The mayor looked around at the olive drab National Guard trucks and uniformed guardsmen, the trailers and booths staffed by FEMA and various state and county agencies. There were sheriff’s patrol cars, vans, and SUVs, California Highway Patrol, police cars from outlying cities, and newspaper, TV, and radio vehicles everywhere she looked. Iris Cash from the Village View waved at her then turned back to a fireman wearing a yellow helmet and a bulky fire-fighting suit. The cannons of Pendleton began booming in the west, a sound that made Evelyn cringe. They could go on for hours.
“Does anybody know who started the fire?” asked a tall boy whom Evelyn recognized as a classmate of her son.
“There has not been an arrest,” said Evelyn.
“I don’t understand why someone would do that.”
“Here, watch this.” She touched Play on her laptop and turned it to face the boy. She had made this video segment, “Arson,” with the help of her son and daughter. They’d enlarged some of the photographs she’d taken out in Rice Canyon where the fire had been started, then used a Flip to shoot them. Also on the video were sketches she’d drawn of the weirdly fused triggering device and container for accelerant that she had found. The DA wouldn’t release forensic photos to the public before trial, so Evelyn had drawn her own. Then they had recorded Iris Cash interviewing Fire Chief Bruck and two sheriff’s detectives familiar with arsonist behavior. “Arsonists are often secretive, introverted individuals,” one of the detectives explained. “They often derive feelings of power and superiority from the fire itself, as well as the human efforts to control the fire. Some arsonists join in to fight the fire as a way of enjoying their control. Some arsonists experience a sexual component when observing the fire.”
“That’s totally gross,” said the boy. “It’s murder if someone dies, right?”
“Some arsonists have been charged with homicide,” said Evelyn. “And have done years in prison or in mental hospitals.”
“Mental hospitals creep me out,” said the boy, staring down at the monitor. Another boy, apparently a friend, came over and stood beside him. Evelyn watched the emotions play across their faces as they tried to understand the psychopathy of fire-setting. The first boy looked offended, the second amused. On-screen the detective explained in a deadpan cop voice that mental illness and antisocial tendencies sometimes found expression in arson. “It’s a crime of control and power,” he said. “Most arsonists are repeat offenders. They begin with small fires and escalate. This Fallbrook fire is one of the largest arson fires in the history of California. It is likely that whoever set this fire has set others. The damage is in the billions of dollars and three lives were lost. It is one of the most heinous crimes I’ve ever investigated. So please, if any of you saw anything suspicious at or around the time of the fire, please contact the San Diego Sheriff’s Department.”
“How much is the reward up to?” asked the second boy.
“Ninety-eight thousand dollars,” said Evelyn. “That jar there is for reward donations.” She had spiked it with three fives earlier, and since then had collected a handful of change and two wadded-up dollar bills.
“I wish I had seen something,” said the first. “That would have been cool. All I saw was smoke and Mom trying to catch the cat.”
By noon there had been far fewer attendees than Evelyn had expected. She knew why, too — because the routed, exhausted, burned-out, and grieving people of her city understood that, in practical terms, their government could do very little for anybody. The city could offer bottled water donated by Major Market. There were pallets of it stacked up beside her table, heavy twenty-four-packs, all free. And the Red Cross had come through with bags of rice and beans, boxes of hot cocoa mix and marshmallows, though most if it was quickly claimed by people Evelyn knew to be the local poor, most of whom lived downtown, which was untouched by the fire. And that was about all the help the City of Fallbrook could give.
Evelyn left her table to check out the FEMA trailers, which were set up directly across from her position. She saw battle-ready ICE and DHS and Border Patrol agents and wondered how they fit into disaster relief. She approached and found the FEMA tables sagging under a bounty of puzzling donations: box after box of ocean-scent deodorant bar soap, large bottles of cider vinegar, cheap socket-wrench sets, cotton balls, bagged garlic cloves, two-packs of aerosol air freshener, bundles of week-old magazines, cartons of single-serve crouton pouches, and pile upon pile of new jeans all in one size — thirty-six-inch waists, thirty-inch inseams. Pawing through the jeans, looking for just one pair in a varying size, was like seeing into the mad mind of government itself, thought Evelyn. So much waste. So many good intentions. Who’s governing it?
She went back to her table and straightened the stacks of pamphlets and sat. Her video detective droned on about arson. From this elevation she could see the blackened hills to the east and south, and the San Luis Rey River Valley still mostly green and spared the burn, and a small housing tract, Meadows, to the north. Meadows was newer and hard-hit by the mortgage meltdown and real estate crash, and Evelyn knew two families who had lived in that tract and just recently sold short and left Fallbrook. The parents of one family were both in the mortgage business itself — loan originators. The other family’s breadwinner was a project manager for a commercial builder, and was laid off with little chance of finding work in that moribund industry. Adios. Now the fire had raged through it and Meadows looked as if it had hosted a neighborhood war, some homes burned flat, some scorched but standing, maybe half of them left untouched. Even at this distance Evelyn could see a family picking through the rubble of one house, while across the street an older man stood and watched the sprinklers water his lawn.
“We’re staying over at the Baptist church for a few days,” a bedraggled woman told her. She had two small children with her. She lifted a pamphlet, scanned it, and set it back under the rock. “They’ve been good to us there. Hot meals and cots. It’s chilly at night. We’re not even Baptist but maybe we’ll consider joining up.”
“You’re free to take all the water you can carry.”
“We’ve got plenty of water, thank you. Did you see this?”
The woman handed her a flyer entitled “Take Back Main Street!”
“Cade Magnus,” said Evelyn.
“I had no idea he was back.”
“Where did you get this?”
“There was a stack of them at the Donut Bin this morning. And they’re all over the telephone poles and bulletin boards in town.”
Evelyn wondered why Cade Magnus would even want to come back to a town that disliked him. “It’s like having a relapse of cancer. It was so nice just to be rid of his father and him.”
“My husband has never met those people,” said the woman. “But he wants to join the protest. He said Main Street needs taking back. Plus he has guns, so he’d fit in. He’s a good man, don’t get me wrong.”
“The less he has to do with Cade Magnus the better. Oh, wait a minute — I’m the mayor and I can’t oppose lawful assembly. I will not oppose lawful assembly, because that would mean Cade Magnus wins? Right? Just tell your husband to exercise caution. We don’t need people carrying guns around Fallbrook.”