Jeffery Deaver - The burning wire

Sachs jotted notes, then asked, "And about the arc flash. Who'd know about rigging that?"

"Tell me how he did it exactly."

Sachs explained about the cable and the bus bar.

He asked, "It was aimed out the window? Like a gun?"

She nodded.

Sommers went silent for a moment. He focused elsewhere. "That could've killed dozens of people… And the burns. Terrible."

"Who could do it?" Sachs persisted.

Sommers was looking off again, which he did a lot, she'd noticed. After a moment: "I know you're asking about Algonquin employees. But you ought to know that arc flashes are the first thing that all electricians learn about. Whether they're working as licensed tradesmen, in construction, for manufacturing companies, the army or navy… any field at all, as long as they're around electrical service lines with enough juice for arcs to be a problem, they'll learn the rules."

"So you mean that anybody who knows how to avoid arcs or prevent them knows how to create them."

"Exactly."

Another note in her quick handwriting. Then she looked up. "But let's just talk for the moment about employees."

"Okay, who here could rig something like that? There'd be live wire work involved, so it'd have to be somebody who is or has been a licensed master electrician in private contracting or been a lineman or a troubleman for a utility."

"A what? Troubleman?"

Sommers laughed. "Great job title, hm? Those're supervisors who arrange for the repairs when a line goes down or there's a short circuit or other problem. And remember that a lot of the senior people here have risen through the ranks. Just because they do energy brokerage now and sit behind a desk doesn't mean they can't rewire a three-phase service panel in their sleep."

"And make an arc flash gun."

"Exactly. So you should be looking for somebody with computer training in Unix control and energy management programs. And somebody with a career as a lineman or troubleman or in the contracting trades. Military too. Army, navy and air force produce a lot of electricians."

"Appreciate this."

A knocking on the door frame intruded. A young woman stood there with a large Redweld expanding envelope in her arms. "Ms. Jessen said you wanted these? From Human Resources?"

Sachs took the resumes and employee files and thanked the woman.

Sommers had dessert, a Hostess cupcake. Then its twin. He sipped more soda. "Want to say something."

She lifted an eyebrow.

"Can I give you a lecture?"

"Lecture?"

"Safety lecture."

"I don't have much time."

"It'll be quick. But it's important. I was just thinking, you're at a big disadvantage, going after this… what'd you call him?"

"We say 'perp.' For 'Perpetrator.' "

" 'Perp' sounds sexier. Say you're going after your usual perp. Bank robbers, hitmen… You know that they might have a gun or knife. You're used to that. You know how to protect yourself. You've got procedures on how to handle them. But electricity as a weapon or a booby trap… whole different ball game. The thing about juice? It's invisible. And it's all over the place. I mean, everywhere."

She was recalling the bits of hot metal. The horrid round holes in Luis Martin's tan skin.

Sachs had a scent memory of the scorch at the crime scene. She shivered in disgust.

Sommers gestured toward a sign on his wall.

She felt an urgency to get on with the case but she also wanted to hear what he had to say. "I don't have much time, but please, go ahead."

"First, you have to know how dangerous electricity is. And that means knowing about amperage, or current. You know what that is?"

"I…" Sachs had thought she did, until she realized she couldn't define it. "No."

"Let's compare an electric circuit to a plumbing system: water pumped through pipes. Water pressure is created by the pump, which moves a certain amount of water through the pipes at a certain speed. It moves more or less easily depending on the width and condition of the pipes.

"Now, in an electrical system, it's the same thing. Except you have electrons instead of water, wires or some conductive material instead of pipes and a generator or battery instead of the pump. The pressure pushing the electrons is the voltage. The amount of electrons moving through the wire is the amps, or current. The resistance-called ohms-is determined by the width and nature of the wires or whatever the electrons're flowing through."

So far, so good. "That makes sense. Never heard it put that way before."

"Now we're talking about amps. Remember: the amount of moving electrons."

"Good."

"How much amperage does it take to kill you? At a hundred milliamps of AC current, your heart will fibrillate and you'll die. That's one tenth of one amp. Your typical Rite Aid hair dryer pulls ten amps."

"Ten?" Sachs whispered.

"Yes, ma'am. A hair dryer. Ten amps, which, by the way, is all you need for an electric chair."

As if she weren't uneasy enough.

He continued, "Electricity is like Frankenstein's monster-who was animated with lightning, by the way. It's stupid and it's brilliant. Stupid because once it's created it wants to do only one thing: Get back to the ground. Brilliant because it instinctively knows the best way to do that. It always takes the path of least resistance. You can grab on to a hundred-thousand-volt line but if it's easier for the electricity to get back through the wire, you're perfectly safe. If you're the best conductor to the ground…" His pointed nod explained the consequences.

"Now, for your lesson. My three rules for dealing with juice: First, avoid it if at all possible. This guy is going to know you're after him and he might be rigging traps with live lines. Stay away from metal-handrails, doors and doorknobs, uncarpeted flooring, appliances, machinery. Wet basements, standing water. Have you ever seen transformers and switchgear on the street?"

"No."

"Yes, you have. But you're not aware of them because our city fathers hide and disguise them. The working parts of transformers're scary and ugly. In the city, they're underground or in innocuous buildings or neutral-painted enclosures. You could be standing right next to a transformer taking in thirteen thousand volts and not know it. So keep an eye out for anything that says Algonquin on it. And stay away if you can.

"Now, you have to remember that even if you think you're avoiding it, you could still be in danger. There's something called 'islanding.' "

"Islanding?"

"Say the grid is down in some part of town, like happened today. You think all the circuits're dead, right? Of course you're safe. Well, maybe and maybe not. Andi Jessen would like Algonquin to be the only game in town, but we're not. Power nowadays is supplied through what's called distributed generation, where smaller energy producers pump juice into our grid. Islanding would happen when the Algonquin supply is offline but some smaller source is still supplying juice to the grid-an island of electricity in the void.

"Then there's backfeed. You cut the breakers on a line and go to work. But the low-voltage lines downstream may start feeding juice back into the transformer-"

Sachs understood. "And the transformer steps it back up."

"Exactly. And the line you thought was dead is alive. Really alive."

"With enough juice to hurt you."

"Oh, yeah. And then there's induction. Even if you're sure you shut off the circuits-it's completely dead, and there's no islanding or backfeed possible-the wire you're working on can still become charged again with deadly voltage if there's another live wire nearby. That's because of induction. The current in one wire can energize another, even a dead one, if it's close enough.