The Twenty-Three 3 (Promise Falls) (16 page)

TWENTY-SIX

Duckworth

I
felt like I was back in high school chemistry class.

With Tate Whitehead’s body still out by the reservoir waiting for a forensic examiner to come God knew when, and Randy Finley cuffed to a door by the entrance to the water treatment plant, Garvey Ottman gave me a quick tour of the place at the same time as he offered up a course in Water Filtration 101. I’d been interrupted with a call from David Harwood, but once that was out of the way, Ottman was able to continue.

“Water treatment is really only about eighty years old,” Ottman said, “and it wasn’t until Congress passed the Safe Drinking Water Act in 1974 that it became the law of the land that the water coming out of the tap had to be one hundred percent drinkable.”

He was leading me through parts of the plant I’d never seen before. Huge water-filled basins divided into different compartments the size of a school gymnasium.

“There are six basic stages water goes through before it comes out
of your tap,” he said. “There’re pretreatment and screening, which is basically what happens in the reservoir. As the water moves from there into the plant, there’re coagulation and flocculation, then—”

“Flock what?”

“Flocculation. Coagulation and flocculation remove suspended particles in the water that survive the screening process. These particles get stuck together into clumps called floc. In the sedimentation stage, the floc settles to the bottom, where it can be collected and separated from the water and—”

“So all the crud, all the bad stuff in the water, it sinks? Like cigarette butts and stuff like that?”

“More than that. Larger things like butts, they should get caught in the screening process, but there are plenty of things in the water that count as solids that are too small to see. It’s that stuff that we get rid of here. Then, at filtration, which is the next stage, the remaining impurities are removed.”

Ottman threw some other words around. Aeration. Chlorination. Fluoridation.

“Fluoridation?”

“Fluoride,” he said. “For teeth. It gets added in one of the last stages. Then the water gets pumped up into the tower, ready to go. So the pumps don’t have to be going all the time. They run a lot overnight, refilling the tower from town water usage during the day. So, when everyone gets up in the morning, when the demand for water is at a peak, what with everyone having showers and cooking and all that kind of thing, there’s plenty in the tower, and the delivery system is as simple as flowing downhill.”

Now we were moving from chemistry to engineering. Neither had been among my top subjects in school. But I was trying my best to get my head around everything Ottman was telling me.

Even though we were well into the plant, surrounded by tanks and massive pipes, I turned to face the reservoir and said, “So let’s say, even if something really bad got into the reservoir, then there’s a whole slew of steps along the way, before that water comes out of
the tap, where the contamination would be caught and neutralized.”

“Like to think so,” Ottman said. “Tate’s not able to defend himself, so I have to say, even if he fucked up somewhere, this system is so well automated, it practically runs itself. Even if he failed to make a few checks in the night, chances are the water would still be fine.”

But it was already looking obvious to me that Tate’s only fuckup was getting himself killed. He didn’t do anything to the water. He was killed so someone else could.

“So, given all these steps, and all the safeguards, if you were going to add something to the water that would make people sick—that would kill them—you’d have a better chance doing it at the tail end of the process.”

Ottman nodded. “Yup. That makes sense.”

“What about putting something into the tower?”

“Seriously?”

I nodded. “Yeah. What?”

“Have you
seen
that thing? I can’t imagine lugging something up there. And even if you could climb all that way, there’s no way to dump something in that I can think of. No, you’d want to do it down here, let it get pumped up there.”

“So where, then?”

Ottman shrugged. “Is that where you’re going with this? Someone deliberately put something in the water?”

Far from us, an angry, echoing shout: “Let me go!”

Ottman glanced that way. “Randy sounds pretty pissed about—”

“Don’t worry about him,” I said. “So if you wanted to add something into the system, where would you do it?”

“I don’t know. Maybe into the chlorine or fluoride tanks.”

“Take me there.”

We continued on farther through the plant to more tanks and pipes and other things I didn’t understand.

“This here’s the fluoridation area,” Ottman said.

Something I’d noticed the moment I’d walked into this place the
first time was how spotless it was. All the floors, every pipe, every pane of glass, were sparkling clean.

But where we were standing now, I noticed something on the floor. I felt it underfoot first, the tiniest bit of grit. I stopped, turned my foot around so I could see the sole.

It looked like salt. I licked my index finger, then touched it to some of the grains on my shoe to get a better look.

“I wouldn’t taste that if I was you,” Ottman said.

“Don’t worry,” I said. I brought my finger up to my eye. “You have any idea what this is?”

“Nope,” he said. He looked down at the floor. “But there’re a few granules of it around in this area. Like someone was carrying around a huge bag of table salt with a pinhole rip in the bottom.”

“My finger feels kind of itchy,” I said.

“Shit,” Ottman said. “You need to wash it off. No telling what it might be.”

He steered me immediately toward a door with a male symbol on it. A men’s room.

“It feels kind of like when you handle fiberglass insulation,” I said. “All irritated.”

Ottman led me quickly to a sink, turned on the tap full blast. “Get it under there. Put on lots of soap. Keep washing it.”

“What the hell is it?” I asked.

“Just keep running water on it,” he said, tension in his voice.

“Do you know what it is?” I was running water on the finger, soaping it up, then sticking it back under the tap. The itchiness was subsiding.

“Not for sure. I mean, I might be completely wrong,” Ottman said.

“What’s your best guess?”

“What were the symptoms?” he asked.

“A burning finger.”

“No, I mean, what were the main symptoms of all those people going to the hospital?”

There were so many, it was hard to remember them all. I said, “Throwing up, dizzy, low blood pressure. Vision problems. I think someone said hypertension. No, not hypertension. Hypotension. A big drop in blood pressure.”

Ottman was shaking his head, almost in wonder. “You’d need so much of it.” He seemed to be talking more to himself than to me.

“So much of what?”

“And it would probably take a long time. You put it in too fast, it might explode on you,” he said.

“For Christ’s sake, what the hell are you talking about?” I asked, still holding my finger under the tap. Then it hit me. “And if the water’s bad, what the hell am I doing holding my finger under the tap?”

He looked at me and turned off the tap. I thought I saw fear in his eyes.

“We need to get out of the building,” he said. “We need to get out now.”

“Ottman, tell me what’s going on.”

“You got some way to get Randy out of those cuffs?”

“A sharp knife, heavy-duty scissors,” I said. “They’re just plastic. There’s no key.”

“Let’s go.”

We left the men’s room, Ottman grabbing my arm to keep me from going anywhere near those salty-looking granules.

“It could be in the air,” he said. “There might be more of it around than what we saw on the floor.”

I decided to stop asking him what he was talking about. We’d get out of the building first. He’d already reached into his jacket for a pocketknife. He had the blade out as he walked briskly toward Finley.

Finley’s eyes went wide when he saw the knife. He must have been wondering whether Ottman intended to set him free or kill him. There must have been some relief as Ottman shouldered Finley’s body out of the way, allowing him access to the man’s wrists.

Finley said to me, “You’re in a lot of trouble, my friend.”

I said, “Soon as he cuts you free, get out of the building as fast as you can.”

“What?” He seemed to gulp. “Jesus, is there a bomb?”

“No,” Ottman said. He cut through the cuffs. “Go.”

The three of us started for the door, Ottman pausing long enough to pull a fire alarm switch on the wall. A high-pitched clanging commenced.

“There’re still some people in there,” he said.

We made it outside to the parking lot. I couldn’t say for the others, but my heart was pounding.

“Ottman,” I said. “Tell me.”

He took a couple of deep breaths. “I could be wrong about this, but I think what was on the floor there could be sodium azide.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“A fucking catastrophe.”

TWENTY-SEVEN

CAL
Weaver was looking for something to drink in his sister’s refrigerator when his cell phone rang. It was someone from the Promise Falls police who had seen the note he’d posted to the door of Lucy Brighton’s house. Cal had indicated that he had a key, and the police wanted to get inside.

“I have to go out,” Cal told Celeste.

“You taking Crystal with you?” she asked.

Cal shook his head. He definitely did not want Crystal to see her mother’s body being taken out of that house.

He went into the living room to talk to her.

“Does your sister have any paper I can draw on?” she asked, looking up from her clipboard.

“I think so. Why don’t you ask her?”

Crystal started to slide off the couch, but Cal put a hand on her knee to stop her. “In a second. I have to talk to you.”

“What about?”

“I have to let the police into your house. They just phoned me. They saw the note I left on the door.”

“Oh.”

“You can stay here, okay?”

“How long will you be gone?”

His shoulders went up and down. “I don’t know. I’m also going to go to my hotel and get my stuff so I can stay here. With you.”

She looked at him, her face devoid of emotion. He was trying to read her, trying to figure out what she might be thinking.

“Okay,” she said, then continued her slide off the couch and walked into the kitchen to ask for paper.

It took him ten minutes to get to Lucy Brighton’s house. There was a Promise Falls police car in the driveway, two cops in the front seat. Cal edged his car over to the curb, got out, and approached them.

“You Weaver?” the one behind the wheel asked.

Cal told them what he knew. The call from Crystal, where he found the body. He gave them Gerald Brighton’s number, but could not guarantee when, or if, the man would show up.

“The kid still with you?” the same cop asked.

He nodded.

There wasn’t anything else they needed from him at this time, so he got back in his car with the intention of heading to the highway that would take him south, out of town, to his temporary home. He figured he could be packed and checked out in less than twenty minutes, be back to his sister’s place by late afternoon.

His phone rang just as he was about to turn the key in the ignition.

“Weaver,” he said.

“Mr. Weaver, my name’s David Harwood?”

Making it sound like a question, as though Cal was supposed to ask, “Okay, is it really?” Instead, he said, “How can I help you?”

But then he realized he recognized the name. Harwood was the guy who’d rescued Carl Worthington when Ed Noble snatched him from his school at the end of the day. Sam had called Cal for help first, but when he couldn’t get there in time, she had called David Harwood.

“I’m a friend of Sam Worthington’s. I—”

“I know who you are. Thanks for getting to the school when I couldn’t.”

“Have you heard from her?”

“No. I mean, we spoke after what happened at her place of work a couple of times, but I haven’t heard from her lately.” The hairs on the back of Cal’s neck started to rise.

Sam and her boy drank the water.

“Shit,” Cal said. “Have you been by the house?”

“Yes,” David said. “It’s not about what’s going on. Not about the water. The house is empty—her car is gone.”

“Okay,” Cal said, his hairs settling down. “Then what’s this about?”

“Do you know about her ex-husband?”

“Just lay it out for me, David.”

David brought him up to speed. Brandon Worthington escaping custody. Sam not answering her phone. It was all news to Cal.

“Call the police,” he advised.

“I did that,” David said. “They’ve got their hands full at the moment.”

“So have I,” Cal said, then thought that sounded too dismissive. “Look, Sam probably got word that he was out, took off with her kid for a few days. Not telling anyone, not taking your call, that might be the smartest thing she could do.”

“Maybe,” David said. “But what if the reason she’s not answering is because he’s already found her? This guy, he was in for robbing a bank. And you already know his parents are lunatics, that they sent Ed Noble to kill her.”

“I was there.”

“I
know
. So you see what I’m saying? I’m not worrying for nothing.” The man’s voice was breaking. “There was a time, maybe, when I was able to handle this kind of stuff. But not anymore. I feel helpless. I want to help her, but I don’t know what to do.”

Cal closed his eyes, leaned his head up against the headrest,
thought of Crystal. Until her father showed up, she was his responsibility. He couldn’t go charging off to help this Harwood guy find Sam. Not now.

“You said you’ve been to the house?”

“Yes,” David said quickly, sounding encouraged that Weaver was taking the time to ask questions.

“See if you can get inside, see if—”

“I did that. It looked like they’d packed up.”

“What did the neighbors say?”

David didn’t answer right away. “Shit,” he said finally. “I didn’t even talk to them.”

“Start there,” Cal said. “Let me know how it goes.”

He felt bad, ending the call, but there was only so much he could deal with. He’d promised Crystal he wouldn’t be long. Right now, he believed she needed him more than Harwood did. David had reason to be concerned about Samantha and her son, Cal knew, but he also knew Sam was no fool. If she’d heard her ex-husband was on the loose, then she’d have done what she had to do and gotten out of town.

Cal hoped David was wrong in thinking Sam wasn’t answering her cell because Brandon had already found her. But hadn’t Harwood been a reporter once? Cal recalled hearing that he was. So let him nose around, use the same basic skills Cal would have employed.

Cal turned on the engine. It was time to check out of his hotel. Before long, he was at a T intersection, about to make a right, when he saw a familiar vehicle approaching from the south.

It was Dwayne, in his pickup truck.

Cal’s brother-in-law blew past, Dwayne’s focus on the road ahead. He never glanced in Cal’s direction, didn’t notice the car.

Cal wasn’t sure what made him decide to turn left, in the opposite direction of the hotel.

He told himself he wasn’t actually following his brother-in-law. Not in any
surveillance
kind of way. It wasn’t as though he’d set out this afternoon to tail Dwayne.

It just happened.

Dwayne drove by, and Cal decided to see where he might be going. Told himself that if Dwayne pulled off the road to go into a 7-Eleven to buy a Slim Jim, he might just follow him in, strike up a conversation, see how the guy was doing. Maybe see if he wanted to go for a beer.

Tell him something like, “Look, I’m sorry that little girl and I have crashed at your place, but I really appreciate it, and we’re going to get out of your hair as soon as possible.”

Yeah. Maybe something like that.

Cal told himself he was definitely not following his brother-in-law even though Celeste was worried he might be seeing another woman. Was that something Cal really wanted to stick his nose into? Okay, maybe a
little
. This
was
his
sister
they were talking about.
You go messing around on my sister and that’s likely to piss me off.

But then again, they were all adults. And if there was one thing Cal had learned from his years working with the police and as a private investigator, there were usually two sides to every story. He hadn’t heard Dwayne’s. Maybe he had some serious complaints about Celeste, and maybe he didn’t. It was possible whatever story Dwayne had to tell was bullshit.

Maybe whatever problems there were in his marriage were one hundred percent his fault.

Cal wasn’t sure he wanted to know. He had no wish to be mediator. If their marriage was in trouble, they should talk to a marriage counselor.

Cal had enough problems of his own to work through without taking on anyone else’s.

Except for Crystal’s, of course.

He’d look after her until her father showed up.
If
he showed up. If he was honest with himself, he’d admit that he was hoping Crystal’s father would take his time getting here.

Cal liked Crystal. He found her quirkiness endearing, even challenging in a way, and there was a mix of vulnerability and toughness
about her. Maybe his feelings had something to do with losing his son. There was a part of him that yearned to care for someone, to—

Dwayne made a turn. He was heading downtown.

Cal decided to stick with him. But he held back, keeping at least one other car between himself and Dwayne. The kind of thing he did when he
did
have someone under surveillance.

Okay,
he thought,
so maybe I am following him. Just for a few blocks.

If he did see Dwayne meeting another woman, what would he do then? Reach under the seat for his camera with the telephoto lens? Show the shots to his sister? Unlikely. But he might, just might, take Dwayne aside at that point. Tell him he knew. Tell him to get his fucking house in order.

Once they were well into the business district, the truck’s brake lights came on. Then the right blinker. Dwayne rolled the truck over to the curb, killed the engine.

Cal drove on, eyes forward.

He checked the passenger door mirror, saw Dwayne get out of the truck and cross the street. Once on the other side, he walked in the same direction Cal had been driving. Cal saw an open spot at the curb and wheeled into it, sat there and waited for Dwayne to come up parallel to him on the opposite side of the street.

Dwayne slowed as he neared a bar, Cal thinking he was going to go inside. But instead, Dwayne disappeared into a narrow alleyway between the bar and a shoe store.

“What the hell?” Cal said.

He had to ease the car ahead a length to get a better view down the alley. Dwayne was heading in from the street, and another man was approaching from the back. They stopped in the middle.

Cal settled back in his seat and reached under the passenger seat from behind. He pulled out the camera with the telephoto lens. The one he often used when he was doing work like this for hire.

It wasn’t so much that he wanted to take a picture. But the camera was as good as, or better than, a pair of binoculars.

He quickly wrestled the camera out of its case, took the lens cap off, and brought the camera to eye level.

The guy meeting Dwayne was mid-forties, short, about 250 pounds. Jeans and a black Windbreaker.

They were talking.

Nodding.

Then the other guy reached into his pocket, handed something to Dwayne.

Click.

It was just reflex, hitting the shutter button when he did. Because if this were a real job, this might be evidence of something. Of money changing hands. A thick wad of it, too, it looked like to Cal.