Hangman's Curse (3 page)

Nancy's voice was almost compassionate. “Dealing drugs just to stay alive. So what happens to Gomez if you get caught?”

Marv shrugged. “I dunno. Says he doesn't know me, I guess.”

Lou sniffed in disgust. “Some friend.”

Marv wiped a tear from his eye. “Yeah. Some friend. I'm just trying to get out on my own, that's all. I wouldn't even cut in on Gomez's turf. I'd go somewhere else. I just need something to get started, you know?”

Lou thought it over for several torturous seconds. Finally, he relaxed and raised the muzzle of the gun toward the ceiling. “Okay, Marv, okay. I guess you do know some people.”

CRASH!
The front door caved in and the house filled with green-jacketed, helmeted police, all leveling guns. “FREEZE! POLICE! ON THE FLOOR! ON THE FLOOR! GET DOWN! SPREAD 'EM!”

Nancy screamed, Lou dropped his gun, the kids fell to the floor and cowered. Marv ran for the back door, but Elijah Springfield hooked his feet in a leg lock and brought him down. More cops came storming in the back door, yelling, shoving, grabbing, flipping Marv over, holding him down, cuffing him. “DOWN! DOWN! DOWN! C'MON, MOVE IT!”

They slapped handcuffs on Lou and Nancy, then on Elijah and Elisha. In mere seconds, all five were facedown on the floor, subdued and guarded by the armed police now towering over them.

An officer found the fifty grams of methamphetamine in the pocket of Marv's jacket. They took him first. With a huge officer grabbing him under each arm, he sailed up from the floor and through the house before he could even get his feet under him. He went out through the front door, the sweeping blue and red lights of the police cars flashing across his dazed face, and then he was gone.

The door slammed shut.

“Don't move,” a burly sergeant warned the others.

Lou and Nancy didn't move. They just waited. Elijah and Elisha remained on their bellies, looking even more dour than usual.

Outside, the doors of a police car slammed shut and the vehicle sped away, its lights making one final sweep through the living-room windows. Seconds later, a police officer poked his head in the door and said, “Suspect is en route.”

Lou and Nancy, still facedown and handcuffed, smiled at each other.

Elijah sighed with relief and muttered, “All right!”

Sergeant Bill Perkins removed his helmet. “Whew! You guys okay?”

Lou moaned a bit—he was kidding. “I think I'm going to be sore tomorrow.”

Officer Jim Dunlop got out his set of keys and unlocked all the handcuffs. Lou, Nancy, Elijah, and Elisha, wrists free, got to their feet.

“Good work,” said Perkins. Then he called toward the pantry, “Did we get all that on tape?”

The pantry door swung open, and Officer Kyle Warner, video camera in hand, made an “okay” sign with his thumb and finger. “Great performance, guys.”

Perkins spoke into his portable radio, “Okay, we have the Gomez location: 401 Taylor.” He signed off and smiled. “Our friend Mr. Gomez is in for a visit, along with Morelli, Baylor, Dorning, and, uh . . .”

Officer Warner helped him out. “Steve Vernon. We needed a lead on that guy.”

“And now we've got it!” Perkins extended his hand for a congratulatory shake. “Nate, Sarah, thanks a lot.”

Nate and Sarah Springfield, who had been posing as “Lou” and “Nancy” for the past two months, shook his hand.

“But Nate,” said Perkins, who really
was
from the East Coast, “the Philadelphia accent could use a little work.”

“You'd know,” Nate responded with a laugh, his own accent reflecting his Montana roots.

Perkins shook hands with Nate and Sarah's sixteen-year-old twins, Elijah and Elisha. “You okay?”

They were both breathing a lot easier and smiling for the first time, as if they didn't really want the whole world to drop dead after all.

“Oh,
we're
intact,” said Elijah, gathering up the pieces of his shattered fake video camera. “I worked three days on this.”

Elisha removed a black wig and shook loose her shoulder-length blond hair. “But what about Marv? What's going to happen to him?”

“We're making it look as much like a real drug bust as possible,” Perkins said.

“You had
me
convinced,” Nate said.

“Well, hopefully, word will get around that Marv's out for good, and that should keep the local gangs and drug dealers from trying to come after him. We have a family from one of the churches who is willing to take him in on a mentor program. It's a strict environment with plenty of rules, but that's why the prosecutor's willing to work with us. It works.” Perkins smiled. “A strict environment with total accountability, but with the love of a family and the love of God.”

“Has anyone been able to find Marv's real family?” Sarah asked.

“We'll need Marv to help us out on that one.” Perkins wagged his head in dismay. “Sometimes runaways have a home to return to, and sometimes . . . well, we'll just have to see.”

“It's just so hard to believe,” said Nate. “How old
is
Marv, anyway?”

“He can't be more than fourteen,” said Perkins. “Gomez finds them young, hungry, and alone.”

“Well, he won't be hungry and alone anymore.”

Perkins smiled. “Not if we can help it.”

“So . . . ,” Nate's eyes scanned the room. “Let's go, folks. We need to give this house back to the owners so they can get back to renting it. Gather up the gear—and whose cat is that?”

While Perkins and Dunlop discussed who might own the cat, the Springfields opened cupboards and drawers, removing dishes, silverware, groceries, and dishtowels they'd placed there to make the kitchen look lived in. They also removed microphones strategically hidden behind the window shades, the ceiling light fixture, and under the counter.

“Oh, by the way, Nate,” said Sergeant Perkins, “Morgan called. He needs you to call him back right away.”

“Thanks,” Nate replied, stepping out onto the back porch and opening his cell phone. He punched in a number, the phone beeping with each entry.

A woman's voice answered after one ring. “
Veritas
Project.”

“This is Nate Springfield.”

“Ah, hello, Nate. Hang on, I'll connect you.”

In only a few seconds, a man's voice came on the phone. “Nate. How'd it go?”

Nate looked toward the kitchen and the cleanup going on. “We have Marv.”

“Wonderful!”

“He was the last drug slave working for Gomez, so that clears that out. And now we finally got the information we needed on Gomez and the others, so there goes the drug ring— hopefully.”

“Excellent! And what do you think of their antidrug program?”

Nate smiled. “The reports we got were on the money. The police and prosecutors are joining up with the community and the churches too, and they're working the problem at a heart level. I guess they're finally starting to see that if you change the heart, the life will change with it. They've seen it work.”

“Think it'll work for Marv?”

“Well . . .” Nate gave it some thought. “It worked for those other two kids Gomez owned. As for Marv, well, we've gotten to know him a while, and I think he has a good chance of turning things around. We've got a Christian family lined up to take him in. We'll just have to let God do the rest from there.”

“So the Truth works.”

Nate had to chuckle. “Well, yeah, if you give it a chance. The problem is, if you really want the Truth, then you have to have God along with it, and that gets a little sticky. If you can persuade the courts and communities to give God's ways a try, then yeah, the Truth works—and that's what I intend to report to the President.”

“Good enough. Now get ready for another one. We just got word of something brewing in Baker, Washington. Some kids are getting sick and demented, and no one knows why. Could be drugs, could be toxic contamination, could be a disease—or it could be something nobody's even thought of. Drug Enforcement's been called, and so have Environmental Protection and the Centers for Disease Control, but they're all backlogged and it's going to take them weeks to get on it. Nate, the President wants you in Baker now. There are . . . well, let's say there are certain undercurrents at that school, certain issues that the other agencies won't be looking for. The President is counting on you to get this thing solved before these other people have a chance to muddle it all up with politics and press releases. As always, Nate, for the record . . .”

“I know,” Nate had heard this disclaimer so often he had it memorized. “The President wants to know the reasons, not just the facts. The
Veritas
Project has nothing to do with his administration. The job is strictly unofficial, strictly up to me if I want to take it.”

“You've got it.” Morgan laughed.

Nate took out his pen and pad. “Go ahead.”

“We were contacted by a counselor named Tom Gessner from the high school. . . .”

Shortly afterward, Nate read from his notes, sharing the potential new assignment with his family as they stood in the now-empty kitchen.

Sarah was intrigued. “There's definitely a spiritual aspect to it.”

Elijah looked a little “iffy” about it. “Yeah, but I'll bet it means going to school again.”

Elisha wrinkled her nose. “Another
school
case?”

“Ehh, so whatza matta?” Nate asked, his East Coast accent returning. “You got somethin' against school?”

“Oh, Dad, pull-eeezzz!”

2
the ghost and
the angel

N
ate Springfield was
tall but not imposing, strong but not brutish, the kind of man who could have played the part of a quiet but intense town marshal in an old western movie—he even wore the jeans, lamb-collared coat, and Stetson hat to convey the image. He loved his family and loved being home, and he counted it fortunate that, when the unusual work of The
Veritas
Project required a bit of traveling, the whole family traveled together. Yesterday, they had helped the police crack open a drug ring in Montague, Oregon—and examined whether or not the police and the community had an antidrug program that really worked. Today, he had an appointment with a competent but somewhat anxious high school counselor in the town of Baker, Washington—and exactly what The Project was about to encounter, he could only guess.

He was clean-shaven and recently showered—no more of the “Lou” image, at least for now—as he stepped out of his car and quietly surveyed the Baker High School campus, as old as Baker itself but recently rebuilt. What was once an old brick and lap-sided schoolhouse was now a modern structure with computerized classrooms, wide open hallways, a vast cafeteria and commons, covered walkways, hedges, planting beds, and a marvelous gym and athletic facility. Classes were in session, so the campus was quiet, with hardly a body visible except through some of the classroom windows. The place looked orderly and peaceful, just as most high schools in most small towns did.

Which raised the question: Did most high schools in most small towns have a metal detector just inside the front door? Nate had to remove his belt and car keys before the metal detector would let him through without beeping. It was a cruel reminder of a new reality in public schools. Parents all over town still trusted this to be a safe place for their kids to learn and challenge life. Unfortunately— and so hard to face!—this was also a place where bizarre and dangerous things were not
supposed
to happen, but
could
.

To hear Tom Gessner tell it, bizarre and dangerous things were happening all right—things the metal detectors were powerless to prevent.

Nate got his belt and keys back from the student attendant and entered the main hall, a long, echoing passage with poster-plastered bulletin boards announcing anything and everything in loud, eye-catching colors and a voluminous trophy case proudly displaying the glories and awards of many a winning team over the years. Down the hall in both directions were numbered classroom doors and lockers, lockers, lockers. Beyond that, the start of more halls, more posters, more lockers. A newcomer might get lost in here. The glassed-in school office was right across the hall from the main doors. He went inside, signed in, and got directions to Gessner's office.

“Nate Springfield!” Tom Gessner, a young man with close-cropped hair and beard, got up from his desk and offered his hand.

Nate shook his hand and admired Gessner's cozy little office. Gessner was new on the faculty this year, but it wasn't hard to see he was well qualified and experienced. The informal snapshots, funny little gifts from students, mementos from other jobs in other places—not to mention several degrees displayed on the walls—testified to that.

A uniformed police officer also rose and offered his hand. Gessner introduced him. “Nate Springfield, this is Dan Carrillo, in charge of security.” Carrillo was a shorter man, a bit thin, and nervous, like a tight little terrier. He shook Nate's hand and muttered hello, but didn't appear too happy. Gessner continued, “He's an officer with the Baker police, and this year we have him on campus full time to handle security.” Then he added with a twinkle in his eye, “He came with the metal detectors.”

“And to serve as liaison between the school and the police department,” Carrillo added boldly. “When you talk to me, you're talking to the Baker City Police—and they're talking to you.” That last line came across as a stern reminder.

Nate noticed Officer Carrillo's badge, gun, belt radio, night stick, handcuffs, and beeper. He was serious about this. “It's a pleasure to meet you, sir,” Nate said.

“Maybe.” Officer Carrillo closed the office door as Gessner gestured to an empty chair. “But let's be clear from the beginning.
Mr. Gessner's
the one who called you in—”