The Twenty-Three 3 (Promise Falls) (11 page)

SIXTEEN

THE
driver of the fire truck told Cal Weaver there were so many casualties from whatever was making people sick that he couldn’t even guess when officials might get to Lucy Brighton.

Cal took the man’s suggestion to leave a detailed note on the door. He walked back to Crystal, still sitting on the front step with the clipboard and sheets of paper she was drawing on.

He sat down next to her and said, “Do you have a clean sheet there?”

Crystal slipped one out from underneath and put it on the top. Cal took the clipboard and pen from her and wrote at the top of the page “NOTICE” and underlined it three times.

In bullet form, he indicated that the body of Lucy Brighton was in the home, in the upstairs bathroom. He wrote that the only other resident of the house, Crystal, age eleven, was safe and with him. He put his name and contact information at the end, adding that he had a key to the house and would return to let the authorities in.

“Where would I find some tape?” Cal asked Crystal.

She told him which kitchen drawer to look in. Also, he was
going to get in touch with her father. Where would he find that information?

“All that stuff is in my mom’s phone,” she said.

Cal nodded. He’d find the phone and bring it along. “You trust me to pack a bag for you?” he asked Crystal.

“Okay.”

“You have a suitcase or anything somewhere?”

“There’s a backpack in my room.”

“You have any prescriptions or anything like that you take that I need to pack?”

The girl shook her head. Cal had already decided he’d buy the girl a new toothbrush. He wasn’t going back into, or taking anything out of, that bathroom unless it was absolutely necessary.

“I’ll be as quick as I can,” he said.

“I need clothes to put on now.” She was still in her pajamas.

“Okay.”

He went into the house and found Lucy’s phone right away, on the kitchen table. In a drawer he found a roll of duct tape. He located her purse up in her bedroom and took a set of keys so he could lock up the house when they left. Finally, Cal went into Crystal’s room and threw some tops and pants and socks and underwear into a red backpack. He kept one change of clothes separate. On her dresser was the collection of markers he’d recently bought her. He grabbed those, too.

He came out the front door, set the backpack next to Crystal, taped his sign securely to the front door, tossed the roll of tape back into the house, locked the door, and pocketed the keys.

“Have you had any breakfast?” Cal asked Lucy’s daughter.

“No,” she said.

“Are you hungry?”

“Kinda.”

“Let’s go get something to eat,” he said, resting a light hand on her shoulder.

“Okay.”

She stood and they walked to Cal’s car. Once inside, he handed her a top and some pants and suggested she put them on over her pajamas. They drove to Kelly’s, the downtown diner, where they got a seat by the window. Crystal ordered French toast with extra syrup and powdered sugar.

Cal, out of habit, ordered coffee.

“We can’t do coffee,” the waitress said. “You see anybody in here drinking coffee? You haven’t heard what’s going on?”

“What was I thinking?” he said.

“People dying all over the place,” she said.

Cal, catching the woman’s eye, gave her a cautious nod toward Crystal, who had her head down. But the waitress missed the signal, and said, “Can’t do tea, neither. Want a milk?”

“No, thanks,” he said. “Have you got bottled water?”

“Yeah, that local stuff.”

Cal thought. “Could you pour some into a mug and nuke it and toss in a tea bag?”

The waitress sighed, as if this were the biggest imposition she’d encountered in her career. “You’ll get charged for the water, and for the tea.”

“I’m good for it,” Cal said.

“And I hope you aren’t expecting our fine china. We don’t know if it’s safe to wash the dishes. We’re doin’ paper plates and plastic cutlery.”

“No problem.”

“What about you, kid? Anything to drink?”

Crystal raised her head. “Milk, please.” A pause, and then, “I know all about what happened. My mom is dead.”

The waitress was stunned into silence.

“She drank the water and she threw up and then she died in the bathroom,” Crystal said, as though describing what she’d studied in school the day before.

“I—I’m sorry.” She looked back at Cal. “I’m so sorry. Your wife?”

“No.”

The waitress took another look at Crystal, as though puzzling over why she didn’t appear more upset.

“Can I have that tea?” Cal asked.

The waitress disappeared. Crystal resumed working on her drawing while Cal opened the list of contacts on Lucy Brighton’s phone.

“What’s your dad’s name again?” he asked her.

Without looking up, she said, “Gerald.”

“Not Jerry?”

Her head went back and forth. Cal found Gerald Brighton quickly under the
B
s. “You okay here for a couple of minutes? I’m going to give your dad a call.”

“Okay.”

He slid out of the booth, went out onto the sidewalk, and stood where he could keep an eye on Crystal through the glass. He e-mailed Gerald Brighton’s contact info off Lucy’s phone to his own, brought it up on the screen, and hit the number.

It rang five times before going to voice mail. “Yeah, hey, you’ve reached Gerald Brighton. Leave your name and number and maybe, just maybe, if you’re really lucky, I’ll get back to you!”

A pause. Cal said, “Mr. Brighton, this is Cal Weaver, in Promise Falls, New York. I need to speak to you about your wife, Lucy, and daughter, Crystal. It’s urgent.” He gave his number, ended the call, and went back inside.

Crystal said, “No answer, right?”

“Yeah,” Cal said, slipping into the booth.

“He doesn’t usually answer his phone.”

“What did your mother do when she had an emergency and needed to get in touch with him?”

“She always leaves—she always left a message and he calls back later sometimes if he feels like it.”

The waitress returned with a paper cup of boiled bottled water and a tea bag. “French toast is almost ready, sweetheart,” she said.

Cal bobbed the tea bag up and down in the water. “Talk to me,” he said to Crystal.

She looked up. “About what?”

“I just wondered how you are. Which I guess is a pretty dumb question.”

“I feel things,” she said. “But I don’t know how to show them.”

“I get that.”

She turned the clipboard around so he could see what she had been working on. The clouds, even darker now, as though heavy with rain.

“They’re about to burst,” Crystal said.

Cal’s heart felt connected to a fifty-pound anchor. “So they are.”

The waitress set Crystal’s French toast in front of her. “You need anything, let me know,” she said.

Cal and Crystal didn’t say another word to each other during breakfast.

“Whose house is this?” Crystal asked when Cal stopped the car.

“My sister and her husband live here,” he told her. “Her name is Celeste and his name is Dwayne. She’s very, very nice.”

“What about Dwayne?”

“He’s okay.”

Crystal seemed to perceive some meaning there. “Is he a douche?”

Cal, for the first time in days, laughed. “A bit. But he’s had a rough time lately. He’s got a paving company and he does a lot of work for the town, but they’ve been cutting back, so he hasn’t had much work.”

“Oh.”

“But that’s just between us.”

“Do you live here, too, since the fire?”

“No.” She looked at the house, then back at him, then at the house again. “Come on,” he said. “Grab your backpack and I’ll introduce you.”

They went to the door together. Celeste showed up seconds later.

“Hey, who’s this?” she asked, bending at the waist to get face-to-face with the unexpected visitor.

“This is Crystal,” Cal said.

“How are you, Crystal?” Celeste asked, extending a hand.

Crystal said, “My mom’s dead.”

“Can we come in?” Cal asked while his sister struggled for something to say.

“Um, yes, yes, come in,” Celeste said. “Crystal, would you like something to eat or drink?”

“I just had French toast with syrup.” She paused. “And milk.”

“Why don’t you watch TV or draw while I talk to Celeste?” Cal said. Crystal walked into the living room, grabbed a remote, and plopped down on the couch as Cal and Celeste excused themselves to the kitchen.

Cal filled her in.

“Oh God, that’s horrible,” Celeste said.

“I haven’t heard anything back from her dad yet. And even if I do, he’s in San Francisco and it’s probably going to be a day or two before he gets here.”

“What are you asking?”

“I can’t have her stay with me at the hotel. It just doesn’t look right. Strange man who’s not her father.”

“She can stay here,” Celeste said without hesitation.

“Dwayne won’t mind?”

Celeste sighed. “He minds just about everything these days.”

“Where is he?”

“Out in the garage doing God knows what.” Celeste’s eyes moistened.

“What’s going on?”

“It’s just . . . more of the same. The more worried he gets about losing work, the more withdrawn he gets. He goes out without telling me, is gone for hours. When he comes back, I ask him where he’s been and all he says is ‘out.’ I don’t know what to do. I try to boost
his spirits, tell him things are going to turn around, but nothing much seems to work. And now, God, given what’s happened today, I don’t know what the future holds for this town.”

“Me, neither,” Cal said.

“They said on the radio that there might be more than a hundred dead. Just for starters. And there may be lots of people sick or dead they don’t even know about yet.”

Like Lucy,
Cal thought.

“How does a town get over something like this?” she asked.

“I can’t worry about the whole town,” Cal said. “Right now all I’m worried about is Crystal.”

“She seems kind of . . . forgive me, but she seems kind of weird. And I don’t mean just because of her mom being dead. There’s something—”

“I know. Just be patient with her.”

“Of course. But is there anything I should know—”

The door that led from the kitchen to the backyard opened and Dwayne came in. “Hey,” he said. “Cal.”

“Dwayne.”

“Thanks for the heads-up about the bad water, but we already knew,” he said.

Celeste added, “Dwayne knew before anybody.”

Dwayne stepped in quickly. “I was out for a walk before Celeste even woke up. Ran into someone on the street who told me. Came home, made sure Celeste knew before she was even out of bed.”

“Lucky thing,” Cal said.

Dwayne nodded. “Yeah.” He heard the television going and peered around the corner into the living room. “Who’s the kid?”

Celeste brought him up to speed.

“She’s gonna stay with us?” Dwayne asked.

Cal said, “Not for long, I hope. I’m trying to get in touch with her father. Once he gets here . . .”

Dwayne shook his head. It was clear he didn’t like the idea, but he said, “I guess. As long as it’s just her.”

Cal went back into the living room. Crystal had tuned the TV in to, of all things, the Weather Channel.

“Why are you watching this?” Cal asked.

“I like weather,” she said.

Cal told her she would be staying with Celeste and Dwayne until her father could get to Promise Falls.

Crystal asked, “Both of us?”

“No,” Cal explained. “I’ll stay in my hotel.”

Cal noticed the child’s face starting to look brittle. “No,” she said. “I can’t stay here without you.”

“Celeste and Dwayne are very nice. You’ ll—”

“No!”

Cal had never heard the child raise her voice before. He’d never really seen her emotional on any level.

She stayed sitting perfectly rigid on the couch, hands clasped together on her lap atop the clipboard, and screamed: “No! No! No! No! No! No!”

Celeste and Dwayne rushed into the room, Dwayne saying, “What the hell?”

Cal slowly sat down beside Crystal, put his arm around her, and pulled her close. “Okay,” he said softly. “Okay.”

As Crystal stopped screaming, Cal glanced over at his sister.

“Sure,” she said, nodding encouragingly, a broad smile on her face. “We’ve got lots of room! Cal can stay here, too.”

“On the couch,” he said. “I’ll be fine right here.”

Dwayne turned and went back into the kitchen, where, seconds later, they could hear the pop of a beer can opening, then the back door opening and closing.

SEVENTEEN

HILLARY
and Josh Lydecker were among the throngs of people crowding the Promise Falls General Hospital ER and adjoining hallways. Doctors were now looking at their daughter, Cassandra, whose symptoms were pretty much the same as everyone else’s.

The Lydeckers had made a trip to the hospital chapel and prayed quietly for their daughter to pull through.

But they prayed for their missing son, George, too.

They were heading back to the ER from the chapel when Hillary spotted the detective who had been to their house after they’d reported George missing.

“Detective!” Hillary called out. “Detective Carlson!” She started running down the hall, her husband right behind her.

Angus Carlson had been talking to one of the doctors when he heard his name called out. He turned, saw the Lydeckers, and said to the doctor, “Thanks, we can talk later.”

He waited for the Lydeckers to close the distance between them, then said, “Hello. Why are you here? Who’s sick? Is it George? Has George turned up?”

Hillary, nearly out of breath, said, “Cassie.”

“Your daughter,” Carlson said, remembering.

“Yes. She’s very sick.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s hit so many people.”

“Is there any news about George?” Josh Lydecker asked.

Carlson’s lips pressed tightly together before parting. “I’m afraid I don’t have any.”

“Cassie told us,” the father said. “About what George has been doing.”

Carlson waited. “You mean—”

“Breaking into garages,” Hillary said. “She said he does it all the time. That he breaks in, that he steals things. I can’t believe he would do that. Is it true?”

“According to your daughter, yes. I’ve asked to be notified of any garage break-ins, see if they might be connected at all to your son’s disappearance, but there haven’t actually been any such occurrences in the last week, at least none that have been reported to the Promise Falls police.”

“So what else are you doing to find him?” the woman asked.

Carlson said, “Well, right now, as you can see—”

“But before all this happened,” the father said. “What have you been doing?”

“We’ve put out a description to all officers, I’ve spoken to George’s friends, I’ve looked for any activity on his cell phone, and—”

“Have you searched?” Hillary Lydecker asked. “Have you gone door-to-door? Have you—I don’t know—searched people’s basements and . . . and abandoned buildings, someplace where he might have fallen and gotten hurt, or—”

Carlson reached out a comforting hand to the woman’s arm. “We can’t just search random houses, ma’am, without cause. We’re doing what we can, believe me.”

“How can this be happening to us?” she asked. “One child missing, now the other sick? What did we do? Why would God do this to us?”

Carlson said, “That’s out of my area, I’m afraid. But if I hear anything about your son, believe me, I will be in touch. I hope your daughter’s going to be okay.”

He made his way outside the hospital so he could use his cell phone. He’d learned a few things since Duckworth had left, and felt it was time to update him. He made the call.

“Duckworth.”

“Carlson, sir.”

“Where’ve you been? Finderman was trying to reach you earlier.”

“Why?”

“She was going to send you out to Thackeray, but I got pulled off and had to take the call.”

“You know there’s no cell coverage in the ER. What happened at Thackeray?”

“Homicide.”

“What? Who?”

“Student named Lorraine Plummer. She was one of the ones—”

“I interviewed her,” Carlson said. “I remember. What happened?”

“Later. Why are you calling?”

“I’m still at the hospital. Story’s not really changing. Same symptoms with everyone. Number of people coming in has slowed. Guess the word’s getting out. Local and state health officials already all over it, taking samples, looking for E. coli, like maybe there’s sewage or animal waste in the water, but it’s not like they can tell you immediately whether that’s the cause or not. It takes several hours to do the tests on the water to confirm what it is.”

“Is that their best guess?” Duckworth asked.

“They’re kind of hedging. The symptoms they’re seeing are not totally consistent with E. coli. So they’re not issuing a boil-water advisory. Like, if they were pretty sure it was E. coli, they’d say if you boil the water, that’ll kill the bacteria, and then it’s safe to drink. But lots of people, they
had
boiled the water, and they still got sick.”

“The overnight guy at the water plant—shit!”

“What?”

“Why didn’t I think of that?” Duckworth said. “Maybe he’s one of the ones who got sick.”

“Say again?”

“Find out if someone named Tate Whitehead has been admitted.”

“I’m going back in. I’ll get back to you.”

Carlson ended the call and reentered the hospital. A paramedic told him a list of patients’ names was being kept at the admitting desk, on paper and on computer. Carlson saw a nurse behind the desk. Early twenties, fair-skinned, black hair that would have fallen to her shoulders if she didn’t have it pulled back into a ponytail.

Carlson gave her the name.

“Whitehead,” she said. “Whitehead.” She looked up, shook her head. “Nothing. Maybe he’s sitting out there and hasn’t checked in with us.”

“Thank you,” Carlson said.

He was about to step away when the young woman looked at him, her eyes filled with fear, and said, “Eighty-two.”

“Excuse me?”

“Eighty-two people have died. And the number just keeps going up. I feel . . . I feel—”

“Scared,” he offered, and she nodded. “What’s your name?”

“Sonja.”

“Sonja what?”

“Sonja Roper.”

“Sonja, everyone’s scared. I know I am. We’re scared for ourselves and our loved ones.” Amid the chaos, he smiled. “Do you have children?”

“No,” she said. “Soon, I hope. My boyfriend—his name is Stan and we’re going to get married in the fall—and I really want to have kids. He’s missed all this, lucky him. He’s a pilot for Delta and won’t be back till Monday.”

“When you see what’s going on here, does it make you rethink that? That the world is too dangerous and unpredictable a place?”

Her eyes moved down to the desk as she thought about that. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

“Sonja!” someone shouted. “We need you!”

“I have to go,” she said, and flew away from her desk.

Carlson took a position in the middle of the ER waiting room and shouted loud enough to be heard over the chatter: “Is there a Tate Whitehead here?”

The noise dropped slightly for several seconds, people glancing at one another, waiting to see if someone would step forward.

One man raised a weak hand.

“Mr. Whitehead?” Carlson said.

“No. But I know him, and he ain’t here. Haven’t seen him.”

Carlson went back outside to give Duckworth the news.