Simple Genius

An idea suddenly interrupted these thoughts. He jumped up. “Come on!”

CHAPTER 76

TOBY RUCKER CALLED HORATIO back while he was packing up. He’d been successful, he’d told the psychologist.

“Around the time you’re talking about, a car was found abandoned about an hour’s drive from here, up in the Smoky Mountains. I was just a freelance reporter at the time, but after reading the story from the archives I remember it fairly well.”

“Who was the car registered to?”

“A William Joyner, sergeant in the Army. He was assigned to the recruitment office they used to have down here. This was back in the late Seventies.”

“And what happened to him?”

“Nobody knows,” Rucker said. “They found the car, but not him. Local police investigated, and the Army sent its people down, but they never did uncover anything.”

“Was Joyner married?”

“Nope. He was in his late twenties. Joined the Army at eighteen. Fought in Vietnam, stayed in the military and had been back in the States about six years when he disappeared.”

Horatio said hesitantly, “Any romantic involvement? Girlfriend?”

“Nothing in the archives about that. Why, you know different?”

“No,” Horatio said quickly.

“Can I ask what your interest in this is? South didn’t fill me in on that.”

“Just call me a curious soul. So the investigation simply hit a dead end?”

“It often does when you can’t turn up a body. Maybe Joyner got tired of the Army and found a better opportunity somewhere else and went AWOL. It happens.”

Horatio thanked the man and clicked off. It looked like William Joyner had had an affair with Frank Maxwell’s wife and then disappeared. His body, assuming he was dead, had never been found. What had Michelle seen all those years ago that had damaged her so badly? Horatio knew the only place he would get those answers was from Michelle herself. Even if her conscious mind had long since buried the memory, he also knew her subconscious would never forget it.

Sean and Michelle pinched some tools from the garage and hid them in a bag. They walked up to the mansion and explained to the guard there that they had come for Horatio. “We’re clearing out, like Champ said to.”

The guard let them through and Michelle and Sean raced up the stairs to the top floor and down the hall toward the room that Sean had first stayed in. Going inside the room, they stopped in front of the wall where Viggie had calculated the secret room, if it existed, would be located.

Sean said, “There has to be a door somewhere, but we don’t have time to find it.” Attacking the wall with their tools, they methodically cut a large hole in it. Shining a flashlight through Sean peered in the hole. “Damn!”

“What is it?”

“You’ll see,” he replied. “Hurry!”

With renewed vigor they attacked the wall. Soon they stepped through a large hole and stared at walls of electronic devices. On the other side of the wall there appeared to be a door. Sean pointed at it. “It’s accessed from the other room, the one that was dead-bolted.”

There was a bank of TV screens against one wall that was showing the interior of all the huts.

“That’s Hut Number One,” Sean said, pointing to one screen.

“And Champ’s Hut Number Two,” Michelle said, pointing to another screen.

She motioned to a bank of computer screens against another wall. Streams of numbers were flowing across all of them.

“They’re secretly recording the data on the computers in Champ’s hut,” Sean exclaimed.

“So Len Rivest was right. There is a spy at Babbage Town, an electronic one,” Michelle said. She glanced up at a red light blinking on a device on one wall. “Oh, shit, is that what I think it is?” she cried out.

They plunged through the hole and ran toward the stairs as the silent alarm burned red.

“What about Horatio?” Michelle called out.

Sean stopped dead, turned back and raced down another corridor. He pounded on Horatio’s door. When Horatio opened it Sean grabbed him and hustled him down the hall.

“Why are we running?” Horatio puffed.

“Avoiding death,” Michelle snapped.

At that, the little psychologist put on an enviable burst of speed.

“How are we getting out of here?” Michelle asked. “The front entrance is guarded.”

“By boat,” Sean answered. “Come on!”

The three made their way quickly down to the boathouse catching only two glimpses of guards along the way and neither one seemed to know about the break-in at the secret room.

“Are we sure that silent alarm was even working?” Michelle said.

“Should we call Sheriff Hayes?” Horatio suggested.

“I’m not trusting anyone right now,” Sean replied firmly.

They reached the boathouse and Sean broke open the storage shed, grabbed the keys for the Formula boat, lowered the lift and they were soon in the water and drifting down the York on idle throttle with their running lights off.

“Keep a lookout,” Sean warned.

Michelle seemed puzzled.

“What’s the matter?” Sean asked as he looked at her from the captain’s chair.

“Why did Viggie come down to the boathouse, get in a kayak and paddle out into the river?”

“You said she didn’t say why.”