Sixty days and counting - Kim Stanley Robinson [89]
He changed clothes in his van, made the short drive up Rock Creek Parkway to the zoo, parked off Broad Branch and walked through the green trees out to Connecticut Avenue and the Delhi Dabai. He found himself inside, seated at a corner table looking at a menu, and realized he had not decided a single move since leaving the boathouse. It had been automatic pilot; but now he had a menu to choose from, and he couldn’t. Decision trees. The automatic pilot was gone. Something hot and angry; just order the curry like always. Indigestion before he had even started eating. Off again through the early evening. The days were getting longer, the temperature balmy. Twilight spent at the overlook, checking out the salt lick at the bottom of the ravine. Big bodies in the infrared. Most were white-tailed deer, but not all. Ethiopian antelope; ibex; hedgehog. Rock Creek was still the epicenter of the feral population.
Back in his van he found the engine wouldn’t start. Startled, he cursed, jumped out, looked under the hood.
The battery cables had been cut.
He tried to collect his thoughts. He looked up and down the dark streets. The van had been parked more or less at random, and locked. No way to get the hood up without getting inside the van; no way of getting into the van without a key. Well, dealers had master keys. Presumably spooks did too.
This must mean that Edward Cooper knew who he was. Knew that he was Caroline’s helper, and no doubt presumed to be more; the man who had thrown a rock at his head, etc. Had him chipped or at least his van.
The hair on the back of Frank’s neck prickled. His feet were cold. He looked around casually as he called AAA on his FOG phone and waited for a tow. When the guy in the tow truck took a look under the hood, he said “Ha.” He took out his toolbox, installed a replacement cable. Frank thanked him, signed, got in the driver’s seat; the engine coughed and started. Back out to the Khembalis’ farm. He didn’t know what else to do.
That night as he turned the matter over in his mind, he began to get both angrier and more frightened. If they had found him, did that mean they had found Caroline too? And if so what would they do? Where would they stop? What was their point?
And where was Caroline?
He had to talk to Edgardo again.
So he did, out on their lunch run the very next day. They ran down the Mall toward the Lincoln Memorial. It was a good running route, almost like a track: two miles from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial, on grass or decomposed granite all the way. There were other runners in the White House compound, and sometimes they went out with some OMB guys, but Edgardo and Frank now usually ran by themselves. It wasn’t the same without Kenzo and Bob and the others, but it was what they had, and it gave them the chance to talk.
They had run a chip wand over each other before taking off, and after they got going Frank described what was happening.
“My computer crash could have been them too. Maybe they were erasing signs that they had broken into my system.”
“Maybe,” Edgardo was shaking his head back and forth like Stevie Wonder, his lips pursed unhappily. “I agree, if they are the ones vandalizing your stuff, then they must have found out you’re the one who helped Caroline get away. But I’m wondering how they did that, if they did.”
“And if they’ve managed to relocate Caroline as well.”
“That doesn’t follow,” Edgardo pointed out. “You’re not trying to hide, and she is.”
“I know. I’m just wondering. I’m worried. Because I don’t know how they found me.”
They pounded on a few paces thinking about it.
“Do you have no way of getting in contact with her?”
“No.”
“You need that. That should be a normal part of the repertory. Next time she contacts you, you have to tell her you need a dead drop, or a dedicated cell phone, or some other way to get in touch with her.”
“I said that up on Mount Desert Island, believe me.”
“She was