“Is Mildred okay?”
“She’s a tough old bird. It seems some thirtyish female decided to add to her trophy collection. Luckily, all those silver bangles Mildred wears got tangled in the garrote and saved her life. Mildred was able to jab her knitting needle into the assailant and that’s all it took. Gives new meaning to the phrase, ‘keep to your own knitting,’ doesn’t it?” McHugh chuckled at his attempt at black humor.
Mike smiled appreciatively. “Does this mean that we have a leak? Someone sure does seem to know when and where our agents are showing up.”
Awakened, Smith picked up the ringing telephone. It was Adams.
“I’ve got some bad news for you. It appears that your Richard Winslow kept some pretty rough company. He’s dead.”
“What happened?”
“The Minnesota State Police headquarters in Mankato, Minnesota, responded to our InfoNet missing person’s bulletin on Winslow. It seems that there was a rather spectacular house fire at a farm south of Mankato last night. It required volunteer fire companies from several communities to put it out. When the fire was finally put out, the firemen found a grisly scene. In the kitchen, they found a corpse burned so badly that they couldn’t even tell at first whether it was male or female.
“The firemen secured the area and called in the State Police to conduct arson and homicide investigations. The homicide investigator was able to find a portion of a Washington State driver’s license that had a partial name ‘…inslow’ that somehow survived the intense fire. The State Police homicide investigator checked the InfoNet missing persons list and thought that we should be notified.”
“Where’s the body?”
“Mankato still has a county coroner system. The body was taken to a funeral home in Mankato, Tuchman Brothers.”
“Herb, what I’m now going to tell you is so sensitive that I can probably be sent to jail for the rest of my life — do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Winslow was a special courier, carrying information of great national consequence. Can you secure the farmhouse until we can get up there? Also, I need to get access to Winslow’s body. Can you arrange that?”
“I’ll get right on it. Great national consequence, huh?”
“Thanks, sorry I can’t say any more. What I’ve told you already could fry me — no joke.”
This time, Adams knew that Smith was not being disingenuous.
“Air Force C-130 Heavy, you are cleared for landing Runway 11 Left.”
“Minneapolis Tower, Runway 11 Left, Roger.”
The Lockheed C-130H-30 Hercules touched down and lumbered down Runway 11 Left coming to a stop about three fourths of the way down the runway.
“Air Force C-130 Heavy, this is Minneapolis Ground Control, you are cleared to taxi on Taxi way AA-5, turn right D5 to Minnesota Air Force Reserve terminal. Good day.”
“Good day, Minneapolis Ground Control.”
As the huge Lockheed Hercules rolled to a stop in the Minnesota Air Force Reserve terminal, connected to the Minneapolis/St. Paul Airport, engines were started in the three Suburbans. Two of the three vehicles carried a complement of five. The middle vehicle had only a driver and a guard. The third seat in that vehicle had been removed and the second seat was folded down. A stainless steel casket and gurney lay on the floor of the Suburban. Joining the Marines this time were two others, Twoomey and Smith.
All of the occupants of the Suburbans were dressed in dark blue uniform shirts and trousers. None of the uniforms bore military insignia or indication of rank.
As soon as the ramp of the Lockheed Hercules hit the tarmac with a metallic clang, the first Suburban started down the ramp, stopping at the solitary figure standing on the tarmac. Smith jumped out of the Suburban, walked up to the man, and shook his hand.
About this time, the other two Suburbans drove down the ramp, stopping directly behind the first vehicle. From the third Suburban, Twoomey emerged. As Twoomey joined the two men on the tarmac, Smith said, “Herb, this is Albert Twoomey. Albert, Herb.”
“How are you doing, Herb? It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Glad to meet you as well. Welcome to Minnesota.”
Pleasantries having been dispensed with, Adams joined Smith in the lead vehicle, and Twoomey returned to the third Suburban. The three-vehicle caravan immediately started out for Mankato with Adams leading the way.
“I had the State Police put extra security around the farmhouse. The Mankato coroner is going to be a problem. He insists that since it’s a local homicide investigation, he has sole jurisdiction in the matter.”
“Do you have anyone working on that problem?”
“No, you said that this was dark. Only I’m aware of this in the office. As far as the office knows, I’m taking a few days off for personal business.”
“Thanks, Herb. I owe you one.”
“George, this is some operation. Can you tell me anything about it at all?”
“All I can say is that the matter deals with national security and that your assistance is deemed essential but that it’s better that you don’t know the organization or the mission. All of these men are specially trained to do what Twoomey and I tell them without question. As you can see, these Suburbans are specially equipped for any situation. Believe me, you don’t want to know.”
“Are there going to be any consequences from the Director’s office?”
“Already cleared. The old man called Judge Alexander this morning himself.”
“I guess I’m yours. One thing, who’s the old man?”
“Rear Admiral Robert McHugh, Chief of Operations, CSAC.”
“What’s CSAC?”
“I’ll tell you more later.”
The caravan rolled out of the service road on to Route 62, turned right on to Route 5 and headed for I-494. After a short period of time it turned west onto Route 169 toward Mankato.
Adams sat watching the occasional farmhouse in the distant countryside slip past him, wondering what he had gotten himself into.
Smith silently hoped that Winslow’s cylinder remained unharmed so that he would not have died in vain. His orders were explicit: Bring Winslow, or whatever remained of Winslow, home in the hermetically sealed, temperature-controlled, stainless steel casket. If the cylinder had survived the fire, it might still carry the encoded message.
“Did you or your investigators sweep the fire scene?”
“The site had been completely gone over by both Minnesota and county officials. I walked the site myself earlier this morning. There was nothing except for the fragment of Winslow’s driver’s license that the State Police investigator found. The farmhouse was pretty badly burned. Obviously arson, started with gasoline. The perpetrators didn’t even try to hide that fact. The gas can, or what remained of it, was still laying in what was the kitchen — that’s where the volunteer fireman found the body. Young kid, pretty shook up by it all.”
“Any clues?”
“In addition to the fragment of the driver’s license, the laboratory guys found one spent .357 Magnum slug. It’s probably the slug that caved in your guy’s head, but it was fragmented and disfigured by the heat. Doubt we’ll be able to get any useful information from it. If there were any more clues, the fire did a good job destroying them.”