Patriot

by A S Bond

  After nearly an hour, Dex carefully pried up the lid. The containers inside the box were food, all right, but his heart sank when he saw what it was. He’d hated dates since childhood, and couldn’t bear to face them now. He began to work on the lid of the next crate. This time was better; there were various dried foods, including crackers and canned tuna. Stacked on the other side of the crate were plastic water bottles, gallons of them.

  For a moment, Dex relaxed. At least he wouldn’t starve. Then he become conscious that this meant his hiding place was far from secure. The men onboard could come for more supplies at any time. He had to find someplace else to hide. But where?

  The day was long, cold and boring, interspersed with occasional moments of panic as one of the crew walked past. By mid-afternoon, Dex was huddled in the far end of the bow, counting the minutes until sunset, when he could chance leaving his prison. The rain had stopped and Dex was eating dry crackers without any pleasure, when footsteps came briskly along the deck towards him. He knew their owner would find it almost impossible to see him unless all the tarpaulins were thrown back, but Dex nonetheless flattened himself onto a small patch of deck between two large crates. A voice shouted something from elsewhere on the ship; Dex couldn’t catch the words, which were muffled by the cases around him. Another voice answered, and this one was much closer. A swarthy arm threw back the corner of the tarp farthest from Dex and pulled out a bottle of water. The tarp dropped back into place, and feet clad in rubber boots turned and walked away.

  Dex breathed again. He had to get out of there.

  He decided on dusk, just before the ship’s internal lights would be turned on. He remembered the small tender hauled onto the lower aft deck, and, after filling his pockets with as much food as possible, he quickly ran the length of the ship. Doubled over to pass beneath the main cabin’s windows, Dex didn’t pause or hesitate. He had no idea if here was anyone on the bridge, or if they could see him, but this was his only chance.

  The ship seemed even bigger as he scuttled uncomfortably the eighty-foot distance from bow to stern. But there were no shouts, no sound of running feet behind him. He stopped and looked down onto the lower deck. There it was, the small boat designed to ferry passengers between the yacht and harbor when the yacht was moored offshore. Cautiously, Dex slipped down the short ladder and crossed to the far side of the tender, where he wouldn’t be seen, should anyone come to the stern. The tarp was securely lashed in place over the little boat, but Dex cut two of the thin ropes with his penknife, and worked loose a section of the covers. It was enough. He reached up and hauled himself over the gunwale and under the covers, into the boat.

  He held his breath for a moment, listening, but there was no sound from anyone on the yacht. Dex looked around at his new enclosure. It was a small motor boat, no more than twelve feet long, with an open half-cabin sheltering the console and two seats at the front. He had landed in what looked like a luggage hold. There was little headroom in the rear section because the tarp was lashed low and tight, so Dex wriggled forward. Slipping into the padded leather pilot’s seat was bliss after the hard deck, and Dex allowed himself a brief smile.

  It didn’t last long. His next challenge was to find Brooke. Dex had tried not to think about what might have happened to her since she had been caught. In truth, he knew there was little he could do to help her, but he had to find her, and she was somewhere on this ship.

  Night fell and the wind picked up. The ship rolled, yawing alarmingly from side to side. Dex, fortunately, had always been a good sailor, and he relaxed into it.

  He didn’t know how long he had been asleep in the chair, but he awoke with a jerk that sent a spasm of pain down through his neck. He rubbed at it, listening to footsteps and voices. Several voices and they were agitated. Then he understood: someone was being violently ill. Dex laughed a little to himself. The crew, who had never appeared to be convincing sailors, were seasick.

  After a while, the vomiting and shouting drifted into low moaning. Slow footsteps moved away and a door closed somewhere on the main deck. Dex looked at his watch. It was eleven o’clock. The heavy weather, although nothing significant by North Atlantic standards, showed no sign of abating. If there was ever going to be a good time to search the ship, this was it.

  He eased himself out of the tender, slipping beneath the tarp and landing softly on the deck. There were occasional running lights, but as Dex climbed the ladder and his head came level with the main deck, he could see no lights shining out from the staterooms. He thought for a moment, then stepped back onto the aft deck. The small door from there into the ship was closed, the porthole obscured by salt spray. Dex wiped it with his sleeve and peered in. It too, was dark, although he could make out the edges of a narrow corridor. Probably the crew’s quarters.

  He turned the handle slowly, and the door opened. Dex almost lost his grip as the yacht lurched over a deepening swell. He grabbed the door with both hands to keep it from smacking into the doorstop, and he stepped into the gloom. There were two doors on either side, narrow and utilitarian. It was definitely where the staff would be quartered under normal circumstances. He figured the captain’s cabin must be on the next level up.

  Dex put his ear to the first door on the right and heard moaning and a kind of regular whispering. Someone was seasick and praying for his life, or to die. The opposite door was the same. The next door along was quiet. He turned the handle very, very slowly and opened it a crack, and an automatic light switched on. In the split second of terror, Dex had the presence of mind not to let the door slam shut. Luckily though, it was the head, and they were empty. But with half a dozen seasick crew onboard, it was hardly a safe place to linger.

  Carefully, he closed the door and followed the corridor forwards, to a T junction. To the right were two more doors. On the left was the galley. The door was propped open by a large can of cooking oil, but there was no one in there. Dex tried the door next to it. Locked.

  Dex stopped and thought for a moment. Then he stepped back into the galley and looked at the other side of the opened door. He almost laughed out loud at the dumb luck of it: A keyring swung from the lock. With one eye on the closed cabin doors, Dex slid the key out of the lock and padded to the next room. The door opened with the third key he tried.

  The sound of a door handle turning in one of the cabins behind him made Dex move quickly into the room, closing the door behind him just as one of the crew stumbled into the head. Dex switched on the light. The room was, as he suspected, the storeroom. Sacks of perishable and dry foods lined the walls, and a freezer hummed in the corner. There was no porthole, but there was another door, and it, too, was locked. Dex again worked through the keys on the ring, until the last one fitted the lock and turned easily. The light from the storeroom revealed it to be little more than a cupboard for buckets and cleaning supplies. In the middle of the floor however, was a bundle of cloths.

  Dex stepped forward to move it with his foot, when suddenly his legs were swept from under him and his breath knocked out as he hit the floor. The handle of a mop was across his throat, choking him, and the shadows created by the overhead light obscured the face of his attacker.

  Even with gravity against him, Dex found he could push back on the handle a little, releasing the pressure on his throat. That was when he managed to focus on the face looming over him.

  “Brooke!”

  The pressure on his throat eased up some more.

  “It’s me, Dex!”

  The handle slid to the floor as Brooke slumped backwards, her breathing fast. Dex could see that she was shaking. He lifted himself to his knees, pushed away the bundle of rags Brooke had hid beneath and pulled her close. For a moment she clung to him, then she pushed him away.

  “What the hell are you doing here? I thought you were going for help!”

  “Shhh! I came back for you. Are you okay?”

  Brooke nodded. “Get me out of here.” She stood up, and he caught hold of her wrist.
/>
  She winced. He glanced down. Her wrists were surprisingly slender for someone so strong, but they were marked by deep red welts.

  “It’s nothing, just where they tied me at first,” she said, pulling her hand away from him and rolling down her sleeves. He looked at her properly for the first time in the light cast by the bare bulb. She appeared exhausted and pale; her right eye was blackened and half closed.

  “Is that where you fell on deck?” he asked.

  “Yes. I managed to clean it up under a tap in that cupboard they locked me up in.”

  “Did they hurt you?”

  “No.” She looked him in the eye for a heartbeat. “They asked me questions...they wanted to know what we saw, how we got out of the mine...I just said we stumbled around in the dark until we found a way out.”

  “Do they believe you?”

  “Probably not, but they have bigger things on their minds right now.”

  She turned to walk out.

  “No, you have to stay here. There’s nowhere to go and if you disappear, they’ll search the ship until they find both of us.”

  “So we have to try and get off this ship!”

  “How, exactly?”

  “What about the tender?”

  “Brooke, it’s tiny, we’re in the middle of the north Atlantic, and there’s a storm outside, in case you hadn’t noticed. I don’t like our chances.”

  “Okay.” She sat on the edge of a shelf and thought for a minute.

  “Then you will have to try and disable it.”

  “Disable what?”

  “The weapon, the EMP thing. I’m sure it’s on board. We’re taking it to be detonated outside Washington...”

  “What?”

  “I saw the route marked on the charts before they got me.” Brooke seemed to be regaining some of her spirit. “We’re sailing to Washington, to set off a bomb that will take us right back to the Dark Ages. And if I have to stay here and play hostage, you’re going to have to find the bomb and disable it before we get there, and then find some way for us both to get off this damn ship.”

  “Is that all?” Dex laughed. “I thought you were going to ask me to do something tricky.”

  Chapter 28

  The results of the Sugar Grove intercept weren’t long in coming. They pinged into life on Scott’s phone as he walked towards the Metro. It was an anonymous number the surveillance guys hadn’t questioned, since it had been accompanied by signed orders from Patel, from inside the Pentagon.

  Scott fought his way out against the tide of workers heading home, like a salmon swimming upstream. Eventually, be broke out of the current and, putting the phone in his pocket, hurried away from the Pentagon area. External security cameras there meant no privacy.

  Scott walked quickly into a tiny park, little more than a patch of grass, among the expressways overpasses, and he sat down on a bench. He scanned the information in the file, then he placed an earpiece in his right ear. After a few minutes, he pulled the earpiece out, put it all in his pocket, and stared at the ground for a while.

  An hour later, Scott walked up the hill to the National Memorial in the Arlington Cemetery. Small groups of tourists were climbing back onto their buses, but there were still enough people wandering among the graves of the famous that he wasn’t noticed. He watched them as he waited, turning up the collar of his overcoat against the chill coming off the Potomac. He’d always wondered why people who probably didn’t even visit the graves of their own relatives at home came on vacation to the nation’s capital to gawk at the gravestones of people they’d never known. It was ghoulish.

  “What did our friends at Shenandoah have to say?” Mike’s voice made Scott jump. He seemed to be doing that a lot lately.

  “Let’s walk.”

  The two men meandered through the trees in the direction of Arlington House, and Scott relayed the results from Sugar Grove.

  “So they’re sure they have found Maynard?”

  “Yes. They used voice recognition against a speech he made in New York last year, some fundraiser for a kids’ hospital. They can’t confirm it was Hassan, though.”

  “Any number in Iran is worrying enough.”

  “And warrants sufficient interest from intelligence.”

  “There was nothing incriminating.”

  “We never thought we’d get that lucky, did we?” Scott almost laughed for a moment. “What worries me though, is that they are still talking about Phase two, and we thought we’d already seen that in the second attack.”

  “So either they’re talking about something entirely innocent, like phase two of a new factory in Tehran - “

  “Unlikely - “

  “Or something bigger is heading straight for us.”

  “That’s what scares me.” Scott stopped walking and, glanced around. The tourists had thinned out now, and there were only a few shapes moving about in the dwindling light. “We need to take what we have upstairs. It’s just a question of whether to take my stairs, or yours.”

  “You trust Sykes, don’t you?”

  “I do.” Scott looked thoughtfully into the distance. “But Waring is his boss, and you know how well that went last time.”

  “Did you dig up anything on him?”

  “Not a thing. As far as I can tell, he’s clean. Worse than that, though, I’m no closer to finding out who is Maynard’s man on the inside.”

  “If he has one.”

  “All we have is Maynard speaking to Hassan via satphone, but any call within the country will almost certainly have gone through a fiberoptic network, and that can’t be intercepted except through a switching station.”

  “Can’t Sugar Grove do that?”

  “Apparently not; satellite only. They tell me the rest is via room 641A, but there’s no way I can get into that with just a faked signature.”

  Mike nodded. “No alarm bells on this?”

  “Not so far. But now we have some solid evidence that Maynard to talking to Hassan, or someone close to him. Hassan is a Person of Interest to Langley already in the Apache investigation, so we’ve got him.”

  “We’ve got a solid reason to look at him, anyway.”

  “Yeah. So right now, I think the Langley route is the better bet, especially given how heavily I’ve been sat on over this at Defense.”

  “And at Langley we can make cooperation with MI6 official, no problems. I’ll keep your name out of it.”

  Scott nodded, pleased at having reached a conclusion. “Talk to Vernon tomorrow.”

  It was past eleven when Scott got home. Man, he was tired. He stretched out on the couch and flicked on the news channel.

  “...an American who is a leading expert in astrophysics, has been working abroad for a number of years, is now also missing. He was last seen a week ago with Washington-based journalist Brooke Kinley, while he was searching for his brother in Labrador. It is thought that one of the bodies discovered in the northern forests is his brother, Kyle Adams, but the authorities have yet to formally identify....”

  Now wide awake, Scott jabbed at the remote, trying to find another station with the story, with no luck. He tossed the remote on the table, cursing himself for being out of touch all evening, and logged on to his laptop. The story was a small one, a few paragraphs.

  Any concerns about the lateness of the hour evaporated as Scott dialled Denzel’s’ home number. There were a few advantages to his job, and access was one of them. A woman’s voice answered on the second ring, sounding sleepy. Denzel, though, sounded like he never slept.

  “It’s all over the news.” Scott realized he was shouting, and he took a deep breath.

  “And we don’t know any more than that,” Denzel, said, a little testily.”I’ve tried her sat phone, and it’s been down for over a week.”

  “Who’s this scientist? Do you know why Brooke was with him?”

  “No idea.”

  “Have the RCMP been out?”

  “They’re talking to some local guy - First
Nations, I think - who saw Brooke with this scientist about three days ago. He took the RCMP to some bodies in the woods. They’re both male,” he added as he heard Scott’s breath catch in his throat.

  “Where did they go from there?”

  “A mine. But when the RCMP turned up, it was deserted. Long abandoned, apparently.”

  “Do you know why Brooke was out there?”

  “Yes, I didn’t think there was anything to it. I guess I was wrong.”

  “Yes, you were.” Scott banged down the phone. He was blaming Denzel, but of course it was his fault Brooke was caught up in this.

  He paced the room for a moment. The walls had never seemed this close before. Then the phone rang, making him jump.

  Scott picked up.

  Mike said, “I’ve got something else, and it may be significant. Can we meet tomorrow after I’ve seen Vernon? Say around one, corner of 12th and Constitution?

  “What is it, is it Brooke?”

  “Who?” Mike sounded confused. “No. It’s Maynard; I’ve found him.”

  Chapter 29

  “Do you need some food?” Dex looked around the storeroom.

  “No,” Brooke said. “Although I wish there was some chocolate here.” she rummaged through the shelves, but it was mostly economy sized cans of the basics, tomatoes, ketchup. She sat down again, disappointed. “You should go, before they catch you here.” Brooke looked at Dex, her damaged eye partly closed. The sight made his stomach contract into a tight ball of anger.

  “I’m not going anywhere just yet.”

  They talked over their plan - or what passed for a plan - and Dex described his new living quarters.