The Sound and the Furry (35 page)

“Anymore dead birds?” Bernie said.

“Eleven yesterday,” said Dr. Ory.

“What did Wes have to say about that?”

“Haven’t discussed it with him yet. He’s coming in this morning.”

“From where?”

Dr. Ory blinked. “From where?”

“Just so I can gauge when he might here,” Bernie said. “I’d like to sit in if you
don’t mind.”

“Don’t mind at all. The truth is, I’m confused about what’s going on. Confused and
frustrated.”

“How do you mean?”

“I hadn’t had a single bird brought in for months, and then up goes number nine and
in they come.”

“Number nine being the new platform?”

“That’s right,” Dr. Ory said. “What’s frustrating is that Wes swears up and down they’re
not leaking a drop out there. So where’s it coming from?”

“Maybe another platform?” Bernie said.

“I asked Mr. Patel from the government about that,” Dr. Ory said. “Apparently all
the other platforms are much farther out, meaning birds would be turning up east of
here on account of the current, maybe all the way to Mobile, and that’s not happening.”

“I’d like to talk to Patel.”

Dr. Ory shook her head. “He got called back to Washington. He didn’t seem too happy
about it.” Bernie’s face hardened. Dr. Ory was watching. “What’s that look?” she said.

“No look,” Bernie said.

“No?” said Dr. Ory. “I think it means some fix is in and you don’t like it.”

“What kind of fix?”

“You’d know more about that than I would. I’m just a vet. But you’re a fighter, that’s
plain to see. Wes is renting a cabin at the fishing club south of town. You can’t
miss it.”

We drove out of town, came to a sign showing a fish leaping over blue waves. Bernie
turned into the next lane, a narrow unpaved road lined with white-painted stones.
Ahead stood a big yellow building up on stilts. We followed the road along a canal
with some boats tied up to the side, including a green one I knew well.

“There’s his boat,” Bernie said, slowing down. “Hey, what are you barking about? I
see it. Chet! Easy, big guy. Calm down.” I calmed it down to a low growl, best I could
do. Bernie glanced over at me. “What’s on your mind?”

What was on my mind? I hadn’t liked getting rolled into a net and tossed into the
water: that was on my mind. Wouldn’t you be thinking the same?

Some little yellow cabins appeared, clustered in a grove of trees; all except for
the last one, kind of off on its own. That last cabin had a green SUV parked out front.
All the other cabins seemed empty. Bernie pulled up beside one of them, turned to
me and made the quiet sign, finger over his lips. The low growling that had been accompanying
us faded out.

We left the car, walked up to the SUV. Bernie took a quick glance inside—all about
grabbing the keys if they were in the ignition, which they were not in this case,
too bad because it was one of our coolest moves—and walked up to the front door of
the cabin.

A screen door, as it happened, meaning you didn’t need to have much going on in the
hearing department to pick up Wes’s voice from inside.

“. . . but, with all respect, Mr. Sim, that’s not my job. I never expected that—”
Silence. Then: “Yes, sir.” And the click of a phone call ending.

Bernie pushed the door open with the toe of his sneaker. Wes
was standing in front of a curtained window, gazing out as though the curtain were
open, his back to us.

“What’s not your job, Wes?” Bernie said.

Wes whirled around, mouth and eyes opening wide.

“What the hell—” he began, his soft brown eyes not quite so soft at that moment. “What
are you doing here?”

“Thought we’d come see the cats,” Bernie said.

“Cats?”

“We’re cat lovers, Chet and I.”

Had I ever been more shocked in my life? For a dreadful stretch of time that felt
like forever I got all tangled up in the idea that I didn’t understand anything about
anything, not one single thing in the whole wide world. Then I noticed a glint in
Bernie’s eyes—very faint but I knew all the signs to watch for in Bernie—that meant
he was enjoying a little private joke, which he sometimes did at unexpected times,
such as in a serious interview. Ah ha! This was a serious interview. No holds barred
in a serious interview—that was basic—meaning sometimes you had to do some wacky things,
like posing as cat lovers. Now we were cooking, me and Bernie.

“I don’t understand,” Wes was saying. “I don’t have cats.”

Which had been clear to me from the get-go on this case. Not only that, but a member
of the nation within had been in this cabin and not long ago.

“No cats?” Bernie said.

“Uh,” said Wes, his eyes shifting and shifting again, like he was trying to remember
something. “Not here, is what I meant to say. No cats here. I leave them at home when
I’m on a remote assignment.”

“Where’s home?”

“Houston.”

“What are their names?”

“The cats?”

Bernie nodded.

Then came a very brief pause, hardly noticeable, but any pause at all at a moment
like that caught my attention, why I couldn’t tell you in a million years, which is
probably a lot, but don’t bet the ranch.

“Babe,” Wes said. “Babe and Ruth.”

Bernie smiled. “You a baseball fan?”

“Matter of fact, yes,” Wes said.

“And a pretty quick thinker.”

“Not sure what you mean by that,” Wes said. “And I’m sorry to disappoint you on the
cats. But if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a big day coming up.”

“Meeting with Dr. Ory?” Bernie said.

“That’s on the agenda.”

“She’s got more birds to show you.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

“What do you think’s going on with all these birds?”

“I believe I’ve already explained,” said Wes.

“You’re talking about the natural seeps theory?”

“It’s more than a theory. Natural oil seeps are established fact in these parts.”

“No way any of the platform wells could be leaking?” Bernie said.

“Absolutely not,” said Wes. “We monitor them twenty-four seven.”

“What about the number nine rig?”

“Least of all.”

“Why is that?”

“Because number nine isn’t even operational yet.”

“What does that mean?”

“We’re not pumping.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a new installation,” Wes said. “Drilling was only completed last week and the
structural test results didn’t come in until yesterday.”

“And how did you do?”

“Huh?”

“On the test,” Bernie said. “Gentleman’s C?”

“We don’t joke about things like that,” Wes said. “The tests were perfect. We don’t
pump an ounce until they are.”

“When will pumping start?”

“Soon.”

“Today? Tomorrow?”

“That’s confidential information,” Wes said.

They gazed at each other. Bernie’s eyes were hard; Wes was back to the soft brown
look.

“I assume pressure measurements are part of the testing,” Bernie said.

Wes flinched, just the tiniest bit, as though Bernie had finger-flicked him on the
tip of the nose. “Wouldn’t know about that,” Wes said. “I’m not an engineer.” He took
a long look at his watch. “And now I’ve really got to get moving.”

Bernie nodded, turned toward the door. The interview was over? That didn’t seem right.
Wasn’t Bernie going to finger-flick him on the tip of the nose? I’d gotten that lodged
in my mind, wanted to see it in the worst way. But it didn’t happen. We walked out
of the cabin, headed toward the Porsche.

And that would have been that, except on the way to the Porsche we passed a scrubby
little bush, probably of no interest to you, but you would have missed the fact that
it had been marked
very recently by a member of the nation within, no offense. I got busy with some thorough
sniffing, then laid a mark of my own on the bush—Bernie calls them Chet marks and
seems to think that’s pretty funny, no telling why—higher up and . . . decisive, in
a way that’s hard to describe. After that I sniffed all around the bush in a circle,
easily picking up the trail of whoever I’d just overmarked—loved overmarking, one
of my very favorite activities—which led around the cabin to a little shed at the
back.

“Chet?” Bernie said, trailing after me. “What’s going on?”

I trotted toward the little shed, not much in mind, except I hadn’t had a fun play
with a buddy in some time; and one other shadowy thing having to do with the Isle
des Deux Amis and the day we’d found those glasses—whose glasses they were not coming
to me, if the fact had ever been there at all. Not to worry.

Bernie caught up to me, walked by my side, not saying a thing. We came to the door
of the shed, a windowless door padlocked shut. I made a low rumbly bark.

From inside the shed came an answering bark, also low and rumbly, almost—but not quite—as
low and rumbly as my own. I got ready to meet a pretty big dude.

“What the hell would I do without you?” Bernie said.

I didn’t understand the question.

Bernie glanced around. The cabin was quiet, the curtains closed in all the back windows.
Bernie grasped the lock, gave it a shake: nothing doing. He raised his leg and in
one smooth motion—making it look easy, Bernie-style—kicked in the shed door. Loved
those splintering sounds, could have listened to them all day. Did I have the best
job in the world or what? All of a sudden I was in the mood for Bernie to smash the
whole shed to smithereens! Oh, the fun we’d have! But something told me this wasn’t
about smashing the shed. It was about . . .

This little dude who came stepping slowly and carefully—like his paws were too precious
to touch the ground—out of the shed. A grumpy dude, which was easy to see from the
way he eyed us, like we were annoying him just by being there. Hey! Who broke you
out of the shed, little grumpy dude? Ever think of that? I like just about everybody,
including most perps and gangbangers, but I was having a problem with this dude, whoever
he happened to be.

Bernie squatted down in a crouch, held out his hand toward the new guy. “Let’s have
a look at your tags, little fella, just to confirm the obvious.”

All that got Bernie was a hard stare and some strange sniffling and snuffling from
a squashed-in nose that reminded me of Snaffles Ferolli, this washed-up boxer who
worked as a bouncer at a club in South Pedroia that we no longer frequented, or even
went to a single time after a certain incident, never mind frequently. But forget
all that, the point being that the flat-faced grump made not the slightest move to
help Bernie with the tags.

Bernie reached for them. What was this? The little bugger gave him a nip? And Bernie
chuckled? I saw nothing funny, found myself crowding in. Someone had to take charge.
The solution was obvious. We had to lock this guy back up in the shed and forget all
about him. As if he was reading my mind, he rounded on me—if any move so slow and
clumsy could be called rounding—and bared his teeth, which were already sort of bared
on a full-time basis, surprisingly sharp-looking teeth, and a point of difference
from Snaffles Ferolli, who had none. With all this going on, he forgot about Bernie,
who caught hold of the tags, gave them a quick once-over, avoided another one of those
nips, and said, “Nice to meet you, Napoleon. Been looking forward to this.”

Which made no sense to me. What was nice about it? And what I was looking forward
to was locking him back in the shed and going on with the rest of my life, Napoleon-free.

Bernie reached out again and . . . oh, no: gave Napoleon a pat? All that did was make
Napoleon growl. A pleasant development, and just in time to stop me from pushing in
between. And then Napoleon made an up-from-under head twisting motion and I realized
he wanted . . . more.

“Ooomph,” said Bernie. “Easy there, big guy. Sit down for a minute.”

I sat down, if sitting down could include butt not actually in contact with ground.
As for how much time a minute was, my impression had always been hardly any at all.

“Chet! We’re working here.”

This was work? The case had something to do with Bernie patting Napoleon? I wasn’t
seeing that, not the least little bit. But it was the kind of thing Bernie would know.
I sat back down, my butt practically grazing the ground.

Bernie gave Napoleon one more pat, real quick and with his eyes on me. Napoleon pressed
his head up against Bernie’s hand with all his puny strength. Bernie’s gaze shifted
to him. “Been through a tough time, huh, little fella,” Bernie said. “Where’s Ralph?”

Ah! I’m not saying I began to get it, but all at once I knew for sure that something
gettable was going on. And it was coming to me—coming, coming, coming, right on the
edge of where my mind grabs things and doesn’t let go—when I heard a sound from the
cabin, specifically the sound of metal curtain rings sliding on a metal curtain rod.
I whipped around and there was Wes at the window, eyes, eyebrows and mouth all taking
the position of human alarm.

Wes was not my favorite guy to begin with and now I got the feeling he was even worse
than I’d thought. I barked. Bernie turned, maybe just in time to see Wes vanishing
from the window.