It was unusual for Copeland to be calling him directly like this. With his penchant for secrecy, their normal mode of communication was a text message-like earlier tonight-and Jack had no doubt that those messages went through half a dozen encryption filters before they reached his phone.
“Yeah, Bob, it’s me. What’s going on? Are you okay?”
“… What?”
The static flared up again and if Copeland said anything more, Jack missed it. “Bob? Did you hear me?”
“… Can’t find my other shoe… Where the hell is my shoe?”
Definitely drunk, or even drugged-although Copeland had never struck Jack as a big fan of pharmaceuticals.
“Listen to me, Bob. Tell me where you are. Are you at home?”
More static.
“Bob?”
“Upstream, Jackie boy… Definitely upstream… Gotta get out of here… Gotta look after the twins…”
Jack had no idea what Copeland was talking about, but if he wasn’t at home, he definitely shouldn’t be driving.
“Whatever you do,” Jack told him, “don’t get behind the wheel. You hear me? Leave your car where it is and call yourself a cab.”
“… What?”
“Call a cab, Bob. I mean it. Promise me you won’t drive.”
“… No driving,” Copeland murmured, his voice sounding distant, as if he’d lowered the phone. “… Can’t find my goddamn shoe…”
Jack was about to insist he let him pick him up, when the line clicked and the phone went dead.
Damn.
Jack sighed. He knew Copeland had a reputation as a hard drinker, but had always thought of him as a man in control. And a drunken phone call at three in the morning was completely out of character.
He tried to think of who he might call to get Copeland some help-family or something-but when it came down to it, Jack really didn’t know all that much about him. Especially after two years of no contact.
As he racked his brain trying to figure out who he might call, the phone rang again.
He clicked it on. “Bob? Is that you?”
No static this time, but no response, either.
“Bob?”
Several seconds ticked by, then the line went dead, and Jack silently cursed again, wishing there was some way to find out where Copeland was. Maybe call the police to make sure he didn’t wind up in a gutter somewhere.
But what would he tell them?
Where would they start looking?
Then it struck Jack. What if there was more to this than a night of simple overindulgence? After what he’d found hanging in his shower, he had to wonder if it was possible that this was some kind of a cry for help.
Could Copeland be in a different kind of trouble?
But when Jack thought it through, that didn’t make much sense. If Bob Copeland were in danger, why would he be calling in a drunken stupor? And there were plenty of people he could call besides Jack. The guy had once worked for the Pentagon, for God’s sake.
This was a simple case of drunk dialing, is all. And there’s nothing worse than a drunk dialer.
Maybe Jack wasn’t the only one who had demons to contend with. He just hoped the guy got home safely and was sober enough to make their meeting tomorrow.
They had a lot to talk about.
14
Jack went back to the Sea Wrighter the next morning. When he stepped onto the deck, he discovered he’d had another visitor in the night. He found a package about the size of a shirt box, wrapped in brown paper and tucked against the starboard pilothouse door. There was no name, no address, no writing of any kind.
Odd, he thought. What the hell was this all about?
He raised it slightly, feeling with his fingers for a minelike depression plate underneath. Nothing. He kept it level as he raised it. There was no lopsided weight to indicate packed explosives, no faint chemical smell, no ticking, no wires that he could see under the wrapping. Snatching it up, he let himself in, then moved into the galley and laid it on the table. He tore away the brown paper. All he found inside was a briefcase containing a swath of papers. Government authorization forms, from the looks of them, generated by the Department of Defense.
Jack paused when he saw them.
Was this something he should be looking at?
The authorization involved a special transport mission. On August 20 of this year, a shipment of highly classified experimental hydrazine-based rocket fuel was to be carried from a facility Jack wasn’t even aware of, designated by number only. For security reasons, the fuel would be traveling by tanker truck rather than the usual rail transportation.
According to the timetable, part of that journey would involve passing over the Golden Gate Bridge at approximately 2200 hours that night, and Jack got the impression that the Bridge Authority had not been notified of this shipment. The truck itself would be marked as a milk tanker.
In other words, this was a so-called black shipment. Okay; Jack had no doubt that happened all the time.
The question was, why had this package been left on his deck, and who had left it?
Searching through the package again, Jack found a business card for a Linda Hodgkins of the Department of Defense. After mulling it over, Jack flipped open his cell phone and called the number.
It was picked up after three rings. “Yes?”
“Is this Linda Hodgkins with the Department of Defense?”
A hesitation. “Yes, who is this?”
“Ms. Hodgkins, my name is Jack Hatfield and it seems a package of yours has been left on my boat. Would you know anything about that?”
A longer hesitation. “Copeland said you can be trusted.”
“You know Bob Copeland?”
“Yes, I wanted him to take the briefcase but he told me to leave it on your boat.”
“Maybe you’d better back up a bit and tell me what this is about.”
She hesitated again, as if trying to gather her courage, then she said, “Yesterday afternoon my colleagues and I went to lunch at Fisherman’s Wharf and we left some sensitive materials in the back of our van. Somebody broke in and took everything except that briefcase, including a classified laptop computer.”
“Okay,” Jack said. “So what does this have to do with Copeland?”
“We’ve already been burned and are looking at some serious disciplinary action. I went to Bob for help and he suggested I stash the briefcase and documents in case I ever need to use them for leverage.”
“And he told you to give them to me?”
“Yes. He said he was too hot to be hanging on to them for now and that you’re the most trustworthy person he knows. But when I went to your boat you weren’t there, so I left them by the door.”
“Something that sensitive,” he said. “You just leave it like a UPS package.”
“That’s exactly right,” she replied. “It’s called a Poe Drop, after Edgar Allan. From ‘The Purloined Letter.’ Hide what people are looking for in plain sight and they’ll never see it.”
“If you say so. What are you expecting me to do with them?”
“Just keep them safe until Bob can take possession of them. That’s all I ask.”
“Okay,” Jack said. “I think I can manage that.”
“Thank you. Now, I really have to go. I don’t want to be on this line any longer than necessary.”
