hundred yards of approach told him that she wasn't dressed like a local. That was odd. You didn't get here except by car. She was also walking in zigzags, even the length of her stride changing from one step to another, and that meant possible public intoxication - a huge local infraction, the trooper grinned to himself - and that meant he ought to pull over and give her a look. He eased the big Ford over to the gravel, bringing it to a smooth and safe stop fifty feet from her, and got out as he'd been taught, putting his uniform Stetson on and adjusting his pistol belt.
'Hello,' he said pleasantly. 'Where you heading, ma'am?'
She stopped after a moment, looking at him with eyes that belonged on another planet. 'Who're you?'
The trooper leaned in close. There was no alcohol on her breath. Drugs were not much of a problem here yet, Freeland knew. That may have just changed.
'What's your name?' he asked in a more commanding tone.
'Xantha, with a ex,' she answered, smiling.
'Where are you from, Xantha?'
'Aroun'.'
'Around where?'
'Lanta.'
'You're a long way from Atlanta.'
'I know that!' Then she laughed. 'He dint know I had more.' Which, she thought, was quite a joke, and a secret worth confiding. 'Keeps them in my brassiere.'
'What's that now?'
'My pills. Keep them in my brassiere, and he dint know.'
'Can I see them?' Freeland asked, wondering a lot of things and knowing that he had a real arrest to make this day.
She laughed as she reached in. 'You step back, now.'
Freeland did so. There was no sense alerting her to anything, though his right hand was now on his gunbelt just in front of his service revolver. As he watched, Xantha reached inside her mostly unbuttoned blouse and came out with a handful of red capsules. So that was that. He opened the trunk of his car and reached inside the evidence kit he carried to get an envelope.
'Why don't you put them in here so you don't lose any?'
'Okay!' What a helpful fellow this policeman was.
'Can I offer you a ride, ma'am?'
'Sure. Tired a' walkin'.'
'Well, why don't you just come right along?' Policy required that he handcuff such a person, and as he helped her into the back of the car, he did. She didn't seem to mind a bit.
'Where we goin'?'
'Well, Xantha, I think you need a place to lie down and get some rest. So I think I'll find you one, okay?' He already had a dead-bang case of drug possession, Freeland knew, as he pulled back onto the road.
'Burt and the other two restin', too, 'cept they ain't gonna wake up.'
'What's that, Xantha?'
'He killed their ass, bang bang bang.' She mimed with her hand. Freeland saw it in the mirror, nearly going off the road as he did so.
'Who's that?'
'He a white boy, dint get his name, dint see his face neither, but he killed their ass, bang bang hang.'
Holy shit.
'Where?'
'On the boat.' Didn't everybody know that?
'What boat?'
'The one out on the water, fool!' That was pretty funny, too.
'You shittin' me, girl?'
'An' you know the funny thing, he left all the drugs right there, too, the white boy did. 'Cept'n he was green.'
Freeland didn't have much idea what this was all about, but he intended to find out just as fast as he could. For starters he lit up his rotating lights and pushed the car just as fast as the big 427 V-8 would allow, heading for the State Police Barracks 'V' in Westover. He ought to have radioed ahead, but it wouldn't really have accomplished much except to convince his captain that he was the one on drugs.
'Yacht Springer, take a look to your port quarter.'
Kelly lifted his mike. 'Anybody I know?' he asked without looking.
'Where the H have you been, Kelly?' Oreza asked.
'Business trip. What do you care?'
'Missed ya,' was the answer. 'Slow down some.'
'Is it important? I have to get someplace, Portagee.'
'Hey, Kelly, one seaman to another, back down, okay?'
Had he not known the man... no, he had to play along regardless of who it was. Kelly cut his throttles, allowing the cutter to pull alongside in a few minutes. Next he'd be asked to stop for a boarding, which Oreza had every legal right to do, and trying to evade would solve nothing. Without being so bidden Kelly idled his engines and was soon laying to. Without asking permission, the cutter eased alongside and Oreza hopped aboard.
'Hey, Chief,' the man said by way of a greeting.
'What gives?'
'I was down your sandbar twice in the last couple of weeks looking to share a beer with you, but you weren't home.'
'Well, I wouldn't want to make you unfit for duty.'
'Kinda lonely out here with nobody to harass.' Suddenly it was clear that both men were uneasy, but neither one knew why the other was. 'Where the hell were you?'
'I had to go out of the country. Business,' Kelly answered. It was clear that he'd go no further than that.
'Fair enough. Be around for a while?'
'I plan to be, yeah.'
'Okay, maybe I'll stop by next week and you can tell me some lies about being a Navy chief.'
'Navy chiefs don't have to lie. You need some pointers on seamanship?'
'In a pig's ass! Maybe I ought to give you a safety inspection right now!'
'I thought this was a friendly visit,' Kelly observed, and both men became even more uncomfortable. Oreza tried to cover it with a smile.
'Okay, I'll go easy on you.' But that didn't work. 'Catch you next week, Chief.'
They shook hands, but something had changed. Oreza waved for the forty-one-footer to come back in, and he jumped aboard like the pro he was. The cutter pulled away without a further word.
Well, that makes sense. Kelly advanced his throttles anyway.
Oreza watched Springer continue north, wondering what the hell was going on. Outof the country, he'd said. For sure his boat hadn't been anywhere on the Chesapeake - but where, then? Why were the cops so interested in the guy? Kelly a killer? Well, he'd gotten that Navy Cross for something. UDT guy, that much Oreza knew. Beyond that, just a good guy to have a beer with, and a serious seaman in his way. It sure got complicated when you stopped doing search-and-rescue and started doing all that other cop stuff, the quartermaster told himself, heading southwest for Thomas Point. He had a phone call to make.
'So what happened?'
'Roger, they knew we were coming,' Ritter answered with a steady look.
'How, Bob?' MacKenzie asked.
'We don't know yet.'
'Leak?'
Ritter reached into his pocket and extracted a photocopy of a document and handed it across. The original was written in Vietnamese. Under the text of the photocopy was the handwritten translation. In the printed English were the words 'green bush.'
'They knew the name?'
