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detective working undercover as a Customs inspector stepped out of the Customs building onto the wharf to witness the beginning of another day. Detective Irvine Wallace had always held this hour in something akin to reverence. It was the hour when few things stirred the silence of creation and a man could claim the earth for himself.
    Waiting at the mouth of the harbor for the pilot to escort her in, sat the first freighter of the day, her cargo contraband originating in Colombia. The cargo listed in the ship’s manifest soon to be checked by the detective was coffee, ostensibly taken on in Nicaragua.
    The trumpeting of the pilot’s horn broke through the early morning stillness as Detective Wallace stood on the wharf, eyes searching the expanse of harbor for signs of the incoming ship. He could see her now, her port and starboard lights bright against the wash of blue where sea and sky were still one. Like other Customs officers on duty when the special cargo from Nicaragua arrived, he had been bribed to sign off on the manifest without inspection, or questions. This morning would be different. On orders of his real superior, the head of the Criminal Investigation Department, there would be an inspection. Wallace was apprehensive, and with good reason.
     
    The detective played idly with his wedding ring wondering if this were the day he would nail his evidence. For months, he had been trying to find proof that cocaine was being transshipped through the port. He paced the dock, working out his next strategy. He eyed a group of stevedores waiting for the Nicaraguan ship to dock. It was a long shot, but maybe they might know something. Or they may have seen something. It was worth a try. Wallace could hear their raucous laughter resounding down the dock from where they stood huddled near a freighter. That ship, one of the Indies Shipping fleet, had been in port for two days now. The regularity with which the two vessels met had become a suspicious pattern.
    As Wallace sauntered idly over to the men their laughter came to an abrupt halt.
    “How’s it going?” Wallace asked casually.
    There was prolonged silence before one of the men spoke, “Everything cool, bredda. Everything cool.” The man said nothing more. Neither did anyone else.
    Wallace’s eyes swiveled towards a giant of a man hovering near him. “Yuh need something?” the giant asked.
    “No,” Wallace replied carefully. “I was just bored waiting for that ship out there to come in.”
    The man laughed, the laughter not quite reaching his eyes. “Well, yuh won’t be bored too much longer, bredda. Yuh ship soon come in.”
    There was a roar of laughter from the men. Wallace waited for it to settle down before voicing the question foremost on his mind, “Yuh know when this one here going load?”
    An exchange of furtive glances followed Wallace’s question. The giant stared at Wallace malevolently. “Why yuh want know dat? Yuh nuh have noting to do wit dat ship. Don’t is di one coming in yuh going inspect?”
    Wallace decided it was in his best interest to drop the matter. Things were getting ugly. “I was only wondering, bredda. Is no big thing,” he quickly explained.
    “Yuh should know better than ask questions round here,” the giant warned. “Don’t forget loose tongues sink ships, bredda.”
    Wallace realized he was up against a wall. It was futile trying to get information from the wharf workers, especially with the giant around. But the giant’s last remark told him a lot. With a cursory remark, he turned on his heels and left the men. As he walked back to the end of the wharf, he glanced in the direction of the parking lot with a worried frown. His backup still hadn’t arrived. Wallace’s eyes wandered along the line of containers. Those containers were all accounted for, awaiting other ships, or transportation by land to various destinations throughout the island. He had checked the documentation for all incoming and outgoing cargo