"Lord. Mom okay? Does she know I'm not around?"
"For a few minutes at a time she seems to. But then just as quickly she forgets. I'm really sorry for all you've been through. You, too, Dr. Solari."
"It's Nikki, please," she said. "I appreciate your concern. This whole business doesn't seem to be getting any better."
"It will. Grimes has a lot of power around where we live, but he doesn't have a lot of power everywhere." He lowered his voice a notch. "I know some excellent lawyers we can go see after we get this mine business straightened out. You still think Grimes is doing all this to protect BC and C?"
"I'm pretty certain of it, yes," Matt said, pointedly ignoring Nikki's expression of doubt.
"In that case, maybe I'd better start watching my back. I've come in contact with these cases, too, you know."
"I hadn't thought of that," Matt said. "All the more reason why we have to get our evidence and put the clamps on Grimes as soon as possible."
"Oh, speaking of evidence, I've found Darryl Teague's brain, but so far Ted Rideout's is a no-show."
"Could someone have taken it?" Nikki asked.
"Well, we like to think we take decent precautions against such things. For the moment I'd prefer to believe it's been misplaced. We have a storage facility for specimens over a year old. Even though Rideout's death was less than a year ago, maybe it's over there."
"I hope so."
"By the way, Nikki, I was very upset to hear about Joe Keller. I met him once at a meeting. He seemed like quite a guy."
"Thanks, he was. The people who murdered him took all of Kathy Wilson's specimens. It seems possible they might be after the ones you have, too."
"Maybe. I intend to be careful and to try and gather up all the specimens I have and get them someplace safe."
"The man Matt and I are supposed to have killed was one of the thugs who kidnapped me. Grimes was at the cabin with him, questioning me about Kathy's death. It was clear Grimes was the boss."
Hal whistled softly through his teeth.
"Well, he says you two killed the guy, then tried to burn the evidence, so to speak. I told him Matt wouldn't have bothered with the fire because he knew I was a sharp enough medical examiner not to miss the bullet hole in the guy's skull even if he was incinerated, but he wasn't interested."
"Well, he either shot the guy or more likely had it done," Matt said. "At least now you see what kind of person he is."
"Now I see," Hal said somewhat ruefully.
"He's banking on support from those country club cronies of his who think I'm way off center to begin with, and probably capable of anything."
"I've known Bill, pretty well I thought, since he came to town. Just goes to show how wrong you can be sometimes. Well, it's time for counterattacking. Let's visit with Fred. Matthew, I'm going to let you speak with him alone. Nikki and I will wait in the reception area. If he doesn't agree to the inspection you want, it will be my turn."
"Whatever you say."
Fred Carabetta was waiting for them in a neatly maintained single-windowed space with a worn leather couch and built-in bookcase. The office would have been relegated to a low- or mid-level manager in the private sector, but in government service, indicated some clout. There were pictures around suggesting a wife and two teenage girls, and interests in deep-sea fishing and golf.
Carabetta was a rotund, balding man around fifty, short enough to seem nearly as round as he was high. He had the tendency of constantly rubbing his fleshy thumbs across his sausagelike index and middle fingers. Probably aware of the nervous habit, he kept his hands in his lap much of the time. To the man's credit, Matt thought, Carabetta listened patiently to his account of locating the toxic dump, only occasionally interrupting to clarify a point. Matt purposely left out any mention of Joe Keller's death or the assault on Nikki. He didn't know Carabetta at all, and to this point at least, there was nothing about him that suggested fearlessness or a commitment to justice.
"Well, now," he said when Matt had finished, "that's certainly not a tale one hears every day around here. Knowing you were coming, I did a little research on Belinda Coal and Coke. There have been some complaints filed against the company over the past few years, but for whatever reason, all of them were submitted by you."
"And there was never any action taken on any of them," Matt replied, way too intensely. "Most of the allegations were never even responded to."
"I assume you've tried the EPA and Bureau of Mines?"
"Only a few dozen times in the past. The issues I wrote about were never this big or easily documented. But I don't have any credibility. I need someone with respect and clout to corroborate what I have to say. That's why Hal suggested you."
"I appreciate that," Carabetta said. "I hope you won't take offense, Dr. Rutledge, but there is a great deal of speculation and hearsay supporting those allegations, and very little fact."
"I'm aware of that, but — "
"And there is another consideration at work here as well."
Matt knew what was coming.
"Namely," he said.
"Namely Senator Nick Alexander."
Matt rolled his eyes. Alexander, the influential, conservative — some might say moral rightist — senior senator from West Virginia, was in bed with the mining companies. He was a consummate politician who, over the years, had skillfully quashed any number of bills that would have caused hardship for the owners.
"The best I've ever been able to get from his office are a few 'We'll be sure to look into it' letters."
"Well, you may or may not know it, but Alexander is the chairman of the subcommittee that oversees this bureau and its budget."
"I'm not surprised."
"He may be in line for Secretary of the Interior in Marquand's second administration. There is no way I can just barge into a company like BC and C and demand a spot inspection without hard evidence."
"This is crazy," Matt said, struggling to keep his voice even. "I was there. I saw that dump. You have a chance to be a hero."
This time it was Carabetta who rolled his eyes.
"Dr. Rutledge, I have never been a mover or a shaker or a hero of any kind. I expect to work in this agency until I retire. By then I will have moved up the GS ladder a couple of more notches. My pension at that level will serve me and my family well enough. The last thing I want to do is jeopardize that master plan."
"I understand," Matt said, resigned.
"There's one more thing," Carabetta said. "I have a graduate degree in chemistry, but I studied a good deal of biology as well. Over the ten years I have been in this division of OSHA, I have been involved in the evaluation of more chemical accidents and exposures than I can count. To my knowledge and experience, there is no toxin that causes the sort of neurologic condition you have described — especially in a woman who lived five hundred miles away and had probably never been in a mine in her life."
"But don't you agree that toxic chemicals can cause mutations?" Matt asked. "And don't you wonder why the mine would send four thugs out to my friends' farm to stop them from telling anyone what we saw inside that cave?"
"Perhaps," Carabetta said. "Dr. Rutledge, I'm sorry. I just don't see how I can go any further with this matter at this time, given your lack of concrete evidence. Maybe a report to the police is the way you should go."
With a sigh, Matt stood and shook the bureaucrat's hand.
"Thanks for listening," he said, taking no pains to mask his frustration. "Hal asked if you might have a few minutes to speak with him."
"Of course. Send him in."
Matt crossed the small reception area to where Nikki and his uncle were waiting.
"No go," he said. "Not enough hard evidence for him to risk taking any chances — especially crossing Big Nick Alexander."