The sound came again. It was a voice, but muffled and far away. A mans voice.
“It's this one.” Jon pressed his ear to one of the doors. It appeared to be thicker, sturdier than the others, and the lock was a heavy dead-bolt. Someone was shouting but barely audible somewhere on the far side.
“Open it!” Marty said.
“Give me the bullpup.” With the big assault rifle, he shot out the lock.
Screams of terror sounded above their heads from the laboratory, but the door swung open. They entered cautiously. There was a second door almost at once. Smith shot this one open, too, and they found themselves in a large, well-furnished living room. There was a kitchen through an archway, a formal dining room, a wet bar, and a corridor that probably led to bedrooms. The noise, clearly shouting now, was coming from the corridor.
“You stay back and cover me, Mart.”
Marty did not bother to protest. “Okay. I'll do my best.”
As Jon warily entered the corridor, whoever was calling must have heard enough to convince him someone was on the way. Banging started behind the third door.
Jon tried it. Locked. “Who's in there?” he called out.
“Mercer Haldane!” the furious voice bellowed. “Are you the police? Have you captured Victor?”
“Stand back,” Jon called again. He used his Beretta on the simple room lock.
The door blasted open, and a short bantam-rooster of an older man with a mane of unruly white hair, thick white eyebrows, and a clean-shaven but choleric face sat in an armchair in what looked like a master bedroom. He was handcuffed and chained to the wall at the ankle but not gagged.
“Who the devil are you?” the old man demanded.
“Lt. Col. Jonathan Smith, M.D. Someone your people have been trying to murder.”
“Murder? Why, for the love of?” The old man stopped. “Ah, yes, Victor. I knew he was worried about… M.D. you say. Don't tell me: CDC? FDA?”
“USAMRIID.”
“Fort Detrick, of course. So have you caught the bastard?”
“We're trying.”
“You'd better try faster. He's getting that damned medal at five o'clock. Probably the money a minute or so later, and no telling where he'll be by six o'clock. A long way from here, if I know him.”
“Then you'd better help us.”
“Just ask.”
“You think he created the virus epidemic?”
“Of course he did. Are you a numbskull? That's why he locked me in here. What I don't know is how he did it.”
Jon nodded. “Figures. Watch yourself. I'm going to shoot this leg chain off.”
Mercer Haldane crunched with fright. Then he shrugged. “I hope your aim's good. I intend to live long enough to bring Victor down to his knees.”
Smith shot out the chain lock and helped the old man up. “My other associate's in the lab. We're trying to locate Tremont's research records.”
“He must have his illicit records hidden. I tried to find them, too.”
Jon patted Marty on the back. “You didn't have my secret weapon.”
When Jon and Marty strode into the laboratory with the short old man red-faced and angry under a shock of white hair, Randi was waiting for them. She had locked the four lab technicians in the conference room.
“What was all the shooting? You nearly gave me a coronary.”
Jon introduced Mercer Haldane and asked, “What did the technician tell you?”
“They work for Tremont and Associates. The password into their computer is Hades.”
Marty made a beeline to the nearest terminal, Haldane on his heels. Marty's face was almost relaxed, so happy was he to be returning to a world he understood. Without looking at Haldane, Marty handed him his bullpup, sat, flexed his fingers, and went to work. Haldane rolled a stool over so he could sit next to him. Jon followed and took the bullpup Enfield away from the former CEO. He was not about to trust him.
Smith quietly explained to Randi, “Mercer Haldane is the former chairman and CEO of Blanchard. Last week Tremont forced him out and took over.”
“How could he do that?”
“Old-fashioned blackmail, he says. But I think he was bought off, too. A cut of the Hades Project. That's what Tremont named the virus and serum project. He kept it hidden from Haldane and Blanchard for more than a decade.”
“A perfect name for the horror they're causing. What else did he tell you?”
“Just about what we'd figured. Tremont found the virus in Peruvian Amazonia and brought it back to Blanchard along with a crude native cure: the blood of monkeys that had survived the disease and were full of neutralizing antibodies. Some Indians down there drink the blood, and it saves a lot of them every year. Tremont set up his secret team with company money and personnel, and they did most of the work here to isolate the virus and develop their antiserum by cloning the genes that made the antibodies. Then the bastard used DNA repair enzymes to introduce a few subtle mutations into the viruses to make it become virulent progressively earlier.”
“That's all he could tell you?” She was disappointed.
“Yes. Except he's sure Tremont's caused this pandemic somehow.”
The shout of rage echoed through the lab. “Useless! It's all nothing!”
Marty was glaring at Haldane and the conference room where they had locked up the technicians. “There's nothing in the files of Tremont and Associates. It's all routine junk about antibiotics and vitamins and hair spray! That technician lied to us.”
“No,” Haldane realized. “That's Victor. It's a dummy company. These people are technicians. He used them but told them nothing. They think they're working for Tremont and Associates. The Hades password is his idea of a joke on anyone accessing his computer.”
Jon nodded. “That sounds like the kind of man who could run an experiment on humans in the Gulf War. But the real stuff has to be in there somewhere, Mart. Keep hacking. We've got to know.”
Marty sounded discouraged. His meds had not worn off yet. “I'll try, Jon. Only I really need my own?”
They heard a sudden sound outside the windows of the secret laboratory. Like a seasoned team, Jon and Randi dashed to look out. A car was approaching on the mountain road, a cloud of dust spinning out from the tires.
Adrenaline jolted Smith. “Mart! Haldane! Watch those technicians.”
Jon and Randi tore across the laboratory, out through the door, and down to the landing. Side by side, they dropped flat where they could see anyone below who passed through the corridor from the living room or the side door. Randi looked over at Jon, at his blue eyes so intense, at his wide face with the hard chin, his swept-back black hair. His expression was granite.
“Now what?”
“We'll know soon.” He did not look at her. He did not have to. He could feel her presence like a reassuring friend.
Two car doors closed. Footsteps rapidly approached the house. A voice spoke low and urgent.
CHAPTER FORTY FIVE
Rapid footsteps, soft and light, padded swiftly along the corridor from the back door.
“What the?” Randi began.
Before Jon could answer, the big Doberman, Samson, appeared at the bottom of the stairs. He looked up at the landing, bared his fangs, and bunched his powerful muscles to attack.
Smith stood up, his Beretta behind his back. “Samson, sit!”
