Let Slip the Dogs of War: A Bard's Bed & Breakfast Mystery #1 (9 page)

Chapter Nine --

“That’s so sad,” I told him. “Why did they
have to wait so long to be together again? Why didn’t he just
follow her to wherever she was?”

Ben reached out and tenderly touched my
cheek, a wistful look in his distant eyes.

“The Soviets suspected it was all a ruse. You
have to remember the Soviets had more than just a couple of moles
in the CIA and other government agencies. Colonel Demitrov planted
operatives and informants all around Uncle Edward after he left for
academia, and they reported back to their handlers on a regular
basis. There was a great deal to be gained from watching the
Soviets spy on Uncle Edward. The CIA ran several operations as a
result, and the agency couldn’t afford to bring Hortense back as
long as it benefited from her absence.”

“That stinks,” I growled. “You’re telling me
that Uncle Edward and Hortense couldn’t be together because the CIA
needed to run some ops?”

“Bea, that’s how it works.” We headed into
the airport. “The gain realized made the sacrifice worthwhile.”

“If it were you, would you have done the same
thing? Would you have left me in the lurch?”

“Babe, I would have, but not for the reasons
you think.” Ben was already on the hunt. I could tell he was
surveying the action. “I love you enough to give you up to keep you
safe. That’s what Uncle Edward was doing for Hortense. He was
keeping her alive and well. As long as Demitrov and his crew
thought she was dead, as long as the informants and operatives made
sure she wasn’t around, she got to have a life. She earned a Ph.D.
and became a well-respected authority on early Egyptian and
Byzantine archaeology. By 1972, she had received tenure as a
professor. Her summers were spent in Cairo, Baghdad, and Tehran,
working on digs.”

We found our way to the baggage claim area,
where I noticed Ben kept fondling his right pocket. That meant he
was carrying a concealed weapon. His eyes scanned the crowd that
had just exited the Delta flight from New York.”

“Hey!” I grabbed Ben’s arm. “Wait just one
cotton-picking minute, Mister!”

He threw me a quick glance before turning his
attention back to the anticipated arrival of “Mr. Williams”. I
sensed his impatience. “What? Tell me quickly!”

“Uncle Edward spent his summers traveling in
the Middle East. I know because he showed me the photographs of his
adventures.”

“Your point being?”

“Why didn’t he just get together with
Hortense over there? Surely they could have had at least one
rendezvous,” I insisted. “They could have dressed in native
costume, disguised themselves and been a couple again!”

“Well, duh.” Ben reached out and tapped my
forehead, as if to punctuate the point. Uncle Edward hadn’t
completely abandoned his wife. If mountains wouldn’t come to
Mohammed, Mohammed would go to the mountains. Even as I stood
there, I thought there was still probably a benefit to the CIA.
They wouldn’t have helped Uncle Edward and Hortense get together if
it hadn’t been advantageous. Still, it was a relief to know that
the lovebirds hadn’t completely lost each other. They had enjoyed
stolen moments through the years. Was it worth it? Would they have
done it again in the same circumstances?

“Bea!” Ben’s voice cut through my musings and
he gave me a good, strong poke towards the baggage conveyor. “Go
over there and greet ‘Mr. Williams’ while I keep an eye out for
trouble.”

“But I don’t see her,” I responded. “There’s
only a little old man over there.”

“Bea, just do it, without an argument. For
once in your life, just cooperate.”

“I’ve cooperated plenty of times....” My
rebuttal was abruptly ended when my husband planted both hands on
my shoulder, turned me around, and sent me unceremoniously on my
way with a solid shove. Glaring at him over my shoulder, I decided
that when “Mr. Williams” was finally brought back to the Bard’s Bed
& Breakfast and comfortably ensconced, Ben was going to hear
about this.

I waited and waited for our guest to appear
through the doors from the gate. When all the other passengers had
collected their bags and the conveyor belt finally stopped, I was
still there, feeling like the proverbial high school girl stood up
for the prom. Of course, misery loves company, and I wasn’t the
only person still unclaimed in the waiting area. I turned my
attention to the little old man beside me. Dressed in a brown suit,
ancient relic of a tie, and white button-down shirt, his shoes
scuffed and well-worn, he had a dark brown homburg hat on his head.
I noticed he barely reached my shoulder as he leaned patiently on a
cane. There was something about the face, something that nagged at
me. I stumbled over my words as I looked at the bushy eyebrows, the
creased smile. The hands. My eyes went to the hands. Small in
shape, fingers narrow and short. A woman’s hands. I felt like a
complete dope.

“Would you be Mr. Williams, by any chance?” I
turned on my most charming smile.

“I would. Hanford Williams. And you are?”

“Call me Bea. Let me get that bag of yours. I
apologize for being so unprepared. I expected your flight to come
in at 5:48, but then I called the airline and found out it landed
at 4:40.” I waited for “Mr. Williams” to add the numerical digits
together and spit out the expected response, which he quickly
did.

“I should have taken Flight 25 to Laguardia
from Detroit. It would have given made more sense, but I was
running late.” There it was, the confirmation. I turned, looking
for Ben, but he was gone. I hesitated, wondering what to do with
the elderly man beside me. Perhaps my husband went to get the car.
That was a very sensible thing to do, considering “Mr. Williams”
needed a cane.

Once outside the terminal, I started to get
nervous. Clearly, Ben had not retrieved the car. It was still
waiting in the parking space across the pavement.

“Do you mind if I take your arm?” asked “Mr.
Williams” as we traversed the crosswalk.

“Not at all.” Offering my elbow, I paused as
“he” took it, using it as an opportunity to lean into me.

“Just relax. Everything will be fine. The one
thing you don’t want to do is draw attention to yourself by acting
nervous. You’ll attract the security people like flies. Any chance
you have the keys to the car?”

“No. Ben’s got them. But I think I still have
my spare.” Digging through the pockets of my purse, I felt along
the bottom for the extra key I had tossed in last week, when Ben
had forgotten to return my set to the wall cabinet, after he used
my wagon to take the trash to the landfill. “Aha!”

“Let’s use it.”

I unlocked the car door and helped “Mr.
Williams” into the front seat, and then I took “his” luggage to the
back of the Subaru, where I loaded it in and slammed the hatchback
closed. As I dithered, trying to decide whether to take the
driver’s seat or park myself in the back, I spotted Ben. He was
definitely in a hurry. As he trotted towards us, he pointed in my
direction, mimicked using a steering wheel, and glanced over his
shoulder. I took that as a sign that I would be driving and slid
behind the wheel. As the engine roared to life, Ben pulled open the
back door and tossed himself into the car.

“Get going,” he insisted. “All hell’s about
to break loose.”

“You must be Ben,” said “Mr. Williams” as I
pulled out of the parking space and joined the line of cars
waiting. “Is this going to go hot on us?”

“Not us,” grinned my handsome husband with a
Cheshire cat smile that I caught sight of in the rearview mirror.
“But I expect there will be a rather impressive emergency response
any second now.”

Sure enough, as we pulled up to the cashier’s
cubicle with our parking stub, sirens cut through the air, and by
the time we headed west on Route 2, we could see the fleet of
police cars flocking to the airport like seagulls at a the opening
of a Frito bag left on an unattended towel at the beach.

“Might I ask what that was all about?” asked
the passenger beside me.

“Ah,” Ben smiled, “you might. It seems that
someone left a package by the men’s room.”

“What was in the package?” I wondered. “It
must have been suspicious.”

“It was,” Ben agreed, “very suspicious. Some
sulfur powder, zinc powder, a couple of rags, and a lighter.”

“Oh,” nodded “Mr. Williams” with great
enthusiasm, “a stinky smoke bomb. Brilliant.”

“Yes, I believe the security folks picked up
a couple of men who were witnessed to be holding the
materials.”

“Let me guess. Philippe and his
body-snatching buddy,” I tossed over my shoulder to Ben in the
backseat.

“Could be.”

About twenty minutes into the drive back to
Arden Woods, Ben ordered me to pull over.

“Excuse me?” Just who did he think he was, my
boss? I was pretty sure he was the guy who was about to get a
tongue lashing.

“Oh, my,” he slapped his forehead lightly,
“did I say ‘Pull over, Bea?’ What I meant to say was pull over,
Bea, and make it snappy, doll face. Chop, chop.”

Beside me, “Mr. Williams” chuckled, barely
able to contain “his” mirth behind the cover of one of those tiny
hands. I glared at the pair of them.

“You forgot to say please,” the front seat
passenger reminded my wayward husband. “A wife is not to be trifled
with, Ben, and you must always remember to treat women with
respect.”

I caught sight of a wink out of the corner of
my eye and turned on the indicator, carefully pulling onto the soft
shoulder of the tarmac on the Ethan Allen Highway.

“Not to worry, ‘Mr. Williams’,” I said
cheerfully. “Ben’s sense of humor is an acquired taste. It comes
from sleeping in the dog house. He’s quite used to it now, and
looks forward to table scraps for dinner and the occasional bone
tossed his way. We’ve found that he just cannot be trusted in the
house without supervision.”

“Woof,” barked my husband, ever the hound.
“To quote Brutus, ‘I had rather be a dog, and bay the moon, than
such a Roman.’”

“Well, I hope your fellow canines keep you
warm at night,” I retorted, “because you have been banished from my
bed! Now, why are we stopped?”

“‘Mr. Williams” and I must have a talk. We
shall be back shortly.”

“You’re leaving me here? You couldn’t ask me
to pull over in Burlington or Colchester, when we passed coffee
shop after coffee shop? You couldn’t sit in the bloody car while I
ducked into a store in Georgia? Instead, you tell me to pull over
in the middle of nowhere, so you and ‘Mr. Williams’ can have a
chit-chat? You low-life son of a....”

“I think you’ll find, Beatrice, that the key
phrase is ‘the middle of nowhere’,” our guest offered in a gentle,
yet firm tone. “Far from observing eyes. Far from astute ears.
We’ll do our best not to keep you cooling your heels for too
long.”

“Ta-ta for now,” my husband called out
cheerfully before shutting the car door. As I watched the pair of
them disappear into the woods, I thought of ways I could make Ben
suffer. His smugness was beginning to get under my skin so deep, I
might have to have surgery to repair the damage to my flesh. No
mere Band-aid would heal this injury. The last thing I wanted was a
smart ass husband thinking he could order me around like some
housemaid. Nay, I would find a way to put him down on bended knee,
begging my forgiveness. I would not take this slight lightly,
because I knew that beast that lived inside him. If I allowed him
to take this liberty with me once, it would become habit, ingrained
into his sorely lacking soul. He would assume I was at his beck and
call, forever waiting on his every wish, every command. I would
sooner tie my own hands behind my back and leap into Lake Champlain
than let this cad have his way.

So busy was I with my marital musings, I did
not notice the rather ominous black beast of an SUV until it was
practically touching the back bumper of the silver station
wagon.

“Crap!” I gasped, quickly checking the side
mirror as I fumbled with the key. My only hope seemed to be getting
the hell out of there as quickly as possible. Instinctively, I
locked the doors, feeling particularly vulnerable, even as I turned
on the engine and peeled out. Even as I pressed the accelerator to
the floor and gunned the motor until it squealed like a stuck pig,
I could see a pair of men in dark clothing hurrying back to their
vehicle. Where was I to go?

Have you ever tried to come up with a plan
while you are hurtling down a rural highway at seventy miles an
hour? Believe me when I tell you, it’s hard to drive and plot at
the same time. As much as I knew the area, and I did, my mind went
blank as I scrambled to think of potential hiding places. That I
left my husband and “Mr. Williams” behind did not trouble me. Those
two were used to fleeing at a moment’s notice. I, on the other
hand, did not have the luxury of practice in the art of
disappearing.

Even as I drove, I could see the dark shadow
moving closer on the horizon. If I could keep up the pace long
enough to get to a decent hiking trail, I might have a chance to
evade my pursuers. But first, I would have to abandon the car. I
knew the hungry black Lincoln was more than capable of catching up
to the bite-sized Subaru, and it would only be a matter of minutes
before I faced the very real possibility of that enormous bumper
smacking my little wagon right off the road. My best bet would
probably be to head towards Silver Lake. Throwing caution to the
wind, I waited until I came to the long, winding curve, pulled the
car off onto a dirt track Ben and I had once used on a hike we
took, and skidded my way across the rough surface. My goal was to
get out of sight as quickly as possible, to get as deep into the
woods as I could. I might not be able to outdrive those bastards on
my heels, but I sure as hell could probably scramble into some
little rabbit hole in the forest and outwait them.