Jack slid over on his side with a low groan. Karen was horrified to see how much blood there was on the floor, under both men. She heard a crash from the other end of the basement. Train came back into view, holding a timber from the wreckage of the collapsed flooring at the other end.
“We’ve got to get them out of here,” she shouted over the noise from the fire.
“We gotta get us out of here,” he shouted back. “Help steady this table.”
She joined him at the table where the computer had been set up. Train swept everything off the table onto the floor in one big crash and then got up on the table. Using a fourby-four, he began battering the floorboards above his head.
She held the table with one hand and his leg with the other as he became a human pile driver, smashing the four-by-four into the rotten flooring up above, choking and coughing in the writhing cloud of smoke that was banking up against the ceiling. Then he was through, and the hole widened as the smoke shot up through the hole into the room above.
The ftimace box and the ducting began to shake as the airflow reversed, feeding fresh oxygen to the burning diesel fuel. When he had the hole big enough, Train turned around and grabbed Karen, and in one great swing he thrust her through the hole in the ceiling, shoving her hips and then her legs up until she was’able to roll out on the floor above.
“Get outside and call for help,” he shouted as he got down off the table. “You can’t lift us out of here!” She nodded and ran outside to the porch.
Down in the basement, Train dragged Sherman and then Jack away from the fire and closer to the hole. His hands became sticky with blood, and he wondered if either of them was going to ‘survive this. Then there was a face in the hole, but it was quickly withdrawn as the stream of smoke immediately blinded the man. A minute later, there was a crash of timbers above the trapdoor, and then it burst open and several men in vests came tumbling down the stairs.
“Head wound!” Train yelled to the first one to reach him, pointing at Sherman. “Gut wound on the other guy.”
“We -got ‘em,” someone yelled. And then there was a general commotion as everyone tried to help. Train saw Karen briefly at the top of the steps before someone topside grabbed her and took her out of there. He helped carry Sherman up the stone steps, through the hallway, and out onto the front porch and into a blaze of headlights, radio chatter, and blue flashers littering the side of Slade Hill. A helicopter was hovering over the trees east of the house, shining a large spotlight at something on the ground. Several men were gathered in the vicinity of the spotlighted area. Karen ran to meet Train as the first signs of the fire appeared in the front window sockets of the old house. He embraced her, but then, to his surprise, she was pulling back, looking behind him.
Mcnair materialized out of the darkness.
“Well?” she said. “Did you get him?”
Mcnair looked over his shoulder at the crowd of police and FBI agents milling around the house. A small fire engine was trying to get up the hill below them, but it appeared to have become stuck. He turned to face them.
“Get who?” he replied.
Train stepped forward. “You know goddamn well who,” he said. “Just what-“
But Mcnair had his hand up, signifying silence. “This would be a really good time,” he said, “for you two to walk down that hill and get in that Explorer and get the hell out of here. A really good time. The commander here will explain it to you. We’re all done up here. But you two might have a loose end or two to work out.” He turned back to Karen and gave her a slip of paper. “The guy at the other end of that number will be expecting your call. He did a little computer work for your boss. The thing you should know about him is that he can undo anything -that he’s done.”
Train started to object again, but Mcnair only pointed down the hill.
Karen touched his arm. “We’ll be knee-deep in cops all night, answering questions she said. “Let’s just get out of here. There are some things I have to tell you.”
Mcnair nodded at her and walked back into the darkness.
MONDAY On Monday morning, Train signed Karen through the Pentagon security checkpoint. They walked in silence through the corridors, along with a steady stream of civilians. Train had to remember not to hold her hand as they walked down the A-ring, heading toward the escalators to the fourth floor.
“You still think this will work?” he asked. Sunday had been a day of rest and recuperation, and planning.
“It had better work,” she said grimly. “If Sherman makes it, I want to be able to tell him why they were so hot to force him out of the Navy.”
Captain Pennington was waiting for Karen when they arrived at the Ill offices. “The admiral wants to see you, Karen, as soon as you get in.”
“But not me?” Train asked innocently. The other officers were keeping their heads down.
Pennington frowned at him. “I think you are going to be reassigned back to the Navy Yard, Mr. von Rensel. I’m not privy to all that went down this past ‘weekend, but there’s been something of a shit storm going on up front since I got in, and your name was featured often and rudely.”
“Oh my.” Train sighed. “And I was beginning to like it here.
Karen was not amused. “I’m not going to see anybody until I’ve had a chance to get into my PC. There’s an archive report I want to see.”
“Um, well,” Pennington began, but Karen walked past him to her cubicle.
Train went to his and turned on his PC.
He could hear Pennington trying to talk to. Karen, but she was answering in monosyllables while she booted up her own machine. When Train was sure Pennington was fully engaged, he got on the phone and called the NIS database administrator.
“What is it now, von Rensel?”
“I need you guys to get into the JAG archive database.”
“JAG? We don’t normally target specific-“
“I know,” Train interrupted, keeping an eye on Pennington, who was starting to get worked up. Karen was supposed to stall him long enough for Train to make this one phone call. “But this one should be easy. I need you guys to pull up a specific investigation file.” He gave the administrator the cite number.
“What the hell, von Rensel. Aren’t you right there in JAG?”
“I am, but I need an external query. And then I need you to attach the report and E-mail it to me at this address, and I need this done ASAP, like anytime in the next ten minutes, if that’s humanly possible.”
“Ten minutes! That’s ridiculous! That’s-“
Train cut him off. “Two people have been murdered,” he said. “An admiral has been shot in the head, and his son has been shot in the stomach, and my car’s been burned up with me in it, and I think, you should really do this thing, and now would be really nice, okay?”
“Holy shit, why didn’t you say so?”
“I just did. Here’s the E-mail address. And this is a real fire, okay?
Get that thing over here right now.”
“Coming at you.” Train hung up. Pennington was stomping off across the office to his cubicle. Karen watched him go, and then looked over her shoulder at Train, who gave her the thumbs-up signal. She turned around and kept going on her PC. Train stood up and rearranged the privacy panel on his cubicle so that no one standing next to Karen’s desk could see him across the room, He heard-Pennington call one of the other commanders into his cubicle for a short conference, after which he came out and started telling the rest of the people in the office that there was going to be an urgent all-hands meeting across the way in the main conference room in five minutes. Nobody would even look at Karen or Train as the commander shepherded everyone else out of the office.
Pennington remained in the entrance to his cubicle, looking meaningfully at Karen, but she ignored him. Train ducked back into his own cubicle and waited for the E-mail banner.
Five minutes later, the office door burst open and Admiral Carpenter stormed in, followed by a worried- looking Mccarty. Train watched through a crack between the privacy panels, but he kept out of sight, resisting the urge to shake his PC monitor to make the E-mail arrive faster.
Carpenter went directly to Karen’s cubicle.
“Commander Lawrence, I am not amused,” he said.
