I hustled the startled Elvis down the five flights, mumblingsomething about a family emergency, jumped in the Jeep, and aimed it west.
I couldn’t risk getting stuck in the trucks clogging Thompson Avenue; I ran the stop signs on the side streets, past the bungalows and the dark shells of the abandoned factories, and shot back onto Thompson Avenue by the Fronts at the outskirts of Riverton, where the highway widens to four lanes. I raced along the highway, swerving around the slow-moving trucks, dodging the occasional car pulling out of one of the long driveways. Cars horns blared; drivers fumbled to lower their windows to scream at my recklessness. I didn’t care. I was Judas, and now people had died.
I got to the hill just east of Gateville and sped up toward the crest with my head out the side window, scanning the sky for black smoke. But the sky was clear and blue, and there were no sirens above the sounds of the traffic. I got to the top of the hill and looked down.
The white marble gateposts of Crystal Waters stood like Corinthian soldiers at rest, calm against the dark green yews by the entrance. No smoke, no flames, no flashing lights. Just three men standing next to a pale blue pickup truck parked on the grass outside the brick wall, right next to the entrance. I rode the brake down the hill, taking deeper breaths.
I got close enough to recognize Stanley Novak, talking to two workmen in pale blue coveralls. All three were staring into a hole in the ground like they were discussing planting a tree. They looked relaxed. I tapped my horn and waved to Stanley, swung around, and parked fifty feet down along the grass shoulder. He hurried up to the Jeep before I could get out.
“Chernek’s office told me to get right over here,” I said through the open side window. “What’s the rumpus?”
Stanley leaned closer to be heard above the traffic going past. “Something blew that lamppost out of the ground, but I don’t think it’s related to our problem.”
He opened my door before I could stop him. I got out.
“Those workers don’t know about the note,” he said, closing the door.
“Mum’s the word.”
We started toward the two workers.
The hole was rough-edged, three feet in diameter and three feet deep. Next to it, a black metal lamppost, jagged at the base where it had been ripped from its cement footing, lay on the grass like an uprooted tree.
The taller workman was down on his knees, sniffing inside the hole. “I still don’t smell anything,” he said, getting up. He looked at Stanley. “Best we call the gas company.” Next to him, the other worker nodded.
I bent down. The inside of the hole was strewn with chunks of broken cement. I couldn’t smell anything except the sweetness of freshly cut grass.
“Get your shovels and poke down in there first,” Stanley said quickly. “See if you can locate the pipe.”
Both workers looked at him, surprised. I did, too. “The shovels might give a spark,” the taller one said.
“Use the wood handles, then. Let’s make sure there’s a gas pipe down there before we call the gas company.”
Neither of the workmen moved.
“Look,” Stanley said to the tall workman, “after the explosion at Sixteen Chanticleer, any reporter getting hold of this will see it as the same kind of explosion, and then it will hit television or the papers. Let’s be sure it’s gas, is all I’m saying.”
The tall workman looked back at Stanley. “What else could it be?”
“Kids, with a coffee can full of cherry bombs.” Stanley turned and touched my elbow, ending the discussion. We started walking back to the Jeep.
I waited until we were out of earshot. “You really think that big iron lamppost was toppled by kids with fireworks?”
“Fourth of July was last week. Kids here, their parents buy themcherry bombs, M-80s, skyrockets. Put enough of that stuff together, you can blow up anything.”
We leaned against the hood of the Jeep and watched the workmen pull blue-handled shovels from their pickup truck. It occurred to me then that everything matched in Gateville: the truck, the workers’ coveralls, Stanley’s uniform shirt, even the shovel handles. It was all pale blue, the color of a clear sky, as if serenity could be painted on.
“Tell me what happened.”
Stanley looked at his watch. “Four hours ago, at two thirteen, I was making my rounds.”
I remembered the way he cruised Chanticleer Circle in his blue station wagon, lap after lap, scanning the empty lawns and the shut-tight houses for movement that didn’t belong. I used to wonder how he stood the monotony, because hardly anything ever moved in Gateville. The residents were never out. The women didn’t talk across hedges, their kids didn’t toss footballs on the lawns, their toddlers didn’t wobble big-wheeled tricycles down the sidewalk. The hedges had been grown tall, to seclude, not to talk over. There were no sidewalks. And the kids were shadows, invisible, gone after school to supervised activities and then later whisked down to basements, to numb themselves with home theaters and video games. What movement there was in Gateville came from landscapers pushing lawnmowers, house painters carrying cans from trucks, maids or nannies exiting beat-up cars left respectfully out on the street. Caretakers, silently serving unseen masters, like workers in ghost towns.
“I heard a loud noise out by the road,” Stanley was saying. “I looked up and saw dirt and dust in the air outside of the wall. I figured a car accident-a car rolled, kicked up dirt. I drove out the gate, met one of my guys running from the guardhouse. We saw that.” He pointed ahead at the lamppost lying beside the hole.
I looked at him. “No note?”
He shook his head. “I checked the Board’s mailbox right after the explosion. Nothing.”
In front of us, the two workmen, holding their shovels by the blade, poked gingerly into the hole.
We watched for another minute, and then Stanley asked, “Anything new at your end?”
It surprised me, because I thought he would have talked with the Bohemian. “I haven’t done anything since my report to Chernek. I told him the threat could be real, that you should take the letter to the police.”
“I was wondering if you are investigating other things.”
“I just did the letter and the envelope, Stanley.”
We went back to watching the workmen. They probed into the hole slowly with their shovel handles, as if at pythons coiled in a pit.
Traffic had picked up on the highway alongside of us. It was approaching six thirty, white-collar rush hour. Every few minutes, a Mercedes, B.M.W., or Jaguar, every third one of them painted black, slowed to turn into Gateville, their drivers oblivious to the workmen outside the wall. When I lived there, I used to wonder what it was with all that black. It wasn’t just the men with their luxury sedans. It was their pert, frosted blond wives, too, driving the most enormous of S.U.V.’s. Most of those were black, too, each looking big enough to haul four caskets, stacked properly. Amanda drove a white Toyota. Reason enough to love her, I’d told her once.
The tall workman set down his shovel, bent down, and began lifting chunks of cement out of the hole. Then he got down on his knees and started scooping out dirt with cupped hands. After a minute, he stood up and gave us a wave. We walked back to the hole.
“I don’t understand it, Mr. Novak,” the worker said, brushing off his hands on the sides of his overalls. “No gas pipe, just the wiring for the light post.”
I bent down to look into the hole. Electrical wires of every color, reds, blues, greens, yellows, and more, severed by the blast,spilled out of a ripped metal utility pipe and lay on the black dirt like multicolored baby serpents. There was no gas pipe.
I kept my face calm, trying to ignore the vein pulsing in my forehead, as I thought about how much force must have been needed to pulverize the concrete. Stanley cocked his head slightly, warning me with his eyes to say nothing. He turned to the workmen. “Loose-fill the hole so no one can fall in.”