­thing with sleep­ing accom­mo­da­tions, nat­u­ral­ly, and a gal­ley would be nice, to avoid hav­ing to eat out all the time.”

“Well, let’s see,” he said as he pulled a list of the har­bor slips from beneath a sheaf of papers. “I think we have four that might fit your require­ments.  Here, let’s look at the har­bor map, and I can show you where they’re located.”

We walked over to a wall-mount­ed chart that showed the entire har­bor, with num­bered slips.  Each extend­ed dock con­tained slips on both sides, and each dock was num­bered in sequence, with the slips giv­en three-dig­it num­bers based on the dock num­ber — even num­bers on the right, odd on the left. Krislov was locat­ed at dock num­ber one, slip num­ber 107.  I hoped that one of the boats avail­able would be at dock two, prefer­ably in a slip on the side direct­ly oppo­site 107.  There were actu­al­ly two boats in the loca­tion I want­ed, one a small­er boat with an inte­ri­or cab­in but no gal­ley, the oth­er just what I needed.

“That one looks quite nice,” I said, point­ing to slip 212.

“Oh, yes.  That is a very nice boat.  Forty-four feet, beau­ti­ful sun deck, sleep­ing quar­ters for six, and a small gal­ley which should be per­fect for you.  I assume you won’t be plan­ning on tak­ing it out?”

“Oh, no.  I’m afraid I don’t know the waters of Lake Ontario so I would­n’t risk some­one else’s boat.  I just plan on resid­ing there dur­ing my stay.”

“Very good, Mr. Tallent.  I’ll draw up the papers right away if you’d care to wait around a bit.  The rental on that boat is $1200 per week.  Is that agreeable?”

“Oh, yes. Quite. A stay at the Hazelton would cost that much or more, I’m sure.”

“Indeed,” he said as he began the search for the papers he’d need for the rental agree­ment.  “I’ll need your iden­ti­fi­ca­tion, Mr. Tallent.  For the paperwork.”

“Of course.” 

I took my wal­let from my jack­et pock­et and hand­ed him the dri­ver’s license with the name Tallent on it.  The address was list­ed as Kingston, New York, not Massachusetts, and he noticed it, “You said you were from Massachusetts, Mr. Tallent.  Your dri­ver’s license lists your address in Kingston, New York.”

“I know.  That license was issued sev­er­al months ago.  I’ve since moved to Massachusetts and haven’t had a chance to change the address.  It keeps slip­ping my mind.  Glad you spot­ted it though.  Perhaps it will help me remem­ber when I get back home.  If I keep dri­ving around Massachusetts with a New York license, I’m like­ly to get a citation.”

“Well, if you’ll just give me the Massachusetts address, I’ll put that into the paperwork.”

I gave him a fake address for Boston and wan­dered about the facil­i­ty while he com­plet­ed the rental forms, want­i­ng to see how vis­i­ble the slips were from the club­house.  Unfortunately, the front of the club­house looked out over the entire har­bor, with a good view of each dock.

As I signed the papers and hand­ed him my Michael Tallent American Express card, I inquired, “Is the club­house open at night?”

“Only dur­ing the sum­mer sea­son.  This time of year, we usu­al­ly close between five and six.  We don’t have night per­son­nel on staff, but the Toronto police patrols the area, so we don’t have any problems.”

“That sounds fine.  When can I get access to the boat?”

“Oh, by about three o’clock, I’d say.  I need to con­tact the own­er and let him know the boat is rent­ed.  Then I’ll check it out myself to be sure every­thing is ship-shape and secure.  If you’ll stop back by here then, I’ll have the keys for you.”

“That sounds fine.  I have a few things to get in order as well, so I’ll see you about three.”

“Good.  Thank you, Mr. Tallent.  And, as we say in the yacht­ing busi­ness, wel­come aboard.”

He laughed.  I smiled, shook his hand again, and left for the car.  I had to go back to the Hazelton, col­lect a few things, and con­tact Armin.  He was going to have to pro­vide me with some spe­cial­ized equipment.