by Kathy Reichs
An hour and a half after I left the annex, the trusty Waze lady directed me onto an unmarked road. Minutes later, she announced my arrival. I did a slow drive-by, scanning the setup. Saw pretty much what I’d observed during my cyber-recon: trees, a short driveway, a whole lot of twelve-foot fencing, the galvanized steel darkened by weather and time. And one additional tidbit. A keypad beside the gate that looked shiny new.
Two passes, roughly half a mile in each direction, revealed absolutely no signage. To either side stretched impenetrable conifer, oak, and beech, their massive branches reaching high to form sun-choking canopies overhead.
The road seemed abandoned by time, save for one shack and two mobile homes on the side opposite the chain linking. The windows of the shack were covered with plywood, the walls with spray-painted graffiti, all pictorial, none skilled.
The owners of the mobile home to the south were also long gone. All glass was broken, and the door was missing. Tangled kudzu wrapped the trailer’s every inch like a leafy green quilt.
The mobile home to the north told a different story. The exterior was white with brown striping. The siding and windows appeared recently washed. A wooden ramp enclosed by banisters and picket rails led, through one right-angle turn, to a do-it-yourself wooden stoop at the trailer’s side door. A red awning jutted from its rear. Below the awning, two molded-plastic chairs and a small table, all Crayola yellow.
Noting the possibility of neighbors, I returned to the fenced property, pulled into the drive, and got out. And felt I’d stepped into the Amazon basin.
I held a moment, listening. The forest was eerily mute. No whining locusts or chirping birds. No creaking branches or shifting leaves. It seemed every living thing was burrowed in, trying to stay cool.
I glanced up. The sun, still low, sizzled behind a gauzy smear of morning haze. The old adage popped into my brain. Mad dogs and Englishmen. No argument here. I wouldn’t be lingering outside long.
The gate was roughly five yards from the road. I walked to it, aware of the gritty crunch of my sneakers on the gravel. Of the possibility I was being observed. Of wilderness in every direction. Of feral hogs.
A security camera mounted high on a metal beam kept vigil like an unblinking alien eye. I saw no buzzer or intercom box, nothing to allow communication with what lay beyond.
I held absolutely still, straining for a hint of human activity. Heard no generator, sprinkler, or mower. No slamming door. No dialogue floating from a radio or TV. No voice ordering me to halt.
If people were back there, they were damn quiet.
I looked up again. The camera stared down. Though it appeared relatively new, I couldn’t tell if the system was functioning or not.
I scanned my surroundings. Noted no utility or phone lines. No mailbox. No address marker. On the gate, a sign saying Private Property Keep Out. A spiffy fresh keypad.
Beyond the gate, the driveway tunneled through hardwoods and pines for about thirty feet, then a jungle of leaves, branches, and kudzu choked off the view. I spotted no tire tracks or oil stains in the gravel. No trash cans. No dog poop or litter. Just vegetation so dense it seemed to soak up every pixel of daylight. My frustration came out as a heartfelt curse.
Stepping from the gravel, I moved north through the scrub bordering the shoulder. Insects billowed from the weeds in frenzied clouds, making me regret my decision to forgo socks.
I caught no glimpse of anything among or beyond the dark trunks and shadows. The fence, though weathered, was well maintained. Beams similar to the one at the gate rose at regular intervals along its inside perimeter. Twenty feet tall, they held nothing. Rectangular discolorations on the outside of the chain linking beneath each beam suggested the possibility of missing signs. Now I was getting somewhere.
A sortie south yielded the same picture. And more bites.
Back in the car, waiting for the AC to kick in, I scratched and debated my next move. A casual internet search of the address had yielded no links. My visit to it had proven spectacularly unproductive. Not sure what I’d expected. A mailbox marked F. Vodyanov, KGB?
I was itchy and irritable. My shirt was damp and stuck to my back. Still, before declaring the trip a bust, I decided on one last effort.
* * *
It seemed I was expected. Or the occupant had been tracking my moves.
As I shifted into park, the trailer door opened and a man hop-stepped onto the stoop. The stump of a thigh projected from one leg of his grubby camo shorts. A faded red tee hung loose on his rib-shadowed chest. A blue bandanna covered dreads perhaps not rewoven since Da Nang.
Dreads watched me climb from my car, eyes unreadable. The sheathed knife on his belt sent a more obvious message.
“Good morning.” I smiled my warmest smile.
Dreads nodded, a barely perceptible angling of his chin. Which grazed his ZZ Top beard across the dog tags hanging from his neck.
“I’m Temperance Brennan.” In case he cared about names.
The only sound was an undulating hum coming from inside the trailer. I guessed an oscillating fan.
“Hot enough to grill steaks on the blacktop.” Jesus, Brennan.
No hint of a smile.
“I’m curious about your neighbors.” Jabbing a thumb over one shoulder.
Dreads continued to appraise me.
“A man died not far from here a little while back. I’m trying to determine who he was.”
“Why?”
“I’m helping the medical examiner.” Sensing that mention of the police might be a deal breaker. “I wonder if you know the owner of the property across the road.”
Dreads didn’t move for a full thirty seconds. From where I stood, I could see his tongue doing something with his front teeth.
“We have reason to believe—”
“I knew someone would show up one day.” Accent definitely not local. New York?
Before I could ask his meaning, Dreads gripped the banister with hands missing four digits and a thumb, collectively. A palm-foot maneuver brought him swinging down the ramp.
“Name’s Duncan Keesing.” Nodding toward the Crayola grouping. “Park it there.”
I did. Keesing followed, hopping like a pogo, then tossed a flip phone onto the table, dropped, and scooched his chair to face me.
“You’re not here to beef me about the cat?”
“No.” Surprised. Keesing didn’t strike me as the Mr. Whiskers type.
“VA gimme a prosthetic. Hurts like a bitch.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Say you got a nameless stiff?” Keesing’s face remained immobile behind the beard, but his eyes roved curiously over me. Odd, russet eyes.
“That’s correct.”
Keesing tapped the dog tags on his chest with an intact middle finger. The nail was long and yellow, with a black crescent cap. “The day I buy it, the cops’ll know exactly who’s gone down.”
“That’s very clever.”
“In Nam, your unit had to leave your sorry carcass, they kicked these little beauties into your teeth.”
“Yes.” Not sure that was true.
“It’s the only reason I keep a phone.” Tapping the device. Which looked like it was manufactured in the eighties. But probably worked better than mine. “Got no one to call me. But I get to feeling poorly, I can SOS.”
“I hope that never happens.”
“Keep my number right there on the lid. It’s ten digits now. That’s a lot to remember.”
“Smart.” It was handwritten in Sharpie. I wondered, didn’t ask, why he might need to call his own line.
“You think your dead guy’s the nutjob from over yonder?” Chin-cock toward the fenced acreage.
As had become my routine, I pulled the composite sketch of Vodyanov from my purse and held it up.
“Yes, ma’am.” Keesing nodded. “That’s the fella.”
“His full name is Felix Vodyanov. Can you tell me anything about him?” Slapping a mosquito that was lunching o
n my arm.
“No, ma’am.”
“Did you two ever speak?”
“We chewed the fat now and again.” Studying the sketch. “Vodyanov, eh? Sounds right. I called him Igor.”
“Why?”
“He talked like a Russki.”
“You never asked his last name?”
“No need to know.”
“Have you visited the property across the road?”
“Negatory.”
“Do you know why it’s protected by security cameras?”
“Negatory.”
“How long have you lived here?”
“Going on twelve years.”
“Why did you refer to Vodyanov as a nutjob?”
“The guy was fucked up, pardon my French.”
“Can you be more specific?” One of the dead mosquito’s pals was circling my ear. I waved it away.
“Hell, I don’t know. Maybe my words was harsh. We’ve all got our demons.”
I gave Keesing silence, hoping he’d feel compelled to fill it. He did.
“The guy would drop by, usually at night, like he had nowhere else to go or didn’t want to be alone. Not often, just now and again. Guess he’d see my light burning, figure an old hermit gimp was safe territory.”
Keesing dropped his gaze, perhaps reliving the horror of his injury. Perhaps his path to a solo life in a trailer at the back end of nowhere.
“Go on,” I encouraged.
“Sometimes he’d talk a blue streak, all wound up and shaking. Sometimes he’d sit and brood. For a while, I thought he might be a drinker. Never smelled a drop. I got a condition. Might be he had one, too. Made him unsteady.”
“Vodyanov exhibited mood swings?”
“That’s it.” Pointing what remained of an index finger. “He’d either be flying high or draggin’ ass.”
“When chatty, what did he say?”
“Bunch of twaddle.” Slowly wagging his head.
“Such as?” Exasperated. The bugs and oppressive heat and humidity were getting to me.
Keesing’s shoulders hunched, and his good leg began dancing a jig.
“I’m sorry,” I said, more gently. “Please take your time.”
Keesing pressed both damaged hands to the jittering knee. “He claimed the government was into bad doings. Said he had proof.”
I felt my pulse accelerate but didn’t push.
“He said the CIA had secret labs all over the country. That they was trying to figure ways to control people’s minds, to get them to crack under pressure. Ask me, they should’ve squeezed the Vietcong on that when they had the chance.”
A long mosquito moment. Annoyingly, Keesing seemed OK with being used as a food source.
“Did Vodyanov ever discuss specifics?” I asked.
“Mostly, he’d ramble. Could be the guy was a junkie.” The stub of finger rose again. “But wait. Once he named names. Most I didn’t catch, but a couple stuck, ’cause of my having been to those places. Philadelphia and Montauk. Yep, those I remember. And there was one sounded like some kinda sci-fi movie.” Pause. “Stargate. That was it.”
“Did he ever mention MKUltra?” With absolutely no inflection.
“Sounds right. Once he was all on about the government creating a disease to wipe out the Chinese. Something about mixing measles and mumps to create a superbug.”
“SARS?” I used the acronym for severe acute respiratory syndrome. A deadly outbreak hit China and the Far East in 2003. Beyond that, I knew little.
“Bingo. He said it smacked the Chinese and Canadians, but—here was the thing boiled his nads—the U.S. had very few cases and no fatalities.”
Why would Vodyanov be privy to information about the SARS epidemic? I made a mental note to do some digging.
“Another occasion, he was in a dither about the government hiding secret military bases. Places that lit up bright on some kind of maps. Didn’t seem likely to me, what with my experience serving.” Lowering both his head and his voice, Keesing added, “The dude also had intel on ops involving kids.”
“What intel?” Little tingle at the base of my skull.
“I was never clear on that, didn’t want to listen. Something about vaccines and holding kids in special camps to train ’em up for something. Maybe sex.” Repulsion sneaking into the rust-colored irises. “Sounded devo, so I tuned out.”
“Did he say—”
Keesing stopped me with a raised palm. “No, ma’am. Don’t want to talk none about hurting kids.”
I decided to switch topics.
“Was Vodyanov living across the road?”
“Hell if I know. Truth be told, I wished he’d just leave me alone.”
“Why?”
“He was nuts.”
“When did you usually see Mr. Vodyanov?”
“At night.”
“He drove?”
“Roger that.”
“What type vehicle?”
“Lots of different ones.”
“A black Hyundai Sonata?”
Shoulder shrug. “Maybe. I don’t know much about cars.”
“Did you ever see anyone else entering or leaving the property?”
“Look, lady. I’m no snoop and no snitch. I mind my own p’s and q’s. Mostly, I’d half listen. Not sure why. I guess I felt for the guy. He seemed kind of lonely.”
“When was the last time you saw Vodyanov?”
“Two, maybe three weeks ago. Came to tell me he was sorry. I figured he was referring to how he’d deep-sixed the signs along this stretch of the road. Hell, I was good with it. Makes it hard for folks to find us out here.” He seemed about to continue, caught himself, and fell silent.
“What is it you’re not saying?”
“It’s probably nothing.” Keesing scratched his neck. Crossed his arms. “The guy was section eight all the way.”
I raised both brows in question.
“A loony tune.”
My eyes drifted past Keesing to the far side of his trailer. Fell on a barrel with a picture of a crab in an aquarium painted on one side. Pink shells at the base of each claw. Or maybe they were eyes. Between the charring and the flaking, it was hard to know.
“Did you do the art?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Very nice.”
A renegade puff of wind shifted the leaves overhead, throwing spiderweb shadows across Keesing’s face. When I thought he’d shut down for good, he spoke, voice again low.
“Your mentioning the barrel does bring to mind one thing. One night, maybe five, six years back, I was out securing the lid against the damn coons. I’d forgotten to do it, had to haul ass back outta bed. If the seal’s not tight, come morning, there’s trash from here to tomorrow. Anyways, it was late. A car passed. Don’t get much traffic this way, so I took note. The car turned into the driveway yonder, idled while the driver leaned out to open the gate.”
“Was it Vodyanov?”
“It was pitch-black, so I’m catching mostly taillights and headlights.” Keesing swallowed. Swallowed again. “But I swear to God I seen a kid peering out the rear window. A small little face with a tiny hand to either side.”
Keesing pantomimed the vision, then dropped his hands and closed his eyes as if feeling pain. Guilt?
I waited.
“I been to hell and back. I know fear when I see it.” The russet eyes locked onto mine. “That kid looked terrified.”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Lady, I ain’t sure of nothing ’cept death. But I stand by one thing.”
Keesing leaned back and ran a mangled hand down his beard.
“That dude was crazy as a bag of rats.”
15
With the conversation still fresh in my mind, I dictated notes onto my phone, then headed out. I was wending toward NC-198 when the lyrics of Les Cowboys Fringants exploded from my mobile.
“Monsieur le detective,” I answered, sounding more chipper than I felt.
“Madame �
� l’anthropol—” A hissing echo garbled Ryan’s customary response.
“What’s up?” Shocked at how glad I was to hear his voice. It hadn’t been that long since we’d spoken.
“Bordeaux this morn— …”
“Any luck with the horse?”
“Neville remains AWOL. But I … wee garcon who …”
“This connection sucks,” I said.
“Want me to … back?”
“Not sure it would do any good. I’m driving through the boonies. And my phone is circling the drain.”
“Sounds like you’re … iving through Uzbekistan.”
“I might as well be.”
“… out so early on a Satur … ?”
“I can barely hear you.” Braking for a squirrel kamikaze-ing across the pavement. “I’ll explain later. For now, may I ask a favor?”
“Bien sûr, ma chou …”
“I want to know about Project MKUltra.”
“The LSD experi … McGill?” Static and distance blurred whatever surprise Ryan’s tone might have carried.
“Yes.”
“I know … done at the Allan Memorial Institute … Royal Victoria Hospital … funded by the CIA and the Canadian government …”
Ryan’s voice cut out abruptly, and a high metallic buzz took over the line.
“This is hopeless,” I said. “I’ll be back on the grid soon. Ring me when you have something?”
“I’ll need …”
A crackling screech. Then the line went dead.
* * *
I was crossing the patio when Les Cowboys crooned again. The thermometer now read 101°F.
“Good timing. I just hit the annex. Hold on.”
En route home, I’d stopped at my neighborhood Harris Teeter. Balancing my provisions on one knee, I fished out my key, opened the door, and stepped into the kitchen. Air thirty degrees cooler puckered my skin.
“Is the birdcat happy to see you?” Ryan asked.
“No sign of him.” Placing the bags on the counter. “He hates hot weather.”
“He never goes outside.”
“I’ve explained that to him.”
“Got some info for you.” Ryan didn’t ask my reason for wanting it. I like that about him. “MKUltra was a nasty piece of work.”