“Well,” Chapel said, “I wanted to make sure you were safe, and—”
“ ‘Rock-bottomed and copper-sheathed,’ ” Ellie said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“It’s an old phrase from The Devil and Daniel Webster. It means I’m just fine. There’s been no trouble and I’ll have Julius to protect me if need be.”
“I’m sure he’s loyal, but—”
“Then there’s the squad of plainclothes policemen sitting in a car out front, where they’ve been for nearly two days now,” Ellie added. “I must remember to send Julius down with some sandwiches and a thermos of coffee later. Cold duty this time of year, and this is a cold year even for Chicago.” She clucked her tongue. “Captain Chapel, I’m old. I know I’m old. I do not believe I am yet an old fool. I know the danger I’m facing. I also know you wouldn’t be here, sitting and chatting with me, just to be cordial. I take you for a man with far better things to do than comfort spinsters. So why don’t you ask the question that you’ve been holding on the back of your tongue since you walked in the door?”
“All right,” Chapel said. “I need you to tell me everything you know about the chimeras, and Camp Putnam.”
In his ear Angel sounded very worried. “Chapel, sweetie, she’s not necessarily cleared to talk about—”
He pulled the hands-free set out of his ear. When his phone began to ring in his pocket, he switched it to vibrate. “Excuse me,” he said.
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS: APRIL 13, T+39:53
“Hee. Ha heh. Ha.”
Tyrone Jameson had been a trauma nurse for twenty-two years. He’d seen his share of horrors in that time, working in the ER at Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta. He’d seen people come through the doors who looked like they were chopped in pieces — and who had eventually walked out again under their own power. He’d seen people gone out of their mind on drugs take gunshot wounds to the face and not even feel it.
This asshole took the cake.
“Ha. Heh… ha,” the man said. He swung his injured foot off the bed and put it down on the floor. Put his weight on it.
The man screamed — and laughed at the same time.
“Jesus, buddy, just — just lie down for me, okay? Will you do that for me?” Tyrone asked, his hands reaching to grab the guy’s shoulders and push him back down onto the bed.
The look the patient gave him made Tyrone’s blood turn to icy slush.
“Ha.”
The jerk had lost two toes. The front half of his foot looked like hamburger when he came in. Now it was encased in a hard cast and a metal brace just to keep the foot from falling off. And he was putting weight on it.
And laughing about it.
“Hee hee ho,” the man said, standing up on wobbly legs. He grabbed for his shirt, which was hanging on a chair next to the bed.
“Look, I can see in your face, you think you’re some kind of badass tough guy,” Tyrone said, not sure what to do. He should call for security, get some orderlies in here and a doctor to sedate the man. But he was scared. He was honestly scared of what his patient would do to him. “But if you try to walk out of here, you’re going to undo all the good the surgeon did. You’re going to wreck that foot permanently.”
He could only watch as the man got dressed, one painful button at a time. He never stopped laughing.
As he headed for the door, clearly intending to check himself out against medical advice, Tyrone just shook his head. “You need to lie down, buddy. You need to spend the next six weeks in that bed. Or you’re doing yourself a real disservice.”
“Ha. Hee. Can’t wait,” the patient said. He turned around to give Tyrone a nasty look. “I’ve got a body to find, and burn. And then I’ve got to kill a bunch of people. Ha. Hee ha hee. It’s going to be a full day.”
Tyrone shook his head. “No, seriously. Seriously—”
The man’s smile was worse than his laugh. It was the kind of smile you would expect to find on a corpse.
“Doesn’t it hurt?” Tyrone asked, because he couldn’t find any other words.
“Hee ha ha ha! Like you can’t imagine,” the patient admitted. “Now. Where — hee ha hee — do I go to find a taxi out of here?”
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS: APRIL 13, T+40:07
“The chimeras. Well,” Ellie said, “that is quite an interesting thing to be asking about. You do understand I’m absolutely forbidden to speak of that with anyone? I signed more than one nondisclosure agreement.”
“I wouldn’t ask if the need wasn’t great,” Chapel told her.
“I have no doubt,” Ellie said. “And I’m sure you know more about security clearances and needs to know and the like than I do. One hates to break the law, though. You’re in some kind of trouble, Captain, I can see it in your eyes.”
Julia glanced over at him in surprise.
“I’m beginning to think so, ma’am. I’m beginning to think my own people are using me as a pawn in a game I can’t see yet. And since those same people don’t seem to want me to talk to you about this, I’m thinking I definitely need to know whatever information you have. I understand your reluctance, but I have to insist.”
“Hmm,” Ellie said, watching him closely.
“There are lives at stake,” Chapel tried.
“Of course,” Ellie said. “There always are.”
Chapel saw in her eyes that she was waiting for him to say the right words. She wanted to talk to him, but she wasn’t going to give up what she had for free. He took a deep breath. He was making a big leap of faith, he knew. But he needed this information. “The chimeras are loose. They’ve left their camp and are at large, with a list of people they want to kill. Your name is on that list. Julia — Dr. Taggart here — wasn’t on that list, but they tried to kill her anyway.”
“They are quite dangerous, yes,” Ellie said, still giving nothing away.
“Not just them. Somebody helped them escape.”
“Ah,” Ellie said, leaning forward. “Now that’s interesting.”
Chapel nodded. “I intend to find out who it was. And make sure they’re punished,” he told her. “Somebody is using the chimeras, somebody has turned them into his personal death squad. I won’t let him get away with it.”
She smiled, and he knew he’d won her over. She sat back and looked up at the ceiling as if gathering her thoughts. “Have you met any of the chimeras? Ian, perhaps?”
“Not Ian. Malcolm and another one, who I’m told was named Brody,” Chapel said.
“Oh, my. Oh, my my. The look on your face tells me something,” Ellie said, leaning back on the couch. She took a deep sip from her teacup full of whiskey. “That’s the look of a soldier. Are they… ah?”
“Yes,” Chapel said.
“At least they’re at peace, then. For once in their lives.” Ellie sighed deeply. “I was their teacher. I disciplined them when need arose, and I daresay I was stricter than they would have liked. But I did care for them. You can’t not love your students, even the stupid ones.”
Julia gasped in shock.
“Oh, young lady, did you think a teacher wasn’t allowed to call someone ‘stupid’? Part of our job is to evaluate them, you know. And there were a few of the boys who were stupid, quite as dumb as the proverbial rocks. Others were brilliant. They all possessed what we used to refer to as animal cunning.”
“You were a teacher with UNESCO, weren’t you?” Chapel asked, prodding her to go on.
“Oh, yes, back in the eighties, back when I thought I could still save the world by teaching it not to end sentences in prepositions. I was rather more idealistic back then. I specialized in children with developmental and emotional issues. That was why the Defense Department wanted to hire me. That and my security clearance.”