The Running Girls(75)

“You must know something else. Was there a check on Sadie’s family during the investigation? Did Burnell meet her?”

“That I don’t know. Everything would be in the file. I wasn’t allowed to get involved, as you well know.”

“You’re telling me you didn’t look into it?”

Warren offered her a sly grin. “I didn’t know much about her,” he said. “I looked into her when Annie told me about the letters. She was a runner at the high school. Middle distance. It was how she ended up being diagnosed. She kept getting injured and they were never sure why.”

Laurie let out a sigh. “A runner, like Grace Harrington?”

“Yes,” said Warren, momentarily confused, as if he’d never before made the connection.

“Her family?”

“The parents died. That was why she was writing to Frank asking for money, I think.”

“But you never spoke to her?”

“Annie died, Laurie. I told Jim about the letters, but a woman in a wheelchair wouldn’t quite have been in a position to do those things to Annie, now would she? Anyway, Jim surely checked it all out. You know how professional he was.”

Warren was probably right, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that Frank had left the letter out for a reason. “Drink that,” she said, getting to her feet. “You need something to eat as well.”

She found Lieutenant Filmore talking to some workmen outside a pair of lavatories being boarded up down the hall from the gym. Laurie pulled her sweater over her nose against the unholy stench coming from the room.

“How are you doing, Laurie?” said Filmore, his face cemented into a grimace against the smell.

“I need some fresh air, but aside from that I’m fine.”

“I could use a break, myself,” said Filmore. “Come on.” He walked her outside, and for a moment the two of them just filled and emptied and refilled their lungs with comparatively pristine oxygen. “Oh Lord, that’s sweet,” said Filmore.

He’d get no argument from her.

“We need to get people out of here,” he said. “We’re way over capacity and people are going to start getting sick.”

“Any help coming in?”

Filmore nodded. “The hurricane has moved back out over the gulf and seems to be dissipating. Looks like that part of this is over, anyway.”

They both understood that was far from the end of it. Even from the snapshot Laurie had seen outside, she knew the damage to the island was catastrophic. The process of rebuilding would start again, but if it was anything like Ike, it could be days before power and facilities were up and running properly.

“I hate to ask it, but do you have a working radio?”

“Limited numbers,” he said, holding up a handheld unit. “You’ll get one.” Filmore understood her priority and directed her to an office inside the building where a team of operatives were in contact with the outside world. “You can get yourself a replacement phone there, too, if you need one.”

David was standing in line to get food as she returned to the building. “You’re up, then?” he said, as she approached. “Thought we were going to have to drag you out of there.”

Despite their strained relationship over the last few months, Laurie always slept best when David was there. They both hated the time they were forced to spend apart when he was away at work. That she could never rest properly when she was alone was a type of dependency she’d never minded, and it worried her that she’d come so close to losing it.

“I’m going to volunteer to go out with the rescue teams,” he said, taking a shuffling step forward in the queue, which appeared to be growing by the second.

“Make sure you come see me before you go,” said Laurie.

“You still looking for Frank?” he said, his quiet tone suggesting he wasn’t looking for a fight.

“We need to find him.”

“I get it, Laurie. I do. Sorry if I’ve been an ass.”

Laurie grabbed his hand. “It’s an impossible situation for all of us. We’ll get through it,” she said, doubting her own words as she walked back into the school, where the first thing she did was place her hand over her nose. The smell in the whole building was close to unbearable now. Little wonder everyone was streaming outside. Sweat prickled her back, and she did her best to breathe through her mouth as she climbed the steps to the main office, where the emergency communication room had been established.

Laurie didn’t recognize any of the three people working in the cramped room, which, mercifully, had an open window. She introduced herself before asking for access to their radios. “I need to speak to a colleague in Houston,” she said to one of the operatives, a man in his sixties with a silver-gray beard and matching ponytail, who sighed and took the details from her before handing her a burner phone. “We need the radio for emergency contacts at the moment. You can use this for now. Pre-charged.”

Laurie stepped out and called Remi, who, true to his word, was working from a station in Houston.

“How y’all dealing with it down there?”

“You’re not going to recognize the place, Remi, but it is what it is. I need to find Frank Randall. I’ve got no Internet and I’m surprised I even got through to you,” she said, before informing him about the letter. “See what you can find about Sadie Cornish. Jim Burnell interviewed her during the investigation, but that letter has got me thinking. May be nothing, but why was Frank reading the letter just before Maurice was murdered and he himself disappeared?”