Everything had been put back in Jean's bags more or less the way she had left them, and Hannibal and B.A. retreated to their own room for the time being. Face and Murdock stayed in the room, each leaning against the headboards on the beds; Face flipping through the channels on TV but not paying attention to anything he saw, and Murdock looked equally zoned out and absentmindedly stroked his hand back and forth as he petted Billy beside him on the bed. When they heard the water shut off, Murdock signaled for Billy to be quiet and picked him up and hid him under the bed. The bathroom door opened and a curtain of steam made its way out as Jean emerged dressed in Murdock's clothes, and made a beeline over to one of her bags and dug out the bottle of peroxide and sat down on the foot of Murdock's bed to apply a new splash of it. Face turned and watched her as she poured it in her hands and smacked her cheeks with it, and he couldn't help remarking, "What're you doing? You don't slap peroxide on like aftershave."
"Why not?" she replied, "That's how I've always done it."
"If you're going to do that, do it in the bathroom," Face told her, "Over the sink."
Murdock looked over to Face; Jean had no way of knowing it but Murdock could tell that there was no energy in Face's whine and that he was only saying it out of a habit of complaining about any little thing. He wasn't even looking at her anymore, he just stared ahead at the TV on the other side of the room. Murdock turned and looked at Jean to watch her response; she didn't pay Face any mind and just ignored him entirely, as far as Murdock could tell, she didn't have any idea that they knew.
So that was why she had acted the way she did towards them. It hadn't made much sense, based on how highly her parents had spoken about her and how joining the military had gone against everything she ever seemed to stand for, how she could possibly become the bitter person that she was. Of course he knew what they all knew, what she had been a witness to would be reason enough to do that to a person; war didn't just kill people, it killed innocence, it killed hope, it killed everything good that existed in the people who survived, and that's exactly what this was, it was a war, a war against the men who trained the soldiers who fought for their own country. That in itself was a mind blowing thought that he still couldn't fully wrap his head around.
But even so, they had all noticed every snide remark she made towards Hannibal and anybody else when they got in her way or interrupted her plans. And all the traps she had set for them; the bomb, the ipecac in the soda, the trip wires at the house, never anything really dangerous, just enough to give somebody a start, and for most people it would've been enough for them to reconsider their position. But it hadn't worked on them, they'd stayed after this kid despite all the things she did, and tried to do, and now they knew why she had done them. It wasn't merely that she had become so venomous by the experiences of the last six months; she treated them as horribly as she did in a desperate effort to make them drop the case, to get away from her, because she believed by doing so, she was protecting them from being killed.
And it didn't make any sense. How could she possibly think their lives would be in anymore danger now than they had been in the last 10 years? Sure, it was riskier with the military being involved, but so what? It was a safe bet that none of these men who were involved with the trafficking ring had any connection to Lynch or anybody on his side. And they had all agreed they wouldn't bring it up with her, but because of that, they would never know what the answer was, they could only guess; unless something happened that she suddenly decided to bring it up with one of them, but that was unlikely. Murdock knew that Hannibal had been on the lookout from the get-go for any sign that Jean might be suicidal, even checking her wrists when they'd first arrived at the hotel back in Ohio; and a search of all her belongings had turned up nothing that would suggest it, but he knew the colonel was still concerned with the idea. As for himself, he really didn't have any idea, he did not think that Jean had it in her to kill herself, that she actually would, and he hoped he was right.
"So what's the plan for today?" Jean asked as she put the bottle back in her bag and laid out on the other side of the bed beside Murdock.
"Not much," Face answered, "It's going to rain later so there's no point in us going out to the pool."
"Just as well," Jean replied as she turned her head to the side and closed her eyes, "I'm tired."
And within five minutes she was out like a light. Murdock reached over and placed his hand on her shoulder, figuring that maybe the contact would ward off any further nightmares for the time being.
Tomorrow David Grant would be coming to this hotel and then he would be going to meet up with the final link of the chain, Jack Saunders, although by now everybody was starting to think the same thing; with so many people dead, wouldn't it only make sense for the two remaining members to build the whole thing up again? That was something they had to find out. They had to end this once and for all. Jean was right, they couldn't bring down the whole trafficking business but they could sure as hell try and end it here where the military was concerned.
The rains came in the early afternoon and poured down with a vengeance; there wasn't anything for anybody to do except sit around and wait for something to happen. Jean had slept through lunch and Face and Murdock tried to be quiet so they didn't wake her; Murdock managed to slip off the bed without disturbing her and instead moved over to the other one with Face and they watched TV for a while. Around 1:30 Jean started to come around and as she woke up with her face buried in the pillow, she turned, and froze.
"Murdock," she said, quietly and somberly, though she was facing opposite them.
The two men looked over to the other bed and Murdock said, "What is it?"
Jean still didn't move from where she lay and she said in the same quiet tone, "Your dog is staring at me."
"Billy, I told you to stay off the bed," Murdock got up and went over to the other bed.
"Get him off," Jean told him as if they were dealing with a poisonous snake instead of an invisible dog, "Get him away from me."
Murdock was in front of her and started to reach for the edge of the bed, but he stopped, and he looked at Jean and told her, "No."
That surprised Jean and also Face, who couldn't help but watch this with the utmost curiosity to see what was going to happen now.
Murdock knelt down beside the bed and said to Jean, "Billy's a good dog, he ain't gonna bite you, now…" he pointed to the space where the dog apparently was, "Animals know about people, they know who to trust and who not to trust, Billy obviously likes you, so I want you to be nice to him too…go ahead, pet him, you'll see."
Jean pulled herself up and turned over so she was half sitting up; slowly, reluctantly, she reached her hand out with the palm up, the way people do to let a dog get familiar with their scent. Face couldn't believe what he was seeing, he couldn't believe in the first place that Jean was actually able to see Billy, but he really couldn't believe what he was watching now. Jean still looked like she expected the dog to bite her, but when nothing happened, she raised her hand and slowly started to pet the dog's head; and Face took note of how her hand was shaking as she did it, as if she were encountering a Doberman pinscher instead of whatever kind of dog Billy was, she was expecting for Billy to bite her. He just knew that if B.A. were here to see this now, he would swear they both were crazy.
A smile formed on Murdock's face that quickly grew into an ear-to-ear grin and he seemed pleased by what was happening. "See, I told you Billy liked you." He petted Billy on the head and added, "And I told you she'd learn to like you too, boy."
"Murdock, I got a question," Jean told him as she sat up against the headboard, "What's the matter with B.A.?"
"Oh nothing, he's just an angry mudsucker," he explained, "I've told him before he needs to learn to chill out."
"No, I mean why is he always saying that there isn't any dog?" Jean asked, "Why can't he see Billy?"
"Oh," Murdock replied, "Well you see, to some people, like B.A., Billy is invisible, he can't see Billy so he doesn't believe Billy exists…of course we know better, don't we?"
"That's right," Jean nodded, "Us normal people."
Face couldn't help laughing at that one.
The rain had carried on all afternoon before slowly dying off, building up into a storm that hit that night. Outside the hotel the rain beat down in sheets, ever few seconds lightning lit up the rooms, followed by thunder that varied between low rumbles and earth shattering booms. It wasn't the storm that was keeping B.A. awake but it didn't help either. He'd spent the last half hour rolling around in the bed trying to get to sleep but all with no success, whereas in the other bed Hannibal had been out cold for over an hour already. Trying again, B.A. flopped over onto his side and thought a different position might help, but as he started to close his eyes, he could hear something other than just the storm. At first he wasn't sure what it was, but the noise gradually became louder and he realized that it was somebody talking in the room next door. The voices grew louder and he could hear somebody giggling and Murdock carrying on in one of his crazy voices.
"Oh no," he tiredly grumbled as his one open eye rolled in his head.
He was only slightly surprised to hear the voice that asked, "What is it, B.A?" he should've known Hannibal wouldn't be asleep if he wasn't.
"That crazy fool's at it again, Hannibal," B.A. groaned.
Hannibal sat up and also heard the muffled talking next door, but he only grinned and replied as he lay back down, "Ah, let them have their fun, tomorrow things are going to start to get ugly."
As far as B.A. was concerned, they already were with Murdock in tow.
Face, Murdock and Jean had still been up when the storm hit. It had come out of nowhere and the first BOOM that made the room shake had all three of them diving under the bed on an impulse. Face and Jean were the first ones to show their faces again and crawl halfway out, Murdock hadn't followed them. Instead he had crawled out under the other side of the bed, and they could hear a low, labored breathing and they turned and saw the dark figure rising up on the other side. Murdock had slipped on a black robe Face had in his suitcase and kept one side of it pulled up over his nose and mouth like Dracula with his cape.
"Murdock, what're you doing?" Face asked as they stood up and saw him.
He shook his head, "Not Murdock," he said in a low voice, lowering the robe he bore a toothy, sinister grin that showed off his teeth and he said with a slight hiss, "Count Orlok!" He went over to Face and added, "I need…ba-lood! And if I don't get it I shall be forced to…to…" he grabbed Face by the neck of his shirt and said, in one of his more normal voices, "Give you a hickey!" And he lowered his mouth, wrapped his lips around a section of the flesh on Face's neck, but instead of biting him he blew razzberries on his neck and made Face laugh, a little too loud for their comfort with the people next door but when the wall didn't explode they took it as a sign that B.A. hadn't heard them.
"Shhhh," Jean told them, struggling not to laugh, and in a dead-on Elmer Fudd impersonation she said, "Be vewy vewy quiet, the big angry mudsucker's trying to sleep!"
They all fell against each other and sank to the floor laughing with their hands covering their mouths.
Murdock had found a flashlight and used it to make animal shadow puppets on the wall, with all the sound effects included, the problem was Face and Jean couldn't figure out what he was doing, things like the dodo bird and a three-toed-sloth.
"He really is nuts, isn't he?" Jean murmured to Face.
"I resent that," Murdock told her, "I was promoted to condiments last month."
When they gave up on guessing his animals, Murdock's next idea was they tell scary stories, and he went first but wound up being put out of commission halfway through the ghost story because he kept getting too loud and might wake up the others. Face and Jean tackled him and pulled him down on the bed and Jean picked up the pillows and buried his face under them; not hard enough to smother him, just to muffle his incessant jabbering.
"Alright," Face said as he turned the flashlight on her, "You go next if you think you can do any better."
"Gladly," Jean said as she got off of Murdock and stood in the middle of the room, "This is one I heard a long time ago, so forgive me if it ain't perfect."
"Just get on with it," Face coyly remarked, deliberately shining the flashlight in her eyes to mess with her.
Jean put her hand up and when the light was lowered she slowly got around to starting and said, "Well, there was a young woman who always attended the early Sunday morning services at the church. One morning when she was still in bed she could hear the bells ringing, so she hurried up and got dressed, put on her coat and hat and ran out the door so she wouldn't be late. It was cold and still dark out because it was late in the year, and as she hurriedly walked to the church she noticed that there wasn't anybody else around; as she walked, she walked alone, there wasn't any traffic, nobody walking by, nobody coming or going, the whole town seemed to be empty. She got to the church that stood next to an old cemetery, and went in, and the lights were low but she found a spot and got seated in a pew towards the back. She looked around, waiting for the priest to start the sermon, and she didn't recognize anybody there. Finally she turned and saw one woman she recognized…but then she remembered that this woman had died last month."
Face turned to the small gasping sound on his right and said, "Murdock, I think you sprung a leak."
"Sorry," Murdock whispered in response, his jaw still dropped and his eyes wide as he listened to every word.
"When the woman looked around again, all the men and women had turned to skeletons and ghosts in suits and dresses. And she knew that they were angry at her because a living person had intruded upon the service for the dead. The dead woman turned to her and told her if she valued her life, that she would leave right after the benediction. When she did, she grabbed her coat and hat and tried to move towards the door before anybody spotted her. But as she neared the door, she could hear the others getting up and starting to follow after her, so she took off running, but she ran behind the church, through the cemetery, and it was there that the ghosts started to catch up with her."
Jean went over to the bed and grabbed Face by the arms and jerked him to his feet and she dug her nails into his skin and told him, "One of them ripped the hat off of her head, another one tore her coat off, and she could feel the long bony tips of the skeletons' fingers digging into her skin as they yelled at her to get out, to never return." She scratched him and left long red marks on his arms like he'd been mauled by a dog, he let out a small gasp of initial shock but otherwise didn't make any noise. "She finally reached the cemetery's gate and ran out and got back on the main road and ran for home, and by this time the sun was starting to come up and everything appeared to be normal again. When the woman got home she started to wonder if she had just been dreaming, and she got undressed and went back to bed. When she woke up later, she realized she couldn't find her coat or her hat anywhere, so, terrified of what she might find but already suspecting that it was true, she returned to the cemetery and found her coat and hat discarded by one of the tombstones, torn entirely to shreds."
Murdock let out another small gasp and they looked and saw him with a hand clenched around his throat. Jean laughed and shook her head dismissively and told Face, "It's too bad it ain't true, if we could get Lynch and his boys in a church like that and lock them in, and let nature of the dead take its course, then that would be the end of that problem and without blood on anybody's hands."
Murdock got both their attention when he started making a low throaty howling sound and he placed his arms up and straight out in front of him and started to walk like a zombie murmuring, "Out, out, out damn spot out!"
"Na," Jean shook her head, "Spot don't want to go out, let the dog stay inside."
The whole room was lit up by a blinding white flash of lightning and only a second later they felt the room shake with another earth shattering BOOM of thunder, and this time they could hear the electricity crackling in the room. Face felt somebody on either side of him and started to find it hard to breathe and he let out a choked gasp as he pushed them away from him.
As it got later in the night, Face made the suggestion that they turned in, and nobody argued although Murdock couldn't help asking 'into what?' As they got ready for bed, Murdock debated with himself over where he should sleep and decided he would bunk with Face and let Jean have the other bed; he knew that if anything happened during the night he could just hop over from one to the other. When Face was in the bathroom changing for the night, Murdock went over to Jean's bed and just made sure that she didn't need him to stay with her for the night. Jean was already half asleep and shook her head and told him everything was fine; all the same Murdock couldn't resist tucking her in for the night and emphasizing getting her in nice and tight so she couldn't escape. As Face returned to the bedroom, Murdock picked up his Bogey Bear and went over to the other bed, but Jean sat up and called over to him in a whispered voice, "Murdock…Murdock!"
Both men came over to the bed and Murdock, still clutching the bear in one arm asked, "What is it?"
"I got it from a good source that when little bears are bad," Jean pointed to Bogey, "They get sent to America for boys and girls to play with, so if I were you, I'd keep an eye on Bogey, no telling what he might do."
Murdock looked shocked and he looked down at the teddy bear he was holding and held Bogey up and looked him up and down and asked, "You wouldn't try anything now, would you, Bogey?" and shook his head and shook the bear's head too.
Face didn't know what time it was but he had a good idea it was still too early. He rolled over in bed and brought a pillow up over his head to try and block out the noise of the cartoons on TV, but he could still hear Murdock and Jean laughing. Finally he forced his eyes open and turned over and looked at the two of them sitting on the floor watching The New Three Stooges cartoons on TV.
"I thought they took that show off the air years ago," Face murmured as he brought the pillow back up to his face, "And kept it off where it belonged."
All he got in response was heckling from the peanut gallery.
"Come on Facey," Murdock said as he gestured to the TV, "This combines the two best things on television, cartoons and the Three Stooges, what could possibly be better than that?"
"Yeah," Jean agreed, "I grew up on these."
"Who could ever forget," Murdock continued, and pointing his two index fingers like pistols, said in a mock gruff voice, "Get out of Town by Sundown Brown!"
"And Tim Bear!" Jean added.
"That's right!" Murdock said, "And remember the abominable snowman?" Murdock got up on his feet and hands and hopped up and down like a monkey and added, "Will you play with me? I'm fun, will you play with me?"
"And he could turn into anything," Jean recalled, "A dancing bear, a penguin."
And both of them said in a bad Ted Lewis impersonation, "Ye-s sir, is e-verybody happy?"
"Not everybody," Face replied from where he lay on the bed.
"Aw come on, Face," Murdock said.
"Yeah," Jean reached up behind her and slapped her hand against his behind with only the sheet and his pajamas between them. Face shot up in bed with a yelp and turned over.
"Alright, alright!" he said as he threw back the covers and jumped to his feet, "I'm up, I'm up, I'm up! Alright?"
"We heard you the first time, now shut up fool!" B.A.'s voice rang through the wall.
"What time is it, anyway?" Face asked.
"6:30," Murdock answered, "We've been up a long time waiting for you to come around."
Face ran a hand through his hair that was standing up in parts and he grabbed his clothes for the day and went into the bathroom to get a shower.
"How do you put up with him?" Jean asked Murdock as she went over to the TV and changed the channel to the real Three Stooges.
"Aw honey he grows on you in time, like a big wart," Murdock told her, "After a while you learn to love him."
"And the others?" Jean asked.
"Oh B.A.'s really easy to like," Murdock said, "He may be an angry mudsucker but he's a nice guy, he just don't like showing it."
"And Smith?"
"Hmmm," Murdock squeezed his eyes almost shut and looked up like he was trying to think, "Hannibal's a bit more of an acquired taste. You have to get to know him before you really start to like him."
"Yeah well," Jean moved back towards him on the floor by the bed, "I doubt I'll be around long enough for that."
Murdock placed his hand on her shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze as he told her, "I know he can come off as a hard case sometimes but I know he likes you. He's just worried about you."
Jean turned and looked at him like he had broken out in Latin, "You serious?"
Now it was Murdock's turn to look surprised, in one of his more serious tones he went into a miniature explosion and said, "Well of course he's worried about you, we all are, we're trying to make sure we get you back to your parents in one piece, until we do we're responsible for anything that happens to you."
Jean rolled her eyes and laughed and told him, "You're not responsible for me, not any of you, I'm 22 years old, I've been responsible for myself for the last four years."
"Now see," Murdock pointed at her, "You think like that because you are 22, when you get a little older you realize it doesn't work like that. Any time we're on a rescue mission we assume full responsibility for the hostages until we return them to their families."
"Well it's a lot of work and tell you the truth Murdock, I doubt the end result is going to be worth it," Jean commented, "I want to make it clear I have every intention of coming out of this mess alive, but then what? After what I've done, how do I possibly go home again?"
Murdock reached over and placed his hand on her shoulder and pulled her towards him so her head rested on his shoulder as he answered, "Don't worry about it, we're going to figure something out, we always do."
Jean yawned and closed her eyes for a minute and groggily responded, "Thanks, Murdock, I sure appreciate it."
Murdock leaned over and kissed Jean on the top of her head and quietly replied, "Anytime, darling, anytime."
They'd managed to luck out last night. He had thought for sure that they could see a repeat of the previous night's events; but he never heard a sound out of Jean all night. Though he wasn't sure exactly what had happened during the night, but he woke up before five and found her sitting at the foot of the bed, just staring straight ahead at the wall even though the whole room was pitch dark. It seemed that she had been awake for a while but she insisted nothing was wrong. So, it could have been another nightmare, or perhaps just anxiety in anticipation of the fact that today Grant would be checking into the hotel here, and they had to keep their cover going as the eccentric Tuttle family, herself included; everybody had a part to play and they had to make sure nobody blew their cover. Whatever it was, he was glad that their cover called for them to be brother and sister because it gave him a perfect excuse to stay close to her and make sure she was alright.
Murdock and Jean had already been dressed when Face woke up, when he came out of the bathroom half an hour later he was also ready for the day, dressed in an unorthodox manner compared to his usual taste of fine suits; instead he wore a pair of blue jeans, white sneakers and a baseball T-shirt.
"The next time we go in as a family," he said as he looked down at his attire, "I say we make it some long lost relative of John D. Rockefeller."
"What's wrong with it?" Jean asked as she looked him up and down, which was mostly up since she and Murdock were still on the floor.
"Nothing," he replied, "I just prefer something a little more…"
"Oh Face is a very fancy man," Murdock tried to explain.
"Oh I'll bet he is," Jean almost laughed, and Face realized she heard something different from what Murdock had said.
"It just so happens," Face told her, "That I am relied upon to get anything and everything that the team requires for all of our plans. And I'll tell you something, it is a lot easier to con people when you look like you just walked off the cover of GQ instead of like you just escaped from a hillbilly family reunion."
"Is that why they call you Face?" Jean asked, "Because you place so much importance on your appearance?"
"Well it don't hurt none," Murdock said as they got up.
Jean grabbed the front of Face's shirt and ran her hands up it until she reached the collar, then her hands forewent his face entirely and went up to his hair and messed it up.
"Very funny," he replied, and brought one of his own hands up and tried to repay the favor, causing her hair to also stand up in places. Jean kept a smirk on her face but didn't let it end there, she brought her hand back up and lightly hit him in the nose. Face brought his hand up in a fist and started to draw it back but let it go, deciding instead that, though he'd probably hate himself for it later, he would enjoy it now, and he put his hand on her face and gave her a light shove back against Murdock. Their little disagreement quickly grew but just before they could lunge for each other's throats, they heard something going on in the room next door, followed by Hannibal's decrepit old man voice warning the 'children' that they had better be decent.
"What's going on?" Jean asked him.
"I don't know," Face replied as they scrambled together and ran their hands through their hair to fix it and make themselves as presentable as possible.
A few seconds later the door opened and Hannibal was wheeled in by B.A. with another man following them.
"This, dear grandchildren," Hannibal gestured to the middle aged man carrying a medical bag, "Is the hotel doctor, he seems to think that somebody's sick here." Hannibal looked to the three of them and pointed to Face and said, "Dirk, you haven't been drinking the wine vinegar from the kitchen again, have you?" He turned back to the doctor and commented, "Nice boy but not too bright."
Face managed to keep a straight face as he replied, "No, Grandpa, we're all fine."
"Oh that's nice," Hannibal grumbled with his head down, "I was telling the doctor how talented you three are, how bright you were in school..."
Face was already dreading where this one was going, what was Hannibal trying to pull off now? Then he realized that Hannibal had said something else and he had missed it, "What was that, Grandpa?"
"I said why don't you recite something to the nice gentleman?" Hannibal repeated.
"Uh…" Face's mind officially went into lockdown at that moment and he couldn't think of a thing. That was when Murdock jumped in.
"I have one, I have one," he said in one of a dozen voices he used when he did something resembling theatrics and he leapt into the center of the room and stood straight and pounded on his chest as he said, "Little fly upon the wall, ain't you got no clothes at all?"
"No no no, Dwight," Hannibal told him, "Not that one."
"Oh."
Face and Jean stood on either side of him, and it was Jean who spoke up next and said, "I've got one." And with a big smirk on her face she said, gesturing wildly, "Little fly upon the track, a train came along and broke his back."
And something must've clicked because all three of them jumped at the same time screaming, 'whoo-whoo!' and grabbed onto each other like a conga line and marched around screaming like a train whistle. Behind the doctor, B.A. was struggling to keep a straight face, though Hannibal managed very well and remarked dryly, "They're nice kids, but you can understand now why Ted Healy kept a loaded gun under his children's pillows."
A few minutes later when the doctor left the room and went back out into the hall, Face, Murdock and Jean collapsed on the bed and she asked Hannibal, "What the hell was that about?"
"I'm not sure," Hannibal replied, "Somebody came nosing around asking a bunch of questions. I don't know who's responsible for it, but I get the feeling that Lynch isn't too far behind on this."
"He never gives up, does he?" Jean asked.
"If he did he wouldn't be in the army," Hannibal told her, "Not to worry though, he's got more men than brains."
Jean folded her arms against her chest and said, "You sound very sure of yourself, Smith."
"I'm always sure of myself," Hannibal replied.
"That's why he's the leader," Murdock explained.
"How could Lynch possibly have found out so quickly where you are?" Jean asked.
"Oh he's part bloodhound, you can be sure of that," Face said.
"Well, he definitely looks the part," Jean agreed.