Thin Air (27 page)

Standing close to where the truck had turned around, he saw in the glow from the fire heavy tread marks in the snow. He noted the strange pattern. Something glinted by the roadside. He bent down painfully and his fingers closed over a brass cartridge case. He stuffed it into his pocket and, with a backward glance at the burning car, started up the road as fast as he could travel. He figured it was two or three miles back to Rinehart's house. But he knew he had to get there. He knew now why the truck had turned around and gone back.

The old man was a sitting duck.

Twenty minutes later, gasping for breath, he lost his footing and fell to the road. He was dizzy, cold, and winded. He struggled back to his feet and pulled up the collar of his flight jacket As long as he kept moving, he would be all right. He broke into a slow trot, eyes downward, concentrating on his footing, trying to fight off the numbing effects of the cold. This is ridiculous, he thought. In Washington, it was still autumn. Birds, sunlight. He wasn't even wearing a winter uniform. He laughed at himself.

Smoke still curled darkly from the chimney as the pickup rolled back up the dirt road to a position behind the cottonwoods. The engine off, the door on the passenger side creaked open. Crepe-soled boots crunched through snow as the gunman walked to the back, reached into the open bed, and pulled out a five-gallon can of gasoline.

The driver kicked his door open and trudged through the mud toward Rinehart's house. One hand was stuffed in the belly pocket of his parka, clutching a blackjack. His ears perked up. He heard cats meowing for dinner.

It was going to be a snap.

Hammond's breath rasped out of his throat, giving no relief to his burning lungs. He plodded on, ignoring the pain. He kept between the tire tracks and tried to estimate how much farther he had to go. Maybe another mile, maybe more.

Voices off in the distance broke through the roaring of blood in Hammond's ears. A flickering red glow lit the underside of the clouds ahead of him. From deep within, Hammond summoned his last reserves of strength and forced himself on.

By the time he staggered into Rinehart's yard, the fire was well on its way to burning itself out. Several men stared at him curiously then went back to hosing down the final flames. Clouds of smoke and shreds of charred paper boiled up into the air, mingling with the snow.

Hammond stood by helplessly, shivering. Several dark objects lay in the slush around the doorstep. Rinehart's pets: dead.

What a setup. The perfect accident for this place—a fire constantly stoked in the living room, the house stuffed to the rafters with old magazines and papers. "Just an old firetrap," they'd be saying in the
cantinas
tomorrow. "Finally went up. Shoulda seen it,
amigos.
Barbecued cats and dogs all over the place and barbecued Rinehart inside...."

Dazed and heartsick, Hammond stumbled along the dirt road, away from the fire. His eyes swept the flats and the banks of the stream, looking for that Ford pickup....

Nowhere. He looked down at the snow on the road. Amid the jumble of footprints his eyes picked up the distinctive tread of the snow tires he'd been following for so long. They cut off the road, heading out into an open field.

Hammond followed them until they seemed to just stop. The light from the fire was so dim, he couldn't be sure at first. Then he saw two Mexicans running toward him across the field, waving flashlights. They were headed for the fire. He hailed one of them and the man stopped, planting his light on Hammond's face, studying him curiously.

"Madre
..." he said, and blinked.

Hammond realized he must have looked like hell. "Can I borrow your light?" he said, pointing to the tire tracks. He hunkered down on his knees to indicate he wanted to examine something.

The Mexican and his companion both came over and shined their lights where Hammond wanted.

The tracks stopped. He felt his heart leap. One hundred feet from the road, the tire tracks simply vanished.

Just like McCarthy.

When he returned to Rinehart's yard with the two Mexicans, the old man's body had been brought out. Hammond felt nausea well up in his throat.

Because of him, another man was dead. This time there had been nothing subtle about the means. It had been an all-out effort to stop both of them. Hammond had sorely underestimated the opposition.

Black soot was still drifting over the snow like fine ground pepper. They had underestimated him, too, he thought to himself. He was barely conscious of the approaching siren—he was so busy letting the anger build up. As a New Mexico State Police patrol car rolled to a stop, Hammond decided the killers had made a terrible mistake. It was no longer just his job or a favor for an old girl friend.

They had made it
personal.

15

The State Police gave him a good going-over and Hammond was in no mood to cooperate. They were understandably upset about the bullet-riddled and burnt-out Air Force car they had found in the stream bed. They were suspicious about his presence at Rinehart's house, coincidentally also burnt-out, and annoyed by his untouchable attitude.

Hammond phoned Admiral Gault from the police station in Taos, in the presence of the police chief, Captain Montez. Gault listened to Hammond's brief explanation in utter silence, then asked to speak to Captain Montez. Gault assured the chief that the nation's security was at stake and Hammond was acting under the direct authority of the Pentagon. He never said
who
in the Pentagon, but that was enough.

Hammond got back on the line and Gault told him, "I want a better explanation from you as soon as you can get to a security line." The click-off came like an exclamation point.

Hammond was released from custody. He stayed in Taos overnight, licking his wounds and letting his uniform dry out.

He was in Captain Montez' office the next morning as the investigating officers reported in with their clues. The vanishing tire tracks in the field turned out to be the biggest single head-scratcher. And Hammond was not about to offer hints. As for footprints, they were too late. If there had been any at all, they had been obliterated by snowfall, soot, and the trampling feet of fire-fighting neighbors.

Hammond's story, although cloudy in its motivations, was borne out by the evidence. He told the police he had been attacked on the road while returning from his meeting with Rinehart on what he termed "government business." The police found expended shell casings on the road near his demolished car that matched the one Hammond had picked up. They were all 5.56 millimeter. Hammond told them he had heard automatic fire: from that they deduced it must have come from an M-16, but without the weapon in hand, the information was useless.

Neighbors verified that Hammond had shown up at Rinehart's house
after
the fire was under way and had appeared out of breath and in great concern.

Several officers were sent to canvass the local motels to see if any strangers had checked in or out recently. Aside from the usual tourists and their families, results were negative.

It seemed as though the men in the pickup and the pickup itself would never be found in Taos. And since Hammond hadn't seen the license plates, there was no way to trace them.

Before noon, he was driven back to Kirtland Air Force Base where the Motor Pool was even less overjoyed with him than the State Police had been. A Navy officer had lost an Air Force car—to them it was a major crime. After changing into a fresh uniform from his flight bag, Hammond was hustled over to the base commander's office where he sat cooling his heels. He got permission to use a security line to contact his commanding officer.

Admiral Gault wasted no time in tearing into Hammond. "You put an innocent man in jeopardy with your flagrant disregard for procedure, and now the man ends up killed! I don't know if it was an accident or murder, but I do know so far you've produced two dead bodies and no case!"

Hammond stayed calm and managed to get across in brief the substance of his interview with Rinehart and the fact that the trail now pointed toward a physicist named Traben and the head of a huge conglomerate named Bloch.

"F.P. Bloch?" Gault exploded.

"Yes, sir—"

"But that's insane! I know Bloch. He's a friend of Smitty's. He's a major figure in Washington. And he's no crook!" Gault paused and Hammond heard muffled swearing. "You're going to need more than the opinion of a dead man. Hammond. I hope this time you've got something on paper!"

"Uh..." Hammond could hardly bring himself to explain how he'd taken tapes of everything but the tapes had been lost when the car had been demolished....

Silence from Gault. Then finally a resounding, "Swell. You should've gone to Okinawa. All right, here's what I'm going to do: I'll double security at the safe house and I'll send backup men out to help you."

Hammond protested. "I can move better alone."

"Really?"

"I know how it looks," said Hammond, "but I need more time and I can't waste it explaining things to a bunch of agents—"

"Hammond!" Gault's voice crackled over the phone. "If you blow it now, it's out of your hands! And you're out of a job!"
      

"That's encouraging," Hammond said to himself as he hung up. He stepped out of the office and a guard returned him to the base commander's waiting room.

Ten minutes later, Hammond was summoned quickly inside. He steeled himself for the expected tongue-lashing, but General Walter J. Pasko turned out to be a calm man who listened attentively to Hammond's explanations. He interrupted Hammond's apology for the loss of the Air Force staff car.

"It isn't every day we get a little Starsky and Hutch out here, Commander. It's clear what happened and the Air Force does have other cars. Of course, the Navy will have to pay for that one...." Briefly, he flashed a sly smile. "Now, with that aside," he continued, "let's turn our attention to how you got into this little mess."

General Pasko was eager to play detective. But Hammond told him the absolute minimum, invoking the terms
classified, top secret
, and
need-to-know,
language the general clearly understood. Hammond revealed only that he had been on a high-level mission to interview Rinehart for NIS. He thought no one had known he was there, but obviously he was wrong. Someone had known enough to get one man and try to get the other.

Pasko asked about Hammond's movements prior to flying out of Washington. Hammond began to think along the lines the general was suggesting. He hadn't told anyone where he was going. He had kept security tight for once. But all along in this case he had been involved with Navy people. Only a Navy man, or an impersonator, could have penetrated BUPERS and set up that warning system in its computers. Dr. McCarthy used Navy facilities like they belonged to him. Wasn't it possible that he or someone else posing as a Navy man followed Hammond into the MATS terminal in Washington, examined the status board, and found out precisely where he was going?

That someone would have known that Rinehart lived in New Mexico and would have made the connection immediately.

They had let him go ahead and interview Rinehart, knowing damned well they were going to bump off both men—but in separate locations, so no one else could be sure of the connection.

Hammond shriveled inside. He was a marked map. These people evidently had tentacles all over the country. But who were they and what were they going to so much trouble to hide?

If Rinehart was right, then Edmond Traben was clearly at the center of it. Hammond's fist curled involuntarily. He wanted a neck to wring. He looked up and saw General Pasko staring back at him.

"Not angry at me, I hope," Pasko said.

"No," said Hammond. "Thanks for your help."

"Anytime. I'll let you know if we need any more cars wrecked."

Hammond went back to the ready room and recovered his flight bag and briefcase from a locker. From the briefcase, he fished out the list of companies he had received from Tri-State—government vendor firms for whom they were underwriting insurance.

His finger ran down the list; he was looking for Bloch's company, RTI. It wasn't there. But there had to be a connection between Fletcher and Traben. What other motive was there for Fletcher's murder?

He borrowed a phone and called collect to the NIS Data Center in Washington, where he asked for a listing on Research Technology Industries. He was given phone numbers and addresses for the Washington offices, New York offices, and the general plant in Pasadena, California.

Hammond figured he was closer to Pasadena, so he tried that first. He called and asked to speak to Edmond Traben.

"I'm sorry, sir, but Dr. Traben is not in this month."

This month? What kind of business was this? Hammond asked where Traben could be located.

"Sir, he spends most of his time with his own company, Micro-Tech."

Hammond bumbled on the phone while his eyes ran down the Tri-State list again. There it was: Micro-Technology Laboratories, Government Vendor Number 5600081, address and phone number in Manhattan Beach, California.