by Douglas Hirt
He didn’t buy that. “Marcie wouldn’t be as upset with you as she obviously is if you had nothing of value to give us.”
“I don’t know who Carl reported to. Far as I know he never relayed the info to Marcie. If he did it’s just one more thing she failed to tell me. Carl had other contacts that I’m sure you’re aware of. Ask one of them.” I cast a wary glance to Louis. Cockran’s expression remained unreadable. Whether or not he believed me, at least he didn’t sic the giant on me again.
“You say they brought you in unprepared. Why would they do that?”
I ignored his sarcasm and said matter-of-factly. “Marcie went missing. I was nearby and available, so they yanked me away from what I was doing, which by the way was a lot more fun than what I’m doing now, and a lot safer. Well, the local trout population might dispute that.”
He scowled. “Being flippant will only attract Louis’s attention.”
Louis showed me a thin line of yellowed teeth.
“I was fishing, honest. I got a call at my brother’s cabin—I gambled he didn't know there wasn't telephone service that far out yet—and was told to head up a certain road to a certain spot and keep fishing, but be alert for Marcie, whom they expected to make an appearance. You know the rest of it. It was your hounds that found us.
“Who called you? What’s your contact’s name?” He leaned close enough for me to smell the tobacco on his breath. “Your contact!” he demanded.
I stared back at him; my mouth stubbornly shut. Two reasons; I didn’t want him to think I was being too willing to pass critical information, but more pragmatically, I didn’t have a contact or a name to give him. I’d bluffed my way this far but sooner or later he’d see through the ruse.
Cockran signaled Louis and strong fingers plunged beneath my clavicles. This time controlling my reaction was impossible and I gasped a cry of pain and tried to melt into the seat cushions. When Cockran finally waved the giant off I wasn’t seeing clearly and my heart was wanting to burst through my chest. My breathing came in gasps, no strength left to even attempt to straighten myself up in the chair. Louis picked me up and got me more or less arranged properly.
Cockran shook the last cigarette from the pack and put it between his lips and casually stated that he’d seen Louis rip men’s bones from their chest. My brain was whirling and my vision out of focus. The cigarette bobbed as he spoke, detached from reality, like something out of a cartoon. “It isn’t a pretty sight. Now, who is your contact at STE?”
“Go to hell.”
I think I read somewhere that this sort of torture had been invented by the Chinese some centuries ago. They had a knack for discovering certain pressure points that generated the most pain without doing permanent damage. Louis must have taken lessons under one of the masters of the technique. Cockran allowed the giant to indulge himself while I choked on my groans until mercifully unconsciousness took away the pain.
A cold splash of water brought me back around and with it the pain too. My shoulders and neck were on fire, not to mention my head still aching from its previous encounter with Alexander’s steel pipe. Cockran swam in and out of my vision, gradually sharpening to a fat, smiling Satan. He no longer reminded me of that dentist I used to go to.
He placed a Styrofoam cup on the desk and turned back, looking pleased with himself. “It can get worse, Mr. Granger. Much worse. Shall I have Louis continue?”
It hurt to shake my head. “No...no, that won’t be necessary,” I groaned.
“Good.” The word came out with a puff of gray smoke.
“I said, “Let’s talk that deal.”
He shook his head. “No deal. That opportunity is past.”
“What do I gain by talking?” I asked, my brain scurrying around looking for a back door out of here.
“The satisfaction of seeing Louis walk out the door?”
From behind me came a low, throaty growl that sounded a lot like a character from an old, ghoulish television series. That had been comedy and fantasy. Louis was neither funny nor make believe, and I’d not be sorry to see him leave. I said, “All right. Get rid of Lurch and I’ll talk.”
The giant swatted me across the back of my head. Cockran nodded toward the door and the one-man torture chamber lumbered out the room.
I said, “Bet he’s handy to have around for crushing beer cans and tearing telephone books.”
“Louis has his uses.”
I tried rotating my arm and winced. The appendage worked after a fashion, but I wasn’t going to be casting a line anytime soon, which meant the local trout population had been given a reprieve.
“A name, Mr. Granger, or I will invite Louis back in here.”
I’d stalled as long as I could, as long as my battered body wanted to endure Cockran’s method of questioning, at least, and blurted the first name that came to mind. “Jacob Marley,” I said, immediately wishing I picked someone else. I only hoped he hadn’t read Dickens and didn’t make the connection.
“Marley?” Cockran’s eye lids narrowed. “There’s no one at STE by that name.”
I gave a silent sigh of relief. He hadn’t made the connection. “Marley doesn’t work for Space Technologies and Electronics. He’s employed by the University; the Agricultural Extension.” Recalling my impression of the vegetation planted around the STE facility I saw where this fiction was going and felt more confident as the story came together. “He’s a consultant to your maintenance people, advising them on all that fancy greenery growing around your building. He recommends things—you know, fertilizers, how often to use them, how long to water and when, companion species that thrive together and which ones ought to be kept apart, which are shade loving, which like full sunlight. Agronomy can be a challenge here in Colorado, this being a northern extension of the Upper Sonoran Ecoregion.” A lot of this information dump was introductory material to a Botany 101 class I taught in at ENMU. I was stalling for time, and also hoping to add credibility to the yarn I was spinning. It gave me a few extra seconds to think ahead to where I was going with all this.
Cockran didn’t seem impressed with my horticultural expertise. “How does Marley get access? The grounds people are separate from the engineers.”
“He hangs around,” I said. “Sometimes has coffee and donuts with the men at break time. I’m guessing he has a contact on the inside, but whomever he or she or they are, I don’t know. Like I said, I was pulled into this with little notice and no briefing.”
“Marcie was one of those contacts?”
I nodded. “Most likely that’s how he knew she’d gone missing.”
“Why was she planted on us?”
“STE builds electronics for nuclear warheads. Don’t you think certain departments in the government what to keep an eye on that?”
“CIA? FBI?”
I gave a short. “Good luck. It’s an agency you’ve never heard of. Part of military intelligence.”
“Hmmm.” He frowned and shoved his hands into his pockets, staring a moment at the big mirror behind the desk. I tested the strength in my still-tingling arms. They were pretty useless. He turned sharply, his eyes narrowly focused. “Okay. We can take care of the girl. Back to Manquist. He told Marcie something and she told it to you. Don’t say she didn’t. Suppose you tell me.”
“You know what he told her. Why ask me?”
“I’d prefer to hear it from you.” Cockran’s false politeness bordered on contempt. He’d pushed me into a corner and the only way out was to tell him what he already knew...something I didn’t know. My fingers had started a nervous tarantella on the chair’s arm and I willed them to stop as I scrambled to collect my thoughts. “He discovered what you were up to,” I said unconvincingly.
“Yes, you’ve already told me that. You’re sweating, Mr. Granger. Is it getting warm in here for you? I’d open a window, but as you can see there aren’t any in this room. Just as well. The temperature’s been falling since we landed. Near zero last I looked. Too cold to be openi
ng windows. It would be unfortunate for anyone to find themselves outside without a coat.”
“No, it’s just fine in here,” I replied, rotating my arm. I was getting some range back, though the motion hurt. “Your overgrown sidekick did a job on my arm.”
“What a shame.” His voice hardened. “Manquist. What did he tell Marcie?”
“If I don’t tell you you’re going to sic your pet person on me again?”
He raised an arm toward the mirror and then suddenly switched motion and swung across with the back of his hand. My teeth ground together and I tumbled from the chair. I looked up at him from the floor, standing over me, clenched fists and anger flaring in his eyes.
“Anything that needs doing here I can take care of myself. I’ve just learned something, Granger. You have no idea what Manquist discovered, and if you don’t, odds are neither does the girl.” He’d lost the cigarette from his mouth and his shoe came down and ground it out on the carpet. Reaching for the pack in his pocket and discovering it empty, he cursed and cast it savagely aside, signaling the mirror. A moment later Louis bent beneath the door frame.
“Take him out of here then have the speeder brought up from the hangar.”
A big hand grabbed the back of my neck, lifted me to my feet and shoved me toward the door.
“You’re making a mistake.” Words of a desperation said over my shoulder, but not completely lacking truth. I’d managed to figure a few things out in the short time we’d been in the house; little clues had triggered something I recalled seeing on TV, or maybe I’d read it in the local newspaper. Being a New Mexican, I’d not paid much attention to local Colorado politics, but that didn’t mean I hadn’t pick up odd bits of it here and there. It’s what Marcie had been trying to warn me about, but I’d already figured it out myself. I grabbed the door jamb to break my forward momentum and turned back toward Cockran, looking past him at the big mirror. “What will this do to Senator Stratterford’s chances of reelection once our people break the story to the newspapers.”
Louis came to a halt, his brooding eyes widening.
Cockran went rigid looking at me, not speaking. For an instant time seemed to have entered a holding pattern. Then the overhead speaker crackled, a man’s voice filled the room.
“Sten, I want to talk with you. Bring Mr. Granger back into the room. Louis can watch him.”
Scowling, Cockran avoided my eyes as he strode out into the hallway, loudly shutting the door behind him. Louis made himself a human barricade in front of it as I sat back in the chair. It had been a guess, a real long shot this time. It felt pretty good to be right for a change. I grinned up at Louis. His face remained as emotionless, immovable, like one of those stone heads in South Dakota.
Chapter Seventeen
The senator from Colorado was not a young man. He looked older now than the sixty-five-or-so I’d have guessed his true age to be. Worry does that to a body, and judging from the pinched expression he wore now, worrying is what he’d been doing. Even so, middle age had treated him kindly. Lester Stratterford had managed to dodge the practically unavoidable midriff spread that comes to most folks watching summer recede in the rearview mirror and the fall years quickly approaching ahead. Judging from his nut-brown skin he’d spent a lot of time out of doors, but I had a feeling the bleached-blond hair had been helped along with a bottle of Lady Clairol—or whatever brand hair dye it was men used these days.
He presented an impressive image of robust health that appealed to the younger constituency that Marcie suggested he tried to woo. What was it she’d called him? A peacenik...and maybe a few other terms not near as flattering.
He’d been frowning when Louis had escorted me into the room behind the mirror and now, with dipped eyebrows, he studied me from behind a wide, oak desk. Cockran stood at one corner of it. A large window with its view to the fluorescent-lit room I’d just left stood brightly contrasted to the subdued warm hues of this place. A wall of floor to ceiling windows showed a snowy, forested mountainside. Bookcases made of some dark wood hugged two walls and oak paneling covered what remained. The room smelled of oiled wood, leather, and pipe tobacco. On a corner of the desk was a silver tray with a crystal decanter containing a golden liquid. Two huge, potted philodendrons stood in front of the tall windows, and a pair of guards hovered quietly in the background. In the daylight the office would be bright and warm; a pleasant place to work or receive important visitors.
Louis brought me to a halt in front of the desk. Senator Stratterford peered at me through contemplated eyes as a doctor might a patient in whom he’d just diagnosed a rare and fatal disease. After a few moments he said, “How did you know?”
I said, “You’re a well-known man, Senator.” I didn’t mention that I’d only been vaguely aware of his existence up until a day ago.
“Indeed. I am a public figure, however, certain aspects of my life I wish to keep private.”
“Doesn’t that become problematic when you shine a spotlight on yourself by supporting protest marches on government contractors and openly embracing communism, especially with the growing tensions between the US and the USSR?” I’d gleaned this much by what little Marcie had told me about Stratterford.
He looked amused. “You twist my stance on the issues, Mr. Granger.”
“I do?”
He stopped smiling. “Answer the question.”
“One of Alexander’s men mentioned your name at the cabin where Marcie was being held, and she told me.” I glance around the room. “This is an expensive house located in a major ski resort. Your reputation for being an outdoorsy type precedes you. I wasn’t certain at first, of course, but I suspected all this belonged to you, sir.”
“Your instincts are good, Mr. Granger.” He leaned back in his chair. “Earlier you said the Feds will be arriving. How would you know this, and how would they know where we are?”
He appeared to be buying my explanation, or at least not immediately discounting it. “That’s easy. I had a backup man. He followed us to the airport. It’s certain he took note of the tail numbers on your plane and traced it back to its owner...you, sir.”
He looked startled, and then the tension left his face and I knew my last remark had been a mistake. “Good, very good.” He took a sip of his brandy and said, “All the loose ends neatly tied up in a fancy, well thought out ribbon...I don’t believe a word of it. It’s too clean. Even if true, the aircraft is registered to the STE Corporation.” He laughed and waved a hand. “Take him away, Louis. Sten, you may proceed arranging for a dreadful accident.”
I said, “If I’m going to die for something, can I at least know what it is?”
“You really don’t?” Stratterford asked.
I shrugged and turned my palms to the ceiling. There was nothing to be gained carrying on the ruse any longer. The game was over. From here on out I had only one objective, and that was staying alive. The odds of that weren’t looking too good at the moment. “Truth is, I’m here because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time when Marcie Rose stumbled into my life.”
Stratterford glanced at Cockran who was fidgeting with the lighter in his pocket, looking desperately in need of a cigarette. Apparently, the Senator didn’t keep any around. Well, cigarettes wouldn’t exactly fit the man’s public image of robust health, I guess. “It’s been a bluff, Sten.”
Cockran said defensively, “He knew about Carl. He knew about you.”
“He was guessing. He tossed us a few crumbs that he’d picked up from the girl and filled in the blanks with guesswork.” He looked back at me. “Isn’t that right, Mr. Granger.”
“You figured it out, sir. That’s why you’re the Senator and Sten here is hired help.” It never hurt to stroke the ego of the man in control.
Stratterford laughed. “We’ve been had, Sten.”
Cockran didn’t see the humor. “I’ll get rid of him,” he said and moved toward me.
“Not so fast. A resourceful fellow like Mr. Granger would ap
preciate what we’ve been doing under the snooping noses of all those alleged agents working at STE. It will give him something to think about while slowly shivering to sleep.”
“I don’t think...” Between the two of them, Cockran plainly had the street smarts.
“I do the thinking around here, Sten.”
Biting back his reply, Cockran locked eyes with the Senator a moment and then glanced away. Cockran might have street smarts, but he knew who cracked the whip. “I’ll have Raymond bring up the speeder. I’ll feel easier about this once the four of them are out of the way.”
Stratterford spoke more gently. “Everything will work out fine. You’ll see.”
“I hope so.” He didn’t sound convinced, and left the room, closing the door behind him.
“Sten’s a good man, but he’s problem oriented not solution,” Stratterford poured a small amount of brandy into a snifter and brought it over to me. He was about my height and our eyes met even. “I intend to have you killed, Mr. Granger, but I see no reason to be uncivilized about it. Nothing personal, you understand.” He handed me the snifter.
“Sure. I understand. That doesn’t make the prospect of dying any less horrifying.” I tasted the brandy. It burned all the way down to the middle of my empty stomach.
“You really didn’t know what’s been going on, did you.”
“Not a blessed thing, sorry to say.”
He smiled and shook his head. “You had my men in a something of a panic, you and the girl.”
“But not you?”
“I had concerns. That’s why you and your friends are here.”
“And now you’re convinced?” I took another sip. It didn’t burn quite so much as the first.
“About you? More or less.”
“But not Marcie Rose?”
“From what I’m told Matthew’s secretary was a bit too nosy, a bit too confident. I’m certain she’s not what she claims to be, and that her disappearance will likely make a few official waves, but not enough to scuttle our boat, I think.”
