AK 239: The Enemy Is Already Here

They were ready and willing to change the world or die trying.

I wasn’t.

New York Hotel

^{Ketchikan, Alaska}

^{Christmas Eve Morning}

As is usual for Ketchikan, it’s raining outside.

The rain had followed me from Portland to my hotel last night. I hadn’t seen the sun for a month, except on Mt. Hood last week. The sun had also peaked out on the flight to Ketchikan when we flew above a thick layer of rain clouds.

Snow was on the mountains but an unusual warm spell, 45 degrees today, had washed away all the snow in town.

The rain was so gentle on my window that it couldn’t even be heard over the TV.

A local news show from Anchorage, Alaska Today, is on and the anchor said:

“Concern has been raised that this deal will raise Russian control of the U.S. uranium market to about twenty percent. Due to low prices on the world market most uranium mines in the United States have been shuttered. Currently, the U.S. imports about half of its uranium from Russia for use in its nuclear power plants…”

I was not paying any attention.

Guess I should have been.

My flight in was unremarkable. I always loved this quirky little airport. The airport is, in fact, on a separate island across The Tongass Narrows from the quaint little town. To get to town you must be ferried across The Narrows.

Ah, Alaska, what an adventuresome place!

My room at the ‘New York Hotel’ was built at the turn of the last century. The room had authentic wood doors, beamed ceilings and hand quilted bedspreads!

The street wasn’t really noisy but the room did come equipped with ear plugs, just in case.

I’m a night owl and generally go to sleep around 2am. However, four or five hours of sleep was all I needed so it wasn’t a big deal.

The café downstairs would have great local musicians and comedians perform on weekends.

Ketchikan was a small town, filled in spring and summer with mostly cruise ship tourists wandering up and down Creek Street. Creek Street is a fun place, built entirely over a creek filled with thousands of salmon during spawning season. I overheard a tourist there once say:

“Why are we taking a boat fishing, I could just fish here!”

I thought, “What’s the fun in that?”

In season, thousands of tourists, dodging the rain, would buy all sorts of crazy, worthless, Chinese made trinkets, from a variety of brightly painted little shops, pretty much all owned by the cruise lines!

At a glance, about all there was to see in Ketchikan were tourist traps, rain and totem poles!

When I get back I’ll probably walk downstairs to the New York Cafe and celebrate Christmas with all the other lonely drunks. The guy I met last night worked at about the only jewelry shop left open in town. The jeweler was in bright, ruby red shoes. He was very depressed that he hadn’t convinced anyone “in days” to purchase a “top quality diamond” from him.

I wish the Great Alaskan Lumberjack Show was playing down by the dock.

Log rolling!

Those were the days.

The Willamette River in Portland, Oregon in July. Doug Meyers! What a jerk! He would cut a log lose from a pack then would dare me to knock him off the log. He and I would run on the floating logs to see who’d hit the river first. I think I held the neighborhood record.

Of course, Doug might have a very different version of this story.

Nothing much floats in the Willamette River today other than house boats, dead fish or dead bodies.

Anyway, my hotel room was upstairs just across Stedman Street where I could see the docks and the cruise ships. But since this is winter, no cruise ship is in port. I was so close to the water that I could literally walk across the street and fall into the Gulf of Alaska.

Technically, it’s the Thomas Basin but hey, it’s the same body of water.

I’d gone to Ketchikan on fishing trips in the past but this was business.

I’d volunteer for any dangerous job but this one was “supposed to be” boring and routine.

Ya, it was Christmas Eve.

Ya, I’d be spending another one on the road but I didn’t have anything better to do.

I had no family in Oregon and if this is George Ruddy, there would be no better Christmas present to innocent citizens, anywhere he was, than to put this guy behind bars.

I had no plans for tonight anyway.

However, this night I would never make it back to Ketchikan.

Little did I know that the next two days would change my life forever.

I was to rendezvous with another FBI Special Agent out of the Juneau office and arrest a felon by the name of George Ruddy. Now George had managed to convince the local Sheriff’s office in Clackamas County, Oregon that he was dead, not a small feat.