Ariel's Crossing - Bradford Morrow [133]
Quite the breathtaking summer night. The sergeant felt calm with his men, armed and equipped, doing what they’d trained to do. He knew he would need his concentration later, so closed his eyes now and let his mind travel. Times such as this he often found himself wondering where she’d disappeared to, Mary Contrary—the sis he missed. He always suspected she was still in New Mexico, even before Johnny and Rose, the twins, swore they’d spotted her in a crowd at the feast of San Felipe. He supposed he hadn’t been the most conscientious brother, given the resources at his disposal. Most everyone was just a couple calls and a few keystrokes away from identification and locationing, unless they were professionally fugitive. He never initiated the query because, well, if she didn’t want to be found, he respected her wishes. He remembered too well how Mary and their father had argued, violently, about everything under the sun. Not that he himself hadn’t been guilty of bad behavior. Like Mary, he had thought many times about hitting the road, cutting out of Gallup, but he figured there were stayers and players, and he was a stayer. He had apologized to his father long since and they’d made their peace.
He wondered whether Mary wouldn’t come back one day, if only to visit their mother. Mary and Mom always got along. He pictured them sewing her costumes for school plays with that foot-cranked, squeaky Singer. That time she trod home from her first waitressing job, in tears because she didn’t know where the dessert spoon went, or how to fold a napkin so it resembled a swan, and Mom—who didn’t know, either—walked her to the library where they looked all that stuff up in a manual for stuffed shirts. If he could reconcile with the old man, Mary could damn well look in on her mother one day. God in heaven, how families defy logic.
Must have dozed off, since the driver now woke him up. Light was already mustering above, rarefied and tenuous.
“How long I been asleep?”
“Hour, not even. Nothing new happening. Just we’re getting up to speed on coordinates.”
Information was that the individual suspect would be picked up once his position was secured and the second team could get men into place for an expedient apprehension. The other group of individuals had, according to a preliminary report, established a base camp at coordinates that put them about ten, twelve thousand meters directly due east of the old Trinity blast site on the other side of the mountains—roughly 106 degrees 19 minutes latitude by 33 degrees 19 minutes longitude, it looked like from the shuddering topo spread out on his lap. It was confirmed that they were armed and to be considered dangerous. Their identities were unknown as of yet, and their objectives unclear. No attempt should be made to apprehend them until further information became available. Orders were to secure a perimeter around this encampment. Stay alert and covert, and communicate postyhasty any change in the situation.
Jim confirmed his orders. He had been up through here many times, knew both the valley and the Jornada with the intimacy of friendship, from Bingham to Organ, Oscuro to Engle. He once climbed Salinas Peak with some of the boys and stood looking out at White Sands due south and the malpais to the east. Pure snow and a kingdom of coal to right and left. Truly a wonder, something to behold. Despite what any bleeding-heart liberal protestor might say, the irony was that all the Defense Department agencies that utilized these lands were far kinder custodians than any strip-mall developer would be. Not that anybody would build, let alone shop at a mall here. But still.
He pinpointed their current bearings and located a wash gully up ahead that would let them drive in pretty close without being seen. It’d put them about a mile southeast of the old Montoya ranch near Dripping Spring—or ghost ranch, more like. Quite a ways into the range for a group of protestors or hunters