Linwood Barclay - The Twenty-Three

“Hang on.”

Maureen was gone about fifteen seconds. Then, “Nothing. Ran it a good thirty seconds and nothing.”

“Okay. Now start-”

“I’m gone,” she said, and hung up.

I loved her so much.

Now I could make the call to my boss. I had her office, home, and mobile numbers in my cell. I dug it out again, brought up the numbers I had for her, and entered her cell into the landline.

Finderman wasn’t very crazy about me these days. She was the subject of the comments Trevor had heard and passed along to Randall Finley, who made them public when he announced he was running for mayor again.

I’d forgiven Trevor, but not Finley.

It all found its way back to me, and Finderman was pissed. But this wasn’t the day to let grudges get in the way of work.

She must have seen the hospital’s name come up on her caller ID, because she answered with an alarmed “Yes?”

“It’s Duckworth,” I said. “I’m at the hospital.”

“I’m heading there.”

“We have to get the word out. The town’s drinking supply may be contaminated.”

“Ferraza’s on it.” Angela Ferraza, the department’s public relations person. “She’s putting out a release to TV, radio-it’s on the Web.”

“Not enough,” I said. “You need people going door-to-door. Wake everyone up. You need every fire truck with a loudspeaker going up and down the streets. You need every person you can find getting on phones. The full emergency plan.”

The town had drafted one of those in the wake of September 11, but no one had thought much about it since.

“I get it,” Rhonda said. I was getting under her skin. She didn’t want anyone telling her how to do her job.

“And CDC,” I said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, outside of Atlanta. “The state health department. Everyone.” I had a thought. “Is Homeland Security still sniffing around town?”

They had parachuted in after the drive-in screen came down and killed four.

“They’ve cleared out. Even though the guy hired to bring it down swears he didn’t do it, they think he did. Which means there could still be charges and lawsuits galore, but it’s not a terrorism matter.”

I had no reason, at least not yet, to think what was happening now was terrorism. It could be an accident of some kind. A failure to treat the water properly. I remembered a case from years ago, north of the border, where a small town’s water supply was contaminated with E. coli from farm runoff. The people who ran the treatment plant didn’t have a clue what they were doing, and people died. But it was incompetence, not terrorism.

“You think it’s a terrorist act?” Rhonda asked.

“I have no idea what it is. I need to talk to whoever’s in charge of the treatment plant. Do you know who that is?”

“No.”

“Leave it with me,” I said, and ended the call before she had a chance to hang up on me herself.

I thumbed through the contacts on my own phone, found the city hall number, and dialed it on the hospital’s phone.

An almost immediate pickup. “Hello-”

“This is Detective Duckworth. Put me through-”

“-you have reached the offices of the town of Promise Falls. We are currently closed. Our hours are-”

“Fuck.”

The recorded voice droned on. “-Monday to Friday from nine thirty a.m. to four thirty p.m. If this call is concerning a power outage, please call Promise Falls Electric at-”

I hung up. I’d been dumb enough to think that in the middle of an emergency like this, someone would be at town hall fielding inquiries, even if the mayor was out of town. I wanted the name of whoever ran the water plant and I wanted it now. I might be able to find it by searching the town’s Web site if any of the computers around here connected to the Internet, and if they didn’t, I’d have to go outside and try to do it on my phone.

It occurred to me I might have a number on my phone that would put me in touch with someone who’d know off the top of his head.

I scrolled through recent incoming calls on my cell, found one from a couple of weeks earlier. I was pretty sure I had the right one. I entered the number into the hospital phone.

He picked up on the third ring.

“Hello?”

“Randy?” I said.

“Who’s this?”

“Barry Duckworth.”

“Barry!” he said loudly, almost cheerfully. He knew I hated him, and yet he greeted me like an old friend, the bastard. “What in Sam fuck is going on?”

“Who runs the water plant?”

“The what?”

“I’m wondering if it would be the same person who did the job when you were mayor. Who had it then?”

“Why don’t you tell me first why you need to know?”

I could almost picture him smirking on the other end of the line. Randy always had an angle. Sure, I’ll help you, but you help me first.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want to tell him what was going on. The whole world would know what was going on in very short order. I just didn’t want to take the time. But it struck me that it would take less time to fill him in than argue.

I gave him the broad strokes-that the town’s water might be deadly.

“Goddamn,” he said. “Makes me glad I use nothing but my own springwater at home. How the hell could something like that happen?”

“A name, Randy.”

“Garvey Ottman. At least, he was in charge when I ran the show. I haven’t heard anything to the effect that he isn’t still.”

“Know where I can reach him?”

“Tell you what,” Finley said. “I’m already up and out. Heard all those sirens, wanted to find out what was going on. I’ll try to track him down for you, get back to you the moment I find him.”

“Okay,” I said, willing, right now, to accept his assistance. “I’m heading out there in the meantime.”

“Glad to help,” Finley said. “I call you at this number?”

I didn’t think I would be staying here that much longer. “No,” I said. “Call my cell.” I knew he had the number already.

“I’ll get back to you ASAP.” He ended the call.

At that moment, I happened to glance at a bulletin board fixed to the wall above where I’d been using the phone.

There were nurses’ schedules, hospital notices about handwashing, a photo of what looked to be several off-duty nurses grouped together at a bowling alley.

All smiling happily.

A promotional calendar from a local flower shop was pinned to the upper right corner, with boxes big enough that social events were scribbled on them. “Book club” and “Marta’s Bday.” For today, someone had scribbled “Bridge.”

That was when I noticed what today’s date was.

It was the twenty-third of May.

JOYCEPilgrim had been thinking seriously of quitting her security job at Thackeray College only a couple of weeks ago, and now here she was, running the department.

Strange, the way things turned out.

Her number one reason for quitting was her boss: Clive Duncomb.

Where to begin?

Even before he’d put her life at risk by using her as bait to catch a campus predator, she couldn’t stand the man. Mr. Macho. Talking about his days with the Boston PD like he was the toughest cop that city had ever seen. Which led Joyce to wonder, If you were such hot shit in Boston, what the hell are you doing running security for a small college in upstate New York? What did you do that you had to get out of Boston and disappear to a place like this?

Joyce had had her suspicions, many of them focused on Duncomb’s wife, Liz, who, rumor had it, was not exactly from Beacon Hill. More like the Combat Zone. Okay, so maybe it had been a few years since the Combat Zone’s heyday of strip clubs and whorehouses, but just because they’d spruced up the area didn’t mean there was no more prostitution. Liz had found a way-and a stable of women-to meet the demand. The supposedly incorruptible cop had been taken by her charms, and before their misdeeds caught up with them, they’d bailed on their respective lives and built new ones here in Promise Falls.