A Maidens Grave
everything except the eyes. He himself pinned it up, next to the picture of the twins.
“Does she have family here?” Potter asked.
Angie looked at her notes. “The dean at Laurent Clerc told me her parents have a farm not far from the school but they’re in St. Louis this weekend. Melanie’s brother had an accident last year and he’s having some kind of fancy surgery tomorrow. She was taking tomorrow off to go visit him.”
“Farms,” Budd muttered. “Most dangerous places on earth. You should hear some of the calls we get.”
A console phone buzzed, a scrambled line, and Tobe pushed the button, spoke into his stalk mike for a moment. “It’s the CIA,” he announced to the room, then began speaking rapidly into the mike. He tapped several keys, conferred with Derek, and turned on a monitor. “Kwo got a SatSurv image, Arthur. Take a look.”
A monitor slowly came to life. The background was dark green, like a glowing radar screen, and you could make out patches of lighter green, yellow, and amber. There was a faint outline of the slaughterhouse and a number of red dots surrounding it.
“The green’s the ground,” Tobe explained. “The yellow and orange, those are trees and natural thermal sources. The red are troopers.” The slaughterhouse was a blue-greenrectangle. Only toward the front was there any shift in the color, where the windows and doors were located. “There’s probably a little heat rising from the lamps. Doesn’t tell us much. Other than nobody’s actually on the roof.”
“Tell them to keep broadcasting.”
“You know what it costs, don’t you?” Tobe asked.
“Twelve thousand an hour,” LeBow said, typing happily. “Now ask him if he cares.”
Potter said, “Keep it on-line, Tobe.”
“Will do. But I want a cost-of-living this year, we’re so rich.”
Then the door opened and a trooper entered, brown bags in his arms, and the van filled with the smell of hot greasy burgers and fries. Potter sat down at his chair, gripping the phone in his fingers.
The first exchange was about to begin.
2:45 P.M.
Stevie Oates again.
“Glutton for punishment?” Potter asked.
“Bored just sitting on my butt, sir.”
“Nothing to pitch this time, Officer. You’ll be going the distance.”
Dean Stillwell stood beside the trooper as, Potter instructing, two FBI agents in flak jackets were suiting Oates up with two layers of thin body armor under his regular uniform. They were standing behind the van. Charlie Budd was nearby, directing the placement of the huge halogen spotlights, trained on the slaughterhouse. There was still plenty of summer light left in the day but the overcast had grown thicker and with every passing minute it seemed more like dusk.
“All set, Arthur,” Budd announced.
“Hit ’em,” Potter ordered, looking up from the trooper for a moment.
The halogens burst to life, shooting their streams of raw white light onto the front and sides of the slaughterhouse. Budd ordered a few adjustments and the lights focused on the door and the windows on either side of it. The wind was gusting sharply and the troopers had to anchor the legs of the lights with sandbags.
Suddenly a curious sound came from the field. “What’s that?” Budd wondered aloud.
Stillwell said, “Somebody’s laughing. Some of the troopers. Hank, what’s going on out there?” the sheriff called over his radio. He listened, then looked at the slaughterhouse through field glasses. “Look in the window.”
Potter ducked his head around the van. With the spotlights, nobody in the slaughterhouse would have a prayer of an effective sniper shot. He trained his Leicas on the window.
“Very funny,” he muttered.
Lou Handy had put on sunglasses against the glaring lights. With exaggerated gestures he mopped his forehead and mugged for his laughing audience.
“Enough of that,” Stillwell radioed sternly, speaking to his troops. “This isn’t David Letterman.”
Potter turned back to Oates, nodded at the thin armor. “You’ll get a nasty bruise if you’re shot. But it’s important to look unthreatening.”
HTs get very nervous, Angie explained, when they see troopers dressed up like alien spacemen plodding toward them. “You’ve got to dress for success.”
“I’m about as unthreatening as can be. ’S’ way I feel anyway. Should I leave my sidearm here?”
“No. But keep it out of sight,” Potter said. “Your first responsibility is your own safety. Never
Weitere Kostenlose Bücher