the side was what looked like a “clean room” devoted to experiments that had to be conducted in an atmosphere free of contaminants. Another room held an electron microscope. All labs had the same sense about them ? orderliness touched with an aura of controlled chaos that came from papers, test tubes, Bunsen burners, glass beakers, flasks, microscopes, file cabinets, computers, refrigerators, and all the other paraphernalia that was so vital to scientists in their pursuit of codifying the unknown. This one also had what looked like a next-century spectrometer.
But what riveted Jon's gaze, what gave him both a sinking sensation and a jolt of triumph, was a heavy door in the center of one wall marked by the glaring red trefoil symbol of a biohazard. It was the door to a Level Four Hot Zone laboratory installation. A secret Level Four.
“I see four people,” Randi whispered.
Jon kept his voice even. “Time to introduce ourselves.”
They pushed in through the door, their weapons in front of them.
CHAPTER FORTY FOUR
Two of the technicians looked up. As soon as they saw the guns, fear shot into their faces. One of them moaned. At the sound, the other two looked up. They blanched. Without saying a word, Jon and Randi had all four's attention.
“Don't shoot!” begged the oldest of the two men.
“Please. I have children!” said the younger of the two women.
“No one's going to be hurt if you just answer a few questions,” Smith assured them.
“He's right.” Randi pointed her Uzi at what looked like a small conference room off the lab. “Let's go in there and have a warm and friendly chat.”
In their white uniforms, the four technicians filed into the room and, when told, took chairs at the Formica- topped conference table. They ranged in age from mid-forties to mid-twenties, and they had the look of people who put in regular days. These were no wild-eyed, pasty-faced scientists who lived in their labs weeks at a time when wrapping up a project. They were ordinary people with wedding rings and photos of extended families on their workbenches. Technicians, not scientists.
Except the older of the two women. She had short gray hair and wore a long white lab coat over street clothes. She had been silent and watchful since they had entered. Some kind of scientist or supervisor.
Sweat bathed the high forehead of the older, balding man. His gaze had been on the guns, but now he looked up at Randi. “What do you want?” His voice was shaky.
“Glad you asked,” she told him. “Tell us about the monkey virus.”
“And the serum that happens to cure a human virus, too,” Jon said.
“We know it was brought from Peru twelve years ago by Victor Tremont.”
“We also know about the experiments on the twelve soldiers in Desert Storm.”
Randi asked, “How long have you had the serum?”
“And how did the epidemic start?”
Hearing the rapid-fire questions, the older woman's gray features pinched. Her faded eyes grew defiant. “We don't know what you mean. We have nothing to do with any monkey virus or serum.”
“Then what do you work on here?” Randi demanded.
“Antibiotics and vitamins mostly,” the supervisor told her.
Smith said, “So why the secrecy? The remoteness? This lab doesn't show up in any of Blanchard's documents.”
“We don't belong to Blanchard.”
“Then whose antibiotics and vitamins are you working on?”
The supervisor flushed, and the others looked terrified again. She had said more than she had wanted to. “I can't tell you that,” she snapped.
Randi said, “Okay. Then we'll look at your files.”
“They're computerized. We don't have access. Only the director and Dr. Tremont do. When they get back, they'll put an end to you and all this?”
Jon's anger was rising. Whether they knew it or not, they had helped murder Sophia. “No one's going to come back anytime soon. They're too busy getting medals, and your three guards are dead outside,” he lied. “You want to join the guards?”
The supervisor glared at him, stubbornly silent.
Randi tried to control her rage. “Maybe you think because we've been polite so far that we won't kill you. You're right, we probably won't. We're the good guys. But,” she added cheerfully, “I have no problem with causing considerable pain. Mistakes do get made. You hear me clearly?”
That got their attention. At least the attention of the other three. They hurriedly nodded.
“Good. Now, which of you is going to tell us the name of the company you work for and the computer passwords?”
“And,” Smith added, staring at the supervisor, “why you need a Level Four lab for vitamins and antibiotics?”
The supervisor's face paled, and her hands trembled, but she intensified her glare of intimidation at the other three.
But the smallest and oldest man ignored her. “Don't try that, Emma.” His voice was weak but determined. “You're not in charge here anymore. They are.” He looked at Jon. “How do we know you won't kill us anyway?”
“You don't. But you can be sure the odds are far better that if anyone's going to be hurt, it's going to be now. Later, we're going to be too busy bringing down Victor Tremont.”
The older man stared. Then he nodded soberly. “I'll tell you.”
Jon looked at Randi. “Now that things are handled here, I'll get Marty.”
She gave a brisk nod. As she held her Uzi on the four lab workers, her mind was on Sophia. She was closing in on Sophia's killer. She was going to make them pay, no matter what she had to do.
“Talk,” she told the older lab technician. “Talk fast.”
Marty was sitting against a tree near the shed, the Enfield bullpup lying across his lap. He was humming to himself. He seemed to be studying sunbeams that danced in a shaft of yellow light through the trees. To look at him where he leaned back, his short legs stretched out on the pine needles, his ankles crossed, he could be an imp from some long-ago fairy tale without a problem in the world. Unless you noticed his eyes. That was where Smith's attention was fixed as he approached silently, cautiously. The green eyes were almost emerald in color and troubled.
“Any problems?”
Marty jumped. “Darn it, Jon. Next time make some noise.” He rubbed his eyes as if they hurt. “I'm happy to report I've seen or heard no one. The shed's been quiet, too. But then there's not a lot any of those three can do, considering how well we tied them. Still, I don't think I'm cut out for guard work. Too boring and too much responsibility of the wrong kind.”
“I see the problem. Feel like some computer sleuthing instead?”
Marty immediately looked more cheerful. “At last. Of course!”
“Let's go into the lodge. I need you to search some of Tremont's files.”
“Ah, Victor Tremont. The one behind it all.” Marty rubbed his hands.
Once inside, they were moving past the row of closed and locked doors when Smith heard a sound. They were almost in the same place in the hall where Randi had thought she had heard something.
He stopped and grabbed Marty's arm. “Don't move. Listen. Are you picking up anything?”
They stayed that way, slowly rotating their heads as if by movement alone they could enhance their hearing.
Jon spun around. “What was that?”
Marty frowned. “I think someone's shouting.”
