We took the county road south, then Highway 185 east, past Corbeil's ranch. As we passed the ranch, we saw two men walking out to a car in the driveway. One of them glanced at us as we went by.
"That guy." LuEllen said. "The one on the right."
"Yeah. He's limping." We continued down the highway, and looking back, I saw the car pull out of the driveway, following. A few miles on, we stopped at an intersection before turning south toward Waco. The car followed, again.
"Still behind us?"
"Yeah, but they would be. There's no place else to go." They didn't seem to be coming after us with any urgency. "Slow down a little; bring it down to about fifty-even or fifty-eight," I told her.
She lightened up on the gas, and the car, a Buick, slowly crept up on us. When they were off our back bumper, they hung there for a while, then, at a flat spot, kicked out around us and accelerated away. I had the glasses ready, and picked out the tag number on the Buick.
"Guy didn't look at me," LuEllen said.
"Why should he? We're just another truck on the open highway. Even paranoia has its limits."
"For amateurs," LuEllen said. "Not for me. We wipe this truck, and take it back first thing tomorrow morning. Before the DMV opens, in case he can check the plate."
"Of course," I said.
CHAPTER 23
We went back to Bobby that night, and I summarized everything we'd figured out. From the GPS receiver, I'd worked out precise locations of the three satellite dishes we'd seen, and the distances between them, and also gave him the directions, azimuths, and times I'd taken from the dish.
unauthorized satellite contacts?
possible. customers could get high-res photos via the net with payments sent to front accounts. names in jack's file were all west and south asia, islamic, and indian.
must be some kind of accounting on tasks. how could they task the satellite without nro knowing?
don't know.
i will show dish data to two friends if ok with you.
must be *good* friends.
both *excellent* friends. both know some things about satellites.
good. any news on green?
yes. attorney sez cops probably done with green.
is room monitored?
will check.
also check license plate.
I gave him the plate number and he said he'd get back. The next morning, we returned the truck, carefully wiped of fingerprints. The gun and other equipment we stowed in the back of the rental car.
"I'd hate to have a cop look at that collection: night glasses, compasses, GPS, the rifle. he'd figure we were assassins," LuEllen said as I put it all in the trunk.
"Maybe we are," I said. As the words came out of my mouth, I tried at the last minute to make them into a joke, but LuEllen looked at me with curious eyes. I had to be careful, now, around her.
More waiting. We spent the day stooging around, checking with Bobby every couple of hours. LuEllen was tired of hitting golf balls with bad equipment.
"Why don't you learn how to play golf? We're always waiting on these things, we're always trying to figure out what to do, and you always want to draw or some shit. Why don't you learn something social?"
"Golf is for morons," I said.
"How would you know? You've never played."
"If you don't shut up, I'm going to have to turn you over my knee."
"Ooo. That could soak up a couple of hours," she said.
The only thing we got from Bobby in the morning was the ID on the car driven by the two men from Corbeil's ranch. A William Hart, with an address.
"Back at the beginning of all this, I got a letter from Jack that mentioned this guy. He said to be careful around him, because he's an evil fuck, or something to that effect."
"So let's be careful around him," LuEllen said.
Late in the day, Bobby had something:
can you go little rock?
yes? when, why?
tomorrow. pick up equipment. need to bug dish.
ok.
excellent. talked attorney. green room [348] probably not formally monitored. man in next room [350] named morris kendall, heavy drugs from cancer, probably die in a day or two, if you need to ask for patient.
thanks.
We checked out of the Austin motel and headed back to Dallas, found another room in another anonymous motel, called the hospital for visiting hours, and were told we could visit until nine o'clock.
"Tell me again what we can get from Green," LuEllen said.
"We can point out the benefits of stonewalling," I said.
"I'm sure he's figured those out," she said, putting her hands on her hips. "You've got something else working through your dirty little mind."
I nodded, reluctantly. "Yeah, I do; but I'm not going to tell you about it yet, because it'd probably piss you off, and then you'd piss me off, and I don't have the energy for all that. Anyway, tonight, I'm going into the hospital alone. I'll want you on the street, ready to roll, in case there's trouble."
"Kidd, if you think there's gonna be trouble."
"I don't think there will be, but I'm more paranoid than our two friends at Corbeil's. Okay? Now, shut up for a while: I'm trying to think."
Something else was working through my dirty little mind, and I didn't want LuEllen to know about it. Not yet, anyway. I'd figured out how to drag AmMath and Corbeil and his goons right into the shit, but I didn't want LuEllen around when I did it. Texas was a bad state for all this.
I went into Mount of Olives hospital at eight-thirty that night, with LuEllen waiting in a parking spot on a street behind the doctors' parking lot. If I had to run for it, I probably wouldn't get out of the building; but if I did, and I could make it across the doctors' parking lot, we could be lost in traffic in fifteen seconds.
A gift shop was open just inside the hospital's front doors, and I bought a bouquet of bright yellow flowers that looked something like daisies, but with a plastic sheen and a harsh odor. They came in a green glass vase; the whole thing looked cheap, but somehow right. I asked at the information desk for Morris Kendall's room, got the number, and went up.
The door to Green's room was open, and a grim, heavyset woman was sitting in a chair looking into a bed at the far end of the room. There were two beds in the room. I could see only the end of the bed closest to the door, where I presumed Green must be. Nobody told me that his room was only semi-private. Goddamnit. I went on to 350 and found Morris Kendall in what appeared to be a coma, dying all by himself, a drip running into an arm that was pockmarked with needle sticks. I put the flowers on a sidetable and tried not to look at him.
After a couple of minutes, I went back out to the hallway and paced for a while. The woman was still sitting there, unspeaking, clutching a purse on her lap. She looked like she disapproved of this whole hospital thing. I went and sat with Morris for a couple of more minutes, and in those two minutes, decided that when I got old, I'd lay in a lethal supply of sleeping pills, just in case. I didn't want to end like this.
People were coming and going in the hall, and I kept looking for the heavyset woman; fifteen minutes after I got there, I was rewarded: she went by the door, walking with purpose, clutching her purse with both hands. I checked the hallwaya little cluster of a man and two kids, all, from their looks, from the same family, were gathered by a doorway fifty feet downand stepped around the corner into Green's room.
Green was in the first bed, separated from the other by a pull curtain. A television was bolted into the far corner of the room, tuned to the romance channel. Green rolled his head toward me when I walked in. I turned my hands palm-up in a question, and raised my eyebrows; he shrugged, but put a finger to his lips. I stepped over next to his bed and put my head close to his. He whispered, "What are you doing here?"