The captain’s face set in bitter lines. “I mean, it couldn’t do me any more damage than when this travesty goes to court.”
They went into the living room. Matt was caught a little off-guard to see that the computer system had been removed. Then again, why should that be a surprise? It meant the room would be free of incoming calls and network news. Of course, it also meant no entertainment or research. If Winters was doing any preparation for his trial, he wasn’t doing it here.
But there were traces of occupancy. Books lay on various pieces of furniture, several of the volumes resting facedown and open. Matt’s mother hated to see that. “It breaks the bindings,” she complained. “We’re not going to have these things around forever, so let’s not be in a hurry to destroy them.”
Then Matt spotted something familiar on the sofa. It was a large, cylindrical scroll of paper — the statement of support Matt had delivered with the signatures of all the Net Force Explorers. He remembered how clumsy the bulky package had been to carry. Now it was undone, loose, and somewhat crumpled, as if it had been unrolled and read many, many times.
Matt could feel his face grow warm.
Winters came up behind him and followed his gaze. “You’re looking at the relic?” he asked.
“Relic?” Matt echoed.
“A fossil, from the long-lost days when I could say something and people would believe me.”
“We still believe you,” Matt said. “All the Net Force Explorers believe you, Captain.”
“Mister,” Winters cut in. “‘Captain’ is a Net Force title. Another relic.” He shook his head. “All those years on the job, and it disappears in less than a week. People you risked your life for — and with — suddenly don’t know you—”
“I’ve talked to the Squirt — Mark Gridley — his dad believes in you, too. He just can’t speak out—”
“Oh, yes, political concerns. You see a lot of those in Washington. I’m sure I’ve got a personal message from him somewhere in the answering system.”
It wasn’t the words that chilled Matt’s soul — although they were pretty upsetting. Even more upsetting was the bleak, lost look in Winters’s eyes as he spoke.
This wasn’t the James Winters Matt knew — sometimes stern, sometimes sharp-tongued, with a quick sense of humor and a tremendous concern for the young people entrusted to him.
This was a man who’d been dragged through the mud and then kicked a few times while he was down. He was wounded, and it showed.
Matt felt Winters’s eyes resting on him. “So, this situation is most intriguing. My lawyer called earlier today. Counselor Laird was quite insistent on getting me to the phone. He wanted to ask me about one Matthew Hunter. Afternoon comes, and the same Matthew Hunter appears at my door. Coincidence? I think not.”
Captain Winters responded to the look on Matt’s face with a lopsided smile. “I can still add two and two and get some sort of answer, Matt. And you can tell Laird I’d better not see a bill with your cab fare on it. What can he stick it under? ‘Restoring the client’s spirits?’”
Winters carefully moved the scroll off the couch, put it on the coffee table, and sank down onto the cushions. “Sit. I really
Matt had to hide a grin. Certainly, events hadn’t robbed Captain Winters of his investigative talent.
“I’m afraid it’s the worst-case scenario,” he responded. “Both of them, aided and abetted along the way by most of the familiar faces in the D.C. group.”
For just a second the old Captain Winters was present with the quick flash of a grin. “Figures,” he said.
Matt chose his words carefully. “We’ve been trying to help you.”
Matt went into some of what they had attempted: Leif’s penetration of HoloNews, Megan’s talks with
The captain’s wry expression turned a bit more serious when he heard of this. “Agent Dorpff has a lot to learn about controlling his charges,” Winters said. “Or am I just now learning about how much I’ve failed over the years?”
“Ummm, there’s more,” Matt pushed on. “Things we, uh, discovered about the earlier Alcista case that never made the news.”
“Meaning those discoveries had to come from Net Force records,” Winters rumbled. “Which would get a certain young hacker in severe trouble if his parents and Net Force ever found out.”
Winters was more his old, stern self as he glared at Matt.
“Given the hacker, I think that discovery’s unlikely, sir,” Matt said.
“You’ve been taking quite an interest in my private business, it seems.” Captain Winters looked at Matt searchingly. But then it seemed as though something inside him collapsed.
The captain’s shoulders sank. “But you still didn’t get the whole story,” he said. “There are bits that even Net Force never got into the record. But I’ll tell you everything, if you’d like. I guess sitting shut up in here has put me in a talkative mood.”
Winters leaned back against the overstuffed back of the couch, but his tight muscles belied his casual pose. “Four years ago, my brilliant partner and I were hot on the trail of a piece of human garbage who offered computer services, and then used his access to steal people’s businesses or whatever worthwhile assets they had. We were closing in on the guy, just shy of dropping the net on him. One rather gray April morning my wife’s car wouldn’t start, so she borrowed mine.”
“To go to the doctor,” Matt said.
Winters looked at him, his face as hard — and gray — as stone. “To be precise, she was going to our obstetrician. We were expecting…our son would have been born—”
He broke off, and Matt sat in horrified silence. Captain James Winters hadn’t suffered one loss, but two — Mrs. Winters and their unborn child. Matt couldn’t even begin to imagine what that had been like.
“Mike Steele was supposed to be the godfather. He’d already given us a baby present. Cynthia — my wife — had scolded him, saying it was bad luck….”
Winters ran a hand over his face, but he at least looked calmer when he met Matt’s eyes again. “I can understand why Mike did what he did. It wasn’t just because Alcista had placed a bomb in his car. But when I learned the truth about the evidence he’d supposedly uncovered, I couldn’t let the trial go on. I had to turn in my best friend. And let my wife’s killer walk. Alcista’s very expensive lawyers jumped in. By the time they were finished, Steve the Bull got a sentence that was more like a four-year vacation — three years and change — than a prison term. And I ended up with this huge hole where my life had been.”
The captain’s expression softened as he looked at his young listener. “Then came a bit of luck. Jay Gridley had me come in to his office for a talk. I told him I was burnt out as a field agent, and I didn’t want to drive a desk in the administrative section. He said he had a special job that needed doing, and that he thought I was just the man for it. I became the liaison for the Net Force Explorers.”
Matt cleared his throat. “We always suspected it was more than a job for you.”
Winters nodded. “It was a lifeline during terrible times. You guys were so young, so enthusiastic, so… spirited.”
“You mean out of control, don’t you?”
“Maybe.”
Matt seemed to see his mentor through completely new eyes. Now he understood why the captain was so tough when the Net Force Explorers bent the law in the cases where they’d become involved. Matt also understood why Winters took every Net Force Explorer so seriously when they came to him for advice. In a very real sense, he treated them like family. Maybe they were his family, the only family he had.
The captain gave Matt a surprisingly shy smile. “It’s like that guy in the old book. I didn’t have one child — I had thousands.”
Then the captain’s smile faded away. “But I’ve lost even that. I can almost laugh at how things turned out… almost. Just before the toilet flushed on me, Net Force asked me if I wanted to go back full-time on active duty. I turned the offer down because I was happy doing what I was doing. Now, even if by some miracle I beat the
