THE UNHIGHLANDER
by Galen Hardesty
Chapter Two
HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH
~~~
"What kind of deal is this?" asked Daria angrily, staring at the Highland Hooraw as if expecting it to answer.
"Hmm?" replied Helen absently, opening a package of frozen lasagna.
"Drug Dealer Walks On Technicality." Daria quoted the headline of the story she'd been reading. "The cops catch him red-handed. They read him his rights and he confesses, but then the DA lets him go when he says the cops "intimidated" him into talking before his lawyer got there. 'Persistent questioning. Threatening facial expressions.' Sounds to me like the cops were just doing their jobs."
"Oh, that. I'd say so too. Wannamaker's tough enough on wife beaters, shoplifters, and small time crooks, but he's strangely lenient on criminals with plenty of money."
"You mean, they're paying him off? He's taking bribes?"
"I didn't say that. No one else will say that either. They may be thinking it, but no one's been able to find any proof."
"So the police are investigating him?"
"Hmph. Don't count on any brilliant detective work from the local police, Daria. They don't seem to be very good at investigating corruption. The only one I know of who's doing anything like that is that young WHIG reporter investigating cost overruns on the new executive office building."
"You mean the whole town's corrupt? I knew City Hall was, but I was hoping the police were just inept."
Helen sighed, shook her head, and gazed out the window. Then she said "There are good cops in Highland. Those two who caught that drug dealer, for instance."
"Yeah. But how long will they stay good, when they keep seeing the worst perps they catch go free? How long till they start taking the bribes themselves, instead of letting Wannamaker have it all? You know what they say about a fish rotting from the head."
Helen sighed again. "Maybe we'll get some better people in office next election."
"Do you really think so?" asked Daria, watching her mother closely.
Helen slid the frozen lasagna into the microwave, set the time, and started it. Her silence spoke volumes.
Daria chose her words carefully. "Mom, you don't like this town. Dad hates it. I hate it too. I can't tell you how much I hate it. Quinn... well, Quinn would be popular almost anywhere, so she'd be happy almost anywhere. Why are we still here?"
Helen looked at Daria with genuine sadness. "Oh, Daria, you know it's not that simple. Your father and I can't just pull up stakes and go. We have to have jobs to go to."
"Sure, Mom, I understand that. But what about those offers you've been getting from those legal firms? I remember there was one from New York, and one from San Diego. I was really hoping you'd take that one."
Helen poured herself a cup of coffee, then came over and sat at the kitchen table with Daria. "Don't think I wasn't tempted to, but so far, none of those firms have offered to pay me what I'm worth."
Daria refrained from pointing out that "what I'm worth" was a subjective concept. Still considering her words carefully, she asked, "Is Houston, Bowie, Bloodworth, Hidalgo, and Clay paying you what you're worth?"
Helen stared into the black depths of her coffee cup. After several seconds she answered, quietly, "No."
Daria did not pursue the point further. Helen didn't need to have it spelled out. The two looked at each other, then away, then at each other again. Daria looked down at her hands. The silence lengthened. Finally Helen asked, "What are you thinking, Daria?"
Daria looked back up at her mother. "I was just wondering... what will I have to look back on?" At Helen's puzzled expression, she continued, "My first day of school in Highland, I was branded, according to Texas tradition. Diarrhea Morkendorker, geek. I've known for years now that I'd never find a friend in this place, unless she just sort of moved in one day, out of the blue. And she never did. I'm in high school now. I never believed I'd have to go to high school in Highland. Never thought we'd stay here this long. Pretty soon, I'll be in college. Not as good a college as... well, never mind that. Then I'll be out on my own, making a living as best I can, doing I have no idea what. What happy times will I have to look back on to lighten my load, to mitigate the drudgery?" She looked into her mother's eyes. "When was the last time I was happy, Mom, can you remember? I can't." Daria rose and sadly headed out of the kitchen. "This town ate my childhood."
~~~
Daria stood in the parking lot of the new City of Highland Executive Office Building. It didn't look particularly lavish or expensive from the outside. But Daria wasn't interested in the cost of the building right now. She had found what she was looking for this morning. The little sign in front of this parking space read "Reserved For District Attorney." The space was occupied by a shiny new BMW sports car. It must have cost over two years' salary for a DA in this town.
Just then Daria's attention was attracted by a small commotion several spaces away. A young woman with a microphone, backed up by a young man wielding a TV camera, was confronting a large man in an expensive-looking blue suit and a white Stetson hat.
"Councilman Beauregard, what was the cause of the huge cost overruns on this building?" she asked him, then pointed the microphone at him.
"Well, Diane, sometimes these things just happen. Sometimes the contractor underestimates the costs." Beauregard replied with a jovial smile, while continuing toward his Cadillac.
"But what was the extra money spent on?" the young woman persisted.
"The auditors are going over the facts and figures now. Beyond that, I can't comment." Beauregard smiled as he slid in behind the wheel.
"Councilman Beauregard, what is the cause of the long delay in removing the asbestos from our school buildings?"
"That job needs specially qualified people," he replied as the door closed.
"What's being done about the uranium in the water supply?" the young woman shouted through the window glass.
The Cadillac's engine started. Beauregard continued to smile, pointed to his ear, shook his head, and shrugged his shoulders. The car backed out of its space and drove away.
The reporter's shoulders slumped a little and the cameraman unshouldered his video camera. They headed toward a white van with the letters WHIG TV 4 as a supergraphic in blue on the side. Daria casually headed in the same direction, making notes as she went.
"Think they'll use any of that?" the cameraman asked.
"Only if there's no actual news today. Same stock answers. No new information. Beauregard's good. Slick as they come in these parts. He'll probably be the next mayor."
"Yeah." the young man acknowledged glumly. "Are we gonna come back for the City Council meeting?"
"We're pretty much obliged to. Not that anything actually gets decided in the official meetings. The real city council meets in the back room of the Dry Gulch Saloon, late at night. Big Jim Roach, our man Beauregard, Slater, Dirk, maybe a couple others. That's where city business actually gets done," the young woman remarked bitterly. Daria's eyes narrowed and she scribbled rapidly in her notebook.
"The proverbial smoke-filled back room, eh?" the cameraman replied. "Man, I'd love to be a fly on the wall in there!"
"Better bring your little fly gas mask. With those big black nasty cigars Big Jim chain-smokes, it'll be a smoke-filled room of the worst kind. Maybe they'll all die from second-hand smoke before they kill the rest of us with the asbestos and uranium."
Daria's eyes widened a bit and she made another note. The newspeople were getting into the van now, so Daria turned her steps toward Highland High. If she walked fast, she should make first-hour study hall in time to mark herself present. If not, she'd make up something about researching for civics class. It wouldn't even be a lie. Daria had learned quite a bit about city government this morning.
~~~
One week later, the Morgendorffers were watching the evening news.
"...And there you have it. District Attorney Wannamaker collapses earlier today in the midst of an interview with our own Diane Hunter in the parking lot of the new executive office building, and is pronounced dead on arrival at Highland General Hospital. No word as yet on the cause of death. It was at first believed that Wannamaker might have suffered an electric shock, due to his reaction immediately upon touching his car door handle, seen here in our exclusive videotape coverage. We now have an unconfirmed report that he may have come into contact with an unidentified chemical substance, though neither the police nor the hospital spokesman will comment on this. We will keep you updated on this story as it develops. This is WHIG news four, Highland. Stay tuned for more news after these important messages."
Jake hit the mute button. "Chemical substance? What kind of chemical could do that? Omigod, Helen! Do you think it's one of those chemical spills where they evacuate the whole town for days?"
"I hear some of the stuff they use in beauty shops is pretty nasty," Daria observed dryly.
"Ha! As if you'd ever get within a mile of a beauty shop!" Quinn got off a snippy non sequitur.
"I don't think I've ever heard of a chemical that deadly, unless it was nerve gas. But nerve gas would've gotten the reporter too," mused Helen.
"Right." Daria agreed. "The Russians have a liquid nerve agent called Yellow Rain that could act like that. And there's nicotine. That's all I can think of, just off the top of my head."
"Jeez, Daria, he wasn't smoking," retorted Quinn in an exaggeratedly scornful voice. "We all saw the tape. And even if he had been, you don't just drop stone cold dead like that from smoking!"
Daria gave Quinn a mild pitying look and shook her head. "I'm talking about purified nicotine. I read about a guy who got one drop of pure nicotine on his pants at work, and immediately went into convulsions, like Wannamaker did. His buddies saw what happened and got them off him and got him to the hospital. He recovered, but the next time he put that pair of pants on, even though they'd been washed several times, he immediately went back into convulsions."
Quinn glared resentfully at Daria. "It sure is strange that, no matter what the subject, you've always "read something" about it. Unless it's something I know something about, like clothes or makeup, that is."
"Quinn!" said Helen. "That was uncalled for."
"Well, you know how she loves to lie to me, just to see how much bull doody she can get me to believe. Who's to say she's not doing that to all of us? She could be pulling this out of..."
"Quinn!"
"...making it up wholesale!" Quinn finished, crossing her arms and glaring at Daria again.
"Quinn has a point, Daria. You have been known to do that." Helen said.
"It's because she treats me like a walking encyclopedia. Not that I mind, but every once in a while I slip her a fib to encourage her to check things out for herself."
"Yeah, right," sneered Quinn. "Well, go ahead. Tell us all you know about nicotine. Tell us where to get it and how to use it. Maybe Mom or Dad will catch you making stuff up."
Daria considered just clamming up, but she knew Quinn would take that as proof that her insinuation was true, and needle her unmercifully and indefinitely about it. "Well, they used to sell it in stores. It was the main ingredient in some bug sprays and dusts, like Black Flag and Black Leaf 40. Eventually someone noticed all the people dropping dead from nicotine poisoning, and the government regulated it. Nowadays, if you don't want to fill out a bunch of paperwork, the easiest way to get it is to extract it yourself from tobacco."
"Oh yeah, easy," retorted Quinn scornfully. "If you have a laboratory and a degree in chemistry."
Daria shot Quinn a sideways glance and a corner of her mouth turned up a bit. "Nicotine is water soluble. If the murderer worked in that new office building, all he or she would have to do is pick up a bunch of Mayor Roach's cigar butts, soak them in water for a couple of days, strain the liquid, and let it evaporate in the sun till it got syrupy. Then they'd just smear some on the underside of Wannamaker's car door handle, being careful not to get any on themselves, of course."
"Ewww!" Jake commented, paying attention for once. "Daria, how do you know all this?"
Daria shrugged. "I read, I learn, I remember."
"But why were you reading about poisons? Why were you interested in that subject?"
Daria sighed. "In this town, if I only read about things I was interested in, I'd've run out of stuff to read years ago. Now I wander the aisles at the library, browsing, pulling out anything that looks like it might be even remotely interesting. I check out seven or eight books at a time to increase my odds of getting home with something that I can get into."
Quinn looked shocked. "Ghod, Daria! If a book isn't really really interesting, why even pick it up?"
Daria would have ignored that question, but she saw that her parents were also waiting for her answer. She looked down at her knees as if the answer was written there. "Reading is my escape from my miserable life in this awful place. I can't not read." She rose and went to her room, leaving her family staring at each other in mutual noncomprehension.
~~~
The next evening, the Morgendorffers were again watching the local news after dinner.
"Good evening. Leading off the news at six, a spokesman for Highland General Hospital has just informed the press that District Attorney Wannamaker's death yesterday resulted from nicotine poisoning. Traces of the deadly substance were found on the fingers of his left hand, and lethal levels of it were found in his bloodstream. A police spokesman said the case is being investigated as a murder but declined further comment at this time. Our mobile reporter Diane Hunter reports that Wannamaker's car has been impounded as evidence, as has the dumpster behind the new executive office building, and, strangely, the contents of all the building's ashtrays. Stay tuned for on-the-spot video coverage. In other news..."
Daria looked toward her father when the sound was muted. He was sitting there with the remote in his hand, staring at her openmouthed. After a second, Daria looked away, only to find Helen and Quinn staring at her too. All three of them looked like they were about to say something, but none did. Finally, Daria rose and said, "I think I'll go read awhile." Receiving no reply, she walked back to her room and closed the door.
Once alone behind the locked door, Daria slipped on a pair of thin cotton gloves, picked up an old newspaper and a scissors and made herself comfortable on her bed. "Wannamaker was the second. The list is long. Highland Beautification League," she whispered, smiling.
~~~