Sporadically, a few completed questionnaires straggled in. Some days there were one or two, on other days none.
Those that did arrive were routed by the mailroom to an elderly secretary in public relations, Elsie Young, who had been on the special staff but had since returned to her regular job. The questionnaires, in their distinctive postage-paid envelopes, were placed on her desk and, when she had time and inclination, she opened and inspected them, still comparing each with a sample of the handwriting from Georgos Archambault’s journal.
Miss Young hoped the damn things would stop coming soon. She found them tedious, time-wasting, and an intrusion on more interesting work.
On Tuesday, around midmorning, Elsie Young observed that one of the special Consumer Survey envelopes had been dropped into her in-tray by a messenger, along with a sizable batch of interoffice mail. She decided to deal with the interoffice stuff first.
Seconds after Karen concluded her conversation with Nim by touching the phone microswitch with her head, she remembered something she forgot to tell him.
She and Josie had planned to go shopping this morning. Should they still do the shopping, and afterward go to Redwood Grove, or should they cancel the shopping trip and leave for the hospital now?
Karen was tempted to call Nim back and ask his advice, then remembered the strain in his voice and the pressures he must be working under. She would make the decision herself.
What was it he had said about a possible power cut before tomorrow’s scheduled one? “It may not happen, in fact it probably won’t …” And later: “It’s just a long-shot precaution.”
Well … obviously! The sensible thing was to go shopping first, which Karen and Josie both enjoyed. Then they would come back briefly and afterward leave for Redwood Grove. They could still be there by early afternoon, perhaps sooner.
“Josie, dear,” Karen called out in the direction of the kitchen, “I just had a call from Nimrod, and if you’ll come in I’ll tell you about our new plans.”
Georgos Archambault possessed a certain animal instinct about danger. In the past, the instinct had served him well and he had learned to rely on it.
Near noon on Tuesday, as he paraded back and forth restlessly in the confined North Castle apartment, the same instinct warned him that danger was close.
A crucial question was: Should he obey the instinct and, taking a large chance, leave immediately and head for La Mission and the cooling pumps he planned to destroy? Alternatively, should he disregard the instinct and remain until darkness, then leave as originally planned?
A second question, equally important: Was his present instinct genuine or the product of a heightened nervousness?
Georgos wasn’t sure as he debated, within himself, the pros and cons.
He intended to make his final approach to the La Mission plant pump house underwater. Therefore, if he could get safely on the river and reasonably close to the plant, he would submerge and, from then on, the likelihood of his being seen was minimal, even in daylight. In fact, daylight, filtering downward, would help him locate his underwater point of entry more easily than in total darkness.
But could he launch the dinghy and get into it, wearing scuba gear, unobserved? Although the spot he had chosen as a launchpoint—a half-mile from La Mission—was normally deserted, there was always the possibility of someone being there and seeing him, especially during the daytime. Georgos assessed that particular risk as: fair.
The really big hazard in daylight—a horrendous one—was to drive his Volkswagen van through North Castle, and then to La Mission, another fifty miles. A description of the van, and undoubtedly its license number, was in the possession of police, sheriff’s departments and the Highway Patrol. If he were spotted, there was no way he could outrun pursuit. On the other hand, it was eight weeks since the description had been issued and the pigs could have forgotten, or be inattentive. Something else in his favor: There were a lot of beat-up VW vans around and the sight of one more would not be unusual.
Just the same, Georgos assessed the first part of his mission, if undertaken now, as: high risk.
He continued pacing and debating, then abruptly made up his mind. He would trust his instincts about danger. The decision was to go!
Georgos left the apartment at once and went into the adjoining garage. There he began what he had intended doing tonight: Checking his equipment carefully before departure.
He hurried, however, the sense of danger still persisting.
17
“There’s a telephone call for you, Mrs. Van Buren,” a waitress announced, “and I was told to tell you it’s important.”
“Everybody thinks their call is important,” the p.r. director grumbled, “and most times they’re dead wrong.”
But she got up from the table in the GSP & L officers’ dining room where she was lunching with J. Eric Humphrey and Nim Goldman, and went to the telephone outside.
A minute or two later she returned, excitement in her eyes. “One of those Consumer Surveys came back and we’ve got a match on the Archambault handwriting. A half-wit in my department has been sitting on the thing all morning. I’ll ream her out later, but she’s on the way to the Computer Center with it now. I said we’d meet her there.”
“Get Sharlett,” Eric Humphrey said, rising from the table. “Tell her to leave her lunch.” The executive vice president of finance could be seen a few tables away.
While Van Buren did so, Nim went outside to the telephone and called Harry London. The Property Protection chief was in his office and, when informed of what was happening, said he would go to the Computer Center too.
Nim knew that Oscar O’Brien, the only other member of the “think group,” was out of town for the day.
He joined the others—the chairman, Sharlett Underhill and Van Buren—at the elevator outside the dining room.
They had gone through the usual security formalities in entering the Computer Center. Now, the four who had interrupted lunch, plus Harry London, gathered around a table as Teresa Van Buren opened out the Consumer Survey form and a photographed handwriting sample which a chastened Elsie Young had delivered to her a few minutes ago.
It was Eric Humphrey who expressed what was obvious to everyone. “There’s no doubt of it being the same handwriting. Absolutely none.” Even if there were, Nim thought, what was written was a giveaway.
The terrorists you presumptuously describe as smalltime, cowardly and ignorant are none of those things. They are important, wise and dedicated heroes. You are the ignoramuses, as well as criminal exploiters of the people. Justice shall overtake you! Be warned there will be blood and death …
“Why the hell,” Harry London said to no one in particular, “did he take so long?”
Sharlett Underhill held out a hand. “Give that to me.”
Van Buren passed her the questionnaire and the finance chief took it to the portable “black light” which Nim had seen used during his previous visit to the center. Mrs. Underhill snapped the light on and held the form under it. At the top of the sheet the number “9386” stood out.
She led the way to a computer terminal—a keyboard with a cathode ray screen above it—and sat down.
First, Mrs. Underhill tapped in her personal code: 44SHAUND, (It was her age and a compression of her two names.)
The screen instantly signaled: READY. ENTER REQUEST.
She typed in the project name—NORTH CASTLE SURVEY—followed by the secret code, known only to herself and one other, which would release the needed information. The words NORTH CASTLE SURVEY appeared on the screen; the secret code didn’t—the computer’s precaution against others observing and memorizing it.
Immediately the computer signaled: ENTER QUESIONNAIRE NUMBER.
Sharlett Underhill typed in: 9386
The screen flashed back:
OWEN GRAINGER
12 WEXHAM RD., APT E
The city’s name and a zip code followed.
“I got it,?
?? Harry London said. He was already running to a phone.
Slightly more than an hour later Harry London reported personally to Eric Humphrey and Nim, who were in the chairman’s office suite.
“Archambault’s flown the coop,” London said. “If that woman had only opened the questionnaire when it came in this morning …”
Humphrey said sharply, “Recriminations will do us no good. What did the police find at that address?”
“A warm trail, sir. According to a neighbor, a man who’s been seen occasionally before, drove away in a Volkswagen van half an hour before the place was raided. The police have issued an APB for the van, and they have the building staked out in case he comes back. But”—London shrugged—“that guy Archambault has slipped through their hands before.”
“He must be getting desperate,” Nim said.
Eric Humphrey nodded. “I was thinking that too.” He considered, then told Nim, “I want an immediate warning sent to all our plant managers and security personnel. Give them a report of what has happened and repeat Archambault’s description; also get a description of the vehicle he’s driving. Instruct our people everywhere to increase their vigilance and to report anything suspicious or unusual. We’ve been that man’s target before. He may decide to make us one again.”
“I’ll get on it right away,” Nim said, as he wondered: Was there no end to what could happen in a single day?
Georgos hummed a little tune and decided that today his luck was holding.
He had been driving for an hour and a quarter and was almost at the point, near La Mission, where he planned to launch the dinghy. Apparently his VW van had attracted no attention, probably—in part—because he had driven carefully, observing traffic rules and speed limits. He had also avoided freeways where encountering a California Highway Patrol car would have been more likely.
Now he was traversing a gravel road, his first objective less than a mile ahead.
A few minutes later he caught a glimpse of the Coyote River through a tangled growth of underbrush and trees which bordered it in this area. The river was wide at the point he had chosen and soon he could see much more of it. He stopped, where the gravel road ended, about thirty yards from the riverbank.
To Georgos’ relief, no other vehicles or human beings were in sight.
As he began unloading the dinghy and supplies, carrying them in a half-dozen trips toward the river, his excitement and a sense of elation grew.
After the initial trip, he removed the dinghy from its container and inflated it with the pump which was in the package. No problem. Then he pushed the dinghy into the water, tying the painter to a tree, and transferred the equipment into it. There was a compressed-air tank and regulator—the tank filled with an hour’s air supply, a face mask, fins, a snorkel for use if he was near the surface, a waterproof flashlight, a mesh belt, an inflatable vest to give him buoyancy because of the weight he was carrying, a hydraulic metal cutter, and wire cutters.
Last of all, Georgos loaded aboard the cyclindrical Tovex bombs. He had brought eight of them, weighing five pounds each, and they would be fastened to his webbed belt. Georgos had decided that eight bombs were all he could carry; to attempt to take more would be inviting disaster. As it was, the bombs would destroy eight of the eleven water pumps—putting most, if not all, of La Mission’s four operating generators out of action.
The fifth La Mission generator was the one they called Big Lil. Georgos had been sorry, in a way, to read in Sunday’s newspapers that Big Lil was already disabled and would require several months of repairs. Well, maybe after today it would be several months more.
When everything was in the dinghy, and secure, Georgos, who had already discarded his clothing and changed into a wet suit, untied the painter and eased himself aboard. The dinghy at once floated clear of the bank and began moving gently downstream. There was a small paddle, and he used it.
The day was warm and sunny and, in other circumstances, an excursion on the river would have been enjoyable. But he had no time for enjoyment now.
Staying fairly close to the shoreline, he kept a lookout for other people. So far he had seen none. There were some boats in the distance, a long way downstream, but too far away for him to be observed.
In less than ten minutes he could see La Mission plant ahead, with its high smokestacks and the big, functional building which housed boilers and turbine-generators. In another five minutes he decided he was close enough, and paddled into shore. There was a small, shallow-water cove. On reaching it, he slipped out of the dinghy, then, wading in front, tied the painter once more to a tree.
Now he donned the tank, mask, snorkel, belt and fins, and attached the remainder of his load. When everything was in place he took one last look around, then waded out toward midstream. Moments later he slipped into deep water and began swimming, ten feet below the surface. He had already taken a sight on his objective—the plant pump house, a long, low, concrete structure, projecting into the river.
Georgos knew that the pump house had two levels. One, above the water and accessible from other portions of the plant, housed the electric motors which drove the pumps. The second level—mostly underwater—contained the pumps themselves. It was this second level he intended to penetrate.
On the way into the plant, he surfaced twice, quickly, to check his bearings, then went under again to stay out of sight. Soon his forward progress was halted by a concrete wall; he had reached the pump house. Feeling his way along, he began searching for the metal grating through which he would need to cut his way. Almost at once, the pull of the water guided him to it.
The purpose of the grating was to prevent large objects from being drawn in with the cooling water and damaging the pumps. Behind the grating was a wire mesh screen, shaped into a large, horizontal cylinder. The cylinder caught smaller debris and was rotated occasionally to clean it.
Georgos began working on the grating with his hydraulic metal cutter, a compact tool about eighteen inches long and favored by underwater treasure hunters. Soon he had opened a large circle and pulled the metal bars away. The cutout portion dropped to the riverbed. There was no problem about seeing. Ample daylight was coming in from above.
The wire mesh cylinder was now exposed. Georgos knew he would have to cut his way into it from the outside, then make a second hole on the far side to reach the interior pump bay. The distance between the two holes—the cylinder’s diameter—would be about ten feet.
He began snipping away with his wire cutters, smaller than the hydraulic cutter and suspended on a looped cord from his wrist. After a few minutes, another hole was cut. Georgos pulled away the cut circle of mesh, then eased himself carefully through the hole, making sure that none of his equipment snagged. Swimming forward, he began cutting the further screen. Soon that, too, gave way and he passed through.
Now he was fully inside the pump bay. From light filtering down from apertures in the pump house floor above, he was able to make out the bulk of the first pump, directly ahead.
Georgos was not afraid of the suction of the pumps. From his textbook studies he knew that he would only be affected by it if he went deep, which he had no intention of doing.
Using the flashlight, he began looking for a place to locate the first bomb.
Just as he found one—a flat surface on the housing—he sensed movement behind him and turned. There was enough light to see that the wire mesh cylinder through which he had entered, and which had been still, was now rotating, continuously and steadily.
The plant superintendent at La Mission was a bright young engineer, Bob Ostrander. He had been second-in-command to Plant Superintendent Danieli when Danieli, Walter Talbot and two others were killed last July as a result of the bomb, planted by Friends of Freedom, which damaged Big Lil.
Bob Ostrander, ambitious and tough-minded, had wanted to be promoted—but not the way it happened. Danieli had been his good friend and they worked well together. The men’s wives were equally close; thei
r children still used each other’s houses interchangeably.
Because of the manner of Danieli’s death, Ostrander nursed a burning anger about terrorists in general and especially the misnamed Friends of Freedom.
Consequently, when a teletype message arrived in the early afternoon of Tuesday, warning that Georgos Archambault, the Friends of Freedom leader and prime suspect in last year’s Big Lil bombing, might make a new attack on GSP & L property, Bob Ostrander put himself and all his staff on full alert.
On his instructions, the entire La Mission plant was searched immediately for possible intruders. When none were found, attention was directed outward to the plant perimeter. A pair of two-man patrols, which Ostrander organized, was ordered to make continuous rounds of the perimeter fence and report by walkie-talkie any unusual activity or sign of break-in. Guards at the main gate were told: No one, other than company employees, was to be admitted without permission from the superintendent.
Bob Ostrander also telephoned the county sheriff and learned that the sheriff’s department, too, had received information about Georgos Archambault and a Volkswagen van he reportedly was driving.
At Ostrander’s urging, the sheriff diverted two of his patrol cars to search roads in the area of the La Mission plant for any sign of a VW van such as described.
Less than thirty minutes after Bob Ostrander’s call—at 2:35 P.M.—the sheriff reported back that a VW van, positively identified as Archambault’s, had been found abandoned by the Coyote River, a half-mile upstream of the plant. Not far from it were a pump and a package which apparently had contained an inflatable rubber dinghy. An intensive search for Archambault by sheriff’s deputies was now in progress. One deputy sheriff would shortly be on the river in his own motorboat.
Ostrander at once removed several staff members from other duties and sent them to patrol the river side of the plant, their instructions—to sound an alarm at the sight of any boat.