Shadowmaker (9 page)

“How long have the Hawkins brothers been in business?” Mom asked.

“Their daddy started the company back in the fifties,” Sheriff Granger answered.

Mom continued the thought: “Before there were laws regulating the disposal of toxic waste. You know as well as I do, all those fifty-gallon metal drums held cyanides, lead,
mercury, and—worst of all—PCB’s, which are now outlawed. Those drums corrode and leak, and all the poisons are absorbed by the soil and water.”

He shrugged. “You can’t hold the Hawkinses accountable for whatever they did before the laws were passed.”

“The houses built on their landfill aren’t very old. If the Hawkins brothers knowingly built them over toxic waste, they can be held accountable.” Mom was gripping her hands together so tightly, her knuckles stood out like small, white knobs. “Surely you recognize the fact that PCB’s can cause cancer, birth defects, asthma—”

“Theory only. And those PCB’s you’re talkin’ about—polychlorinated biphenyls, if I remember rightly—manufacture of same was outlawed in 1979.”

“But many electrical transformers and other products that use PCB’s because they’re heat-, light-, and water-resistant are still in use, or they’re in need of disposal,” Mom insisted.

Sheriff Granger stood. “If you want to get tangled up in government rigamarole, that’s up to you, but you’ll have a tough time provin’ anythin’ against the Hawkins brothers, and folks here won’t like your nosin’ around, tryin’ to stir up trouble. Keep in mind the words of Douglas Jerrold: ‘Some people are so fond of ill-luck that they run half-way to meet it.’ ”

I knew Mom well enough to expect steam to come out of her ears any minute. She snapped, “Why don’t you just stick to solving your murder, Sheriff, and stop threatening me?”

“Don’t get things wrong,” he said. “I wasn’t threatenin’ you. I was just tellin’ you the way things are.”

“You’re good at that,” she said.

“And as for the murder,” he said, “it’s solved.”

“Already?” I broke in.

At the same time Lana Jean said, “Wow! Who did it?”

Sheriff Granger barely glanced at Lana Jean and me before he nodded curtly in Mom’s direction and left our house.

The next morning at school everyone was talking about the murder and what the sheriff had done, and I couldn’t believe it.

He hadn’t been able to come up with either witnesses or the murder weapon. The county medical examiner sent the bullet that was found in the body all the way to Dallas to a ballistics expert, but it was going to take a while to get the report. Sheriff Granger couldn’t pin the murder on any of the carnival people, so he told them to clear out, to get out of town and forget about ever coming back.

That evening, during dinner, I said to Mom, “Can you believe it? He let a murderer
get
away. Just like that, the case is closed.”

“A murder case is never closed until it’s solved,” Mom said. “There’s no statute of limitations on a murder, and regardless of what people in this town may think, the records are available to other police agencies in other towns and cities.”

“Do you mean that some other sheriff or police detective can use the information?”

“Yes. To help them solve a similar crime in their jurisdiction.”

“Which might mean another murder.”

“That’s right.”

Something Mom had said suddenly rang a bell. “You said ‘regardless of what people in Kluney might think’—something like that. What did you mean?”

She poked with her fork at the tuna casserole on her plate before she answered. “There was a lot of talk about the murder while I was in the drugstore. It seems that most of the Kluney people agreed with the sheriff about wanting the carnival people to just pack up and get out. As Belle put it, ‘Those carny people can fight with each other as much as they want to. We just want them to take their disagreements out of Kluney and leave us out of it.’ ”

“What did you say to that?” I asked even though I imagined Mom’s reaction.

“They weren’t interested in what I had to say,” Mom told me. “There was some very pointed talk about Anita Boggs and people causing trouble for her and everyone else. I asked if they weren’t concerned about her child’s health. A woman got tears in her eyes, but she said that Anita hasn’t been herself since she lost her baby. They didn’t want to talk about toxic waste—didn’t even believe in it. Some man insisted that this toxic waste fuss was something thought up by the government to create more paperwork, and a woman reminded everyone that we didn’t used to eat swordfish because the government said it had mercury in it, and now swordfish is all right. Belle slammed my purchases
into a bag and wouldn’t even talk to me, except to tell me what I owed.”

“The woman has a point,” I said.

“Katie!”

“Mom, you can’t run around trying to solve other people’s problems when you’re supposed to be writing a novel! You don’t even have any proof to go on.”

Mom sighed. “You’re right about that. I did get the information I requested, and there were no negative reports on the Hawkinses’ company. However, they’ve had contracts over a number of years, with several manufacturing companies along the Gulf Coast and in Houston, to dispose of dangerous waste.”

“What kind of dangerous waste?”

“Herbicides, pesticides, paint thinners, lead and mercury used in storage batteries and electrical equipment … There’s a long list.”

“Where do they dispose of these things?” I asked.

“Good question,” Mom said.

I shuddered. “I don’t understand why anyone would want a job collecting and disposing of toxic stuff.”

“Commercial waste hauling is a highly profitable business,” Mom explained. “Industries are willing to pay well to get their wastes taken away. The only problem is that it’s expensive to dispose of the wastes properly, so a few waste disposal companies take the easy way out by mislabeling the contents of the drums or even involving their drivers in midnight dumping of the poisons along the sides of roads.”

“Do you think that’s what the Hawkins brothers are doing?”

“I don’t know,” Mom said. Her mouth got that tight look, which meant she had her mind set on something and wouldn’t give up. “It may take time, but I’ve requested that an inspector do whatever is needed legally to get some soil samples from the Boggses’ property.”

“Why can’t an inspector come right away and decide this thing one way or another?”

Mom shrugged. “There are only a few inspectors and a lot of territory to cover.”

“I guess you can’t just ask Mrs. Boggs if you can take some samples, after her husband hurt her.”

“I actually went to see Anita Boggs,” Mom told me, and I could hear the discouragement in her voice. “She was so frightened, she told me to go away and not come back.”

Mom picked up her plate—she’d eaten hardly anything—and took it to the sink. “Anita has a black eye, and her mouth is swollen,” she said. “I asked her if she’d like to come and stay with us, but she stared at me as if I were crazy and said there was no way she was going to leave Harvey. She even refused to press charges, so he’s out of jail. I feel terrible about what happened to her just because she talked to me.”

I got up quickly and put a hand on Mom’s shoulder. “Don’t start blaming yourself for what happened,” I said. “Remember … 
she
came to
you
because she wanted your help.”

“It’s pretty obvious that she doesn’t want it now.”

“What are you going to do?”

Mom’s voice was low, but I could hear the determination
in it. “There are other people being hurt too. I can’t give up,” she said.

You have to give up!
I thought.
You don’t know for sure there’s a problem of toxic waste, so writing your novel is more important!
I immediately began trying to figure out how to prove Mom wrong and send her back to her word processor, when the phone rang. It was Lana Jean.

I could hardly make out what she was saying at first, she was so excited. I almost shouted at her to slow down. She gulped a couple of times, making squeaking noises like a kitten with the hiccups, but she did manage to calm down a little.

“Katie,” she said. “I did it! I really, truly did it!”

“Did what?”

“Talked to Travis. He was outside the back door here at Kennedy’s waiting for B.J. I knew that B.J. wouldn’t come out for a while, because the boss was chewing him out for not clearing the tables fast enough, so I just walked right into the alley and up to Travis, and this time he talked to me.”

“Great,” I muttered. “He said more than hi, I hope.”

“So did I.” Lana Jean’s giggle was so excited and high-pitched, I pulled the telephone receiver away and rubbed my ear.

She was going on and on. “I thought about what you said, that watching Travis was kind of like spying on him, and I didn’t want him or anyone else to think I was a spy, so I told him that I liked to watch him—the way he walks, the way he talks to people, the way he smiles kind of easy-like.”

“You didn’t!” I felt my face grow hot, as though I were the one who should be embarrassed instead of Lana Jean.

“Yeah, I did. I even told him about following him at the carnival.”

“Didn’t he mind?”

“He was kind of surprised at first, but then he wanted to hear more. I found myself telling him how I’ve been writing all about him in my journal, and even included the night of the carnival.”

I groaned. I couldn’t help it.

“Don’t be like that,” she scolded. “I did the right thing, because he said I was a very interesting person, and he’d like to get to know me better. He’s going to take me out as soon as—”

I heard a gruff voice growling in the background. Talking as fast as humanly possible, Lana Jean said, “We’re not supposed to make personal calls on the kitchen phone. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

There was a click in my ear, so I put down the receiver. It was just as well that she hung up on me, because there was nothing I could say. At first I thought about how pathetic Lana Jean was. Poor girl, she might spend most of her time in a fantasy world, but she wouldn’t lie about what she told me. It was Travis Wyman I couldn’t understand. He’d never noticed Lana Jean or paid any attention to her except to be rude. Then, when she finally admitted spying on him, he didn’t get mad. He asked her out. It didn’t make sense. I found Lana Jean’s interruption very confusing, but I finished my homework, watched the last half of an old movie on television, and went to bed.

When the phone rang, I thought it was my alarm clock, and I fumbled to turn it off. While I was staring at the lighted numbers, trying to figure out why it was ringing at one o’clock in the morning, Mom turned on her bedroom light, stumbled into the living room, and answered the phone.

At this hour it had to be a wrong number or maybe an obscene call, I decided, and prepared to squirm down further under the blanket. But Mom was talking to someone, and I heard her say, “I’m sorry, Mrs. Willis. I’ll check with Katie right now. If she knows anything, I’ll call you back.”

I hopped out of bed, meeting Mom in the doorway.

“When’s the last time you saw Lana Jean?” she asked. “At school?”

“Yes, but around nine o’clock she telephoned from Kennedy’s Grill,” I told her. “Why?”

Worry wrinkles creased Mom’s forehead. “Did she tell you anything about what she’d be doing after work?”

What had Lana Jean said about Travis asking her out? I couldn’t remember all of it, but surely if he asked her for a date, it would be on a weekend. The restaurant closed at ten, and it would be nearly eleven by the time she’d finished her work in the kitchen—too late to go out on a school night.

“She didn’t say anything about what she’d be doing after work,” I answered, but I felt kind of scared. “What’s the matter, Mom?” I asked. “Where’s Lana Jean?”

Mom put an arm around my shoulders, hugging me close. “That’s what her mother would like to find out. I’ll
call her back and suggest she try some of Lana Jean’s other friends.”

“Lana Jean doesn’t have any other friends.” As the exact words she had used came back to me, I shivered.
He’s going to take me out as soon as
— As soon as what? Could it have been,
as soon as I’m through work tonight
?

“Mom,” I said, fighting the hard, cold knot of fear that pressed against my chest. “I think I’d better talk to the sheriff.”

I
nstead of the sheriff, I spoke to the dispatcher who answered my telephone call. He sounded half asleep and kind of grouchy. He listened to what I had to say, then asked, “Are you reporting a missing person?”

“No. I told you, Lana Jean Willis’s mother called us, trying to find her.”

“Listen, kid,” he said, “your friend’s probably spending the night at a girlfriend’s house or, at worst, she’s run away, but we can’t do anything about it until her mother officially reports her missing, and then we give it three days.”

“What do you mean, you give it three days?”

“We figure that with teenagers, most of ’em take off for the city. After around three days they run out of money and call home, or decide to make up with their mothers or fathers—whoever they had an argument with—or they
shoplift something and get caught, and the police, wherever they’re arrested, notify us.”

“This girl didn’t run away,” I insisted.

“Okay. She didn’t run away. We’ll let her mother tell us that.”

“If you just talk to Travis Wyman—”

“I told you, I’m not doing anything until after her mother talks to us.”

“We have to do
something.
”

“The best thing you can do is get off the phone. If her mother wants to call us, she will.”

I hung up, totally discouraged, and told Mom the dispatcher’s reaction.

She leaned her elbows on her desk and rested her head in her hands. “I did research two years ago for the article on runaways. He’s right about most missing teenagers being runaways,” she said.

“But Lana Jean didn’t run away!” I insisted. “She was excited about just talking to Travis and almost goofy about going out with him.” I thought for a moment and said, “Mom, it doesn’t make sense. Travis dates a number of really knockout girls. Why would he ask Lana Jean for a date?”