guy?”
He shook his head, then nodded, then shrugged. “I really couldn’t get a read on him, Cap’n.”
I thanked Bug and told him to call us if he got anything else.
“So, what d’you think, Boss?” asked Bunny. “Crow one of the good guys or one of the bad guys?”
“No way to tell. We’re not even sure we have any bad guys in this. Burke could be shacked up with some chick.”
“And doing what?” asked Top. “Making crank calls to the AIC?”
“ And terrorists?” added Bunny.
I grinned. “Yeah, yeah.”
We drove through the town, which takes less time than it does to tell it. Couple of stoplights. Rows of craft shops. A surprising number of cafes and bars, though most of them looked run down. More for drinking than eating, I thought. The biggest intersection had the Terrance Wolfe Memorial Medical Center across the street from the Saul Weinstock Ball Field. The hospital looked new; the ball field was overgrown, and a hundred crows huddled in a row along the chain link fence. Ditto for the hospital.
I noted it away and kept driving. The place was starting to get to me, and that was weird because I worked a lot of shifts in West Baltimore, which is probably the most depressing place on earth. Poverty screamed at you from every street corner, and there was a tragic blend of desperation and hopelessness in the eyes of every child. And yet, this little town had a darker tone to it, and my overactive imagination wondered if the storm clouds ever let the sun shine down. Looking at these streets was like watching the sluggish flow of a polluted river. You know that there’s life beneath the grime and the toxicity, but at the same time you feel that life could not exist there.
We left town and turned back onto Route A-32 as it plunged south toward the Delaware River. This was the large part of the township, occupied for the first mile by new suburban infill—with cookie-cutter development units, many still under construction, and overbuilt McMansions. More than three quarters of the houses had FOR SALE signs staked into the lawns. A few were unfinished skeletons draped in tarps that looked like body bags.
Then we were out into the farm country and the atmosphere changed subtly, from something dying to something still clinging to life. Big farms, too, like the kind you expect to see more in the Midwest. Thousands of acres of land, miles between houses. Endless rows of waving green corn, fields bright with pumpkins, and row upon row of vegetables. A paint-faded yellow tractor chugged along the side of the road, driven by an ancient man in blue coveralls. He smoked a cheap pipe that he took out of his mouth to salute us as we went by.
“We just drive into the nineteen forties?” asked Bunny.
“Pretty much.”
Mist, as thick and white as tear gas, slowly boiled up from gullies and hollows as the cooler air under the storm mixed with the August heat.
The GPS told us that we were coming up on our turn.
The lane onto which I’d turned ran straight as a rifle barrel from the road, through a fence of rough-cute rails, to the front door of a Cape Cod that looked as out of place here in Pine Deep as a sequined thong looks on a nun. Heavy oaks lined the road, and the big front lawn was dark with thick, cool summer grass.
“Okay, gentlemen,” I said softly. “Place should be empty, and except for a brief walk-through by the handler, no one else will have disturbed the crime scene.”
“Wait,” said Top, “you want Farmboy and me to play Sherlock Holmes?”
“We’re just doing a cursory examination. If we find anything of substance we’ll ship it off.”
“To where? CSI: Twilight Zone ?”
I rolled the car to a slow stop in a turnaround in front of the house. The garage was detached except for a pitched roof that connected it to the main house. A five-year-old Honda Civic was parked in that slot. The garage door was closed.
“Looks nice and quiet,” Bunny said as he got out, the big
He shook his head, then nodded, then shrugged. “I really couldn’t get a read on him, Cap’n.”
I thanked Bug and told him to call us if he got anything else.
“So, what d’you think, Boss?” asked Bunny. “Crow one of the good guys or one of the bad guys?”
“No way to tell. We’re not even sure we have any bad guys in this. Burke could be shacked up with some chick.”
“And doing what?” asked Top. “Making crank calls to the AIC?”
“ And terrorists?” added Bunny.
I grinned. “Yeah, yeah.”
We drove through the town, which takes less time than it does to tell it. Couple of stoplights. Rows of craft shops. A surprising number of cafes and bars, though most of them looked run down. More for drinking than eating, I thought. The biggest intersection had the Terrance Wolfe Memorial Medical Center across the street from the Saul Weinstock Ball Field. The hospital looked new; the ball field was overgrown, and a hundred crows huddled in a row along the chain link fence. Ditto for the hospital.
I noted it away and kept driving. The place was starting to get to me, and that was weird because I worked a lot of shifts in West Baltimore, which is probably the most depressing place on earth. Poverty screamed at you from every street corner, and there was a tragic blend of desperation and hopelessness in the eyes of every child. And yet, this little town had a darker tone to it, and my overactive imagination wondered if the storm clouds ever let the sun shine down. Looking at these streets was like watching the sluggish flow of a polluted river. You know that there’s life beneath the grime and the toxicity, but at the same time you feel that life could not exist there.
We left town and turned back onto Route A-32 as it plunged south toward the Delaware River. This was the large part of the township, occupied for the first mile by new suburban infill—with cookie-cutter development units, many still under construction, and overbuilt McMansions. More than three quarters of the houses had FOR SALE signs staked into the lawns. A few were unfinished skeletons draped in tarps that looked like body bags.
Then we were out into the farm country and the atmosphere changed subtly, from something dying to something still clinging to life. Big farms, too, like the kind you expect to see more in the Midwest. Thousands of acres of land, miles between houses. Endless rows of waving green corn, fields bright with pumpkins, and row upon row of vegetables. A paint-faded yellow tractor chugged along the side of the road, driven by an ancient man in blue coveralls. He smoked a cheap pipe that he took out of his mouth to salute us as we went by.
“We just drive into the nineteen forties?” asked Bunny.
“Pretty much.”
Mist, as thick and white as tear gas, slowly boiled up from gullies and hollows as the cooler air under the storm mixed with the August heat.
The GPS told us that we were coming up on our turn.
The lane onto which I’d turned ran straight as a rifle barrel from the road, through a fence of rough-cute rails, to the front door of a Cape Cod that looked as out of place here in Pine Deep as a sequined thong looks on a nun. Heavy oaks lined the road, and the big front lawn was dark with thick, cool summer grass.
“Okay, gentlemen,” I said softly. “Place should be empty, and except for a brief walk-through by the handler, no one else will have disturbed the crime scene.”
“Wait,” said Top, “you want Farmboy and me to play Sherlock Holmes?”
“We’re just doing a cursory examination. If we find anything of substance we’ll ship it off.”
“To where? CSI: Twilight Zone ?”
I rolled the car to a slow stop in a turnaround in front of the house. The garage was detached except for a pitched roof that connected it to the main house. A five-year-old Honda Civic was parked in that slot. The garage door was closed.
“Looks nice and quiet,” Bunny said as he got out, the big
Similar Books
