Deadly Waters

by T. Alan Codder

  “But not the river?”

  “No. We’re not required to sample or report that. We do that sampling as a PR thing in case Thacker got his panties in a wad and went on television again.”

  “Makes sense, I guess. What kind of tests?”

  She smiled. “Do you really want to know?”

  “I’m curious, mostly. Is there a problem telling me?”

  “No, but for most people, the less they think about what we do here, the better they like it. That, plus most people have their eyes glaze over after a few words. We have to report pH and conductivity, along with temperature and dissolved oxygen. We want to make sure the water we discharge is oxygen rich to prevent the bugs, the bacteria, in the stream, from driving the oxygen too low as they consume the nutrients in our discharge. The dissolved oxygen tells us that. We also test for fecal counts. I don’t need to tell you what that is, do I?”

  He grinned. “No. I got it.”

  “We also report our BOD and TSS, which we’ve already talked about. We also have to report phosphorous, total nitrogen and ammonia. Those last three form the nutrients the bugs like. Lastly, we have to report TCLP metals,”—she pronounced it T-Clip—“which stands for… let me think a moment. It stands for Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure, and that’s all the toxic heavy metals the Feds set limits on.”

  “So, the State of North Carolina says you can have this much of, whatever, and so long as you are below that, you’re in compliance?”

  “That’s it. We typically run well below our limits unless we have a catastrophic failure somewhere, or we spill, like we did after Chasity. Want to take a walk?”

  “Where’re we going?” he asked.

  “I’ll show you where we’re discharging into the stream.”

  “Sure, why not.”

  Maggie led him around the admin building and down the hill to the gray prefab building at the lowest point in the yard. “Inside there is our UV system,” she said, gesturing at the building. “It kills anything dangerous before it goes back into the stream. But what I wanted to show you is back here.”

  She led him around the building toward the sound of falling water. Water was pouring out of a wide trough into a basin before it swirled away down a large hole.

  “This is Lizard Lick Creek Falls,” she shouted to be heard over the sound of rushing water. “This water is straight out of the final filters and the UV system! It pours down that hole into another trough, which pours over another water fall, and then repeats a third time before it flows into the creek! This is where we oxygenate the water before we dump it into the creek! That water is much cleaner than the water in the stream and the stream is actually improved by our discharge! You could almost drink this water!”

  “Ladies first!” he shouted with a grin.

  She laughed. “No, I don’t think so! But seriously, this water is as clean as any natural stream you’re likely to find anywhere in the world, and we monitor it! We’d know if our chemistries were off and were going to cause problems, and we have to report that to the state! Unless Thacker thinks the state is covering something up, we couldn’t possibly be responsible for what he accused us of, even if the kills were down stream of us!”

  He watched the rushing water a moment. “Surely, as a riverkeeper, he must have known this!”

  She shrugged. “You’d think so! The kills have been going on for a while! Years! Maybe he was frustrated and looking for a target! I don’t know! All I know is, despite what he said, we weren’t the cause of the kills!”

  He took her arm and led her away so they could talk without having to shout.

  “I’m starting to think there is more going on here than just Thacker’s death. Do the mayor and Steve have an axe to grind with you?”

  She stared at him a moment as her face hardened.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I’d rather not say, but do they?”

  She was quiet another moment, clearly deciding on how to answer.

  “Maybe. After the spill, there was a lot of negative press, and I do mean a lot. I don’t know who voted how, but the city council voted three to two to ask me to resign. I refused. I told them they could fire me but I wouldn’t resign. I hadn’t done anything wrong and I wasn’t going to act like I had. My guys busted their asses during the crisis. Those assholes at city hall should have been handing out medals, but all they could think about was covering their ass with the press. Why, what did the mayor say?”

  “Nothing. Don’t worry about it. So, let me ask you this. Let’s assume for a moment Thacker wasn’t crazy and was actually onto something. What would it take to produce the results of his test?”

  She shrugged. “Any kind of organic material flowing into the river would do it. If someone were dumping illegally, that would do it too. Upstream are farms, and after a heavy rain, we see a pretty good spike in BOD. That’s from all the fertilizer and animal poop running into the river.”

  “Has anyone investigated illegal dumping?”

  “Of course! Do you know how hard it is to catch something like that? Someone opens a valve on a truck and it takes it twenty or thirty minutes to empty. So, you have, say, a thirty-minute window to catch them. Add to that, they don’t have to dump in the same place every time. But what makes it worse is you don’t even know it happened until a few days later, and the evidence isn’t even where the actual dumping took place. I’m certain there are all kinds of violations happening all the time, either intentional or unintentional. It’s the catching the violations, that’s the hard part. For example, you have a spill somewhere, and even though you cleaned it up the best you could, if rain washes any of the spill into the water, that’s a violation, but how would you know?”

  He pointed to the silly little badge stuck to her shirt and grinned. “So, junior detective, how would you like to help me with this case?”

  She giggled. “What do you mean?”

  “I think I need to broaden my thinking a little. I’m going to start with the assumption Thacker wasn’t a total nut job and he was actually onto something. Not only was he onto something, but he actually found something, and that’s what led to him being killed.”

  “Okay, makes sense, but what does that have to do with me?”

  “You, Ms. Neese, are going to be my expert in all things water. I’m likely to look right at the problem and not recognize it, but you might.”

  “I’ll help anyway I can.”

  “Good! Can you start by showing me where the fish kill happened?”

  “On a map?”

  “That’s fine, but I also want to see it for myself.”

  “Sure, I can do that. What a refreshing change.”

  “What?”

  “Having someone actually respect my opinion.”

  Eleven

  Sean held on as the city truck bucked and jounced over the rough path leading to the Siouan River, the tall dry weeds making faint scratchy sounds as the truck passed over them.

  “Nice road,” he quipped after an unusually hard jolt.

  Maggie grinned. “You’re the one who wanted to see the kill area. Would you have rather walked?”

  He grinned at her as the white Ford bounced and heaved. “No, that’s okay.”

  She pulled the truck to a stop near the water’s edge where the weeds had been beaten down. There were no other vehicles there, but it was obvious this was a popular area for people to come. Before them, framed by trees on either side, was an expanse of the muddy, sluggish, Siouan River.

  The Siouan wasn’t a large river, far too shallow and narrow for any type of commercial use, but lots of people used it for recreational fishing and boating. There was a foot path leading away from where they’d parked, disappearing over the edge of the collapsed bank between a fallen tree on one side, and another leaning precariously over the water on the other.

  “This is where we come to sample. It’s the closest easily accessible point to the river upstream of our discharge. We also see
a lot of people fishing here, which is what probably gets the kills noticed. Any fish kill isn’t a good thing, but as far as kills go, these were pretty minor.”

  “What does minor mean?”

  “A few hundred to maybe a thousand? I don’t know, but there weren’t dead fish everywhere like some kills I’ve seen. My guess is that it was the weaker fish that died when the depleted oxygen in the water stressed them.”

  His gaze traveled over the river, trying to imagine what it looked like with dead fish everywhere.

  “And just because the fish died here doesn’t mean the problem was caused by something that happened here?”

  “Right. Of course, the kill wasn’t just here, it was all up and down the river for about a mile. Whatever happened, happened further upstream. There has to be time for the bacteria bloom to occur.”

  “What’s upstream from here?”

  She shrugged. “People, cities, farms, factories. Depends on how far upstream you want to go.”

  “I’m starting to see how difficult it is to find the problem.”

  “Finally!” she cried with a grin. “So many people think this is easy, but it’s not. You can be certain what happened didn’t happen downstream from the first evidence of the kill. But how far upstream do you go? It depends on the richness of the nutrients that went into the water, the time of year, even how much rain we’ve had.”

  He scrubbed his face. “When was the last kill?”

  She thought about it a moment. “It’s been a while. July or August of last year maybe?”

  “Does that imply the, whatever, hasn’t happened since then?”

  “No. It only implies the event didn’t reach the level necessary to kill the fish. Whatever is happening isn’t major. If it were, when it did happen, we would find hundreds of thousands of dead fish for miles down the river, not a few hundred in one small area.”

  “What do you think it is?” he asked.

  “Me? I’d guess its run-off from farms. We have more kills in the summer months, but is that because that’s when farmers are applying fertilizers, or because the water is naturally lower in oxygen in the summer, or a combination of the two? I have no way of knowing.”

  “But you’re sure whatever happened, happened upstream from here?”

  “Positive.”

  “Can you start sampling the river every day?” he asked.

  “I can, but why?”

  “The more I dig on this, the more I think Thacker was onto something. I’m thinking he stumbled onto something he wasn’t supposed to see, and it cost him his life.”

  “Are you serious? You’re talking about illegal dumping?”

  He looked at her and nodded. “Yes.”

  “That’s crazy, Sean. You get caught dumping you’re going to get fined, and if you’ve been doing it for a while, maybe go to jail for a couple of years, but how long will you be in jail for murder?”

  “Probably longer than that, but people don’t think about that. They panic and then do something they would never do otherwise.”

  She stared at him for a long moment. “It would explain a few things. But who?”

  “That’s the hard part. How many industries are there in the area?”

  “Dozens. But don’t assume it’s just industries. If you’re looking for anyone who could do it, that includes practically every business in town, from restaurants to the porta-john place.”

  “How many are we talking about?”

  “Probably a couple hundred.”

  He looked around in frustration. “But you can begin to test?”

  “Yeah.”

  She didn’t look or sound very enthusiastic about it.

  “What?” he asked.

  “I’m not sure how I’m going to pay for it.”

  “Pay for it?”

  “You think the tests are free? Each test I run costs me money for people and lab supplies. I’m going to be testing seven times as often as I was before.”

  “Charge it to my department. The city council approved me for overtime and expenses to get the case solved.”

  She gave him a sideways grin. “I could use a couple of new trucks for the plant. Can I bill you for those too?”

  He chuckled. “I give you an inch and you try to take a mile.”

  “Okay. Just the lab tests then. Alex is going to gripe over having to do the extra sampling. You don’t want this on the weekends, do you?”

  “Is that a problem?”

  “A little. The lab doesn’t work on the weekends.”

  “Oh. Okay, through the week is enough then.”

  “What are you looking for?”

  “I have no idea, but I’d like to know if you see evidence of another spike in whatever. I want to find out if Thacker found something, or is there something else I don’t know.”

  “So, you’re wanting me to do this for no real reason?”

  “I wouldn’t put it like that. I’m looking for any kind of pattern. Failing that, I’m looking for a break in an existing pattern. Anything that changes. I might very well be wasting your people’s time, but I won’t know until I find out.”

  She bobbed her head side to side as she made a face, twisting her mouth to the side. “I understand what you’re saying, but I won’t tell Alex you said that. Okay, we’ll do it every day we’re in the lab. We’ll only test for the stuff that could cause the kills. There’s no point in testing for metals, for example. For that to have caused a kill, it would have had to have been exceptionally high, and we’ve never seen evidence of that.”

  “You’re the expert. When we get back to the plant, can you get together all the results of the upstream tests on the river and explain to me what I’m looking at? It’ll give me some history to compare to.”

  “Sure. Anything else you want to see here?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Is this the only place someone could get in and dump something into the river?”

  “No. In fact, this would be the worst place to try something like that because you’d be caught for sure here. And remember, it had to have happened farther upriver.”

  Sean grimaced. “That’s right. I’m having a hard time adjusting to the idea that the scene of the crime isn’t where the evidence is found. Where else could someone get in to dump? And how much stuff are we talking about?”

  “Depends, and depends,” she said as they began walking back to the city pickup. “A tanker truck obviously can’t get in the same places a pickup can go. As far as how much, it depends on what it is. If it’s high in organic waste, it won’t take as much as if it were low. For example, it will take a lot less of the stuff from Instant Porta-Potty or the septic tank companies than it would from Prickle. Two different types of waste.”

  “Let’s assume a worst case,” he said as they climbed into the Ford.

  “Worst case? The Siouan isn’t that big of a river, and it doesn’t have a strong flow.”

  She started the truck and then sat a moment, staring at the water.

  “I’d guess you’d need something in the neighborhood of three to four thousand gallons of organic rich waste.”

  “Anyone you know who dumps that much?”

  She grinned as she put the truck in gear. “Everyone. That’s a standard size honey-dipper.”

  “Honey-dipper?”

  She giggled. “That’s what we call a vac truck, like those the city or the septic tank people use.”

  He grimaced. “You’re not making this any easier.”

  “If this were easy, we would have caught and busted someone a long time ago.”

  “We?”

  “We. The plant,” she explained as she turned the truck around and they bumped their way back to the main road. “We’re in charge of pretreatment. We’re the de facto enforcement arm of the city for what goes in the sewers. We go out and inspect businesses to make sure they’re doing what they’re supposed to, and part of that is making sure that what’s supposed to go in the sewers is actually going into the sew
ers and not being dumped into the environment.”

  “Do I need to bring you some more junior detective badges?”

  She ran her finger over the sticker still stuck to her shirt while she waited for the line of cars to pass before pulling out onto the road.

  “Oh, could you, please?” she gushed.

  -oOo-

  “Here are the results of the tests on the river since we started sampling on September twenty-third,” Maggie said, settling into her chair.

  When they’d returned from the Siouan, she’d parked Sean in her office and then went to the lab to pull the results of the tests they’d been running on the river.

  “We’re testing for BOD, dissolved oxygen, TSS and fecals. For BODs, anything under forty isn’t anything to worry about. For dissolved oxygen, since it’s winter, anything over nine is good. For TSS, thirty to fifty is fine unless it’s rained recently, and then it could be over ten thousand. Finally, fecals, anything under four hundred meets state standards, again, unless it rained. Then it could be in the millions from all the poop that washed in.”

  She paused as she flipped through the reports.

  “I don’t see anything in here that just jumps off the page at me as a problem.”

  “And there have been no kills since you started testing?” Sean asked, sitting in a guest chair.

  “None reported, no.”

  “But, if I understand you right, if the illegal dumping was right at the lower limit of what’s necessary to cause a kill, didn’t you say it would be more likely to happen in the summer because the water is low in oxygen anyway?”

  “Lower than in the winter, yes.”

  “Why’s that, again?”

  “Because cold water can hold more oxygen than warm water.”

  “Really? Why?”

  She grinned. “Molecular chemistry 101. The colder something is, the closer together its molecules are. Warm water has more space between the water molecules for the oxygen to escape.”