Combustible (A Boone Childress Novel) (26 page)

“But why? You’re helping him. Even if he won’t admit it.”

“S
ome men,” Abner said, taking a drink from a water fountain as Boone opened the outside door, “don't want to be helped.”

Boone
followed Abner out. “So, what’s next? What steps do we take now?”

“You interviewed that band teacher
, right?”

“Not yet
. Now about Eugene Loach—”

“
Loach. That name keeps coming up, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, Doc,”
Boone said, “It does. Is he next on my list?”

Abner
looked doubtful. “Not on your list. Let the experts handle that one.”

But Boone had no intention of letting
Abner handle it. Stumpy Meeks was counting on him. Eugene Loach was behind the arson, he was sure of it. All he needed was the evidence to prove it. The chemicals stolen from the schools were all alkali metals. Highly reactive. Highly volatile. Very difficult to remove once they were handled. Easily discovered with spectra analysis. All he needed was to get Eugene near a spectra analysis machine. He laughed at his own suggestion. Obviously, that wasn’t going to work. What he needed was a lord high substitute, something capable of identifying minute traces of alkali metals. Where was he going to find that?

They reached the main entrance to the jail area. Boone pulled the door for
Abner again, and in walked a middle-aged woman wearing heavy sunglasses and a kerchief over her hair.

"
Dr. K?" Boone said.

Startled, she bumped into
Abner, then patted her chest. "Please excuse me. I didn't see you there. Boone? Good heavens, what are you doing here?"

"Visiting
Stumpy Meeks."

"Oh," she said. Her mouth pinched so tight
ly, her lip disappeared. "How, how do you know Henry?"

Henry? That was Stumpy's real name, but the only time Boone had ever heard was on the APB Hoyt put out for him. "We're friends.
Sort of. He asked me to come down. They're trying to charge him with arson. He doesn't have a lawyer."

"He certainly does now," she said. Her shoulders drew back, and her spine straightened. "I've seen to it."

"So you're friends with Stumpy?"

"No,"
she said and removed the sunglasses. She had been crying. "Henry Meeks is my brother. Half-brother, to be exact, and I'm here to see him through this ordeal. We Blevinses always stick together."

Dr. K
excused herself, and Boone and Abner left the building. As they walked across the parking lot, Boone's mind reeled with the implications of what his science professor had just revealed. If she and Stumpy were half brothers, then so were Stumpy and Mr. Blevins. That meant that Stumpy had an interest in the same property that Blevins had sold to Landis. Funny, Stumpy didn't look like someone who had recently inherited valuable property.

"That was interesting,"
he said as they climbed into Abner's Range Rover.

"Downright peculiar,"
Abner agreed. "But it does make your job easier. After hearing what that woman had to say, there's no reason for you to go interviewing that band teacher. I found out all I needed to know."

“With Blevins off my list, I can go after Loach.”

“No, leave Loach to the—“

“Experts. I know.”

But Boone’s days of taking orders were over.

“You need to borrow my what?” Cedar said to Boone a few hours later.

“Your nose.”

Cedar clapped a hand over her face. “No way.”

“Not your nose, you’re N.O.S.E. Your device for detecting smells. I need it to gather evidence against
Eugene Loach.”

They were
on the courthouse green, where volunteers were setting up tents for the Bragg Fest vendor fair. Boone’s mom had reserved three booths for the fair. One for her vet practice, one for Lamar’s business, and one for the Bragg County Historical Society. The Society had launched a petition against the Tin City development, and they were hoping to collect hundreds of signatures to stop the re-interment of the cemetery.

“You’ve got
Loach on the brain,” she said.

No, he had
Cedar on the brain, ever since she’d gone quiet when he used the “L” word. Loach was what he was using to distract himself. “What if I told you that he was responsible for the fire that killed Consuelo Vega and that all I need is to find traces of alkali metals on his person to prove it?”

“Alkali?
That’s like sodium and lithium.”

“And potassium, rubidium, cesium, except for francium.”

“Which hardly exists on Earth. I know. So you’re looking for all of them?”

“Sodium, definitely. Maybe others. I’m looking for the chemicals that might have been in the school’s lab.”

“The one’s that were stolen.”

“Bingo.”

“And you think Eugene Loach stole them?”

“Bingo.”

“And you think Eugene Loach is suddenly smart enough to use alkali metals without blowing himself up?” she asked. “If you say bingo, I’m never kissing you again.”

“Maybe not s
mart enough. Stumpy hinted that he stole the chemicals and left them in the custodian’s closet for pick up.”

“
Let’s get back to the others. You’d like to borrow my research experiment, a project that I’ve worked on for months, for hundreds of hours developing the software, the N.O.S.E device, calibrating data, and crunching numbers?”

“Yes?”
he said.

“No.”

“No?”

“N
o. Absolutely not. Winning the Olympiad means more to me than any stupid tennis trophy. I’m not going to let you stick it up to a redneck version of Bigfoot and risk getting it crushed. Besides, it’s too unwieldy. I use a shopping cart to transport it.”

“Er. I hadn’t though
t of that.”

“I do have another idea.”

“Oh?”

She whistled. “Chigger! Here, boy!”

On command, the beagle bounded out of her Bug, which was parked on the green near the stature of General Bragg. He raced across the grass, zigzagging through the rows of metal folding chairs, until he reached Cedar. He sat, then lifted his head for a treat.

“Here,”
Cedar said, rubbing the dog’s ears, “is your answer.”

“Chigger?” Boone said.

“Hello? Five million scent receptors,” she reminded him, “and trained by Customs to detect bombs.”

“But I thought Chigger flunked out of bomb sniffing school.”

“Only because he was too aggressive,” she said. “Don’t besmirch the name of my dog.”

“Besmirch?”

“Didn’t you get the memo? Girls with extensive vocabularies are hot.”

That’s the truth,
Boone thought but didn’t say it. He was too busy trying to read her signals. “Cedar, about the other night. When I said…that thing.”

“What about the other night?” she said with a straight face.

So that’s how we’re going to play it, he thought. Fine. At least she was still speaking to him, instead of giving him the heave-ho. “Chigger will be great. Thanks for the offer. Really. I’ll be glad to have him.”

“You should act quickly, then,”
Luigi said, coming up behind them. He wore oversized earphones and carried something like a tuning fork in one hand and an ergonomic mouse in the other.

Boone shook his hand.
“Hey, Luigi. Where did you come from?”

“I heard you
r discussion and thought that I could aid you.”

“You heard us?” Boone said. “Where were you?”

“At the Red Fox Java enjoying an iced milk and tea.” He raised the tuning fork. “I heard you with this.”

“What is this exactly?” Cedar asked.

Realization dawned on Boone. “It’s his research project.”

“
Hai, hai.
A small part of it. It allows me to isolate conversations from hundreds of meters away. For example, Eugene Loach has gathered with the other firefighters for the parade.”

He pushed up his glasses with his middle finger. The mop of his hair blew in the breeze, and his cheeks looked red enough to bleed, but he had thi
s look in his eyes that told Boone that he was onto something.

The parade. That’s right. Boone had forgotten it, since he was still suspended from the
Frisco VFD. “Perfect. Okay, here’s the plan.”

The Bragg Fest parade was a big deal. Over two hundred organizations, clubs, businesses, departments, and schools either marched or walked the route. In fact, there were so many people involved, Boone wondered how there was anyone left in town to watch it. Except for the parade route, the streets of Stanford were virtually deserted, so Boone and Cedar had no trouble running parallel with the parade.

They trotted at first, the beagle stretching the leash and pulling Cedar along.
They lengthened their strides and turned on Fremont to cross ahead of the parade. As they crossed on the WALK sign, the dog padded along, his attention focused on the chimney swifts that dipped and swooped around the smoke stack of the physical plant.

"Some bomb dog you are," B
oone said. "Those are birds."

They stopped for a water fountain near the green
.

“
Come on. We’re going to miss Eugene,” Boone said.

“He’s thirsty.” Cedar held the pedal down to let
Chigger drink first.

Chigger
covered the steel dish with both paws and lapped up the stream of rusty water. He hiked his leg to let loose on the fountain base.

Cedar jumped back. "I can't take you anywhere."

The Atamasco VFW was number three in line for the parade, while the Frisco house was near the end, number one hundred seventy three. As he ran with Chigger to catch up with the Atamasco firefighters, he passed several men from his own firehouse, notably Lamar and Julia, who waved his one fingered salute at Boone.

Turning t
he corner of Third and Palmetto, the Atamasco VFW, came into view. There were nineteen firefighters in brown and yellow turnouts lead by the fire captain’s yellow truck. The parade led them down the rivulet of Third Street to the wide channels of downtown.

The parade turned the corner onto Palmetto
Street, the truck sounding its horn. On the corner of Second Street, they passed the public library building and neared the green. Eugene Guthrie was marching on the opposite side of the street from where Cedar was in position.

“Luigi,” he said as if his friend were standing next to him, “tell Cedar to cross the street.”

Through the ear bud Luigi had given them, he heard Luigi give the direction and Cedar acknowledge it.

Boone loitered for a moment at the corner to watc
h the Bragg High Band march by, led by Mr. Blevins, who probably had more on his mind, like the angry phone calls he was getting about the Tin City cemetery.

Boone blew h
is nose into his handkerchief. It was the signal.

"Let’s go, Chigger,”
Cedar said, her voice coming into Boone’s ear bud.

Five minutes later
, Eugene Loach marched past the Firebird Hotel. He was turned waving to the crowd when Cedar crashed into his hip, knocking him flat on the pavement.

Cedar dropped knees-
first on top of Eugene, pinning him to the ground.

“Get off me!”
Eugene bellowed.

“Sorry,” Cedar said, “trying to catch my dog. Chigger!”

Boone moved closer. He saw Eugene draw back his leg, like he was going to kick Cedar. Then when Loach saw her face, he held off.

“Lucky you’re
a girl,” he said.

Lucky, she’s a white girl, Boone thought. If
she had been Latin, what would he had have done?

The other firefighters stopped short, and Chigger raced between their legs until he found Cedar. He leaped into her arms, and she held him still long enough to get a good, long sniff.

Chigger barked and growled.

Boone pumped his fist. Yes!

“Get that mutt away from
me!” Eugene bellowed.

“Sorry officer,”
Cedar said, backing up to the curb.

“I ain’t no
cop,” Eugene growled. “I’m a goddamn firefighter.”

He was a lot of other things, too, Boone
thought as he waited for the parade to move on. A few minutes later, he and Cedar met up on the front steps of the public library.

“Yes!”
Boone said, leaning down to rub Chigger’s ears. “Good boy, you caught the bad man. Yes, you did.”

“No, he didn’t,”
Cedar said.