The Cassandra Conspiracy (24 page)

             
CHAPTER 22

The day seemed to drag on forever. Payton puttered around, trying to make sure everything was ready for their getaway, while seemingly keeping the appearance of a normal weekend. He had already been out to the barn twice–once to check the Jag and a second time to make certain that the pickup was ready to go. He verified that the oil and antifreeze in both were topped off. He even made himself a list of things to do before they left the farm. In spite of his detailed preparations, the gut feeling that he’d overlooked something important stayed with him. He had gone over his plans again and again. They were bulletproof. Now he wanted to get on with it. Although Janet tried to hide her anxiety, she was clearly on edge.

Earlier, Payton had carefully checked out the barn, although he didn’t figure that Wingate’s men would have bothered bugging it. Besides, there were no phones to tap, making a bug harder to conceal.

Most of the evening they had communicated by writing cryptic notes. Up to this point, that had worked fine. Payton got up and turned on the television, adjusting the volume louder than normal. He walked over to where Janet was standing and whispered in her ear. “You packed yet?”

Janet nodded.

He leaned over until his lips brushed her ear. “Good. My stuff’s already in the barn.”

The rest of the evening the two of them watched television, bantering back and forth under the assumption that others were listening to everything they said. Around nine, Payton popped a couple of Tylenols. Minutes later, the butterflies in his stomach were playing badminton with them.

Around midnight, they called it a night and went to bed. Neither of them slept. Janet remained introspective, lost in her thoughts, while Steve’s eyes remained glued to the digital display on the front of the clock radio.

Just before three, Payton tapped Janet lightly on the shoulder unsure if she was asleep. Aware of the bug, he was careful not to scare her. Like Payton, she couldn’t sleep either. Janet got up, and quietly left the room. Before she had gone to bed, Janet had taken the clothes that she planned to wear down into the living room. She would dress there, keeping the second floor as quiet as possible.

Payton had been walking around behind her since 3
A.M.
, careful not to make any sound their watchers might overhear. “Give me your stuff, and we’ll get out of here.”

He took her suitcase along with the case of computer equipment and placed them in the trunk. “We’ll buy whatever else we need.”

It was the last minute details that would make or break his plan. Payton chuckled at the irony. A plan, yes a plan. Payton's new definition was knowing what he was going to do next-not three steps later or four, but what he had to do right now to save their lives.

When Payton prepared a case for trial, he mapped out every possibility. If the other side could request a delay, Payton had an answer in mind that would be the basis of his response to their motion. If there were case law precedents, Payton had them all synopsized and ready to go. If he needed to locate witnesses or take depositions, he handled those tasks deftly. In short, he planned out his whole case  from the first step to the last.

Now he faced his biggest challenge, and he wasn’t close to being prepared. He didn’t have any idea how they were going to get safely out of the country. Worse, he didn’t know for how long he’d be able to keep the tentacles of the Wingate organization from wrapping themselves around the both of them.

Over the course of the evening, the fall wind had grown stronger. Now, early in the morning, it whistled through the rafters, creating an eerie noise.

“What’s left?”

“Nothing that I can think of except giving you a quick run
-down on the car,” Steve said, guiding Janet over to the Jaguar.

“Shush.  I think I heard something... or someone.”  Stone froze where he was, terrified that Wingate’s men were on to them.  “Sounded like someone moving near the house.”  He snuffed out the flashlight.

“I’m going to check it out.  Just stay here and whatever you do, don’t turn on any lights.  I’ll be back in minute,”  He said confidently, hoping to mask his fear.

Stone opened the barn door just enough to ease through it sideways and slowly stepped out of the barn and into the enveloping darkness.  If one of Wingate’s henchmen were lurking in the shadows, at least the man’s attention would be focussed on the house and not the barn
--he hoped.

From where he stood, the house was shrouded in darkness.  Stone gazed into the shadows enveloping the house.  Unsure whether the noises he heard were real or figments of his imagination, he advanced slowly toward the house, all the while thankful that there wasn’t a full moon.  At first, he was certain that someone was out there, sneaking around the farm house.  Stone’s imagination began to run wild.  Maybe somehow they screwed up, said something they shouldn’t have, or let on in some way that things weren’t what they seemed. 

Stone’s eye picked up the movement of the shadow across the wall, seemingly from one window to the next.  He had to figure out what he’d do if someone was really there.  The only weapon he had was the flashlight still clutched in his hand--hardly sufficient protection against a gun or knife.  The beating of Stone’s heart seemed loud enough to warn off the intruder.  As he moved closer, Stone realized that if he were spotted, there were no trees or bushes to hide behind.  Stone’s success or failure was totally dependent upon being able to sneak up on the man before the latter saw him approaching.  And that assumed that there was only one man.

From over near the house, Stone heard a scraping noise
--apparently the intruder casing the place.  He moved in closer, still unable to get a good view of what he was up against.  From the appearance of the shadows and the noise coming from the side of the house, he decided that he was most likely facing only one person.  A rudimentary plan began to formulate in Stone’s mind.  He’d get as close as he could to where he knew the intruder to be, make a loud noise and shine the flashlight in the man’s eyes.  Once he blinded him, Stone figured he could charge the intruder.  Hopefully the element of surprise would be on Stone’s side.

From his rear, Stone heard a sound.  He whirled, ready to flick the flashlight on and illuminate whatever or whoever it was behind him.  Then there was silence.  Stone’s mind was busily processing data.  If there were two men, they’d both be watching the house.  Any noise behind him had to be coming from the barn or near it, and that ruled out Wingate’s people.

Finally he got as close as he dared.  Hands shaking, Stone pointed the flashlight toward the side wall and flipped the switch to its ‘on’ position.  A cone of light shot from the flashlight and lit up the area from which he saw the shadows.  But there was no one there.  Stone moved the beam up and down, finding only a tree limb blowing in the wind and occasionally scraping the side of the house.  He started to laugh, but realized that he was standing outside with a flashlight in his hand, most likely in line of sight of the stake-out car.  Quickly, he extinguished the light.  Shaking his head, he walked back to the barn.

As soon as he reached the barn door, Stone whispered, “Janet, it’s me.  Everything’s okay.”  Now that she knew who was coming through the door, Stone entered the barn.

“What was it?”

“Nothing
--just a tree limb hitting up against the house.  Let’s get going.”

“I was scared to death.  When you heard something out there, I was sure Wingate was on to us.”

“Me too.  Thank god it was just a false alarm,” Stone said guiding Janet over to the driver’s side of the car.

“The headlight switch is the round one on the left side of the dash. Turning it up to the first position turns on the parking lights. The next is the headlights. Remember, keep the headlights off until you’re on the road,” Steve said praying that the men in the surveillance car wouldn’t spot the Jag’s parking lights.

Janet and Payton stood outside the car. There wasn’t anything else to say. “Be careful, but whatever you do, don’t panic. I’ll keep them from coming after you. Remember you have enough horsepower to outrun anything in Pine Lakes. As long as the road behind you is dark, everything’s fine.”

Janet threw her arms around Payton. “But what about you?” she asked, worried that Steve was trading his safety for hers.

“I’ll be okay.”  He hoped that he was right. “We’d better get going. When you get to the end of the drive and are ready to go, tap your brakes twice,” he reminded her.

Payton kissed her with an urgency that told her that they needed to get going. Janet slid into the driver’s seat,
and then turned on the ignition. The Jaguar’s engine came to life, and in a few seconds the idle decreased as it settled into its usual purr.

With Payton in the pickup behind her, she left the barn using only the parking lights to make her way up the drive. Although the trip took only seconds, to Payton it seemed like hours until Janet stopped at the end of th
e driveway. Behind her, Payton saw the car perched in the shadows cast by the trees. The surveillance team must have had a small map light on, since he could just about make out the shapes of two men, both sitting in the front seat of the surveillance car.

Janet tapped the brake pedal twice,
and then turned on the high beams. Payton watched the scramble inside the surveillance car. It took Wingate’s men a good ten seconds to wake up to what was happening, get the car started and the lights on, and begin their pursuit of the fleeing Jaguar.

As he waited for the other car to approach the intersection, his right foot pressed the accelerator halfway to the floor, while his left controlled the clutch. Payton's leg quivered, half from the anticipation of finally striking a blow against Wingate, half from nerves. When the car got within fifty feet of where he sat waiting, Payton popped the clutch and flipped on the headlights.

The pickup’s wheels sprayed stones and loose gravel. For a moment, Payton thought that the other car would make it past the driveway before he could get out onto the main road, but then the truck’s rear tires got traction, and it lurched out of the driveway. Payton had timed his entrance perfectly, pulling out into the road only a second or two before the sedan crossed the intersection.

The driver of the surveillance car, unaware of Payton's presence, caught only a glimpse of the pickup truck now targeting his right fender. Payton switched his high beams on, flooding the road with light. Blinded and desperate to avoid the impending collision, Wingate’s man swung the steering wheel hard to the left sending the car careening out of control.

The road’s shoulder was only a few feet wide, not nearly enough to allow the driver room to steer around the pickup. To his misfortune, the driver also didn’t see the drainage ditch that ran alongside the road. It would be his last mistake for the night. The car’s front wheels, unable to traverse the ditch, pitched the nose of the car down, driving it into the side of the hill. With one front tire blown and the steering arms bent, the chase was over.

Payton, in spite of his attempt at ramming the chase car, managed to maintain control of the truck. Satisfied that Wingate’s men wouldn’t be following Janet, he continued toward the interstate.

When he reached the road near the exit ramp, Payton pulled the pickup truck off into the bushes. As he emerged from the underbrush, Janet flashed the high beams.

“Thank God you’re all right,” she said as she got out of the car. “I was so afraid.” Janet threw her arms around him, and pulled him tightly to her. Instead of being serious, Steve’s face formed a smirk.

“There are a couple of real pissed off guys back there,” Steve said, gesturing toward the farm. “It seems that they just became one with the local scenery. Come on, let’s get the hell out of here. One problem down, the next to go.”

“Which is?” Janet asked.

“Figuring out how we’re going to get to London. No doubt Wingate’s people are already watching the local airports, so that leaves Baltimore-Washington International, Dulles, and Washington National out. Have any ideas?”

Janet’s face appeared drawn, both from the tension that had permeated their relationship over the past few weeks, and the danger they now found themselves in. “We could drive to Philadelphia, but Wingate’s probably looking for us there. It’s a logical choice.”

“Maybe something closer where we can catch a flight to one of the larger international hubs such as New York or Boston?” 

“We could try a commuter flight from Harrisburg to New York, then connect to London. We’re within two hours of Harrisburg, and I think the commuter flights are pretty frequent.”

“All right, we’ll give it a shot. The European flights leave in the early evening, and I want to be on the next one over, which means tonight’s flight. We’d better get moving or we’ll miss it.”

.   .   .   .   .   .

Halfway to Harrisburg, he stopped for gas. While the attendant filled the tank, Payton found the station’s pay telephone and made reservations for the two of them on the evening flight to London’s Heathrow Airport.

The airline wou
ld be checking their passports before boarding, forcing Payton to book their reservations under his name. He was counting on the fact that Wingate’s people would only be watching the local airports.