The fuel gauge pointed at E.
Luckily, the engine caught, and I sped toward the hospital, located about two miles from my apartment. I leaned forward in the seat, slipping the clutch several times racing around corners and through intersections. James hadn’t mentioned the severity of any injuries, so I didn’t know what to expect but understood how it worked. Seldom was bad news delivered over the phone.
Arabella’s sister, Ruth, lived on the island. I gave her a call, and she said she’d get to the hospital as soon as possible. Ruth’s appearance anywhere always proved interesting.
Hospital San Francisco sits at the edge of Kralendijk, on a road called Kaya Soeur Bartola. The sixty-bed facility offered limited services, and severe cases went by air ambulance to the nearby island of Curacao.
I parked and made my way to the front receptionist desk, lower rib cage on fire, breaths shallow and labored. James waited in the lobby, and before the receptionist said anything, waved for me to follow him down the hall to the emergency room.
“Is she hurt badly?” I asked, gasping for air and holding my side as we hurried through the corridor.
“I do not think so. Looks like some cuts and bruises. She was still delirious when I arrived. The ambulance crew said she might have a slight concussion.”
At the emergency room, a nurse instructed us to have a seat. “Someone will be with you shortly.”
James sat down. I paced the floor.
“What happened?” I asked.
“She went through an intersection and into a building.”
I closed my eyes. “Brakes?”
“Looks like they went out. She said something about the brake pedal not working and not able to slow down. She swerved to miss some people on the sidewalk.”
The doors separating the waiting area from the examination rooms swung open, and a female doctor walked through.
“My name is Doctor Amanda Ingerbretzen,” she said with a hint of German accent. “Miss Arabella is doing fine. We stitched some cuts, and she has some bruises on her face. She also has a slight concussion.”
“Will she be alright?” I asked.
“She should make a full recovery. We will observe her overnight.”
“Can I see her?”
“Yes, but we are currently moving her out of the emergency area and to a private room. She has an IV for pain medicine, so she will be sleepy.” Doctor Ingerbretzen smiled, raised her eyebrows, and straightened her stance ever so slightly. “As you may know, since the hospital remodeled, all of the rooms now have air-conditioning.”
That would suit Arabella just fine. Most Dutch I knew didn’t use air-conditioning, not even when sleeping. Whenever I asked why, most of them responded with a grunt and a shrug. I guessed it had something to do with the extra electricity costs. Until she started spending nights at my apartment, Arabella hadn’t used AC either. Now she was hooked on it—one of the few positive influences I’d had on her.
“I am leaving then,” James said. “I will check with you tomorrow.”
I shook his hand. “Thanks, James.”
Doctor Ingerbretzen led me to Arabella’s room. I walked through the door and stood by the bed a moment and stared.
A white, three-inch square bandage covered Arabella’s right eyebrow and stretched to her temple, a patch of hair having been shaved to accommodate half a dozen stitches. Some scrapes and red blotches marred her right cheek, and, between her eyes, a large, blue-green bruise spoiled the beauty of her short, fleshy nose. An IV dripped clear liquid into her left arm.
This was my fault.
I pulled a big-armed, green upholstered chair close to the bed, sat in it, and took her by the hand. She opened her eyes and smiled. I stroked her hair.
“Hey, Conklin.” Her voice was low and throaty, sounding as if it hurt to talk.
“Shhhh … Take it easy.” I got out of the chair and sat on the edge of the bed. I moved some hair out of her eyes and looped it around her ear.
“Sorry about your Wrangler.”
“Not an issue, but I’ll have to borrow your car for a while.”
“Not a problem.” She tried to laugh. “You will need to buy some gas.”
I smiled. “You need to rest. Close your eyes and get some sleep.” I kissed her forehead. “I’m sorry, honey. I should be laying there, not you.”
“An accident is an accident. It is not your fault.”
I didn’t argue but knew the truth.
With a slight head movement, she motioned for the cup of water on the nearby table. I grabbed it and held the straw in front of her. She sipped some water.
“Thank you,” she said. “I do not remember much. Was anyone else hurt?”
“No. You swerved to miss some bystanders.”
“Thank goodness …” Her voice trailed off as she slipped into slumber.
The chair creaked as I lowered myself onto the cushion and stretched out my legs. I took the remote and turned on the TV. The mute button worked, as did the closed caption.
Nothing on TV would hold my interest, not with Arabella lying in a hospital bed, but I flipped through the channels anyway. I stopped on a Dutch reality show, Wie Is de Mol? and smiled. Arabella watched Who Is the Mole? on a regular basis. As the name denotes, one of the ten contestants worked in conjunction with the producers to hinder the other contestants’ ability to win money. The goal of the other nine players—and the viewers—was to identify the mole before time ran out. Arabella claimed watching the show and identifying the mole strengthened her deductive reasoning skills and forced her to think outside the box.
I wasn’t concentrating on the episode but needed someplace to stare. Let my mind go a little. After numbing myself with the TV, I couldn’t sit any longer and paced the room a few times, tucked in Arabella’s covers, and checked her pillows. The displays and numbers on the equipment continued to change, and I felt hopeless not knowing what most of them meant. Regardless of the staff’s approval or hospital policies, I was prepared to stay the night in this chair. It’d take an army to throw me out. I wanted to be here in case she needed anything.
I considered what the WGN anchor had reported as I ran out of my apartment—something about new developments in the case. Not sure how long the newscast ran or if it repeated stories on a regular basis. I flipped to that channel, sat back, and read the closed caption flashing along the bottom of the screen. The newscast came to an end with no re-mention of the case. Not interested in the Chicago weather or the sports report, I clicked the TV off and made a mental note to ask Penn about the new development.
From down the hall came the distinct staccato clicking of high heels striking the tiled floor, growing louder every second. The rhythm changed as the heels made a turn outside Arabella’s room and sauntered through the door.
An overwhelming scent of perfume entered the room five seconds before the heels. No surprise who owned both. Arabella’s older, red headed sister, Ruth, had arrived.
Now the fun would begin.
“Oh my God,” Ruth said. “Is she alright?” She clicked over to the side of the bed.
Ruth fussed with the blankets and bedsheets as I explained what had happened and updated her on Arabella’s condition. When I asked if she had any questions, she took the remote and turned on the TV, increasing the volume. She fluffed Arabella’s pillow, sat in the big-armed chair, and held her sister’s hand, remaining quiet for a moment and staring at the diagnostic machines.
I walked over to the TV and unplugged it, then stood on the other side of the bed from Ruth.
After a few minutes, without looking at me, Ruth asked, “Are you going to stay with her?”
I nodded, but it was a wasted motion. Ruth still wasn’t paying me any attention, so I said, “Yes.”
She stroked Arabella’s arm and kissed her on the cheek. “When can she go home?”
“Tomorrow, hopefully.”
“Tell her I was here, and I will pick her up tomorrow.” She stood and pressed on the
edge of a loose piece of tape along one of Arabella’s bandages, then turned and headed toward the door.
“You’re leaving?” I asked.
Without pausing, she said, “We are busy tonight. Since she is okay, I have to get back to work.” She clicked out the door and started down the hallway.
I looked at the floor, bit my upper lip, and tried a ten count. I made it to three and walked into the hallway. Ruth strolled away, her heels echoing off the hard walls and tile floors.
“You know, if the situation were reversed, your sister wouldn’t leave your side,” I said, loud enough that a nurse behind a counter at the far end of the hall snapped her head in my direction.
Ruth didn’t turn around or slow her stride. She put her hand in the air for a few seconds and turned down another hall leading to the exit.
The perfume lingered in the room, a not so gentle reminder of Ruth’s temporary stopover. My shoulders slumped with guilt. Regardless of my feelings toward Ruth, Arabella would be hurt knowing her sister’s visit was so short and meaningless.
I calmed myself and dropped into the chair, managing a full ten-count. The ache in my rib made it challenging to get comfortable, so I concentrated on the rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor, an electronic version of sheep counting. On the edge of slumber, Arabella’s monitor beeped in unison with the pulsing of my heart. A romanticist might say we had two hearts beating as one.
And he—or she—might be right.
CHAPTER 18
I LEFT THE hospital at ten the next morning. James had called earlier and told me they towed my Wrangler to Richter’s Garage, a mere four blocks from the hospital. I didn’t trust the gas supply in Arabella’s car, so I walked.
Kevin Richter stood in front of an open overhead door as I limped up the driveway to the five-bay service shop. Oil-stained fingers of one hand held a half-finished cigarette while the other cradled a cellphone to his ear. The sun shone over the top of the building and cast a long shadow down the front side. I put my back against the wall and savored the shade, the coolness of the concrete-brick exterior a welcome relief.
“Hello, R,” he said, sliding the phone into a holder attached to his belt. “We have your Wrangler on the lift. I will show you what we found.”
“Sounds good.”
Kevin dragged the heels of his shoes along the concrete floor as he led me through the garage. The back cuffs of his long, baggy pants were torn, dirty, and partially worn away from being walked on and dragged underneath his shoes. I stepped over patches of dried oil and worked my way around filthy pieces of engine parts, transmissions, and radiators. My Wrangler, high atop a lift, rested a few inches below a sign that read Bay 3. All four of its tires were off and lay on the floor.
Walking a slow circle to the front of the lift, I examined the damage. Only a few bits and pieces of the front grill, broken in multiple places, were still attached. The lens and bulb of the right headlight were gone, and the housing hung out of its mounting bracket. It dangled a few inches above the bumper, held in place by a couple of small wires. A foot-long crease on the right portion of the front bumper caused it to poke out at an awkward angle. The other side of the bumper stuck out too far, and a significant dent ran from the front quarter panel all the way across the right side of the hood.
The damage to the Wrangler was frightening. I loved my Wrangler, but it didn’t compare to my love for Arabella. The accident meant nothing. Arabella’s recovery meant everything.
“Do you do bodywork, Kevin?” Knowing he didn’t, I asked anyway with a half-laugh, trying to add some levity.
“No. You will need a body shop for that.”
His face showed no humor, only concern. I had forgotten Kevin never joked about car repairs. It was a serious topic for him. Like a doctor touching the warm forehead of a young patient, he ran his skilled fingertips down the bent and misaligned bumper.
“But it’s not that bad,” he said, talking more to the vehicle than to me. “We’ll bend you back into place, the best we can. You will be okay.” He patted the bumper, then turned to me. “I can throw in a headlight. Should be okay to drive.”
A mechanic in the next bay used a torch to cut through an old car’s rusty exhaust system, the cloud of acetylene and molten steel stinging my throat. I coughed and tried to inhale as little of the noxious fumes as possible. Thick layers of dust and grime covered every shelf, bench, and otherwise flat surface in the shop, and I knew from experience not to touch or rub against anything. The filth seemed to sense human presence, yearning to jump out and embed itself in anyone who wandered too close. The soot hovered around me, and I couldn’t breathe through my nose. I felt my life expectancy dwindle with every minute I stood in Bay 3, or, for that matter, anywhere else in the building.
Kevin pulled on a droplight from an overhead retractable reel and led me underneath the vehicle. He flipped the light on and pointed at the front driver’s-side brake hose.
“The brake hose sprung a leak,” he said. His greasy finger pointed at a pinhole in the rubber hose connected to the brake caliper. He followed a dark, wet stain that ran along the hose and onto the frame. The crimson trail continued along the metal, finding a low spot where it became a steady drip. On the floor, a small puddle of brake fluid had formed.
When it came to vehicles and keeping them functional, the extent of my knowledge ended just beyond keeping gas in the tank. I looked at the hose again and followed the trail of brake fluid to the floor. Before I managed to ask about the repairs, Kevin spoke.
“Someone tampered with the brakes,” he said. Fine particles of soot and dust floated in the glow of the droplight.
“What?”
He motioned for me to step out from beneath the Wrangler. We walked to a workbench where random tools, rags, and a vehicle battery sat. I followed his lead and hunched over the dimly lit bench, peering at the battery, again careful not to touch anything.
“We took your battery out and checked for leaks,” Kevin said.
I waited.
As if double-checking his work, he examined the exterior of the battery and tapped the hard-plastic shell with a screwdriver. “No leaks,” he said.
“Okay.” I had no idea where he was going with this.
Pointing at the manufacturer’s label on top of the battery, he said, “Watch this.” He peeled the label off the battery. Underneath was a round hole, about an inch in diameter. “I would say someone drilled a hole in your battery.”
I leaned closer and touched the hole with my index finger. “What?”
“The acid level is low,” he said.
“How does that happen?”
“Not sure.”
I could’ve asked “What?” again but didn’t see the point. Staring at the battery seemed appropriate. After a moment, I turned and studied the Wrangler. “Someone took acid from my battery?”
“Maybe. I would guess some type of siphon device through the hole?”
“Could that eat through a brake hose?”
“Not much is gone, but it would not take much. Over time, a little amount could do damage.” Kevin took a deep breath and sighed, slowly shaking his head. “We see hoses with salt on them. ’Cause of the ocean. But salt on a rubber hose is random. There would be other places on the hose and truck that would look bad.”
“So, someone siphoned acid out of my battery and squirted it on my brake hoses,” I said, a statement, not a question. We walked back under the Wrangler, and Kevin pointed to the damaged hose.
“The one bad spot on your hose looks more like a burn, or something like that.” He pointed at a white substance on the brake hose. “See this white, flaking stuff around the hole? It looks like corrosion, almost like dried sulfuric acid.”
“Sulfuric acid?”
“Battery acid is about one-third sulfuric acid.”
He walked me to the other side of the Wrangler and pointed at the brake hose on the front passenger side.
“This hose has the same burn marks and
corrosion on it,” he said. “Not failed yet, but close.”
I pointed at the driver’s-side brake hose, then back at the passenger side. “Both front brake hoses have the same burn pattern and corrosion on them?”
“Yes.” Kevin inched up on his tiptoes, moved his head sideways, and placed his face near the brakes. He scrunched his nose and inhaled. “Put your nose close and smell.”
I got on my tiptoes and took a whiff.
“Smell something?” he asked.
“Maybe,” I said, which was a lie. Along with the cigarette smoke and brake dust, two large ceiling fans swirled oil, gas, and exhaust fumes into an invisible cloud engulfing every square foot of the shop. My nose might clear in a week or two.
“Smell a little like rotten eggs?” he asked.
It didn’t, at least not to me. But I shrugged and said, “Possibly.”
His eyes widened, and he bit his lower lip. “Sulfuric acid smells much like rotten eggs.”
I walked to the open bay door but stopped before heading out into the sunlight and turned around. “Guess you shouldn’t touch the Wrangler anymore. It’s probably a crime scene now.”
Lighting a cigarette, he sighed, released the safeties on the lift, and pressed a button. The Wrangler slowly slid down until it rested a few inches above the tires.
Not trying to do my Lieutenant Columbo impersonation, I said, “One last thing. This seems complicated. Wouldn’t a person need specific training to know how to do this?”
Kevin blew smoke out his nose and glared at me as if I’d grown a dorsal fin. Auto repair might be easy and second nature to him, but I wondered how many people were knowledgeable enough to pull off something like this.
“Could the average person do this?” I asked.
“Maybe, maybe not. I guess it would depend on what they knew.”
That sounded like something I’d say and couldn’t tell if he were mocking me. Perhaps he’d picked up on my world-class interrogation techniques. I stared at him for a moment, then walked out the bay door and called James.
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