But what they saw as they crisscrossed toward Waterbury was less organized relief efforts, and more individual evidence of that older, less official, rural New England code that tended to respond to catastrophe stoically. Things were what they were, such a philosophy dictated. And then you got on with it.
It was close to the end of day when they reached their destination, and Joe was happy that he’d called ahead instead of relying on serendipity to supply them with room and board for the night. On the map, the town’s main street was ruler straight for over a mile, with the Winooski River hanging like a droopy clothesline from each end, outlining a half-oval parcel containing the office complex, a large field, and one perpendicular street with its bridge at the bottom. By and large, that whole section of land, roughly seven thousand feet long by two thousand at its widest, had been plunged underwater.
Waterbury had received the proverbial shellacking.
“Damn,” Spinney said as they crested the hill heading down into the floodplain at the center of it all. “I’m impressed they’re only missing one person.”
Traces of recovery were plentiful, as they had been all the way here, along with defiant hand-lettered signs adorning mud-clogged front yards and semi-destroyed homes, but the brutality of what had occurred lingered in the faces they saw as they drove by. This was a community funeral of sorts, and there was no amount of thumbs-up or spirit-rousing rallying that could alter it.
The man Joe had phoned was Bill Allard, the director of the VBI, who-along with the squad that handled this portion of the state-had been evacuated from the public safety building while inspectors checked it out. This made Allard at once a busy guy, making sure that his other units were up and running smoothly-by whatever means they could muster-and someone with time on his hands. He’d been the one to ask Joe to handle this missing person case.
Bill lived on Winooski Street-located within that flood-prone bulge between Main Street and the river. Fortunately for him, his address was near Main, and thus on higher ground. Those closer to its far end had run the gamut from getting their basements flooded to having their homes washed away. Turning right to reach Allard’s house, Joe was again reminded of his family’s good fortune. A second call to Thetford had recently revealed that Leo and their mom had suffered nothing beyond being cooped up indoors on a terrifically rainy day.
As Joe and Lester emerged stretching from their vehicle in the driveway at last, a square-built, muscular man approached from the adjacent Greek Revival home.
“Rough trip?” he asked, extending a hand in greeting. “I didn’t have a clue when you’d get here.”
“Would’ve been sooner,” Joe told him. “We rubbernecked some on the way. Wanted to check out the damage.”
Bill shook his head sorrowfully. “I wish I’d had to do that to see worse than what we got here. But this was about as bad as it gets. They’re saying over two hundred homes have been either badly hit or totally destroyed.” He waved a hand down the street, adding, “Including a couple almost within sight of here. My own backyard was flooded. It stopped just shy of the place.” He indicated his home. “It feels so random, you know? Fluky. I’ve been watching the news. They’ve got footage of a streamside house that looks so good, even the garden’s okay, but the next-door neighbor-not a hundred yards away-is off his foundation and sitting in a field of mud. Makes me feel guilty, almost. You got more bags?”
The three of them entered Allard’s home and settled in the kitchen as he prepared them something hot to drink. His wife came down to meet them and offered to cook dinner, which they gratefully accepted. Bill therefore shifted them to his office off the living room to give her space.
Joe glanced around at the signs of upheaval-piles of folders and files and scattered paperwork, covering every flat surface. “All the conveniences of your real office?” he asked with a sympathetic smile.
Bill was clearing seating space and groaned. “Yeah-right. I have no idea how people work at home.” He then looked up and added, “Thank God, we run a pretty autonomous outfit with the VBI. Can you imagine if we were more traditionally top-down? Other agencies are in a real pickle right now.”
They settled down with their coffee, making themselves comfortable.
“How is the public safety building?” Joe asked.
“It would’ve been fine, except for the damned tunnels,” Allard explained. “The water never reached the walls, pretty much like this house. But no one thought to rig the tunnels with watertight doors, so that’s how it got in. So stupid,” he added. “It’s always the things you don’t think of.”
“Those the same tunnels that Carolyn Barber used?” Lester asked. “They sound like a rabbit warren, going everywhere.”
“Pretty much,” Bill agreed.
“I take it there’s still no news about her?” Joe asked.
Their host shook his head once more. “Nope. Vanished into thin air.”
“Or drowned,” Lester added glumly. “From the looks of downtown, she may be fifty feet from the hospital, caught in a flooded passageway. When will we be able to get in there to check? I had no idea the whole campus was still six feet under.” He looked at Joe for confirmation. “We thought search and rescue had already gone through the tunnels.”
“They did what they could,” Bill hedged. “Not an easy job.” He raised a finger for emphasis as he answered Lester’s question. “If the estimates are correct, you might get in tomorrow. The water’s draining fast. It’ll be a mess, but it should be accessible.”
“You have hazmat suits for us?” Joe asked. “I could smell the pollutants as soon as we hit town.”
Lester shot him another glance, clearly not having considered the issue.
“Yeah,” Allard said airily. “We’ve got you covered. You’re not only facing all the crap you can guess, but there’s asbestos, too, from the leftover underground pipes and conduits, dating back to the bad ol’ days. It should be a real blast, poking around down there.”
“Great,” Lester murmured.
“Not to worry,” Allard reassured them. “You’ll have people with you who know their stuff. I’m not sending you in there alone.”
Lester did his best to fake a pleasantly surprised smile. “Ah,” he said. “That makes all the difference.”
CHAPTER FIVE
“How’re you holding up?” she asked.
“Better than most,” Joe admitted. “I can think of ten other professions right now that’ve been working harder than us from the start. The uniformed cops are mostly making sure people don’t get into trouble, and we fancy guys in suits are being called on to do even less.”
She laughed knowledgeably. “Unless they’re Willy Kunkle, diving into the floodwaters to save the brain-dead.”
He was impressed. “You heard about that?”
“I’m the governor, Joe. I have people.”
He smiled at the phone in his hand. She was, and she did. And Gail Zigman also made it her business to be better informed than most of her recent predecessors. Her early years as a selectman and prosecutor had sensitized her to the old rule that all politics are local. Among the backroom organizations that she’d created before her first day at work was a team of phone and e-mail workers whose sole duty was to keep in touch with handpicked human listening posts all across the state. These were mostly people whom Gail had wooed and won during her years of ascension, ranging from small-town politicos to fire chiefs, town clerks, church leaders, and almost anyone else who was engaged, informed, and/or just plain nosy. It had served her more than once in sensing an upswelling before it became a tidal wave.
“How’re your people serving you in the middle of this mess?” he asked.