The Empty Chair

"The canal? No, it doesn't."

Rhyme asked, "You know much about it?"

"Not really," Bell said deferentially. He'd known Rhyme for only a short while but must've sensed when to play straight man.

"I've been doing a little research," Rhyme said, nodding at the phone. "The Dismal Swamp Canal's part of the Intracoastal Waterway. You know you can take a boat all the way from Norfolk, Virginia, down to Miami and not have to sail on open sea?"

"Sure. Everybody in Carolina knows about the Intracoastal. I've never been on it. I'm not much of a boater. I got seasick watching Titanic."

"Took twelve years to dig the canal. It's twenty-two miles long. Dug completely by hand. Amazing, don't you think?… Relax, Jim. This's going someplace, I promise you. Look at that line up there, the one between Ta

"You mean, our canal. The Blackwater Canal?"

"Right. Now, a boat could sail up that to the Paquo then to the Great Dismal and – "

The approaching footsteps weren't half as loud as Bell 's had been, with the door being shut, and there was little warning before it swung open. Rhyme stopped speaking.

Mason Germain stood in the doorway. He glanced at Rhyme then at his boss and said, "Wondered where you'd got to, Jim. We got to make a call to Elizabeth City. Captain Dexter has some questions 'bout what happened at the 'shiners' cabin."

"Just having a chat with Lincoln. We were talking about -"

But Rhyme interrupted him quickly. "Say, Mason, I wonder if you could give us a few minutes alone here."

Mason glanced from one to the other. He nodded slowly. "They're in a mind to talk to you pretty soon, Jim." He left before Bell could respond.

"Is he gone?" Rhyme asked.

Once again Bell glanced down the corridor then nodded. "What's this all about, Lincoln?"

"Could you check out the window? Make sure Mason's left? Oh, and I'd close that door again."

Bell did. Then he walked to the window and looked out. "Yeah. He's headed up the street. Why all this…?" He lifted his hands to complete the thought.

"How well do you know Mason?"

"As good as I know mosta my deputies. Why?"

"Because he murdered Garrett Hanlon's family."

"What?" Bell started to smile but the expression faded fast. "Mason?"

"Mason," Rhyme said.

"But why on earth?"

"Because Henry Davett paid him to."

"Hold up," Bell said. "You're a couple steps past me."

"I can't prove it yet. But I'm sure."

"Henry? What's his involvement?"

Rhyme said, "It all has to do with the Blackwater Canal." He fell into his lecturing mode, eyes on the map. "Now, the point of digging the canals in the eighteenth century was having dependable transport because the roads were so bad. But as the roads and railroads got better, shippers stopped using the waterways."

"Where'd you find all this out?"

"Historical Society in Raleigh. Talked to a charming lady, Julie DeVere. According to her, Blackwater Canal was closed just after the Civil War. Wasn't used for a hundred thirty years. Until Henry Davett started ru

Bell nodded. "That was about five years ago."

Rhyme continued, "Let me ask – you ever wonder why Davett started using it?"

The sheriff shook his head. "I remember some of us were a little worried kids'd try to swim out to a barge and get hurt and drown but none of 'em ever did and we never thought any more about it. But now you mention it I don't know why he'd use the canal. He's got trucks coming and going all the time. Norfolk 's nothing to get to by truck."

Rhyme nodded up at the evidence chart. "The answer's right up there. That one bit of trace I never did find a source for: camphene."

"The stuff in the lanterns?"

Rhyme shook his head, grimaced. "No. I made a mistake there. True, camphene was used in lanterns. But it's also used in something else. It can be processed to make toxaphene."

"What's that?"

"One of the most dangerous pesticides there is. It was used mostly in the South – until it was ba

Bell nodded, fascinated. "Which was where?"

"Everywhere," Rhyme said. "I had Lucy take samples of dirt and water from around Ta

"But it's ba

"I called an FBI agent friend of mine and he called the EPA. It's not completely ba

"Don't like the sound of that."

"You shouldn't. Toxaphene is ba

"And they can use it?"

"It's legal in most Third World and Latin American countries. That's the circle: Those countries spray food with pesticides and send it back into the U.S. The FDA only inspects a small percentage of imported fruits and vegetables so there are plenty of people in the U.S. still poisoned, even though it's ba

Bell gave a cynical laugh. "And Davett can't ship it on the roads because of all the counties and towns that won't let any toxic shipments go through 'em. And the ICC logs on his trucks'd show what the cargo is. Not to mention the public relations problem if word got out what he was doing."

"Exactly," Rhyme said, nodding. "So he reopened the canal to send the toxaphene through the Intracoastal Waterway to Norfolk, where it's loaded onto foreign ships. Only there was a problem – when the canal closed in the eighteen hundreds the property around it was sold privately. People whose houses butted up against the canal had the right to control who used it."

Bell said, "So Davett paid them to lease their portion of the canal." He nodded with sudden understanding. "And he must've paid a lot of money – look at how big those houses are in Blackwater Landing. And think about those nice trucks and Mercedeses and Lexuses people're driving around here. But what's this about Mason and Garrett's family?"

"Garrett's father's land was on the canal. But he wouldn't sell his usage rights. So Davett or somebody in his company hired Mason to convince Garrett's father to sell and, when he wouldn't, Mason picked up some local trash to help him kill the family – Culbeau, Tomel and O'Sarian. Then I'd guess that Davett bribed the executor of the will to sell the property to him."

"But Garrett's folks died in an accident. A car accident. I saw the report myself."

"Was Mason the officer who handled the report?"

"I don't remember but he could've been," Bell admitted. He looked at Rhyme with an admiring smile. "How on earth d'you figure this out?"

"Oh, it was easy – because there's no frost in July. Not in North Carolina anyway."