“That it is.”
“I’ve got it. Sorry. This is your way of getting to that Faoni woman.”
“Yes.”
“And you need to get to her because of some other story you’re working on.”
“You’re thinking pretty well, for someone half asleep.”
“And let me guess: the other story has something to do with those escapees from the federal prison in Kentucky. Am I right?”
“I make no promises. I’m not sure what the story is. I’m not even sure there is a story. And if there is a story, at this moment I haven’t the slightest idea how I can get ahold of it, or how I can report it.”
“I understand.”
“Andy? To be honest, there is also a personal element to what I’m doing.”
“Aha! Just as I guessed: the shapely Faoni is an old flame!”
“Therefore I expect to pay my own expenses on this one.”
“We wage-slaves will appreciate that, Mister Fletcher.”
“Who is free on-camera in Chicago right now? Could Cindy and Mac meet me at O’Hare Airport shortly after noon?”
“I’ll check.”
“I’ll do the writing, of course, if…”
“Yes, sir, Mister Fletcher. I’ll get Research to fax you everything they have about food-addicted people at the farm before dawn.”
“Atta boy. Also everything about Blythe Spirit. Who owns it, who runs it, does medical insurance pay for their services, or is it a place one checks into with a credit card?”
“Yes, sir. But, Mister Fletcher …”
“Yes, Andy?”
“When I called Blythe Spirit they were highly protective of their patients, or clients, or whatever. What makes you think they’ll be glad to see you arrive with Cindy Watts and Mac and his camera on a Sunday afternoon?”
“You’ll have to talk with them, of course. That charm of yours. Assure them we absolutely shall respect the privacy of their clients, except any who volunteer to be interviewed on camera, either disguised or not. Their choice.”
“You don’t think they might suspect an ulterior motive if I call them at midnight and say a GCN crew is arriving at teatime?”
“I believe Blythe Spirit is a private, for-profit enterprise, Andy. You know they’ll be dazzled by the publicity possibilities. For them it means more clients, income, a chance to explain their meditation techniques. And you know the one thing people never can remain silent about is silence.”
Andy remained silent.
Fletch chuckled. “So call Blythe Spirit early in the morning and tell them we just happen to have a crew in their area, this is their big chance—”
“Okay.”
“Sorry to ask for all this at this late hour Saturday night, Andy.”
“Sunday morning.”
“Sunday morning.”
“It’s okay, Mister Fletcher. It’s always interesting to see how you work. I’ll bet you have a very big story here.”
“Don’t bet anything you can’t afford to lose, Andy. Don’t bet your job on it.”
When he arrived home, the Jeep was in the carport as clean as new.
Thus Fletch assumed a certain matter had been taken care of.
He assumed the remains of Juan Moreno had been carted off.
The garbage bag filled with the filthy prison clothes and boots was undisturbed by the back door.
The phones were working.
Before he had poured his coffee Sunday morning, Fletch had heard Emory’s truck arrive. Normally, Emory did not work on the farm Sundays.
Emory stood on the front lawn, squinting in the early morning light, talking to Fletch on the upper balcony.
“I didn’t know you and Carrie made it home last night. So I came by to feed the horses and the chickens.”
“Nice of you, Emory. We got home pretty late.”
“I didn’t know you were here until I saw the truck and the station wagon.”
“We were at a dance. In Alabama.”
“Was it a high ol’ time?”
“I guess. You should have been with us.”
“Did you do any buck dancin’, Mister Fletch?”
“Not last night.”
“Many pretty girls?”
“Pretty girls…” Fletch thought of the bare-chested men circling the bonfire knocking each other silly. “I only had eyes for Carrie, Emory. You know that.”
“None you’d bring home to Mama, uh?”
“A few I might bring home to the Judge.”
“That ugly, uh?”
“Criminal.”
“Mister Fletch, I thought maybe we’d lost a cow. Some-thin’ smelled dead. I followed my nose. To the gully. A human. A dead man in the gully. Suspect it might be one of those escaped villains?”
“Might be. All your relatives accounted for this morning, Emory?”
Emory laughed. “I never have been able to count ‘em all. The mess in the gully isn’t anybody I recognize, anyway.”
“That’s good.” On the balcony, Fletch blinked in the sunlight. “Guess I’d better come look, Emory, before I call the sheriff’s department.”
The sheriff’s department without a sheriff, he said to himself.
Fletch realized there really was not much need for him to go look. The mess in the gully was Juan Moreno, late of the federal penitentiary in Tomaston, Kentucky. Fletch had already seen him dead. He did not want to see him again.
His training as a reporter made him go down through the house, leave his coffee cup in the kitchen, walk with Emory up the fields to the gully, and peer down at what once had been relatively human.
He could not report anything of which he was not immediately sure.
“GUESS I’M GOING to Chicago.”
When Carrie came into the study in her bathrobe she was holding a cup of coffee to her lips as she walked.
At the desk, Fletch was reading through a sheaf of faxes which had arrived from GCN and Andy Cyst. There were several pages describing the clinical disorder of life-threatening obesity. There were two pages regarding Blythe Spirit, its founding, corporate structure, ownership, size, services offered, qualifications of senior staff, professional operating theory, licenses, etc.
There was a one-page note from Andy saying that Mac was in hospital with a slipped disk but Cindy and Roger would meet him at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport shortly after noon; the administration and staff of Blythe Spirit would be delighted to see the crew from GCN whenever they arrived that afternoon, and would do their best to prevail upon “one or two patients to volunteer for interviews.”
“When?” Carrie drew her legs onto the couch under her.
“Leaving as soon as I get dressed.”
