The Second Mouse - Archer Mayor [90]
Until now.
He smiled at the memory of Banger, pleading and spent, totally confused by the violation of such an encounter’s implicit contract—you torture me, I give you all I have. Hey, his expression had told Mel, I gave it up. Why’re you still going?
Because information gathering had only been Mel’s surface ambition. Intelligence about the cousins—Paul and Bob Niemiec, he now knew—could have been collected any number of ways, including by just asking around. They were in retail, after all, and needed to get the word out. But Mel had wanted more. That extra piece—that emotional satisfaction—had been at the heart of his desire.
Not that the promise of big money hurt. Banger had confirmed what Mel had suspected even before he targeted High Top—that the newly arrived Niemiecs were aiming to be major players, exchanging the big city with its attendant overhead and risk factors for the easy pickings of a rural state. But where such operators in the past had used Vermont purely as a retail market, these boys were hoping to create a production base as well. Better still, they’d chosen to step up in style, taking advantage of the local airport to improve importation beyond precedent. Toward the end, Banger had told Mel of a plane delivery of drugs—and of such quantity as to set a man up for decades.
This was what Mel had been longing to hear, which explained why he was watching the Niemiec headquarters now, taking note of all the players, their habits, and their methods of operation.
When it came time to strike, he wanted to do it with military precision. If this was to be their last shot, the Three Musketeers were going to make it their very best.
Chapter 19
“Special Agent Gunther. Good to meet you.”
Wally Neelor was the head of hospital security—a large, open-faced man with a camp counselor’s friendliness. He greeted Joe with a two-handed shake. No doubt to quell the concerns of nervous patients, his uniform was low-key and looked only faintly official, lacking all but a couple of muted patches that identified his function here. He carried just a radio on his belt.
He preceded Joe down the broad hallway as he spoke, leading the way to his office. “You said on the phone you were checking out the disappearance of that low-level bag. Is there something I don’t know about?”
“Not particularly,” Joe told him, sensitive of being in a public place. It wasn’t crowded, and they certainly weren’t attracting attention, but people were nevertheless milling about.
“I just wondered,” Neelor continued. “We did push all the required buttons here, but I didn’t really think it was that big a deal. Most of our bells and whistles with that stuff are just to keep the local paranoids happy, you know?”
“I do,” Joe told him, grateful to have finally reached the office. They filed past a dispatcher in the front office and ended up in a small, windowless room decorated with charts, maps, and a few pieces of memorabilia showing that Neelor had, in fact, a good deal of police experience in his background.
He waved Joe into a chair and offered him some coffee, which Joe turned down.
“So what’s the concern?” Neelor asked, settling into his seat and giving Joe a calculating look.
“I’m fishing,” Joe conceded. “Pure and simple. The Fusion Center told us the bag was one of several funny events in this area over the last few weeks, and we’re just trying to see if there’s a connection between any of them.”
Neelor’s eyebrows rose. “Other radiological vanishing acts?” he asked.
“No,” Joe admitted, almost embarrassed by the slimness of his motivation. “That’s part of the problem. We haven’t figured out a common thread. It’s a bunch of random stuff.”
Neelor laughed. “I get it—supersecret stuff. Need-to-know only. No sweat. What do you want from me?”
Joe allowed him his conspiratorial fantasy—it was easier than trying to explain their