The Protector

PART FIVE. Threat Escalation
1

While Jamie drove, Kline sat next to her. Cavanaugh was in the back, his pistol under a newspaper on his lap, ready to shoot through the rear of Kline's seat if Kline did anything to justify it.

A hundred miles west of Washington, the Virginia countryside was lush and hilly, with fewer towns and more fields and wooded areas as they went along. Occasional farmhouses, stone fences, and ponds were visible along the tree-lined two-lane road. The prevailing impression, though, was of large estates and horses grazing.

At four in the afternoon, there was little traffic. As Jamie guided the Taurus into a hollow, up a slight rise, and into another hollow, Cavanaugh asked Kline, "How far?"

"Another five minutes."

"You're certain the two men you left here to watch for me have gone?"

"You heard me phone and tell them to leave. You made it clear: You'll shoot me if you catch even a glimpse of them. I assure you, they've gone. I gave them no warning."

Jamie drove past a sign that read bailey's ridge. "Where's the town? I don't see any buildings."

"It's not a town," Kline said.

"Then what is it?"

"A site where a Civil War battle occurred."

Past the sign, a plaque showed a map and an historical note. Jamie stopped next to it.

The map was in bas-relief, dramatizing the contour of the wooded hills in the area. Arrows indicated where Union and Confederate soldiers had fought one another in a battle that had destroyed most of a farm owned by an Irish immigrant, Samuel Bailey, killing his wife and daughter. The battle had concluded when Bailey put on a fallen Union soldier's jacket, grabbed a rifle, and led a company of Northerners across a ridge above his farm, outflanking their opponents. Bailey went on to receive a field commission as a captain and to fight in numerous other battles, eventually dying from diphtheria, never again seeing his farm and the graves of his wife and daughter.

"Well, that's enough to ruin my day," Cavanaugh said.

"Mine already was ruined," Kline said. His wrists remained tied together beneath his leather jacket. "Two hollows from here, there's a lane on the right."

Jamie drove on, went up an incline, and descended into the first hollow.

"Take this lane," Cavanaugh told Jamie.

"No, that's not the one," Kline said. "I told you two hollows."

"I know what you told me," Cavanaugh said, "but we're trying this one."

Jamie pulled off the road. Flanked by dense bushes and trees, two shadowy weed-choked ruts in the dirt were blocked by a wooden gate, the white paint of which had faded to the color of dirty chalk. What attracted Cavanaugh's attention was that the weeds in the lane looked crushed, as if a vehicle had recently gone over them.

"I don't see a lock," Jamie said. After a cautious glance around, she got out of the car and unhooked a rusted chain from the gate, swinging it open. She drove through, stopped, and took another wary glance around before she returned to the gate and shut it behind her.

"It's so flimsy," Jamie said, getting back into the car, "if we have to when we come back, we can always ram through it."

"Park where the undergrowth conceals us from the road. We'll walk," Cavanaugh said.

After warning Kline to be quiet, Cavanaugh made him lead the way up a potholed lane that twisted through trees and bushes. He had his pistol out, following Kline at a careful distance.

Overhead branches shut out the sun. Then the branches opened, and the steep rise brought them to knee-high grass in a clearing where old weather-grayed picnic benches looked down on a valley half a mile wide. The area down there was completely devoted to pasture, no shade trees anywhere, which was odd if the pasture was intended for horses, Cavanaugh thought, but not odd if the trees had been leveled to create an unobstructed line of fire and to remove places in which an intruder might be able to hide.

A wooden sign attached to a post had faded yellow letters that might once have been orange: welcome to bailey's ridge.

"Looks like one of the locals tried some kind of tourist thing several years ago," Cavanaugh said.

He glanced down at indentations in the long grass, where a vehicle had recently been parked. Then he motioned for Kline to walk along a furrow in the grass toward the picnic benches. A trampled area around one of the benches attracted his attention, as did cigarette butts, the paper of which looked fresh.

"This was where your men watched for me, right?" Cavanaugh asked. He peered down at the paved road that went through the pasture. "From here, they could see pretty much everything that happened down there. Yesterday, what made you think I'd use the next lane?"

"It's the only area where the trees have been cut back from the road. Until a month ago, a chain-link fence used to be there. The dirt was disturbed when they ripped the poles out. The sanitiz-ers tried to smooth the dirt and put in bushes, but it's obvious the landscape's been changed. Every other lane that seems to go nowhere is made of dirt and has weeds and potholes. That lane's as smooth and weed-free as can be. Beyond the trees, it becomes paved."

"How did Prescott and his controllers get permission to block off a historic site?" Cavanaugh asked.

"Prescott didn't need permission. This property's historic, but it isn't owned by the government. It's his."

"Is it safe to go down there?"

"Nobody's around. The lab was abandoned as soon as the project was terminated."

"But where's the lab?"

Kline pointed toward the valley.

"I don't see anything except a burned-out farmhouse," Cavanaugh said.