Midnight Haul

by Max Allan Collins

  “He’s got school tomorrow.”

  “That’s his problem.”

  “Well, you didn’t fare much worse than most of his baby-sitters.”

  “How did you fare?”

  “With the ‘Hazardous Waste Strike Force,’ you mean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Don’t ask.”

  He didn’t say anything for a while; neither did she.

  Then she rose and said, “How about some wine?”

  “Sounds almost as good as another kiss.”

  “Doesn’t it?”

  She went away for a few minutes, came back with a bottle of red wine and some wineglasses. She poured. They drank. They kissed again. Then she got thoughtful.

  “It was like talking to you,” she said.

  “What was?”

  “Telling my story to the Task Force guy. His name was Hart. Sidney Hart. He was a nice guy, about my age. A special investigator assigned through the state police to the Task Force. He spent hours listening to me.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Like I said, it was like talking to you. He was interested in what I had to say, polite, but skeptical. He said he’d heard rumors about Kemco, but that the company had never been caught in a major violation. He questioned what we’d really seen last night. Yes, it’s suspicious for trucks to haul waste to a landfill at night; but it isn’t necessarily illegal.”

  “What about the manifest system? What if Kemco didn’t report the dumping?”

  “Then it’s just our word against Kemco’s that any dumping took place at all. We didn’t even write down the license number of the fucking truck, ’cause we thought we had it on film.”

  “It was New Jersey plates.”

  “But you don’t remember the number, do you? Me either. So all we’ve got is our story, and who’s going to take us seriously? Who are you, but the fiancé of a woman you think Kemco killed? And who am I, but the disgruntled ex-wife of a Kemco executive, out for blood, right? What kind of credibility does that give us?”

  “That’s what Patrick said.”

  “Patrick?”

  “Yeah. I talked to him this afternoon.”

  “You talked to Patrick?”

  Crane told her about the Kemco car stopping for him, about going out there and spending half an hour with her ex-husband.

  “I can’t say he struck me as… a monster or anything.” Crane said.

  She moved away from him on the couch, just a little. “How did he strike you?”

  “I didn’t exactly like him. And I can understand why you couldn’t put up with his attitudes. But I find it difficult to believe he’s in any way involved with Mary Beth’s death.”

  “He must be.”

  “You really think your ex-husband is a murderer? Your son’s father?”

  “Patrick is… it’s possible.”

  “You can’t say it, can you? The guy’s selfish and self-centered and I think he’d do a lot of shady things if his bosses asked him to… like maybe pay off some midnight haulers in cash… but not murder. I just don’t buy it. And I don’t think you do either, if you’d be honest with yourself.”

  “It’s a criminal conspiracy, Crane. It’s Watergate. It’s something that got out of control, that people got caught up in. And Patrick was one of them.”

  “It’s not Watergate, Boone, and even if it was, I don’t remember anybody getting killed over Watergate.”

  “Who really knows?”

  “Oh Christ. Let’s not sing the Paranoid Conspiracy Nut Blues again.”

  “What do you think happened to Mary Beth, then? You think she killed herself?”

  Crane put down the wineglass. He looked at Boone. Their eyes locked.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Crane…”

  “I don’t like it. I don’t want to believe it. But yes. I think she killed herself.”

  “No…”

  “Yes.”

  “What about all the other ‘suicides’?”

  “They were suicides. I talked with Mrs. Meyer today. She’s fiercely loyal to Kemco; feels they’ve done right by her. I found something out from her that you didn’t, when you interviewed her for your book: her husband had a long history of mental illness. He had very deep emotional problems that didn’t have a goddamn thing to do with Kemco.”

  “Ten times the national suicide rate, Crane!”

  “That’s just a fluke. I talked with Mrs. Price, too, and her husband was an emotionally disturbed person, headed for a breakdown. Headed for suicide.”

  “Crane, Mary Beth knew something. It’s Karen Silkwood all over again. She was killed because she had something on Kemco.”

  “What did she know? About the midnight dumping? We know about it. We’re still alive.”

  “What did you say to Patrick about last night?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Does he know about it?”

  “If he does, he didn’t indicate it.”

  “Maybe they don’t know about us. Maybe we weren’t seen last night.”

  “Fine, but that shoots your theory about the truckers stealing your camera, doesn’t it? You can’t have it both ways. To steal it, they’d have to know about us. And if they know about us, our lives are in danger.”

  “Well maybe our lives are in danger.”

  “I don’t think so. If a decision had been made to add us to the suicide rate, why would Patrick bother having me out for a talk this afternoon? No, Boone, it doesn’t make sense. It’s all very confusing, but there’s nothing sinister going on here at all.”

  “Dumping hazardous waste in an ordinary household dump, in the middle of the night, isn’t sinister?”

  “It’s criminal, Boone. You’re right about that. I don’t doubt for a moment that Kemco is a criminally irresponsible company, but…”

  “A baby girl with a cleft palate, Crane. That sinister enough for you? Liver disorders? Nervous conditions? High miscarriage rates? High cancer rates? Any of that strike you as sinister?”

  “It strikes me as depressing, and since you exposed Mary Beth to your crusade, as you have me, it’s no wonder she was depressed, living in the house where her father died of cancer, living in a house where across the hall little Brucie in his crib paws the air with no hands, and you come along and fill her with your bleak vision of a chemically contaminated America, it’s no wonder she slashed her wrists.”

  Boone sat quietly for a moment, staring into the redness in her wineglass. Without looking at Crane, she said, “So. Finally it comes around to this.”

  “To what?”

  “To it being my fault. Mary Beth’s suicide.”

  “No. You’re wrong. I don’t blame you.”

  “You’re just too fucking generous, Crane.”

  “You’re right about one thing: it was suicide. I believe that now. I don’t like it. But I believe it.”

  “Then maybe you better go back to Iowa.”

  “Maybe I better.”

  She rose, slamming her glass down on the coffee table, splashing wine. She looked down at him, giving him a cold, sarcastic look, the likes of which he hadn’t seen from her since their early, off-on-the-wrong-foot moments together.

  “Go back to school, Crane. Learn something.”

  “All right.”

  She walked toward the stairs.

  “Boone…”

  She stopped; her back was to him.

  “Is this the way it has to be?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. There was no sarcasm in her voice, now. It sounded very small.

  “Your book, Boone. It’s good. It’s more than good: it’s important. What you say about Agent Orange and its effect on the Vietnam vets. Your study into the effects of Kemco on its workers and their families, their town. The midnight hauling story. That can go into the book. Our staking out the Kemco plant; your camera maybe being stolen, that can be a nice ambiguous touch… all of it. You’ve got enough, Boone. You don’t have your smoking gun, exa
ctly, but what you’ve got is good. But Mary Beth killed herself, and so did the others. Accept it. Leave it behind. And go ahead and finish your book and publish it and tell your story on Donahue. Wake America up. But be a journalist. Don’t be a conspiracy nut.”

  Without turning, she said, “I’m going to bed.”

  “I still believe in what you’re doing.”

  “That’s nice.”

  “Boone.”

  “What?”

  “What about this morning?”

  “What about it?”

  “Why don’t you come over here and sit down with me.”

  “And what?”

  “And we won’t talk anymore.”

  “And it’ll be just like this morning? At the motel?”

  “I hope it will.”

  “Your timing sucks, Crane.”

  She went upstairs.

  He sat on the couch all night, without sleeping.

  In the morning she drove him to where he could catch the bus that would take him to the airport. She didn’t say anything the whole way, but just as he got out, she leaned over and kissed him, and then drove away and left him.

  Part Four:

  CRANE

  Chapter Twenty

  The Mill was a late ’60s time warp. The booths were displaced church pews; stained-glass panels hung behind the bar; a folksinger was doing something by Phil Ochs. During the folksinger’s break, somebody put money in a jukebox that still had “Big Yellow Taxi” on it and when something by Sting came out, it seemed like a mistake. A waitress in sweater and jeans took an order, then spoke to her black boyfriend for five minutes before turning it in. Two guys with ponytails and facial hair sat facing each other, leaning across one of the tables scattered between the pews and the bar, making a conspiracy out of a dope deal as if anyone still cared, saying “man” a lot, like it was fifteen years ago in California, and not today in Iowa City.

  Crane hated the Mill.

  But his friend Roger Beatty and Roger’s girl Judy had talked him into coming along. The food at the Mill was good, particularly the antipasto salad, and afterwards they would go to the Bijou Theater for a John Wayne movie, The Searchers. Roger said it was a great movie, so Crane had consented to come. He hadn’t been out much since he got back from Greenwood. He hadn’t been out at all, really. Maybe it was time he did.

  Roger was explaining some things about the movie to Judy, who was listening patiently, or pretending to. Judy usually didn’t go in for these old movies, and Crane wondered why she was here.

  Judy was a thin, pretty girl with a short dark cap of hair and dark blue eyes with long lashes; she gave Crane a slow sideways look, while Roger babbled (“doorways in the film represent civilization”) and gestured with both hands, the eyes behind his thick glasses lost in themselves.

  Their antipasto salads came, and they ate, Roger continuing his critique of the film they would be seeing, Crane beginning to feel uncomfortable with Judy’s eyes on him. He knew her well enough to know she wasn’t putting the make on him. So why was she staring?

  Finally Roger, who liked food even more than films, shut up and ate.

  Judy said, “I’m glad you’re getting out tonight, Crane. You needed it.”

  He managed a smile. “Who needs to see a movie, with Roger here to tell it to you.”

  Roger looked up from his salad. “I was just giving you some background.”

  “Like the ending,” Judy asked, with a not unpleasant smirk.

  Crane smiled at them and said, “It’s nice of you guys to ask me along. I haven’t been doing much lately except study.”

  “Not that it shows,” Roger said.

  Crane shrugged. “I missed a few deadlines.”

  “Yeah, and had some pieces rejected.”

  “What’s the problem, Crane?” Judy asked.

  Roger said, “He’s going to lose his spot on the Daily Iowan, is the problem. You know how many journalism majors are lined up in back of you, Crane, wanting on that staff?”

  “Just all of them,” Crane said.

  “So what’s the problem?” Judy asked again.

  “He’s still got his head back in New Jersey,” Roger said.

  Crane didn’t say anything.

  Their waitress brought the food: Roger had a small pizza, Judy spaghetti, Crane vegetarian lasagna.

  Roger and Judy began to eat.

  Crane poked at his food with his fork.

  “Why don’t you call her?” Roger said.

  “Roger. Please.”

  “I know you don’t want to talk about it in front of Judy, but I already told her all about it.”

  “Thanks, Roger. Confiding in you is like taking out an ad.”

  Judy said, “Why don’t you call her, Crane? See what’s been happening? It’s been a month.”

  “Five weeks,” he said.

  “And you wrote her one letter and she didn’t answer it. That isn’t much of an effort to get through to her.”

  “Who says I should try to get through to her?”

  “Nobody,” Roger said. “But you better start getting with it.”

  “Getting with it.”

  “Yeah. Do your work. Have some fun. You know. Live a little.”

  “Can I quote you?”

  “Go ahead. Maybe if you use my stuff you won’t get rejected.”

  Judy touched Roger’s arm and gave him a sharp look. Roger shook his head and took his frustration out on a slice of pizza.

  Crane took a bit of lasagna: it was cold; he ate it anyway.

  After the meal they had some wine and Crane said, “I know you two are trying to help, and I appreciate it. Really. I’m glad to be out among the living again. But your advice… well, it’s just that I’ve been over all of this in my own head so many times that…”

  “Do you still think about Mary Beth?” Judy asked.

  “Of course I still think about Mary Beth! I still sleep in the same bed I slept in with her, damnit.”

  “From the way you just snapped at me,” Judy said, giving him her slow, long-lashed look, “I’d say you’ve got a bad case of the guilts.”

  “The guilts.”

  “That’s right. You went to your girlfriend’s funeral, and you met this Boone and went home with her. And you feel guilty about it, and that’s why you haven’t made any real effort to get back in touch with her. You’re punishing yourself.”

  “Judy, I know you mean well, but you just don’t understand.”

  “Maybe not. But I’d like to. So would Roger.”

  Crane didn’t say anything.

  Neither did Judy or Roger, for a few long minutes.

  Then Crane said, “All right, maybe I do feel guilty about Boone and me, getting together so soon after what happened to Mary Beth…” He shook his head. “But that isn’t what… you see, what came between Boone and me was the goddamn Kemco thing. I couldn’t get her to accept that Mary Beth’s death was really suicide.”

  “It probably was,” Judy said, nodding.

  “What probably was?”

  “Mary Beth’s death. It probably was suicide. I agree with you.”

  “That sounds like an expert opinion.”

  “Well, maybe it is. When Roger started talking about all this, telling me some of what you told him about the Kemco situation, I did some reading up. They make Agent Orange at that plant, don’t they?”

  “Yes.”

  “So we’re talking dioxin, among other goodies.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Keep it simple,” Roger interrupted, between sips of red wine. “We’re not all science majors, here, you know.”

  Judy said, “Three ounces of dioxin in the New York City water supply could wipe out the city’s population. At Love Canal—you’ve heard of Love Canal, Roger? At Love Canal, they buried 130 pounds of the stuff.”

  “Judas,” Roger said.

  “Here’s the point, Crane,” Judy continued. “In addition to being one terrific carcinogen, and the
bearer of such glad tidings as liver disease and miscarriages, dioxin can cause psychological disturbances. And what is a suicide victim, other than a psychologically disturbed person?”

  “Very few well-balanced folks kill themselves,” Roger conceded.

  Crane leaned forward. “Then the depressed state Mary Beth and the other suicides were in might’ve been brought on… or anyway, amplified… by chemicals they’d been exposed to?”

  “Why not?” Judy asked. “They all worked at that plant, didn’t they? Now if a non-Kemco employee in Greenwood committed suicide—particularly somebody who’d been asking embarrassing questions around town, like you had—that would be suspicious. Then I’d be inclined to agree with your Boone that people were being murdered to look like suicide.”

  “There’s something I don’t get,” Roger said. “The Kemco plant is twenty miles or so from Greenwood, right? Then why the high rate of illnesses and such among the families of employees? The families aren’t directly exposed to any Kemco pollution.”

  “Yet the wives and husbands and children are affected,” Judy said, nodding.

  “Skin rashes for the kids,” Crane said, “miscarriages for mom, loss of sex drive for dad, fun for the whole family.”

  “It really does sound like Love Canal,” Judy said. “Same kinds of things were reported there, only the reason for it all became obvious, when corroded waste drums started to break up through the ground in backyards. Did you know one backyard swimming pool popped up right out of its foundation? Floating in chemical shit. And people had pools of this stuff, oozing, bubbling up in their basements.”

  “Thanks for waiting till after dinner to get into this,” Roger said, pale.

  “The government moved a lot of people out of Love Canal,” Judy went on, “but some had to stay behind. Out of less than 200 homes, bordering on the condemned area, there were twenty-some birth defects, thirty-some miscarriages, forty-some cases of respiratory disease. I don’t know the exact figures, of course, but you get the idea.”

  Roger pointed a thumb at her and said, “She doesn’t know the exact figures, of course.”

  “I do know that there were something like twenty nervous breakdowns and three or four suicides… suicides, Crane.”

  “In less than 200 homes?”

  “That’s right. Wrap the national suicide rate around that one.”