So Cold the River

liquid the color of sandstone.

“They drank this stuff?” Eric said.

“Drank it out of the bottles, yes, but they also had spas, springs you’d sit in that would supposedly cure physical ailments. That was the big deal at the resorts. People would come from all over the world to visit those springs for the healing effects.”

Eric was running his thumb over that etched figure on the base, watching sediment rise and settle inside the glass with his motions.

“Isn’t it just a gorgeous bottle?” Alyssa Bradford said. “It’s the one thing I found that had something to do with his hometown. I think it’s fantastic that he kept it all these years. That bottle is about eighty years old. Maybe more.”

“What’s with the devil?”

“He’s Pluto. It’s the Roman version of Hades. God of the underworld.”

“Seems like a strange mascot for a company to choose.”

“Well, the mineral water came from underground springs. I suppose that inspired them. Anyhow, he’s a happy-looking devil, isn’t he?”

He was that. Cheerful, welcoming. That water inside the bottle, though, was a different story. Something about its odd color and those fine, grainy flakes of sediment turned Eric’s stomach, and he set the bottle on the table and slid it back to her.

“No, you can keep it for now,” she said. “I’d like you to take it with you. See if you can find someone who can give an accurate date for it.”

He didn’t want the bottle at all, but he accepted it when she pushed it across the table, wrapped his hand around it and felt that unnatural penetrating cold from within.

“What do you have in that purse, dry ice?”

“It always feels that way, actually,” she said. “I don’t understand why. Something about the mineral content? Or maybe that old glass.”

He put the bottle in his briefcase and refilled his coffee while she wrote him a five-thousand-dollar check, keeping his palm pressed against the warm side of the mug until she’d signed it and torn it free and handed it to him.

3

IT WAS THE SORT of story that begged for telling, and with the addition of those wild, extravagant hotels in so rural a place, it was a story with a strong visual component. Perfect for film. Maybe this could go somewhere beyond the Bradfords. Maybe, if he did it right, this could open some doors that had swung shut in his face out in L.A.

Before even setting foot in the town, Eric had swiftly developed a sort of possessive fear about the place, a worry that somebody else was going to get there first. The stories he’d found in his first pass of research were countless. Rich and poor, gangsters and politicians, the explosion and then death of the passenger trains, Prohibition and the effects of the stock-market collapse—all of it had swirled through these bizarre little towns. They were a microcosm, really, a story of America. It was a chance to do something real again.

Alyssa Bradford called him three days after their meeting to say he could check into the West Baden Springs Hotel on the first Friday of May. That was just one week away, and she’d arranged for him to have his first—maybe his only, depending on the man’s health—chance to talk with Campbell Bradford on the Thursday prior. Alyssa warned that the old man was not well, might not be able to communicate. Eric said he still wanted to give it a shot.

Claire called that night, and when he saw her number on the caller ID, he felt flushed with relief and gratitude—it had been a week since they’d spoken, and each day was drawing longer and harder on him. Then she said, “I was just calling to check on you,” and that was all it took to erase the positive feelings. Calling to check on him? Like he was suicidal or something now that they weren’t together, incapable of maintaining a life without her in it?

He made a few cutting remarks, threw in one jab about her father, and guided her toward an early hang-up like a dog herding cattle toward an open gate. When she invited him to give her a call in a few days, he said not to count on it.

“I’m headed out of town for a while,” he said. “Few weeks, maybe a month.”

“Spontaneous vacation?” she said after a beat of silence.

“Work.”

“And where are you going?”

“Indiana,” he said, biting off the word with pain.

“How exotic.”

“It’s a hell of a story. Believe it or not, those don’t always come from Maui or Manhattan.”

“I’m just kidding. Tell me about the story.”

“Maybe later. I’ve got a lot to do, Claire.”

“Okay.” Her voice had some sorrow in it, and that pleased him. “Well, I hope it goes great for you, whatever it is.”

He swung a closed fist toward the wall, pulled the punch at the last minute, and landed it with a soft thump, no real pain. Damn her hopes for him, her well wishes, and her blessings.

“I’m sure that it will,” he said. “I’ve got a good feeling about it. Things just seem to be looking up for me lately.”

That was a cruel parting line, and he knew from her frigid Good-bye, Eric, and the click of the breaking connection that it had scored a direct hit. He turned off his phone and went to the kitchen and poured himself two fingers of Scotch. No, hell with it, pour four. He dropped an ice cube into that—Water the drink down a touch, and the quantity becomes no problem at all, right? —and then went into the living room and began scanning through the DVD collection, looking for something to take his thoughts away. Something by one of his old favorites, Huston or Peckinpah, maybe. Yes, Peckinpah. Make it bloody and loud. That seemed right tonight.

He’d watched Straw Dogs and had another Scotch and tried without success to sleep before he found himself back at the computer, researching again. He’d found there were matches for the correct Campbell Bradford—though it appeared in most formal circumstances he referred to himself as C. L. Bradford—but all of them had to do with his philanthropy. For a man of such great wealth, he’d lived a remarkably quiet existence. Eric couldn’t find so much as a short bio paragraph on the Web, just the name on list after list of contributors for various causes. His donations spanned a wide spectrum, too wide to tell Eric much about the man, but it was obvious he was partial to liberal politics and a supporter of the arts, particularly music. He’d made sizable donations to various community orchestras, but Eric noted that they seemed to be small or rural groups, with names like Hendricks County Philharmonic, rather than the prestigious symphonies. Perhaps he assumed—correctly, no doubt—that the large ones were better funded.

After cycling through pages of results without finding anything of interest, Eric went back and ran a search for Campbell along with the words “West Baden” and got nothing. He tried again with “French Lick” and was surprised to find three results. A closer look revealed all three were basically the same thing—a request for information on Campbell and a handful of others posted by an Indiana University graduate student named Kellen Cage. The student explained that he was researching the area’s history for a thesis and was hoping for any information about a handful of people—particularly, he’d written, Campbell Bradford and Shadrach Hunter. The latter name meant nothing to Eric. There was an e-mail address listed, though, so Eric went ahead and dropped him a note. If the kid was intrigued by Campbell, that meant he’d heard some stories already, which put him well ahead of Eric. And, for that matter, Campbell’s family.

After exhausting the minimal possibilities for Campbell, he turned to searching for Pluto Water and soon found some old ads that he’d have to include in the film. They were priceless. Pluto Water cured damn near everything, it seemed. Alcoholism, asthma, obesity, paralysis, pimples, hives, influenza, insomnia, malaria, and venereal disease all made the list. It turned out the product was nothing more than a laxative, but even after that