Aaron Elkins - Fellowship Of Fear

"Gently, John. I’m not pulling your leg."

Slowly, simply, Gideon began explaining his conclusions. John was testy, however, and querulous, arguing every point. Gideon didn’t have the energy for it. After a few minutes his enthusiasm had drained away. "The hell with it, John; I don’t give a damn if you buy it or not. Solve it all yourself. Look, could we go back? I’m really bushed." He could feel the torn muscles in his cheek sagging, blurring his speech. His ankle had begun to throb again, and it felt grossly swollen.

"Fine," John said, sounding as if he didn’t give a damn either. "If it’s all right with you, we’ll stop at the Security Office on the way in to see if anything new has come in."

Gideon didn’t answer. It wasn’t a question.

In the car, he sulked most of the way. John was silent and fidgety. As they neared the base, John suddenly said, "Look, Doc, I know you know a lot of things about bones. If this was some old fossil skeleton, I wouldn’t argue with you. What do I know? But I can’t just blindly accept what you’re telling me. What am I supposed to put in my report? ‘Professor looked at burned piece of jawbone and identified victim as five-foot-four-inch male Japanese with a birthmark on his left ear and a pimple on his ass’?"

Gideon’s eyes were closed. He opened them. "Five-four was wrong," he said slowly. "That formula was for male Caucasians. This guy was Mongoloid-he’d have a shorter leg length relative to total body size. That means I underestimated. He’s probably about five-five. And change his weight to one-fifty."

"Come on, Doc-!"

"John, don’t worry about it, will you? I’m just talking to myself. Believe whatever you want."

He was quiet again for a while, dozing a little in the late afternoon sun. Then, after the brightly smiling Italian guards had waved them through the base gate, he said, "John, I have a favor to ask. Nobody else calls me Doc. Nobody ever called me Doc. Nobody calls anybody Doc. My name’s Gideon."

John lit up. "Okay, you’re on, Gid."

" Gid? Oh God, please. If we have to choose between Gid and Doc, I’ll take Doc." He shook his head. "Gid! Jesus Christ!"

"What a prima donna," John said. They both laughed, glad to be friends again.

"If I have to choose between Doc and Gideon, I’ll stick with Doc. Takes less time to say."

"So be it," Gideon said. "I’m resigned."

At the Security Office, John left Gideon in the car while he went into the white frame building. A moment later he returned and leaned into Gideon’s window.

"Nothing new. There’s a telephone call for you from Heidelberg. Do you want to go in and call back?"

"Heidelberg? Gosh, I forgot!" Dr. Rufus had called him two days before, full of avuncular concern and reassurance. Gideon was not to worry about the Heidelberg lectures that week; when news of Gideon’s "accident" had reached them, they had contracted with a German professor from Heidelberg University to deliver them through an interpreter. "Not quite the Oliver eclat," Dr. Rufus had said, "but adequate."

As for the following week’s lectures in Madrid, they would take care of those, too, if necessary. Gideon was to concentrate only on getting well at his own pace.

Gideon, however, did not intend to spend the next couple of weeks in a hospital bed. Putting what little verve he had into his voice, he had told Dr. Rufus he’d be ready to fly to Madrid by the next weekend, but that he’d call in a day or two to confirm. Then he’d forgotten all about it.

John handed the message to Gideon. A routing slip stapled to it showed that the call had come in to the Education Center yesterday. The message had been forwarded to the hospital and then to Security. It was from Eric Bozzini, not Dr. Rufus, and it said "Pls call back. Impt." For a moment he couldn’t place Eric Bozzini. When he did, he wondered why the laid-back Californian should be telephoning him-with an Impt. Call, no less.

Even using his cane, he needed a steadying hand from John to get out of the car, up the three steps, and into the office.

"My God, I feel like I’m a hundred years old," he muttered as he fell into a chair behind a battered wooden desk with a telephone on it.

John went to talk with the shore patrol personnel while Gideon telephoned. To his surprise he got through on the first try.

"Hello, Eric, this is Gideon Oliver."

"Hey, Gid!" shouted Eric. Gideon raised his eyes ceilingward, but said nothing. "What do you say, man? Hey man, what’s happening? You had an accident, huh? You okay now?"

"Yeah, Eric, I’m fine. What’s up?"

"You know, I was in Sig on Friday," Eric said. "Tried to see you, but they said no visitors."

"I’m a lot better now. What’s up?"

"Rufe said to check with you about whether you were going to do the Spanish gig." Gideon almost laughed. Eric was laid back farther than ever.

"Sure, Eric. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to call back earlier."

"Fantastic, man. We figured you’d say that. Like, the show must go on, right? Well, I’ve been working on your logistics-I don’t know if you knew Cindy Poretzky had to go back to the States, so I’ve been made acting logistics director?"

"Uh huh," said Gideon, although he had no idea what Eric was talking about. He began to be sorry he hadn’t waited until tomorrow to return the call.

"So I’ve been working on your logistics. Believe it or not, the easiest way for you to get from Sicily to Spain is to fly back to Germany and take a direct shot from Rhein-Main to Torrejon. So-"

"Wait, I’m getting mixed up. I thought I was going to Madrid. Where’s Torrejon?"

"Torrejon’s the name of the base you’re going to. Twenty miles from Madrid. Groovy place. Fantastic chicks." Amazing, Gideon thought; he must get his vocabulary from 1950s movies.

"Yeah, man," Eric said, with a leer Gideon could feel over the wire. "Get all the Spanish pussy you want."

Change that to 1970s movies, Gideon thought. "Fine," he said. "What do I do?"

"Well, if you’re able to fly tomorrow, we got you a special dispensation for a military flight out of Sig to Rhein-Main. Then come on down to Heidelberg for a couple of days-we got you a BOQ reservation at Patrick Henry. Then on Sunday you fly commercial out of Frankfurt to Madrid. Air force bus’ll leave for Torrejon an hour after you get there, and we’ve already set you up in the BOQ."

Gideon was impressed in spite of himself. "That’s really helpful, Eric, thanks. I hadn’t even thought about how I’d get there."

"We got our act together here, man. Service is our motto, right? Look, I hear John Lau from NSD is out there on something. Can you connect with him?"

Gideon smiled. "I believe so."

"Okay, get a hold of him and let him set it up for you to come back with him. It’ll save you a lot of paperwork."

"Will do, Eric. Thanks again."

"Take it easy, man. See you in Heidelberg."

Gideon hung up and swiveled around in his chair to see John sitting on the edge of a desk in the midst of a group of shore patrol men, looking at him with an oddly calculating expression. Without asking, John took a sheet of paper, some form, from the hand of the man sitting behind the desk and walked over to Gideon, never changing his expression. Silently, he held the form out.

It gave Gideon a nervous, guilty feeling. "What is this, John? What’s the matter?"

"Read it." Gideon half-expected him to toss the paper at him, but he laid it carefully on the desk.

The form was unfamiliar. Gideon shifted in his chair to ease the pain in his ankle. "Is this a missing person’s report?"

John nodded, still watching him with that peculiar expression. "One of the base cafeteria workers. Been missing since last Friday."

"John, I’m not up to fooling around. Will you tell me what’s going on, please?"