They went shrieking down Ceremonial Drive and came to a halt at a second set of barricades, beside a welter of fire trucks, police cars, and SWAT vans. Police barricades were up over the entrance to the complex, but they were flung aside as the motorcade pulled through.
Once they turned onto Arlington Boulevard, he could guess where they were going: Arlington Hall Station, where his father worked for INSCOM, the United States Army and Intelligence Command. Gideon didn't know whether to be thrilled or scared. They were joined by more motorcycles, squad cars, and finally an ambulance: a motorcade that screamed through the traffic-laden streets. Sirens screaming, the officers escorted them down the Columbia Pike to George Mason Drive, forcing cars aside as they went. Keep up-we'll be driving fast and clearing traffic.»īut they were already running back to their motorcycles.
«What's this all about?» Gideon's mother asked. «Follow us,» said one, leaning in the window. There was none of the slow deliberation of a routine traffic stop-instead, both officers hopped off their motorcycles and came running up.
The one in front motioned with a black-gloved hand toward the Columbia Pike exit ramp once on the ramp, he signaled for Gideon's mother to pull over. They were driving on Route 27, passing the long cement wall enclosing Arlington National Cemetery, when the two motorcycle cops intercepted their car, one pulling ahead, the other staying behind, sirens flashing, red lights turning.
Gideon had turned the dashboard vents onto his face, enjoying the rush of cold air. It was a hot day, well up in the nineties, the kind where clothes stick to one's skin and sunlight has the texture of flypaper. His mother was driving him home from his tennis lesson in their Plymouth station wagon. Every insignificant detail, every trivial gesture, every sound and smell, became frozen as if in a block of glass, unchanging and permanent, ready to be examined at will. Nothing in his twelve years of life had prepared Gideon Crew for that day.
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