middle fingers. The road began to flatten. I tried the phone again.
'Nautilus,' Harry barked. It sounded like he was on the far side of the universe.
'Harry, check out Will Lindy's whereabouts on the nights of the murders. I think Ava is the target of the messages, but keep Clair guarded too. I won't get back for at least four hours. Call me with up-dates and keep trying, I'm going to be jumping between cells.'
Harry didn't linger. 'On it.'
I downshifted, drifted sideways in the gravel, straightened back out.
'Harry, wait.'
'Still here.'
'Be real careful around Lindy, bro. I think he's an exotic.'
'I'll treat him like sweaty dynamite. Get your ass back here, brother.'
I tossed the phone onto the passenger seat and watched it bounce, onto the floor. In the split second of inattention my right-side tires slid into the rutted shoulder, yanked the steering wheel from my grip. Trees raced at me and I stood hard on the brakes, sliding sideways.
The truck dropped into the ditch, the left-side tires spinning off the ground. I rocked the gearshift from reverse to first. Not enough traction. Screaming and cursing and pounding the steering wheel, I dragged myself out just as the two guys I'd nearly sideswiped drove up.
'Sorry about the driving,' I said. 'Help me get back on the road, I got an emergency.'
They jumped out, red faced and swearing. 'Sumbitch try'n drive us off the side, we'll give you a fuckin' emergency…'
The first guy's fist caught me behind the ear and sent me spinning into the second. He swung a looping right that I managed to block, cutting to the outside. I spun an elbow into his mouth and he fell to one knee. The first guy scrabbled in the truck bed and found a ball bat.
He moved toward me as the bat drew slow circles in the air.
'Bust your fuckin' head open…'
I pulled the.32 from my ankle holster. Their windshield was already cracked and the hollow point collapsed it across the truck's dash like crinkly fabric.
'Get my goddamn truck back on the road NOW!' I screamed, turning a headlight into dust for added emphasis.
Yes-sir ring like Brit butlers, they had me road worthy in thirty seconds. I shot out two of their tires and left them leaping over the guardrail as I climbed back into my truck. My phone beeped. I grabbed it, dropped it in my lap, picked it up.
Tell me she's safe.
Harry conveyed the facts without emotion. 'Doc Peltier's here at the morgue. There's no trace of Lindy. He's a no-show at work. First time in three years.'
'What about Ava?' I said.
'Her car's there, but…'
'She should be at home. Keep looking.'
Over four hours to Mobile. I hung up and tried to remember everything I'd been taught in the police course on emergency driving. The phone rang. 'Talk!' I bellowed.
Voices in the background. Harry speaking to someone. The phone changed hands and I heard an unknown voice. 'Carson, I want you to head north. There's an old weigh station on the highway at the 217-mile marker. A chopper's set to meet you there.'
'Who the hell is this?'
'Your favorite boss, Carson.'
Tom Mason. I didn't recognize his voice; he was talking so fast he sounded normal. I kicked over toward the highway, figuring times. A half hour to the chopper, then maybe an hour and change to get back to Mobile. And then… what?
I was passing vehicles like they were bolted to the road when lights sparkled in the rearview. State police. I figured I'd been busted by the rednecks in the truck and eased up on the gas, thinking of a fast way to sell my story. The lights lit up my truck cab and I pulled toward the shoulder, cursing.
The static passed by with horn blasting and his hand waving forward out the window, Keep going, keep going. I jumped in behind and we ran a solid one-ten all the way to the weigh station, where I saw a big helo with the state seal on it. I flicked a salute to my escort and jumped into the state bird of Alabama, a Sikorsky. The pilot studied me through his dark helmet visor.
'I don't know who you are, buddy,' he yelled over the banshee engine,
'but you sure's hell got friends in high places.' He tossed me a helmet and the chopper thundered aloft. I suddenly remembered the dedication ceremony at the morgue. Who was chatting up the attorney general like an old fishing buddy?
Clair.
The land flowed by like a green flood and I used the time to breathe down my fear and focus on Willet Lindy. Who had access to the schedules? Lindy. He could 'aim' the bodies, kill on the nights when he knew Ava would be first up for the post, a fresh body ready for her inspection.
But what was Lindy's motive? What did he gain from his aimed autopsies? A perverse voyeurism? He'd never been in the autopsy suite while I'd covered a post. My mind raced through the process of an autopsy, what it generated: Paperwork. Results. Conclusions.
Speculations. Reports. The pro sector did the postmortem, keeping track of the process… giving a play-by- play to the microphone.
To the tape recorder. Then to the transcriber. Then into the records.
I saw the pilot twiddle a knob on the console and talk into his helmet mike. He reached over and pushed my helmet mike into position.
'You got communication.'
I heard Harry's voice crackle in my ears and yelled, 'What's going on, Harry, what's happening?'
'It's like Lindy and Ava fell off the face of the world.'
A cold hand gripped my heart and began to squeeze. 'Is Clair there?'
'Across the room.'
'Ask her who handles the tapes made of the posts.'
A few seconds of muffled voices and Harry returned. 'Lindy's responsibility. He makes sure they get to the transcriber, then catalogs the actual voice recordings. Dr. Peltier says all the electronics stuff is wired to his office, voice and everything else.'
'What's everything else mean?'
More indistinct voices. I heard Clair in the background.
'What's the commotion, Harry?'
'Sit tight, Cars. New info arriving, strange stuff.'
'About Ava? Is it about Ava, Harry?'
'Hang on.'
Montgomery was five miles ahead of us. It was five miles behind before Harry's voice crackled into my ears again.
'Lindy not only has voice recordings wired to his office, he has video input. Part of the security system installed after the bomb. Video cams in the halls, entrances, and so forth. They feed to screens and recorders in a big cabinet in Lindy's office.'
The pilot had the engine maxed. 'Louder, Harry, I can't hear!'
'Get this, Carson: Lindy's repositioned some of the cameras you can't see them, they're like pencil erasers. He's got four cameras in the ceiling above and around table one, four different views. He's spying on the autopsies, Carson.'
Another rustle and mumbling into my headset. Yelling, anger. Harry reappeared. 'I found some people who might know more about Lindy.
They're heading into town now. But there's a problem here.'
I heard a familiar voice barking orders in the background. 'Squill,' I spat.
