Wes sat down on one of the chrome bar stools and removed his gloves. “As long as it’s hot, I’d love some.”
“Me too.” Dutch sat next to Wes.
“Your face doesn’t look too good, Dutch.”
“Yeah, I think I may need some stronger antibiotic cream.”
“Then you’ve come to the right place. I’ll get it for you as soon as the coffee is ready.” Their unusual attire hadn’t escaped him. He remarked on it as he spooned instant coffee crystals into three mugs. “Are you going skiing?”
Wes glanced at Dutch, yielding the floor to him. Before they got there, he had coached Dutch on the best way to approach William Ritt. “He’s a nerd. He’s always been a nerd, an outsider who wanted to be in our circle when there wasn’t a chance in hell of his ever getting in. So flatter him. Make him feel that he’s on our team and essential to our plan.”
“He is essential to our plan,” Dutch had said. “That’s the hell of it.”
Dutch hadn’t been at all happy about having to suck up to a weasel like William Ritt. Now that it was time for him to make his pitch, Wes held his breath.
Dutch began by coughing behind his hand, then assuming a grave expression. “I didn’t come here this morning for coffee or medicine for my face.”
“Oh?”
“Thi
s may seem like an odd request, William,” he continued in the same solemn voice. “In order to even ask it, I must take you into my confidence about an official matter.”
Excellent, Wes thought.
“You know I’d never betray your trust,” William said.
“We need to use your snowmobiles.”
“Thought you’d never ask.”
If he had said he’d once been a body double for Tarzan movies, they couldn’t have been more stunned. Dutch was the first to find his voice. “Excuse me?”
William smiled. “As I was driving here this morning, thinking how bad the roads still are, and how long it was going to be before I could get back up to my folks’ place on the mountain and resume my restoration, it suddenly occurred to me that I don’t need a car to get up there. I can take one of my new snowmobiles. It then occurred to me that I could offer them to SAC Begley—”
“Not Begley.”
Wes had to curb the impulse to lay a restraining hand on Dutch’s arm. He’d spoken too sharply. William’s ears perked up. They needed a quick save, and Dutch didn’t have the reflexes for it. Wes said, “This is where the confidentiality comes in. No one’s supposed to know this, but Begley has ordered a helicopter up here later today.”
“Why isn’t anyone supposed to know?”
“Hell, his case got blown yesterday by those yahoos on the radio. Can’t begin to tell you how pissed he was over that snafu. Imagine what would happen if word of a chopper got out. One equipped with all the high-tech gewgaws the FBI has at its disposal, guys in black suits and ski masks, automatic weapons, ropes and stuff. Begley would be up to his armpits in gawkers who would endanger themselves as well as his rescue operation.”
“I see what you mean.”
“This morning Begley and Wise will be busy organizing that mission,” Dutch said, having caught on to the manipulation tactic. “Wes and I are serving as an advance team. That is, if we can use your snowmobiles.”
“Certainly. I’m only sorry I didn’t think of them yesterday. You could have been spared that disaster with Hawkins.”
“Yesterday it wouldn’t have been safe to drive them. It was snowing too hard, and that road is tricky on a clear day.”
“I’m glad to make them available to you now.”
Wes’s shoulders relaxed. “Are they ready to go?”
William nodded. “Before I bought them, I had a mechanic check them out. They’re in showroom condition. The keys for them are at my house. We can pick them up on our way to the garage. While I’m changing clothes, Marilee can make coffee for us to take along.”
“You’re not going.”