Glash keeps the speedometer at eight miles above the speed limit in his newest vehicle – a gold Volkswagen Passat. He killed its previous owner and took her purse. Before he slit her throat he ripped a gold locket from her neck – Mary will like that. She liked the ring; men should give women jewelry. Now, he has a little time; he assumes the gas station had Closed Circuit TV, but all he needs is twenty-two minutes. He must remember to wipe off the blood from the chain before giving Mary the necklace.
He glances at George Houssman curled in the seat to his left, his hands tied with a black nylon restraint. He’s too old now, he thinks. He sees the bruises on Houssman’s face and wonders at the extent of his wounds from the Ford crashing into the tree. ‘Why do you wear an overcoat in August?’ Glash asks, noting that Houssman’s eyelids just fluttered.
‘I’m cold,’ Houssman replies. ‘Where are you taking me?’
‘To the Ashokan Reservoir; we’ll arrive in approximately eight minutes and thirty-seven … six seconds.’
‘What do you intend to do there?’
‘I’m going to make people believe that I’ve contaminated the water with plague.’
‘But you’re planning something else,’ Houssman says.
‘Yes. The water is too cold and the culture would become too dilute. The probability of infecting a single person or animal in that manner approaches zero.’
‘Agreed.’ Houssman glances through the windshield. ‘What happened to the other man?’
‘He’s in the trunk,’ Glash says. ‘He’s unconscious; it’s better that way. His chances of playing tricks on me are greatly diminished.’
‘I’m awake,’ Houssman says, testing Glash’s reasoning.
‘You’re old,’ Glash replies. ‘I can kill you easily. If I hit you too hard you’ll die.’
‘That’s probably right.’ Houssman shudders and sinks into the warmth of his coat.
‘If you played a trick and tried to escape, I’d kill you whether I intended to or not.’
‘What do you intend?’ Houssman asks. ‘What do you want from me?’
‘You’re to take Dr Conyors’ place. You’ll write everything down. You will write a book about me. I like your books. I’ve read them all. You’ll illustrate it with my pictures. You can decide which ones to include.’ He turns to look at Houssman. ‘I draw very well. I remember you told me that when I was a little boy.’
Houssman’s breath is shallow. ‘Why would I write a book about this?’
Glash turns back to face the road. ‘Do not make me mad. You will do as you’re instructed.’ He silently mouths the minutes and seconds remaining. ‘Shut up now.’
As frightened as he was, George couldn’t help but search for traces of the little boy he and Delia had taken in thirty-eight years ago. Glash had lived with them for over two months before the horrific incident with the girl next door. He remembered how his daughters had been traumatized, not that they’d witnessed what had happened, but he and Delia had had to explain repeatedly how their new little brother would not be living with them after all. He’d sat on the edge of Alice’s bed, feeling her little body convulse as she cried, frightened that she too might do something which would make her lose her family. They’d begged him to bring back Richard. Stephanie, his oldest, had pleaded through a wall of tears, ‘I’ll make sure he doesn’t do anything bad. I promise. Please bring him back, Daddy. Please. Please.’ It had ripped them apart. He and Delia had explained how what Richard had done made it impossible for him to remain; he was too dangerous. It was a cruel lesson from which none of them ever recovered. He knew, on that day, his two little girls learned that love – even a parent’s love – is not unconditional.
Glancing at Glash he shuddered, and wondered what part he might have played in the man he’d become. Could this have been changed? Should we have tried harder? His daughters’ pleas were still clear, their faces raw with unbearable grief. ‘Bring him back. Daddy, please bring him back.’
Glash looked at him. ‘I’m angry with you,’ he said.
‘I know,’ Houssman replied, and gently pressed, ‘I’m sorry.’
‘You were supposed to be my new family. You were supposed to be my new father.’
‘Yes.’
‘You sent me away … you never came back for me.’
‘I tried to visit,’ Houssman said, feeling the old regrets.
‘I begged you to take me out of that place. I told you I’d never do that again. You left me there!’ Tears rolled down Glash’s cheek.
‘I know,’ Houssman said, struck at the odd disconnection between Glash’s flat voice and stony face and the steady stream of tears that tracked down his cheek. His throat choked up as he remembered those horrible visits to Albomar, the children’s facility where Glash had been taken – initially to be evaluated and then later where he would be held for the next fourteen years of his life. Delia had come with him for the first visit only; she never returned. Glash had shrieked and screamed from the moment he saw them. His tantrums brought the guards, as the little boy hurled himself at Houssman. When he’d been told that he couldn’t return he’d flailed and kicked, demanding that he be taken home. He’d screamed to the point of exhaustion, shouting that Houssman was supposed to be his new father. At the last visit Glash had kicked him viciously and then clung desperately to his bleeding and bruised legs as he’d tried to leave. It had taken a team of nurses and aides to finally pry the little boy off him. After that, Glash’s psychiatrist had recommended that Houssman no longer visit. ‘He’ll never leave Albomar,’ is what he’d said, the words seared deep into George’s brain. ‘It’s for the best that he tries to forget you and your family.’
‘You said you’d try to take me home,’ Glash stated. ‘You never did. You lied to me.’
Houssman said nothing, his thoughts filled with ghosts of old dreams. The son he’d always wanted; Delia … thinking of her now, how he missed her. Those long-ago excited evenings anticipating the perfect little boy to complete their family. And he had been beautiful … at least at first. Houssman snuck a glance at the intense man who would likely kill him before this was over. He could see traces of that odd little boy, with his magical drawings and stilted speech. That first day he’d taken him home, dressed by some social worker in a navy blazer and corduroys. It was all so clear; Delia and he had dismissed the odd behavior, the lack of emotion. They’d assumed he was in shock; he’d just lost both his mother and father. As Houssman replayed the old memories the first basin of the reservoir came into view. Tall pines, sugar maples and ancient oaks surrounded the calm water, as picnicking families and small groups of hikers took advantage of the shade and the relative cool. He caught the smell of grilling meat and somewhere in the distance heard children shouting and laughing as they played.
‘This is the Ashokan Reservoir,’ Glash said dully. ‘It was completed in 1917 and involved the flooding of nine villages: West Hurley, Ashton, Glenford, Olive Bridge, Shokan, West Shokan …’
George stayed silent as Richard lectured and drove to the far end of a mostly deserted dirt parking lot.
‘… It was completed a year ahead of schedule and was considered the second most important feat of engineering of its time – the Panama Canal being the first. Eight hundred skeletons had to be removed from existing cemeteries, and the construction included a hundred and twenty-six miles of aqueducts to bring potable water to New York City.’
George looked through the windshield at a steep gorge hundreds of feet deep that was bordered on one side by a massive cement dam and High Point Mountain. A sluiceway from the reservoir created a bucolic scene at the base of the ravine, where a stream rolled over massive boulders into the distance, its waters swollen from the summer’s unusually heavy rains.
Houssman wondered at this choice of location and watched as Glash backed in and parked next to a black panel van, the only other vehicle in the lot.
He stayed silent as Richard got out and reached under the van’s left front bumper. He heard the jangle of keys as he unlocked the driver’s side. Then Glash went to the back of the van, unlocked those doors and opened the trunk of the Passat.
Houssman watched through the rear-view mirror. It was difficult to see. The trunk door obscured most of what Glash was doing. Houssman assumed that Glash had transferred Cosway to the back of the van when those doors slammed shut. Minutes passed. He could hear Glash doing something from inside the van. Then he reappeared, carrying what at first appeared to be Cosway’s unconscious body in a white shirt and slacks. Houssman strained for a better look and saw that the body had different hair from Cosway – it was red. But he could have sworn the clothes belonged to the Homeland agent. Glash crammed the body into the trunk of the Passat. He then yanked open the driver’s side door. He was lugging a second body – it reeked of death. This one was tall and dressed – exactly as Glash was – in khakis and a button-down shirt. The body had dark hair, but must have been dead a couple of days. Translucent yellow maggots had nested in the decaying flesh of his mouth, eyes and nose.
Houssman gagged, and nearly vomited. Glash came around to his side, opened the door and roughly lifted him out, then carried him into the back of the van. Continuing his dissertation on the reservoir, he dropped him next to Cosway’s naked body and proceeded to snip off his wrist restraints. ‘Sixty-four miles of highway had to be discontinued, and eleven miles of the Ulster and Delaware train track had to be rerouted …’ He yanked off George’s coat and told him, ‘Take off all of your clothes.’
Shocked, and overcome by the reek of death that permeated the van, Houssman couldn’t move.
Glash reached over to his one-time foster father and roughly undressed him. ‘Most of the displaced residents stayed in the area and established three new villages, West Hurley, Ashokan and Tongore.’ He then cinched on a fresh pair of wrist restraints and looked at Houssman. George shivered, as Glash gathered up his clothes. ‘Here,’ he said, and he pulled back a blue plastic tarp to reveal a tall woman’s dead and naked body. With an almost tender touch, Glash wrapped George in the crinkly tarp. ‘It should keep you warm,’ he said. He quickly dressed the woman in George’s clothes. When he’d finished he dragged her by the arms out of the van.
Gooseflesh popped on George’s arms and legs as he heard car doors opening and closing. He startled as Glash returned, reached into the back of the van and retrieved two five-gallon plastic gas cans. The doors slammed again, and over the smell of death came a strong odor of gas. George heard the liquid being poured out, more doors opening and closing …
Houssman struggled to get his breathing under control, the smell of the three unknown bodies that had been baking in the hot van was overpowering. Houssman’s thoughts tumbled: Who were these people? How long had they been there? And most importantly, who had killed them? If not Richard, who was out there doing these things for him? What suddenly became clear was why he was doing this. Glash was about to fake all of their deaths.
Glash returned. Reeking of gasoline, his lips were moving silently as he retrieved Clarence Albert’s metal box from the back and removed a glass bottle filled with a murky, yeast-colored liquid.
He reached under his seat and removed a small white first aid kit, and an empty glass bottle identical to the other two. He took out a HEPA mask and hunching down he walked into the back. He knelt next to George and fitted the mask over his face. ‘Do not take this off without being told to do so.’
Glash looked at Cosway. He stared at his chest and put a finger to his neck. ‘Good,’ he said and then turned to George. ‘Watch this.’ He put on a HEPA mask and snapped on a pair of tan vinyl gloves. Carrying one of the two full bottles and the matching empty one he leaned over Cosway. He looked back to make certain George was paying attention. ‘Watch me.’
‘Don’t do this, Richard.’
‘You’re not my father.’ He cracked open the lid of the full bottle.
Horrified, Houssman heard a hiss as the seal broke and Glash propped up Cosway’s head and proceeded to inoculate him with the deadly fluid. It was precise and clinical as Glash dipped a cotton swab into the bottle and wiped it on the mucous membranes of Cosway’s nostrils and mouth. He recapped the bottle, and placing the contaminated swab in the palm of his left glove he removed the gloves and dropped them into a sealable plastic bag. He lowered Cosway back to the floor. ‘I’ll be right back … Dad.’
Houssman frantically kicked at the rear doors – they were locked and secure. He looked toward the front of the van, and attempted to wedge his body through the opening between the two captain’s chairs. He heard the sound of glass breaking not forty feet away, and made a desperate attempt to grab for the driver’s side handle with his restrained hands.
Glash returned, and caught him as the door clicked open.
He said nothing as he shoved Houssman back. George landed with a thump. Winded, he coughed on the thick fumes of gas coming from the Passat. He looked up and tried to stand, he could see Glash opening the door of the small gold car. He heard an engine start, and for the briefest instant hope surged. Had someone spotted them? His head whipped to the left as the Passat shot through the underbrush. There were long seconds of silence as it flew over the edge of the gorge. Then came the jagged crash of metal on rock, a popping sound and an explosion that shook the van.
‘Time to go home,’ Glash said. He turned over the engine and popped open the glove compartment. He retrieved a cell phone and dialed. ‘This is Richard Glash. I’m at the Ashokan dam; it’s started.’ And then he sang. ‘Ring around the rosy, a pocket full of posy. Ashes, ashes, we’ll all fall down. You couldn’t catch me, and now I’m dead … then again, so are you.’ He tossed the phone on to the ground where the Passat had been. He threw the van into drive, and glancing back at Houssman said, ‘Time to go home.’