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  It was getting late when he finally made it back to his vehicle. The BMW was long gone, of course. As he approached he noticed that the rear tire looked a bit strange, then realized it was flat. So was the front. It took only a minute to verify all four tires had been flattened. Another delaying action by Crampton he realized. At least he had a battery-powered pump in the trunk. He could start the car to keep the battery charged, and get all the tires back up again as long as the seals around the rims had held. He wouldn’t know until he tried. It took some digging around through all of the junk he had managed to accumulate, but finally he was setup to inflate the first of the tires. As he prepared to hookup the pump, he noticed something. You must be kidding he thought! Shortly thereafter he knew he was screwed. All four valve stem cores were missing. There was no way he was filling these tires. He just hoped there would be traffic so he could get a ride out of here before dark.

  Chapter 20

  Monday, 29 May 2006

  Outside Seattle, Washington

  Late in the day now, the sun flickered through the trees as the BMW rushed down the country road less than a dozen miles from where I had left the frustrated hireling of the dead federal agent. Would he take the warning we had given him, or was he so obstinate he would persist in his dogging of my activities? From the surprise he hadn’t been able to conceal at some of my revelations, I was willing to bet I was done with tracker Sam. I would have liked to have taken his wallet, just to get a full name and address in case my guess was wrong and he persisted. However, that would have lessened the impact that knowing his name had yielded. That little tidbit that Mike had gotten from the agent we still held prisoner had shaken the man.

  Naiya was free and clear. She had sent me a coded text message that indicated she had made it back to her ride and was making her way to Carol’s house. The two had something planned, and I was going to be occupied this evening as well. It had taken a second warning shot it seemed, to convince the man to wait as warned. After that Naiya had packed up, sure the man would stay put. Not that it really mattered.

  I thought I heard a chirp from the phone, and reached across to pick it out of the little phone caddy mounted in the console. Nope, nothing. I set it back in its holder and my hand strayed to the four dirty rubber valve stem cores. I picked them up, and after a moments consideration, tossed them out the window. Sam wouldn’t have discovered as yet that his vehicle was going to require some specialized care before it was going anywhere. Effective and non-destructive, the removal of the valve stems would ensure he was occupied just getting home this evening. I was willing to bet he would be surprised if he knew that I was still in the vicinity rather than making my way back to Seattle. The cabin was only a few more miles, and the stop to remove the tail hadn’t required a major detour.

  I slowed as I approached the small community of Mountainview. With a population of less than five hundred, it served as a tourist get away in the summer months and was already showing signs the first wave of summer visitors had arrived. Just up the street was a small unpretentious Mexican restaurant that I knew from past experience made some of the best carnitas in the area. “What the hell,” I thought. We had the cabin well stocked, but a little hot, fresh food would be nice.

  “Would you like a table?” asked the petite waitress as I walked through the entrance. I was early for the dinner hour, and none of the tables were occupied as yet. The waitress, probably sixteen or seventeen, was most likely the daughter or some other relative of the owner.

  “Just a menu,” I asked politely. “I’m going to want to place an order for take out.”

  “Sure. Just a minute and I’ll get one,” she responded. “Why don’t you have a seat there while you look it over.”

  I moved obediently to the table and chair indicated while she returned to the register for the promised menu. She was back almost immediately, handed me the menu, smiled, and left me to my choices. It didn’t take me long, as I had been here before and knew the layout of the menu and pretty much what they offered. I bought more than the four of us would need, but better too much than too little. In the end, a couple orders of the pork carnitas, one of carnie asada, three of the larger chicken burritos, a large tub of beans, and two more of rice were duly noted by the pretty girl. I also ordered four cokes, and had them fill the thermos I had brought in from the car with coffee.

  While I waited for my order I thought about the hard sell I had ahead of me. It was necessary that I somehow convince the remaining agent to help me recover the files they had copied from Kurt’s hidden computers. It would be great if I could get the processed versions as well, but Carol and John has assured me that we would have little trouble decrypting the originals. From our perspective, acquiring the files with the minimum exposure was the preferred route. But how to motivate the agent to hand them over I wondered? He had been somewhat helpful so far, but that may have been due as much the initial shock of what he and Williams had caused, and the realization that his career may well be forfeit. Now, having been detained by us, he may be less cooperative. We still needed to decide what to do with him afterwards? He represented the only real link that tied us into the whole mess. That meant we couldn’t simply let him go. He would have to disappear. It might have to be something permanent, but I wasn’t eager to take that step. It might be necessary in the end, but I was reserving judgement until I saw how well the man responded to our requests. There was something about him that had caught my attention from the first day we met when he walked into my office a little over a week ago. Damn, it seemed like months ago.

  The cabin was another issue, although minor in comparison. I doubted any of the faces seen coming and going would result in undue interest. We could well be the long absent owners here for a couple of weeks at the start of the season. But we probably should shut it down and stay away when this was over. If no inquires were made, then it might be a place we could use later. If somehow we had attracted attention, we would simply walk away and never return. No records existed that could tie it to us. A close look would reveal the owner had died ten years ago, and the title had never transferred. That was all true. The man knew he was dying, wanted money to send to his estranged daughter, and participated in some clever paper shuffling that hid the fact he had owned it from his estate.

  “Here you go,” uttered the waitress, placing two large bags on the table next to me. “Let me get your cokes and thermos.” Not waiting for a response, she hurried towards the rear of the restaurant, returning with the aforementioned items. Since I had already paid, I thanked her, managed to get everything in one trip, and made my way to the car. I reached over the driver’s seat to place the bags on the passenger side floor. The cokes I sat on the seat and the thermos I slipped into the holder that rode behind the passenger seat where I could grab it while driving. I climbed into the vehicle and started the engine. Another ten minutes and I should be there, I thought.

  I was moving slowly now, working my way up the dirt and gravel road that led to the cabins off the country road that had brought me from town. The road I was on was barely wide enough for a single car, with frequent wide spots to allow opposing vehicles to pass one another. So far I had the road to myself. After I passed the last cabin in the first group, I was able to increase my speed. Ours was one of four in the remote group and there was a half-mile of clear road before getting to the turnoff. As I rounded the next to the last bend, a deer and her two fawns surprised me. The mother and one of the fawns hurried across the road. The other was frozen on the opposite side, uncertain what to do. At the last minute, not wanting to be left behind, it bolted from where it had stood immobilized and ran directly into my path. Slamming on the brakes and turning the wheel sharply, I felt the tires break free of the gravel and the rear of the car coming around in the start of a skid. Only the reduced speed prevented me from killing the fawn, which successfully made it back to its family and continued unconcerned into the trees. After a minute, my heart slowed, and I was able to conti
nue the last quarter mile to my own destination. The gravel crunched under the tires as I drove up the private driveway. Coming to a stop just opposite the stairs leading up to the entrance I turned off the engine.

  Doc came down to greet me, showing concern that we were engaged in an illegal detention of a federal agent. But he knew the situation. He had been part of this for some time. Splitting the packages between us, we headed back up the steps where Mike was keeping an eye on our visitor.

  “How’s the guest?” I asked.

  “He’s been awake for about an hour now, so the drugs are completely out of his system. He wants to know where he is, but he doesn’t seem to be insistent about being released. I think he doesn’t know what he plans to do from this point.”

  Inside we set the packages on the table and I looked across the room where Jeff sat. His eyes had widened as I entered the room, but so far he said nothing. The others had been strangers to him. He knew me. There was no longer any choice. He knew now for certain there was a connection between Kurt and myself. Doc was setting up the food, so I crossed the room and sat down in the chair across from where Jeff was sitting. Mike continued to watch from across the room. He was armed, but no weapon was displayed. Obviously, he and Jeff had come to an understanding making a visible threat unnecessary.

  Our guest was remarkably calm. “So these guys work for you?” he asked rhetorically. “I knew it. Nothing else made any sense. Who else could have an interest in pulling me out of that accident, then quizzing me about Morris and his daughter, and then detaining me? You and the old man are connected somehow.”

  I looked at him, considering where to start. This man was partly responsible for the unnecessary death of someone I had just started to like. More importantly he may have cost us access to a discovery which could change our whole understanding of the time complex. At the same time, he was the one man who might be able to help us recover from this tragedy.

  “But you didn’t kill him. Or kidnap him as Williams wondered. From the looks of things you and he must have been into something together.” He began talking again before I could formulate my first question.

  Suddenly the need to blame someone filled me. After all I had promised Morris, I felt I owed him. Now I would never be able to help him complete his lifelong quest. “You idiots killed him!” I shouted at the agent seated across from me.

  He flinched back, away from my accusation. “I’m really upset about that,” he replied. “There was nothing I could do. I probably should have disassociated myself from Williams a long time ago. Especially after we were directed to end it. But that would have meant I would never understand some of the things I need to have answered. But when Williams saw Morris in the car, he went wild. It happened before I could stop him.”

  “So Williams had recognized him?” I asked. “Not just the daughter?”

  “Oh yeah,” Jeff responded. “Williams knew the daughter was here meeting somebody. He hoped it might be a lead. But when he realized who the old man was, he freaked. Williams was certain that Morris had somehow set him up. Made him look bad and ruined his career.” Jeff paused. I think Jeff was thinking about the future of his own career. “Where in hell did you keep him hidden all this time?” he asked. “And why is he back now? He looked like he must have been ill.”

  “Cancer,” I replied ignoring his first question. “Kurt had just managed to beat a rather nasty type of cancer. He was recovering, and was spending time with his daughter before resurfacing.” Part of it was true. Let him think whatever he would. Maybe he would think Kurt had gone away to seek treatment out of the spotlight.

  “I see,” he said considering. “You want me to think that you knew and were somehow helping him. That’s doesn’t fit with everything I know about you and he before he went missing last year. Everyone says there was bad blood between the two of you.”

  “Maybe things changed,” I responded, my voice a bit husky. “Maybe when he learned. . . .”

  Jeff was shaking his head. “Doesn’t make sense. Besides, why would it be kept such a secret? Even if you wanted to keep it secret from the public, Morris would have let the government in on it. Why would he do something that resulted in the extended investigation for the past year? Why should he suddenly turn to you?” He stopped for a moment. “Even if this cancer story is true, it explains nothing about the items we found. How does that fit in?”

  There was nothing to lose at this point. There was no story I could make up that he would believe. He wasn’t going to be allowed to tell anyone about what he learned anyway, so why not tell him a bit of the truth? It has a certain menace value if nothing else. I held up my hand to stop the rush of questions from him. After he fell silent, I looked him straight in the eye and said, “Williams was right. I kidnapped Kurt Morris!”

  Mike sat up straighter in his chair. I heard Doc stop moving in the kitchen as well. Jeff’s eyes widened as he realized I wasn’t kidding.

  “You are admitting such a crime to a federal officer?” he asked.

  “Who are you going to tell?” I responded, and let the implied threat sink in. He understood, but he was also curious.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “It’s complicated. Kurt and I have been at odds for all the wrong reasons for years.” I looked at the agent, wondered which parts to tell him. “He stumbled onto something that I have been working on in secret for a number of years. . . .”

  “Somehow related to the gun,” Jeff interrupted. “And the box of unexplained items.”

  I nodded. “Okay. Related to all of that. I didn’t know he had the gun until you and Williams brought it to my office. Kurt’s having it explained a lot. But that was later. Kurt had tumbled to something else. We had to remove him until we could see how to deal with his discovery. When he and I worked through it, we found we had been working different parts of the same puzzle for years. He thought I was the bad guy. I assumed he was. We agreed to work together. He was back now because he was going to bring his piece to us, so we could integrate the effort.” I looked down for a minute to compose myself. I looked up again and said, “And he really had just recovered from cancer. We caught it just in time.”

  Jeff was silent for a minute. I could tell he was trying to sort all the input and decide what he believed and what he didn’t. I could see he was leaning in my favor, at least with regards to Kurt. “You use a lot of vague descriptions that don’t really tell me much,” he finally said.

  “I can’t see why it’s to my benefit to tell you,” I answered truthfully.

  “I’m shocked,” he admitted suddenly. “All along I thought Williams was wrong. He was sure you were tied in somehow. You were the only person we could find with possible motive, even if we never understood the reasons behind Morris’s animosity. But I checked on you. I checked up on your partner as well. There was nothing. Morris had frequently painted you and Ms. Martens negatively, but the record says otherwise. Your group has helped the country make significant breakthroughs that have helped both militarily and commercially. So it seemed the conflict between the two of you must be personal for some reason. I could find no record that would support a personal animosity either. You had always simply tried to maintain a certain distance from his tirades. Nothing else.” He looked at me for confirmation.

  I sensed where he wanted to go. But I made him take the step. He was up to the task.

  “Williams never believed any of the stuff that Morris had written about the objects we found. Especially after being suckered by the code. He decided it was all part of the ruse surrounding the disappearance.” He watched for a reaction. Getting none, he continued. “I always felt differently. The gun wasn’t faked. I looked at it carefully. Sure, the cloth may have been added later, but that gun is old.” He emphasized the word old. “The corrosion and the crap inside the barrel and cylinders wasn’t added by someone trying to fake something. I don’t know how long it would take for something to get like that, but it is a lot longer than is possible given th
e manufacture date.”

  He paused a minute, but when I didn’t respond, he decided to continue. “Also, there’s the problem of those metal samples. I was the one who had a lab check run. They wanted to know where they had come from, but I told them it was classified. Morris’s notes were correct there. No one knows how to make the stuff. So where did it come from?”

  We were getting off the track. I was satisfying Jeff’s curiosity, or at least allowing him the chance to ask about it. But this wasn’t what I needed. “It’s all tied in,” I admitted. “But I need something from you,” I said pointedly.

  “Answer my question, and maybe I’ll help you,” he objected. “Depending on what it is.”

  “I was hoping you would help anyway. It might keep you alive.” The threat hung between us as he considered whether I was serious. At first he thought it was simply for effect, but then he looked at Mike.

  “I was wrong before,” he admitted. “I didn’t think you had taken Morris. Maybe you would do as you say.” He sat back, his enthusiasm gone. “What is it you want?” he asked.

  “I want the files you and agent Williams recovered from Kurt’s secret computers,” I asked.

  “What?” he replied, confused. “They’re nothing but junk. It was all a trick to. . .” He hesitated, then it hit him. “They aren’t worthless,” he said. “They missed it and there is something still hidden there. Why do you need them if you and Morris were working together?”

  “Because he was killed before he could take us to something we need. He left us directions as a backup. But we need the files to get his directions. We know your labs have them, but are hoping they still reside on the computers at the Morris residence.”

  “The originals from the house are encrypted. They won’t do you any good. It took our best cryptologists and the governments best computers four days to crack them.”