"It's what blew Dan's tire," the sheriff said. "A piece of junk metal. Probably fell off a truck when some asshole was dumping garbage out in the Barrens, and then Dan drove over it."
"You know, it looks as if it's been in an explosion," Glynes said.
"Why do you say that?" Resmann asked.
"Look at this link of chain stuck in it. The only way that could happen is if it struck it with great velocity."
The sheriff took the piece of metal from Glynes.
"There's burned areas too," the sheriff said. "I read one time that in a hurricane, the wind gets blowing so hard, so fast, that it' ll stick pieces of straw three inches deep into a telephone pole."
Glynes took the piece of steel back and lifted it to his nose, and then, carefully, touched the edge of the burned area with his fingertip, and then looked at his fingertip. There was a black smudge. When he touched his finger to it, it smeared.
"The explosion happened recently," he said, handing the steel to the sheriff. "You can smell it, and the burned area is still moist."
The sheriff sniffed. "I'll be damned. I wonder what it is?"
"I'd like to know. I'd like to run it by our laboratory. You think I could have this for a while?"
"Would we get it back?"
"Sure."
"I know Dan would want that for a souvenir."
"I can have it back here before he comes back to work."
"What do you think it is?"
"You tell me. Have there been any industrial explosions, anything like that around here?"
The sheriff considered that for a moment, and then shook his head, no.
"Take it along with you, Chuck, if you want. But I really want it back."
"I understand."
Special Agent Glynes was halfway to Atlantic City when he pulled to the side of the road.
I don't need the goddamned laboratory to tell me that piece of metal has been involved in the detonation of high explosives. What I want to know is where it came from.
It could be nothing. But on the other hand, if somebody is blowing things up around here with high explosives, I damned sure want to know who and why.
He made a U-turn, stopped at the first bar he encountered, bought a get-well bottle of Seagram's 7-Crown for Deputy Springs, and asked for the telephone book.
He found a listing forSprings, Daniel J., which was both unusual and pleased him. Most law enforcement officers, including Special Agent Glynes, did not like to have their telephone numbers in the book. It was an invitation to every wife/mother/girlfriend and male relative/acquaintance of those whom one had met,professionally, so to speak, to call up, usually at two A.M., the sonofabitch who put Poor Harry in jail.
He carefully wrote down Springs's number and address, but he did not telephone to inquire whether it would be convenient for him to call. It was likely that either Dan Springs or his wife would, politely, tell him that it would be inconvenient, and he was now determined to see him. If he showed up at the front door with a smile and a bottle of whiskey, it was unlikely that he would be turned away.
Glynes had been on the job nearly fifteen years. When he saw advertisements in the newspapers of colleges offering credit for practical experience, he often thought of applying. He had enough practical experience to be awarded a Ph.D., summa cum laude, in Practical Psychology.
He found Springs's house without difficulty. There was no car in the carport, which was disappointing. He thought about that a moment, then decided the thing to do was leave the whiskey bottle, with a calling card,"Dan, Hope you 're feeling better. Chuck." That just might put Springs in a charitable frame of mind when he came back in the morning.
But he heard the sound of the television when he walked up to the door, and pushed the doorbell. Chimes sounded inside, and a few moments later a plump, comfortable-looking gray-haired woman wearing an apron opened the door.
"Mrs. Springs, I'm Chuck Glynes. I work sometimes with Dan, and I just heard what happened."
"Oh," she seemed uncomfortable.
Why is she uncomfortable? Ah ha. Dear Old Dan isn't as incapacitated as he would have the sheriff believe.
"I'm not with the Sheriff's Department, Mrs. Springs. I work for the federal government in Atlantic City. I brought something in case Dan needed something stronger than an aspirin."
"Dan went to the store for a minute," Mrs. Springs said. "My arthritis's been acting up, and I didn't think I should be driving."
"Well, maybe I can offer some of this to you."
"Come in," she said, making up her mind. "He shouldn't be long."
Deputy Springs walked into his kitchen twenty minutes later.
He's not carrying any packages. And his nose is glowing. If I were a suspicious man, I might suspect he was down at the VFW, treating his pain with a couple of shooters, not at the Acme Supermarket.
"How are you, Mr. Glynes?"
"The question, Dan, is how are you? And when did you start calling me 'Mr. Glynes'? My name is Chuck."
"Cracked some ribs," Dan said. "But it only hurts when I breathe."
Glynes laughed appreciatively.
"Doris get you something to drink, Chuck?"
"Yes, she did, thank you very much," Glynes said.
"I think I might have one myself," Springs said.
"Well, then, let's open this," Glynes said, and pushed the paper sack with the Seagram's 7-Crown across the table toward him.
"I don't know what happened," Dan Springs said, ten minutes later, as he freshened up Chuck Glynes's drink. "I'm riding down the road one second, and the next second I'm off the road, straddling a tree."
"I know what happened," Glynes said.
"You do?" Springs asked, surprised.
"Let me go out to the car a minute and I'll get it," Glynes said.
Springs walked out to the car with him. Glynes handed him the explosive-torn chunk of metal.
"You ran over that," Glynes said. "It opened your tire like an ax."
"Jesus, I wonder where that came from?"
"Well, they found it in your wheel well, up behind that rubber sheet. But I'd like to know, professionally, where it came from."
"Excuse me?"
"That piece of steel has been in an explosion, Dan. Look at that link of chain stuck in it."
"I'll be damned!"
"I'd really like to see where you had the wreck."
"Out in the Pine Barrens."
"Could you find the spot again?"
"Sure," Springs said. "But not tonight. By the time we got there, it would be dark."
"Would you feel up to going out there tomorrow?"
"I'm on sick leave."
"Well, hell, the sheriff wouldn't have to know."
"Yeah," Springs said, after a moment's thought. "I could take you out there tomorrow, I guess."
"I'd appreciate it, Dan. We like to know who's blowing what up."
"Yeah, and so would I."
Mrs. Springs insisted that Chuck stay for supper. He said he would stay only if she let him buy them dinner.
At dinner, when he said he would have to head back to Atlantic City, Mrs. Springs said there was no reason at all for him to drive all that way just to have to come back in the morning, they had a spare bedroom just going to waste. He said he wouldn't want to put her out, and she said he shouldn't be silly.
TWENTY-TWO
"Ihave just had one of my profound thoughts," Officer Howard Hansen said to Sergeant Bill Sanders as they watched Corporal Vito Lanza drive his Cadillac into the area reserved for police officers on duty at the airport.
"And you're going to tell me, right?"
"I'm not saying Lanza is a nuclear physicist, but he's not really a cretin, either…"