“It’s already in the works, Sir.”
“Let me know as soon as you find anything, Doyles.”
“Yes Sir.”
Chapter 34
New York, Seneca Vineyards: Friday, June 22.
The first thing they noticed was the crispness in the air and the second was the sheer size and beauty of the estate. Set in the soft rolling hills that surrounded the Finger Lakes Region, the estate’s French Country style buildings complimented the lush greenery that flowed throughout the property. The main house sat on a bluff overlooking acres of vineyards. Even the cleverly designed utilitarian hangar looked like a 19th century barn. In the distance, were several more buildings following the same architectural theme, some of which were considerable in size.
As Colleen completed her post-flight on the aircraft, Tony was on the phone requesting ground transportation and help moving the Jet Ranger into the hangar.
“It’s better if your chopper is out of sight for now,” explained Tony.
“Now, I would like to welcome you two to Seneca Vineyards, my home.”
“You actually make wine here?” fumbled David.
“Yes, we actually make wine here. We make a very fine selection of estate-bottled wines. We sell them through a network of distributors, which we also own.”
A few minutes later, a black Hummer with a clever looking Seneca Vineyards logo painted on the door drove up. Three men got out and Tony introduced them as Jimmy, Sal and Rick.
“Jimmy, I want you and Sal to help Bobby and Vinney with the choppers while Rick takes us up to the main house.”
Rick loaded Colleen and David’s bags into the back of the Hummer and motioned for them to get in the rear seat. The drive to the main house was short, about a half mile up a winding tree lined driveway. They pulled up under a portico. Standing in the doorway was an elegantly dressed woman who Colleen estimated to be in her early forties. As Tony stepped from the front seat, she came to him and put her arms around him.
“Antonio, my Antonio, welcome home.”
“Allow me to introduce my Maria,” said Tony with a flourish. “This is David and Colleen. They are the couple I was telling you about, the ones who might know what happened to my father. Rick will take you to your room so you can freshen up. Cocktails at 7:30 PM with dinner at 8:00 PM. I have an excellent chef and you will not be disappointed.”
Colleen and David followed Rick up a winding staircase and down the hall to their room.
“David, do you believe this place, it’s like something out of a dream?”
“You mean it might be out of a nightmare.”
“No, I really think they mean us no harm. Even the goons seem friendly.”
“Yeah, but I still don’t like that Bobby the Pock character. What kind of a name is that any way?”
They were inside a few minutes when there was a knock at the door and David opened it to find Maria standing there.
“I just wanted to see if you have everything you might need. There are towels and toiletries in the bath through that door. Tony explained how they found you. I know they can be a little frightening at times but he means you no harm. Tony has always felt something mysterious happened to his father, a father he has never known. It has always bothered him. He is so happy to find out something about him. Family is very important to us.”
“We will have cocktails on the patio so when you come down the stairs just go to your left and out the double doors. Tony and I will be waiting for you. Dress is casual.” Maria smiled and touched Colleen’s arm saying, “Welcome to our home,” and quietly left.
“She is very nice; I like her. I think we will be okay David.”
The room was rather heavily decorated in French provincial style with a king size canopy bed covered with pillows. There was a sitting area in the bay window framed with heavy drapes held open by gold braided ties. Two dressers and a small desk made up the rest of the room. There were two large walk in closets with a bath between them.
“David, I need a shower. It’s almost a quarter to seven now, so I think we both have time.”
“I’ll just put our things away while you are in there.”
A little past seven-thirty, they emerged from their room. Colleen wore a knee length skirt and light blue sweater while David wore his blue Oxford button-down shirt and tan slacks.
Chapter 35
Defense Intelligence Agency: Friday, June 22.
Commander Robin Camp was just sitting down for dinner with his date, Sue Ellen Prichard, when the phone rang.
Robin answered with an edge in his voice. “Commander Camp here.”
“Sir, it’s Doyles.”
“Go ahead, what do you have?”
“We found the tracking device but it looks like it fell off the chopper.”
“So, you are telling me you have no fucking idea where they are?”
“Actually, they purchased fuel at the Charlie Brown Airport outside Atlanta on June 20. We checked the local radar at that airport but they went off the screen while they were headed north somewhere around Clayton, GA. They filed a flight plan to Richmond Hills Airport in Virginia.”
“A Jet Ranger has a range of more than 300 nautical miles. I suggest you not only check Richmond Hills Airport, but also check all airports within a 350 nautical mile radius of Charlie Brown Airport to see if they refueled again. If they did not, then we may have a big problem.”
“Do you think they are going to try to fly that thing all the way to Seattle?”
“I don’t think so. That was just some kind of diversion. That damn girl looks like trouble. Find out all you can about her, she may be with the government.”
“Yes Sir.”
Chapter 36
Seneca Vineyards: Friday evening, June 22.
There were three people on the patio when David and Colleen joined them. Tony, Maria and another man were standing by the patio bar having a conversation.
“Colleen, David, welcome, I would like you to meet a friend of mine, Michael O’Donnell. He is with the Public Corruption Division of the FBI.”
A cold sweat slickened David’s skin.
Colleen stood in disbelief. “How…how could you?” Colleen shuddered.
“Please allow me to explain,” Michael injected, extending his hand to David. “I’m not after you and the United States Government is not after you! Tony and I grew up together on the same block in Brooklyn and have remained friends over the years. From time to time, we help each other on various matters. After listening to what Mr. Carbonara has told me, it appears that someone or some group have been up to no good. Please sit down. I assure you, there is no danger from either the FBI or me,” Michael handed David his card saying, “the Public Corruption Division looks into matters of this kind and I’m here to help and protect you.”
“Please,” smiled Tony, “Michael is a friend. Now let me get you something to drink and we’ll talk.”
David and Colleen sat on the sofa and Maria sat next to Colleen. A domestic assistant named Mirko took their drink order.
Michael began to speak. “Recently, we have had several bits of data come to our attention that at first did not seem to be connected. As you can imagine, the FBI gets a constant stream of information from thousands of sources. Some of it valuable, some of it not and some of it connected to incidents that might not readily be apparent.”
Mirko brought Colleen a Bloody Mary and David a gin and tonic. They sat apprehensively on the sofa as Michael unfolded his story.
“A while back I got a call from Senator Land requesting a meeting regarding a possible government cover-up involving, as he put it, some rogue operatives. We have not yet had the meeting because, as you are probably aware, the Senator was shot outside his apartment and is still recuperating.”
“Som
e time after that, Tony called us and said he thought he was onto some kind of Government cover-up regarding the disappearance of his father over sixty years ago and the murder of his cousin, Mario Russo, at a scrap yard they own in Philadelphia. At that time, Tony gave us your names and told us you might be on the run. We initially filed a report on the murder at the De Costa Scrap Yard thinking drugs or organized crime might be involved. When the place turned up clean, our investigation was over and it became a local police issue. The case was closed as far as we were concerned.”
Michael continued. “Up until that point there did not seem to be a connection between what Senator Land wanted to discuss with me and Tony’s concern over his missing father over sixty years ago. As part of the normal investigation process, I referred Tony’s call to Agent Linda Gentilcore to do some follow-up work while I waited for the Senator to call again and set up a meeting. Agent Gentilcore did background checks on Mario Russo, Colleen Gilmore and David Albright. As it turns out, Colleen, you are a close friend of Senator Land’s and your parents reported you missing last week. Both of you worked for Farrell Labs, David as a metallurgist and Colleen as a biologist. Both of you were clean except for the missing persons report filed by Colleen’s parents.”
“They did?” replied Colleen, “My parents filed a missing person’s report?”
“Yes, they did.”
“Now all of this was interesting but we still did not make the connection. You would think we might but with a heavy workload and different agents being assigned to the Senator’s call and Tony’s call we did not yet see how they might be connected.”
“On June 18, Senator Land contacted me again. He gave me a brief outline of your story and told me the remaining samples of metal were stolen from his limousine that morning. He was very concerned about your whereabouts and safety and asked if we could help find you both. That phone call was the catalyst that tied a lot of this together.”
“Agent Justin Miles did some checking at Farrell Labs and confirmed that the reports and samples of metal were indeed stolen a while back. David, your supervisor, George Quinn, told us the samples were from the USS Morgan and you filed your report along with samples to the Department of the Navy. He also mentioned that you were agonizing over it because you thought you found some human DNA in the metal.”
“Yesterday, we sent an agent to the De Costa Scrap Yard to get a look at the USS Morgan and see if he could get another sample of metal from the ship. The men at the yard told him the Navy removed the ship on the sixteenth of this month. They told our agent the Navy towed the USS Morgan or Aratusa, as some have called it, out past the continental shelf and sank it as a fish haven. The men at the yard believed they sank it in several thousand feet of water. After doing more checking, we believe a Commander Robin Camp of the Defense Intelligence Agency signed the order to scuttle the ship at a very specific location known as the “Tongue of the Ocean,” which was stated in the order.”
“I am concerned as to why the reports and samples of metal were stolen. Was there something in the samples they were trying to hide? It now appears this is related to the cover-up the Senator called me about. I also question why you would want a fish haven in over 18,000 feet of water when nobody fishes that deep. In addition, there were no permits pulled from the EPA for a fish haven. It just smells wrong. Getting additional samples would now be extremely difficult, if not impossible, since it is one of the deepest locations in the ocean.”
“There is still a lot we don’t know,” replied David, “but this has been very enlightening.”
“Tony called me this morning to say that you were both staying with him and Maria for a while and suggested I come for dinner. I always accept dinner at Tony’s as Mirko, his chef, is fantastic.”
“So far, they have been very gracious hosts to us,” acknowledged Colleen.
“Well,” asserted Michael, “there is more and I think you will find this part very interesting. The USS Morgan, let’s call her that for simplicity sake, was for many years berthed at the old Packer Marine Terminal after decommissioning by the Navy. As part of a routine investigation we checked on events that occurred in the terminal and came up with the following eyewitness report filed near the end of 2004.”
“You are going to find this very interesting,” Tony, pointed out.
“A report filed on December 10, 2004 stated; ‘There was a blinding flash of green light and 45 bodies suddenly appeared around the dock area where the Navy had done top secret experiments during WWII.’ At first, the witness called the local police but the Navy denied them access to the base. The witness, known only as Seaman Mike P. declined to give his full name, then called the Philadelphia office of the FBI and gave a similar report. The report says he described the bodies as mutilated. He said there were holes in many of them; some were perfectly round and others were square and of varying sizes. There were limbs missing on some, cleanly severed with no bleeding at all. The report said the man on the phone sounded scared and upset and was whispering as he spoke. He said the victims were all sailors but they were dressed in WWII style Navy uniforms. They all had dog tags but the names and numbers were all in some haphazard order, not actually spelling out a name. We sent two agents to the base to check this out but they found no evidence of anything out of the ordinary. The OD, a Lieutenant Dwight Phillips, implied the witness was on drugs or possibly drunk and that it had been a quiet night. Since we could find no evidence of any wrongdoing, there were no bodies and the witness never came forward again, we considered the case closed. We noted the phone call did come from a pay phone on the base.”
David finished his drink and signaled to Mirko for another. “Dimensional Pulse Rephrasing of Frequency,” replied David, “that is what I believe happened.”
“We have people working on that possibility right now,” divulged Michael.
“With that thought,” Tony announced, “I think Mirko has dinner ready for us.”
Maria took David and Colleen to their places opposite Michael, then sat at one end of the table with Tony at the other end.
“I think you will find this an excellent Cabernet,” boasted Tony as Mirko poured. “Tonight we will enjoy Chateaubriand.”
Chapter 37
Defense intelligence Agency: Saturday, June 23.
Commander Robin Camp was just finishing his second cup of coffee when Chief Petty Officer Doyles came in.
“What have you got for me, Doyles?”
“Well Sir, you already know what happened on Friday with the tracking device and the rest is not good either. The FBI’s Public Corruption Department is planning an investigation. A friend of ours in their office overheard one of the administrative assistants talking about it on the phone with a field agent.”
“That damn girl is an agent, I knew it.”
“I don’t know about that Sir, but he did overhear Agent O’ Donnell talking to his administrative assistant about setting up a meeting.”
“Shit Doyles, where the hell are those two? Have you found anything on them yet? If we can just get rid of them, the FBI will have nothing to go on.”
“Well Sir, our FBI friend told me that a Mr. Tony Carbonara is a personal friend of Agent O’Donnell and this Carbonara character was somehow related to Mario Russo, the guy we took out at the DeCosta Scrap Yard. Apparently, he owns some sort of wine making operation in upstate New York. From what our man overheard, it is just possible those two are hiding out there. It makes sense. The last gas stop they made in the chopper was at Morristown Airport and they charged the fuel to a Seneca Vineyards account.”
“Doyles, get some people up there and take care of it. I’m going to call Bobby Casey and bring him up to date.”
“Yes, Sir.”
Chapter 38
During dinner, Tony took charge of the conversation and explained the wine making process at Seneca Vineyards. He became
very animated when he described how the grapes were grown and tended before harvest time. Later, he delved into the actual wine making process, explaining how red wines differed from whites, the storage and aging processes and how they bottled the wine at their own state-of-the-art bottling plant. He finished by promising a full tour of the facilities tomorrow.
“Mr. O’Donnell,” Colleen began, “we still have another sample of the metal taken from the USS Morgan. We actually got two pieces cut from the same area of the ship on that Saturday we went to the scrap yard.”
“I thought Senator Land said his was the only remaining sample and it was stolen.”
“Well,” Colleen replied, “We forgot about the second sample with all that was going on. The weekend after we picked up the samples at DeCosta’s we went to my parents’ house in Ocean Beach, NJ. When we opened the trunk to get our luggage out, there were the two pieces of metal. David took them out and left them by the side of the house. After returning from Washington, we put one sample in the underground trash holder at my parents’ house and covered it back up with some loose gravel. We put the other one in a plastic bag and gave it to Senator Land. He was not aware of the one in the trash holder. Most likely it is still at my parents’ house since the trash holder is no longer used by the garbage collectors.”
“Excellent,” exclaimed Michael. That piece of evidence is very important. With the ship sunk in close to twenty thousand feet of water, perhaps even upside down, getting a sample from the same area would most likely not be possible. If you will give me the address of your parents’ house and the location of the trash holder I’ll have someone go there and secure that piece of evidence first thing tomorrow.”
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