Die Trying

guidance. He was careful. And he was realistic. Realistic enough to know he was now in over his head. Things were turning bad in a way which made him sure they were about to explode into something much worse. How, he didn’t know. It was just a feeling. But he trusted his feelings. Trusted them enough to stop and turn around before he reached his special tree. He breathed hard and changed his mind and set off strolling back the way he had come.

    WEBSTER HAD BEEN waiting for McGrath’s call. That was clear. McGrath got him straightaway, like he’d been sitting there in his big office suite just waiting for the phone to ring.
    “Progress, Mack?” Webster asked.
    “Some,” McGrath said. “We know exactly what happened. We got it all on a security video in a dry cleaner’s store. She went in there at twelve-ten. Came out at twelve-fifteen. There were four guys. Three on the street, one in a car. They grabbed her.”
    “Then what?” Webster asked.
    “They were in a stolen sedan,” McGrath said. “Looks like they killed the owner to get it. Drove her five miles south, torched the sedan. Along with the owner in the trunk. They burned him alive. He was a dentist, name of Rubin. What they did with Holly, we don’t know yet.”
    In Washington, Harland Webster was silent for a long time.
    “Is it worth searching the area?” he asked, eventually.
    McGrath’s turn to be quiet for a second. Unsure of the implications. Did Webster mean search for a hideout, or search for another body?
    “My gut says no,” he said. “They must know we could search the area. My feeling is they moved her somewhere else. Maybe far away.”
    There was silence on the line again. McGrath could hear Webster thinking.
    “I agree with you, I guess,” Webster said. “They moved her out. But how, exactly? By road? By air?”
    “Not air,” McGrath said. “We covered commercial flights yesterday. We just hit a private field. Nothing doing.”
    “What about a helicopter?” Webster said. “In and out, secretly?”
    “Not in Chicago, chief,” McGrath said. “Not right next door to O’Hare. More radar here than the Air Force has got. Any unauthorized choppers in and out of here, we’d know about it.”
    “OK,” Webster said. “But we need to get this under control. Abduction and homicide, Mack, it’s not giving me a good feeling. You figure a second stolen vehicle? Rendezvoused with the stolen sedan?”
    “Probably,” McGrath said. “We’re checking now.”
    “Any ideas who they were?” Webster said.
    “No,” McGrath told him. “We got pretty good pictures off the video. Computer enhancements. We’ll download them to you right away. Four guys, white, somewhere between thirty and forty, three of them kind of alike, ordinary, neat, short hair. The fourth guy is real tall, computer says he’s maybe six five. I figure him for the ringleader. He was the one got to her first.”
    “You got any feeling for a motive yet?” Webster asked.
    “No idea at all,” McGrath said.
    There was silence on the line again.
    “OK,” Webster said. “You keeping it real tight up there?”
    “Tight as I can,” McGrath said. “Just three of us.”
    “Who are you using?” Webster asked.
    “Brogan and Milosevic,” McGrath said.
    “They any good?” Webster asked.
    McGrath grunted. Like he would choose them if they weren’t?
    “They know Holly pretty well,” he said. “They’re good enough.”
    “Moaners and groaners?” Webster asked. “Or solid, like people used to be?”
    “Never heard them complain,” McGrath said. “About anything. They do the work, they do the hours. They don’t even bitch about the pay.”
    Webster laughed.
    “Can we clone them?” he said.
    The levity peaked and died within a couple of seconds. But McGrath appreciated the attempt at morale.
    “So how you doing down there?” he asked.
    “In what respect, Mack?” Webster said, serious again.
    “The old man,” McGrath said. “He giving you any trouble?”
    “Which one, Mack?” Webster asked.
    “The General?” McGrath said.
    “Not yet,” Webster said. “He called this morning, but he was polite. That’s how it goes. Parents are usually pretty calm, the first day or two. They get worked up later. General Johnson won’t be any different. He may be a big shot, but people are all the same underneath, right?”
    “Right,” McGrath said. “Have him call me, if he wants firsthand reports. Might help his situation.”
    “OK, Mack,