The Death in the Willows by Richard; Forrest Page B

of this quiet place on the river and the scene they had witnessed a short time ago numbed them. Bea looked down at her wavering reflection in the water, her rippling image appearing as a skewered tragic mask—a face drawn in the reflection of horror. She had seen people die before. A few years before, within a year of each other, her parents had died. They had died in a quiet room filled with solicitous people and the beep of nearby machinery, their discomfort stilled with painkilling drugs—not unexpectedly in an inescapable oven. She ran her fingers along the contours of her face.
    â€œIs there ever a why? Is it possible that today was just some crazy coincidence?”
    â€œI don’t think so.”
    â€œThe young man in the ditch that I saw die … did you know him?”
    â€œHis name was Robert Hannon. He was to be a junior at Wesleyan this fall.”
    â€œThe one who was shot by the hijacker?”
    â€œYes.” He walked to the water’s edge and stood near his wife’s shoulder. “Those people, all who died this afternoon, had an unusual feeling toward me, as if I were their talisman or protector, and in one woman’s case, her Rada. And yet, I somehow have the feeling that I was the instrument of their destruction. If the hijacking had continued until stopped by the police, today might not have happened.”
    â€œThat’s not true. You had nothing to do with the bus fire.”
    â€œLast night I held an old woman and promised her she was safe.”
    â€œYou can’t assume guilt like that.”
    â€œWhat did Donne say? ‘And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee.’”
    She buried her head in his shoulder so that he would not see her cry. “Stop, stop, stop …”
    Their wavering images reflected in the river swells merged.
    Bea’s martini was too large and she talked too quickly and too intensely for her actions to be anything but a nervous attempt to remove the guilt Lyon voiced. Rocco Herbert listened, stared at the ice in his vodka, and occasionally nodded.
    â€œIt was an accident, Rocco. The tanker driver had a heart attack. It happens all the time. He pulled onto the highway, blacked out, and his truck went out of control and collided with the bus.”
    â€œThe medical examiner took a look as soon as we got the body of the driver to the medical center.”
    â€œA stroke …?”
    Rocco shook his head. “If Lyon hadn’t alerted us, we might have missed it, considering the condition of the deceased. It was a small-caliber bullet with an entrance wound above the hairline at the back of the head.”
    â€œSomeone at the service area would have heard the shot.”
    Rocco shook his head again. “The discharge of a small weapon near the truck stop would have gone unnoticed.”
    â€œDamn! Damn! Damn!” Bea went to the bar cart to freshen her drink, and Lyon noticed that her fingers shook.
    â€œAny trace of an explosive device?”
    â€œThe bomb squad picked up a small residue of thermite.”
    â€œIt’s becoming as common as ordinary dynamite.”
    â€œThey reconstruct that it was placed directly under the tank. And now there are seventeen dead.”
    â€œSeventeen?”
    â€œFourteen passengers and the driver, the tanker driver, and the hostess.”
    â€œSomeone’s missing?”
    â€œYou! Thank God!” Bea said.
    â€œNo, another one of the passengers. I wonder who it is?”
    â€œIt’ll take a while to make a positive ID here. Let me put in a call to Nesbitt in the city and see what he knows.”
    As Rocco went to use the phone in the kitchen, Kimberly Ward called from the foyer. “Anybody home?”
    â€œIn the study,” Bea called back and hiccuped.
    Kim came into the room and immediately put her arms around Bea. “The commissioner came to the office and told me about it. Oh, Bea. How