Ashes, Ashes

by Charles Atkins

  Zane’s headset rang. ‘It’s the CDC,’ he commented, as he stepped away.

  Hobbs tapped Barrett on the back of her suit. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, keeping her voice low. ‘They’ve got this wrong.’

  ‘Move fast,’ he said, ‘before they notice.’

  With Carla Phelps following close, the trio shed their suits in a trailer marked ‘decontamination’ and assuring the young Guardsman posted at the entry to the parking lot that they had Zane’s blessing to be on their way. They fled the scene in Hobbs’s banged-up Crown Vic.

  Corbin Zane wrapped up his conversation with a top governmental scientist working for the biohazard unit at the CDC. He then took a call from his agency’s director and another from a member of the Chiefs of Staff. Despite the sweltering heat and the incredible pressure he was under Zane had never felt more alive. He’d reassured his supervisor that both bottles of bacteria had been dumped by Glash at the reservoir and were being rapidly neutralized. ‘Glash is dead, thank God. And sadly,’ he’d added, lowering his voice and lending it a touch of grief, ‘Martin Cosway, my boss and a great man, a true patriot and asset to the Department of Homeland Security, along with Dr George Houssman, also perished.’

  Zane swelled under the praise of his director. ‘You’re doing strong work in a tough situation, keep it up,’ he’d said.

  When he’d finished with the last half-dozen calls he stopped to look around for Dr Conyors, who’d try to shoot holes in his slam dunk … probably not able to deal with the death of the old man; she’d seemed pretty choked up about that. He looked around for her and the other two. He was certain she was still there, but with everyone dressed the same it was hard to tell. He scanned the periphery, admiring the regimented placement of the Guardsmen around the reservoir, and pleased to see that large buckets of white powdered laundry detergent were being rapidly dumped into the crystal clear water. Small, motorized pontoon boots were getting lowered into the reservoir. He was handling things well, everything was under control. Look like you know what you’re doing, he reminded himself. He lifted up the cell and said, ‘Griffin?’ It buzzed a couple of times before Pete answered. ‘Give me a status report.’

  He listened as his eager underling told him that his orders were being followed to the letter. As an afterthought, Zane asked, ‘You seen that lady doctor and the other hostage … they were with an NYPD detective?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Griffin said, ‘they went back through the checkpoint. They got out of here a good fifteen, maybe twenty minutes ago.’

  ‘What? Under whose orders?’

  ‘Don’t know,’ Griffin said, ‘but I’ll find out ASAP.’

  ‘Good man, we cannot have them running around.’ He thought of what Barrett had said, that she didn’t think Glash was dead, that he was in fact just warming up. Zane had a terrifying moment’s doubt: What if she was right? What if she went to the press?

  ‘Pete,’ he said, making his voice strong and authoritative, ‘this is a priority. Dr Conyors, Carla Phelps and Detective Ed Hobbs need to be tracked down and quarantined; they have been in contact with the plague virus. Do you understand? This is a top priority.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Good man. I’ll want a progress report in thirty minutes. I repeat, they represent a significant risk for the spread of the virus. They must be tracked down, they must be quarantined … if they resist, force may be used.’

  There was a moment’s hesitation, and then Griffin asked, ‘How much force?’

  ‘Whatever is necessary.’

  Twenty-Three

  Naked and huddled in the back of the van wrapped in blue plastic wrap and wearing a protective mask, George Houssman’s mind raced. He felt desperate and vulnerable, knowing that Glash intended something so horrific that if he succeeded 9/11 would pale in comparison. His anxiety was red hot as Glash drove across the Whitestone Bridge – he pictured his granddaughter, Faye, and his daughter; this was too close – and down the West Side Highway to Glash’s father’s building in the Lower East Side. ‘I’ve not been home,’ Glash said, in a dull conversational tone, ‘since the day my father killed my mother.’

  ‘Who were those women?’ Houssman finally asked, dreading the answer, but even more the proximity between his beloved family in SoHo and the Lower East Side candy store – not even a mile as the crow flies.

  ‘Joggers,’ Glash replied simply.

  ‘Why did you kill them?’ he asked, his eyes falling on Martin Cosway’s unconscious body.

  Glash glanced back at Houssman. ‘I didn’t. Stop asking questions.’

  Houssman swallowed. ‘If you want me to write this book, Richard, I’ll need details.’

  Glash paused and then nodded. ‘Yes, I can see that. My father killed three joggers. I’d originally meant for them to match Carla Phelps, Dr Conyors and me.’

  ‘That’s why she had red hair,’ Houssman said, his stomach churning.

  ‘Yes, to be the double for Carla Phelps. I had to make a switch and there wasn’t time to get new bodies.’

  ‘So you dressed them like us.’

  ‘Yes, is that enough information for the book?’

  George found it hard to breathe, and it wasn’t just the lingering stench from the dead bodies. ‘Yes,’ he whispered. There was a strange flutter in his chest and a dull ache that ran from his jaw to his shoulder. ‘Wait, I have another question, something I don’t understand.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You drive very well, Richard. When did you learn?’ he asked, taking slow, even breaths, telling himself that no matter what he could not have a heart attack.

  ‘At Albomar,’ he said, while timing the lights on the West Side Highway. A cab tried to edge him out at the 34th Street exit. Glash slowed to let him get in front and then floored the van just as the light turned yellow. ‘It was another lie,’ he said. ‘They taught us to drive, saying we’d need that skill when we were released. They even had special cars with two steering wheels and two sets of brakes. Lies upon lies. I practiced every day; I took the test and passed. I had a license. I like to drive. My father has a motorcycle; he promised that he’d teach me how to ride it.’ Glash turned again. ‘I don’t think he’s lying.’

  ‘So that’s how he did it,’ Houssman commented, realizing Peter Glash had planted the van and the bodies at the reservoir and then ridden off on a motorcycle.

  ‘Yes,’ Glash said. ‘That’s how he did it.’

  They took the right off Houston and headed three blocks down Orchard. George saw the candy store’s front was locked and gated; the alley on the right was also gated. As they approached Houssman braced himself on shaky knees and could just make out Peter Glash’s tall figure in the alley behind the gate.

  The gate creaked open and the van drove through.

  ‘Hello, son,’ Peter said, as he put a HEPA filter mask over his mouth and nose.

  ‘Hello, Father.’

  Peter Glash stared at Houssman in the back. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘I’ll enjoy watching you die. You deserve it.’ He went around to the rear of the van and opened it.

  Cosway’s eyes shot open. ‘What the fuck do you—’

  Before he could complete his sentence, Peter Glash took a pistol from his jacket pocket and pointed it at Cosway’s head. ‘Shut up,’ he said, not raising his voice.

  ‘There’s no way you’re going to get away with this,’ Cosway hissed, as he struggled to free his wrists from the nylon restraints. He then realized his clothes were gone and asked, ‘Why am I naked? What did you freaks do to me?’ Gooseflesh popped on his pale arms despite the ninety-degree heat.

  ‘I needed them,’ Richard Glash said, as he joined his father at the back of the van.

  ‘Is this the one you infected?’ Peter asked his son.

  ‘Yes,’ Richard said, and he snapped on vinyl gloves, gagged Cosway and then dragged his kicking body over the filthy, bloodstained carpet of the van.

  ‘How long till we know?�
�� Peter asked.

  ‘Four hours for the fever to start, twelve for the respiratory phase to begin. I hope Albert wasn’t lying. I’ll be very angry.’

  Richard disappeared into the house carrying Cosway. Peter stared in at Houssman. ‘Get out,’ he said, ‘and don’t try to run.’

  ‘Peter,’ Houssman said through his mask, ‘don’t let him do this. Think of how many innocent people will die. You can’t let this happen.’

  ‘Of course I can,’ he said. ‘It’s what we want. It’s payback. You took everything away from me – my life, my son, my livelihood. It’s time to even things out. What you took away from us, we’ll take away from you.’

  ‘But what about everyone else?’ Houssman whispered, pulling the plastic close as he tried to steady himself on wobbly knees.

  ‘They don’t really matter,’ Peter said, poking the gun into Houssman’s back while directing him to the open door. He leaned in to Houssman and whispered, ‘Don’t think I haven’t seen your pretty daughter – Alice, isn’t it? – and her little girl. They don’t matter, George. Perhaps we’ll keep you around to watch them die.’

  Houssman gasped, his foot caught on a crack in the drive. He stumbled and glimpsed the street through the chain-link gate with steel bars slotted through it. He had to do something. From under his HEPA mask he opened his mouth and started to shout as loud as he could: ‘Help me! Somebody—’ The butt of the gun landed hard on the back of his head; he stumbled and dropped the tarp. He saw the ground coming toward him, the flutter in his chest turned to pain, a vise crushing his ribs. He gasped once, his vision faded and before he hit ground, everything went black.

  Twenty-Four

  Hobbs, Barrett and Carla hurriedly ditched their spacey orange hazmat suits and ran from the Homeland Security checkpoint at the reservoir back to the smashed Crown Victoria in the gravel lot a hundred yards away. ‘You can’t leave me,’ Carla said, as Hobbs and Barrett tried to persuade her not to come.

  ‘You’ll just be in the way,’ Hobbs said, looking to Barrett to back him up.

  ‘I need to go with you. You don’t believe that Glash dumped the plague here. You have to let me help. I know people, just please don’t leave me.’

  ‘Look, Ms Phelps,’ Hobbs said, ‘I don’t know what we’re doing right now, but—’

  ‘I have a little girl,’ Carla pleaded, her hand on the car door. ‘One day, if she lives … she’ll discover that her mother was the one who helped Richard Glash escape; I can’t let that happen. You’ve got to let me help.’

  ‘It’s OK, Ed,’ Barrett said. She glanced back in the direction of the checkpoint where they’d just lied to get away and not get carted along with the Channel Eight crew to some hastily established quarantine unit. ‘Let’s just get out of here. I’ve got a horrible feeling.’

  ‘Tell me something new,’ Hobbs quipped, realizing that even covered with dust and days’ worth of grime and sweat, he would have done anything for her. He pressed the button for the car’s automatic locks. It didn’t work. He unlocked it manually and reached over to open the other door. He said a prayer as he put the key in the ignition. ‘Thank you, Jesus,’ he whispered as the engine turned over.

  The women scrambled in, Barrett next to him, Carla in the back.

  He threw the car into reverse and did a clumsy U-turn, the tires struggling for grab in the loose gravel. ‘Zane does not get it,’ he said, sneaking a glance at Barrett. ‘He didn’t even want to hear what you had to say about Glash – idiot! God, we were so fucking close. How did they let him get away? How could I let him go?’

  ‘You didn’t have a shot, Ed,’ Barrett said. ‘He was using George like a shield.’

  ‘I know,’ Hobbs said, laying heavy on the gas as they roared and clanked away. ‘But I can’t shake the feeling that if George were here he would have told me to take the shot, to go through him if necessary.’ He missed Houssman and there was a stab of regret. If anything happened to the old guy …

  ‘But he’s not here,’ Barrett said, ‘and you’ve never been someone for whom the ends justified the means.’

  ‘Yeah, but every once in a while …’ He reached for his cell and dialed. ‘Anderson, it’s Hobbs.’ He put it on speaker.

  ‘What did you do?’ Anderson asked. ‘We just got word – along with everyone else – that you and the two ladies are to be sent to quarantine. Do not pass go, do not continue to traipse around the state of New York looking for a maniac with a bottle of plague in his pocket and a song in his heart.’

  ‘I don’t know about the song,’ Hobbs said, ‘but what did you say about quarantine?’

  ‘Apparently you done pissed someone off. I think DHS is more interested in finding you than Glash. Are you messing with somebody’s spin control?’

  ‘Could be,’ Hobbs replied. ‘But no one here is infected with anything … nothing that I care to share with you. What’s the status with Glash?’

  Anderson’s frustration came through loud and clear. ‘We’re being told in no uncertain terms that he’s dead and at the bottom of a gulch. Are you saying something else?’

  ‘They’ve not made a positive ID,’ Ed said, choosing his words, needing to know that Anderson got the message. ‘And one of the ladies in question has serious doubts that our boy offed himself.’

  ‘Fuck! They’re telling us he’s dead. They basically ordered a shutdown of any manhunt activities. All available personnel have been shifted to work on containment,’ Anderson said. ‘If what you’re saying is true, we are so fucked.’

  ‘How could he have slipped through?’ Hobbs asked, struggling to comprehend how Glash had managed to elude the dozens of pursuing vehicles with air support that had gone after him from Albomar.

  ‘Don’t go there,’ Anderson said.

  ‘I don’t get it,’ Hobbs said. ‘It was like shooting fish in a barrel.’

  ‘Look around,’ Anderson said, a bitter edge to his voice. ‘Way too many yahoos in the mix. My guess is we have over half a million in trashed vehicles, none of the damage caused directly by Glash. It’s a miracle no one got killed … except the poor woman who’d just stopped to gas up. He just keeps slipping through.’

  ‘What about his accomplice?’ Ed asked.

  ‘We checked the father like you asked. Went back through every prison log to see if he ever visited … nothing. We even paid the old guy a visit … he doesn’t remember you fondly, which judging by the black eye you gave him makes sense. Searched the place, not a damn thing. We’re chewing through every person on that list who visited Glash even a single time while he was locked up.’

  ‘It can’t be that long a list,’ Hobbs said, his desperation mounting as he turned on to 28, heading east. ‘He’s not exactly mister personality.’

  ‘You’d be surprised,’ Anderson said. ‘Trouble is, they all seem to be either lawyers, writers, there’s even a couple art agents. We chatted with one creep who wanted to represent Glash and sell his paintings. He dropped that when I told him that the way the laws were constructed, Glash, or anyone helping him, couldn’t make a dime from the sale of his artwork. But the writers were a different story. Seems Glash went on a letter-writing spree a dozen years ago, contacted just about everyone who’d written a true-crime book. He wanted to get his name in print. A couple bit, and came for a visit or two. According to his prison records, that stopped after he threw a tantrum and attacked one of the authors.’

  ‘Why?’ Hobbs asked.

  ‘Our boy wanted the whole book to be about him and he got a bit upset when he learned he’d just get a paragraph or two.’

  ‘There is someone helping him,’ Hobbs said. ‘But who and why?’

  ‘There is someone …’ Barrett said.

  ‘Hey, doc,’ Anderson greeted her.

  ‘Agent Anderson,’ Barrett said, talking fast, ‘he’s got a girlfriend named Mary, or at least he thinks he does,’ and she gave them the highlights of her fashion tips to the love-struck Richard Glash.

  ‘Mary,’
Anderson repeated. ‘Well, that certainly narrows it down.’

  ‘Can you still access the visitors’ logs?’ Hobbs asked. ‘There’s got to be something we missed.’

  ‘I’m pulling them up as we speak … let’s see. Here we go. I’ve got two Marys to pick from. I’ve got a Mary Sullivan that goes way back and then more recently a Mary Fleming. She signed in as a social worker with the Department of Mental Health.’

  ‘Oh God,’ Carla muttered from the back. ‘Oh God, that can’t be true.’

  Barrett turned back. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Mary Sullivan was the little girl Glash first tried to scalp. Why would she visit him?’

  ‘You have an address?’ Hobbs asked. ‘Seems like we got a person of interest. Course, if he went after her twice …’

  ‘Third time’s a charm,’ Anderson said grimly.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I got a number here, and an address in Katonah for Mary Fleming, nothing for a Mary Sullivan. I’ll give you the first call, and I’m sending a team out now. Christ, I should have picked this up sooner.’

  ‘If I reach her,’ Ed said, ‘I’ll get right back to you.’

  ‘Based on our boy’s track record, if he’s been there, something tells me she won’t be picking up.’

  Ed hung up and with one hand on the wheel he dialed. The phone rang. No one picked up, but he let it keep ringing over the Crown Vic’s speakers. Hobbs turned to Barrett and shook his head. He was about to hang up when a woman’s voice answered.

  ‘This is Detective Ed Hobbs with the NYPD. I’m calling for a Mary Fleming.’

  ‘Yes,’ the voice answered, then a long pause, ‘this is she.’

  ‘Ms Fleming, I’m calling regarding Richard Glash, an escaped prisoner. We have reason to believe he might be coming after you.’ He listened intently as he edged the car on to I-87 south.

  ‘You’re too late,’ she said. ‘He’s already been here.’ She was crying.

  ‘Is he there now?’ Hobbs asked, mentally mapping the shortest route to Katonah, and frantic over the distance – even flooring it, over an hour. ‘Is he there?’ he repeated.