Nelson Demille - Wild fire

The road was well traveled and cut through open country, farms, and hamlets. We were definitely out of the Adirondack Mountain region and into the Great Lakes plains. Back there in God’s country, where the bears outnumbered the people and road traffic was light, Kate and I would attract attention and be remembered. Here, we blended in with the general population. As long as I kept my smart mouth shut.

The little Hyundai handled well, but I’d wanted a four-wheel drive in case we needed to crash the fence at Custer Hill at some point in time. Like tonight.

I asked Kate, “How much ammo do you have?”

She didn’t reply.

“Kate?”

“Two extra magazines in my briefcase.”

I had one magazine in my inside jacket pocket. I never carry enough ammo. Maybe if I had a briefcase or a purse, I’d carry an extra magazine. “Is there a sporting-goods store in Canton?”

Without answering, she flipped through a local guide, then said, “Here’s an ad for a sporting-goods store in Canton.”

“Good.”

We drove in silence, and within ten minutes, she said, “Turn here onto Route 68. Look for Wilma’s B and B.”

“Maybe we can open a B and B. You’ll cook and clean. I’ll shoot at the arriving guests.”

No reply.

I saw the sign for Wilma’s and pulled into a gravel drive that ran through a rolling field dotted with evergreens. Up ahead was a Cape Cod-style house with a covered porch.

I stopped the car, and we got out and stepped up to the porch. I looked back toward the highway, which was barely visible.

Kate asked me, “Okay?”

“Perfect. Looks like someplace where Bonnie and Clyde would stay.”

She rang the doorbell, and a minute later, a middle-aged gent opened the door and asked, “Can I help you?”

Kate said, “We’d like a room for the night.”

“Well, you came to the right place.”

That must be the local line. They probably said the same thing when you showed up at the hospital for an emergency appendectomy.

We went inside to a small office space in the foyer, where the proprietor, Ned, said, “You got your choice. Two rooms upstairs, or two cottages.”

I said, “We’ll take a cottage.”

He showed us two photos. “That’s Pond House-it’s on a pond. And this here’s the Field House.”

The Field House looked suspiciously like a house trailer. Kate said, “I think the Pond House. John?”

“Right.” I asked Ned, “Do you have outside phone lines in these cottages?”

He chuckled. “Sure do. Got electricity, too.”

I wanted to tell him we’d just come from a luxury resort without television or phone service, but he wouldn’t believe that.

He said, “Pond House has cable TV and VCR, and you got Internet hookup.”

“No kidding? Hey, do you have a laptop I could borrow or rent?”

“Got one you can use for free, if you get it back to me by six-thirty. That’s when the wife goes on eBay to check her auction. That woman buys junk, then she sells it back on eBay. She says she’s making money, but I don’t think so.”

If I wasn’t trying to keep a low profile, I’d tell him that she was probably fucking the UPS guy. But I just smiled.

Anyway, I paid cash for the room, which Ned appreciated, and he didn’t seem to need any ID or security deposit. He handed me his laptop, worth about a thousand bucks. I thought about asking him for a six-pack of beer while I was at it, but I didn’t want to impose on his hospitality.

Ned gave us a key to the cottage, some basic house rules, and directions to Pond House. “Just follow your nose.”

That would have put me in his kitchen, but I think he meant get in the car first.

Kate and I went to the car, and she said to me, “Do you see how nice and trusting people are here?”

“I seem to be missing my wallet.”

She ignored that and continued, “This is like where I was raised in Minnesota.”

“Well, they did a good job there. Let’s discuss relocation later.”

I followed my nose for a hundred yards, and we came to a little shingled cottage on a pond.

Kate took her briefcase, and we entered. It was a decent enough place, with a combination sitting room, bedroom, and kitchen decorated in what looked like eclectic eBay. Out back was an enclosed porch that overlooked the pond. Hopefully, there was an indoor bathroom somewhere.

Kate was inspecting the kitchen, and I asked her, “What’s in the fridge?”

She opened the door. “A lightbulb.”

“Call room service.”

She again ignored me and found the bathroom.

I picked up the phone on the writing desk and called Dick Kearns, collect.

He accepted the charges and asked me, “Why am I paying for this call?”

“I’m in jail, and I already used my free phone call to call my bookie.”

“Where are you? Who’s Wilma on my caller ID?”

“Ned’s wife. How’d you make out?”

“With what? Oh, Pushkin. Russian writer. Dead. No further information.”

Dick apparently felt the need to jerk me around in lieu of billing me. I said, “Come on, Dick. This is important.”

“First, I’m required to ask you, What is your clearance?”

“Five feet, eleven inches.”

“Unfortunately, Detective Corey, most of this stuff is not available to people under six feet, but I’ll just write here that you’ve applied for a six-foot clearance.”

The old joke out of the way, Dick said, “Okay. Ready to copy?”

“Hold on.” Kate had come out of the bathroom and pulled up a kitchen chair near the desk. I said to Dick, “I’m putting us on speaker.” I hit the Speaker button, hung up, and said, “Say hello to Kate.”

“Hi, Kate.”

“Hi, Dick.”

“I’m glad you’re there to keep this guy out of trouble.”

“I’m trying.”

“Did I ever tell you about the time-?”

“Dick,” I interrupted, “we’re on a tight schedule.”

“Yeah, me, too. Okay, ready?”

Kate got her notebook, and I took the pad and pencil from the desk and said, “Shoot.”

“All right. Putyov, Mikhail. Born in Kursk, Russia, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, 18 May 1941. Father deceased 1943, Red Army captain, killed in action. Mother deceased, no further info. Subject attended… I can’t pronounce these fucking Russian words-”

“Spell them.”

“Right.” He filled us in on Mikhail Putyov’s education, and my eyes were glazing over until he said, “He graduated from Leningrad Polytechnic Institute with an advanced degree in nuclear physics. And later, he was associated with the… what the hell…? Kurchatov? Yeah, Kurchatov Institute in Moscow… This says it’s a major Soviet nuclear facility, and this guy did research there.”

I didn’t comment, but Kate and I exchanged glances.

Dick asked, “Is that what you’re looking for?”

“What else?”

“Well, then he worked in a borscht factory, dropping little potatoes in the soup.”

“Dick-”

“He worked on the Soviet nuclear weapons program someplace in Siberia…” He spelled the name of some town or installation. “This stuff seems to be classified, and from 1979 to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, there’s not much info.”

“Okay… how reliable is this information?”

“Some of it I got directly from the FBI. Putyov is on their watch list. Most of it I got from Putyov’s own C.V., which is posted on the website where he works.”

“Where is that?”

“Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He’s a full professor there.”

“What’s he teach?”

“Not Russian history.”

“Right-”

“I also got some stuff on him online from academic journals. He’s well respected.”