Solitude Creek (Kathryn Dance 4)

Holly said, "We're still doing the preliminary, Sam."

Dance said, "I'm not a criminal investigator. I'm in the Civil Division."

Cohen looked around, breathing heavily. His shoulders sagged. "Everything," he said in a whisper. Dance had no idea what he'd been about to say. She was looking at a face marred by indelible sorrow.

"Could you tell me what you recall about last night, sir?" Dance asked this automatically. Then remembering the fire marshal was in charge. "Okay with you, Bob?"

"You can help me out anytime you want, Kathryn."

She wondered why she was even asking these questions. This wasn't her job. But sometimes you just can't leash yourself.

Cohen didn't answer.

"Mr. Cohen?"

She repeated the question.

"Sorry." Whispering. "I was at the front door, checking receipts. I heard the music start. I smelled smoke, pretty strong and I freaked out. The band seemed to stop in the middle of a tune. Just then I got a call. Somebody was in the parking lot and they said there was a fire in the kitchen. Or backstage. They weren't sure. They must've seen the smoke and thought it was worse than it was. I didn't check. I just thought: Get everybody out. So I made the announcement. Then I could hear voices. Swelling. The voices, I mean, getting louder and louder. Then a scream. I thought, No, no, not a fire. I was thinking of the Station in Rhode Island a few years ago. They had fireworks. Illegal ones. But in, like, six minutes, the entire club was engulfed. A hundred people died."

Choking. Tears. "I went into the club itself. I couldn't believe it, I couldn't believe what I saw. It was like they weren't people at all; it was just one big creature, staggering around, squeezing toward the doors. But they weren't opening. And there were no flames. Anywhere. Not even very thick smoke. Like in the fall, when I was growing up. People burning leaves. Where I grew up. New York."

Dance had noted a security camera. "Was there video? Security video?"

"Nothing outside. Inside, yes, there's a camera."

"Could I see it please?"

This was her Crim-Div mind working.

Sometimes you can't leash yourself...

Cohen cast a last look around the room. Then stepped into the lobby, clutching the box of survivors' tokens he'd collected. He held it gingerly, as if a tight grip would mean bad luck for the hospitalized owners. She saw wallets, keys, shoes, a business card inside.

Dance followed, Holly behind. Cohen's office was decorated with posters about the appearances of obscure performers--and many from the Monterey Pop Festival--and was cluttered with the flotsam of a small entertaining venue: crates of beer, stacks of invoices, souvenirs (T-shirts, cowboy hats, boots, a stuffed rattlesnake, dozens of mugs given away by radio stations). So many items. The accumulation set Dance's nerves vibrating.

Cohen went to the computer and sat down. He stared at the desk for a moment, a piece of paper; she couldn't see what was written on it. She positioned herself in front of the monitor. She steeled herself. In her job as investigator with the CBI, most of her work was backroom. She talked to suspects after the deeds had been done. She was rarely in the field and never tactical. Yes, one could analyze the posture of a dead body and derive forensic insights but Dance had rarely been called on to do so. Most of her work involved the living. She wondered what her reaction to the video would be.

It wasn't good.

The quality of the tape was so-so and a pillar obscured a portion of the image. She recalled the camera and thought it had been positioned differently but apparently not. At first she was looking at a wide-angle slice of tables and chairs and patrons, servers with trays. Then the lights dimmed, though there was still enough light to see the room.

There was no sound. Dance was grateful for that.

At 8:11:11 on the time stamp, people began to move. Standing up, looking around. Pulling out phones. A

t that point the majority of the patrons were concerned, that was obvious, but their facial expressions and body language revealed only that. No panic.

But at 8:11:17, everything changed. Merely six seconds later. As if they'd all been programmed to act at the same instant, the patrons surged en masse toward the doors. Dance couldn't see the exits themselves. They were behind the camera, out of the frame. She could, however, see people slamming against each other and the wall, desperate to escape from the unspeakable fate of burning to death.

Pressing against each other, harder, harder, in a twisting mass, spiraling like a slow-moving hurricane. Dance understood: Those at the front were struggling to move clockwise to get away from the people behind them. But there was no place to go.

"My," Bob Holly, the fire marshal, whispered. A man who had surely witnessed plenty.

Then, to Dance's surprise, the frenzy ended fast. It seemed that sanity returned, as if a spell had been sloughed off. The masses broke up and patrons headed for the accessible exits--this would be the front lobby, the stage and the kitchen.

Two bodies were visible on the floor, people huddled over them. Trying pathetically ineffective revival techniques. You can hardly use CPR to save someone whose chest has been crushed and heart and lungs pierced.

Dance noted the time stamp.