"Is there anyone who can cancel school for the rest of the day?" Molly wondered, stroking Vanessa's head, softly and gently a if to reassure the frightened girl.
"The district super intendant, probably," I grumbled, "though after the attack, I doubt he'd have anyone stay for the day... and considering that your room, the office, and the front lawn, are now crime scenes... by law we have to keep you out until we have all the evidence we need... though since Williams did not survive his own rampage, I don't think that part will take too long. The rest of it will be cleaning up after the damage he caused."
Molly let a growling sigh escape her lungs. Trying to conceal her frustration with a difficult man and the events of the day... and almost mothering sort of instinct to protect and comfort the students.
"You know he'll cause some trouble over this, George," Molly sighed.
"I know," I sighed, "but now is not the time for that. If you want to vent about it... vent later. Officer Barnes and I will do what we can to see that the kids here are looked after... and get home safely."
"What was the explosion?" Molly asked after a moment, "I heard an explosion about ten minutes before the power shut off..."
"That was the station," I said weakly, "we can talk about that later too."
As I departed to head toward the school again, I glanced to see Molly seated with a nervous look on her face. She likely knew the explosion was powerful, or guessed at it, based on that she had heard it. And when hearing that it was the station that was car-bombed, she was probably worried about me. I didn't know how to respond to that, because as it happened, I had been worried about me too. It was an inordinate stroke of luck that Bill Williams hadn't done more damage then he did. But then, one can never tell with crazy people...
Bill Williams probably wasn't insane, but considering what he did, as far as I was concerned, he was crazy. I put that to back of my mind and went back into the school. I found Officer Barnes in the main janitor's office in the center of the building and on the phone with a middle aged to elderly man standing nearby. I guessed he was the school's janitor/custodian or the head of a crew, depending on how many worked in each shift at the school. I guessed Officer Barnes was on the phone with the coroner. After a few moments, he hung up.
"The coroners are on their way for all the bodies," Officer Barnes answered.
"We may have to do something special for the guy out front," I commented, "the officers there did manage to dig out his gun and an ID card. According to it, he's a Federal Agent."
"FBI?"
"OSS, in this case Office of Strategic Sciences," I sighed, "possibly a hoax, as from history, the OSS was the Office of Strategic Services and was the ancestor of the CIA... but there is an awful lot about the card that looks too legit to be a hoax..."
"So more research as to why he was hanging around," Officer Barnes nodded, "anyway, the coroners are on their way and should here in roughly fifteen minutes."
I nodded.
"I also spoke with the District Superintendent, who was his usual charming self," Officer Barnes added, "blames your wife for the entire incident, but seemed to be horrified that Mrs. Fitzpatrick was wounded, a secretary murdered, and two kids wounded. He has given the all clear and his staff has began calling the parents to come pick up their kids. He's also agreed to call the parents of the kids who were shot."
I nodded, "best we can do, I suppose."
"Short of going through private files one at time," Officer Barnes commented.
"And what will that leave us with?" I wondered.
"Checking William's place," Officer Barnes replied, "see if he left anything behind."
Again, I nodded.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The process of removing the bodies from the school and dismissing the kids took a little while, and was a fairly complicated effort. The coroner's office representatives arrived first and began their work. Officer Barnes and I were both there to supervise and provide them with what little information we had.
"This guy's a Federal agent?" one of the coroner's asked as "Robert Honorius' body was loaded into their vehicle.
"That's what the identification on him said," I answered, "we've haven't had time to double check it though."
"What was he doing here, though?" the other coroner asked as Honorius' body was secured and they moved to collect the secretary's body next.
"In this case, playing hero," Officer Barnes told them, "at least that is what we've managed to gather. What he was doing in Columbia Falls in general, we don't know... if he actually is a Federal Agent... he's opened up a whole can of worms on jurisdiction issues."
"Ought to just let it go," the first coroner commented as we made our way into the office and began to go through the process of moving the secretary's body, "he's paid for the mistakes he made."
Officer Barnes and I both shrugged. The unknown man... Robert Honorius... was a mystery, and one I had wanted to solve when he first appeared. At that time it was merely suspicion and curiosity at a stranger inviting Molly and I to dinner, seemingly out of the blue. Now, I felt needed to solve the mystery. He died trying to stop an insane shooter, and while he had obviously made a few stupid choices... one couldn't argue against where his heart was. He had to have family somewhere. They deserved a fair explanation for how their son, husband, brother, other relative, or in-law died. Not some cover up.
Moving the remaining bodies went quietly. The coroners voiced their reactions to the grizzly scene that was secretary's body and their disgust at the body of Bill Williams. One of them had even been a good friend of of the former principal. He voiced almost disbelief that he would actually do this. Said that the man had always been protective of his students. He couldn't believe that he would threaten the students more then anyone else.
"When people snap, you can't predict what will happen," Officer Barnes told him, "he and a lot of die-hard R.A.M. supporters took a hard hit when Beauregard was proved to be a cheat and a liar... and he's since seen my partner and his wife finally succeed in their lives here in Columbia Falls."
"Which R.A.M. never wanted to happen," I added, "and he snapped."
The coroners nodded and proceeded with their work. Bill Williams' body was carried out and placed on the third compartment on the rather large hearse that the coroners were using. By its size it was almost like they had their own "ambulance" to carry away dead bodies.
"We'll keep Williams separate from the other two, in case there is anything you want to check on him," the first coroner informed me and Officer Barnes as they got into the cab of their vehicle and prepared to drive away.
+++++++++++++++++++++++
From there our only business at the school was to supervise the dismissing of the students. They were all ushered through side and back doors and sent around the school to avoid having them see the mess in the office. Parents did slowly arrive, and the busses made a special run to pick up those kids that lived out of town and the parents couldn't come. Many of the kids were visibly nervous and Molly's students didn't look much better, even as they were reunited with their parents or got on their bus... some of them with Molly's assistance. As they departed, Molly approached Officer Barnes and I. Megan was present and clutching Officer Barnes' hand.
"It would appear we were both lucky today," Molly told me.
"Looks to be that way," I nodded.
"Will you two need me for anything more?" Molly asked, "a statement or something?"
"We have all we need," Officer Barnes answered.
"You gonna be okay?" Megan asked weakly.
"I will," Molly sighed, "it's just a little stress."
"Do you want a hug?" Megan asked.
"Sure," Molly gave a weak smile and knelled down and took a polite hug from Megan, "you be good for your dad, now."
"OK," Megan answered, knowing that Officer Barnes wasn't her biological father, but he was still "dad" where it really mattered.
"If you don't need me for anything more, I'll head back to Bandhavgarh," Molly told me, "and try... try to recuperate from all of this."
I nodded as Molly turned and began to head back toward our cabin. Megan politely waved goodbye while Officer Barnes and I waited for her grandmother to show up and take Megan home. Once that was done, my partner and I moved to finish the work required of us on one nightmare of a day. Checking Bill Williams' home for any clue as to why he flipped and did what he did.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Bill Williams' home was a quiet one and in a relatively good neighborhood. It looked like nearly every suburban/country home one would see in a post card. A well kept home, a nice lawn and at least a one car garage. It made some of the wondering about why he had snapped all the more perplexing, but I doubted there would ever be a true answer to that question. And it didn't remove anything that would be viewed as suspicious.
The first thing was his garage door was open. Completely wide open. Now, it could be possible that he simply forgot to close the door, but that seemed like an extremely forgetful thing to do. Particularly if you were going to go on a rampage in an elementary school. The open door gave us very easy access. Officer Barnes didn't complain though and pulled our car onto the driveway. We were alone for this part, as the rest were headed by to the station with what evidence we had at the school to join Officer Jenkins in what work could be done there.
"Well," Officer Barnes commented as we made our way into the garage, "let's see what you've failed to hide."
The garage carried a heavy and strong scent that I caught the instant I entered it. Some of the scent did drift out, but I couldn't fully identify it. Once in the garage, I caught it all too clearly.
"You said the car bomb was likely made with fertilizer?" I asked.
"Yes," Officer Barnes nodded, "cheaper to buy and less conspicuous as an explosive... why? Do you smell fertilizer?"
"A lot of it," I answered.
Officer Barnes gave a sigh and then looked around the garage and then centered in on a garbage can in the back of the garage. As he opened the lid, we both looked into to see a lot crushed bags of fertilizer, which were the source of what I was smelling. The can was soon tipped over and the empty bags were dumped out of it. It appeared like the entire can was full of nothing but bags of fertilizer.
"And it was a lot of fertilizer," Officer Barnes grumbled.
"Too much, I'd suppose to simply fertilize his own lawn," I nodded.
There was a silence for a moment. Then...
"DAMN IT!" Officer Barnes practically roared, "the ass didn't just assault the school. He bombed the station!"
That added two more people killed to Bill Williams' list of victims.
"One of the others did find something that looked like a remote control in the truck that was there," I said weakly, "it he had a remote detonator, he likely tossed it somewhere on the way to the school from the station."
"Damn it all," Officer Barnes cursed again.