***
Max Pary’s office at the Milan Company was located a few hundred feet east of the dam site. Jacobs pulled the Police cruiser into a parking space and shut it down. Two other vehicles were parked nearby, a gray corvette that belonged to Max Pary. The other car he didn’t recognize.”
Jacobs walked across the small parking area and stepped up on the porch of a mobile office trailer. He pulled the door open and stepped through the opening. It felt cool inside yet humid and musty. The smell wasn’t bad but neither was it pleasant. A young girl, typing on a computer, looked up. “Hello, Deputy Jacobs. Can I help you?”
“Hello.” Jacobs removed his police cap. He stepped to the front of her desk and felt cold air blowing across the desk from a window air conditioner unit. “I need to speak with Max Pary a moment please.”
She looked surprised and said, “He’s down at the construction site. Do you want me to page him for you?”
He thought a moment. “Well, that’s okay. Maybe you can help me. What’s the scheduled date for closing the gates and letting the water back up?”
The girl glanced nervously out the window, hesitated, and then replied, “Next Tuesday morning is what I understand. Of course, we’ve been holding back three feet for a month now. The cement trucks use a lot of water for mixing and pouring the concrete so the state gave us a permit for that.”
He followed her gaze out the window, “I didn’t realize they could do that without flooding some property up stream.”
She shook her head side-to-side, “We’re not holding that much water. It’s all in the permits that were approved by the state and federal management regulations six months ago.”
“I understand that part. What I mean is, the Tuesday date for closing the gates. I thought they had to wait until December 1st so the timber could be logged out from up stream.”
“The people who were going to cut the timber released the property.”
Jacobs felt the blood draining from his face. He glanced back out the window and noticed several pieces of heavy machinery moving about with a cement truck unloading near the dam. He looked back at the secretary and decided that the girl’s smile was not real or sincere. It seemed almost painted on her face. She blustered and said, “Why don’t you let me call Mr. Pary to the office? He can answer all your questions better than I.”
Jacobs shook his head “Why would you make him stop what he’s doing just to tell me the same thing you just did? That’s okay.”
The smile on her face faded and she stammered, “Well, I just thought that you...”
He cut her off. “I didn’t mean to sound nosy or anything and this isn’t an official visit. I was just out this way and decided to stop by and see how things were going for the project. I’ve got some plans to buy some property on the lake when she’s up and steady.”
The smile returned, “You’ll need to see Mavis down at the Pary Real estate office. She’s in charge of selling the property rights around the lake. There are building restrictions so everything will have to meet size and specifications”
Tipping his hat, Jacobs smiled, “I understand. We don’t want any neighbors on the lake towing in an old beat up mobile home now would we? Thanks for the information.”
As he backed the patrol car away from the office, his mind clicked furiously. For one thing, the water level near the dam appeared to be a lot deeper than three or four feet. Had the gates already closed? Also, if Matt Veal had relinquished timber rights upstream then he must have done so in the past week, but how if he was out of town?
Jacobs, his mind made up, turned the patrol car back toward town and mumbled, “This is going to cost me my job.”
The Beginning (Whispering Pines Book 1) Page 24
