Fever Dream

In a few minutes, they were squishing across the lawn toward the tangled remains of an old chain-link security fence, topped with concertina wire. A gate lay on the ground, sprawled and broken, and they entered through a narrow gap. Beyond lay the remains of the burned building. It was of yellow brick like the rest, but the roof had collapsed, great charred beams sticking into the sky, the windows and door frames black holes with scorched streaks above. Massive carpets of kudzu crept up the walls and lay in heavy mats over everything.

Hayward followed Pendergast through a shattered doorway. The detective paused to examine the door lying on the ground and the frame itself, and then he knelt and began fiddling with the door lock with some lock-picking tools.

"Curious," he said, rising.

The entryway was strewn with charred pieces of wood, and the ceiling above had partially caved in, allowing a dim light to penetrate the interior. A flock of swallows burst out of the darkness and flew away, wheeling and crying at the disturbance. The odor of dampness clung faintly to everything. Water dripped from the black timbers, making pools on the once-tiled floor.

Pendergast slipped a penlight out of his pocket and shone it around. They moved into the interior, stepping over debris, the thin beam of Pendergast's light playing this way and that. Passing through a broken archway, they walked down an old corridor, burned-out rooms on either side. In places melted glass and aluminum had puddled on the floor, along with scorched plastic and the wire skeletons of furniture.

Hayward watched as Pendergast silently flitted through the dark rooms, probing and peering. At one point, he stopped at the remains of a filing cabinet and poked among a sodden mass of burned papers in the bottom of a drawer, pushing them apart. The very center remained unburned, and he plucked out a few pieces, examining them. " 'Delivery completed to Nova G.,' " he read aloud from one of the papers. "This is just a bunch of old shipping manifests."

"Anything of interest?"

More poking. "Unlikely." Removing several charred fragments, he slipped them into a ziplock bag, which in turn disappeared into his suit jacket.

They arrived in a large central room where the fire appeared to have been fiercest. The ceiling was gone and mats of kudzu had risen over the debris, leaving humps and nodding growths. Pendergast glanced around, then walked over to one and reached into it, grabbing the vine and yanking it aside, exposing the skeleton of an old machine thick with wires and gears whose purpose Hayward couldn't begin to guess. He moved through the room, pulling aside more vines, exposing more melted, skeletal instrumentation.

"Any idea what this stuff was?" Hayward asked.

"An autoclave--incubators--and I would guess that was once a centrifuge." He flashed the light toward a large half-melted mass. "And here we have the remains of a laminar flow cabinet. This was once a first-class microbiology lab."

He kicked aside some debris, bent down, picked something up. It glinted dully in the light, and he slipped it into his pocket.

"The report of Slade's death," said Hayward, "indicated that his body was found in a laboratory. That must be this room."

"Yes." Pendergast's light flashed over a row of heavy, melted cabinets under a hood. "And there is where the fire started. Chemical storage."

"You think it was deliberately set?"

"Certainly. The fire was necessary to destroy the evidence."

"How do you know?"

Pendergast reached into his pocket and showed the thing he had picked up to Hayward. It was a strip of aluminum, about three-quarters of an inch long, that had evidently escaped the fire. A number was stamped into it.

"What is it?"

"An unused bird leg-band." He examined it closely, then handed it to Hayward. "And no ordinary leg-band, either." He pointed to its i

Hayward handed it back. "If you don't mind me asking, what makes you think the fire was deliberately set? The reports were pretty clear that they found no evidence of accelerants or foul play."

"The person who started this fire was a top-notch chemist who knew what he was doing. It is asking far too much of coincidence to believe this building burned accidentally, right after the avian flu project was shut down."

"So who burned it?"

"I would direct your attention to the high security, the once-formidable perimeter fence, the special, almost unpickable locks on the doors, the windows that were once barred and covered with frosted glass. The building was set apart from the others as well, almost into the swamp, protected on all sides. This fire was surely set by someone on the inside. Someone with high-level access."

"Slade?"

"The arsonist burned up in his own fire is not an uncommon phenomenon."

"On the other hand," said Hayward, "the fire might have been murder. Slade, as head of the project, knew too much."

Pendergast's pale eyes turned on her slowly. "My thoughts exactly, Captain."

They stood in silence, the rain dripping through the ruins.

"Seems like we're at a dead end," said Hayward.

Silently, Pendergast removed the ziplock bag with the charred paper and handed it to Hayward. She examined it. One of the fragments was a requisition for a shipment of petri dishes, with a handwritten note at the bottom upping the number "as per the direction of CJS." And it was signed with a single initial, J.

"CJS? That must be Charles J. Slade."

"Correct. And this is of definite interest."

She handed it back. "I don't see the significance."

"The handwriting evidently belongs to June Brodie, Slade's secretary. The one who committed suicide on the Archer Bridge a week after Slade died. Except that this note scribbled on the requisition would suggest she did not commit suicide after all."

"How in the world can you tell?"

"I happen to have a photocopy of the suicide note from her file at the Vital Records office, left in her car just before she threw herself off the Archer span." Pendergast removed a piece of paper from his suit jacket, and Hayward unfolded it. "Compare the handwriting with that of the fragment I just discovered: a purely routine notation jotted down in her office. Very curious."

Hayward stared at one and then the other, looking back and forth. "But the handwriting's exactly the same."

"That, my dear Captain, is what's so very curious." And he placed the papers back within his suit jacket.

58

THE SUN HAD ALREADY SET IN A SCRIM OF muddy clouds by the time Laura Hayward reached the small highway leading out of Itta Bena, heading east toward the interstate. According to the GPS, it was a four-and-a-half-hour drive back to Penumbra; she'd be there before midnight. Pendergast had told her he wouldn't be home until even later; he was off to see what else he could dig up on June Brodie.

It was a long, lonely, empty highway. She felt drowsy and opened the window, letting in a blast of humid air. The car filled with the smell of the night and damp earth. At the next town, she'd grab a coffee and sandwich. Or maybe she could find a rib joint. She hadn't eaten since breakfast.