Into the Inferno Read online

  “I can’t believe you tried to cancel the committee,” Ben Arden said.

  “I’ll make some calls. If there’s been a misunderstanding, I’ll put it to rights. But I’m not going to forget about Christmas.”

  Haston stepped out the front door, forcing my former father-in-law away from his listening post. After the door closed, Ben slapped his hands together several times as if he’d just cleaned up.

  Karrie said, “Sorry about that.”

  “Do you?” I asked. “Have any symptoms?”

  “No.”

  “Good. I hope you don’t get any.”

  “Thanks, Jim.”

  35. GETTING SUCKED INTO THE HAY BALER

  Icalled Jane’s again, but Hillburn and Dobson must have gotten through to them before I did. Nobody would talk to me. When I asked for Gray or Stuart, I was told they would both be in meetings for the rest of the day. I called Southeast Travelers Freight in Chattanooga, but that remained a dead end. They referred me to their law firm, and from there I was asked to write a letter requesting an interview.

  When we still hadn’t heard from Marge DiMaggio by eleven, I said, “Does your aunt know I’m on a timer?”

  “I don’t know what she knows. I’ll go see her. You stay here and—”

  “No way. I’m coming with you.”

  Stephanie insisted on driving, but rather than squeeze into Holly’s cramped Pontiac, we took the Lexus. Neither of us relaxed as we cruised up Highway 202 past lush farmland and treed hillsides, talking at length about our quest, painstakingly revisiting the details of our phone calls. I was virtually certain the source of our problems came from Jane’s California Propulsion, Inc., even more so after the way Dobson and Hillburn retreated when they found out we didn’t have any physical proof that their company was implicated. “Bastards!” I said.

  “You may be overreacting simply because you didn’t like them,” Stephanie said. “I didn’t like them, either. But don’t let that affect your judgment. It might not be them.”

  “I’m not overreacting.”

  “I’m just trying to help you do this with your reason and not your emotion.”

  “Easy for you to say.”

  Much like the tough-nut farmer who cuts off his trapped arm with a piece of tin to keep the hay baler from pulling his whole body in, I was developing an incredible will to survive, to beat this any way I could.

  After learning we’d spoken to Charlie Drago, the Chattanooga Fire Department PIO called us and handed out the official CFD account of the Southeast Travelers incident, sounding as smooth as melting butter and as sharp as a stomach cramp.

  Her statement, which sounded as if she were reading it verbatim off a script, was riddled with buzzwords, evasive language, and carefully sculpted commentary. Yes, they did have three casualties, but whether or not those casualties were related to the Southeast Travelers incident or even to one another was still a question to be determined by law. Yes, the families were suing the shipping company in ongoing separate actions.

  When I prodded for an off-the-record opinion, she would only say Charlie Drago had undergone psychiatric hospitalization after the incident and the last she’d heard he was still on Prolixin and Haldol, which I knew to be antipsychotic medications. I knew right away she was giving me this information to discredit Drago, and guess what: it worked.

  “You need more help besides me,” Stephanie said at one point. “If people are going to be playing games, you should have somebody to look out for your best interests. Someone able to speak to the media, too.”

  “Who would you suggest?”

  “A friend. Somebody you trust.”

  There was a pitiful dearth of candidates. It was bad enough to die when everyone around me was going to keep on going, but to die realizing I had no real friends left was a patch of rough pavement I didn’t need just now. Stan Beebe or Joel McCain would have been my logical choices. It would have been a perfect job for Chief Newcastle, but we were a month late.

  Ben or Ian might watch my back, but they were both young, and I wasn’t sure they could handle it.

  The thought occurred to me that I might call one of the fifteen or twenty women I’d dated in the past couple of years, but I discarded that notion. I’d made a pretty good mess of all that.

  As we drove, I spotted a kingfisher with a tufted crown sitting on a wire alongside the highway. The little bastard probably wasn’t going to survive the winter, but he didn’t seem to care, was intent on taking the summer minute by minute.

  Maybe we could stop this syndrome; maybe we couldn’t. Whatever happened, I determined not to go down in a panic. I would do this with dignity. Same as that kingfisher on the wire.

  Suddenly a greater sense of calm descended on me than ever before. The one big mystery we all face—our own death—was right in front of me. My mood today was a strange mixture of detached serenity and introspective hysteria. Serenity because I finally knew my end. Hysteria because time was running low. And because I’d always been, down deep, prone to hysteria. Maybe that was why I’d become a firefighter, in order to confront my basic nature.

  Canyon View Systems was on a tree-filled campus in Redmond, three large buildings, an artistic collage of steel and glass and neo-something-or-other architecture. It was situated on a hillside, but most of the property had been graded until it was nearly flat, three or four wooded acres, no structure older than ten years, a score of sixty- and eighty-foot Douglas firs to shade the buildings in summer and keep out the worst of the winter storms, two fountains, a pond, and a bewildered flock of Canada geese shitting in the parking lot.

  Stephanie swung past the guard gate and parked. As we got out of the Lexus, we found ourselves pursued by a heavyset guard in uniform. I had the feeling if we’d been getting out of my pickup truck instead of a Lexus, he might have pulled his pistol.

  “Guess we were supposed to stop at the gate,” I said.

  “I never have before.”

  A Jeep roared up behind us with two more guards. “You been shoplifting?” I joked to Stephanie.

  “This is crazy,” she snapped.

  I kept quiet while Stephanie alternately chastised and argued with them. She was a doctor. Mrs. DiMaggio was her aunt. She had business here, and furthermore, if we weren’t allowed inside immediately, she would make it her goal in life to ensure that all three men lost their jobs. I believed her. They must have, too, because they left us alone, though one of the men from the Jeep trailed us into the building, pretending to pick up litter on the grounds when I looked back at him.

  Inside, a Muzak version of “I Got You, Babe” spilled from hidden speakers. There was a large atrium reception and waiting area with two twelve-foot bamboo plants and a tall oak-and-brass counter with a woman behind it.

  After we got past the receptionist, we went up a long open staircase and along a corridor full of offices. Although DiMaggio’s door was locked, we could see through a narrow, vertical window that nobody was inside.

  “I think I know where she might be,” Stephanie said.

  I followed her to a room two doors down, paint-splattered canvas tarps on the floor, a ladder in one corner, DiMaggio standing alongside two men in coveralls, the three of them flipping through carpet samples on a metal ring.

  “Stephanie!” she said. “Stephanie, darling. What on earth are you doing here? I thought you were flying today.”

  “We need to talk, Aunt Marge.”

  “Of course, dear. Of course we do.”

  Without a word to the painters, she led us out of the room and down the corridor to her office, unlocking the door with a key. She kissed Stephanie on the cheek and gave me a huge smile. Walking around behind her desk, she sat heavily in a large swivel chair and invited us to sit.

  36. DONOVAN CATCHES AN AWARD

  “What is it, Steph?” DiMaggio asked. “Is Holly all right? Maybe now’s a good time to talk about moving her back to the nursing home.”

  “It’s already arranged.
She’ll be there tomorrow.”

  “It’s for the best, don’t you think?”

  “Of course it’s for the best. Or I wouldn’t have done it. Marge, I’ve been phoning all morning.”

  “I got your message a couple of hours ago, along with about ten others. By the time I’d worked my way through half my callbacks I figured you would be in the air. I knew you’d call again tonight when you got home, and I figured we could have a long, leisurely chat then.”

  “I’m not flying anywhere. It’s the syndrome. More people are coming down with it.”

  “I was aware some people had been ill. Jim told me when I saw him at the hospital, but . . . I’m sorry. I’ve forgotten your last name.”

  “Swope.”

  “Aunt Marge. Jim has it, too.”

  “Has what?”

  “The syndrome.”

  It took a few moments for DiMaggio to digest the implications of what her niece had said. “I can’t believe this. How could he have it?”

  “He’s got three days left. If we don’t find out what’s causing this and stop it, he’ll be just like Holly.”

  “How can you be certain?”

  “We’re as certain as anyone can be,” I said.

  We might have said a lot of things to shock DiMaggio, but this seemed what she was least prepared for. It was half a minute before speech returned. “I thought what happened to your sister was . . . I thought it was a freak deal. I thought . . .”

  “We think Holly caught it the night she had the accident near North Bend. Holly and four firefighters. Jim will be the fifth.”

  “You’ve tested him? You know he has it?”

  “Tested and normal so far. But we found nothing anomalous in Holly’s workups, either.”

  “Jim looks fine.”

  “Yes, he does.”

  “I’m sorry,” DiMaggio said, turning her dark-brown eyes on me. “If you have this, I really am so sorry.”

  “Aunt Marge? Three years ago your company was involved in an investigation in Chattanooga. Several firefighters came down with a syndrome similar to this after a fire in a shipping facility.”

  “Yes, I vaguely remember that. But I never knew the particulars. We had a small shipment in the building where they had the fire. So did dozens of other companies. Our involvement came about when we sent people down to help in the investigation. But these were firefighters who got sick after a fire. Holly was found in her kitchen. Holly wasn’t exposed to any smoke.”

  “What about her symptoms?”

  “Honey, I don’t recall anything about the symptoms of those poor people in Tennessee.”

  “Aunt Marge, if you know something that might help, tell us.”

  DiMaggio leaned forward, touched a button on her intercom, and said, “Cathy, would you send Donovan in here?”

  “Right away, Ms. DiMaggio.”

  She turned back to us. “All I know is that the episode in Chattanooga was precipitated by a fire. I never was conversant with the catalog of symptoms. If I’d had any idea what happened to Holly could even be remotely connected to Tennessee . . . Had the thought even occurred to me, I would have told you. You know that.”

  “I know, Aunt Marge.”

  Rapping on the half-open door, a large man came in quickly, glanced at me, and then gifted Stephanie with a much longer look. He was almost as tall as I was but thicker, more powerfully built, shoulders like a gladiator, neck like a professional football player. His hair was cropped short and he had bright blue eyes. A deep tan. A man who would attract his share of female attention.

  “Scott Donovan, this is my niece, Stephanie Riggs. Her friend, Jim Swope.” His handshake was as light as tissue, his voice soft and whispery. When I swung around after the handshake, I accidentally knocked a small statue off DiMaggio’s desk, a gold obelisk that looked like an award.

  Donovan caught it midway between the desktop and the floor, then put it back, smiling at me. The guy could move fast for someone his size, for someone anyone’s size.

  “Stephanie is Mr. Swope’s doctor. She tells me Mr. Swope has three days before he lapses into a coma. They’ve come for information about the incident in Chattanooga three years ago.”

  “There were two of us working on it. Me and Hardy.”

  “Ah, yes. Hardy. He’s gone now, isn’t he?”

  “Been gone awhile.”

  “Would you like to fill my niece in?”

  Donovan began to talk hesitantly. “There was a fire. Three firefighters got sick. The fire had been in a busy shipping facility, so all together there were hundreds of products that had been exposed during the incident. Plastics, artists’ paints, you name it. I could go dig up the paperwork and my notes, but we came out of it pretty much empty-handed.”

  Stephanie said, “We want to know everything you found. What we’ve got here is too close not to be related.”

  “Okay. Sure. But we were down there for weeks. I’m not sure I even know where all my notes are.”

  “Tell you what,” DiMaggio said, swiveling back and forth in her chair. “I’m going to bring Carpenter in on this.”

  “Carpenter?”

  “That all right with you, Mr. Donovan?”

  “Oh, sure. I think Carpenter’s a good chemist. In fact, I like working with her.”

  “Good. Because I’m going to assign you and Carpenter to do the same thing with these people that you did in Tennessee with Hardy.”

  Donovan’s voice grew squeaky. “But the Fudderman project.”

  “I’m going to loan the two of you to Dr. Riggs. Give her any information she requests and put all of our resources at her disposal.”

  “Fudderman needs to be completed by Monday morning, Tuesday at the latest.”

  “This will take precedence.”

  “Sure. Okay. You know me. I’m just wondering who’s going to pay. This isn’t going to be part of our deal with Tananger, is it?”

  “We’ll pay for it. The company will.”

  “I just hope the board doesn’t see anything wrong with that.”

  “Me, too,” DiMaggio said, humoring him.

  “It’s just that Canyon View has certain commitments right now, and after dedicating myself to those commitments for the past six months, it kind of throws me off course when all of a sudden the energy is going somewhere else. I’ll get Carpenter.” He turned to DiMaggio. “Is that what you want?”

  “That’s what I said. Bring your notes from Tennessee and give Carpenter an update on the way in here.”

  “I can do that.”

  “Thank you, Donovan.”

  “My pleasure.”

  Donovan was one of those men whose faces flushed when they were nonplussed. Even under the tan it had flushed several times during our conversation, usually at the same time his voice got squeaky. It was hard to square up the impressive physique with everything else about him.

  After he left the room, DiMaggio said, “He’s a bit of a nervous type, but trust me, he’s probably pound for pound the best chemist on the West Coast. He has an astonishing background. He was in the Army Rangers. He’s a black belt in karate. There’s a picture in his office of him breaking a whole stack of boards with his head. Unbelievable. And Carpenter is nothing less than a genius. Entered college when she was fourteen, got a degree in chemistry by the time she was seventeen, then a master’s in molecular biology. She was halfway through med school when we outbid four other companies for her services. MIT would have held on to her if they could. She doesn’t have much experience, but I think this combination of the savvy in Donovan and intellectual in Carpenter will be just what you need.

  “I want you to pull through this, Jim. And I want you, Steph, to find anything you can that will help your sister. Call me. Day or night. I mean that. I’d put the whole company on it if it weren’t for this merger.”

  “Thank you, Aunt Marge.”

  The room grew quiet. I said, “What is it your company does exactly? Holly told me once, but I’ve forg
otten.”

  “We’re researching a new type of liquid metal.” She went on but soon was talking about complex helical molecules and negatively charged DNA crystals, and it was all I could do to keep my eyes open. She was so enthusiastic about her work and the prospects for new discoveries, I quickly discarded the idea that she was trying to hide behind a facade of doublespeak. In her building, this was the lingo.

  A noise in the corridor cut her talk short. She stood, smoothed her skirt, and walked around her desk. “You can use my office.” When I stood, she grasped both my hands in hers and said, “Jim. You run into any roadblocks, call me. I can make phone calls, use my connections in the industry, whatever.” Tears puddling her eyes, she tightened her grip. “I’m so sorry about this. Nobody deserves this. Especially not somebody with the heart you have. I really am sorry.”

  Not knowing what else to do, I nodded dumbly. She left the room in a swelter of emotion, then stuck her head back in and said, “I thought it was them, but it was the painters. I’ll go see what’s holding up the show.”

  I had no idea where she got that business about my heart, whether it was something Holly told her or a trait she thought she’d detected on her own. People were dying, you said all kinds of silly crap hoping they would buy into it. Much as I hated to admit it, I didn’t have any kind of heart. The petty details of my life had swallowed every waking moment of my days. I’d been consumed with details since I was born. Except for my daughters, I’d never had time for others. Stephanie—working her ass off for a man she barely knew and didn’t like—now that was heart.

  After we were alone, Stephanie said, “At least we won’t be overwhelmed by technicalese if this all turns out to be chemical in origin. I’ve had plenty of chemistry, but not like them.”

  “And we can ask them about those people from San Jose.”

  She reached over and patted my hand.

  37. ACHARA

  Twenty minutes later Donovan came back carrying a fat manila folder. The young woman accompanying him carried a yellow legal pad and a pen.