A Bob Lee Swagger eBook Boxed Set: I, Sniper, Night of Thunder, 47th Samurai

by Stephen Hunter

  “What are the odds?”

  “Not good. Lots of folks here don’t repair their dents and dings or they do it themselves. Or if the car was stolen, maybe he’ll just dump it and forget about it, that’s something these thrill drivers do. Anyhow, that’s what the book says. Now I work a different way.”

  “I’m hoping you’ll tell me.”

  “I’m no genius but I have a sound appreciation of human nature. I collect snitches. What I do is, when I bust a kid on meth or grass or assault, I pull him aside and I say, ‘Look I can go forward or you can cooperate with me and this can go away, you get a fresh start and maybe you ain’t as dumb as you look.’ ‘What you mean?’ he says. ‘I mean,’ I say, ‘what do you know, what can you give me, what things you heard, where’d you buy the stuff, who’s moving the shit, this sort of thing.’ He listens, sees where his best interests lie, and opens up. I take notes. Clear up a lot of cases that way. Who broke into the Piggly Wiggly. Who stole seventy-six dollars and fifty-three cents from the Pizza Hut. How Junior Bridger afforded his new Camaro with a 344 under the hood. Other things I hear about it factor in: Why homecoming queen Sue Ellen Ramsey dumped quarterback Vince Tagetti for seeming no-’count Cleon Jackson. The answer is that Cleon’s cousin Franklin just got into the meth business big time, and suddenly the dough is rolling in. Cleon delivers to folks all over town, he’s now got a Lexus SUV, and Sue Ellen has always loved the Lexus line. That sort of thing. That’s how crime works in a rural zone of hills and hollows and small towns and big football and bad methamphetamine addictions and very peculiar behaviors. And the kids, the snitches, they take to it. Finally, for some of ’em, they got somebody to listen to them. So right now I have my snitches working full time. And somebody’ll talk. Too much beer in Smokey’s one night, he’ll talk. He’ll brag on it, how he bopped the Volvo and it felt good. The story’ll get around, it’ll get to one of my kids, and he’ll let me know, and I’ll get a name. Then I’ll bring ’em in and sweat ’em and they’ll roll over and we’ll have a case. It may take a little while, but that kind of police work is worth all the CSI bullshit in the world.”

  “That makes good sense to me,” he said. “I can see you know your profession. May I call you now and again for some kind of update?”

  “Why, sure, Mr. Swagger.”

  “But I have to ask you one other thing,” he said. “I also know that in the real world, you’re dealing with a workplace. I know how workplaces are. You got a boss who wants progress. Soon enough, there’ll be other, bigger, fancier criminal situations and he’ll want his number one investigator on them. My daughter’s situation goes on the back burner. That’s not your choice, it’s not my choice, that’s just the way it is, right? Now, especially with this big race coming up, with all the parties, all the drinking, with your department most likely pitching in on the security arrangements for an event that attracts a quarter of a million people, I am not exactly confident that you’ll have enough time to devote to this. Not your fault. I ain’t criticizing you. I’m just saying, that’s what happens.”

  “I won’t let that happen, Mr. Swagger. I will work this thing out for you.”

  “And then there’s Sheriff—” he could tell, since she hadn’t mentioned by name the recently famous hero of the meth wars, Sheriff Reed Wells, of the helicopter-borne drug raid and the highest conviction rate in Tennessee, that she didn’t care for his high-handed, possibly self-aggrandizing way—“he wants cases that git his name in the paper. He wants the big raid, the splash. He doesn’t want slow, careful, patient development of sources.”

  “You do know a thing or two about the real world, sir.”

  “Just a bit. Anyhow, I may hire a private investigator or a lawyer with investigative skills, if that’s all right with you. Or I may do some poking around myself.”

  “Sir, there are some fine private investigators in Knoxville and some fine ex-police attorneys who know the system. Yes, that would be your right, and I understand your concern. I would strongly recommend against any poking around on your own. It can be tough out here, and unless you’re a seasoned investigator, you can make things murkier, not clearer, and get yourself in a heap of trouble at the same time. These young men, they can be tough and merciless. I’ve seen killings, beating victims, all sorts of unpleasantness. I’d hate to find you victim of something like that, because you went to the wrong bar and asked the wrong questions.”

  “Well, that’s sound advice. Okay, I’ll stay away and try not to get my old bones beaten to pulp and get you another case.”

  “Then you and I are on the same page, Mr. Swagger. Now I’ve got to get back into town—”

  Suddenly there was a squawk of electronic noise, harsh and indecipherable, and Detective Thelma switched a button on the microphone-receiver pinned near her collar and leaned into it.

  “Ten-nine, here,” she said.

  She listened to what Bob heard as a gibberish of squawks, now and then cut by a recognizable number. Then she pushed Send and said, “I roger and will proceed on my Ten-Forty.”

  She looked over at him.

  “Well, we have some strange boy in these parts who likes to burn trucks. Don’t know why but this is the fifth one in the past two months. I’ve got to get over there fast, Mr. Swagger, and run the crime scene investigation.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “I will be in touch.”

  She smiled, jogged off to her car, hit the gumball and the siren, and fired off.

  Bob went back to the hospital and sat around for a couple of hours. He met some more of Nikki’s reporter friends and picked up on how much she was loved and respected and how angry everyone was. He told them about Thelma and was gratified to learn she had a fine reputation, had been to a number of FBI schools, had a few big cases, and was something of a local character. She’d been a raving beauty once; who knew she’d turn up as a cop and become the three-time Tennessee state ladies’ USPSA champion, which, he now realized, was why she carried the fancy automatic in the speed holster. He also was invited to dinner and turned down the invites, being too tired and depressed for much more comfort. About ten he kissed his daughter’s still cheek, and headed back to her apartment. There he called Julie and reported in on his findings.

  “We’ll be there tomorrow.”

  “No, please. Just give it a few more days. I just don’t know. I like this detective and she wouldn’t steer me wrong but I still have a queasy feeling.”

  “Is someone following you?”

  “No. And if they were, I sure made it easy on them. So no, no, there’s no sign it’s some old mess of mine, I agree.”

  “Then it’s clear for us to come?”

  “I got one more trick to play out. Then I’ll call you.”

  It was stupid, he knew. But the tracks made no sense to him. He went to his laptop, turned it on, and called up good old Google. He typed in “Aerial photography, Knoxville, Tennessee.”

  FOUR

  If he blinked, he could have sold himself on the illusion he was back in Vietnam, at some forward operating base, where the helicopter was the only way in or out, and the helicopter the order of the day: taking men to and from battle, hauling out the wounded, laying on solid suppressive fire where needed. He was back in a war zone of engines somehow, and although the sandbags were missing, the perimeter security wasn’t, and the whole wide area was separated into bays so that each powerful machine was isolated from the others, and its crew and shop worked as one. No, not Vietnam, but big, powerful machines just the same. The noise of them was gigantic, a physical presence demanding ear protection, so powerfully did the vibrations fill the air and set everything buzzing to the rhythm of their firing. Everyone running about had something to do with engines, all smeared with grease, all filthy in that happy way of men who love what they’re doing and don’t care what it looks like.

  Meanwhile, a secondary fact of life was the stench of high-test fuel, which lingered everywhere, just as palpable in its way as the grinding
roar of the engines. If you wanted to continue the Vietnam game further, you could: Like the aviators of that long-ago, so-vanished time and place, the drivers were the aristocrats here. Thin young men in their specialized suits, sexy, and it seemed that everybody wanted their attention or merely to be in their presence.

  Of course it wasn’t FOB Maria, north of Danang, somewhere in Indian country, RVN, circa ’65–’73. It was the pits, that is, the center of the track, at the Bristol Motor Speedway, Bristol, Tennessee, and what towered above wasn’t mountains full of Victor Charlie, but the enveloping cup of the speedway itself, a near vertical wall of seats for one hundred fifty thousand or so fans. The seats were largely empty, but a few die-hards sat and watched or took notes or worked with stop watches.

  Bob was in the pit next to a vehicle that was just as purpose-built as any Huey or Cobra gunship. It was called “USMC 44,” a Dodge Charger in the new, blurry digital camouflage just like the boys wore outside Baghdad, with the globe and anchor emblazoned king-size on hood, roof, and doors. Mechanics and submechanics leaped around, each, seemingly, with a special job to do, as they struggled to bring it to some kind of mechanical perfection. They worked in puddles of oil and fuel, and tracks crisscrossed the concrete as in Vietnam, the tracks of running men, the tracks of rolling, smooth, wide tires, and a myriad of smaller-scaled tracks for various wheeled devices that serviced the big machine. The USMC 44 carried a special-built V8 Hemi engine so brawny it was bursting to get out, rode on four smooth, wide tires instantly changeable, and devoured some poison brew of chemically adjusted fuel. Like any tool, it sported no softness for comfort, but was a hard, serious bucket of bolts meant for one thing only, and that was to zoom full-bore around a mile track five hundred times, spitting clouds of exhaust. It had all the gizmos: the spoiler on the rear to keep it from going airborne, the shocks made of Kryptonite or some other wonder steel, the four-inch ground clearance, all engineered to make USMC 44 go like hell. Inside it was like a hard devotional place, also lacking any softness for comfort, with one seat bolted in, the doors bolted shut, netting everywhere.

  He stood there, on the outside of the ruckus, feeling like a tourist. But this is where he had been told to be, and this was the time, and the various obstacles to his penetration of the most intimate secret places of NASCAR had fallen when he gave his name, almost as if he were important.

  It was the good old USMC retired NCO network in action. Bob had gotten a batch of pictures taken by Dewey’s Aviation Inc. out of Knoxville, and what he saw was mainly skidmarks down ten miles of descending road on Iron Mountain, and some skell in some kind of fast mover closing in upon and trying to kill his daughter. It was, even from the air, nonsense and gibberish to Bob. But he had friends, and he called the son of a friend, who was a lieutenant colonel in personnel at Henderson Hall, or HQ, and asked if the colonel could come up with some ex-marine who’d know a lot about car behavior, accidents, skidmarks, that sort of thing. Turned out, no, he didn’t, but he had something better. Someone who was fresh off the marine PIO at HQ where he’d been a part of the team that had worked with a big New York ad agency to recruit a NASCAR driver to run the USMC emblem on his car the upcoming season. Not for charity, because there was no charity anywhere in NASCAR these days. It was all marketing, done for the money. But still, the fellow, his people, his team, they all got it, and they loved running under the globe and anchor. In fact, he was still in the running for the Sprint Cup and he’d be right there at Bristol that very weekend. Calls were made, things were agreed to, and though the USMC-Chrysler team was working 24/7, there was no problem if Bob got there at eleven today, as qualifying didn’t start till tomorrow and they were still tuning.

  So now Bob was standing, when a scrawny youngster in jeans and a baseball cap came up to him, smiled, shook his hand, and bid him to follow. No words were exchanged, because the noise was so loud, and Bob followed the boy through the hustle and bustle, dodging a rolling tire someone was wheeling toward the car itself, its top half—Bob wanted to call it a fuselage—visible over a wall. He ducked and bobbed and then found himself inside a trailer home that was way nice, like a hotel suite, clearly set up as some kind of relaxation area. When the door was sealed Bob popped out his ear plugs, as did the boy, and Bob introduced himself.

  “Gunnery sergeant, eh? You were some kind of cowboy hero in that war all that time ago, is that right?”

  “It was mostly squirming around, hoping not to get shot, was all,” Bob said.

  “Well, I’m Matt MacReady.” Bob was stunned to see that this kid was the man he’d come to see, the actual driver himself, fourth in NASCAR standings, a real comer, had a shot at winning a few nights down the road and a shot at the big cup. So young. Freckly even, with a thatch of red hair. But then the chopper aviators were all young, and if you put a helmet on them and a bird under them, they’d go into hell to get the mission done. So he warned himself against holding the boy’s youth against him.

  “Pleased to meet you. Congratulations on your fine racing career. Sorry I didn’t recognize you.”

  “Being recognized is overrated, Gunny, let me tell you. And most of the folks who do just want something from you, from a signature to an investment. They all seem to have fancy haircuts, too. Don’t trust a man with a fancy haircut, all smoothed up like cake frosting, you know. Hell, I just drive cars around in a circle, don’t even get to go nowhere! I end up right where I started, what’s the goddamn point!”

  Bob smiled at the joke and the boy tried another one. “If this don’t work out, I guess I’ll head back to the gas station.”

  “Son, from the looks of it, it’s working out swell.”

  The boy grinned, pleased to have impressed a genuine hero.

  “So far, so good. The cars don’t crunch up so much no more, and I take crunching up seriously because it put my granddaddy in a wheelchair for the last sixty years of his life. And they don’t burn much no more neither, that’s the best thing. My daddy burned to death in one, so I take burning seriously. Anyhow, since you don’t want to tell me how damned great I am, that tells me you ain’t no ass-kiss haircut here who wants free tix. Or no corporate glad hander wants me at a cocktail party with some of the clients where I stand around all bashful-like and the boys come up and pet me like some kind of cuddly critter. Hate all that shit, but it is a part of the business. So we are getting off to a good start. Now you tell me how I can help you. I’m guessing it don’t involve putting on the firesuit and shaking a lot of hands.”

  “Nor putting frosting in your hair, nor getting petted much.”

  “I’m liking this better n’ better.”

  “Yes sir, well, I hope I won’t take too much of your time.”

  “Let me get Red Nichols in here, my crew chief. He’s forgot more than I know. He was my daddy’s crew chief too.”

  “Sure.”

  While Matt MacReady got out a cell to call Red, a beautiful girl—say, the kid was doing well!—came out and offered Bob a cold drink. Bob took a bottle of juice, and pretty soon the door opened, and a man Bob’s age, wrinkled and greasy, came in.

  “Red, meet Bob Lee Swagger, of the real USMC.”

  “Mr. Swagger, an honor, sir. I was a motor mechanic late in Vietnam and I heard of the famous Bob the Nailer.”

  “That old bastard is long gone. It’s just an old man with a bad leg here today.”

  “Matt, you realize he run just as hard as you, difference is, people shooting at him. So you mind your manners around him.”

  “I will,” said Matt. “I already have Mr. Swagger marked down as a serious southern man, not a haircut with a soft-gal handshake.”

  “Well, let’s see if we can help him some.”

  And so Bob laid it out, quickly as he could, free of nuance. What had happened to his daughter, what the police made of it, his own worries, his decision to spend $2,700 to have Dewey’s photo-recon the road, the arrival of the pictures over a fax transmission a few hours ago.

  “So m
y hope is, you can look at the skid marks and make sense of them for me. It looks like chicken scratches to me. I figure you’ve seen skid marks before, you know how cars behave at high speed, brakes on, brakes off, how they skid, turn, wobble, go over. So you can tell me what happened. If the cops are right, and this is some hopped-up teenager, then I can rest easy. They’ll get him, I’m sure. If not, I have to dig deeper and make preparations. I will protect my daughter.”

  “I believe you will. Is there any reason to expect anyone might try to kill your daughter?”

  “It’s not inconceivable. She was investigating a criminal enterprise in a county known for its corruption and drug trade. That would be one thing. Another would be my involvement, over the years, in a number of situations where violence sometimes came into play. Those episodes may have made me some powerful enemies. So it is possible that someone is trying to strike at me through her. That one just can’t be ruled out. I’ve been around enough not to believe in coincidence.”

  “We don’t believe in it either,” said Red. “Out here, on the track where it’s all happening at close to two hundred per, we don’t never believe in coincidence. So let’s see what you’ve got there, Mr. Swagger.”

  The boy and the old man examined the faxes, not the clearest photos ever taken, but Mr. Dewey had gotten pretty damned low and he had a real fine camera. Bob felt he got every cent’s worth of the twenty-seven-hundred-dollar dent he’d put in his credit card.

  “What you’ll see right away is two tracks. One is my daughter’s Volvo, though she doesn’t come into the picture till late in the sequence. Hers are much lighter and narrower.”

  “Yep, he’s sailing on some heavy, wide tread, no doubt about it.”

  “You can see where he tries to knock her this way and that, you can see how she gets away from him twice, and how she got enough down the hill that so when he did finally whack her off the road, the incline wasn’t so steep and the car never rolled. They say that saved her life.”