Miracle Creek(13)

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AFTER LUNCH, entering the courtroom, Pak recognized a silver-haired woman in the back. A protester, the one who’d threatened him that morning, saying she wouldn’t rest until he was exposed as a fraud and his business shut down for good. “If you don’t stop right now,” she’d said, “you will regret it. I promise you.” And now that her promise had come to fruition, here she was, surveying the room like a proud director on opening night. He imagined facing her, threatening to expose her lies about that night, to tell the police everything he saw. How satisfying it would be, watching the smugness drain from her eyes, replaced by fear. But no. No one could know he was outside that night. He had to maintain his silence, no matter the cost.

Abe stood up and something fell to the floor: the flyer, with 43! in a red, fiery font. Pak stared at it, this piece of paper that had started everything. If only Elizabeth hadn’t seen it and gotten fixated on the idea of sabotage, of fire being set under the oxygen tube, he’d be driving Mary to college right now. A surge of heat coursed through him, sending his muscles quivering, and he wanted to grab that flyer, tear and ball it up, and hurl it at Elizabeth and the protester, these women who’d wrecked his life.

“Dr. Thompson,” Abe said, “let’s pick up where we left off. Tell us about the last dive, during which the explosion occurred.”

“We started late,” Matt said. “The dive before us is usually done by 6:15, but they were running late. I didn’t know, so I got there on time, and the front lot was full. All us double-divers had to park in the alternate spot down the street, like that morning. We didn’t start until 7:10.”

“Why the delay? Were the protesters still there?”

“No. The police took them away earlier. They apparently tried to stop the dives by releasing Mylar balloons into utility lines, which caused a power outage,” Matt said. Pak almost laughed at the succinctness, the efficiency, of Matt’s description. Six hours of chaos—the protesters upsetting the patients; the police saying they were powerless to stop “peaceful protests”; the AC and lights going dead during an afternoon dive, scaring the patients; the police finally arriving; the protesters’ shrieks of “What power lines?” and “What on earth do balloons have to do with outages?” All that, reduced to a ten-second summary.

“How could the dives continue with an outage?” Abe said.

“There’s a generator, a safety requirement. Pressurization, oxygen, communications—all that still worked. Just secondary things like AC, lights, and the DVD didn’t work.”

“DVD? Air-conditioning, I understand, but why DVD?”

“For the kids, to help them sit still. Pak attached a screen outside a porthole and put in a speaker system. The kids loved it, and I can tell you the adults appreciated it as well.”

Abe chuckled. “Yes, in my house, anyway, kids tend to be significantly quieter in front of a TV.”

“Exactly.” Matt smiled. “Anyway, Pak managed to hook up a portable DVD player outside the rear porthole. He said dealing with all this caused delays. Not to mention, some of the earlier patients got scared by the protesters and canceled their dives, which took more time.”

“What about the lights? You said they were out?”

“Yes, in the barn. We started after 7:00, so it was starting to get dark, but it being summer, there was still enough sunlight to see.”

“So the power’s out, and the dive’s delayed. Anything else odd about that evening?”

Matt nodded. “Yes. Elizabeth.”

Abe raised his eyebrows. “What about her?”

“You have to remember,” Matt said, “earlier that day, I saw her stomp off after a fight with Kitt, so I expected her to still be mad. But when she came in, she was in a really good mood. Unusually friendly, even to Kitt.”

Abe said, “Perhaps they’d talked and worked it out?”

Matt shook his head. “No. Before Elizabeth arrived, Kitt said she tried to talk to her, but she was still mad. In any case, the really strange part was that Elizabeth said she felt sick. I remember thinking it was odd, how upbeat she was when she was supposedly coming down with something.” Matt swallowed. “Anyway, she said she wanted to sit out, just stay in her car and rest during the dive. And then…” Matt’s eyes darted to Elizabeth, his face scrunched up like he was hurt, betrayed, and disappointed all at once, the way a kid looks at his mother when he finds out there’s no Santa.

“And then?” Abe touched Matt’s arm as if comforting him.

“She asked Kitt to sit next to Henry and watch over him during the dive, and maybe I could sit on the other side and help, too.”

“So the defendant arranged for Henry to sit between Kitt and you?”

“Yes.”

“Any other seating-related suggestions from the defendant?” Abe said, emphasizing the word suggestions so it sounded ominous.

“Yes.” Matt peered at Elizabeth with that hurt-disappointed-betrayed-kid look again. “Teresa started going in first, like always. But Elizabeth stopped her. She said since the DVD screen was in the back and Rosa didn’t watch shows, TJ and Henry should sit back there.”

“That seems reasonable, no?” Abe said.

“No, not at all,” Matt said. “Elizabeth was very particular about the DVDs Henry watched.” Matt’s face tightened, and Pak knew he was thinking about the DVD-selection fight. Elizabeth had wanted something educational, a history or science documentary. Kitt had wanted Barney, TJ’s favorite. Elizabeth gave in, but after a few days, Elizabeth said, “TJ is eight. Don’t you think you should introduce something more appropriate for his age?”