24 Declassified: Death Angel 2d-11

by David S. Jacobs

  Jack pushed the platform on to the runway, positioning it at the front of the plane. He set the levers that locked the wheels in place, immobilizing the stepladder. He climbed the ladder to the platform. The engine cowling worked like the hood of a car.

  He unfastened it, swinging it out of the way so he could get at the motor.

  He held the flashlight in one hand. His other hand wielded a screwdriver, pair of pliers, and a wrench, switching from one to the other.

  Ten minutes later, he’d removed certain key components, without which the engine could not start. He threw them as far as he could into the tall weeds on the far side of the runway.

  “Zane won’t be going anywhere in this plane,” Jack Bauer said. He and Orne Lewis stood off to one side, out of Dennison’s hearing.

  “Would you really have gone through with it, Bauer? All the way, I mean — if Dennison hadn’t talked?”

  “What do you think?”

  18. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 4 A.M. AND 5 A.M. MOUNTAIN DAYLIGHT TIME

  4:33 A.M. MDT

  Highway 5, Los Alamos County

  Dennison had named Bluecoat Bluff as Adam Zane’s destination, and Jack Bauer, Orne Lewis, and Dennison were on their way. Lewis was driving, Jack was in the passenger seat, and Dennison was tied up and locked in the trunk.

  The car rolled north on Highway 5. Black was leaching from the sky in the east, replaced by a touch of growing grayness. The sky was overcast, its vaulted ceiling lowered by the pall of smoke that continued rising from the firestorm.

  In the west a ghostly half moon inched toward the horizon, glimmering dully through streaming gray-black curtains. A scattering of stars winked through rents in the smoky haze.

  “Bluecoat Bluff is a local landmark,” Lewis said. “A state historical site. It got its name from a U.S. cavalry fort that was there during the days of the Old West. The cavalry soldiers used to wear blue coats as part of their uniforms. It’s lonely, secluded — a good place for a meeting.”

  Dennison was part of Varrin’s crew. Varrin had sent a car and some men to escort Zane and his bodyguard, Hank Ketch, to the bluff.

  T. J. Henshaw had nothing to do with the operation, as far as Dennison knew. The Wind Farm, foreclosed by the bank, had a conveniently located landing strip. The site was abandoned, unguarded. Varrin had refilled the below-ground aviation fuel tanks and put the pumps back into working order in anticipation of Zane’s arrival. So Zane could fly in, transact his business, and fly out.

  “Who’s this Varrin that Dennison claims he’s working for, Lewis?” Jack asked.

  “Some gunman and gang boss, apparently. I’ve heard the name before but that’s all I know about him. That’s outside my area of expertise. Sabito could quote you chapter and verse about the local hoodlums. Why don’t you ask him?”

  “Maybe later. I’d just as soon steer clear of Vince for the moment. This is a delicate situation and I don’t need him charging around like a bull in a china shop.”

  “Dennison was almighty scared of the Blancos. Not as much as he was scared of you, though,” Lewis said, chuckling. “Apparently Varrin’s bunch and the Blancos are having some kind of war.”

  “Good. The Blancos are a handful. If Varrin can monkey wrench them, so much the better.”

  Tires thrummed on the pavement, the motor raced. Messages crackled on the police band frequency from time to time. An exchange of messages sounded a note of urgency and suppressed excitement.

  “What’s that?” Lewis asked. Jack Bauer turned up the volume.

  A Sheriff’s Department patrol car manning a roadblock on Ridgefoot Drive reported that they had apprehended a person answering the description of Dr. Hugh Carlson. The subject’s documents identified him as one Jason Endicott. His car was different from Carlson’s vehicle. Different license number, different make and model of car. However, the subject’s suspicious demeanor and inability to explain what he was all about had prompted the deputies to detain him pending verification of his bona fides, which were now being processed at Sheriff’s Department headquarters.

  “Ridgefoot Drive — that’s right on the way to Bluecoat Bluff,” Lewis said, excited. “The bluff’s just several miles north of the intersection, over a rise.”

  “Maybe Carlson’s been headed off at the pass after all,” Jack said. “How far away is it?”

  “A couple of miles.”

  “We’re headed in that direction anyway. Let’s find out if they have the right man or not,” Jack said.

  Lewis’s foot put more weight on the accelerator.

  4:45 A.M. MDT

  Intersection of Highway 5 and Ridgefoot

  Drive, Los Alamos County

  “Am I under arrest?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Then why are you holding me?”

  “We’re detaining you pending verification of your identity, sir. Headquarters is running a check on your record. Once that comes through and checks out okay, you’ll be free to go.”

  It felt like an arrest, though. So thought Dr. Hugh Carlson, now occupying the backseat of a Los Alamos County Sheriff’s patrol car at the crossroads.

  Carlson fought to keep a poker face. Inwardly, he cursed his luck. To have the work of a decade threatened by a twist of fate now!

  He was not handcuffed. But the rear seat of a police car is a form of detention itself. A grille separated the rear from the front seat. Windows that could not be rolled down from inside. Doors with no interior exit handles.

  They had his attaché case, too. Inside it: the PALO codes. The lawmen were as yet unaware of the significance of the computer disks in the metal briefcase.

  Carlson had been heading west on Ridgefoot Drive en route to the rendezvous at Bluecoat Bluff when he’d run into the police roadblock. The patrol car sat at the intersection where the drive met Highway 5. It stood in the middle of the crossroads, barring the way in all four directions.

  Ridgefoot Drive ran along the base of the north side of a ridge running east-west.

  Rocky spurs and limbs jutted out from the ridge, causing the road to twist and turn to avoid them. The rugged terrain had screened the crossroads, preventing Carlson from seeing the police car until it was too late.

  Rounding a blind curve, he’d come upon the roadblock. The patrol car’s headlights were on and its red and blue rooftop flashers blinked lazily. Fear seized Carlson. Panic. For an instant he thought of flight, turning the car around and retreating in the direction he’d come from.

  Too late for that. They’d seen him. Flight would be sure evidence of guilt. He had no illusions about his ability to outrace police pursuit. The only thing to do was brazen it out.

  He had a few things working for him. He was supplied with documents attesting an alternate identity. Photo driver’s license, insurance card, bank, and credit cards in his wallet were all made out to his new identity of Jason Endicott.

  He’d switched cars, too. The car was registered to Endicott. The documents were not forgeries. Nothing as crude as that. They were the real thing, bought from corrupt officials in the Department of Motor Vehicles and other licensing authorities. The information substantiating his background had been entered into the appropriate data banks. He’d been assured by his associates in this venture that the documents would withstand official scrutiny.

  The roadblock was manned by two deputies wearing the Stetson hats and tan uniforms of the County Sheriff’s Department. One wielded a baton flashlight. Carlson drove up to the police car at the crossroads and halted. He rolled down his window. The deputies approached him. The senior man was Alvarado; his younger partner was Merritt.

  Alvarado was moon-faced, with graying temples and a salt-and-pepper walrus mustache. His paunch swelled over the top of a low-slung gun belt.

  Merritt was thin, wiry, with a dark eyes and sharp features. Merritt came around to the driver’s side of Carlson’s car. “Good morning, sir.”

  “Something wrong, Officer?” Carlson asked.
Noting with satisfaction that his voice was smooth, assured.

  “Just a routine check, sir. May I see your license and registration, please?”

  Carlson fished the wallet out of his pocket. He handed Merritt his license, registration, and car insurance card. Merritt examined the photo license in the flashlight’s gleam.

  A far from casual scrutiny. He shone the light in Carlson’s face, eyeing it. Carlson squinted against the glare. Merritt looked at the photo ID, then back at Carlson.

  “Hey, Ray,” he called to his partner.

  Alvarado came over to him. He and Merritt stood several paces away from Carlson, discussing him, low-voiced, with much handling of and referring to the photo ID.

  “Let me see,” Alvarado said. He took the flashlight from Merritt and shone it on Carlson. “Fits the description,” he said.

  Alvarado stood by the driver’s side of the car. He stuck his face in the open window frame. He showed leathery skin with a small crescent moon scar near the corner of his left eye. “What brings you out this way, Mr. Endicott?”

  “I’m on a buying trip for my firm. Going out to some of the Native American reservations to purchase jewelry, trinkets, and handicrafts.” Carlson even had business cards printed up for that nonexistent firm in a real office building in Santa Fe.

  “Kind of early for that, isn’t it?”

  “I wanted to get an early start because of the fire. I didn’t know but that it might affect driving and cause me to have to make some wide detours.”

  “It’s raised hob with local traffic conditions, that’s for sure,” Alvarado said. “Pull over to the side of the road and turn off your car, please.”

  “Did I do something wrong? Am I in any kind of trouble?” Carlson asked.

  “The fire’s brought a lot of hassle with it. Looting, theft, and whatnot. We have to check on everybody who comes through. Just pull over on the shoulder there.”

  Carlson did as he was told. He had a crazy thought about gunning the car and making a break for it. He recognized it for what it was and stifled the impulse to flee. The way to get out of this was by not losing his head. He made a K-turn, pebbles crunching under the tires as he rolled into the spot indicated by Alvarado.

  “Turn off the car.”

  Carlson turned the key in the ignition, switching off the engine.

  “Please open the glove compartment, sir.”

  Carlson knew his rights. The cops couldn’t search him and his car or hold him without probable cause. He also knew the futility of quoting the law to the cops. That would really harden their free-floating suspicions. They could hold him until headquarters sent out a man with a warrant to search him.

  Carlson opened the glove compartment. No worry there. Contents innocuous. Merritt came around on the passenger’s side and riffled through the glove compartment.

  He ducked his head down into the well and shone his light under the car seats, peering under them.

  “Get out of the car, sir. Thank you,” Merritt said.

  They didn’t frisk Carlson. It hadn’t reached that stage yet. Alvarado shone the flashlight beam up and down, sweeping Carlson from head to toe, practiced eye scanning for the suspicious bulge of concealed weapons. Finding none.

  Carlson was very glad that he’d rejected the idea of arming himself. He was no gunman. A killer, yes, several times over, but no gunman.

  A metal attaché case sat on the passenger seat beside Carlson. “What’s in the case, sir?” Merritt asked.

  The most valuable intelligence hoard in the Western world today, Carlson thought but didn’t say. He’d wanted it close by, right next to him. Its reassuring presence, the nearness of it. That was why he hadn’t locked it in the trunk. “Just some disks — computerized sales records and the like,” Carlson said.

  “Open it up, please.”

  Carlson stood facing the left front side of the car. He set the base of the metallic reinforced carrying case on top of the car hood. Alvarado and Merritt came up close behind him, flanking him. He unsnapped the fasteners and lifted the lid. Inside, in a black velour lining with slots, were two rows of computer disks, each in its own hard clear plastic protective carrying case.

  “Thank you, you can close it now. Put it back in your car.”

  They had him open the car trunk next. Carlson pressed a button in the front of the instrument panel that unlocked and opened the trunk.

  “Please come with me,” Alvarado said. He and Carlson went to the rear of the car. The deputy lifted the trunk lid. Nothing in the boot but a spare tire. Down went the lid, relocking it.

  “I’ll get on the horn to headquarters,” Alvarado said. Merritt stayed behind to keep an eye on Carlson/Endicott. A very close eye.

  Alvarado got in the passenger side front seat of the patrol car. He left the door open, leaving the dome light on. He worked the hand mic of the dashboard mounted radio, calling into headquarters at the Sheriff’s Department. He reported that he and Merritt were detaining a man who fit the description of Dr. Hugh Carlson but whose license and registration identified him as Jason Endicott. He read the pertinent information off the cards to the dispatcher. He reported the attaché case with the computer disks.

  The dispatcher said he’d run a make on the ID ASAP. After that there was nothing for it but the waiting.

  “Bring him over here, Jim,” Alvarado said. He opened the right rear door of the patrol car. “Sit down and make yourself comfortable while we’re waiting for your documents to be processed and verified, Mr. Endicott. It’ll take a few minutes. Make yourself comfortable.”

  “Thanks.” Carlson was unable to repress a tart sting of incipient sarcasm that he quickly smothered. “Am I under arrest?”

  “Any reason why you should be?”

  “No.”

  “There you are, Mr. Endicott. Just routine.”

  Carlson got into the back of the police car. Alvarado closed the door. The sound of the door closing had an ominous note of finality. Like a cell door closing.

  So there was Dr. Hugh Carlson, sitting in the back of a police car. Where all your scheming and masterminding — and treason and murder — have brought you, he told himself.

  But he was still in the game. The documents were real, his assumed identity had been prepared by professionals. They would pass muster. Of that he had no doubt. They were good enough to survive the scrutiny of a notoriously corrupt law enforcement agency headed by a buffoon such as Sheriff Buck Bender.

  They would have to release him. Play it cool. Keep your nerve, maintain your front, and you’ll get clear of this. They’ll let you out with an apology, and you’ll get back in your car and be on your way.

  Alvarado and Merritt stood off to one side out of earshot deep in earnest discussion. They kept looking up and casting side glances at him.

  Carlson had time to think. Recalling the last few frantic hours, events whirled in montage through his head. He was not alone. He had friends on the outside. Associates, confederates.

  Alone, single-handedly, he had accomplished the most spectacular espionage/atomic secrets theft in modern history. Since the Rosenbergs had stolen the secrets of the atomic bomb and passed it to the Soviets at the start of the Cold War. They’d been caught and executed in the electric chair.

  Carlson had achieved the theft by himself. But he needed help on the getaway. And to eliminate threats along the way. He’d made alliances. Potent allies who could make things happen. His elaborate machinations, spread across the years, had stirred suspicions. Especially in the last year.

  Perhaps because he was so near to his goal, he’d rushed things, becoming careless in his haste and eagerness. Naturally the first to suspect had been those who worked most closely with him. His colleagues.

  Dr. John Yan had been the first. He’d made the mistake of failing to dissemble those suspicions. Carlson had caught Yan checking up on him, snooping. Yan didn’t know that Carlson knew. That signed his death warrant. Carlson alerted his allies that Yan was on hi
s trail. They assured him they’d take care of it.

  Enter Varrin. Carlson knew nothing of the man personally, had never met him.

  He preferred it that way and that’s how it had to be. For Carlson’s associates, Varrin was the go-to guy for assassination. Soon after, Yan dropped dead on the tennis courts. It looked like a heart attack. He’d been poisoned with an untraceable drug that counterfeited the symptoms of a heart attack.

  Yan had communicated enough of his suspicions about Carlson to his close friend, the INL’s venerable savant Dr. Hamilton Fisk. Fisk’s clumsy fumbling attempts to follow up on the late Yan’s efforts stood out like a neon sign to Carlson. Carlson passed the word to his associates and Fisk was the next to die.

  The inevitability of it was comforting, reassuring. Knowing he could depend on his allies to do their part in enabling his great work of stealing the PALO codes.

  Several months passed before murder once more came into play. It was the result of Carlson’s own clumsiness. In his eagerness to finalize his tasks, he’d cut corners, gotten sloppy. He’d downloaded a chunk of the encoded codes (disguised as Perseus test data) onto Freda Romberg’s computer, parking it there for temporary safekeeping.

  She’d discovered the anomaly but hadn’t realized its significance. She’d made the mistake of bringing it to Carlson’s attention — never suspecting that he was the culprit. She’d planned to report it to Rhodes Morrow. Carlson had to act fast.

  His newfound mastery over the computerized scanner readers had proved invaluable, allowing him to stealthily enter the Snake Pit when she was alone in it and activate the robot arm that had swatted her like a mosquito.

  Doctoring the scanner reader data erased all cyber traces that he’d been in the tank at the time of Romberg’s death.

  But SECTRO Force guard Ernie Battaglia had seen Carlson in the vicinity near the time of death. If he should put the facts together, the results could be uncomfortable indeed for Dr. Carlson. The associates had seen to Battaglia, removing him from the game board by a convenient fatal hit-and-run accident.