by Scott Carson
The fewer the better, in fact.
30
Mick’s phone rang repeatedly on his drive back through the rain and into the mountains, but he ignored every call. Most were from Ed Cochran, no doubt wanting to chat about Mick’s email. Fine. He’d warned Ed that reception would be bad out here. He’d return the call in due time, but he wanted to force Ed’s hand first and make sure that he contacted Arthur Brady. When Mick arrived at the Chilewaukee, he needed Brady to be in a cooperative mood.
There was much to handle. The longer he rode with Anders Wallace at his side, the more he understood. The Chilewaukee would not be an easy task, and it was only the first step.
To reach the city—the sacrifice that mattered—he would need to achieve much more.
Another call came in, from a number he didn’t recognize, but the area code covered the part of the state that included Torrance County, and so he was curious enough that he almost answered. He decided not to, though. There was a structure for his day, a system of priority assignments, and he couldn’t interrupt that for unknown callers.
The closer he got to Torrance County, the harder the rain fell. He turned his wipers to high and sent them into a slashing frenzy and still it was hard to see. Cars in both directions had their headlights on in the middle of the day. Pools of floodwater lined the roadside. In some areas the median looked like a creek. Fields had turned to ponds.
He’d seen such flooding in the area before, but only a few times, and always in the spring. That was the danger season, when snowmelt and spring rains collided to engorge the creeks and rivers and then the reservoirs. He was used to worrying the most about his dams in the months of April and May. For this to be happening in October was very strange.
“Not so strange,” Anders said, as if Mick had spoken the thought aloud.
Maybe he had. It was hard to tell now. Anders came and went visually; sometimes he’d be there in the passenger seat, fastidious and formal, but others he’d be gone, and then his voice would return as if aware of each of Mick’s thoughts.
Thoughts that were, right now, focused on the aged infrastructure that was creaking and groaning to process this round of flooding. Almost none of it was slated for winter repairs. The snowpack would melt off, the spring rains would come, and the infrastructure would be tested once more.
How long could you go like that before disaster struck? Why couldn’t people think about risk with any level of long-term outlook or horizon view? They cared only about the immediate, cared only about the news of today. Tell them a dam might fail in the next five years and they shrugged.
They need a wakeup call, he thought, gripping and regripping the steering wheel as he sped south, his tires shedding plumes of water. They need to hear the alarm.
“Exactly,” Anders said, floating into Mick’s peripheral vision again. “And that means someone must sound the alarm.”
Mick nodded. If a few sacrifices had to be made to prevent a larger catastrophe, so be it. The math on that was very simple. Greater than, less than, or equal to. When the figure in question was death toll, there was only one correct answer: less than. Always.
He wondered why he’d never been able to see the clarity of this before.
No matter. He saw it now.
“Not only do you see it,” Anders told him, “but you know your role in it.”
“Yes,” Mick said. “Yes, I certainly do.”
31
The farther Steve got from the Chill, the easier it was to feel embarrassment over how seriously he’d treated the idea that Mick Fleming might have lied to them all.
Back at the gatehouse it hadn’t felt that way, for some reason. In the gatehouse he’d been able to believe there was something deeply wrong with Mick Fleming. Maybe it was fatigue, or maybe it was shame and shock from watching Aaron on the security cameras, peering into the darkness and then running away as if to escape an unknown terror.
Whatever the reason, while he was in the gatehouse, Steve had allowed Gillian Mathers to drive the conversation toward foolishness. Ridiculousness.
DEP detective. Hardly the real deal.
The thought snuck into his mind like an intruder. This attitude had long been prevalent among police in upstate counties where the DEP had their own units, and Steve had long fought to eradicate it. The DEP force was capable and competent and needed to be treated as such.
Steve suddenly resented Gillian Mathers, though, blaming her for disrupting what had been a good morning.
That only worsened when he arrived home to find Aaron already gone. Then he stepped inside the house and saw the tumbler glass in the sink.
He approached it slowly, as if it were a coiled snake. The glass was empty. Steve picked it up and smelled it. The lingering pungency of whiskey hit him. He closed his eyes as if that could shut out the scent.
It wasn’t even noon yet.
Enough, he thought. This has gone far enough. He took out his cell phone and called Aaron’s. It went to voicemail. He started to leave a message but couldn’t come up with the right words, and then he felt stupid for letting the seconds tick by in silence, so he disconnected, found the card Gillian Mathers had given him, and called her mobile number. She answered.
“I think I let you talk me into some bad ideas,” he said. “Are you with Aaron? Or is he out drinking somewhere?”
“He’s here, Sheriff. And he’s not been drinking.”
“Bullshit. He left a whiskey glass in my sink. What’s he got to tell you about his little piece of dinner theater for the security cameras?”
She was quiet for a moment.
“He’s sober,” she said. “And he’s been helpful.”
“There’s nothing he needs to provide help on,” Steve snapped. “He needs to get help, and today that’s what I intended to be working on. Now that’s all shot to hell. Send him home, Sergeant. Nobody needs to waste time like this.”
“I’m going to need him for a couple hours longer.”
“Hours? What are you asking him to do, memorize Shakespeare?”
“I’m asking him to guide our diver to where he found the body yesterday.”
“You’re not serious. Mathers, this is getting out of hand. Before you put somebody at risk in the water, let’s—”
“I don’t think there’s risk to diving down here. It’s in the stilling basin. The current isn’t strong down there. I want to know if he saw what he said he did. I’d think you’d support that.”
“I don’t need a diver to tell me there’s nothing down there. I also don’t need anyone to tell me Aaron didn’t murder a man who’s walking among us. I believed you felt the same, but it seems I was wrong.”
“All due respect, Steve? It’s my jurisdiction. It’s my case.”
“It’s my county.”
“You called me.”
“A mistake I won’t make again.”
“You all through, Sheriff?”
His inhalation seemed to draw more anger than air.
“I don’t want any divers going in that water. I’m the county sheriff and I—”
“Don’t have jurisdiction at the Chilewaukee Reservoir,” Gillian Mathers barked. “I hope that’s what you were going to say, because it’s correct, and it is very damn important that you remember that today.”
“That’s right, the ‘fauxlice’ have jurisdiction down there. The Busy With Something folks. It’s still my county, and that’s still my son.”
There was a silence before she said, “Are you hearing yourself right now?”
He almost hadn’t been. What was he snarling out at her? Fauxlice was a nickname for the DEP officers, one that he chastised his deputies for using. But the other one, the Busy With Something folks, that didn’t even make sense. That went back generations, to when the DEP police had been called the Board of Water Supply police. That nickname belonged to his grandfather’s era. Steve had never had a problem with the DEP, and yet here he was, using those childish slurs on Gillian Mathers?
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br /> “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s just… I had a plan for this day. The plan was to get my son some help. He does need that help.”
Her voice softened and she said, “I understand that. I’m sending him back home as soon as I can. I need you to respect my case in the meantime. Please.”
Steve didn’t answer.
“Did you find out about Fleming?” Mathers asked.
“What?”
“You were going to check on him. See if he actually went back to Albany last night.”
Who the hell cares? he wanted to say, but he held his tongue.
“Not yet. I’ll make some calls. Just do me the favor of making sure Aaron gets home soon and making sure that he’s sober. I’ve got my doubts.”
“I’ll make him blow if you want.”
“Do that. I’m curious what he’s showing. It’s not going to be three zeros.”
“I’ll let you know,” she said in a tone that was somehow both cooperative and defiant, a voice that promised she could be counted on to do what she said but not that she agreed that it needed to be done. “I’ll check on Aaron, and you check on Fleming. That was the deal. Is it still?”
“Yeah,” he managed. “You let me know what he blows, okay?”
“Ten-four, Sheriff,” she said, and then she hung up.
He tossed the phone onto the counter with disgust. When he’d called her from the Chill, it had seemed like the right thing to do, removing himself from a situation over which he should not exert any power or influence. Now he regretted that and wanted the power and influence back. He’d taken her for compassionate; he’d not taken her for crazy. But here she was, summoning divers to check on a hallucination.
“Fauxlice,” he muttered again. The DEP, baby: Doing Errands, Probably. Dumbass Endless Patrols. All sorts of names had sprung up over the years, and some of them were earned. The DEP officers were nothing but a hassle, and he’d invited them into his life. What in the hell had he been thinking?
“How’d you get that badge?” he said aloud, cutting off his own angry thoughts. It was a question his wife used to ask with biting sarcasm when he was acting foolish or childish. How’d you get that badge? People elected you? On purpose? So I guess they haven’t seen you act like this, then? Because I can’t believe you’d be winning votes right now, Sheriff.
She could always shame him straight, and while there’d been more than a few times when he resisted, he couldn’t look back and say that she’d been wrong. Not when it came to his bitching and grousing, at least.
But that’s our son, and so it is different, he thought, as if Lily could rise from the grave to agree or object.
He sighed, rinsed the whiskey glass out, and put it in the dishwasher. Then he picked up his phone and walked to the desk where his laptop waited. He’d call Albany and ask about Mick Fleming. He would do that much.
32
Aaron heard his father’s voice on Gillian’s cell phone, but then she walked away and spoke in hushed tones. He heard one word plain as day, though: sober. Gillian was defending him, telling his dad that he was sober.
He stood with his hands in his jacket pockets and his back to her and tried to pretend he was oblivious to it all. He was sober… but only by a few minutes. If her call hadn’t come, he would have taken that first drink, and the first drink always had a way of shaking hands with the second.
He was sober now, though. Sober and cold and wet. He hadn’t expected to stand out here in the rain again, but here he was, pointing directions to the divers.
“Center and down, then look left, and follow the timber?” one of the divers asked. He was already knee-deep in the water.
“Yeah. There’s part of a tree down there. The limbs split into a Y, and the body is pinned between them. Be careful. There are hooks.”
The diver nodded, lowered his mask, and inserted his mouthpiece. His partner gave a thumbs-up and then followed him into the water. They swam about fifteen feet and then descended, leaving a trail of bubbles that was hard to see because of the way the rain dimpled the surface.
Gillian Mathers returned to stand beside Aaron. He couldn’t see her face because she had the hood of her rain jacket up. She looked smaller in the rain jacket, and the shadow of the hood made her dark skin deepen a few more shades. The blue eyes contrasted against her skin with a fierceness.
“That was my dad?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Thinks I’m drunk?”
“Was worried you might’ve had one or two.”
He nodded. “I haven’t, but I was close. Poured it down the sink when you called.”
Gillian looked away, embarrassed. “He wants me to test you.”
Aaron gave a soft laugh. He was going to be Breathalyzed even while the divers searched the bottom to check on his sanity?
“I don’t have to,” she said. “I can tell you’re sober.”
“No,” he said. “If he wants to know, then do it.”
She hesitated, then shrugged and walked back to her car. A minute later she returned with the Breathalyzer.
“It’s just a field test,” she said as she fitted a plastic tube into it. “Not even admissible in court anymore. Only official chemical tests or blood draws are—”
“I’m familiar with the process, trust me. Blow until the beep, right?”
She nodded almost apologetically.
He put the cool plastic tube between his front teeth, sealed his lips around it, and blew hard. She was still holding the device, which brought her in close to him. She kept those bright blue eyes on him, her dark hair framing her face, while she watched and waited on the truth.
About five seconds later the device beeped. He parted his lips and she pulled the device back and looked at the screen.
“Zeros,” she said.
He nodded.
She rooted around in the pocket of her rain jacket and came out with her cell phone. Snapped a picture of the screen.
“Just to add some documentation for him,” she said. “He means well.”
“Yes,” Aaron said. “He does.”
One of the divers broke the surface in the stilling basin. He lifted his hand, waving to get their attention, and then spit his mouthpiece out.
“You’ve got a ten-zero down there all right,” he shouted. “Tangled up in the tree. Heavy lines and hooks. There was something over the head. It’s pretty well decayed now, but I don’t think it was clothing. Looks like a bag or something, pulled over the head and tied off at the neck.”
For a long moment Gillian Mathers didn’t answer. She just stared out at the water as if she could see through it, down to the depths. As if she hadn’t needed the diver at all.
“Okay,” she said at last. “I’ll call it in. Can you bring her up, or will you need help with her?”
“We can bring…” The diver hesitated. “It’s a woman?”
“You don’t think so?” Gillian asked.
“I couldn’t tell. I mean, it’s a skeleton. I don’t know how you—”
“Sorry. Slip of the tongue. Can you bring that corpse up, or will you need assistance?”
Aaron glanced at her, wondering what this was all about. It was the second time she’d referenced a female corpse, and each time she’d become edgy.
“We can get it,” the diver said. “Are you okay with us cutting those lines, or you want them untangled?”
“Cut them if you have to.”
He made an Okay gesture with his thumb and index finger, then put the mouthpiece back in, roll-turned, and submerged again.
Gillian looked at Aaron. Neither of them spoke. It was as if words would break the moment, send the diver shooting back to the surface to shout that he was just kidding, there was no corpse, and Aaron Ellsworth was out of his ever-loving mind.
Bare limbs shivered in the wind, but the surface of the stilling basin earned its name, remaining placid as a pond. Just upstream, the roar of the water thundering down the spillway could be heard, and j
ust below the basin it surged back through the creek bed, toward Torrance. The stilling basin slowed the energy but didn’t stop it.
They stared at the water and nothing happened and Aaron was just about to speak when the skeleton hand broke the surface.
He almost screamed, because for an instant it seemed the skeleton was rising under its own power. Then the first diver appeared just beside the hand, and then his partner surfaced. From there they rose in a triangle—divers at each end, corpse at the point. The divers handled the corpse as gingerly as they could, but they were bringing old bones through resistant waters, and the skeleton shifted and slackened and slipped. The body collapsed in on itself as if insulted or ashamed.
As Aaron watched the divers haul the objecting bones out of the water he thought that Gillian Mathers had made a mistake, allowing them to handle this task. Then he wondered how it would have been better accomplished. With ropes? With a net? What dignity could be granted to a disintegrating body in the depths?
He wanted to look away, but instead he mimicked Gillian’s stance, arms folded and eyes steady, as if this sight were a normal thing. He tried to channel the spirit of his father, his grandfather, his great-grandfather. Lawmen.
The corpse was pulled clear of the water. Remains of old boots flapped around the ankle bones, rubber soles held together by scraps of leather and metal grommets that glistened. Thin strips of blue-black fabric interspersed with tendrils of dead weeds weaved between ribs. At the top of the body, flopped against the right shoulder, the skull rested on the broken neck.
On the surface, the black hood that had covered the skull was clearly nothing but shreds of decaying cloth. The shreds clung damply against the sides of the skull, but the empty eye sockets and the full set of teeth were unobscured.
One of the divers put his hand gently on the back of the skull and lifted it so that the head aligned more naturally with the spine. It was a pointless effort but a tender one, and for some reason it was the thing that made Aaron look away.
He saw then that Gillian Mathers already had her back to the scene.