Pieces of Light

by Julie Cave

  Inside the trash can, the cleaner showed them the bright yellow work clothes that had been stuffed inside. There was a broad-brimmed hat, perfect for pulling low over the face, a long-sleeved shirt, and long pants.

  "Did you touch these?" Sinclair asked the cleaner, who glanced at his supervisor and shook his head.

  "No, sir."

  Using a fresh evidence bag, Sinclair carefully placed the clothes inside for evidence. There was little else of value inside the trash.

  They thanked Nate and drifted into the food court. There, they split up and asked each food vendor if they remembered seeing a person in high-visibility work clothes around the time of the bombing. Nobody seemed to have seen anything. Most could have described the exact moment the bomb exploded with startling detail, but nothing about who had been hanging around the food court at the time.

  Their final destination was the Public Safety Office, from where the security guards worked. The supervisor, a bulldog of a man named Oliver with small eyes and weathered skin, explained what had happened on the day. They didn't know where the bomb had detonated or whether there were more bombs timed to explode. The policy book requires that shoppers and vendors be evacuated with minimum panic from the building to a safe zone in the event of a disaster.

  Oliver and his guards had done just that. With efficiency, they'd organized the terrified shoppers into some semblance of order and helped them out into the street. Next, they'd rounded up the shop owners and workers, who had quickly locked up to safeguard their goods. Then they'd had another quick run-through of the building to ensure it was empty and locked it up until further notice.

  "It seems strange," Oliver admitted. "We made sure everyone was on the street, but we couldn't be sure there was no danger out there. We could have been sending everyone into harm's way."

  "It's an impossible choice," said Dinah. "You couldn't have known. If you'd let everyone stay inside the mall, a bomb there might have hurt people, too."

  "Anyway," said Oliver, "it turned out okay. But I have to say that I didn't notice one person from another. My main concern was getting everyone out, whether they were male, female, black, white, young, or old. I wanted them safe."

  "What about surveillance tapes?" Sinclair asked. "Specifically, we're interested in the food court area."

  Oliver barked an order to one of the security guards. "It probably won't be the resolution you're after," he said. "High-resolution cameras are inside the stores to help with shoplifting, but in the general areas we only have a few."

  They crowded around a small screen and watched as the guard rolled the footage. It was long-distance and grainy, and though they could see people's movements, distinguishing characteristics was impossible. The images weren't in color either, and if someone wearing the high-visibility work clothes had entered the mall, it wasn't evident on the tape. Dinah was disappointed that they wouldn't catch a glimpse of the bomber.

  Ferguson, Sinclair, and Dinah thanked Oliver and his guards, and strolled back up to the food court for lunch.

  "So what do we know so far?" Sinclair said, a little dismally. "A person who wore high-visibility work clothes, who stole a van, who built a bomb."

  "Cheer up," said Dinah. "We might get some DNA from the clothes, or some information from the lab about how the bomb was built. Don't give up yet!"

  Sinclair smiled lazily at her and she suddenly felt dizzy and flustered. What is going on? she wondered. Start acting like a woman your age, for goodness' sake.

  Ferguson just watched them, a paternal knowing smile on his face.

  * * * *

  It was mid-morning by the time Scott lurched into the kitchen, looking decidedly worse for wear. Isabelle made him a coffee and placed it in front of him. Her hands were shaking with anxiety — that he would notice the long sleeves she wore to hide her bandages, even though the day was blisteringly hot; that he would be in a terrible mood because of his hangover; and that she would make his mood worse by asking questions.

  "How was the meeting?" she inquired.

  Scott grunted. "Good."

  "I imagine it must have gone very well," she continued. "You were out for a long time."

  Scott rolled his eyes. "Are you going to nag me all morning? I have better things to do."

  "I'm just saying a phone call would have been nice," Isabelle said, trying to make her voice sound placating. "I was worried about you."

  Scott ignored that comment and took his coffee upstairs. Isabelle retreated to the deck, staring at her favorite view, feeling utterly invisible.

  She didn't have any classes that day, due to the light summer semester workload, so she spent the morning cleaning the house. She found cleaning therapeutic, and anyway, hadn't she always been taught that cleanliness was next to godliness?

  It was the day for her monthly lunch date with her mother and the location was an Italian restaurant downtown. The food was impeccable, and more importantly, up to Rosa's standards. Rosa also liked to see if any power brokers came to lunch there, and if she could eavesdrop, there was no happier woman alive.

  "How are you?" Rosa asked as they sat down to their table.

  "Fine. How are you?"

  "You look tired." Rosa looked at Isabelle critically. "Have you been sleeping well?"

  "I'm okay. I didn't sleep well last night."

  "You should try some warm milk," advised Rosa. "Or take a bath. It'll relax you."

  Warm milk and a bath aren't going to fix what's wrong.

  "Right. I'll give it a try," agreed Isabelle, if only to change the subject. She decided not to tell Rosa about Scott's late night. It would only upset her, and Isabelle would be fending off a dozen phone calls a day, checking up on her and dispensing advice. This irritated Isabelle, because she hated that her mother tried to pretend that her marriage had been perfect.

  "What have you been up to?" Isabelle asked. The waiter came and took their order — ravioli with snow peas and calamari for Isabelle, and gnocchi with pine nuts and white wine sauce for Rosa.

  "Just the usual — the garden is looking good after the storms. I've been swimming every day," replied Rosa, who had been diagnosed with osteoporosis several years ago and now followed a regimen of exercise to ward off further deterioration in her bones. "What about you?"

  "Work mostly. I work on my thesis when I get the chance." The food came with a plate of hot garlic panini.

  They had been eating companionably for several minutes, when a high-pitched voice sounded: "Rosa! Great to see you! Mind if we sit down?" Two women in their sixties stood above their table, one with steel-gray curls and the other with a frosted bob. Both women were lightly made up and dressed expensively in linen. They were vaguely familiar to Isabelle.

  "Hi, ladies. Please pull up a chair," invited Rosa. "You remember my daughter, Isabelle? This is Hazel and Heather, from the church."

  "Gosh, we haven't seen you in years," said Hazel, she with the blond bob. "Since you were a young girl. How are you?" Without waiting for a reply, she turned to Rosa. "It was a lovely funeral, Rosa. How are you coping?" Her tone was pleasant and concerned, but Isabelle detected the slightest hint of gossipy glee in the other woman's voice.

  "It's been hard," admitted Rosa. "We all miss him terribly of course."

  "I'm sure you do," said Heather, of the gray curls. She turned to Isabelle. "Your father was just a saint, wasn't he? You must just miss him awfully."

  "Oh yes," agreed Isabelle, her voice heavy with sarcasm. The two older women didn't notice.

  "Reginald did such a lot for the church and parish," said Hazel. "He organized the fundraising and building of the new building for the parish primary school. Nobody else wanted to take on that task. We haven't found a replacement for him that even comes close."

  "And he always organized the church fete every year," chimed in Heather. "It all ran so smoothly while he was in charge."

  "Remember all the work he did around the church?" added Hazel. "He was such a handyman. He could fix a
nything. One year the church roof started leaking after a bad storm and the father didn't know who else to call. Reginald came out in the middle of the night and fixed the roof. He saved the church an awful lot of money."

  "Such a dear man," said Heather fondly. "The church misses him in so many ways."

  "Yes, we all do," Rosa said very quietly.

  Isabelle savagely speared a piece of calamari and stuffed it into her mouth to squash the alarming wellspring of tears that had surfaced.

  "And how is Michael?" asked Hazel, suddenly remembering the younger sibling.

  "He's doing very well," Rosa said. "He's a paralegal at a law firm here in D.C., and he also does some writing in his spare time."

  "Oh, I bet he inherited his father's altruistic streak, too," said Heather. "Good for him. Does he feel the loss of his father very badly? It's hard for boys to lose their father, don't you think?"

  "It hit Michael very hard," said Rosa. "He still misses him very much."

  "Are there any grandkids yet?" asked Heather, winking at Rosa.

  "No, we're taking precautions," replied Isabelle acidly. The two ladies looked taken aback and uncomfortable, literally drawing away from Isabelle as if her sin might be contagious. Isabelle enjoyed their awkwardness. Rosa glared at Isabelle.

  "Well," said Hazel brightly, after the silence had dragged on for longer than was polite. "We'll leave you to your lunch. Lovely to see you, Rosa. Do call if you need anything, won't you?"

  They teetered away, heads close together, no doubt gossiping about Rosa's condemned daughter.

  "So you've been lying to them for a while now, have you?" Isabelle said, before she could help herself.

  Rosa put down her fork. "Pardon me?"

  "Dad was a saint, was he? A wonderful, caring man even. They have absolutely no idea what Dad was really like, do they?"

  Rosa sighed. "Isabelle, do we have to go into this?"

  "I'm just curious. I assume you've known Hazel and Heather for a pretty long time. They never even guessed at Dad's true nature?"

  "Please don't speak ill of him," said Rosa sharply, but Isabelle ignored her.

  "I would've thought the church would help you," she continued. "Surely you could've asked them for help, and we could've gotten away from Dad."

  Rosa shook her head. "Isabelle, divorce is a sin. What do you think the church would have done?"

  "Are you serious?" Isabelle asked, feeling old resentments boiling away inside her. "The church would rather you stayed with an abusive husband than get divorced?"

  "It is my family," Rosa said quietly. "It's not their business. If we had problems, it was up to me to solve them."

  "Well, you really did a fine job of it," muttered Isabelle.

  Rosa flinched as if she had been slapped, her eyes shadowed and wounded. Isabelle immediately felt awful. "Mom, I'm sorry," she said.

  Rosa pushed her plate away. "Are you finished? I'd like to go home now."

  They did not speak as the bill was paid and they walked downstairs to the parking lot. As Isabelle drove home, she was haunted by conversations that should never have been voiced.

  * * * *

  Ferguson had received a phone call during lunch from the FBI lab, where technicians had been working around the clock to identify the components of the bomb. After lunch, where Ferguson had eaten an impressive plate of nachos, they headed to the lab. Dinah looked forward to seeing Zach Booker, the unique and irrepressible crime scene technician.

  He came to meet them in the lobby. Instead of one mohawk, he had three – one down the center of his head and one on either side. The middle mohawk was dyed platinum blond and the side mohawks were dyed bright green. His facial piercings — eyebrow, nose, and lip — were all tiny little pirate flags.

  "Well, if it isn't the good pirate," commented Dinah, shaking his hand. "Yo ho ho and all that?"

  "It may interest you to know, uncultured one," said Zach, loftily, "that today is International Speak Like a Pirate Day."

  Dinah laughed. "Your lab report should be interesting then, m'hearty."

  Zach grinned. "Well, I wouldn't put you through that. I'm just showing a little solidarity." He quickly stuck out his tongue, which was also pierced and which also sported a pirate flag.

  The three of them followed Zach into his lab, which was appropriately adorned with skull-and-crossbones for the occasion.

  "So, the bomb," Zach began. He'd identified the components using a mass spectrometer and had the results on his computer screen. "It was a very typical ANFO bomb, made up of fuel oil and ammonium nitrate. Easy to source the ingredients and easy to make."

  He clicked the mouse and the screen changed. "The fuel oil is diesel. Diesel fuel is cheap and readily available. You can obtain it to use to fuel trucks, for example, or heating oil. They have slightly different chemical compositions. In this case, your man obtained diesel fuel used to operate trucks and machinery. About five and a half percent of the bomb was diesel fuel."

  "Hard to trace," said Sinclair knowledgeably. "He wouldn't have needed staggering amounts to make the bomb, and thus wouldn't have triggered suspicion."

  "Right," agreed Zach. "The remaining ninety-four and a half percent of the bomb was ammonium nitrate, or fertilizer. The fertilizer is synthetic nitrogen made in granular form, used extensively in the agricultural industry. Here is where you might find some leads. A person needs a reason and a license to obtain this type of fertilizer."

  "Or have stolen it or have a contact who can get it for you," added Sinclair.

  "Sure," said Zach. "Now the bomber used old-fashioned dynamite as a booster, which was set off with a remote detonator. A time-delayed fuse was attached to the blasting cap, which detonates the dynamite, which in turn causes the ANFO to explode."

  "Where did the dynamite come from?" asked Sinclair. "Is it traceable?"

  "It was actually quite old dynamite," said Zach. "The kind they used in quarrying or mining a while ago, I believe."

  Sinclair nodded, deep in thought.

  "All told, the bomb was pretty small," Zach continued. "My guess is about five hundred pounds. Compare this to the Oklahoma City bombing, for example, which was about five thousand pounds."

  "I guess the fuse and blasting caps were all pretty generic?" Sinclair asked.

  "Yeah, I'm afraid so, though I'd hazard a guess and say that they may have been obtained with the dynamite," said Zach. "Maybe from a quarry or mine? I believe the ANFO mixture was probably mixed in the heavy plastic bags in which the fertilizer is sold. I can't find traces of plastic or metal that would indicate the bomber used barrels or crates."

  They stood in silence for several moments, contemplating what they had learned. Dinah thought about the type of person the bomber would be — he or she would have to be reasonably organized and methodical, given what they knew about him. There had been great attention to detail in the type of vehicle used and stolen, the materials obtained, the scene set up, and the disposal of the identifying clothes.

  "There's only one other thing that might be of some help," Zach added. "If the bomb was made off-site, which is probable, he wouldn't have wanted to drive the van very far with the fuse and blasting caps attached. The ANFO mixture is stable, but the blasting caps are somewhat volatile. I would think the bomb was built easily within the city limits."

  "How much fertilizer are we talking about?" Sinclair asked.

  "I'd say about eight 50-pound bags," said Zach. "Before you do the math and tell me I can't add up, you have to add the weight of the fuel oil and dynamite to the fertilizer to get the five-hundred-pound weight of the overall structure."

  Sinclair nodded. "Thanks, Zach. You've been helpful. I guess you didn't find any identifying markers?"

  Zach shook his head. "No useable fingerprints. Plenty of DNA, as you'd expect from a scene where there were multiple injuries and fatalities, but nothing of any use."

  Ferguson sighed. "What are your thoughts on the guy or group who did this?"

 
; "My first thought is that it's not a group, at least not in the way you're thinking," replied Zach. "I don't think this is the work of a terrorist group, for instance. They would usually target a much more symbolic address, like an embassy or a government building. They like to target people and buildings that cause maximum shock value around the world. This is a little too low key. Second, I'm not even thinking a radical right-wing extremist like Timothy McVeigh, for example, because the bomb was so small. People who are hardened by years of hatred and contempt often try to cause a lot of damage, but again, this isn't the case."

  "So, any ideas on who might be behind this?"

  "My gut feeling, which is based on nothing except instinct, is that it's a lone person, with a specific agenda," said Zach. "The agenda may be against the Catholic Church, but I don't think it includes killing as many people as possible. I think it's an agenda fueled by desperation, rather than ideology or hatred."

  "That's a very interesting viewpoint," commented Sinclair. "I tend to agree with you."

  "Of course you do. That's why I'm the man!" joked Zach.

  "Oh, Zach," said Dinah, shaking her head sadly. "What a crazy, deluded world you must live in."

  * * * *

  When Dinah opened the doors to her church that evening, she couldn't help but cast an eye around for suspicious people before entering the building. She was here for her weekly Bible study with four other ladies from the church. For a brief, chilly moment, she imagined that she would be in this church when the bomber blew it up.

  Don't be ridiculous, she chided herself. For one thing, he'd probably wait for a Sunday service, not your little study group. For another, this is one of hundreds of churches. Why would he choose this one?

  Dinah forced the thought from her head and found the little room where they held their weekly Bible study. On weekdays, it was used for playgroup and senior citizens' meetings. On Sundays, it was used for Sunday school. It was a busy, thriving church, but now Dinah couldn't help but worry that it was also a target.

  They were studying the life of King David, and Dinah was enjoying it immensely. She loved how the Bible told the history of his life with such candor. King David had been a great king, a godly man, yet he had also plumbed the depths of sin. It was comforting, in a way, to know that even the greatest men in the Bible struggled with their sinful natures, just as she did some two thousand years later.