Michael Palmer - Oath of Office

“Anything important?”

“Not really,” Lou said, unable to keep himself from shaking. “He just wants to get together is all. Listen, can you all take Steve’s car and let me have yours? The Mercedes is virtually undrivable.”

“No problem. Just put your shot-up one in the driveway. The neighbors don’t take kindly to folks who let such things happen to a Mercedes. Here are the keys to my BMW. You bring it back with the windshields all busted out, and you’re going to have to open up a lemonade stand to pay for it.”

“You have maps in your car?”

“A terrific GPS and a whole road atlas, why?”

“Just some thoughts I want to check on,” he said, his eyes averted again.

From what Lou remembered, Monroe was about twenty minutes south of Wardensville and a good two hours’ drive from Renee’s house in Arlington. He checked the time. He could make it at the designated hour, but only if he left soon.

At that moment, the house phone rang.

“That was Steve,” Renee said after a moment’s conversation. “He’s about ten minutes away.”

“I’m going to head off because Cap doesn’t have much time,” Lou said, before realizing that he had spoken the grisly, terrifying truth. “Keep your doors locked and the phone handy until Steve’s here. Call me when he arrives, and then as soon as you’re settled in.”

“You be careful,” Renee insisted.

“I love you, Daddy,” Emily said, throwing her arms around him.

“I love you, too, Kiddo. This will all be over soon.”

I’m coming, Cap, he was thinking . You stay strong. I’m coming.

Lou was a few miles from the grain silo before allowing himself to feel nervous. Throughout the ride, he tried to formulate a plan-any sort of plan as to what he might do once he arrived at William Chester’s rural lair. The highest card he had to play appeared at the end of Chester’s text message:

We need to talk .

Talking meant there might be some wiggle room. Chester’s son and only child was dead. It was a given that the man wasn’t going to allow Lou to live. But there was information he wanted that Lou might be able to use to barter for Cap’s and George’s lives-most likely the identity of those whom he had spoken to about what he knew.

In earlier, simpler days, he had hiked the Appalachian Trail through West Virginia a number of times. The lush forests and churning rivers were just what John Denver had written in the song: “almost heaven.” He had actually driven through the hamlets of Wardensville and Monroe once, although he could not remember the circumstances. The towns were somewhere around the junction of state routes 50 and 220. The GPS showed only one major east-west rail line in the area, and his smartphone one corn silo near the intersection of the two roads. It was owned by Chester Enterprises. Obstacle one, albeit a small one compared to those ahead, had been negotiated.

Jaw clenched, he located the track-a pair of parallel tracks, actually-as well as the two-lane roadway that ran alongside them. Unless he came up with something soon, he was going to show up at the rendezvous with Chester less prepared than Emily had probably been for her most recent math test, although if he recalled correctly, she had reported getting an A on it nevertheless.

Lou had considered and rejected bringing a weapon of some sort to this showdown, perhaps a kitchen knife. Given the manpower Chester was sure to have, a slingshot like the one David had used against Goliath would have done him more good. He had decided that going to the authorities was a no-go as well. Cap and George had essentially no time left. Even so, twice, on the drive to Monroe, he grabbed his cell phone to call 911, but could not get past Chester’s blood-chilling warning.

I’ll kill both of them as slowly and painfully as possible, and then, your wife, Renee and your daughter …

Lou needed only to glance at the horrifying picture of the two men, hands secured by chains, faces beaten to pulps, to convince himself that bringing help would be a death sentence.

Lou took in a deep breath and vowed he would not let them die. It was his fault that their lives were on the line. Cap had been there for him since the day the two of them had met. George had already pulled himself out of a situation that had buried many others. He was a role model-an important role model to kids from the inner city. His future was full of productivity and service-if he lived. At this point, it seemed like the best Lou could hope for was to find a weakness in William Chester-some miracle negotiation that would save their lives.

No matter what, he wasn’t going to go down easily.

The two-hour drive to Monroe felt interminable. His mind wandered through the Frankencorn transmission conundrum and the solution that had to be right. The quiet, tree-lined streets of the village, with its clapboard houses, white picket fences, and old town general store, glided past and vanished in his rearview.

William Chester was nearby now, waiting.

Lou followed the twin rail beds out of town. The trees thinned out and then disappeared altogether. Dusk settled into twilight as the GPS in Renee’s car instructed him to turn onto a rutted single-lane road. Lou kept the BMW’s speed down, just in case a police cruiser lurked behind a billboard.

It was nineteen minutes until eight o’clock.

Still no plan.

Outside of Monroe, the terrain became flat. The two sets of tracks were on his left, perhaps thirty yards away. In the distance, through the deepening gloom, he could see the silos, brightly illuminated by spots, rising like a mystical metropolis from the tableland. On the far track, the one that he guessed handled westbound traffic, was a train-almost certainly, the train . It was a colossus stretching toward the horizon as far as he could see, perhaps a mile or more long with what seemed an infinite number of cars.

As Lou rolled past the caboose, he could see two men inside. They were at a table, drinking or playing cards, or perhaps both. He chose not to cut his lights. There was no need to call any unwanted attention to himself, and he was far enough away from the train, on the opposite side of the other track, that he could have been any traveler heading west.

Lou drove until he was five or six cars past the caboose, then slowed almost to a stop. The behemoth shook as its rusted wheels struggled to inch forward. Then it stopped for a time before inching forward again.

Is it loading?

Lou’s heart sank. He had no idea how enormous Chester’s train was going to be. Even if he were able to sneak aboard, it would be nearly impossible to locate the car where Cap and George were being held. Then he remembered the number, clearly visible in the photograph.

Fifty-eight.

He checked the picture to be sure. The number was stenciled on the wall behind his two battered friends. Lou looked carefully at the cars as he drove past. Each one was numbered, although in no particular sequence that he could discern. Some of them were standard boxcars and some were grain cars. They represented several different rail lines, and were probably rentals. But a majority of them, particularly the boxcars, belonged to CHESTER RAIL SYSTEMS and had stenciled black numbers at the center of their side, similar to the numbers inside the car holding Cap and George.

Lou had planned simply to walk up to Chester’s storage facility, turn himself over to William, and negotiate-essentially winging it from moment one. Now, he increased his speed, searching for car number fifty-eight, and just as important, a way to get onto it. To his left, the train lurched forward again. Another load.

Lou drove a quarter mile. No fifty-eight.