CHAPTER 26
I WAS PICKING AT A HEALTHY CHOICE ENTREE-A TRAY of bland lasagna I’d overcooked in the microwave-when the phone rang. I jumped, which was my standard response whenever a phone rang or a door slammed these days, then reached for the cordless on the kitchen table. “Garland Hamilton’s hiding out up here in Cooke County,” Jim O’Conner’s voice said, and instantly I was on full alert. “He rented a cabin up on Fish Creek. It’s on a private gravel road all by itself, way off the highway.”
Part of me leapt to embrace the news. I desperately wanted Hamilton to be found, and Cooke County made sense: If I were a fugitive on the run, Cooke County-with its hills and hollows and frontier mentality-might well be my hideout of choice. Still, I was afraid to get my hopes up. “How do you know it’s him?”
“Two days after Hamilton escaped, this guy called a realty company in Jonesport that rents out vacation cabins. Asked if they had something really private, way off the beaten track.”
“Hell, Jim, if I were renting a cabin in the mountains, I’d ask for something like that, too.”
“He paid cash for the first week.”
“So?”
“Two days ago he paid for another week. He used a credit card this time.” I felt the hairs on my neck and arms stand up. “It’s Hamilton. Or else a guy who fits his description and stole his credit card. The TBI got a call from the bank, and Steve Morgan looked into it. Morgan’s convinced it’s him.”
“He had to know that the credit card was being watched,” I argued. “Why would he risk using it?”
“I asked Morgan the same thing,” said O’Conner. “We went round and round about it, but Steve finally convinced me. First, Hamilton’s probably out of cash by now. Second, this cabin-rental outfit is way back in the Dark Ages, technologically speaking-they use those old-fashioned mechanical gizmos to take an imprint of the card. Send it to MasterCard by carrier pigeon. Besides, who else could it be? Who else is going to be using Hamilton’s card and wearing Hamilton’s face?”
My hands were shaking. So were my knees.
“Bill? You okay?”
“Just a little jittery,” I said. “Now what?” I checked the wall clock; it read eight-fifteen, and the light outside was getting watery.
“We’ve called in the heavy artillery. A SWAT team is moving into position after dark, and they’ll go in at sunup.”
“What if he spots them and makes a break for it?”
“The SWAT-team commander? He was in the Army Rangers with me. For practice he used to sneak up on the guys in the squad. You’d know he was coming after you, but you wouldn’t know when-not till you felt the flat of his knife at your throat. If his guys are half as good as he is, even the owls and the coyotes won’t see ’em coming.”
“But you’ll wait till morning?”
“Safer that way. Besides the SWAT team, we’ll have helicopters, K-9s, state troopers, TBI agents, and every Cooke County coon hunter I can deputize between now and then. We’ll come down on him like the wrath of God.”
I felt my throat tightening, my heart pounding, and my breath coming in quick gulps. “You’re sure you’ll get him, Jim?”
“I don’t see how anybody but the devil himself could wriggle out of this noose.”
A shiver ran through me. “Damn, Jim, I wish you hadn’t said that.”
“Don’t worry. We’ll get him.”
“Be careful. Call me when you’ve got him.”
It took everything I had not to jump into the truck and head for Cooke County as soon as I hung up, but I knew I’d only be in the way and might even jeopardize the operation. So I paced around the kitchen awhile, stirring a fork through the congealed lasagna every few laps of the table and the island. Then I went outside and paced Sequoyah Hills awhile, winding my way down the mazy streets toward the river. Darkness was falling now, but the park along the riverfront remained lively. A young couple, their eyes better adjusted to the twilight than mine, tossed a Frisbee back and forth. A pack of dogs-friendlier than the ones that had chased Art and me out of the Georgia woods-raced and roughhoused across the field, occasionally colliding in a five-dog pileup of tumbling fur. A runner jogged past, lifting a hand in silent greeting, like some athletic priest conferring a sweaty blessing on me. “Peace,” the gesture seemed to say, but peace was nowhere within reach for me.
By the time I’d walked a mile along the river, it was too dark to see my feet, so when I got to the parking lot by the Indian mound, I followed the gravel up to Cherokee Boulevard. A cinder path ran down the center of the boulevard’s median; mileposts ticked off every quarter mile from the lower end of the street, down by the river, to the stoplight up at Kingston Pike. Just beyond the 1.5-mile mark, the median widened to accommodate a large fountain ringed by grass and a traffic circle. Normally the fountain shot a plume twenty feet into the air, but the drought and water rationing had dried it up, and tonight the fountain’s built-in lights illuminated stained concrete and empty air. Beyond the fountain the boulevard curved away from the river, winding over one low ridge and then up a second to the intersection with Kingston Pike. Old-fashioned streetlamps along the median lighted the cinder path, and I kept walking, past palatial houses whose pediments and even surrounding trees were lit like Hollywood sets.
When I reached Kingston Pike, I turned and retraced my steps, all the way back to the far end of the boulevard, 2.6 miles away. I repeated the circuit twice more-I covered fifteen miles without getting a step closer to peace. But although peace eluded me, fatigue did not. I staggered into my house at midnight, fell onto the bed, and drifted into a fitful sleep, haunted by dreams of Jess’s corpse and Garland Hamilton’s sneering face.
The phone woke me.
“Bill, it’s Jim O’Conner.”
I shook myself awake. “What’s up? Have you got him?” I glanced at the window and saw that it was still dark outside. The digital clock on the nightstand read 4:59. An uneasy feeling grabbed hold of my stomach. “Jim? Is everything okay?”
There was a pause, and the uneasy feeling turned into a knot. “I…I think so, but we’re not sure yet. All hell broke loose up here about an hour ago.”
“What? Tell me.”
“There was a big explosion and a fire. Cabin’s destroyed and the mountain’s on fire. I think Hamilton’s dead.”
“But you don’t know?”
“We can’t get in there to check for a body yet, but I don’t see how anybody could have survived. Couple of the SWAT guys got knocked flat, and they were fifty yards away.”
“Come on, Jim, what would cause a log cabin in the mountains to explode, just as an army of lawmen is about to arrest the guy inside? That can’t be a coincidence.”
“Hang on, hang on.” In the background I heard a crackling voice on a radio, and then I heard O’Conner saying, “You’re sure? Hundred-percent sure?” Then he was talking to me again, his voice racing. “Waylon says he just spotted a human skull. Burned, but definitely a skull, and definitely human.” My emotions felt like they were on some sort of theme-park thrill ride, tumbling headlong up and down and around, faster than I could give names or even meaning to.
After a while I noticed the voice in my ear. “Doc? Are you there?”
“Yeah,” I managed to say. “I’m here. Give me just a minute.” I focused on breathing-slow, deep, steady breathing. The ride slowed, and I felt my adrenaline subside. I also felt my conscious, curious mind start to assert itself. “We’ll need to make a positive identification to be sure it’s him,” I said. “You want me to come up with a team and do that?”
“Well…” O’Conner paused again, this time for longer than before. His voice sounded measured and careful now. “If you’re up to that and feel like you can step back from your personal involvement enough to focus clearly, sure, come on up. But if that’s asking too much, say so and I’ll request some assistance through the TBI or the FBI or the medical examiner’s office over in Memphis. There’s a forensic anthropologist over there that you trained, isn’t
