Ricky Harpole 10/10/14

Published 12:00 am Friday, October 10, 2014

Caribbean Contra rendezvous left daughter

At the beginning of the third season she was about 80 sea miles out at a small island and just off the coast of Cuba which, except for Guantanamo Bay, was “off limits.”

My oldest child Marlina was conceived at some point on the delivery trip. She is now 38 years old. We had been kicked out of the Caribbeans due to Ronald Reagan whose chief CIA officer was Colonel North. I spent 11 or 12 days in a Mexican jail until Colonel North bailed our butts out of the Matamoras jail after impounding the “Sweet Daisy  May.” 

Email newsletter signup

Sign up for our daily email newsletter

Get the latest news sent to your inbox

By the grace of the devil we had to leave under the support of the British Navy and were escorted to Matamoris Mexico. We pulled out under armed escort and put under armed guard. Colonel North managed to arrange our release. However our pilot was diabetic. They don’t feed foreign nationals in Mexico. 

Captain West got their flying boat off the bay and I flew that PB 5 Catalina the rest of the way to the States. Getting that old antique off the water was tricky enough, but landing in the bay would be trickier. I told the crew to see if there was anything in the cargo compartment, water for dehydration, rum for the pilot. And it worked.

There was insulin and an extra ration of rum for the crew to settle their nerves as well as mine. 

As for Marla, when we left the docks I believe we both knew we never meet again.
I was barred everywhere south of the Rio Grande and could not return under the penalty of death.

She led missions for a couple of years later and it was eventually one too many. Captain West informed me in 1979 that I had a child. The hell of it was that I couldn’t retrieve her and I’d been married to a very protective wife for a year before I got the news. I dealt with it, sort of, 

Marlina is happily married to a British naval officer and has been for 20 years.
I’ve met her once face to face and talk to her from time to time on the ghost phone. She currently lives in the British Virgin Islands and is currently producing my new granddaughter. I could go on and on but some memories are mine and mine alone.

One more thing, the last time I saw Marla, she was on the dock, but she wasn’t dancing, she wasn’t wearing silk, but a full colonel’s uniform. She saluted. On our last adventure, she told me how to swim with piranha. It is a trade secret and maybe later I will share with y ‘all.

Good night my friends,

Ricky Harpole

(Contact Ricky Harpole at www.facebook.com/harpolive or www.colespointrecords.com)