The Generals by W.E.B. Griffin Read Free Book Online Page B

Parker said, “I have been seriously considering moving my vigil to the bar. Perhaps you would care to join me?”
    “I think that’s a splendid idea, Colonel,” Denn said. “Give me a minute to tell the manager where we will be.”
    Parker nodded stiffly.
    They had been in the bar half an hour, and had just ordered a second drink, when the airport manager’s secretary came to them.
    “Mr. Denn, the tower’s got a report on your Aero Commander. It’s five minutes out.”
    “Where can I meet it?”
    She looked a little embarrassed.
    “We tried to save a place close by for them,” she said. “But somebody just parked there. It’ll be way down at the end, I’m afraid.”
    She pointed down the airfield. Sioux Falls was jammed during pheasant season with hunters, many of whom came by private aircraft. There were, Denn judged, well over a hundred private aircraft already on the field, ranging from corporate jets to small Cessnas and Pipers.
    “Colonel, I have a station wagon just outside. Why don’t you come with me?” Denn asked.
    “There are five of them, plus their luggage,” Colonel Parker said. “I think it would be best if we took two cars.”
    As Denn retrieved the Hertz Mercury Park Lane station wagon from the parking lot, he saw Colonel Parker unlock the door of a black Cadillac Fleetwood. The car bore Kansas license plates, and Denn put that together with the coating of road grime and deduced that Colonel Parker had driven to South Dakota from Kansas.
    As the security guard unlocked the hurricane fence to pass him through, Denn stopped and rolled down the window and told him the Cadillac was with him. Then he drove down the line of parked aircraft to the end of the access road pavement. Because the moon was nearly full, there was enough light for him to see a white-and-red Aero Commander (a six-place, twin-engined, high-winged airplane) coming in to land two hundred feet over the prison. The prison, he supposed, had been built in “the country” long before there were airplanes. And the airport had probably started as a dirt strip. The result was that on approaches from the west, aircraft passed directly over the prison yard. It was hardly, Denn thought, what you could call good public relations for Sioux Falls.
    When the Aero Commander touched down and rolled past on the runway, he turned to see if Colonel Parker had made the connection, and for the first time noticed that the colonel was not alone in his Fleetwood. There were two passengers in the back seat, looking with dignified curiosity out the windows. Colonel Parker had brought his own Labrador retrievers with him.
    The Aero Commander taxied back from the end of the runway, turned into line beside a Twin-Beech, and stopped. The rear door almost immediately opened, and a young man wearing a blue nylon insulated jacket got out. Without a word, he went to the tail of the airplane, turned his back to Denn and Colonel Parker, and relieved himself.
    Next out was a pleasant-faced Irishman, in the act of zipping up a hooded parka. He too headed for the tail of the airplane.
    Denn glanced at Colonel Parker. He was not smiling. He was obviously offended at open-air urination.
    Next out of the airplane was a stocky, ruddy-faced man. Either he or the other one was General Hanrahan, Denn decided.
    A fuel truck drove up, distracting Denn’s attention. When he turned around again, another man had gotten out of the airplane. He was dressed in a tweed coat, sweater, and open-collared shirt. And he was enormous, probably weighing two twenty-five or more. Denn expected that he too would go to relieve himself, and he did. Last out of the airplane was a tall, handsome blond man. He saluted Colonel Parker and, looking somewhat sheepish, joined the others at the tail of the airplane.
    When he had finished, the tall handsome officer went to Colonel Parker and offered his hand.
    “Have we kept you waiting long, sir?” he asked.
    “There are rest facilities in the