No kidding. But it had the advantage that they'd be out of my jurisdiction in a hurry. I kept my thoughts to myself.
'I have no idea where they might be headed!'
Sure he didn't.
'Here we are! Put us over by the big shed…'
I looked out, and saw the Grossmans' house about two miles away. As we swooped in, and I hung on for dear life, I saw an old green Chevy near the house, but no plane. Gone? Already?
Then I saw the nose of a propeller-driven small plane, blue and white, as we went by the open machine shed and settled to the ground.
30
We left the Huey as fast as we could, slipping in the damp snow, and I swear that helicopter was starting to lift off before I was out the door. The downwash was enormous, and we were pelted with chunks of snow, bits of mud and straw, and tiny lumps of cow manure. Then it was gone, and I found myself running toward the cover of a tractor with a scoop bucket attached to the front. I slid to a stop behind the comforting disk of the big rear wheel. I stopped, snuggled up against the tire. The shed with the aircraft was just about straight ahead of me, with a barn to my left, and the house on a little rise to my right. None of them more than 100 feet away.
The sound of my running, and of the departing helicopter, had stopped at the same time, and it became very quiet in the yard. The only thing I could hear was my own breathing. I cautiously looked to my left, and saw George crouched behind a corner of the barn about fifty feet from me, with Volont behind a couple of rusted old 55 gallon drums between George and the airplane. I looked to my right, and saw Hester was on one knee behind a woodpile. About thirty feet from my position. So far, so good. I did notice, though, than none of us had anything but a handgun. Not good.
'Carl!' I saw George frantically gesturing toward the inside of the shed containing the airplane. 'On the ground, to the left…'
I cautiously peered around the edge of the tractor tire, expecting to see a man with a gun. Or a bazooka. Or a tank emerging…
Instead, I saw nothing in the dark recesses except the plane. The sunlight on the snow was making things so bright the inside of the impromptu hangar was like a black pit.
'What? I don't see anything…'
'To the left of the building,' he said. 'On the ground!'
I looked again. Ah. Oh, my. Grossman had apparently used the space between the shed and the barn as a place to push the snow out of his yard and driveway. He'd left a small space on either side of the ten-foot-high pile, wide enough to permit someone to walk between the buildings. There was a black snowmobile boot, and a dark blue snowmobile-suited leg visible on the far side of the pile. It was very still.
'Yeah?' I said.
'Surveillance. They got down here to keep them out of the plane…' He looked awfully grim.
As he spoke, Volont rose from his position behind the rusted drums, and ran straight toward the pile and the motionless leg.
One shot, but so suddenly loud that I jumped. I don't know where it went, but Volont covered the last ten feet in the air, and hit the side of the shed with a loud
I caught what I thought was a muzzle flash from inside the shed. It seemed to come from near the tail of the plane, but it was very hard to tell. No handgun, though. No, sir. Automatic rifle.
I could imagine the surveillance man moving slowly between the shed and the pile, and shots coming through the corrugated steel of the shed and cutting him down. Never had a chance. I glanced toward Hester, and saw that she was looking toward the house. I could only see an edge of the upper floor and part of the roof from my vantage point.
'Hester…' She turned toward me. 'You got something in the house?'
She shook her head. 'Gotta be there, though.'
Of course. The shooter inside the shed couldn't see anybody moving in the narrow space between the shed and the pile. But somebody in the house sure could.
Well, now we knew where. It then became a question of how many. And, given the capabilities of Gabriel, I thought it would be very nice to know who was where.
Since the tractor I had picked as my refuge had a large glazed cab with a pair of frozen coveralls obscuring my view, and since the bucket and engine stood a good eight feet above the ground, I had a dilemma. If I looked at the shed and airplane from the rear of the tractor, I wasn't able to see the house. If I looked at the house, I wasn't able to see the shed. Furthermore, it occurred to me that, if I moved toward the front of the tractor in order to see the house again, the lower half of my body was completely exposed to whoever was in the shed. Well, I had to find out who was where. On both sides. I'd now lost sight of Volont, and assumed that there was at least one other member of the surveillance team somewhere…
'George…' Sort of came out in a very energetic whisper.
He looked toward me.
'How many people from the surveillance team…?'
He held up two fingers.
'Where…?'
He shook his head.
I took a deep breath. Well, maybe I could at least locate Gabriel. 'Jacob Nieuhauser!' I hollered, generally toward the shed.
Silence. I repeated myself. With an addition. 'Deputy sheriff! We have a warrant for your arrest! Surrender!'
Total silence. I tried again. Nothing. I was thinking about reinforcements, and stalling until they arrived. I figured that it had taken us about ten minutes to get to the farm via helicopter. That meant that, if things went completely without a hitch, we could expect the chopper back about twenty minutes after it had left us. And with it, some of the TAC team. At least fifteen minutes from now, and probably thirty, knowing how things usually went.
I looked to my right, toward Hester. She was looking toward the house. 'Hey, Gorse!' She looked around. 'Cell phone?' I mouthed.
'What?'
I made a 'talking on the phone' gesture, and then held out my hand. She fumbled inside her jacket, and then produced her phone. She squared herself facing me, concentrated for a second, and then tossed it toward me, underhand.
Unfortunately, it landed just on my side of the front tractor tire. About fifteen feet from me, and twelve of those feet were completely exposed to whoever was in the shed.
Hester stared at the phone, and then looked up. She appeared to start to say a word that began with an
Well, now. I thought about it for a few seconds. Most of the time, if you're in a rush, you screw up. Calm and deliberate actions usually succeed. Right. With that in mind, I holstered my sidearm, and almost literally threw myself at that damned phone. I slipped as I reached for it, caught myself with my left hand, went down on one knee, grabbed the phone, and hurled myself back toward the safety of the huge rear tire.
Panting, I became aware that there hadn't been a shot fired. Even better.
Still breathing hard, I dialed the Sheriffs Department. They answered on the second ring.
