Lights, Camera . . . Read online

  The rest of us kept a safe distance while the chemical retardant burst out of the hoses. The amateur fire crew was able to contain the fire until the pros arrived. I recognized River Heights Fire Chief Cody Cloud leading the pack. They didn’t even try to fiddle with the padlock. They pulled Jane and the others out of the way, and then tore into the truck with axes and put out the fire.

  While the others cleaned up, Chief Cloud looked around. He recognized me and waved. “Nancy!” he called, walking over. “This isn’t the first time you’ve beaten me to a fire. Is anyone hurt?”

  “I don’t think so,” I told him. “There aren’t that many people on the grounds right now. The director gave most of us the evening off.”

  “You working here now?”

  “She’s in the movie!” Bess declared.

  “I see,” he replied. He was clearly not impressed. “Well, wait right here,” he added. “I want to ask you a few questions.” He left to talk to a couple of the people who had been the first on the scene.

  Meanwhile Jane and another man came over to talk to us, followed by Luther and Morris. Jane introduced the man with her as Dave Linn, the other on-site security officer. We were telling him what we’d seen and heard when Morris and Luther ran up to join us.

  “What happened?” Morris asked. “We were at the cabin getting ready for tomorrow’s shoot. Is everyone all right?”

  “Seem to be no injuries,” Dave said. “But we’ve got a mess on our hands. When that generator blew, it caught fire. The rig was locked, so the firemen used axes to break into the truck and get to the fire.”

  “The generator!” Morris exclaimed. “It’s practically brand new! How could that happen?”

  “That was my question,” the fire chief said, rejoining us. “I’ve got some men checking over the site now. We’ll stay with it until we get some answers.”

  “It was an accident, though,” Morris prompted. “It was an accident, right?”

  “That’s what we’re going to find out, sir,” the fire chief said. “I’ve got my top arson investigators on it. Pretty odd, it blowing up like that. No rainstorm tonight, so lightning didn’t hit it. Hard to figure some sort of spontaneous combustion event. Don’t worry—we’ll get to the bottom of it. I’m on my way back there now to talk to my men. I’ll be checking in with you later.”

  The fire chief left, and Morris turned to the rest of us. “Okay, what happened? Nancy, were you here?” he asked. “Did you see what happened?”

  I repeated what I’d told the fire chief. “I saw no one suspicious,” I concluded. “I didn’t hear any vehicles start up or drive away from the scene. Of course, it was pretty chaotic right then, with people running to the soundstage and yelling for help. But I didn’t see or hear anything that didn’t fit. Except . . .”

  I turned to Jane, who was jotting my words in her notebook. “Jane, I watched you try to unlock the semi, but there was something wrong. Did you have the right key? What was the problem?”

  “I had the right key, but it wouldn’t work,” she explained. “I tried the other keys, but none of them fit the lock either.”

  “We need to check that lock,” I told her. “Either it was jimmied, or maybe it was a different padlock.” I turned to Morris. “We might need to check purchase orders to see whether it was the original lock, or if someone substituted a new one.”

  “I don’t remember buying a new lock for that door,” Morris said. “And believe me, I’ve been checking every purchase we’ve made around here. At this point, I can’t even afford a new lock.”

  “Are you thinking that this wasn’t an accident, and whoever sabotaged the generator used a new padlock to close it up?” Bess asked.

  “Exactly,” I answered. “Either they broke the original one, and had to replace it so the break-in wouldn’t be discovered before the generator blew out, or they used a different padlock just to make it impossible to get inside without causing further damage and more trouble.”

  “I don’t believe we’ve met,” Morris said to Bess. “Are you part of Nancy’s investigative team?”

  “Sometimes,” Bess said with a grin. “I’m Bess Marvin.”

  “Your new carpenter,” I added. “Sorry about not getting around to introducing you two. Bess, this is our boss, Morris Dunnowitz.”

  “Welcome aboard, Bess, “he said. “You’ve got a lot of work ahead of you, but Nancy says you can handle it.”

  “Jane, we need that padlock as soon as you can pry it away from Chief Cody,” I said.

  “No problem,” she said. “I’ll go keep an eye on it now.”

  “So you don’t think this was an accident at all, right, Nancy?” Morris asked. “What do you think happened—and who do you think did it?”

  “I don’t have any idea,” I answered. “Right now, all my suspicions are based on nothing but a hunch.”

  “A hunch based on experience,” Luther pointed out.

  “I think it’s pretty weird that the generator blew,” I said, “especially in view of the other problems you’ve been having around here. George, was the generator connected to any of the production company computers?”

  “Yes, a couple of them—they’re keyed in to the generator chip, and programmed so that the electricity usage coordinates with the production company schedule. But those were the first ones I got back into service. A manual override was used while the computers were down, but we switched back to electronic management when I restored those machines.”

  “Could someone have played with the data, and programmed the generator blowout?” I asked.

  “Maybe,” George answered. “I can check that out.”

  “What about the Muskoka Musketeers?” Dave suggested. “I saw their protest camp along the road when I drove up here. They waved all sorts of signs about how the production company is upsetting the natural balance of the riverbank in this area.”

  “I don’t know,” Luther said. “They’re a pretty quiet bunch. They’ve never done anything really destructive. It’s kind of a leap from hiding a skunk in a closet—if they did that—to blowing up all the power for the production company.”

  “Luther’s right,” I added. “We need to cast the net a little wider. And we might be way off base anyway—we don’t even know for sure that the generator blowout wasn’t just a horrible accident.”

  I didn’t really believe that it was for a minute. I was just trying to keep Morris’s hopes up a little longer. But it didn’t take long to clear up the question. The fire chief reported back, saying that the blowout was deliberately engineered.

  Morris slumped against a tree. “We’re sunk,” he said in a low voice. “We can’t shoot a film without electricity. We can’t finish the sets, we can’t go on location to the cabin or the river, we can’t even feed the crew. I haven’t got the budget to replace the generator—I doubt if I can even afford to try to fix this one. We’ve got a couple of small backup generators to get us through minor problems, but it’s not nearly enough to run the whole production.”

  “Would you like Bess to take a look?” I suggested. Bess nodded eagerly. “She’s just as good with motors as she is with hammers and saws.”

  “Let me scope it out,” Bess urged. “Maybe I can work out a sort of parasite setup, so that the big one feeds off the two backups. At least we might be able to nurse them along for a while, until you can come up with a better plan.”

  “If we don’t get the electricity working, we won’t need you to fill in as carpenter,” Morris told Bess. “We won’t need anybody out here at all, because the production will shut down. Please look at the generator and see if there’s any hope. And I’ll even pay you the industry rate. It might have to be in installments, though.”

  “Whatever,” Bess said. “If I don’t get it all at once, I won’t spend it all at once.”

  “No one’s going near the scene until we’re through with our investigation,” the fire chief warned. “Then you’ll have a real cleanup ahead of you before you ca
n do any patching or start up the machines. I’d say you’re looking at tomorrow afternoon at the earliest.”

  “Okay,” Morris said. “It’s too late to alert all the crew now. Everyone reports to breakfast at nine. Rita and I will work on the schedule tonight. Maybe we can figure out a way to take one of the small generators to the cabin tomorrow for a location shoot while Bess works on the other two back here.”

  “And George will check out the computers involved and see if there’s anything suspicious going on there,” I said.

  Luther checked his watch. “Well, I’m late for my date,” he said, “so I’ll be leaving you all now.”

  I looked at him and smiled. “With Althea?” I asked.

  “Yes, with Althea,” he said, with a mock frown. “It’s a work date.” Then the fake frown faded, and he grinned back at me.

  “What about you, Nancy?” Morris asked. “What’s your next move?”

  “I’m going to talk to the fire investigators first. Then I might stop off at the Musketeer camp on the way home.”

  “Nancy, what would we do without you, Luther, George, and Bess?” Morris said. “You’ve brought us the only good luck this production has had. Thanks so much. Okay then, everybody, we all have our assignments. See you tomorrow.”

  Luther left to meet with Althea. Morris and George went back to the office, and Bess and I walked to the generator semi. The electric-burn smell still filled the air.

  We stepped around glops of fire extinguisher foam and puddles of muddy water. A wide step stool had been placed in front of the semi. I saw Chief Cody standing just inside the rig, talking to one of his investigators. When he saw Bess and me, he hurried down the step stool.

  “Now, Nancy, I know why you’re here,” he said, “but we don’t have anything for you yet. I told you I’d get back to you as soon as I knew anything.”

  “Can you just tell me whether it was an accident or not?” I asked him.

  “No, I can’t tell you that yet,” he answered firmly.

  “Okay. How about letting us inside, just for a minute or two. Bess is going to be repairing this machine, if possible, and she wants to see how big that job is going to be.”

  He shook his head, but then surprised us by saying yes. “All right,” he said, “but just for a few minutes. Watch where you step and stay out of the way. If you find something suspicious, call one of us over—don’t touch it yourself.”

  I hurried over to the step stool before he could change his mind. Bess followed closely.

  “Boy, Chief Cody wasn’t kidding when he said it was a mess,” Bess muttered. The fire crew had placed a few large-beam lanterns around the inside of the rig, so it was pretty bright in there. And it was humid. Water dripped and trickled from the walls and slicked up the thick, carpetlike padding on the floor.

  Only two people were inside there with us—a man was videotaping the whole interior, and a woman stood beside the generator. It was a huge, multiunit machine. Bess gasped when she saw it.

  The investigator was systematically panning across the surface of the blackened machine with a special light. I recognized the instrument she was using as a multiple-color-band forensic light source. It was sort of like a UV black light, only much more precise. Forensic investigators use it to pick up traces of blood and other evidence that can’t be seen by the eye alone.

  “Have you found anything yet?” I asked her. I tried to sound casual, as if I were just another investigator asking an official question. It worked. She answered without even looking up.

  “Not on the machine,” she answered. “Just the blood drops on the floor. I probably won’t find any on the generator,” she admitted. “If there was any, they would have been blown off by the hoses. But the stuff on the floor . . . it seeped down into that pad.”

  She finished her inspection while Bess and I cautiously looked around. Finally the woman left to join the investigator at the other end of the semi.

  “This thing is huge,” Bess said, inspecting the generator. “It will take me forever to patch it up.” She took time to look it over and jotted a few notes on a pad. “That’s about all I can do right now,” she finally said. “Without being able to touch it or try to start it up, I’m just guessing about whether it’s even possible to fix it.”

  “Come on, you two,” Chief Cloud called from outside the rig. “You’ve been in there long enough. Let my team do their job.”

  He helped us descend the step stool. “How soon can Bess get in here to really inspect the generator?” I asked him. “You heard how desperate the director is to get the electricity back up and working.”

  “I fully understand the seriousness of the situation,” Chief Cloud said, firmly steering us away from the rig. “And I will inform Mr. Dunnowitz when it’s okay to let people back in the semi.”

  I thanked him, and Bess and I walked to our cars. “Looks like George has already left,” Bess said, checking her watch. “Her car is gone. Are you still going to stop by the protest camp? It’s pretty late.”

  “I’ll check it out when I drive by, and decide then. Let’s ride in together tomorrow. Morris said everyone will be at breakfast here at nine.”

  “I’ll drive,” Bess volunteered. “And I want to get here early. The sooner I get into that generator, the sooner this movie will get back into production. I’ll pick you up at seven.” She got in her car and started it up. “I’ll follow along with you. If you stop at the camp, I will too.”

  I drove out onto the road, with Bess following closely. The Muskoka Musketeers’ encampment was pretty dark and looked closed down for the night, so I decided to wait until the next day to talk to the protestors. I waved a “forward” gesture to Bess. The two of us had an uneventful ride back to River Heights.

  Bess and George picked me up at seven on Monday morning in Bess’s car. Bess had already told her cousin about our peek inside the generator rig.

  George passed out samples of muffins and juice from one of her mother’s catering experiments and shared what she’d learned from the computers. “The generator hookup is really protected,” she told us. “Password, full encryption, and—best of all—a tracking system. It’s set up so that anyone entering the program leaves a marker that can be traced back to that person.”

  “So did anyone hack into the program?” I asked.

  “I’m still working on it,” George said. “But I’ll find out. It takes a hacker to find a hacker.”

  When we arrived at the compound, hardly anyone else was there yet. We went straight to the mess hall where the caterers were setting up a breakfast buffet.

  Bess was thrilled to learn that she could get into the generator semi. She took the keys from Morris, promising to let him know as soon as she could give him an estimated timetable for recovering power. We went back to her car to get her huge tool cart and headed for the semi, dragging the cart on its four wheels.

  The axed-out hole in the side of the rig had been boarded up. We climbed the step stool, and Bess unlocked the doors and slid one open. Everything looked the same inside except for the addition of good lighting. Someone had installed six battery-operated spotlights on tall stands. We switched them all on, and the long room was flooded with light.

  We wrestled the tool cart up into the rig, and Bess began puttering with the generator. I inspected the rest of the room, jotting notes and taking pictures. But I didn’t find anything that could be called a clue. I wasn’t surprised—a lot of people had trooped around in there since the generator blew out, and Chief Cody’s investigators seemed to be pretty thorough.

  Bess and I were so absorbed in our separate investigations that we both jumped when Rita Clocker’s voice blared through a bullhorn: “Will everyone on the grounds report to the mess hall, please. Company meeting right now in the mess hall.”

  “Yikes, it’s nine twenty already,” Bess said. “Morris wanted us all there at nine sharp.” She put her tools away in the cart, closed it up, and locked it. I dropped my notebook and ca
mera into my backpack, and we scurried out of the semi. Bess locked the rig, and zipped the keys in her cargo pocket.

  When we got to the mess hall, most of the cast and crew were there. George waved us over to her table, which seated eight. Luther and Althea were already there, and Luther introduced Bess to Althea.

  “Somebody sitting there?” Bess said, nodding to the seat next to hers. That place and the one next to it were littered with empty muffin and butter wrappers, wadded-up napkins, and used forks.

  “Luke and Ben,” George answered. “They went back for seconds. I haven’t even had firsts yet—Mom’s muffins were enough breakfast for me.”

  “And almost enough for me,” I agreed. “But I think I’ll get some more juice. How about you, Bess?”

  “Juice would be good,” she answered. “I’ll come with you.”

  By the time we got back, Morris had arrived in the hall and was barreling toward our table. He pulled Bess and me aside so we could talk privately. “What do you think, Bess?” he asked. “Do you have any idea when we can get back up to speed?”

  “It’ll take me a few more hours to patch the big generator, but then not long to hook it to the other two. You should be back on schedule by midafter-noon. I just don’t know how long the parasite system will last.”

  “Oh, that’s great!” Morris said. He seemed not to have heard her last sentence. “Can I use one of the small generators this morning?”

  “Sure,” she said. “I won’t be needing it till afternoon. He grabbed her in a big hug, then bolted off to the small stage in the corner of the room.

  “Looks like most everyone is here,” he said into the bullhorn. “And I can tell by the buzz I heard around the compound this morning that most of you already know what I’m about to say.” He talked for a few minutes about the generator blowout, praising the quick response of the security team.