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don't—!"
    Hammond stayed calm. "Look," he said, "I did meet with you and Jan whether you care to admit it or not. And I did some work at your specific request. Now, there was one discrepancy in your record—"
    "I don't know what you—" Fletcher started, then paused. "Discrepancy?"
    "Did you know you're still in the Reserves?"
    "I'm what?"
    "I didn't think so. If you'd care to talk about it—"
    "Commander Hammond"—his voice sounded barely controlled—"I don't know what you're up to, but I think you better stop. Unless you're conducting an official investigation, don't go any further. I won't have my privacy invaded! Is that clear?"
    "Whatever you say, sir."
    Hammond put down the phone and sat in silence, wondering who was actually having the nightmares. He got up, turned out his light, and went home, completely baffled.
     
     

 
    3
     
    Hammond picked up a quiche from Publick House on M street and drove home. He ate in darkness by the kitchen window, watching the barge creep by, her lights illuminating the grass and trees as she passed. He finished the quiche and downed a bottle of beer, then leaned back in the dark and stared at the blank screen of his TV. He wanted to turn it on and become oblivious, a mindless zombie staring at flickering colors, but he couldn't push Harold Fletcher's tense features out of his head.
    The man was definitely a mental case. But something apart from Fletcher's antics nagged at him, something that had happened in the course of his brief investigation. He remembered stubbing his proverbial toe on it at the time, but now he could not recall precisely what it was.
    Something at the Watergate? Something on the phone? At BUPERS? What?
    Everything became jumbled in Hammond's mind, so finally he succumbed to the lure of his TV and turned it on. He blinked and flinched as the shark loomed up out of the sea and Roy Scheider leaped backward in the boat. Jaws had finally made it to television. Hammond melted into his sofa and watched the rest of the movie. But his mind was somewhere else.
    He woke up in the morning remembering exactly what it was. He'd had a nightmare of his own, a cross between Fletcher's crazy dream and the movie he'd seen on TV last night—Fletcher being gobbled by a hungry shark, blood spurting all over an invisible deck like red paint smearing unseen planking...
    Red.
    The color had caused him to remember the card that idiot chief had pulled from Fletcher's personnel file. The card had been red.
     
    He was standing in the hallway outside the Inactive Personnel Records Section when the chief came to work. He didn't even give the man time to get his coffee.
    "A few days ago you pulled a file for me on a man named Fletcher. There was a red card in it which you sent, somewhere in the pneumatic chute. You said it was routine. I'd like to hear more about that."
    The chief stared at him, this time careful not to betray his feelings. "It's called a flag," he said. "Very common in personnel files. They come in al} colors." He paused, but Hammond held him with a look. "They use 'em to call attention to a special routing," he continued. "It means there's somebody who has to be notified when the file is pulled."
    "What does the color red signify?"
    The chief shook his head. "I just shoot 'em up the tube, sir."
    "Is anything printed on the card?"
    "Sure. Information for the computer. The red card and the white card you filled out both go to one place, a computer on the fourth floor."
    Hammond thought a moment, then came around the counter. "Let's go back in the vault and have another look at Fletcher's file."
    "Sorry, sir. Can't allow that."
    "No? Well, I suppose I could take it up with Captain Haglan...."
    Hammond saw right away it had been worth it: taking the trouble to look up the name of the chiefs immediate superior. The chief 'moved without a word to the double doors, then paused for a last try: "Of course, you'll have to fill out another white card," he said.
    "Put it on my