Drought (3 page)

Martin glanced across at Arlene but Arlene simply nodded toward Saskia as if she were telling him to let her have her say, because this was critical.

Saskia said, ‘The reason I've come here today to talk to you is because we're faced with having to consider rotational hiatuses in service.'

‘Excuse me? “Rotational hiatuses”? That sounds like some kind of skin complaint.'

Saskia kept on smiling that slightly nauseated smile. ‘Let me tell you this, Martin. Water reserves nationwide are lower than they have been in almost fifty years.'

‘Sure, I know that. But I can't see
this
city running dry, can you? We're sitting right on top of more underground water than we know what to do with. I mean, that was the whole reason the city was built here in the first place. And what about Arrowhead Springs, up in the mountains? San Bernardino
exports
water, for Christ's sake.'

‘Well, sorry, but not right now you don't. You'll have seen for yourself on the TV news that reservoirs are nearly empty and rivers and lakes are down to the lowest levels ever recorded. This is happening all across the country, Martin, coast to coast, especially in California and the Midwest. Even here in San Bernardino, I'm afraid to tell you. You used to have one hundred fifteen million gallons of water stored in your reservoirs, and your groundwater wells used to hold more water than Lake Shasta, but now they've dropped to less than a fifth of that. Demand is outstripping supply, by a very long way, and continuing to do so, and that's one of the reasons I'm here.'

‘OK,' said Martin. ‘But you still haven't told me what “rotational hiatuses” are.'

‘Martin – this is strictly restricted information which is being given to selected individuals only – local government administrators, emergency services, the police and military. If we made it public we could be risking a national panic. The drought situation is very much more severe than you've seen on the news. Crops have been devastated, especially corn and soy, and if it carries on like this we're going to be facing food rationing as well as water restrictions.'

‘Go on,' said Martin. He had a long-standing aversion to being lectured, especially by women, but he knew he would have to listen to this.

Saskia said, ‘We've already been forced to start rotational hiatuses in San Bernardino, both city and county. That means we've been cutting off the water supply on a strict rota basis, first one neighborhood and then another, and we've been doing it without giving those neighborhoods any prior warning.'

‘That's kind of drastic, isn't it?'

‘Yes, I agree. But if you give people notice that their water supply is about to be cut off, they immediately fill up buckets and bathtubs and any other container they can lay their hands on, which puts an even greater strain on what limited reserves we have left.'

‘So how long is each of these “rotational hiatuses” going to last?'

‘Hopefully, no longer than forty-eight hours.'

‘Forty-eight hours, in this heat?'

‘Well, we're hoping it won't have to be longer.'

‘Yes, but come on! How are people going to wash, and cook, and everything else you need water for?'

‘I'm afraid they'll just have to get by.'

‘That's easy enough to say. But what about local businesses? How are restaurants and laundries going to cope? And what about hospitals, and clinics, and retirement homes? In forty-eight hours, believe me, people won't just be thirsty, they'll be dying. I saw droughts when I was serving in Afghanistan, and it didn't take more than a couple of days without water before old people and children were dropping like flies.'

‘Martin,' said Saskia, ‘you just don't get it. Take San Bernardino alone. The average rainfall here is usually sixteen-point-four-three inches per year, and that's pretty low by any standard. Over the past three years you've had less than a tenth of that, one-point-five-two, which is disastrous. We can't supply people with water that we simply don't have.

She paused for a moment, and lowered her voice, as if she were making an effort to be reasonable. ‘I came here today to talk to you at CFS because you need to be aware that many families which are already dysfunctional are going to be under even greater stress when they find that they have no water, especially in this heatwave. You need to know what the situation is so that you can keep them calm – explain to them that the San Bernardino Municipal Water Department is doing everything it can to share out water fairly, and that protesting about it is not going to do them any good – in fact it's going to be severely counterproductive. You have to persuade them that this drought is an act of God, and not the fault of the county, or the state, or the federal government for that matter.'

‘And this is your remit, is it?' Martin asked her. ‘You're here to tell us that we have to keep a thirsty sweaty resentful underclass from running riot?'

Saskia raised her eyes again and looked at Martin steadily. ‘It's in everybody's best interests, Martin. Especially all of those children you care for.'

‘So what do we say to them? “Let them drink cola?” As well as wash in it, cook in it, and spray it on their lawns?'

‘Not even that, Martin. All soda manufacturers have been ordered to stop production until further notice.'

Arlene tilted her chair forward and gave Martin her most serious frown. ‘Saskia tells me that Governor Smiley has been keeping a very tight lid on this, Martin, and now you can understand why.'

‘Oh, for sure. It's coming dangerously close to inhumanity.'

Arlene ignored that. ‘I'm not sharing what Saskia has told us with everybody in the office, Martin, believe me, and I'm only sharing it with
you
because you're in charge of some of the city's most deprived districts, which have a much higher risk of social disorder. We're right on the front line, here at CFS, you know that. We have to do our best to keep at-risk families from boiling over and falling apart, with all the damage that could do to their children.'

Martin shrugged. ‘All right, Arlene, if you say so. I don't quite understand how you can boil over and fall apart both at the same time, especially if you don't have any water. But at least I know what's going on now. I'll call my wife and tell her.'

He stood up, but Saskia reached up and caught hold of his tan leather watch strap. ‘I'd rather you didn't, Martin.'

‘You'd rather I didn't what? Tell my wife? It's OK. She's only my
ex
-wife, as it happens.'

‘I'd prefer it if we kept this information on a need-to-know basis only, if you don't mind. Like I say, we could be right on the brink of a national panic. It only takes one spark to start a forest fire.'

‘With respect, Saskia, I think my ex-wife has a need to know. My daughter has a high temperature and she has no water.'

‘Martin, please. Just tell her that the water is coming back on again very soon, if she can just hold on. I'm not supposed to advise anybody to do this, because supplies are so low, but tell her to go to her nearest supermarket and stock up on as much bottled water as she can, if she hasn't done that already – and if there's any left.'

Martin looked down at Saskia's hand, still holding his watch strap. Her fingernails were polished red to match her suit and her lips. She was wearing a single large ring with a red agate in it, but no wedding band. He was prepared to admit that he didn't always understand women, but they never frightened him. All the same, there was something about Saskia Vane that put him off balance, although he couldn't understand exactly what it was. Maybe it was that pungent post-coital perfume; or the way that she looked at him with eyes as bright and hard as nail-heads. He may not have been frightened of her, but then it was obvious that
she
wasn't frightened of
him
, either.

‘OK,' he said. ‘But you'll need to give us a schedule. Which neighborhoods you're planning to cut off, and when. Then – if we do get any trouble – at least we'll be prepared for it.'

‘I can't do that, Martin. That really
is
restricted information. If it got into the wrong hands … believe me, it would be disastrous. All hell let loose. Some neighborhoods have much higher and more critical needs than others, and you can imagine the resentment if some were disconnected for a shorter period than others.'

Martin didn't know what to say to that. He looked across at Arlene again, but all Arlene could do was shrug. ‘Don't see what else we can do, Martin. We're here to keep families together and protect children from harm. Starting a riot isn't going to help any.'

Martin lifted his arm a little and Saskia released her grip on his watch strap.

‘It was very good to meet you, Martin,' she said. ‘Look – take one of my cards. If there's anything else you need to know, just get in touch. Do you have any further questions for now?

‘No,' said Martin. ‘I don't think so. Or – yes, maybe one. Can I ask you what qualifications you have? I mean, what does it take for somebody like you to be appointed to a drought crisis advisory team?'

Saskia kept on looking at him unblinking and for quite a long time Martin thought that she wasn't going to answer him, or else she was going to tell him to mind his own business.

Instead, she said, ‘Good looks, Martin, and a natural flair for diplomacy. And a doctorate in environmental management from UCLA, that helped. And a law degree. And connections in some very high places.'

‘I just wondered, that's all,' Martin told her. ‘I find it hard to picture you, when you were an innocent little girl, dreaming of telling everybody in California not to flush their toilets so often.'

Saskia looked away from him, but as she did so, she said, ‘I was never an innocent little girl, Martin.'

Martin hesitated. If this had been a cocktail bar, and he had been coming on to her, he could have thought of some smart and provocative response to that. But it was Arlene's office, and Arlene was listening intently.

He smiled at Saskia as if to say ‘
touché
', and then he gave Arlene a salute and turned to leave. On his way out the pale man in the pale lemon shirt bobbed up from his chair and held out his hand.

‘Lem Kunicki,' he said. His palm was chilly and damp and Martin thought that it was like shaking hands with somebody who had recently died.

P
eta put down the phone and went through to the sunlit living room, where Tyler was sprawled on the couch with his laptop, playing
Alien Armageddon IV.

‘Tyler? I was just talking to your dad. He says the water's going to be staying off for at least two days and we should stock up on as much bottled water as we can lay our hands on.' Pause. Silence. ‘
Tyler
?'

Tyler couldn't hear her, with his headphones in his ears, and he kept on frantically playing.

‘
Yessss
!' he said, clenching his fist, as he blew up another alien cruiser.

Peta went up to him and snapped his computer shut, catching his fingers in it. He looked up at her in hurt and astonishment, as if she had just slapped him.

‘
Mom
– what did you do that for?' he protested, taking out his headphones. ‘I was up to my highest level ever!'

‘I need you to run an errand for me, that's why.'

‘Oh,
shoot
, Mom, can't it wait? That was my highest level ever!'

‘Your dad says we should do it as soon as we can.'

‘Oh, I see! My
dad
says! I thought you didn't even
like
my dad.'

‘Of course I like him. As a matter of fact I love him, but that doesn't make him any easier to live with. He says our water's going to stay cut off for at least forty-eight hours and some expert from the water department has told him to stock up on bottled water, as much as we can get hold of.' She dangled her car keys in front of him and said, ‘Take my truck and go to Ralph's and see how much you can manage to buy. Here, look, here's a fifty. If there's any change you can keep it.'

Tyler tossed his laptop on to the couch. At times he not only looked like his father but sounded like him, which Peta found quite disturbing, as if Martin had gone but left a clone of himself behind, to keep an eye on her. Tyler was tall and wide-shouldered but very skinny, with blond hair that stuck up like a porcupine and a long, chiseled face. He even walked like his father, with that brisk aggressive stride that made people feel that he was coming up to hit them for no reason. He was wearing tight blue rolled-up jeans and a maroon Cardinals T-shirt.

‘Listen,' she said, ‘I'd go myself, but I can't leave Ella. I think I may have to take her to the doctor if she gets any worse. I'm just hoping it's not West Nile fever or anything serious like that.'

‘Oh, come on, Mom! Ella
always
has something wrong with her, you know that. She's a hypo-con-artist, whatever you call it. She only does it for attention.'

‘She's
sick
, Tyler. She has a very high temperature and she can't keep anything down. Now, please.'

Tyler reluctantly snatched the car keys from her. She followed him out through the front door to the driveway in front of their single-story house, where her turquoise-blue Hilux was parked. The day was cloudless and baking hot, and the concrete driveway was so dazzlingly white that she raised her hand in front of her face to shield her eyes. When she checked the thermometer by the side of the front door she saw that it read 112. Behind the rooftops of the single-story houses on the opposite side of the road, the brown San Bernardino mountains were almost invisible behind a haze of heat, and buzzards were circling over them, around and around, without having to flap their wings even once.