twenty-piece orchestra in a computer, lit off in the comer and ended any Pope of further conversation.
After dinner, they walked slowly out to the parking lot.
She was wondering how he would tie off the evening.
“I’m glad we did this,” he said when they reached their cars. He looked as if he wanted to say more but was too shy to come out with it.
“So am I,” she replied. “However this Sherman mess comes out.”
He smiled, and she almost invited him back to the house for a nightcap4 But the moment passed and he became all business again.
“Are there any other signs that the JAG’s having second thouihts about our investigation?” he asked as he unlocked his car.
“Other signs?”
“Who else-but Carpenter would have the power to lock you out of a JAG archives file? That’s what I was talking about earlier. “
“Oh. I never thought-you think he did that?”
“He did or someone did on his orders. I was th4iking: Maybe tomorrow would be a good, day to call in sick. In case he’s waiting to call you up to the front office and tell you to go back to reviewing investigations. I don’t know, but I suddenly have this feeling that we’ve been switched off the main line here.”
“Well, I suppose I could.” Once again, he had taken her by surprise.
Carpenter?
He opened his car door. “Look,” he said, “like I told Sherman, you need to be vigilant, too. Remember what’s been ha pening to people close to Sherman. Right now, I p from an outsider’s perspective, you qualify.”
There it was, that big-brother attitude of his again, she thought. But this time, she did not resent it. She decided to flirt a little. “But I have you to protect me, Mr. Man Mountain, right?”
He gave her a wary eye. “You want me to stay with you tonight?” he asked, keeping it light by giving her a barely visible grin.
She felt a tingle of excitement, and she batted her eyes.
“How The neighbors would talk.”
“What neighbors are those, specifically?” he asked. But then, as if sensing this was getting a little too personal, he backed off. “Look, whoever’s doing this is pretty good at it. Something strikes you as being out of whack, call me.”
He fished out a card and wrote something on the back of it.
“Here’s the number for my car phone, and my home phone and fax numbers down in Aquia. False alarms are acceptable.
She thanked him and then watched him drive out of the parking lot. She drove home, speculating on things and feelings long dormant, too long dormant. Once home, she started to lock up the house, then remembered the dog. She went back out onto the front porch and called. Nothing. The barn-the last place she had seen Harry. He had been trotting down toward his favorite sunning spot. I’ll bet he’s sound asleep. She walked across the front of the house and down toward the aisle of hedge between the yard and the barn. The night was cooler now, with clear skies and a sprinkling of stars. The loom of Washington’s lights permeated the southeastern horizon. She automatically searched for and found Polaris; Frank had made a fetish of fixing the North Star every time he went outside at night. She could hear small rustlings in the hedge as she passed down the shadowy aisle, taking care not to hang up a heel on a crack in the mossy bricks. A car went by out on Beach Mill Road, but the sound was dampened by the dense hedge.
She came out into the barn enclosure and looked around.
The horses were not visible, but there was a night-light on in the aisle. She called the dog again, but nothing happened.
Funny. Normally, he would have been bounding out of the barn by now. She walked forward, into the isleway. The familiar smells of hay, straw, and leather reeking of One Step cleaner met her as she crossed the threshold. She looked down the aisle in the dim light and saw Harry, lying on his saddle pad against the door of the tack room.
“Hey, beast, let’s go. It’s time to go in the house.” Harry didn’t move.
Alarmed, she went over to him. The dog was not in his customary furry ball. He was lying against the door, breathing, but more crumpled than curled. “Harry?”
she called, kneeling. The dog didn’t move. His breathing sounded ragged, shallow. Then she smelled something medicinal, like alcohol, but not exactly. Sweeter, almost sickly sweet. She remembered that smell. What the hell was it?
Ether! That’s what it was, ether. She bent closer to the dog’s muzzle, and the smell was stronger. Some bastard had There was a loud crash as something hit the tin roof of the barn, something hard and sharp that rattled down the slope of the metal roof and fell with a small thud into the paddock outside. She nearly jumped out of her skin and stood up, flattening herself against the door, her breath frozen in her throat.
Silence. The dog groaned softly at her feet,, his rear legs twitching.
There was another noise, this time at the far end of the barn, like weeds or bushes scrabbling against the retracted aisleway doors—coming toward the doorway. She panicked and ran out of the barn, across the barn enclosure and up toward the house. But when she got to the hedge passage, she stopped abruptly, grabbing the post of the grape arbor to stop herself. The walkway between the hedges, which was nearly fifty feet long, was in deep shadow. She looked over her shoulder at the barn, but there was nothing coming or moving-yet.
She looked back into the gloom of the hedge passage and back at the barn. There were fences on either side of the hedge passage. She was in her uniform skirt and low heels.
That fence would slow her down-a lot. The hedge passage was a direct shot to the house-unless there was someone in there, someone who could reach through the hedge and grab her. A night breeze swept gently through the tree branches over her head. The barn remained silent.
She made her decision: Get to the house; get to a phone.
She took off again, straight through the hedge passage, staying low, bent over as she ran, grateful for every day of-her workouts, her right arm held up, her hand balled in a fist.
She erupted from the other side of the passage and sprinted the remaining hundred feet to the front porch in about six seconds. She hurtled through the front door, spun around, slammed and locked it. She leaned back against the door as she recovered her breath. Phone. Get on the phone. Call the cops . No. Call Train. Where was that card? In her pocket.
Call his car phone. Get him to turn around and get back here.
Then she realized the house was dark. There was enough starlight coming in to see the furniture and the walls but not much else. Turn on the lights, hunny.
They had been on when she left.
She held her breath as she slowly moved her hand over to feel the bank of switches by the front door. Three of the four were up, in the “on” position.
The power. The power’s out. Someone’s cut the power She swallowed hard and moved sideways into the living room, feeling her way through the familiar shapes of furniture. She stopped when she reached the phone at the far end of the couch, then listened carefully. She thought she Sensed a foreign presence in the house, then wondered if it was just her imagination. Her mouth dry, she settled into the couch and put her hand on the telephone.
If he’d cut the lights, he might have cut the phone, too.
Please, please let it be working.
With Train’s card in one hand, she lifted the handset. But she couldn’t see the numbers in the darkened living room.
This was no time to mess around. She couldn’t bear to see if there was a that tone or not. She took a deep breath and punched 911. Then she put the handset to her right ear and held her breath. Her heart sank when she did not hear a ringing sound.
Commander Lawrence, a voice whispered.
She nearly dropped the phone. Someone was on the line, and it sure as hell wasn’t the 911 operator.
I know you’re there, Commander.
