The Windchime Legacy

by A. W. Mykel

  His problem now would be figuring out a way to get rid of Gina long enough to get in and out of Elizabeth’s office safely.

  After several moments of thought, he opened the file drawer of his desk. It was in here that he kept the personnel files of all his assistants. He took out Warren Geisler’s folder and another belonging to Dr. Phillip Clark. Both men were young and talented scientists, with promising futures in the SENTINEL program. He had been after Elizabeth to raise their security levels one notch, to get them into the program on a deeper level. It would also fatten their pay checks substantially. These would do nicely, he thought.

  He put Dr. Clark’s folder back on the desk and took out a third one from the drawer. He got up, put on his jacket, and walked to the door, starting a phony limp as he got into Pat’s office. He grimaced with each step as he walked past her desk and into the hallway.

  Just before rounding the corner near Elizabeth’s office, he snubbed out the cigar in a wall-mounted ashtray. Gina was busily typing away at some of Elizabeth’s correspondence as he walked up.

  “Hi, Gina,” Bridges said. “Is she in her office?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Dr. Bridges, but Dr. Ryerson is going to be out for the day. Her laryngitis was getting worse, and she wanted to try to shake it over the weekend.”

  Bridges made a disappointed frown. “Hmmm! I have some files she wanted to talk to me about this morning,” he lied. “She made a point of wanting to get this thing cleared up before Monday, too.”

  “You could leave them with me, Dr. Bridges. I could attach a note and see that she gets them first thing on Monday,” she suggested.

  He nodded. “Yeah, I guess that’s the best we can do,” he said and checked Geisler’s folder, then handed it to her. He checked the other folder and frowned. “Ah, damn,” he said, “I brought the wrong file.”

  He turned to walk away and grimaced again. After a few well-acted limps, he turned back to her. “I hate to ask this, Gina, but do you think that you could be a doll and run down to my office for me? My leg is killing me, and I have to get over to engineering for a meeting I’m already late for.”

  “Oh, sure, I’d be happy to. What was it you wanted me to get?” she asked with a smile, glad at the chance to get away from her desk for a few minutes.

  “Well, I had intended to bring Dr. Clark’s personnel file along with Dr. Geisler’s, but I must have picked up the wrong one by mistake. Just give this one to Pat, and tell her to leave it on my desk. Dr. Clark’s should be right there,” he said, handing her the folder.

  “Fine, I’ll go right down to get it,” she said.

  “Thanks, Gina, you’re a real doll.” He began to limp away in the direction of engineering.

  “You’re welcome,” she said after him, walking around her desk and starting down the hall. A moment later she had disappeared around the corner.

  Bridges hurried back into Elizabeth’s office. He stepped inside and closed the door behind him. He guessed that he had about five minutes to find what he was after. He could count on Pat and Gina to gossip with each other for at least that long. He would be out of there in less than three.

  He rushed over to her desk and tried the drawer. No good, it was locked. Damn! The drawer was fitted with a separate lock so that the rest of the drawers remained usable at all times. This is stupid, he thought. Why take such a dumb risk now, especially on the last day. I could blow the whole thing.

  But the risk has already been taken, a small voice inside of him said. Why walk away now? It’s already paid for. You’re already here.

  He opened the center drawer and began rummaging through it. He found a small metal box. He tried it, but it was locked. He pulled out his pocket knife and tried it gently. A few moments later it was open. Inside he found a small key-envelope. In it there was a single shiny key. He tried it. It fit. He twisted it, and the drawer unlocked. Bridges looked up at the clock. Only a minute left.

  There were about thirty or forty folders in the drawer. There were no names or subject headings, just numbers. He spotted a red folder. He had remembered glimpsing a red folder in Elizabeth’s attaché case prior to several of her Washington trips. He removed it and put it up under the back of his jacket and stuffed it into his pants. It held firmly under the belt. He closed the drawer, locked it, and put the key into his pocket. It would be needed later when he returned the file. That could be done when Gina was out to lunch.

  He opened the door slowly. Gina wasn’t back yet. He passed out of Elizabeth’s office, through Gina’s, and then out into the hallway, hurrying off toward engineering. In a moment he was safely away.

  About five minutes later, when he was reasonably sure that Gina would be back at her desk, he went back to his office. He limped past Pat’s desk and passed through the door, closing it behind him. He headed straight into the inner office, where nobody could disturb him. Besides himself, only Elizabeth had authority to open the door. That would mean absolute privacy for as long as he needed it.

  He removed the folder from his pants. It was bent and creased from the rough handling. He looked at it. So what, he figured. By the time Elizabeth sees this folder again I’ll be inside Russia and under heavy protection.

  The folder bore no identifying marks, not even numbers, as had the others in the drawer. He took out a pad and pencil and placed them on the desk for notes. He opened the folder.

  It contained about twenty sheets of paper, the first of which was a title page bearing a two-word heading—OPERATION RAPTOR.

  Edward Bridges began reading.

  The Lear had streaked about half its course homeward when Chakhovsky regained consciousness. He was strapped in a reclining position. He had been awake for several minutes already but had pretended not to be. He just listened and sneaked short, fast glances, in an attempt to assess his situation. At least he was alive; that showed some promise.

  He decided finally that it was time to formally wake up. He opened his eyes wide and saw the tall, dark figure that had saved his life back at the safe house. For a moment their eyes locked. Chakhovsky’s were still frightened, Justin’s cool and unreadable.

  The details of what had happened began to filter slowly back into the Russian’s head. He remembered the old woman holding the gun. She was suddenly there, straighter and not so old as before. Then, when he thought he was dead and had closed his eyes, there was the sound of the silencer. The grunt from the old woman as she fell made him open his eyes. He saw the blood spurting from her head. Then he saw the man.

  He remembered the young girl, her body being knocked backward against the dresser, the blood on her beautiful hair. And the man. Why did he kill the young girl? The girl…nothing was real anymore.

  The compartment of the plane was small. He recognized the type of plane immediately. He looked out of the window at the sky. The position of the sun told him they were heading west. Thank God, not east.

  “Can you sit up?” Justin asked him as he began to undo the Russian’s straps.

  Chakhovsky nodded and sat up after Justin had finished. He squinted and looked out of the window again. They were at a very high altitude. The sky was magnificently clear, and he could see the vast expanse of water below. It had to be the ocean.

  “Do you need one of these?” Justin asked, holding out the small bottle of nitroglycerin pills.

  The Russian shook his head.

  Justin went forward and told Fanning that Chakhovsky had come to. They came aft together. Chakhovsky did not recognize Fanning.

  “Who are you?” Chakhovsky asked. “And where are you taking me?”

  “We work for Robert Morsand,” Fanning lied. “You’re on your way to the United States.”

  “In this plane?” Chakhovsky asked, shaking his head. “Maximum range is eighteen hundred miles,” he said in his good, but accented English.

  Fanning shook his head right back. “She’s been modified. She’ll go over four thousand miles, at almost six hundred miles an hour. You’re heading
for America, all right,” he said.

  “Where is Morsand?” Chakhovsky asked.

  “Trying to shovel his way out of the mess you got him into by leaving your room. Your little adventure cost seven lives. Four CIA, three KGB,” Fanning said.

  Chakhovsky’s eyes narrowed. “I…I am sorry,” he said.

  “Sorry doesn’t make it,” Justin told him. “Your people were pretty good in there. It would have been messy any way we went. But what you did almost made it easy for them. It’s a good thing Morsand decided to send us in early, or it might have been a short day’s work.”

  “Seven lives…” Chakhovsky stared at the floor of the cabin.

  “How long have you had the heart condition?” Justin asked.

  “Only for some months now. Six, maybe seven,” the Russian replied.

  “Exactly what is the problem?” Justin asked.

  Chakhovsky shook his head.

  “Well, what did the doctors tell you?”

  “There were no doctors. I took the pills from the consulate infirmary,” Chakhovsky confessed.

  “You mean you didn’t go to a doctor? You just took these pills without knowing what was wrong with you?”

  The Russian nodded his head.

  “Why?” Justin asked in disbelief.

  “My work is…was all that I had. My wife and only son are dead. I have no one. Only my work. They would have relieved me and retired me,” he said.

  “Have you ever had an electrocardiogram?” Justin asked.

  “Yes, but before the attacks started. It was completely normal.”

  “You should have gone to a doctor. There are a dozen things it could be, not even related to the heart,” Justin said.

  Chakhovsky shook his head. “One knows,” he said.

  “Not as much as you think,” Justin retorted.

  Justin went forward with Fanning.

  “What’s it look like?” Fanning asked.

  “What in the hell are you asking me for? I think he needs to be looked at right away,” Justin answered with a wrinkled expression.

  BEEP!

  “Come in, Control,” Fanning said.

  “You will proceed on your course heading. You will be receiving course changes before your ETA. Your new destination and additional instructions will be given to you at that time.”

  “Roger, we copy.”

  The instructions puzzled Justin and worried him a little bit. He didn’t want to have to stand up his son again. He was supposed to take him for the weekend starting tomorrow.

  “New destination?” he asked. “I wonder where to.”

  “Don’t know. I put down at St. Simon’s Island once with a cargo just like this one,” Fanning said, throwing a thumb to the rear of the plane. “He was wounded pretty bad. They changed course in midflight for that sucker, and he wasn’t as important as this one here. Might be that his condition has someone concerned. More than likely a medical facility or something down there.”

  “How long will it take for us to get there?” Justin asked.

  “If it’s St. Simon’s Island, it should take about four hours. Why? You gotta be someplace? Big date?” Fanning asked with a smile.

  “Yeah, a big date I can’t afford to break,” Justin said.

  “You’ll make it,” Fanning guaranteed.

  Edward Bridges was sweaty and flushed. What he had just read had shaken him. It couldn’t be possible. Not…not today, not here, he thought.

  Not all of the meaning was yet clear in his head, but enough of it was, and it scared him. Operation Raptor had been started over thirty-five years ago. It had survived and grown all these years. It was incredible, and it was here, in America.

  The pad next to him contained some key notes he had made. It was greatly condensed, almost like a simplified flow chart of a complex chemical reaction. It could all be made to fit on one page if organized properly and then typed. He could stop off at his place and type it before heading out to O’Hare. He was sure the Soviets would receive this with the utmost interest.

  He checked his watch. It was almost one o’clock. Gina would be getting back from lunch soon. The time had just slid by. He was so engrossed in the contents of the folder that the noon hour passed without his knowing it. He had to get that file back quickly.

  Bridges rearranged the sheets and put them in the folder. Then he stuffed it back into his pants, covering it with the jacket once more. He left his office and hurried into the hallway.

  Moments later, he was in Elizabeth’s office, replacing it in the file drawer. He wished that he had the time to go through the rest of the folders in the drawer. He was almost afraid of what they might say. There was no doubt, however, that what he had seen was the most important of the bunch. He closed the drawer and locked it. He put the key back into the small metal box and returned it to the center drawer. He checked the room to make sure that everything was as he had found it. Then he left and returned to his office.

  He ran through his plans one more time. The information, the typing of the notes he had taken from the red folder, out to O’Hare for the rental car, and then off to Beloit and a new life. He looked at the clock. Four hours left. The nervousness began to build in his stomach. It was a countdown now, in hours, then it would be minutes, then seconds, as he passed through security for the last time. The last time! It rang in his head. Everything he did today was for the last time.

  It was ten minutes past quitting time at Alpha. Warren Geisler had not gotten the figures he needed from engineering until five minutes before the end of the day. He decided to finish the report on Saturday morning. All that needed to be done was to put in the final figures and then to check the 019 schematic one last time on Monday. An hour’s work at the most.

  Edward Bridges was relieved that he didn’t have to let out that schematic. Not that it would have made any difference, it had to be back in his hands by the end of the day anyway. But he felt better about keeping it close. He walked to his door and looked out. Pat was gone, probably for the evening, he thought. He pushed the door to shut it and turned back toward his desk. He didn’t see that the door hadn’t closed fully. He went into the inner office to get the schematics.

  Outside of his office, Pat was just returning to her desk. She had forgotten her car keys.

  Bridges stepped out of his inner office just as Pat entered hers. He walked over to his huge desk and plopped the schematics down. He counted out the first twelve. His nervousness had been building throughout the later part of the day. His palms were cold and wet, but he still felt good.

  Pat found her keys, removed the weekend days from the calendar, and was about to leave, when she noticed that Bridges’s door was partially open and that the light was on inside. She hadn’t seen him before leaving the first time and decided to wish him a good weekend. She moved for the door.

  Bridges was sitting behind his desk with the first twelve sheets in his hands. Their heavy bond would not bend as easily as he had anticipated. He placed the schematics on the desk, bent forward, pulled up his right pant leg, and tugged at the sock, pulling it away from the leg to test the stretch.

  “Good night, Dr. Bridges. Have a nice weekend,” Pat called from the doorway.

  Bridges’s body jerked violently upright, his hands pulling upward in response to the shock of the voice. His sudden, forceful move stretched the sock, snapping many of the elastics. He threw his arms across the schematics to hide them from her view. He looked up, white-faced.

  “Oh, Pat. You startled me. Good…good night, and you have a nice weekend, yourself,” he said, doing his best to sound unshaken.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Dr. Bridges. I didn’t mean to startle you like that. Did you tear something? It sounded like something ripping,” she said.

  “No. No, it was just my sock, the elastic. It’s been falling on me all day. I was just pulling it up. I stretched it that’s all,” he invented quickly.

  “Are you sure? If something has ripped I can sew it up for you
real quick. I have a needle and thread in my desk,” she offered.

  “No, Pat, really. It was just the elastic in my sock. Thanks. Honest.”

  “Well, okay, I guess. I am sorry, Dr. Bridges.”

  “It’s okay, Pat. Have yourself a nice weekend,” he said as sweat beaded on his face and forehead.

  “You too, Dr. Bridges. See you on Monday.”

  “On Monday.” He nodded. On Monday, he thought. Shit!

  His heart was pounding like a cannon. He raised a hand to his wet forehead. Oh Christ, that had triggered him. The floodgate was open. He was shaking now and couldn’t stop it.

  He breathed deeply, trying to calm himself. He put the schematics on the desk, walked over to the door, and pushed it closed again. This time he saw it open up after not closing all the way. He gave it a shove. It was closed tight this time.

  He went back to his desk. By the time he got there, the sock had fallen to his ankle. He bent over again and examined it. Maybe it would still hold. If not, he’d use a rubber band to secure it. He picked up the first pile of schematics again and tried bending them around his leg. It was a tougher job than he had imagined it would be. They were considerably heavier than the report sheets. He managed to pull the baggy sock up over them. It felt snug enough. He got up and took a few steps around the room. It would hold. The rubber band wouldn’t be needed.

  He had some difficulty with the other leg, so he stretched that sock, too. He stuffed the leg and pulled up the sock. It felt perfect. Now to get the hell out of there.

  Before getting up, he looked slowly around the room. It seemed to him as if he were seeing it for the first time instead of the last. He mentally pictured the rest of the complex, or he tried to, anyway. It seemed so vague, as if he were already forgetting. But this office, his office—a wave of emotion engulfed him. This had been his second home for seven years. And now he was leaving it, for places unseen and unknown. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He was supposed to be happy.