Small Mercies

The prompt for the Tuesday meeting of The Sturgis Library Writing group was “Small Mercies”. About two years ago I started a story about a husband and wife team of law enforcement officers in the Huntsville, Alabama area who get involved in the search for a young girl believed to be abducted by human traffickers. I didn’t finish the story, which is a story in itself. While we were vacationing in South Carolina this past winter, we drove past a turquoise and pink painted motel near the Edisto River and it thought it would make a great story setting. My tale follows.

Small Mercies

An early morning fog blanketed the Edisto River and its inlets.  Fingers of mist stretched into the creeks that fed the river and into the pine trees that lined its shore.  The black waters of the river lapped gently against the sides of an irregular row of four small fishing boats anchored about 25 yards from the shoreline.  There were two occupants in each boat, their fishing poles extending out over the water.  However, none of the people fishing paid attention to the red and white plastic bobbers floating on the river’s surface, they couldn’t care less about the large and small mouth bass the Edisto was famous for.  What they hoped to catch was suspected to be in the Edisto Motor Lodge, enveloped in the mist about 50 yards from their boat.

In the last boat in the line, Limestone County Detective Sergeant Lucinda, or Lucy, Amberson and her husband FBI Special Agent Derek Amberson huddled in the morning dampness.  They had been on the trail of human traffickers who were suspects in the abduction of 7-year-old Niecy Lawrence who had disappeared on her way home from school.  The tips and leads they’ve received had led them on a journey from Decatur, Alabama to this damp skiff on the Edisto River trying to peer through the fog to observe the flea bag motel in no-where-land, South Carolina.  The Ambersons and the FBI agents in the other boats were all awaiting the command to rush the building, arrest the traffickers and rescue Niecy.  Other agents and police officers would approach the motor lodge from the trees and high grass lining Route 17.  Hopefully without any gun play. 

“I don’t like this, Lucy.  We can’t see that shit box hotel through the fog.  And why aren’t there any agents posted to watch the fishing camp downriver?”  Derek’s rich bass voice had an edge to it.

“I feel the same Derek.  But that county sheriff was dead certain our suspects are in the motel.”

“Right, but he was too quick to answer, like he was…”

Before Derek could finish expressing his concerns about the county sheriff, the command to rush the motor lodge barked over their radios.  The boats fired up their engines and sped to the shore, an agent poised in the front of each boat to leap once land was touched. The boats to the right of the Ambersons startled a siege of Blue Herons which flew from their rookery with a great deal of noise.  They flew low and close to the water, aiming directly for Derek’s head.  Ducking and turning to avoid the onslaught, he spotted a small skiff dart out into the river from a narrow inlet and turn downriver into the fog.  There appeared to be four large forms hunched around an object in the middle of the skiff.  Derek shouted to Lucy to turn and follow the boat before it was swallowed up in the mist.  He then shouted into his radio to alert the other agents of the suspicious boat.  No other boats were supposed to be on the river while the raid was underway.  Lucy sped their boat into the mist, the other boats trailing at a distance behind them now.

It was no small mercy that the fog thinned as the Edisto River neared the seacoast.  The suspicious skiff burst from its gray cloak and directly into a semi-circle of Coast Guard small response boats.  The skiff’s engine was cut and its occupants, four hard looking men, raised their hands.  Between them was a lump covered with empty rice sacks.  The Amberson’s boat spit out of the mist behind the skiff and came to a stop on its starboard side.  With his pistol, Derek motioned to one of the skells to lift the sacks away from lump.  As the last sack was lifted a young boy of about 10 years old sprang up, sputtering and crying.  Lucy nudged closer to the skiff.  Derek extended his arms to the boy and pulled him to the safety of their boat.

“What’s your name son?  How old are you? Where are you from?” Asked Derek.

“My name is Anthony Taylor, sir.  I am 9 ½ years old and I live in Savannah.”

The Ambersons soon discovered Master Taylor had been abducted only a week prior to his rescue.  The four men arrested were indeed part of human trafficking ring based in the Balkans.  

“It’s a small mercy that Blue Heron almost took your head off Derek,” said Lucy, “or you would never have seen that skiff slip out into the river.”

Before the end of the day, the Amberson’s would receive a tip that a girl meeting the description of Niecy Lawrence had been seen in Georgetown, South Carolina.  

Ernie Stricsek

The Sturgis Library Writing Group

June 27, 2023