Oath of Office

carrying me in the gym.”

“Aw, shucks,” Lou said, helping his friend up while keeping the gun leveled at Dolph. “Okay, Cap. Can you get down from here? Good. Just stand close to the car and keep your eyes out for trouble. Now, Dolph, this guy’s name is George. If he doesn’t make it, you don’t make it. Got that? I said got that?”

“You bit-”

Lou swiped the muzzle hard across the back of the man’s neck. “Up, let’s go.”

Glaring at Lou, Dolph pulled George to the doorway, jumped down, and hoisted the young botanist onto his shoulders as if he were a doll.

Then Lou followed, knelt down, and peered beneath the train. The last of the cars of the black CSX train had picked up speed, and were just rolling off toward the east.

“Almost home, Cap,” he said. “Kneel down and tell me if you think you can make it across.”

“Piece of cake,” Cap said.

“Okay, then, we’re going to slide underneath this car and across the tracks. Dolph, you do exactly as I say, and none of those pretty women out there will have to go looking for another guy. My friend, here, looks like he can handle George, and that makes you expendable.”

“No, you’re the one who’s expendable.”

Lou whirled to the voice.

William Chester was standing beside an empty grain car, shielded by a wall of half a dozen beefy men, each with a gun trained on Lou.

“Drop it, Welcome,” Chester continued, “and get inside this car. We need to have a chat.”

“Let these men go, and I’ll chat all you want,” Lou said.

“You had your chance,” Chester said. “I only give one. Company policy.”

Before Lou could respond, pain exploded from the back of his skull, and his world went dark.

CHAPTER 52

Lou could hear himself groaning, but did not have the strength to open his eyes. There was an intense throbbing from the back of his skull. Gradually, he was able to blink. His surroundings were blurred. The smell, a dusty, heavy farm odor, was much stronger than the one inside the boxcar where Cap and George were being held. Maybe some sort of grain car, he thought.

He brushed his hand over a huge knot on his scalp. Stupid! He had let one of Chester’s goons get behind him. Things came into focus and he rolled onto his side. The car’s interior was alarmingly dim.

Directly overhead, twenty feet or so, a round hatchway in the roof, not totally sealed, let in the only light. Lou pushed himself upright and walked his hands around the metal walls. No steps, no ladder. No way out. The rectangular space was not the full size of one of the cars. It was half as large, maybe a third-a full-sized car partitioned off, he guessed.

From nearby he heard moaning and crawled toward the noise, trying to ignore the shell bursts from the back of his head. As a doctor, he would often ask his patients to measure their discomfort on a scale of zero to ten, with zero being none and ten being the worst pain imaginable. Taken as individual injuries, his head and the bullet wound in his thigh hovered around a seven each. Bearable. When he finally located the source of the moaning, his own discomfort all but vanished.

Cap and George lay huddled together on the floor of the grain car, hidden by shadows and propped up against one of the walls.

“Hey, pal,” Cap said weakly. “You okay?”

Typical of the man.

Lou’s vision adjusted even more. Neither of the two was restrained-a bad sign.

He stood, shakily crossed to Cap, and gave him a hand up. Cap’s grip was all but gone. He had absorbed more beating. Aside from swollen eyes and a freshly split lip, Lou saw that he was also missing two front teeth.

“Oh, Cap…” Lou’s anguished whisper echoed in the empty chamber.

“Two on one, I’d bet on me any day. Four on one, it’s still gonna to be close. But five or six? Bad odds, brother.”

“You’re a lion, buddy,” Lou said. “They really did a number on you.”

Cap shrugged. “Hey, like they say after those horror stories at meetings, at least I’m sober.”

George had absorbed another pounding as well, but he actually seemed more conscious. He cried out when they tried to move him.

“I think they busted him up inside,” Cap said. “Maybe some ribs.”

Instinctively, Lou checked George over. He was battered, but his pulse was holding.

“We’ve got to find a way out of here,” Lou said. “There’s nothing resembling a ladder.”

“What about this hatch?” Cap asked, tapping his foot on a spot on the floor.

Lou felt around the edges of a square hatch in the floor, three by three, that lay directly beneath the round portal above them. He was looking for a handle or lever of some sort, but it appeared the hatch opened only from the outside.

“Fill from the top, empty from right here,” he said.

“A giant steel coffin,” Cap replied. “I think Chester’s not taking any chances.”

Lou sighed heavily. “I’m sorry about this, Cap. It’s my fault you’re here.”

“Nonsense, I don’t remember you forcing me into tailing those guys to Kings Ridge.”

“Thanks for saying that.”

“And don’t you start thinking you’re not going to see Emily again. Because that’s not going to happen. Not on my watch, it ain’t. We’ll think of something.”

Before Lou could respond, the portal above fully opened, and artificial light from the mammoth granary brightened the space.

“Well, hello, down there,” Chester called out.

Lou could see the man, backlit from above. “Let us go, Chester!” he yelled up to him. “It’s over.” Echoing in the chamber, Lou’s punchless order made him feel infinitesimally small.

“First things first, Doctor,” Chester replied. “Who knows?”

“Who knows what?”

“Don’t play me for the fool,” Chester said. “Who knows there might be trouble with our corn? Who have you told?”

“I haven’t told anyone,” Lou called out.

“That’s bullshit!”

Lou knew their situation was hopeless. Desperately, he searched his thoughts for something-anything-he could say to change matters.

“Okay,” he tried, “every major newspaper and network is going to run stories about you and Chester Enterprises mutating termites and engineering poisonous corn, and then shipping it off for sale before testing it properly. If I don’t get out of here to recant my story and explain that you aren’t responsible, you and your company are finished.”

“You did no such thing!” Chester yelled down. “I know precisely when you killed my son and when I text messaged you that photo of your friends, there. You didn’t have the time to do anything. Nice try, though.”

“I didn’t kill your son, Chester. Your flunky Gilbert Stone did. Edwin saved my life when Stone was trying to kill me. Now, what do you want?”

“I told you,” Chester said. “I want to know who you’ve told.”

“Nobody, that’s the truth.”

“You’re lying.”

Lou hesitated. “You’re right,” he said. “I did tell somebody. Somebody very important, who will destroy you. Agree to let us go, and I’ll tell you everything.”