He didn’t see the bus until he almost ran into it. Strange, because the dark was a gray color, not black, and he had the illusion he could see more than this incident suggested. He redoubled his caution. If he could just get inside where he could make contact with his father, he should be safe.
The driveway curved; he couldn’t head straight for the lighted windows because tree trunks partially obscured his view of them, and he suspected that the ground among the trees was rough. He found one car and then another. He must be following the same route that Slick had followed.
Nothing blocked his view of the windows now. He could walk directly toward them. He saw people inside, but he was too far away to recognize anybody.
Suddenly he hit the ground. He had tripped over a rock and fallen forward so fast his hands had failed to protect him. Judging from the all-encompassing pain, he had hurt his head and just about everything else.
He lay on the ground for several seconds, trying to determine what parts of him were operational. He heard a noise and saw a light sweep over him. He rose to his knees but was blinded by the light, which was now shining directly in his eyes. The voice behind the light spoke. “What are you doing here?”
Drake was at a disadvantage. He couldn’t see his questioner. He remained silent. He felt something running down his forehead. He must have cut himself. Blood was heading toward his eye. He reached for his pocket that contained a handkerchief.
“Don’t move.”
The man thought he was going for a gun. He raised his hands to show they were empty. Better to have blood in his eye than a bullet. The man spoke to somebody else. The second man appeared in the light of the flashlight. He walked up to Drake and roughly twisted his hands behind him one at a time, handcuffing them together.
“Get up.”
Easier said than done. Drake rose slowly and awkwardly, feeling pain in both knees as he did. The man who had handcuffed him patted him down, searching for weapons. He grabbed Drake’s arm and urged him forward. The other at least had the courtesy to shine the flashlight in his path so he wouldn’t trip again. He walked slowly, not having his hands free to protect himself. He could see with one eye; the vision of the other was blurred by the blood. They escorted him around a corner of the building and down a dirt slope strewn with pine needles and the occasional rock.
One opened a door and then pushed him through the doorway. A light was turned on. Drake could see through a window that the guards had also turned on the outside lights. They were in what looked like a recreation room. It had wood-paneled walls. Drake saw a pool table and another for table tennis. He determined that this room was on a floor below the one where the conference was in session.
Drake turned and looked at his captors. They were big men wearing suits. The one holding the flashlight held a gun in his other hand. How many of these people did Casey employ?
A round table-perhaps for playing cards-sat along one wall with chairs surrounding it. The man without a gun turned around one of the chairs and indicated that Drake should sit in it. When Drake didn’t move fast enough to satisfy him, he shoved Drake into the chair. Drake’s handcuffed hands hit the back of the chair, but he repressed an epithet. He had to do something to even the odds.
“Okay, you can take the cuffs off now. I need to wipe the blood out of my eye.”
The man peered at his forehead. “You’ll live. You don’t need to see.”
It was time to play his ace. “I came here to see my father, Admiral Drake. He’s in the meeting upstairs. My name is Oliver Drake. I’m part of Running California.”
The men looked at each other. The one with the gun laughed and said, “Nice try, Jack.”
“I’m wearing my Running California jacket.”
“Any idiot can buy one of those things. They’re for sale all over the place. I got one for my boy.”
“My wallet is in my front right pocket. It has my identification.”
The men looked at each other again. Drake was trying to use the tone of somebody in command. Men like these were used to taking orders. The man with the gun nodded to the other one who pulled Drake’s wallet out of his pocket and checked his I.D.
“He’s got a California driver’s license, says his name is Oliver Drake.”
The man with the gun looked at his watch and said to the other guard, “We’re not supposed to interrupt the meeting unless it’s really important. It’s probably going to go on for another hour.”
Drake couldn’t wait an hour. The world as they knew it could end by then. “I’ve got information that concerns Mr. Messinger and everybody in that meeting. They need it now.”
“I thought you came to see your daddy.”
“That too.”
The man with the gun looked skeptical, but he also realized that his job was on the line if he did the wrong thing. “Take off his cuffs and let him clean himself up. I’ll go up and talk to Mr. Messinger.”
With his hands free, Drake was allowed to use a bathroom that opened off the recreation room. He went inside and shut the door. It didn’t have any windows, so he couldn’t escape, even if he wanted to. He wiped the blood from his eye and forehead with a paper towel and examined his head in the mirror. The cut should probably have a couple of stitches, but it had pretty much stopped bleeding. As the man said, he would live.
He came out of the bathroom to find that the man without a gun now had a gun. They still didn’t trust him. He tried to engage the guard in small talk but found that his supply of small talk was very small. Drake sat back down in the chair and waited for Casey.
In a short time he heard footsteps coming down the stairs at the other side of the room. Casey appeared, followed by the guard. Casey was dressed in sport clothes. He spotted Drake and came striding across the room.
“Drake, what are you doing here?”
“I heard my father was here, so I thought I’d come and say hello.”
“What happened to your head? Did they do this to you?”
“No, I tripped in the dark.”
“Sorry. I forget how dark it gets.”
He spoke to the guard who had been watching Drake.
“Bennie, you can go back on patrol. Keep those outside lights on. We don’t need another accident.” And to the other one, “Artie, wait just outside the door and keep it open.”
Bennie and Artie went through the outside doorway. Casey pulled one of the other chairs away from the table and sat down, facing Drake. Drake measured the distance to the stairs from where he sat and from the doorway. The doorway was closer to the stairs.
Casey said, “As you apparently already know, I’m holding a meeting here tonight.”
“If I could just speak to him for a few minutes-”
“How did you find out about it? Did your dad tell you?”
“No. I…” Drake stopped, not having a ready answer.
Casey eyed him closely. “What are you doing here, anyway? You should be resting tonight. Tomorrow’s the final leg of the race, and you’ve got a shot at a million.”
“I thought this was more important.”
Casey didn’t ask the obvious incredulous question. He appeared to be mulling over what to say. Drake waited for him to speak first, which he did.
“I get the feeling that you’re not wholeheartedly behind me.”
“I don’t like to see the Constitution trampled.”
“I’m not here to have a constitutional debate with you, but as you know the founders of our country sanctioned rebellion in defense of freedom.”
“Defense of freedom? You’re overthrowing the government in the name of freedom?”
“Freedom from attack by a foreign power.”
So many rebuttals came to Drake’s mind that he was momentarily speechless. “Isn’t that the job of our duly elected president and members of Congress? And another thing. You talk about freedom, and yet you advocate taking the property of everyone who lives on the coast.”
“They will be compensated.”
“But what choice do they have? What’s next, taking everyone else’s property ‘in the national interest’?”
“Speaking of interest, it’s in your interest to join us. I’ve got the top military brass here, including the
