Zero Option

16

Gwinette Warren led Stafford across the large screened porch and through a formal entryway. The ceilings inside were at least fourteen feet high, and the interior was cool, somewhat dark, and smelled of crayons. The front doorway opened into a main hallway, with a large airy parlor room on the left that had been converted into a classroom for small children.

The double doors to what should have been its twin on the right were closed. A staircase rose up the left side of the fiall to the second floor. Stafford wondered where the children were, but Mrs. Warren walked straight back into an expansive well-lighted kitchen area, and then she turned right into an office, where she invited Stafford to sit down.

The office was long and somewhat narrow, reflecting its antecedent as the kitchen pantry. There was a desk near the single window and high bookshelves down one of the long sides. The opposite wall had several framed academic certificates, as well as what looked like a collection of family pictures. A large white PC sat to one,side of the desk, and behind and to the left of the desk, there was an alcove crowded with other office equipment. In front of the desk were two upholstered chairs, and behind them a small conference table. She sat across from him in one of the upholstered chairs and crossed her slim legs.

Stafford found himself distracted by this woman. He secretly wanted another moment to examine her face, but he forced himself to get back to business. “Well, Mrs. Warren, I believe you called me.” “Yes, I did,” she said. Her voice was husky, as he had noticed before, and her diction was unusually precise, with only the barest trace of a Georgia accent.

“Before we begin, I’d appreciate it if you would explain what you are, Mr. Stafford. I’m not familiar with your organization.”

Her gaze was direct, but if she was aware of his interest in her as a woman, she gave no sign of it.

Stafford proffered his credentials, which she dutifully examined. He briefly explained the mission of the DCIS, and why he was in Atlanta.

“I’m assuming your call has something to do with what happened in the airport that day?”

She gave him a long, level look before replying. In the subdued lighting of her office, her enormous green eyes were the color of jade.

“Yes, Mr. Stafford, it does,” she said. “I’m not sure where to begin with this. Perhaps I ought to tell you about Willow Grove School first.”

“This is a school? I thought the sheriff said it was a home.”

“It’s both, but he’s right. It’s first and foremost a group home, what used to be called an ‘orphanage.’ This house has been in my father’s family for a longtime. My father was a doctor, and my mother was a schoolteacher here in Graniteville. This place was called Willow Grove Farm back when I was born here. I came back to it permanently almost ten years ago, when I was divorced. It was my father’s idea, originally, to start an orphanage.”

“How many kids do you have here, Mrs. Warren?”

“Now only six. We’re licensed for eight. That’s fairly typical of group homes in Georgia. Few of them are very large, — . We have five youngsters and Jessamine, who is a teenager.”

“That’s a most unusual name, Mrs. Warren,” Stafford said. “The sheriff seemed to know her.”; ‘

“We call her Jess.”

“And Warren? That’s also the sheriff’s name.”

“Yes, Mr. Stafford.” She was giving him that faintly challenging look again. “John Lee and I were married, after I came back to Graniteville from the university. We’re divorced now, but it’s — what’s the word?

Amicable? It’s difficult to be anything else in a town and county as small as this.”

“Especially if he’s the sheriff,” Stafford said, trying to lighten it up a little.

She regarded him thoughtfully for a moment, as if still trying to decide whether or not to trust him with something. He heard noises from upstairs.

“Yes,” she said. “I suppose that’s true.” “And where do these kids come from?” he asked.

“The north Georgia mountains, primarily. The process begins when the state takes custody. These are basically normal kids who’ve been abused or neglected or even abandoned by their parents. The situations are usually bad enough that they’re never going back home.”

“So you don’t work with autistics, or things like that?”

Her expression changed to dismay. ” ‘Things’? Autistics aren’t ‘things,” Mr. Stafford.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean the kids were things. I meant conditions such as autism, Down’s syndrome, problems like that.” He concluded that she must be pretty nervous to have snapped at him like that.

“No. We’re not equipped to deal with the special cases. And the school part of it is a supplementary schooling. We mainstream our kids as quickly as possible once we can determine a grade age for them. But most of them need a great deal of remedial work, both academic and emotional, as you might imagine.”

There were definitely noises coming from upstairs.

“Naptime is over,” she said, glancing up at the ceiling. “Mrs. Banning will be bringing them down soon. The littles have their lessons in the morning, then lunch, then naptime. In the afternoon we usually do a group project with the farm animals out in the barn.”

“And Jessamine?”

“She’s in public school.” She rose.- “Why don’t I give you a tour?”

“Sure. But Mrs. Warren? Then you’ll tell me what this is all about?”

She eyed him warily. “If I think I can trust you, yes, I will.” She paused at the doorway, standing in a way that revealed the fullness of her figure. “That’s perhaps unfair,” she said. “Let me rephrase: If I think you can handle something that requires extreme sensitivity and discretion, and not act like some government cowboy closing hi on Ruby Ridge, yes. I know that’s perhaps impolite, but I don’t know you, and you do come from Washington.”

Stafford, taken aback by her vehemence, managed a game smile. “And neither of those things much recommends me, I take it.”

She did not return the smile. “That’s correct, Mr. Stafford. You’re in the north Georgia mountains now. People here have a low regard for Washington and all its works.”

Stafford nodded. “In my experience, Mrs. Warren, that’s a sentiment shared by more than a few people,” but I am a federal officer. My job is to ferret out fraud against the government, fraud committed by government employees, for the most part. In my small way, I serve the taxpayers. None of us in federal law enforcement, however, ever expects to mitigate the larger frauds perpetrated by the government”

She detected the exasperation in his voice. “I apologize if I’ve hurt your feelings, Mr. Stafford. But this matter involves a young girl who’s been through some very difficult times. I suppose what I’m saying is, I need to take your measure before I proceed with this. Please be patient with me, and I think you’ll understand.”

He felt like telling her to knock herself out; he had nothing else to do with his afternoon. And yet her-concern seemed genuine. She hadn’t asked him up here just to rail against the federal government and all its minions. Besides, she was interesting. He wanted to know more about her, the home, and what she was doing here. “As you wish, Mrs. Warren,” he said. “How about that tour?”

She took him through the lower floor of the house, showing him the classroom and the dining area, which was really just one big table rigged for small children in the kitchen area. There were play areas out on the left-hand porch, and a small playground outside, which he had not noticed when he arrived.

“What’s in there?” he asked, pointing to the closed double doors to the right of the main hall.

“That’s where I live, Mr. Stafford. I have a small suite of rooms on the ground floor, and that side of the porch has been blocked off.”

He nodded without comment She moved with unusual grace, and he found himself staring at the back of her neck as she turned away, the glimpse of smooth white skin beneath all that luxurious black hair stirring him.

At that moment a chattering group of children came flying down the main staircase, followed by an older woman who was telling them to walk, not run. They skidded to a stop, piling on top of one another on the last step when they saw Stafford. There were three boys and two girls, all somewhere between four and seven years old. Mrs. Warren made introductions.

“Kids, this is Mr. Stafford. He’s a federal investigator from Washington, D.C. Mr. Stafford, these are the kids. We use family nicknames here.”

She pointed in turn to each of the three boys. “That’s Crash, that’s Hollywood, and that’s No-No.” She then turned to the two girls, both of whom were trying to hide behind the boy known as Crash. “That is Too, on the left, and, last but not least, is Annie. And supposedly in strict control of this crew is Mrs. Benning, one of our teachers.”

Stafford nodded at them while putting a smile on his face. They all stared back at him as if he were from Mars. Mrs. Benning took charge and herded them all out the front door, where the noise level resumed at full volume. Mrs. Warren indicated they should follow.

“We have three elderly horses, six Nubian goats, chickens, some guard geese, and undoubtedly some other assorted creatures back in the barn,” she said. “The kids do projects out there in the afternoon. Mr. Jackson is the barn and grounds caretaker. He takes care of the animals and teaches the kids something about animal husbandry. We’ve found that caring for animals improves their chances for dealing successfully with people.”

He caught a faint scent of perfume as she walked in front of him. “And why do you suppose that is?”

“Because animals have personalities, needs, fears, and urges. They communicate these things, just not in English. By teaching the kids to be conscious of how the animals do communicate, they learn to pay attention to another being, to look for those manifestations I spoke about. If you catch them young enough, and they have the basic intelligence, they’ll eventually apply those same skills to humans, and if they do that, they’re more likely to succeed than people who don’t.”

“Which is most of us.”

“Well, you say you’re an investigator. I would imagine you pay attention, don’t you?” She said this with a hint of a smile, which softened her face. First the Iron Lady. Now a hint of the coquette? Was she flirting with him? He was confused, but he certainly was paying attention.

They walked around the side of the house and out toward the barns. The pond on the left was rippled by a small breeze stirring through the bright green limbs of the surrounding willows. “How many employees do you have here?” Stafford asked.

“We have four: Mrs. Benning is one of two full-time teachers; Mrs. Coney is the other. They alternate days, taking the kids through lunch, nap, and the afternoon activities. Mr. Jackson is only here in the early morning and i afternoons. Mrs. Hadley is our cook, but she’s only here f at mealtimes. They all have families down in Graniteville. We have a doctor and an LPN whom we can call. I live; here except when I’m traveling on research trips.”

“Do you teach?”

“Yes. I take care of individual learning problems and run the home. It’s funded by the state, which pays a per diem allowance for each child under care. There’s a lot of paperwork.”

“I’m in the government, Mrs. Warren. You don’t have to tell me about paperwork. You mentioned travel.”

“Yes, I’m a doctoral candidate at the University of Georgia in Athens.

I’m studying indigenous American sign languages. And sometimes there are other trips.”

“Like the one where we met in Atlanta?”

She stopped by the gate to the barnyard area and looked ‘- across the field to the base of the mountain that rose behind the farm. “Yes. With Jessamine.”

She did not elaborate, so Stafford kept his silence while they watched the kids groom two of the horses under the direction of an elderly black man. She’d tell him when she was ready, or not tell him at all. He sensed there was no point in his asking any direct questions about the elusive Jessamine. The warm breeze molded her dress to her body, and he was a little embarrassed at how hard it was to keep his eyes off her. He imagined for a moment that there was a sexual tension growing between them, but then he immediately dismissed it as the product of an overaetive imagination amplified by prolonged abstinence. It had been ridiculous for him to think she’d been flirting with him. And yet … They had been standing there for a few minutes when a noisy yellow school bus ground its way up the hill out front and stopped in front of the driveway. A lone passenger got out, and the school bus roared away in a cloud of diesel exhaust, wearily pursued by a stream of frustrated cars and pickup trucks. Stafford watched as the girl came up the driveway, carrying her book bag like a baby across her chest. She was dressed in baggy jeans, a blouse, and a sweater. Stafford was unable to get a clear look at her features because of the distance. The girl waved tentatively at Mrs. Warren with the fingers of her right hand, then went directly into the house., “That’s Jess,” she said.

“She doesn’t join the horse activities?” he asked. f “When the kids are done, she’ll come out to ride. She’s a teenager, Mr. Stafford. She doesn’t play with he little kids. Do you have children?”

“Nope. I was married for several years, but we recently divorced. We never made time for kids.”

She nodded but, to Stafford’s great relief, didn’t say anything.

“What’s back there, Mrs. Warren?” he asked, pointing to a gap in the willows where a well-defined path paralleling the creek led back toward the mountain’s slope.

“Please, call me Gwen,” she said. “Back there is How ell Mountain and the national wilderness area. Fancy a walk?”

“Sure, and please call me Dave.”

The path took them through the tail end of the willow grove along the banks of the creek, with the pasture fence to their right. After fifteen minutes they entered a small gorge. The green bulk of Howell Mountain loomed up on both sides. He wondered if either one of them was properly dressed for a hike in the mountains, but it quickly became apparent that this was a regular exercise path for Gwen Warren. She led the way at a fairly brisk pace, without speaking. Stafford was suddenly glad he had been exercising, although he was having to control his breathing to keep from puffing out loud. He also had some trouble balancing himself with one arm stuck in his pocket.

After twenty minutes they reached a clearing next to a pool formed by a small waterfall. The view back down the gorge was spectacular. The air was cool and clean, scented with the aroma of leaf mold, wet stone, and falling water.

The path continued on up the gorge, although it looked to be much steeper. She paused and asked how he was doing.

“Fine,” he said, still trying to mask his heavy breathing. It hadn’t looked it, but they had climbed nearly two hundred feet. Only the top of the house was visible through the trees. “How far does the path go?”

“Up to the top of the gorge. There’s a bigger waterfall up there. After that, the federal wilderness area begins. Want to continue? I always ask, because some people are unused to climbing.” He explained about his balance problem, and she walked over to the edge of the path and found him a stick. She asked him what had happened to his arm.

“I was at the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said. “Couple of hopheads hit a convenience store and started shooting. I caught a ricochet in the arm. Sitting in my car, if you can believe it.”

“Did you shoot back?”

“No, this one came through the window. We’re not normally armed, Gwen.

I’m not a street cop. Most of what I do involves unarmed paperwork.”

She smiled. “Will you get it back?”

He took his hand out of his pocket and extended his arm slowly and very carefully. His right hand was somewhat pale in comparison with his left. He was barely able to make a fist, and his fingers trembled visibly.

“They tell me yes,” he said, trying not to show the strain he was feeling. “I do a series of rehab exercises, and I guess there is some minimal progress.”

He was surprised when she took his right hand in both of hers. Her hands were surprisingly warm. “Keep trying,” she said. “At our age, minimal progress constitutes victory.” Then she smiled at him again, released his hand gently, and turned to continue up the trail.

He took off his suit’jacket, loosened his tie, and put his hand back in his pants pocket while he followed her up the mountainside. It was harder going, with more rocks and ruts than before, but with the stick, he made better progress and was mostly able to keep up with her. He was content to enjoy the mountain scenery as well as the occasional glimpse of her beautiful legs ahead of him. Forty minutes later they reached the second waterfall, which was indeed much larger. The spray from the water chilled the air, causing him put his coat back on, even while he thought how nice it would be to plunge into the deep pool at the bottom of the falls. She must have read his thoughts.

“I sometimes come up here to swim,” she said. “Although that’s a lot colder than it looks. We’re nearly to the top of the pass; let’s finish the climb and then we can rest.””

He followed her again, this time on a path that snaked diagonally across the side of the mountain, whose top appeared to be nearly a thousand feet above them, until they reached another notch in the mountain. The path up this defile was steep and narrow, and he had to concentrate on keeping his footing. A couple of times he nearly went down on all fours to maintain his balance. Gwen, he noticed, was simply picking her footing more carefully than he was. After fifteen minutes, they reached the top, where she sat down on a flat benchlike rock. He stood by the rock for a moment to recover his breath. He noticed that she did not seem to be particularly winded, although the direct sunlight had brought out a sheen of perspiration on her brow. She hiked the dress back up over her knees, and extended her feet to stretch her legs. He looked away, not wanting to be caught staring at her again.

The view from the notch was well worth the climb. Willow Grove was clearly visible in the narrow valley below, bounded by intermittent patches of white concrete where the state road climbed the lower flanks of Howell Mountain. A church steeple and the clock tower of the county courthouse in Graniteville were visible across an expanse of trees, and the scarred, rocky shoulder of the gravel quarry rose up into the mountain air on the other side of town. The view through the notch behind them was even more magnificent, extending for miles to the north, east, and northwest, presenting a veritable sea of rolling tree-covered hills and rocky crags, all draped in a smoky blue haze. There were even larger blue-green shapes crouching on the distant horizon. A warm wind blew through the notch.

“That’s the tailbone of the Appalachian Mountains directly to the north,” she said. “That’s Tennessee to the left, North Carolina to the right. The area directly in front of us is part of the Chatahoochee National Forest. It’s all federally protected wilderness area, which begins right about here. The Willow Grove property comes to the top of this notch.”

“Wow. This is some prime real estate. I take it that your family has been here awhile.”

“Yes, awhile,” she said, looking out over the panorama in front of them.

A solitary hawk soared soundlessly in lazy circles above them. The breeze stirred the mass of black hair on her head, revealing the smooth line of her neck. She patted her hair back into place. He felt a sudden strong desire to touch her, an urge he quickly banished. Get a hold of yourself, he thought. She is not coming on to you.

“Anyone live out there?” he asked, pointing north.

“Officially, no. That is all a federal wilderness area. Nothing can be taken in or out of there, not even firewood. You can walk through it, but don’t get hurt, because any rescue will have to be done on foot. No helicopters, ATVs, or any sort of motorized vehicles can go back in there.”

“So no one would be allowed to live out there.”

“Not officially, no. When the wilderness area was created, the government moved everyone out. But some of the families had been there for two, three hundred years, Mr. Stafford. It wouldn’t surprise us if some of them hadn’t slipped back to the old ways and the old places.”

He nodded, picking up on her use of the word us. In other words, we locals know some things that you, an outsider, will never be permitted to know. What had Ray said? Black hats, long black beards, and moonshine? Then he noticed something else that made him ask another question. “And would some of the children who end up here in Willow Grove possibly come from out there?”;

She turned to look at him, her eyes widening in surprise. “What prompted that question?” ‘ “The fact that the path keeps going,” he replied, pointing to the far side of the notch. The path indeed kept going, showing up again halfway down the opposite slope before disappearing into a stand of hardwoods halfway down the mountain.

She looked down the path for a long moment but did not reply. Then she got up and brushed past him, saying, “We should get back.” He again decided not to push it. He had to assume she was still making up her mind about him. The less he said, the better chance he had that she would come out with it.

As they came out into the clearing near the lower falls, he heard the sounds of hoofbeats coming up the path. Moments later, Jessamine appeared, mounted on a black horse. She saw them at once, reined in gently, and waited for them to approach. She was very slim, but surprisingly full-breasted for a teenager. She was wearing short boots, jeans, and a sleeveless white shirt. Her arms were tanned, and she had much darker eyes than Gwen had. Her face had the pinched look of someone struggling with a chronic illness. As Gwen drew near, the girl began to sign excitedly with her hands. Dave, not used to being around horses, remained a few steps back.

“She was getting worried when we didn’t come back,” Gwen said.

“Normally, I don’t take visitors beyond the lower falls.” The girl was looking over at Stafford, clearly expecting an explanation. Gwen introduced them. ‘ This is Mr. Stafford from Washington, Jess,” she said. “We saw him in the Atlanta airport, remember? When that man fainted?”

At the mention of the man fainting, the girl’s face froze for a moment.

Gwen immediately reassured her. “No, Jess, it’s all right. Mr. Stafford is a policeman. told you

I was going to invite him up here, remember?”

The girl gave him another frightened look, and then she began to shake her head slowly. She was clearly agitated now, and the horse was picking up on it and starting to dance around. With one hand on the reins, she managed another few seconds of signing, then pulled the horse around and trotted off, not giving Gwen a chance to reply.

“I assume that she’s not happy to see me?” Stafford said as horse and rider disappeared into the first of the willow trees below them.

“She’s scared,” Gwen said with a sigh. “Oh, this is so complicated. I don’t really know what to do.”

Stafford thought about that for a moment. “Is there someplace you and I can have dinner around here?” he asked. “Besides the Waffle House?”

“No, not really,” she replied, starting back down the path. “There’s a tourist lodge over in Galloway, but that’s a thirty-mile drive through the mountains — one way. Not good at night.” She paused. “Why don’t you stay here for dinner?” she said. “Mrs. Hadley is a competent cook, and what we have to talk about is going to take some time.” “I’d like that very much,” he said. “Let me get checked into the motel, and then I can come back, say, what, six-thirty, seven?”

“That’s fine. The house and kids should be settled down by then.” She looked in the direction the girl had gone. “Most of them, anyway.”

Carson received the first call from the Pentagon at four twenty in the afternoon. A Major Mason from something called the Security Working Group at Army headquarters was on the line, wanting to speak to the DRMO manager. His secretary patched the call to his office and then left for the day.

“This is Wendell Carson speaking.”

“This is Major Mason, Mr. Carson. I’m with the Security Working Group, HQDA. We’re a long-range study group trying to scope out better ways to apportion funds to secure logistical assets. I won’t bore you with our full terms of reference, but we came up with a question you might be able to help us with.”

“Sure, Major. Fire away.”

“Do you have a demilitarization facility at your DRMO?”

“Yes. We’re the only one with a full-scale demil facility in the Southeast.”

“And can that facility contain toxic by-products of the demil process?”

“Yes.”

“How toxic? And how completely are they contained?” Carson explained the thoroughness of the Monster’s digestive system.

Mason was silent for a moment as he made notes. “Okay,” he said. “Then if something went through your demil system, say a container with a CW residue, there would be no release of any by-products of that process?”

Oh shit, Carson thought immediately. They’re here.

“No. The system is completely contained. If something was radioactive, the residue would still be radioactive, but chemicals? No, chemicals are neutralized. Why? Do you think some CW has gotten into the DRMO system?”

“Oh, no, nothing like that,” Mason replied quickly. “Better not be anything like that going on, right? No, I was just using that as an example of an extremely toxic substance.”

Carson thought he detected a whiff of anxiety in the major’s almost-too-quick reply, but he played along. “Damned right there had better not be anything like that getting into the DRMO pipeline. But the system is pretty safe. We have the EPA in three times a year to ensure we’re right and tight, and the by-product dealers, especially the bulk chemical feedstock companies, run tests on everything they buy from the derail process.”

“Okay, great. Thanks for your input, Mr. Carson.”

Carson thought fast. “If you have any further questions, Major, feel free to call. Oh, and may I have your number, please?”

“Sure,” Mason replied, and gave him a phone number.

Carson recognized the Virginia area code. He hung up and studied the number, which looked to him like a Pentagon exchange. HQDA, Mason had said. Headquarters, Department of the Army. Asking about the demil process and containers for chemical weapons. A tendril of apprehension coiled in 1us belly. If the Army had discovered that a cylinder of CW was missing, how would they go about tracking it down?

Carson knew his Army. They’d be extremely surreptitious about it. The Security Working Group. That could mean anything, or nothing. Then another thought whacked him between the eyes: Was this perhaps the real reason Stafford had shown up on his doorstep, apropos of absolutely nothing? Without warning from JDLA, other than that single “look out, here he comes” phone call? With some fanciful cover story about his being shit-canned out of headquarters? Jesus H. Christl Did they suspect him already?

He pushed aside his stack of paperwork and sat there in his office, mulling over the possibilities for almost an hour before finally picking up the phone and calling back the number Mason had given him. No one answered. He studied the number, then called it again, subtracting one from the final number to see if it had been an extension. The phone rang, but still no one answered. It was five thirty, so most of the Pentagon inmates would have escaped for the day. Then he had an idea. He got out his Department of Defense phone book and looked up the number of the Pentagon information operator. He gave her the number and told her it didn’t appear to be a working number. She tried it, and came up with a ring but no answer. He asked if he might have transposed a digit. She did some checking and then came back on the line.

“That number is a working number. It’s an extension in the office of the commanding general of the Army Chemical Corps,” she said. “Do you want to try the base number in the general’s office?” “No,” he said. “I just wanted to make sure I had the number right. I’ll try them again in the morning.”

He hung up the phone gingerly, as if not wanting to provoke a return call. Son of a bitch, he thought. The Army Chemical Corps. Mason had been lying.

So they knew the cylinder was missing.

And they knew where to start looking. They we’re tracking the shipment of environmental containers.

He got up and paced around his office. The bad news was that they had found out the thing had gone missing. The good news was that the only other person who had known that the cylinder was here had been “processed” out of the picture. Which left two loose ends: whatever investigation was going on about Bud’s house fire, and, possibly, but only possibly, Investigator Stafford, who was out of town for the day.

He went down the darkened hall to Stafford’s temporary office, which was unlocked. He switched on a light. All the DRMO reference binders were still piled on the desk. The blotter was covered with doodles and scribblings, a couple of phone numbers Carson didn’t recognize, and the names Lambry and Graniteville.

Graniteville? Why did that name ring a bell? He studied the blotter.

Then he remembered. The weird girl in the airport. Had Stafford gone to Graniteville? Was that why he had wanted a state map? He sat down in Stafford’s chair, thinking hard. If the Army knows, the Army is going to come here, sure as shit. I’ve got to warn Tangent. The deal has to go on hold for the moment. The thought of maybe losing his shot at a million dollars almost made him physically sick. But, he thought, this still might work out. If I can convince the Army that all the containers went straight through to demil, then they might take the easy way out — claim that the cylinder was destroyed, declare victory, and go home. That would leave the cylinder even easier to sell. Then the only loose end would be Stafford and whatever the hell he was doing up in Graniteville, and with whom. He went back to his office to retrieve the current 800 number for Tangent.