Road to Nowhere (45 page)

“It’ll be a busy day tomorrow,” he said. “The flood, and now this. Fire and water, you could say.”

October 14, Saturday

Steve looked around from the computer screen.

A bright yellow plastic wheelbarrow was winding its way across the floor, filled with envelopes. Attached was Josie.

“Here is your mail, Daddy.”

“Thank you very much.” He spoke as seriously as she had.

After the official transfer, and the exit of the vehicle, Steve took the big NCDOT Asheville envelope and peeked inside. Ah, yes. Environmental statement, nice and thick. And core sample data.

He’d been thinking about this data. They had supposedly drilled 150 feet into the mountain to see what it was made of. Not just any mountain would take a 130-foot cut.

In fact, not many engineers could really evaluate a cut that huge. NCDOT sure didn’t do it routinely. And they’d been in such a hurry.

In Chapel Hill, though, was a man who could. Steve still had fond memories of his geology classes. Surely Dr. Lombardi would be pleased to answer a few questions.

It had been a busy day, just like he’d told Sue Ann the night before, with the adjustor coming up from Asheville first thing, and Roland needing all the calming down he could get. Now Randy was finally back in his armchair to get a little calming of his own.

And he needed all the calming he could get.

Most of the time, selling insurance was a straightforward affair, and he enjoyed doing it, and it gave him a heartwarming feeling to know that people had just the right coverage in case something did happen. And if something should happen, then the check was in the mail right away. And even when there was some question about exactly what was covered and exactly what the loss had been, it usually got resolved, and even if the customer wasn’t completely happy, Randy had never really seen the underwriter do anything but the best they reasonably could, under the circumstances.

But once in a blue moon, really, or even less, a case popped up where something wasn’t straightforward. He’d even worked with Gordon and his force when the authorities should be involved, where there was fraud or worse involved, because insurance claims could mean a lot of money.

Not that even for a minute did Randy think Roland Coates would ever do anything that wasn’t upright and proper. And while it was true that he had specifically asked about fire coverage, that didn’t have to mean anything. But it was also true that he had a warehouse full of unsold furniture and a drawer of unpaid bills, as most people in town knew. All of that didn’t have to mean anything, either, as coincidental as it had been. Surely anybody seeing poor Roland that night, and today, too, would see how truly torn up and beside himself he was.

And, well, Roland was no actor.

And, hard as it might be to imagine, Roland might be more upset than even just the warehouse burning would explain.

So Randy had had his little talk with the adjustor, the two of them just by themselves, and he’d said what he had, and he certainly hoped he’d done the right thing.

October 18, Wednesday

Steve was getting to like Kyle McCoy. The kid was hyper-courteous, but apparently he still liked to pulverize opposing football teams and basketball teams and anybody else who it was acceptable in polite society to maim.

And now they were on ladders directly under a hundred-pound piece of wood, removing the nails that kept it from falling on them.

“Do you know how long this has been nailed here?” Steve asked.

“No, sir. My father might but I hadn’t ever noticed it myself.”

The opposite corner was Julius Caesar, in a robe, with his hand up and leaves in his hair. That, however, provided no clue to what was in this corner—symmetry of design was conspicuously absent. The two scenes adjoining the plywood were pilgrims at Plymouth Rock, and some other character who was either Charlemagne or possibly Theodore Roosevelt, or even Marilyn Monroe, but probably not.

The last nail was coming out. Steve had his end loose, and then Kyle dropped the hammer and they were holding the whole thing by themselves.

“Here we go,” Steve said, and slowly they stepped down the ladders and laid the plywood on the floor. “Wow. Thanks.”

Kyle smiled, a pure clone of Randy. “Yes, sir.”

Then they looked up.

“What is it?”

“I can’t tell,” Kyle said.

It was a profusion of jagged green lines and green triangles and other green shapes, squarely in the artistic tradition of the rest of the ceiling. But where the rest was supposedly realistic, in this section the realism overwhelmed itself by the great number of details in its small space. The result was in pure abstraction, accentuated by one straight, bold brown line through the middle.

“Maybe it’s a Picasso,” Steve said.

“More like Jackson Pollock,” Kyle said.

“What?”

“I’m taking Art Appreciation.”

“They teach Jackson Pollock at Jefferson County High School?”

“No, sir,” Kyle said. “But I’ve been looking at books on my own at the library.”

“It would be hard to throw paint at a ceiling.” Steve looked up. “Does it say something?”

“I’ll get up and see.” At the top of the ladder, Kyle was inches from the ceiling. “It does, but it’s hard to tell. ‘TS40’? Or something. Way back in the corner. It’s kind of scratched up.”

“Oh, well. Maybe somebody knows.” Steve lifted the edge of the plywood and leaned it against the wall. “I wonder what we should do with this. I’d hate to be arrested for stealing it.” He had to laugh. “The sheriff would grab any opportunity.”

“Yes, sir. You crossed him back during the flood and he’ll remember that.”

“I won’t forget, either,” Steve said.

“Is there anything else I need to do for you, Mr. Carter? Otherwise, I’ll be needing to leave, now.”

“No. That’s fine. I’m meeting someone in a couple minutes anyway.”

Joe parked his truck in the courthouse lot and walked in the back door and up the stairs. Steve would be waiting in the main room.

“Thanks for coming,” Steve said, and they sat at the tables. “You probably want to just get to business.”

“That would be fine.”

“Okay. I’ve been finding a lot of stuff about Gold River Highway and the new shopping center. I think you need to know about it.”

Such a young man. And smart, but he had sense, too. “Go ahead. And I’ll tell you a few things.”

“Okay. I’ve got a copy of the contract between the Trinkle family and Regency Atlantic. They signed it last year, and Regency says they’ll only carry through with buying the land and building on three conditions—the taxes get paid, the deed is settled, and Gold River Highway gets built. The first two were settled, so that means that last year, both parties were expecting Gold River Highway to be approved by this December. You said you knew who had pushed it through the Assembly?”

“Jack Royce. It was the Trinkles that paid him.”

“Paid?”

“That’s how it usually is.”

“Right. So you already knew how it happened?”

“Only some.” But he still didn’t know the important part. “Who’d be against the road?”

“Against it.” Steve shook his head. “I don’t know, beside everyone you know. Just that whole gang who’ve been against it since January. Everett Colony and his friends.”

Since January.

“Are you okay, Joe?” Steve asked.

That was likely it. The weight of it came down on him.

“What are you voting on this road?” Joe asked.

“Uh . . . I don’t know yet,” Steve said. “Everyone wants me to vote yes. I just can’t stand thinking what they’ll do to the mountain.”

“Tell people you don’t know. Tell anyone who asks.”

“Okay.”

“Is there anything else you know?” Joe asked.

“I guess not. I know a lot more now about how NCDOT works, but that doesn’t matter for this. Oh, I know. Joe, can you tell me anything about that corner of the ceiling?”

“Oh, that.” Joe turned to look. It was about the way he remembered from thirty years back. Somehow, looking at it took some of the weight back off.

“What is it?”

“It’s a Bible verse.”

“It is?” Steve stood to look at it closer. “Why was it covered?”

“The board decided it wasn’t fitting for the courthouse.”

“Oh. Because it was religious?”

“That’s what they said. I didn’t see it was a problem.”

“You voted against uncovering it.”

“Just so you others wouldn’t have the trouble of deciding what to do with it.”

“Right. What is it?”

“He knew right off,” Steve said to Natalie.

“So what was it?”

“I thought it said
TS40.
But it was Isaiah 40. It was an
I,
not a
T.
”

“What does that say?”

“He recited it. From memory.” Steve held up Max’s Sunday school Bible. “Check this out. ‘A voice is calling, “Clear the way for the Lord in the wilderness; Make smooth in the desert a highway for our God. Let every valley be lifted up, And every mountain and hill be made low.” ’ ”

“Why would they have that on the courthouse ceiling?”

“It was supposed to be about founding Wardsville in the wilderness. Isn’t it weird, though? We uncover it right before we vote on building a road over Mount Ayawisgi?”

October 20, Friday

“Louise! Louise, come out here!”

She did! She came flying out of the kitchen into the hall, and there was Byron standing at the front door with his eyes wide open and his mouth open even more.

“What is it?”

“You won’t believe it!”

By now, she’d believe anything. When he was home, all Byron could talk about was what a frenzy Mr. Coates was being in every minute—up and down, hot and cold, and driving himself to distraction.

“Just tell me!” she said.

“Mr. Coates called us all up to the front, the ones who were there, just when we were finishing up for the day. He looked as bad as I’ve ever seen him. And he said, ‘I’ve got bad news, terrible news, and I don’t even want to tell you, but I will.’ It was only a dozen of us there with him—that’s all that were working today. And he said, ‘The insurance company and the State Police have been asking questions and looking around, looking at the warehouse and how the fire started and who might have thought to do it.’ ”

“ ‘Thought to do it’? Oh, Byron. I’ve been so scared that Mr. Coates had done it.”

“I think that’s crossed a few minds. But that’s not what he said. ‘So they just told me,’ he said, ‘the police want to arrest Jeremy for it.’ He couldn’t hardly say Jeremy’s name.”

“Jeremy!”

“Jeremy. And sounds like the boy got wind of it, because he’s gone.”

“What do you mean, gone?”

“Not at his place in Asheville, not been at his job all week, no sign of him.”

“Why did they ever think it was him?”

“It sounds like it was the insurance company asking questions first, and they put the police onto him, by what Grady and Doris are saying.”

“Poor Jeremy.” It was terrible. Somehow, it didn’t seem like a surprise. But it was so terrible. Jeremy running away, and how must Mr. Coates feel?

“And the worst of it,” Byron was saying, “is that I think Mr. Coates knew it all along.”

And it was because of that terrible road!

“There it is.”

Yes, it was. Eliza stood with Steve Carter beneath the strange markings. They confused her.

“I don’t understand it,” she said.

“Right,” Steve said. “I had to ask Joe. He remembered it from before it was covered up.”

It had seemed important to uncover it. But now, it was not what she had thought it would be. “Does it have a meaning?”

Zach was leaned back in a chair, waiting for her, but also looking with her at the ceiling.

“Yeah,” Steve said. “It’s from the Bible. It’s actually a verse about making a road. ‘Every valley be lifted up and every hill be made low.’ ”

“What is the road for?” she asked.

“Well, for God. ‘
Make a way for the Lord’
is what it says.”

Bring down a mountain. For a road! Two Powers in opposition, in absolute conflict.

“Randy McCoy, good evening.”

“Randy? It’s Louise.”

Randy put his head down on his hands. He’d been expecting the call, not that that meant he was ready for it.

“How are you, Louise?”

“Well, better than I was a little while ago.”

“What can I do for you?”

“I’m calling to see what you’ve already done.”

She didn’t sound angry. “Only what I had to,” he said.

“Did you tell your insurance people that Jeremy started the fire?”

“That’s what I had to do.”

“Oh, Randy.” No, she wasn’t angry. Her voice in the telephone sounded just so sad. “Did he?”

“I think he did, Louise.”

“And now he’s run off?”

“I guess I’ve heard that, too.”

“You could have called me, Randy. If I’d known before Byron did— maybe I could have been more ready. These weeks have already been so hard on him.”

“I wanted to call. The police and the insurance investigator told me not to. They didn’t want word to get to Jeremy.”

“But why did he do it?”

“He was thinking it might break up Roland’s deal to sell the factory. I won’t say that makes much sense, but it seems more and more people don’t use any sense in what they do.”

“How do you know what he was thinking?” Then she said, “And how did he know to run off?”

“Maybe somebody talked to him.” The week had been hard on Randy, too.

“You two were in school together, weren’t you?”

“We were, Louise, and we even played basketball together.”

“Then good night, Randy.”

“Good night, Louise.”

October 23, Monday

“I didn’t say that!” Steve had the
Wardsville Guardian
in his hand. “I didn’t say it!”

“I know you didn’t,” Natalie said. “ ‘People in Gold Valley are mighty worked up about the road, Steve Carter said.’ You couldn’t talk that way if you tried.”

“ ‘Mighty worked up’? Good grief. He asked how I was planning to vote, and all I said was that I knew most people in Gold Valley were strongly in favor. That’s all I said.”