Читать книгу Drago #6: And the City Burned - Art Spinella - Страница 6

Climbing from my chair, my shirt’s back stuck to the vinyl from perspiration. The humidity was maybe 7 percent. Nowhere near the usual 30 percent. But the temperature was already in the low 80s in the Chief’s office. My comfort zone is between 70 and 73 degrees.

“Show me where this one was found.”

Forte led Sal and me to the gully behind the police department. Even this early in the morning, the sun was giving its full face and force. The four-foot tall mix of gorse, wild blackberries and other scrub crackled under our feet. The heat had taken the last bits of moisture out of the plants and ground. We scrambled down the short incline and picked our way into the brush.

About 30 feet into the field Forte stopped and pointed to a small patch of tamped down scrub.

Sal pushed through the scrub to the north side of the patch. I did the same to the south, eyeballing the ground, figuring it was about three feet square. Bitter dry bushes had been trampled a bit, broken stems and dry leaves clumped into a non-descript pattern as if someone had simply walked to the spot and dropped the propane tank.

“No foot prints,” Sal said, bending down to inspect the thatch.

I pulled back some of the overgrowth hoping to find at least something that would provide a clue. Nothing except a circular indentation from the bottom ring of the propane tank. Someone had placed it on the ground and given it a twist to keep it upright. The hardpan lived up to its name.

Forte looked around the field to its edges. “If the bomb had gone off, this stuff would have turned into a nice brush fire. With this heat and the usual afternoon wind, it would have taken all the fire fighting resources of Bandon to put it out.”

Sweeping an arm around, “What is this, about 200 acres? The houses up there” nodding toward the east, “would have torched in a matter of minutes.” Turning toward the PD, “Our building would have gone up in just a few more minutes. This is scary, Nick.”

“Especially since there are presumably 39 other tanks somewhere.”

We pushed our way through the scrub back to the low-slung police station and Forte’s office. As the seriousness of the potential fire began to take hold, Forte said, “I’ll let the surrounding PDs know what we’re facing. Ditto the mayor and the fire departments. If someone is truly interested in reenacting the ’36 fire, I’m not sure we have the resources to deal with it. Even on a county basis.”

Sal sniffed his coffee mug and dropped it on a tray next to the coffee urn.

“But why do this, guys?” Sal asked. “What’s in it for someone to burn Bandon to the ground again?”

I shook my head. “Doesn’t matter right now. We have 39 potential explosions that are set to go off today.”

“You think they’re all set to go off at 4:30?”

“Sure do. Let’s play bad guys for a second. How do you get the most bang for your buck? How do you get total chaos and beheaded chicken confusion? You could set off the bombs one at a time over eight hours and have resources scrambling from one place to another, but you run the risk of having each of those fires put out quickly and the full force of the responders able to move on to the next fire. Light them all off at once, and there’s no way there are enough people to combat that many brush fires, especially if the afternoon wind kicks up, which it undoubtedly will.”

Forte fell into his office chair, picked up the phone, ready to dial. “Look, what I would like you two to do is give me a plan for ending this. As our semi-official detective bureau, I need you to do what you do and fast.”

He began dialing, head down but still talking to us.

“ I’m going to be coordinating our guys and the responses from the other PDs and fire departments. I’ll call in everyone in the department. Set them to looking for these tanks. I’m not sure we’ll have support from other towns like Coquille. They may feel it necessary to do their own searches in their own backyards. Nothing says this is a Bandon-only problem. Ditto the fire departments. If these damn things go off and we’re eyeball deep in brush fires we can’t handle, most of the other towns are going to hesitate leaving themselves naked.”

“Makes sense to me. If someone is really looking only at Bandon, setting one or two of these things off in Coquille or Myrtle Point – even near Coos Bay – could be a nice diversion.”

Beads of sweat were beginning to trickle down the Chief’s face. It was hot, but he’d seen worse so I wrote it off to anxiety. “True. Which is why we have to act like we’ll have to handle this on our own. That said, I’ll be stuck to this chair until the end of the day, hoping the whole thing is nothing more than a bad joke.”

As Sal and I walked from the office, Forte called after us.

“Listen, Drago. Act fast. No stopping for donuts.”

On the way out of the PD, I asked Beth for a county map. She opened her desk drawer and pulled one out handing it to me.

“Is this for real, Nick?”

“Gotta treat it like it is, sweetie.”

Back in the parking lot, I unfolded the map and spread it across the hood of the Crown Vic.

“Okay, you want to torch Bandon. Where do you put the bombs?”

Sal dug his fingernails into his beard, stared at the map.

“Man, there’s a lot of scrub and gorse around here.”

Bandon itself is slightly more than three-square miles, most of which is landmass and heavily treed. At barely 20 feet above sea level, the area was formed 4.5 million years ago during a massive land deformation as the tectonic plates shifted. The Jurassic rocks can be seen in the sea cliffs, sea stacks and large islands along the shore near the Coquille River. Most of the land is greywacke sandstone, greenstone and chert, and ultra-hard blueschist. The last could be found in sufficient amounts that construction engineers blasted Tupper Rock to bits in order to build the all-important jetty.

“Yeah, but how would you take down Bandon?” I pointed to the east of Filmore Ave. “Big area here.” Tracing my finger down to Rosa Road. “And tons of open scrub here.”

Sal pointed to the south of town. “Along the backside of City Park, near the softball and little league ball fields.”

I marked each of those areas and a few more where thick brush choked the ground.

“Add a few of these old abandoned buildings and houses, Nick, and you’ve got a ring of fire that spells inferno.”

“Should we take a quick cruise around and see if we ID some of the more likely spots?”

It really wasn’t a question. Sal climbed into the passenger seat and we headed up 101 to Old Town. That, it seemed to me, would be a good place to start because Bandon is identified by its historic district and would most likely be the target.

We idled along First Street, the river and boardwalk on our right, a series of stores on the left. At First and Oregon Avenue we turned up the bluff to Third then back down Bandon Ave. to Second to the old Coast Guard Coquille River Patrol building. Lots of brush with older wooden houses spotted in the shore pine.

Sal marked the spots as we returned to First, moved up Edison and circled behind town toward the high school on Ninth.

“Holy Joseph and crackers, Sal. There are more places to put explosives than M&Ms in Hersey, Pennsylvania.” I speed dialed Forte who picked up on the first ring. “Chief, I’d send as many of your guys into the areas behind First and Second streets as you’ve got. With the heat and dry weather, there must be a hundred places to hide one of those bombs.”

“I’ve sent a couple out toward Rosa Road, but hell, Nick, what do I tell them to look for? I’m having them find a big patch of scrub and walk it. It’s hit and miss, at best.”

“Tell me about the kid who brought the bomb to you.”

“Name’s Timothy Dornan. Senior at Bandon High. Why?”

“Where’s he live?”

“Up on Chicago Avenue Southeast, behind the PD.” He shuffled through his desk-top papers and provided an address. “Have something in mind?”

“I’ll let you know.”

Dialing off, to Sal, “We gotta talk to Dornan. Should be in school about now, but first let’s take a quick side trip.” Back up 101 to Tenth, left onto Baltimore Ave. SE and a few quick turns to Chicago SE.

“Remember Della Haye?”

Sal’s eyes twinkled. “Oh, yeah.”

“She lived up on Chicago.”

“Hotty.”

“You dated her, didn’t you?”

Sal grinned. “Oh, yeah.”

Shaking my head. “Letch.” Reflected back to those high school days. Sal and Della were a hot item for about a week.

“You two seemed pretty good. Why’d you break up?”

“Sauerkraut.”

“Sauerkraut.”

“Her family ate it all the time. I think they put it on their Fruit Loops for breakfast.”

“Foul smelling stuff.”

“You ever eat sauerkraut?”

That made me laugh. “Are you kidding? You know me. Nothing crosses my lips if it has more than seven letters or two syllables. Beer. Meat. Pizza. Fish. Shrimp. Soda.”

“Hamburgers has three syllables and 10 letters.”

“There’s no ‘ham’ in hamburgers. To me they’re ‘burgers. Seven letters. Two syllables.”

“Ice cream. Eight letters.”

“The exception that proves the rule.”

“Oh, yeah.”

Chicago cuts up the bluff overlooking Old Town. Most of the houses are neat and trim clapboard, well maintained and tidy. Checking the addresses, I pulled into the driveway of the Dornan house. Sal and I climbed out of the Vic and walked to the front door.

I pressed the doorbell button, a little blue thing with a whale engraved on it.

A hefty women in her 40s peeked through the glass panel, smiled and opened the door. “Hi. Can I help you?”

“Mrs. Dornan?”

“Yes.”

“My name is Nick Drago, this is Sal Rand. We’re working with the Bandon Police Department.”

“I know you, Nick. You’re in the papers all the time.”

A slight exaggeration, but I could feel my head swell an additional hat size.

“We’re looking for Timothy.”

A shadow crossed her face, “Is he in trouble?”

“No, not at all. In fact, he helped the Department this morning and we’re just following up.”

The smile returned. “He’s in school right now.” She checked her watch, “Should be in Mr. Martin’s English class, I would guess.”

“Would you mind if we walked around the back of your house?”

“Not at all. Why?”

“The view from up here is great. We’re trying to get an idea of how something could have been done.” The obvious vagueness didn’t seem to bother Mrs. Dornan. She walked onto the board porch and led us around the side of the house to the rear yard. Well kept, neat grass and trimmed back wild blackberries. A small patch of flowers in a well-turned garden was being watered with a lawn sprayer set on low.

Behind the yard, the roof of the police department, visible through a stand of scrub trees. The slope was pretty steep.

To the north, Old Town looked like a scene from an elaborate train set; buildings in redwood and clapboard with the Welcome to Old Town Bandon arch greeting visitors to the historic district. But the heat of the day was already building. Dry air, unlike the usual humidity that comes with being on the coast, forecasting another near-100 degrees.

Having seen enough, “Well, thank you. You have a lovely place here.”

“Come back anytime, Nick.”

Sal and I returned to the Vic, climbed in.

“Whatcha thinkin’ Kemosabe?”

“Nothing good, I’m afraid.” Starting the Police Interceptor V8, the exhaust grumbled from the Vic’s sidepipes. The harsh sun already heating the steering wheel to an almost uncomfortable temperature.

We returned to Tenth, made a quick right onto 101 and a left on Ninth. Pulling up to the high school, we took the broad walkway into the building. Low and wide, Bandon High hadn’t changed much since Sal and I attended. Glass front, big lobby, administrative offices straight across from the doorways, also behind glass. A pair of spacious hallways – one heading left, the other straight ahead – led to classrooms.

The walls were covered in trophy cases, class photos, pictures of past administrators. The usual high school decor.

The woman behind the Administration counter cocked her head, glanced at me then Sal. “Mr. Rand?” She was a few years older than Sal or me, hair cut short, blond with a streak of gray matching gray eyes.

Sal returned the smile. “Yes, ma’am.”

“I recognized you from the football photos in the trophy case.” Totally ignoring me, “My sister had a huge crush on you.”

Sal’s ears didn’t turn red. His cheeks didn’t blush. Why should they? ALL high school girls had a crush on Sal back then.

I leaned on the counter, “Uh, I played football, too. Quarterback, ya know.”

The woman twisted her eyes toward me, “Mister Drako.”

“Drago. With a ‘g’.”

Her eyes returned to Sal, “What can I do for you?”

I’d lost the battle and let Sal continue the conversation.

“We’re looking for Timothy Dornan. Can you call him to the office for us? It’s police business.”

“Oh, my, I hope he’s not in trouble.”

“No. We just need to talk to him.”

She flashed Sal a huge grin, patted his hand and returned to her desk. A few seconds later she returned. “I buzzed his homeroom and asked Mr. Martin to send him.” Twirling a strand of hair, “Is there anything else I can assist you with… Sal?”

I sighed. The big teddy bear had done it again. Another slavish female with googly eyes for Salvador.

“No thanks, …”

“MaryBeth.”

“MaryBeth. I think I’m set, thanks.”

We returned to the lobby to wait for Timothy.

“What is it with you and women? I’m bigger, prettier, thinner, funnier. They look at me like I’m lint on a blue suit.”

“You don’t talk to them with your eyes, Nick. Someday I’ll teach you how to do it.”

“I could rip that grin right off your fuzzy face.”

“And what? Set the entire female population of Bandon on a vengeful course of destroying you?” He snuffed. “I don’t think so.”

The clattering squeak of running shoes on waxed linoleum telegraphed the arrival of Dornan.

“Hi! You looking for Tim?”

“You’re not him?” I asked.

“No. I’m Peter Braul. Rhymes with school.” He said it in a single breath. Once a joke, probably. “Tim’s not here today. Mister Williams said I should tell you that.”

“Where’d he go? He was on his way here this morning.”

Braul, rhymes with school, looked over his shoulder. “I saw him in the parking lot this morning. He flashed a wad of money and said he was taking Dorothy to Eugene for the day to spend it.”

“Dorothy is…”

“Girlfriend. Dorothy Flack. Rhymes with stack, if you get my meaning.”

“And Tim has a car?”

“Well, a mini-pickup, actually. Ranger.”

“So he doesn’t walk to school?”

That made Braul laugh. “Nah. Tim hates to walk. He drives everywhere. Even up to the DQ which is, what, two blocks away?”

Sal asked, “And Dorothy has been dating Tim for how long?”

“Since forever.”

“Did you see him yesterday?” I asked.

“Almost every day. We hang a lot.”

“Did he have the money then?”

“Didn’t act like it. Never mentioned it.”

“Did he give you any clue he was going to Eugene today?”

“Nope. In fact, we planned on skipping last period and going to Langlois for hot dogs. His mom expects him home right after school, so we have to go during last period in order to be home right after last bell.”

“What color is the Ranger?”

“Well, mostly brown, but it has a blue left front fender.”

“How much money you think he had?”

“At least a couple hundred.”

“Big bills? Little bills?”

“Twenties, it looked like. Fresh out of the magic money machine.”

Sal, scratching his beard, his way of assembling thoughts or questions, “So he doesn’t have a job. He’s a good old fashioned C student. Isn’t on a sports team and is smarter than the average bear but school bores him to death.”

Braul laughed. “Gee, you sound like Sherlock Holmes. How’d you guess that stuff?”

“Is my friend right?”

“Down the line.”

Sal nodded.

Sal’s like that. The three-dimension puzzle solver. Give him a fact or two and he’ll provide a dead-on analysis. That’s what makes us so suited for working together. I can fit random pieces of a puzzle together. Two dimensions. Sal has trouble with that kind of tidbit gathering.

“Thanks Peter.”

“Call me Pete.”

“Rhymes with feet.” The kid looked at me like I’d just stepped in dog doo. I waved him away and he took off down the hall.

Sal and I settled back into the Crown Vic. I called Forte and filled him in on our conversation with Braul and the fact Dornan was MIA.

Forte mulled that for a second. “Think he made the bomb?”

“No. Think he got paid to find it and let you know where it was.”

“Okay. I’ll put the word out to look for his Ranger. Brown with a blue fender?”

“That’s it.”

“Thanks, Nick. By the way, we’ve got troops from the PD and fire department beating the bushes to find propane tanks. No one’s reported back yet.”

“Sal and I have checked a few other areas we think you should take a close look at. I’ll text you those spots.”

Disconnecting from my call, Sal punched in a few coordinates into his iPhone and sent a Bandon map with possible bomb locations marked in “X” to Forte.

“Done.”

Putting the Vic into gear, we idled away from the school up to Franklin, left to Eleventh and right toward Bandon City Park with its miniature version of the “Welcome to Bandon” arch. The Barn community center abuts a children’s play park, city library and Sprague Theater where plays and other events take place.

For a small town run efficiently, the buildings – except The Barn – are newer, buff colored modern facilities and the product of a population that is willing to hang onto some of the finer pieces of its past while adding polish to the present. There’s a sense of pride among these folks that transcends the so-common negative vibes radiated from many small towns that have seen their existence and jobs nearly demolished by disappearing timber, logging, ship-building and industrial enterprise. Playground slides and swings and geodesic climbing structures continue to be clean, bright, colorful attractions never appearing misused or ignored. The Little League ball field while dusty in the unusual heat still had its grass evenly clipped, the dugouts empty of clutter and the small scoring building freshly painted.

“How old were you, Nicky, when you hit your first home run? 11?”

“Nine, actually. I was so stunned that the ball was actually going over the fence, I just stood and watched.”

Sal laughed. “Coach had to push you toward first base or you’d still be standing there. But, hey, you were a big kid then.” Sal fisted my arm. “Still are.”

“Funny.”

“Quick stop for donuts?”

“Not yet, Sal. In a bit.”

We rumbled through the turnaround and back toward Highway 101 with the softball field and the surrounding scrub pines and thatch.

“Whoa, Nick.”

Braking, “See something?”

“Other side of the ball park.”

I pulled the Vic to the curb, the two of us jumped out.

“Over there,” pointing one of his ham hock fingers toward the woods behind right field.

I could see it now. A propane tank a few feet into the trees, visible only because the sun had climbed high enough to highlight the white paint of the tank against the dark brown of the trees and brush.

We approached it carefully. Like the one on Forte’s desk, this one had three sticks of dynamite and black wires running to a timer. I dropped to my stomach and stared at the LED screen. Same as the other. Set for 4:30 p.m.

Reaching for the wires, planning on performing the same yank-and-smirk Sal did at the police station, the gruff baritone froze me solid.

“NO! Don’t touch that! We’ll be dust in the wind.”

1936

The inferno’s plume of black and orange embers blocked the sun with a veil of eerie rampage. Acrid smoke carrying the stench of burnt fabric, scorched dirt, the bitter smell of oil-treated timbers with the occasional choke of the incinerated flesh of farm and domestic animals unable to escape the ravages of flames and heat. A runaway locomotive wasn’t as loud or palpable as the roar this blaze made. A hurricane carrying debris as small as indistinguishable pieces of metal, as bulky as blazing roof beams with the ear-splitting gushes of hot air speeding past, beyond the abilities of the county’s fastest horse or automobile.

The world appeared to be ending with little hope of a new one beginning.