Trace looked about in the immediate vicinity of the grave. The cemetery was empty, and this spot wasn’t visible from either the PX parking lot or the building that housed the caretaker of the cemetery.
To the left of the Custers, Trace was interested to see the name Robert Anderson, the commander of Fort Sumter when it was fired upon at the beginning of the Civil War. She wondered who else that had been such an integral part of the country’s history was buried here, but now was not the time. The PX would be opening shortly, and she needed to go in there and get the equipment to uncover the diary.
The doors to the PX were unlocked At exactly at eleven, and Trace was the third person in. She went to the back of the store where the four seasons section was and quickly found what she was looking for — a small hand spade that she could easily fit into the pocket of her coat. In hardware she picked up a measuring tape and took her purchases to the front. She was required to show her ID card before paying, then she made her way out into the parking lot.
The weather was still cold and gray with a low overcast sky. Trace could hear distant cheers coming from the vicinity of the track and field stadium down at river-level below the cemetery, next to Target Hill Field. She passed her car and slipped between the trees into the cemetery.
She walked directly to Custer’s grave.
There was still no one about, so Trace kneeled in the hard earth and pulled out the tape measure. Two feet to the left, on line with the front of the gravestone. She dug the point of the spade into the earth and began digging. She was grateful the ground wasn’t frozen or else it would have required dynamite to make any sort of penetration. Trace felt very exposed as she continued to dig and kept glancing about, keeping an eye out.
In the PX parking lot an MP car pulled up to Trace’s rental car, noted the license tag, then drove away to park near the main PX itself. The MP in the car picked up his radio mike and called it in to Sergeant Taylor. Within four minutes a van pulled up, and a major — identified as Quincy by his nametag — and a young captain stepped out. The MP pointed out the car to them.
Quincy glanced around, then pointed at the PX.
“She must be inside.” He jabbed a finger at the MP.
“You stay here and watch the car.” He grabbed the other officer.
“Let’s go. Captain Isaac.” The two entered the PX and began a systematic search of the store.
The spade hit something solid about ten inches down.
Trace continued to excavate, adding to the small pile of dirt next to the hole. She brushed away with her fingers and exposed a red plastic surface. She carefully dug around, until she reached the edges — about ten inches long by eight wide. She pressed the point of the spade in along the sides, breaking the box free from the dirt. After four minutes, it came loose and she held in her hands a plastic box, the seams wrapped in duct tape. It was heavy, as if whatever it contained was solid and filled most of the space inside.
“She’s not in here,” Captain Isaac said. They were standing at the checkout counters, having been through the entire store twice.
Major Quincy looked out into the parking lot, noting the location of the car, and thinking furiously.
“Could she be at the gas station?”
Isaac shrugged.
“Let’s check it out.”
The two officers double-timed across the parking lot and after a brief look inside, insured that the object of their search wasn’t there.
“Where the hell is she?” Quincy muttered.
Isaac pointed.
“The cemetery?” he guessed.
“What would she be doing in there?” Quincy asked, moving before Isaac had a chance to answer. The two headed for the break in the trees.
Trace shoved the dirt back into the hole, but the absence of the box left a depression there that would be noticeable to the first person passing by. She pulled her key chain out and flipped open the small knife attached to it and began cutting open the duct tape to see what was inside.
“There she is!” a voice cried out.
Trace looked up and she didn’t have to consider the situation very long. Two officers, their long black raincoats napping in the wind, were racing toward her. She tucked the box under her arm and ran in the opposite direction, straight for the wall enclosing the cemetery.
She made it there with a fifty-meter lead on her pursuers. She looked down the rock-and-tree-strewn slope on the other side, unable to see the bottom. She knew it had to come out around Target Hill field, and she also knew that that was putting herself in a dead-end situation, but a glance over her shoulder convinced her that it was better than the one she was currently in. The two officers had drawn .45 caliber pistols from the pockets of their raincoat and the lead one — a major from the oak leaves on his collar — halted briefly and fired, the round cracking by. Trace threw herself over the wall and began scrambling downhill.
Quincy and Isaac made it to the wall in time to see Trace disappear into the woods below.
“Follow her!” Quincy ordered.
“I’ll get the van and meet you there.” He turned and ran back to the PX parking lot.
Trace cursed as she slipped on the steep slope. She dropped the box as she desperately grabbed with both hands for a low tree branch to arrest her fall. The box continued downslope on its own. Trace followed it at a slightly slower pace and reclaimed it when it lodged next to a small boulder.
She could hear the yells from what must have been the scout jamboree at the stadium off to her far right. She glanced over her shoulder and couldn’t see any pursuit, but she assumed there had to, be. She didn’t know how they had found her. Maybe the damn checkout women in the PX were scanning IDS for all she knew. At this point it didn’t really matter.
Trace tried to come up with a plan as she continued down. She knew that there was only one way out once she got to the bottom. Target Hill Field was a level area surrounded on two sides by the mountains and on the third by the Hudson. She would have to go to the right, past the sewage treatment plant. She also knew that whoever was after her also knew that and they could cut her off. She increased her pace, ignoring safety for speed.
She broke out of the trees just to the left of the sewage treatment plant and skidded to a halt, trying to catch her breath as she looked around. The Huey helicopter she had seen was parked in the middle of the nearest soccer field.
She heard a distant yell above and behind her. No time and no other options. She ran forward to the helicopter. It was open; the crew must have been over at the scout jamboree.
A sign giving the aircraft’s specifications was leaning up against the open left cargo door; obviously the aircraft was a static display for the scouts to look at later in the day.
Trace swung open the left pilot’s door and settled into the seat. There wasn’t time to do it by the book, the way she’d been trained at Fort Rucker over ten years ago. She flicked the generator switch to start and opened the fuel flow. She grabbed the throttle and rolled it to the start position while pulling the start trigger. She was rewarded with the turbine engine slowly whining to life. She breathed a short prayer of thanks that the battery had been up to power as she watched the N-l gauge — the indicator of the. engine’s RPMS — slowly rise. The engine was still warm from its recent shutdown, so the startup was much faster than starting a cold engine.
Out of the corner of her eye she spotted one of the officers emerge from the woods and look about. The I’ll gauge hit fifteen percent, and the blades overhead began to slowly turn. The officer stared at the helicopter in surprise and then began running forward. Trace increased torque on the throttle, turning on the inverter switch, going to full power. She knew she was risking overheating the engine, but the options seemed limited as the officer pointed his pistol at her from forty feet away and fired a shot. The bullet ricocheted off the Plexiglas to Trace’s right, cracking it-She pulled in the collective with her right hand, keeping the engine at full throttle. With a shudder the helicopter slowly lifted. The officer fired again, missing wildly. Trace kicked the pedals, putting the bulk of the helicopter between her and the man. She wasn’t surprised to see a van skid through the chain link fence surrounding the field and come bouncing straight toward her. She pulled further up on the collective and the gap between the skids and the ground grew. With only twenty feet of altitude, she pushed the cyclic over with her left hand and headed along the ground, away from the van.