“Nothing new, unfortunately. Casey is still agitating for doing something. He made another speech in front of a business group somewhere. Mentioned the land grab idea. At least he hasn’t suggested attacking the USSR yet.”
The first team they caught was that of Glen and Winthrop. Drake and Melody had an easy time catching them because the two were walking. Winthrop was walking very stiff-legged. As they approached them, Drake slowed down. “What’s the matter?”
Winthrop grimaced. “My knees have locked up.”
Melody nodded. “You took the downhill too fast. You’ll have to walk it off.”
“It’ll take us all day to finish.”
“Do you have anything better to do?”
There was nothing Drake and Melody could do for them, so they sped up. Drake was making mental calculations.
“Those two are right in front of us in the standings. I suspect that by the end of the day we’ll have moved up another position.”
“I’m going to eat some gorp-what Fred calls energy food. We’re going to need all the energy we can find for the uphill.”
The heat and the uphill climb were taking their toll again. Although Drake and Melody weren’t running fast by any marathon standard, they had passed all the teams except Tom and Jerry and Phil and Brian during the ascent. They were gaining on those two teams, which were in sight. They figured to at least catch them by the end of the day’s run. They shouldn’t lose any time to them overall.
“This may turn out to be a three-team race,” Drake said.
Melody nodded. “Don’t count us out. Maybe we should have bet on ourselves.”
Fred’s only sign of nervousness was that he was smoking a cigarette. Drake knew that he smoked, but he usually did it in private because none of the runners smoked. Of course. And yet, Drake had once met a man in England who said he was a mountain runner, meaning that he ran up mountains such as Scotland’s Ben Nevis, the highest peak in Great Britain at 4,400 feet. Drake was impressed, and then dumbfounded when he found out that the man smoked.
They were in Fred’s room at the motel in Lompoc. Drake mentioned that he had talked to Sterling-he kept Melody out of it-and that Sterling had admitted his part in the betting. Fred took a drag on his cigarette.
“I hired Sterling to make sure that the runners followed the rules-and also to check up on them during the runs to see if anybody was in trouble. I didn’t expect him to bet on the outcome.”
Drake produced copies of the two letters from a folder.
“Sterling admitted he wrote the first letter, but he says it was at your insistence. We’ve proved that the second letter was written on his portable typewriter. He said you got it delivered it to the motel where we were staying.”
Fred reached out his hand and took the two letters. He studied them for a long time.
“I love the broken English. I suppose he wanted you to believe that the writer was Russian or something. How did you say you found Sterling?”
“His fingerprints were on the first letter. They were in the FBI database. He’s a known felon, and he’s used the U.S. mail for extortion, among other sins.”
“I wouldn’t have hired him if I’d known that. So you tracked him to a motel in Solvang. Clever of you.”
Drake didn’t mention Peaches or Grace. Let Fred think he’d done it all himself. He waited for Fred to say something more. Fred reread the letters, as if trying to memorize them.
“You had Sterling cornered. Of course he’s going to try to spread the blame. I can assure you that I and my staff didn’t have anything to do with these letters.”
Drake could prove otherwise, but he wasn’t going to play his trump cards at the moment. “Anyway, Sterling’s gone. Actually, fleeing for his life would be more apt. You never know what those Vegas folks are going to do.”
Was that a shudder from Fred or just a noisy exhale of cigarette smoke? Whatever it was, Fred quickly gained control of himself.
“Drake, I want to thank you very much for bringing this to my attention. I guess I don’t have to take any action on Sterling because he’s gone. We don’t really need him anymore. The rules have changed, and it’s going to be easy to keep track of the runners on Route One, which we will be following for many miles. I apologize for the problems this has caused you. I trust that you won’t be harassed again during the rest of the race.”
“There’s one thing more you should know. I asked Sterling why they bet on Melody and me since we were such long shots. He said all we had to do to win was to finish. The mob would take care of the rest. As I said before, they can get pretty nasty. Our good guys should have them neutralized soon, but I just wanted you to know what could have happened.”
Fred’s hand shook as he put the cigarette to his lips.
CHAPTER 21
After two very tough days of running, today will be a little easier. The run goes from the top of the hill past Lompoc to the top of the first (much shorter) hill after you cross the Santa Maria River, which is close to the border between Santa Barbara County and San Luis Obispo County. Be very careful on the steep downhill at the beginning of the run. It is steeper than the downhill during yesterday’s run. Don’t go so fast that you injure your knees. Again, since we will be inland all day, the weather will be warm. We will provide water along the way, but carry plenty of liquids.
“It looks like everybody’s learned their lesson.”
Drake was referring to the fact that all nine teams were taking the downhill in one loose pack. Nobody was charging ahead. Several people had suffered knee problems from yesterday’s run. Winthrop’s were the worst; he and Glen trailed the other runners at the moment. Drake and Melody had passed them, overall, and moved into sixth place. They had also gained on everybody else except the two leading teams.
Melody changed the subject. “We’ve gotten rid of Sterling and, hopefully, the threat from Las Vegas. Fred hasn’t admitted anything, but from what you’ve said, you scared him. He must think you’re some kind of Superman to have dug up all that information while you were running.”
“I don’t think that Fred will be playing any more games with the boys from Vegas. They’re out of his league as far as evil is concerned.”
“So the question is whether we should be talking to Casey about all this.”
“I’ve been giving that some thought. What would be our objective? To get rid of Fred? At least he’s not bothering you and Grace. We would have a tough time proving anything without Sterling’s and Grace’s involvement. If we botched it, Grace could be without a job. If Fred is on the straight and narrow, maybe we shouldn’t rock the boat.”
“Maybe we could communicate better if you didn’t use all those American cliches.”
“Wasn’t it your own Shaw who said we’re separated by a common language? You can be my fair lady, and I’ll teach you proper English.”
