'That's a security breakdown on their side, Roger, but, yes, it appears that they did. I suppose they planned to use that information for any of the Marines they might have captured. That sort of thing is good for breaking people down in a hurry. But we got lucky.'
'I know. Nobody got hurt.'
Ritter nodded. 'We put a guy on the ground in early. Navy SEAL, very good at what he does. Anyway, he was watching things when the NVA reinforcements came in. He's the guy who blew the mission off. Then he just walked off the hill.' It was always far more dramatic to understate things, especially for someone who'd smelled gunsmoke in his time.
That, MacKenzie thought, was worth a whistle. 'Must be rather a cool customer.'
'Better than that,' Ritter said quietly. 'On the way out he bagged the Russian who was talking to our people, and the camp commander. We have them in Winchester. Alive,' Ritter added with a smile.
'That's how you got the dispatch? I figured SigInt,' MacKenzie said, meaning signals intelligence. 'How'd he manage that?'
'As you said, a cool customer.' Ritter smiled. 'That's the good news.'
'I'm not sure I want to hear the bad news.'
'We have an indicator that the other side might want to eliminate the camp and everyone in it.'
'Jesus... Henry is over in Paris right now,' MacKenzie said.
'Wrong approach. If he brings this up, even in one of the informal sessions, they'll just deny, and it might spook them so much that they'll try to make sure they can deny it.' It was well known that the real work at such conferences was done during the breaks, not when people had to address the issues formally over the conference table, the very shape of which had taken so much time.
'True. What then?'
'We're working through the Russians. We have a pipeline for that. I initiated the contact myself.'
'Let me know how it turns out?'
'You bet.'
'Thanks for letting me talk to you,' Lieutenant Ryan said.
'What's this all about?' Sam Rosen asked. They were in his office - not a large one, and the room was crowded with four people in it. Sarah and Sandy were there, too.
'It's about your former patient - John??ll?.' That news didn't come as much of a surprise, Ryan saw. 'I need to talk to him.'
'What's stopping you?' Sam asked.
'I don't know where he is. I was kind of hoping you folks might.'
'About what?' Sarah asked.
'About a series of killings,' Ryan answered at once, in the hope of shocking them.
'Killing who?' This question came from the nurse.
'Doris Brown, for one, and several others.'
'John didn't hurt her -' Sandy said before Sarah Rosen was able to touch her hand.
'Then you know who Doris Brown is,' the detective observed, just a little too quickly.
'John and I have become... friends,' Sandy said. 'He's been out of the country for the past couple of weeks. He couldn't have killed anybody.'
Ouch, Ryan thought. That was both good and bad news. He'd over-played his hand on Doris Brown, though the nurse's reaction to the accusation had resulted in a little too much emotional response. He'd also just had a speculation confirmed as fact, however. 'Out of the country? Where? How do you know?-'
'I don't think I'm supposed to say where. I'm not supposed to know that.'
'What do you mean by that?' the cop asked in surprise.
'I don't think I'm supposed to say, sorry.' The way she answered the question showed sincerity rather than evasion.
What the hell did that mean? There was no answering that one, and Ryan decided to go on. 'Someone named Sandy called the Brown house in Pittsburgh. It was you, wasn't it?'
'Officer,' Sarah said, 'I'm not sure I understand why you're asking all these questions.'
'I'm trying to develop some information, and I want you to tell your friend that he needs to talk with me.'
'This is a criminal investigation?'
'Yes, it is.'
'And you're asking us questions,' Sarah observed. 'My brother is a lawyer. Should I ask him to come here? You seem to be asking us what we know about some murders. You're making me nervous. I have a question - are any of us under suspicion of anything?'
'No, but your friend is.' If there was anything Ryan didn't need now, it was to have an attorney present.
'Wait a minute,' Sam said. 'If you think John might have done something wrong, and you want us to find him for you, you're saying that you think we know where he is, right? Doesn't that make us possible... helpers, accessories is the word, isn't it?'
Are you? Ryan would have liked to ask. He decided on, 'Did I say that?'
'I've never had questions like this before, and they make me nervous,' the surgeon told his wife. 'Call your brother.'
'Look, I have no reason to believe that any of you has done anything wrong. I do have reason to believe that your friend has. What I'm telling you is this: you'll be doing him a favor by telling him to call me.'
'Who's he supposed to have killed?' Sam pressed.
'Some people who deal drugs.'
'You know what I do?' Sarah asked sharply. 'What I spend most of my time on here, you know what it is?'
'Yes, ma'am, I do. You work a lot with addicts.'
'If John's really doing that, maybe I ought to buy him a gun!'
'Hurts when you lose one, doesn't it?' Ryan asked quietly, setting her up.
'You bet it does. We're not in this business to lose patients.'
'How did it feel to lose Doris Brown?' She didn't reply, but only because her intelligence stopped her mouth from reacting as it wanted to. 'He brought her to you for help, didn't he? And you and Mrs O'Toole here worked very hard to clean her up. You think I'm condemning you for that? But before he dropped her off with you, he killed two people. I know it. They were probably two of the people who murdered Pamela Madden, and those were his real targets. Your friend Kelly is a very tough guy, but he's not as smart as he thinks he is. If he comes in now, it's one thing. If he makes us catch him, it's something else. You tell him that. You'll be doing him a favor, okay? You'll be doing yourselves a favor, too. I don't think you've broken the law to this point. Do anything for him now except what I've told you, and you might be. I don't usually warn people this way,' Ryan told them sternly. 'You people aren't criminals. I know that. The thing you did for the Brown girl was admirable, and I'm sorry it worked out the way it did. But Kelly is out there killing people, and that's wrong, okay? I'm telling you that just in case you might have forgotten something along the way. I don't like druggies either. Pamela Madden, the girl on the fountain, that's my case. I want those people in a cage; I want to watch them walk into the gas chamber. That's my job, to see that justice happens. Not his, mine. Do you understand?'
'Yes, I think we do,' Sam Rosen answered, thinking about the surgical gloves he'd given Kelly. It was different now. Back then he'd been distant from things - emotionally close to the terrible parts, yet far away from what his friend was doing, approving it as though reading a news article on a ballgame. It was different now, but he was involved. 'Tell me, how close are you to getting the people who killed Pam?'
'We know a few things,' Ryan answered without realizing that with his answer, he'd blown it after coming so close.
Oreza was back at his desk, the part of his work that he hated, and one reason he worried about striking for chief, which would entail having his own office, and becoming part of 'management' instead of just being a boat- driver. Mr English was on leave, and his second-in-command, a chief, was off seeing to something or other, leaving him as senior man present - but it was his job anyway. The petty officer searched on his desk for the card and dialed the number.
'Homicide.'
'Lieutenant Ryan, please.'
'He's not here.
