chest, the dog, now strapped into his Velcro-hitched hagvar vest, happily licking Choir’s face as the Chinook’s rear wheels touched down in what sounded like a hailstorm as gravel and sand kicked up by the rotors’ fierce downdraft struck the Chinook’s fuselage.
Within a minute every man, with his pack, and Prince were on the hard ground of the DARPA base, and Freeman was being greeted by a somber-looking sheriff from Sandpoint, the wilderness resort area of about five thousand souls at the top of the lake twenty-seven miles north of the naval research station.
“Bad business,” said the sheriff glumly.
“It is,” said Freeman. “First thing I need to do is talk to the staff here at DARPA.” Away from the exhaust and dust, the general could breathe more deeply, taking in the damp coolness of the mountain lake. Prince had already been doing this, his tongue lolling expectantly, a distinct smile on his face. He loved tracking, though at the moment all he could smell was baking soda, the result of a standing order from Freeman for his men to eschew any deodorant to combat the sweating in armpit and groin. The soda, unlike deodorants, including those that commercials boasted were unscented, was neutral and would help absorb the smell of their perspiration.
“We threw up roadblocks,” the sheriff assured him, “all around the area north, south, and west of the research station. And we sent boats across to the eastern side of the lake. All sides covered. But there was nothing. Highway patrols were alerted on the Washington state, Montana, and British Columbia borders, so they didn’t get out that way. But they had mountain bikes, you know.” He pointed to where his deputy had found the mountain bike tracks up beyond the high hurricane-strength fence. “But they left them behind.”
“Which way do you think they’re headed, Sheriff? Your best guess?”
“I’d say north — Canada.”
“Yep. So would I,” said Freeman. The general paused, looking out across the metallic gray lake under the gathering gray stratus. “Everyone’s expecting them to be hightailing it in cars or a plane. How about that, Sheriff — a plane?”
“General, we shut down everything. No planes out from Sandpoint except for an emergency airlift of a hiker to Spokane. He broke his leg on one of the islands in Priest Lake farther north of here. Had to bring a float plane for him but he’s a local. I know him. ’Sides, I double-checked. Only the pilot and him aboard. Locals — know ’em both.”
Freeman slapped the sheriff on the back by way of appreciation. “You’ve done good work, Sheriff. It’ll go in my report.”
The sheriff nodded appreciatively, then added grimly, “Ten people murdered in cold blood. Like a family.”
“Ten?” queried the general. “I was told there were eleven.”
“No, seemed so at first, but one of ’em, Roberta Juarez, a technician, survived. Massive head injuries but she’s holding on. With a head injury like that, they no doubt figured she was dead.”
“I need to see her,” said the general.
“Well, first,” the sheriff told him, “you’ll need to talk to Grierson, the local M.D. He’s a tough nut. Says we can’t talk to her for days, maybe weeks, even.”
“Choir,” Freeman told the Welsh-born American. “Take Prince over to where the paratrooper bikes were abandoned after the raid. Should be good scent there.” He suddenly turned back to the sheriff. “You didn’t let anyone near the bikes, did you?”
“No, sir. Yellow-taped the area and I’ve had a deputy there since.”
“Good man.” Freeman entertained the possibility of the terrorists backpacking out. Next, he called Johnny Lee over. “Sheriff says there’s a patient, Roberta Juarez—” Freeman paused and looked back at the sheriff. “—I take it she’s Spanish-American, or is that her husband’s—”
“She’s Mexican.”
“Right,” said Freeman, and turned to Lee. “You come with me, Johnny. We’re going for another helo ride. Quick trip up to Sandpoint. Ten minutes and we’ll be there. Let’s go.” As he strode toward the chopper, he told Aussie Lewis, Salvini, Gomez, Eddie Mervyn, and Tony Ruth to take a break while Choir and Prince were checking out the abandoned mountain bikes that had so successfully been used as props in the terrorists’ attack.
CHAPTER SIX
Freeman and Lee moved quickly away from the chopper’s downdraft and the exhaust fumes that were polluting the pristine mountain air into the thick antiseptic air of Sandpoint Hospital, their Vibram boots squeaking sharply on the polished linoleum floor.
Through the glass of the intensive care unit, Freeman could see thirty-three-year-old Roberta Juarez lying in a bed, her head in a shroud of bandages. Only her left eye, her lips, and nostrils were visible, giving her an unfortunately ghoulish appearance, an impression reinforced by the fact that her badly bruised right arm was attached to an intravenous drip. It was obvious to Freeman, from his side on view of her neck, that Roberta’s hair had been shorn off in the trauma unit. Her left hand was in a cast, the doctor explained, because when she’d been shot, her left hand and arm must have taken the brunt of the fall.
“She conscious?” asked Freeman.
“In and out,” replied the young, casually dressed doctor, who, except for his stethoscope, could have passed for a golfer about to go practice his putting. Through the window at the end of the corridor, Freeman glimpsed a menacingly overcast sky. He flexed his wrist and glanced at his watch so that the young doctor would get the message that there was no time to lose. If it started to rain, it would wash away the marauders’ scent. There were other ways, of course, to track them — broken twigs and brush — but the best would be for Prince to get the scent from the abandoned bikes and go from there. Since Freeman’s call to Eleanor Prenty, the word had gone out to the Department of Homeland Security, FBI, and the Bureau of Land Management in northern Idaho to give “all assistance possible to General Freeman’s team.”
“Doctor, I need to speak with Ms. Juarez as soon as possible. Find out if she can tell us anything that might —”
“No way,” said the athletic-looking doctor, planting himself imperiously in front of the door. “This patient is in critical condition and I—”
“Johnny,” the general told his SpecFor translator. “Give me a strip.”
Lee whipped out a plastic cuff strip from one of his battle dress uniform’s many pockets.
“What the hell—” began the doctor, his face flushed with shock and anger. “Nurse!”
Freeman’s face was an inch from the young physician’s. “Listen, Grierson, I’m on the trail of terrorists who murdered — I say again,
“This is outrageous!” said Grierson. “I’m not moving.
Freeman felled him with one blow.
“Cuff him, Johnny!”
The general stepped over the physician, who was gasping for air like a landed fish, and opened the door to Intensive Care. Roberta was moving her head slightly from side to side, moaning. Perhaps the kerfuffle, the general thought, with young Dr. Grierson had brought her around or had disturbed her somnolence sufficiently that she might hear him. He identified himself gently but firmly, not knowing whether she was hearing him. Had she seen anything that might help them identify the killers?
No answer. No response at all.
He pressed the question respectfully but insistently. “The men who attacked you, Ms. Juarez?” Freeman could hear the doctor swearing. Johnny Lee had him cuffed to a hallway chair and told him that if he didn’t want to be thumped again he’d better be quiet. A nurse saw them, advanced, stopped, then turned and ran back to her station to call security.
