“Where?” she asked. Her suspicions linked them to the old ghost town at Calico. There had been a gathering there. And the Hunters had searched for clues. “Hard enough?” the Chief wondered aloud. “Maybe not. Maybe not.”
She reached for the intercom to order a top team back into Calico. In her heart there was a growing suspicion that this might be a nodal point. If they could find something there, then that could open up some routes to pursue Hilton and his team. That part of the Hunters’ plans was assuming disproportionate importance to her. She knew it, but it had become a compulsion.
ZELIG STOOD UP and walked around the room, stopping in front of his pin-studded map. He was a well-built, muscular man who’d been a running back at West Point. Now into his forties, he was a little thicker around the midriff than he wanted to be, but he worked out every day in the gymnasium.
The pins that interested him most were those that applied to the movements of the crew of the Aquila. The project wanted to pull in all manner of people with all sorts of skills. But Hilton and the others were his people.
“Or what’s left of them,” he said aloud.
For such a stocky, strong man, his voice was surprisingly thin and high.
They’d only just picked up the message at Calico ghost town. On his instructions, his team had left it where it was in case others came along. They’d also checked out the wreckage of the Chinook, though they knew there were no survivors. Now they were trying to get through to Muir Woods, hoping for another clue there, despite its being already ten days past the original rendezvous. However, the results of some major quake activity in central California were proving a problem for his patrols.
But time was racing by, and the weather was deteriorating. They had plows at Aurora, but if they worked too well in keeping highways open, it would point to their location as clearly as a giant scarlet arrow.
Zelig shook his head and walked back to the desk. The word “batteries” stared at him from the pad. He took out his fountain pen and wrote in a firm, angular hand, with green ink, a memo to himself.
“Send teams south to search for incomers.” Then he added a “?” and underlined it.
Chapter Six
Hearing the noise of secret intruders creeping up toward the hydroponic-plant complex in the darkness, Kyle picked his way out of the waist-high brush as quickly and silently as he could. He slipped into the long, narrow hut where Jim Hilton, Heather, Carrie and Sly were sleeping on folding bunk beds.
Easing the door shut behind him, he winced as the hinges squeaked.
“Jim,” he called softly, his hand on his friend’s shoulder, ready to clamp it over his mouth if he made a noise.
Jim was instantly alert. “Trouble, Kyle?”
“Visitors.”
“Hunters?”
“Can’t tell.”
“How many?”
“Didn’t wait to find out.”
Their whispering woke Heather and then, almost simultaneously, Carrie. Snoring gently, only Sly Romero remained snugly asleep, hands folded across his chest, like the statue of a crusader on his marble tomb.
“What is it, Dad?”
“Kyle heard someone coining.”
“Hunters?” asked Carrie, already pulling on her pants and reaching for her boots.
Kyle bit his lip. “Shit, I don’t know. Heard a footfall. Someone swore. Trying to creep up on us. I didn’t stop and ask him for his Social Security number.” Tense anger underlined his words.
“Hey, who rattled your cage, Kyle?”
“Just cut it out,” hissed Jim. “Heather. Wake up Sly. And for the Lord’s sake, don’t let him make any noise. Carrie, you and Kyle go out with the kids and wait by the vehicles.”
“We running?” The young black man couldn’t conceal the surprise and doubt in his voice. “What about…?”
“I’ll warn Diego and the others.”
“And then?”
Jim straightened up, drawing the Ruger, the blued steel gleaming in the pallid light that filtered in through the hut’s dusty windows.
“No time for a balanced debate. I’ll warn them. Take a quick look around. Might be a loner or a couple of vagrants hanging around. If it’s more, we get out the back door. No arguments. We come first. Right? You all agree?” Nobody spoke. “Fine. Least you don’t disagree.”