Border vigil ends on wary note

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PALOMINAS, Ariz. - Mike Gaddy, 58, a retired Army veteran of Vietnam, Gre-nada and Beirut, rises silently to address fellow Minuteman Project volunteers gathered at their "command center," the mess hall of a ramshackle Bible college.

"Heaven help these folks when we leave," Mr. Gaddy says, attempting to make eye contact with each of the 40 men and women sitting at a dozen wooden tables. "The relative peace and tranquility they've experienced over the past few weeks is going to end, quite literally, overnight."

No one has to tell Connie Faust what he means.

Every night, illegal immigrants head north across the "retirement hideaway" that Mrs. Faust and her husband, Ed, own four miles down the highway near the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona.

"You have no idea how much safety and quiet you have given us, how grateful we are that you all are here," she says to the Minuteman Project volunteers, struggling to maintain her composure.

The volunteers remain silent, but each smiles at her and nods.

"I love all of you very much," says Mrs. Faust, one of the many women to participate in the Minuteman Project's 30-day border vigil toprotestwhat the activists considerthe lax immigration-enforcement policies of Congress and the White House.

John Waters, who opened his diner at the antiquated Palominas Trading Post on Highway 92 as an "eating and meeting place" for the Minuteman volunteers, also knows what Mr. Gaddy means.

"All night, every night, the dogs are barking, the U.S. Border Patrol is chasing up one road or down another, and their helicopters are constantly buzzing overhead," says Mr. Waters, whose border property is also a favorite corridor for illegals crossing into the United States.

"Since the Minutemen arrived, we've been able to sleep at night, and that's no small task," he says.