Chase

Seventeen

Daggert’s cell phone rang.

“What?” he said. After leaving the bus station and hunting around Canfield for the dog, he, Bailey and Crawford had spent the night in a cheap motel. Now they were up, sitting in a diner, plotting their next step over a second cup of coffee.

“It’s Wilkins, sir,” a man said.

“Wilkins? Who the hell are you?”

“I work in the control room, sir. I’ve worked for you for four years.”

“Oh yes, Watson. What is it you want?”

“I have good news and bad news.”

Daggert gritted his teeth. “Bad news first.”

“We lost contact with the target. We’d almost reestablished it, but then it was gone. We think there was some kind of impact, that the animal may have had a serious fall, or even been hit by something.”

“Hit by what?”

“Don’t know. But it was enough to disrupt the circuitry, at least momentarily.”

“And you have good news?”

“Yes. Just before we lost our connection, we were able to pinpoint a more tentative location.”

“Yes?”

“The dog is near Canfield.”

“I already knew that, Watkins.”

“Wilkins, sir.”

“The dog got off a bus in Canfield. We’re still in Canfield. Tell me something I don’t already know.”

“We narrowed the dog’s location to be west of the town. We did a GPS overlay and it was in the vicinity of the local garbage dump.”

“The dump?”

“Yes, sir. It’s not far from where you are now.”

Daggert thought about that. It made sense. A dump would be a good place for the animal to hide out, and scrounge some food. Plus, there’d be rats. A magnificent buffet, if you were a dog.

“Send me that location,” Daggert said.

“Yes, s—”

Daggert ended the call. “Leave your coffee,” he said to the other two. “We’re going to the dump.”