Drago #6: And the City Burned. Art Spinella
He began dialing, head down but still talking to us.
“ I’m going to be coordinating our guys and the responses from the other PDs and fire departments. I’ll call in everyone in the department. Set them to looking for these tanks. I’m not sure we’ll have support from other towns like Coquille. They may feel it necessary to do their own searches in their own backyards. Nothing says this is a Bandon-only problem. Ditto the fire departments. If these damn things go off and we’re eyeball deep in brush fires we can’t handle, most of the other towns are going to hesitate leaving themselves naked.”
“Makes sense to me. If someone is really looking only at Bandon, setting one or two of these things off in Coquille or Myrtle Point – even near Coos Bay – could be a nice diversion.”
Beads of sweat were beginning to trickle down the Chief’s face. It was hot, but he’d seen worse so I wrote it off to anxiety. “True. Which is why we have to act like we’ll have to handle this on our own. That said, I’ll be stuck to this chair until the end of the day, hoping the whole thing is nothing more than a bad joke.”
As Sal and I walked from the office, Forte called after us.
“Listen, Drago. Act fast. No stopping for donuts.”
On the way out of the PD, I asked Beth for a county map. She opened her desk drawer and pulled one out handing it to me.
“Is this for real, Nick?”
“Gotta treat it like it is, sweetie.”
Back in the parking lot, I unfolded the map and spread it across the hood of the Crown Vic.
“Okay, you want to torch Bandon. Where do you put the bombs?”
Sal dug his fingernails into his beard, stared at the map.
“Man, there’s a lot of scrub and gorse around here.”
Bandon itself is slightly more than three-square miles, most of which is landmass and heavily treed. At barely 20 feet above sea level, the area was formed 4.5 million years ago during a massive land deformation as the tectonic plates shifted. The Jurassic rocks can be seen in the sea cliffs, sea stacks and large islands along the shore near the Coquille River. Most of the land is greywacke sandstone, greenstone and chert, and ultra-hard blueschist. The last could be found in sufficient amounts that construction engineers blasted Tupper Rock to bits in order to build the all-important jetty.
“Yeah, but how would you take down Bandon?” I pointed to the east of Filmore Ave. “Big area here.” Tracing my finger down to Rosa Road. “And tons of open scrub here.”
Sal pointed to the south of town. “Along the backside of City Park, near the softball and little league ball fields.”
I marked each of those areas and a few more where thick brush choked the ground.
“Add a few of these old abandoned buildings and houses, Nick, and you’ve got a ring of fire that spells inferno.”
“Should we take a quick cruise around and see if we ID some of the more likely spots?”
It really wasn’t a question. Sal climbed into the passenger seat and we headed up 101 to Old Town. That, it seemed to me, would be a good place to start because Bandon is identified by its historic district and would most likely be the target.
We idled along First Street, the river and boardwalk on our right, a series of stores on the left. At First and Oregon Avenue we turned up the bluff to Third then back down Bandon Ave. to Second to the old Coast Guard Coquille River Patrol building. Lots of brush with older wooden houses spotted in the shore pine.
Sal marked the spots as we returned to First, moved up Edison and circled behind town toward the high school on Ninth.
“Holy Joseph and crackers, Sal. There are more places to put explosives than M&Ms in Hersey, Pennsylvania.” I speed dialed Forte who picked up on the first ring. “Chief, I’d send as many of your guys into the areas behind First and Second streets as you’ve got. With the heat and dry weather, there must be a hundred places to hide one of those bombs.”
“I’ve sent a couple out toward Rosa Road, but hell, Nick, what do I tell them to look for? I’m having them find a big patch of scrub and walk it. It’s hit and miss, at best.”
“Tell me about the kid who brought the bomb to you.”
“Name’s Timothy Dornan. Senior at Bandon High. Why?”
“Where’s he live?”
“Up on Chicago Avenue Southeast, behind the PD.” He shuffled through his desk-top papers and provided an address. “Have something in mind?”
“I’ll let you know.”
Dialing off, to Sal, “We gotta talk to Dornan. Should be in school about now, but first let’s take a quick side trip.” Back up 101 to Tenth, left onto Baltimore Ave. SE and a few quick turns to Chicago SE.
“Remember Della Haye?”
Sal’s eyes twinkled. “Oh, yeah.”
“She lived up on Chicago.”
“Hotty.”
“You dated her, didn’t you?”
Sal grinned. “Oh, yeah.”
Shaking my head. “Letch.” Reflected back to those high school days. Sal and Della were a hot item for about a week.
“You two seemed pretty good. Why’d you break up?”
“Sauerkraut.”
“Sauerkraut.”
“Her family ate it all the time. I think they put it on their Fruit Loops for breakfast.”
“Foul smelling stuff.”
“You ever eat sauerkraut?”
That made me laugh. “Are you kidding? You know me. Nothing crosses my lips if it has more than seven letters or two syllables. Beer. Meat. Pizza. Fish. Shrimp. Soda.”
“Hamburgers has three syllables and 10 letters.”
“There’s no ‘ham’ in hamburgers. To me they’re ‘burgers. Seven letters. Two syllables.”
“Ice cream. Eight letters.”
“The exception that proves the rule.”
“Oh, yeah.”
Chicago cuts up the bluff overlooking Old Town. Most of the houses are neat and trim clapboard, well maintained and tidy. Checking the addresses, I pulled into the driveway of the Dornan house. Sal and I climbed out of the Vic and walked to the front door.
I pressed the doorbell button, a little blue thing with a whale engraved on it.
A hefty women in her 40s peeked through the glass panel, smiled and opened the door. “Hi. Can I help you?”
“Mrs. Dornan?”
“Yes.”
“My name is Nick Drago, this is Sal Rand. We’re working with the Bandon Police Department.”
“I know you, Nick. You’re in the papers all the time.”
A slight exaggeration, but I could feel my head swell an additional hat size.
“We’re looking for Timothy.”
A shadow crossed her face, “Is he in trouble?”
“No, not at all. In fact, he helped the Department this morning and we’re just following up.”
The