Why didn't you stop them from entering the park?
"I tried, but by the time our internal security forces could act, it was too late. De Croix and Castile have already been in the 92
park for two hours and both refuse to leave. We can only keep our fingers crossed that Rondheim's killers stick to their time schedule."
"Cutting it a bit fine, aren't you?" Pitt said slowly.
Kippmann shrugged indifferently. "Some things YOU can Control, others you can only stand by and watch."
The car turned off the freeway onto Harbor Boulevard and soon pulled up to the employees' gate, and while the driver showed his credentials and asked directions from the guard, Pitt leaned out the window and watched the monorail train pass overhead. they were at the north end of the park and all he could see over the landscaped mounds that surrounded the buildings was the top half of the Matterhorn and the turrets on the Fantasyland castle. The gate was pushed open and they were passed in.
By the time Pitt walked down the underground hallway to the park security offices, he was beginning to think how good that hospital bed in Reykjavik had felt and wondered how soon he could fall into a replacement. He wasn't sure what he expected to find in the park security offices but he had hardly envisioned what he stepped into.
The main conference room was huge; it looked like a scaleddown version of the war room at the Pentagon. The main table ran for at least fifty feet and was circled by over twenty people. There was a radio in one corner and the operator was busily pointing out locations to a marker who stood on a ramp beneath a map that must have stretched ten feet high and covered half the facing wall. Pitt walked slowly around the table and stood under the beautifully contoured and painted map of Disneyland.
He was studying the many colored lights and the trail of blue fluorescent tape the marker was laying throulh the park traffic areas when Kippmann tapped him on the shoulder.
"Ready to go to work?"
"My body is still running on Iceland time. It's past five o'clock there. I could stand a little bracer."
"I'm sorry, sir." The words came from a big man, a tall pipe-smoking man whose eyes stared out at Pitt from behind fashionable rimless glasses. "Alcohol has never been permitted in any area of the park since we opened. And we intend to keep it that way."
"Sorry about that," Pitt said goodnaturedly. He looked at Kippmann expectantly.
Kippmann took the cue. "Major Dirk Pitt, allow me to introduce Mr. Dan Lazard, Chief of Park security."
Lazard's grip was firm. "Mr. Kippmann has filled me in concerning your injuries. Do you think you're up to this?"
"I can handle it," Pitt said somberly. "But we'll have to do something about my bandaged profile-it's a bit conspicuous."
Lazard's eyes.
A glint of amusement came into Lazard's eye.
"Think we can fix it so no one will notice your bandages-not even the nurse who taped them."
Later Pitt stoed in front of the full-length mirror and struck a menacing pose. He was torn between uttering laughter or a stream of four-lettered words from embarrassment as he stared at the life-sized figure of the Big Bad Wolf, who politely stared back at him.
"You've got to admit," Kippmann said, fighting back a chuckle, "your own mother wouldn't recognize you in that rig."
"I suppose it is in keeping with my character," Pitt said. He removed the wolf's head, sat down in a chair and sighed. "How much time have we left?"
"Another hour and forty minutes to go before Kelly's deadline."
"Don't you think I should be sent in the game now? You're not leaving me much time to spot the killers . . . if I can spot them."
"Between my men, the park security staff and agents from the F.B.I there must be close to forty people concentrating every effort on stopping the assassination. I'm saving you for when we Come down to the wire."
"Scraping the bottom of the barrel for a last-ditch attempt." Pitt leaned back and relaxed. "I can't say I agree with your tactics."
"You're not working with amateurs, Major. Every one of those people out there are pros. Some are dressed in costumes like you, some are walking hand in hand like lovers on a holiday, some are playing the part of families enjoying the rides, others have taken over as attendants. We even have men stationed on roofs and in the dummy second-st
ory offices with telescopes and binoculars." Kippmann's voice was soft, but it carried total conviction. "The killers will be found and stopped before they do their dirty work. The odds we've stacked against Kelly meeting his goal and deade are staggering."
"Tell that to Oskar Rondheim," Pitt said. "There's the flaw that knocks the hell out of your good intentions-you don't know your adversary."
The silence lay heavy in the small room. Kippmann rubbed his palms across his face, then shook his head slowly, as if he were about to do something he intensely disliked. He picked up the ever-present briefcase and handed Pitt a folder marked simply 078-34.