by R. Chauncey
“I didn’t know you had eggs and bacon,” he said, noticing the heavy snow falling.
“I bought some in Wichita before you showed up. Knew we’d be living outdoors for a while. I left them in the Highlander where they’d stay fresh in that red and white plastic container with ice packs in it.”
“I wondered what that red topped container held,” he said.
How’d you sleep?”
“Soundly,” he said. “I was really tired even though I slept on the train. How long did we sleep?”
“Close to ten hours,” she said. “We needed it, too.”
“If we want to get to where the Society keeps its information before their soldiers stop us, now would be good time to start going,” Larson said. “This storm should hide us while it last.”
Marajo looked up and said, “Not if they’re using satellites to track us. They have the ability to detect metal objects in a storm. They help rescuers rescue stranded motorists.”
“Think they are?” he asked, sipping his coffee and looking up at the sky. It was good and hot with just enough sugar and cream in it.
“Yes.”
“Think they know what this Highlander looks like?”
“Maybe may be not. But I figure they’ve been to my home in Westport and talked to some of my neighbors so yeah. They’ve probably got a pretty good description of the Highlander and me.”
Larson turned around and looked at the snow covered woods about them.
She noticed him looking and said, “Don’t worry for now. If they were here, we’d have known about it.”
“Or we wouldn’t have because we’d be dead,” he said. He drank his coffee and looked around.
“Put some of these eggs and bacon in your stomach,” she said, putting some of the eggs and bacon on a paper plate for Larson. “It may be sometime before we can eat a hot meal again. And no more truck stops.” She started eating the rest of the eggs and bacon from the skillet. “Pardon my table manners.”
He put his mug down on the tailgate, got a plastic spoon from a nearby box, and started eating. “If they’re smart, and they probably are, they’re going to hit us where we least expect it,” he said between swallows.
“But where?” she asked as she continued eating.
“Someplace where the advantages will be with them and against us,” he said as he finished his food and reached for his mug and drank the rest of the coffee.
“Got any idea where that might be?” she asked as she quickly finished her food.
He took the skillet from her and his paper plate and walked a few yards away from the Highlander’s tailgate next to a snow covered bush, and knelt down and dug a hole in the three foot deep snow. “This plate biodegradable?” he asked as he buried his plate.
“Yes,” she said, walking over to him. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“Studying and reading history has taught me that the best place to attack an enemy is when the enemy is close to his objective.” He dug a hole in the snow and put the paper plate in it, and used snow from the hole to wash the grease from the skillet making sure to dump the greasy snow in the hole.
“Why do you say that?” she asked him.
“When you’re close to your objective, you begin to think you’ve won and you let down your guard making yourself very vulnerable,” he answered her as he began to push snow into the hole.
“So we should expect an attack close to those Nevada Mountains?” she asked.
“That’s right,” he said, smoothing the snow over the hole with his hands to make it look as natural as possible. He stood up and looked at what he’d done and thought, God, I’m covering my tracks like I’m some hunted animal. He dismissed the thought from his mind and looked up at the storm. “And this storm isn’t our ally, but against us.” He looked at the hole and was satisfied it didn’t look much different from the rest of the snow around the bush at a distance.
“How can you say that?” she asked. “It’s shielding us.”
“Not from satellites they may be using. And it’s driving most vehicles off the road. Pick up the Highlander on a satellite and they’ll know it’s us, because only we’d be out in a storm.” He stood up and looked at the Highlander. “And like you said they probably know what the Highlander looks like.”
“Got an idea?”
“Yeah. If we encounter them before we reach the Simpson Park Mountains, and they don’t start shooting at us, we act like we’re just trying to make it through the storm. Remember they don’t know what we look like.”
“You think that’s smart?” Marajo asked in a worried voice. “If they know what the Highlander looks like when they spot it they’re going to know we’re in it?”
“Yes. If we encounter any other vehicle they’re just going to be trying to do what we’ll be trying to do. Make it through the storm. But we stay alert and ready. Because if we encounter the Society’s soldiers they just may come in shooting, they may be the sort of people who’ll start shooting at any Highlander they see.”
“That seems risky even for them.”
“Got a better idea?”
Marajo thought for a few seconds and said, “No, I don’t.”
“Let’s just pray whatever vehicle they’re using isn’t built to handle deep snow and slippery roads.” He started walking back toward the Highlander. “And we’ve got to keep our eyes open for anyplace that looks like it could be a trap.”
“That could be anyplace,” she said, following him.
“No,” Larson said. “It’ll be some isolated place. Far from where people will be able to hear any shooting, where our vision will be limited.”
“So in open country we’re safe,” she said.
“Reasonably. Through they could hit us with short range portable ground to ground rockets. But that I doubt.”
“Why?”
“The Society’s greatest asset has always been its ability to remain hidden. That’s why they want to kill us. To remain hidden from the world. A short range ground to ground rocket would make a mess of this vehicle and us in it. And I doubt if the Society‘s in the habit of cleaning up its messes.”
“And a mess caused by a short range rocket would attract a lot of police attention,” she said.
“And questions as to where the rockets came from and who used it.”
“You’re smarter that I thought, Larson,” Marajo said, feeling a bit more secure.
“I’m thinking because I’m scared and angry,” he said.
“Welcome to the club of scared people, Larson,” she said. “I’ve been in it for twenty years. And believe it or not I’m more relaxed that I’ve been in the last twenty years.”
“Why didn’t you paint this thing a different color?” he asked.
“That’s primer not paint,” she said. “I had intended taking it to a paint shop but never got around to doing it.” She smiled then added, “A neighborhood boy, teenager, told me to paint it a bright red.”
Larson looked at the Highlander and shook his head as he said, “No that would have made it more noticeable. This primer makes it look like it’s been camouflaged, but for a wooded area.”
“I never thought of that,” she said.
“Let’s clean up and get moving, and wash our faces with snow. We should be ready for anything that comes our way,” he suggested. “In another eight to ten hours we’re probably going to be fighting like hell to stay alive.”
“Against trained, experienced killers who don’t miss when they shoot,” she added.
“Yes,” he agreed. “But maybe, just maybe, we can come up with
something that’ll give us an edge.”
“A thin one at best,” Marajo said.
***
Chapter 33
January 9, 8:45 p.m.
Betty had driven for four hours before she woke up Dodge at six a.m. Then he’d driven from six a.m. to two p.m. and let her drive till eight p.m. on the eighth till nine a.m. on the morning of the ninth till noon. He’d been driving since then.
She was snoring loudly as she lay on her back on the reclined passenger seat.
“We fucked up, Betty,” Dodge said. Her snoring was annoying him.
She woke up and looked at him. “What? You say something?”
“We fucked up,” he repeated.
“How?” she asked, looking at him with a wide awake expression on her face.
“We should have asked that kid we talked to from that house next to Marlene’s did he know the Highlander’s plate number,” he answered.
“Damn!” she exclaimed. “We sure should have.”
“I suggest we don’t mention that to Karl,” he said. “You know how he is about soldiers who make mistakes.”
“Yes, I agree,” she said as she raised the seat back. “Why did you think of that?”
“You want to give Karl conflicting stories?” he asked her.
“No, that wouldn’t be smart,” she said. “So we just tell him the kid went into his house before we could ask him.”
Dodge nodded and looked at the speedometer. He was doing sixty-eight miles per hour. He glanced at Betty and asked, “Where are we now, Betty?”
She looked at the map on the computer and said, “We’re approaching Salt Lake City.”
“Get anything on that last satellite scan?”
“No. Like you said they’re probably somewhere asleep.” She looked at him and said, “You’ve been driving for over eight hours, Dodge. Want me to take over?”
“No, I’ve got the feel for the storm and the road. You got a spot picked out for the ambush?” He was tired, and in need of sleep – he’d never been able to sleep soundly in cars of any kind, but he wanted to remain in control and driving kept him awake and in control.
“Perfect place. Isolated. No towns around for miles. And in this storm no sightseers around either. Route 29 cuts between two five hundred foot hills with woods on both sides, and its five miles west of the Great Salt Lake.”
“This weather is exactly what we need for an ambush there won‘t be anyone around to interfere with us,” Dodge said.
“I wonder how far ahead of them we are?” Betty wondered aloud.
“Don’t know,” Dodge said. “But we’ve got the advantage. Especially if they’ve stopped. We’d be at that ambush spot now if I didn’t have to slow down every now and then because of the lousy driving conditions.”
“Shame we didn’t pack any stay alert pills,” Betty said.
“Nobody was thinking of drugs,” he said. “Just of getting this Marlene Done woman and her companion.”
“That’s why we didn’t think of asking that kid about the Highlander’s plate number,” she said. “We’ve become too obsessed with finding and killing Done and her companion and getting that drive back, we missed asking obvious questions.”
“Yeah,” he agreed.
“It’s cold in here,” Betty said, noticing her breath in the air.
“Need to keep it cold so I can stay awake and alert,” he told her.
“We were stupid,” she said bitterly.
He glanced at her. “Explain yourself,” he demanded.
“Marlene Done wouldn’t have started running if this other person hadn’t contacted her. Apparently Julian told her what to do when contacted by this unknown person.”
“Yeah,” he agreed.
“This person would have had to go to Westport to contact her.”
“Of course,” he said.
“Did Westport look like the type of place that gets a lot of visitors? Especially in the winter.”
He understood her. “No,” he said. “Whoever this person is they would have stood out like a white spot on a black sheet.”
“Exactly,” she said. “Finding him would have been easy. Instead of looking for
Marlene Done we should have been looking for an outsider once we learned that Paul
Duffy returned to Westport and died there. There probably aren’t that many hotels in Westport, and we should have been checking for anyone who’d recently arrived in town.”
“The drive Julian gave this person certainly would have contained information about Paul Duffy, and Julian would have been smart enough to have Marlene Done go to the town where Duffy lived. He certainly knew about Duffy opening up that electrical parts company there, he would have known this person he gave the drive to would check out the information on it. And Duffy would have been the perfect person to start his checking.”
“We’ve all agreed to that, Dodge,” she said.
A gust of wind hit the right side of the Land Rover and Dodge had to compensate for the sudden push to the left by steering into the wind. His speed dropped by only five miles per hour. Once he felt he had complete control he returned to sixty-five.
Betty smiled a smile of relief when she felt the Land Rover return to its former position.
“And now here we are driving like maniacs in a fucking blizzard hoping to reach an ambush spot before Marlene Done and her help do,” she grumbled, looking out the window
at the storm. “I can’t see more than a hundred and fifty feet in any direction.”
“Check our position,” Dodge told her.
She looked at the computer and brought up a map on the screen. It showed their exact position. “Take the off ramp coming up on the left. It’ll take us around Salt Lake City.” She typed on the computer keyboard and ’satellite overhead’ appeared on the screen. She typed again requesting the position of all vehicles on the road ahead of them. “We’re in luck, Dodge,” she said. “No one’s out here but us fools.”
Dodge dropped his speed to a safer twenty-five miles an hour and took the off ramp.
“Take the next left to a highway that crosses the Jordan River, then right onto Route 215 a few miles north of there we hit Route 80” Betty told him. “Then another left and we’re out of Salt Lake City territory.”
“See if you can get a satellite scan of Route 29, and look for any vehicles on it behind us,” he told her as he followed her directions onto the highway.
She did so.
“There are five vehicles on Route 29 heading west.”
“Speed?”
“All are going ten to twelve miles faster than they should be going in this weather with the roads as bad as they are,”
“Slower than we were going?”
“How fast are we going?” she asked.
“I was doing twenty-five now I’m at thirty-five miles an hour,” he said.
“All of these vehicles are going five to ten miles an hour slower.”
“What type of vehicles? Where are they?”
“Can’t tell what type. A lot of electrical interference from the storm,” Betty said.
“But they’re not trucks. And they‘re over a hundred miles behind us.”
“Didn’t think there’d be any trucks on the road,” he said. “No truck driver is going to be out in this weather no matter how many safety devices his truck has.”
“The closest one is twenty miles behind us, Dodge,” she said, glancing out the window. “The Jordan River is coming up. It’s a few more miles after that and we�
�ll be on 215 heading north.”
He smiled as he saw the sign off to the right announcing a bridge and warning it was slippery during the winter, and said, “Good. One of them is that damn Highlander. We’re ahead of them.” He dropped his speed by ten miles.
Betty leaned to her left and looked at the speedometer and said, “Smart.”
“Twenty-five is still fast for these conditions,” he told her.
“We don’t want to attract any traffic cops wondering where we’re going in such a big hurry, do we, Dodge,” she asked him.
“We should be out of the Salt Lake City area in an hour or so, and then pass the southern part of the Great Salt Lake in another hour or so. Then we can get on 29 and go to the spot you’ve picked.”
***
Chapter 34
January 9, 2 p.m. the desert near Simpson Park Mountains
Derrick had slept an hour longer than he usually did, but what else was he to do in his luxurious camper? Invite Dorothy, Charlie, and Lester in for morning coffee and a few hours of chit chat? Such an act was unthinkable as far as he was concerned. He was a Leader, and a leader didn’t associate with the soldiers of the Society unless they had a mission to assign them. To do so would have destroyed the social barriers that had existed between soldiers and members since the Society of Merchants was created, giving the soldiers the belief they were equal to members. And that couldn’t be allowed.
As long as the soldiers realized they weren’t the equal of the members, and remained well paid, they’d remain in their obedient positions and carry out their orders when given them without question.
He had awaken at one, taken a hot shower, fixed himself a lunch from the fresh vegetables and lettuce in the small kitchen’s refrigerator, and washed it down with a wine far below his usual medium standards. But he didn’t complain. He was just glad the camper’s shower had hot water. Cold water would have been too much for him to stand. No matter how important it was to him to be here. But he did enjoy the thrill of fixing the first meal he’d ever eaten in his life with his own hands. But, of course, it was not something he looked forward to doing on a regular basis. That’s what well paid servants were for.