This was a complication he hadn’t planned on, and when the F-250 turned onto 1-81, he had a decision to make. Follow him? Or break it off and go back out to the arsenal to search some more for Lynn? But of
course, that wouldn’t work, not after that big explosion there this afternoon.
The place would be crawling with feds. He didn’t want to think about the possibility that Lynn might have been caught up in all that.
He’d seen a television news report when he got home, a film clip taken from an airplane or a helicopter in the late-afternoon sun, showing the bare concrete floors of what had been the power plant. Big bomb, that, he thought. Really big bomb. The surrounding buildings had all been damaged in some fashion, with the two process buildings nearest the power plant semi flattened He’d checked those buildings, all those buildings, and had found everything locked tight and no signs of recent entry.
Should I go back to the guy’s house? he wondered. The pickup was three cars ahead of him, its big taillights distinctive enough that he didn’t have to stay too close. The traffic out on 1-81 was heavy, as usual, with wall-to-wall semis jockeying for that vital extra hundred feet of progress down the congested roadway. Where the hell was McGarand going? And then turn signals—the pickup was getting off.
Kreiss slowed down, slipped between two semis, and then turned off, going as slowly as he could so as not to come right up on the pickup at the end of the ramp. He almost did that anyway, but McGarand’s vehicle turned right and then right again into the front parking lot of the big TA truck stop. Kreiss waited for as long as he could at the ramp, but then headlights flared behind him and he had to move. He went right, then into the truck-stop plaza, which was brightly lighted. He caught sight of McGarand’s truck going behind the main building, through the big rig fueling lanes, and disappearing out into the back parking lot, which was filled with dozens of semis idling in the smoky darkness. He pulled the repair van up to the auto-fuel lanes and turned out the lights. The lanes weren’t filled to the point that there were cars waiting, so he got out, locked it, and hurried around the corner of the restaurant and store building, dodging incoming vehicles and weary-looking drivers filing in and out of the building. The whole area was brightly illuminated by sodium vapor lights coming from several towers, and the air was filled with the smell of diesel exhaust from the trucks parked out behind the building.
He paused when he got to the back: There was no sign of the pickup truck.
Had McGarand spotted him and ditched him? He didn’t think so. So what was he doing back here among all the semis? He watched the occasional truck driver walking back out of the restaurant building, cradling a thermos of coffee or some carryout gut bomb from the choke and puke
inside. There were three women hanging around a set of phone booths over on the other side of the plaza, kids, really, standing out in their cutoff shorts and halter tops, eyeing the rigs as they rumbled back out through the plaza. AIDS victims in the making, he thought. But where had the pickup gone? He wasn’t thrilled with the thought of walking out into that dense pack of trucks out there, where the only lights were the running lights of the tractor-trailers. There was a high chain-link fence around the whole area, so that truck had to be out there somewhere. Doing what?
And then he squatted down behind a Dumpster by the back of the building as McGarand’s truck reappeared from between two semis in the farthest parking lane, lights out now, going slow and headed back into the main plaza area. The truck went right by the Dumpster, and Kreiss got a good look. Yes, the same guy who’d opened up on him at the power plant.
Which wasn’t there anymore. Courtesy of this guy? Had they been running a bomb factory in that power plant? An illegal bomb factory at an ammunition plant—what a concept. He’d told Carter that Foster and Bellhouser had been blowing smoke; maybe not.
He moved to the corner of the building as the pickup truck cruised out into the open area, did a careful 180, and pulled into a parking place right in front of the restaurant. He watched from around the corner as McGarand went into the restaurant, carrying a thermos, just like any other trucker. Just as soon as the bearded man had gone in, Kreiss hurried back to the telephone company van and checked the fuel gauge. Half-full.
He put Jared’s telephone-company credit card in, cranked up the fuel pump, and filled the tank, keeping an eye on the front door while trying to keep the van between him and the building. Would McGarand see the telephone repair van? Recognize it maybe? He finished fueling and re stowed the hose. There were cars waiting now, so he couldn’t stay there.
He got in, started up, and drove out toward the front area of the plaza, looking for a place to park where he wouldn’t stand out quite so obviously.
Then he saw an Appalachian Power truck parked all by itself in one corner of the plaza, and he drove over there, turned around, backed in, and shut down. He could see the main entrance door and McGarand’s pickup, while the larger truck masked his van. Then he waited.
Janet woke up at 11:00 P.M. and had a confused moment trying to remember where she was and why. The hospital was quiet, and her room was in semidarkness. Lights from the parking lot below illuminated the windows of the hospital building. She sat up carefully. She could
hear nurses talking quietly at the charge desk out in the hall. She hurt in a general sort of way, but her mind was alert. Her wrist was not as swollen, and she was able to breathe without nearly as much pain. She wondered what was going on with the arsenal case. She rolled over very carefully, found the phone, got an outside line, and put a call through to the Roanoke office.
The secretaries weren’t there, of course, but one of the agents in the fraud squad answered and told her everyone was still in the office trying to sort out the disaster over at the arsenal. There were a million questions coming down from both FBI and aTF headquarters in Washington, and everyone was pretty upset about the loss of Ken Whittaker. She told the agent that she was ready to escape from the boneyard and asked him if someone could come get her at the hospital in Blacksburg.
An hour and a half later, she carried into the federal building and went directly to Farnsworth’s office. His door was closed, but there was a group of agents, including Ben Keenan, Farnsworth’s number two, in the RAs conference room. The conference table was piled with papers, site diagrams, photos, teletype messages, and a dozen very used polystyrene coffee cups. They all stopped talking when they saw Janet, which is when she realized that she probably looked a mess.
“Janet, what are you doing here?” Keenan asked, his tone of voice belying his brusque question. Keenan was known for his people skills and was extremely well liked within the Roanoke office.
“Got tired of staring at the ceiling,” she said, coming in and clearing away some papers so she could sit down.
“And it not being my honeymoon and all.” This provoked some smiles as she sat down.
“Since I was there when it happened, I thought maybe I could help.”
Farnsworth’s door opened and the RA came out, accompanied by Marchand’s red-faced executive assistant. They stopped short when they saw Janet. Farnsworth looked like he hadn’t slept for a long time and his suit was a rumpled mess. Foster’s expression was flat. He didn’t make eye contact with anyone.
“Ransom didn’t make it,” the RA announced.
“Died an hour ago.
Never woke up.” He turned to Foster.
“That makes two agencies who are going to be mad at us now, aTF and the spooks.”