'Well, if that isn't just mouse turds in the cornmeal.'
'Stop talking like a hick,' Maria said under her breath.
'They had all the time in the world to dynamite the mine,'' Dan said. ''It's twenty or thirty miles from anything. Nobody would hear it.'
'We don't have evidence to prosecute,' McNiel said with finality. 'Who would we prosecute?'
'I understand,' Dan said. 'What do they say about the big reservoir out there and the plastic pipe?'
'They're growing pacific yew in hedges and they use that to mix pesticides.'
'That's bullshit.'
'Well, what do we do, arrest them for lying?'
'I've seen the hedges,' Maria said. 'I'll bet they've already run agricultural chemicals through the pond, so if we looked for residue, we'd find bug killer. But shouldn't we at least look?'
'I'll never get another search warrant. What is it we suspect they do with that reservoir that's illegal?'
''Do they have permits to spray pesticides?'' Maria asked.
'They do,' the sheriff said.
'There's got to be something,' said Dan. 'Maybe the DA has-'
''Oh, believe me, we're talking to him. He wants evidence. Even if we took your testimony, Dan, we don't know who was shooting at you. Some guy named Meat Ball is all we have and you threatened him, not the other way around. We'll be watching them. If they sneeze, we'll be on it, but as it stands now we can't charge anyone.'
Dan sat stunned, not quite believing it. Without saying a word he got up and walked to the door.
The woman's hands flowed over his back. She was an artist. Slowly she stripped the tension from his shoulders and loosened his lower back. Whatever his secretary paid her, it wasn't enough. Kenji was in the wintertime conference room that was something of a sunroom, a library, and a good place for a drink. It contained a collapsible massage table that he was beginning to use with regularity.
Nothing, not even the best massage, brought his stress level to normal, but it was an improvement over a back full of violin-string muscles. His enemies were everywhere, poking into everything. Blowing up the mine was only a temporary measure and would set back research immensely because now they had no volume of effluent on which to run their tests. And a ghost was stirring in the grave, thanks to Dan Young.
Hans Groiter entered the sunroom and dismissed the masseuse.
'He was in the mine,' Kenji said. 'Do you suppose he found the body?'
Groiter didn't bother telling him that if he did, it was headless.
'I hid it well.'
'They're going to look into it. I guarantee you that.'
'Let them investigate. There's a mountain of rock in the way. And we took everything out, including the photographer's body.'
'You took the body out without my authorization?'
'Yeah. But you don't want to be involved in the details. You're better off not knowing.'
'Who else knows?'
'Only those who absolutely need to know. You're safe. Relax.'
'Don't tell me to relax. I told you to stop them. Since that time you've accomplished nothing. They have come onto Amada land, forced us to derail a major project, and set us months behind. They're going to cost us hundreds of millions and you tell me to relax.'
''It takes time. We will get Maria Fischer. That will divert him, and we'll know everything they know.'
Groiter's threat about the photographer's body was only implied, but it was just beneath the surface of his words. Of course Hans wanted Kenji to believe that if something should happen to him, the people who 'needed to know' about the photographer's body might pay a visit to the sheriff. When the time was right, he would deal with Groiter. Probably send him off to the South Seas with a nice pension that would disappear if the photographer didn't stay buried. Right now the unnerving uncertainty was good for both of them.
'Suppose he did get a sample of the effluent. How long do we have before they've analyzed it?'
'Three or four days. But what's it going to tell them?' Groiter said.
'It's going to tell them that we're doing something with wood distillates and that it has nothing to do with yew trees.'
'It'll tell them that somebody spilled a wood alcohol byproduct in the mine.'
'Even that tells them too much. But you can't explain that effluent without understanding the catalyst. So that tells them a lot. Way too much,'' Kenji said.' 'Those two fucking lawyers did something the police could never have done without a warrant. Up until now they had no way or reason to get one.'
'Once we snatch Fischer, everyone will be distracted.'
'I need time,' Kenji said. 'Sixty days to get this lab wrapped up and moved. We can't hang onto it any longer. We've lost all the effluent and it will be tough to continue working on bulk conversion. Until I get out of the country, I want those two lawyers dead or distracted.'
Corey was not averse to all of the wishes of the German. This morning she had to take care of a major detail in what had become their plan to take down Maria Fischer.
In her kitchen after her second cup of green tea, she went to the drawer and removed a razor-sharp fillet knife from the knife rack, then picked up a day pack that she had already loaded. On the way through the garage, she picked up a torch and the TV/VCR player. She climbed into the front seat and turned the key, sending the van rumbling to life.
It took about sixty minutes to drive from her house to the grower's place deep in the mountains at the end of an isolated back road. Jack Morgan was a pot farmer who grew most of his crop on property Corey had acquired with a tiny portion of her father's money. For $10,000 every six months, paid in small-denomination bills, Jack had the use of 160 forested acres with good access to water. Located miles away from any residence, the property was almost surrounded by Forest Service land.
Jack Morgan lived in a two-story yellow farmhouse with gables and a steep-pitched roof. When Corey arrived at the front door, the bearded, balding grower greeted her but didn't invite her in. A short, rail-thin man, Jack Morgan glanced around nervously, obviously not wanting anyone to see him with Corey Schneider.
''Hang loose,'' said Corey. ''You got a tick up your dick? You think there's guys hidin' in the bushes?'
'Let's go out back.' Jack led Corey around the back of the house and into a large barn. There he seemed to relax. Reeking of hay and livestock, the place felt like a real farm. Jack stopped just inside the door, near a stack of gray fifty-five-gallon drums marked diesel. They looked military. 'I've got workers coming and going-I don't want them spreading rumors I talk to you. There should be no connection between you, me, and that property.'
'Fine by me.'
'So why did you come?'
'Well, it's like this. You owe me thirty thousand including interest and haven't paid me back. Furthermore, you have ten thousand in rent coming due.'
'Two of my places got raided. It's only a couple of months till the crop comes in. I borrowed the money for planting. You know that.'
'You're late, Jack.'
'I don't have it. Spent it on lawyers after the raid. They got the pot and my lawyers got what money I had.'
'Fortunately for you, I have a way you can work your way out of this. Somebody will pay you the forty grand you need to pay me.'
Jack eyed her suspiciously. ''I can pay you the forty grand after the harvest. I thought you understood that.'
'I need the money now. I have a plan I'm working on, and you're going to help me. One Maria Fischer has gone over to the other side, and you are going to help me detain her and ask her a few questions.'
''I don't know, Corey. I gotta keep a kinda low profile out here, you know? I don't know that I wanna get involved.'
'Way I see it, Jack, you don't have much choice. Cops could find out about this place in a hurry, for
