032 High Marks for Malice (10 page)

“I haven’t made up my mind yet. But I do like it.”

“How’d you hear about it?” Maria asked. She went back to napkin folding again.

Nancy told the truth. “Line told Ned, Ned mentioned it to me. Why?”

“I just wondered,” Maria answered, her lids fluttering nervously.

Maria badgered them with probing questions during the entire break. It was clear she had begun to wonder about them. Even when Nancy, trying to find out a little more about Maria, asked a few questions of her own, she had little luck. Maria’s answers were brief and always followed by another attempt to find out about their activities at Basson.

Nancy was curious about this turn of events, but she didn’t have time to pursue it. She had to get back to work.

She was cramming towels down the laundry chute when she saw Maria approaching in shorts and a T-shirt. “The Powers That Be sent me to help, since you’re new and this place has gotten
so
busy all of a sudden. There’re no students in the lab so I just closed it down until next shift.”

“Great. I could use the help,” Nancy said. That’s funny, she thought. Pickering had not
been back. How did he know what was happening up here? “Can you hold the fort a few minutes?” she asked. “I think the laundry chute’s jammed.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Maria volunteered quickly, and Nancy went back for more towels, trying to work out this new development.

She wondered what was going on. Maria knew nothing about the equipment or how to change the weights—although to give her credit, she tried. Had Pickering really sent her? If so, why?

Maria also stuck to Nancy like glue, never letting her out of sight. Whose idea was this? Nancy wondered. Maria’s? Pickering’s? Or the man in the conference room yesterday?

Suddenly the towels began to spill from the laundry chute. Great, Nancy thought. I knew this would happen. It was definitely clogged at the bottom, which she guessed was in the basement. Maria had promised to check the chute a while ago and now it was really backing up.

Nancy wondered if Maria was trying to keep her out of the basement. She looked over and saw that Maria was busy with a boy doing sit-ups. Here’s my chance, Nancy told herself, and slipped out. She found the stairs leading to the basement and hurried down.

The basement was a maze, and though Nancy had a good sense of direction, she lost her way almost immediately. To add to her troubles, most
of the doors were unmarked. She took a lucky guess and stumbled into the laundry room, closing the door behind her.

The room had drab, cement block walls with fat pipes snaking across its ceiling and down the walls. Two commercial washers and dryers squatted like one-eyed monsters at the far end.

The problem with the laundry chute was caused by several towels that had caught behind one of the pipes beside the opening. They blocked the fall of the towels into the laundry cart.

She pulled one free, then a second, and tossed them into the cart. But the last towel was stuck fast. Nancy gave it a good hard yank.

Immediately she knew she’d made a big mistake. That third towel had covered a split in the pipe. Now scalding steam came blasting out—right toward her face!

N
ANCY REACTED INSTANTLY
, dropping on all fours to duck the burning steam. In one smooth motion she was on her feet again, her back against one of the dryers. The small gray room filled rapidly, the steam boiling and swirling as it bounced against the concrete-block walls.

In seconds Nancy was wrapped in the deadly fog. Perspiration streamed from her forehead, bathing her eyes in a salty, stinging flood. She was blind and finding it harder and harder to breathe. She had to get out!

Dropping to her knees, Nancy felt her way toward the door, hoping she didn’t stray too far
in either direction. If she didn’t get out soon, she’d die from the heat.

She bumped into something hard and smooth, the door and not a concrete wall. But her relief was short-lived. Her hands were so wet she couldn’t turn the knob.

Scrubbing them against the smooth fabric of her leotard, almost as wet as her hands, she gripped the knob as hard as she could. It turned. Nancy rushed out and almost ran over Maria.

“Nancy! What happened to you? You’re soaking wet!”

Unable to answer, Nancy slumped against the wall, trying to catch her breath. When she finally could speak, she explained what had happened. Maria was oddly silent.

“You’d better call an engineer,” Nancy said sharply, wiping her eyes. “That pipe’s under a lot of pressure. If it explodes all the way—” As her vision cleared, she saw that Maria had turned ghostly pale, her eyes wide with fear.

“Maria!” Nancy shook her.

Coming to life, Maria took off, running as if her life depended on it.

“Maria!” Nancy ran after her, stunned by the girl’s reaction. Pursuing her through corridor after corridor, she saw where Maria was heading—toward an exit. Nancy pushed herself to the limit, catching Maria as she hit the bar on the door to the outside.

“Wait a minute, will you?” Nancy panted, winded. “What’s wrong with you?”

Maria tried to shake her off but was not strong enough. Nancy watched as the slender girl tried to pull herself together. Finally she managed a sheepish smile. “I’m sorry, I panicked. You said the pipe would explode, and I didn’t want to be around when it did.”

“The room would have contained it,” Nancy pointed out. “We weren’t in any danger in the hall. I can’t guarantee whether the washers and dryers would survive it, though.”

The reminder of the appliances seemed to spur Maria to action. “I’d better get to a house phone.”

Nancy opened the door, assuming Maria would use one of the wall phones in the corridor. They had passed several.

But Maria shook her head and backed away. “No!” She gave a nervous smile. “Let’s go around to the front. I need some air. Basements make me nervous. I—sort of have a phobia about being underground.”

“Oh. Sorry,” Nancy said. Perhaps that explained why Maria hadn’t come down to unclog the chute to begin with. It was just as well she hadn’t, Nancy thought, or she’d have been severely burned. It was pure luck that those towels . . .

Or was it? Nancy slowed, beginning to wonder
about the accident in the laundry room. Had it been rigged? And for whom? She shivered as the winter air cut through her wet leotard. They entered the spacious lobby and started up the steps.

“Oh, there you are.” One of the boys who’d been lifting weights leaned over the railing. “We were getting lonely up here.” He stared at Nancy. “Is it raining?”

Belatedly, Nancy realized how she must look. Her hair was damp, snaking in reddish-blond tendrils over her shoulders. “No. I was in the steamroom earlier and haven’t dried out yet.” She turned to wink at Maria and found that pale, pinched look on her face again.

Nancy went back to the spa, while Maria phoned maintenance. Something else had triggered what she’d seen in the girl’s eyes before Maria had sprinted away. Something more than just being in the basement. Maria had been terrified.

After her shift was over and Maria had left, Nancy changed clothes at a leisurely pace, stalling until she was alone. Jim Pickering had come by to make certain she hadn’t been hurt, offering to let her leave early if she wanted to. But she had chosen to stay, waiting for just this moment.

After checking the dining room to satisfy herself of Jim Pickering’s whereabouts, she found the nearest door to the basement and slipped downstairs to the laundry room.

It was clear of steam now, but the walls and floor still glistened with moisture. Remembering the death trap this place might have been, Nancy set about her task quickly. The sooner she got out of there the better.

She took her first clear look at the pipe, which was now shut down. It had not split, as she’d first thought. It had been cut, probably with a saw, a clean cut that sliced through the insulation around the pipe and the pipe itself.

So the towels had been wrapped around it on purpose. No professional engineer would have pulled such a stunt. Someone set this up to get me, Nancy thought. Someone who knew I’d be working in Cass’s place.

And Maria had helped. By stalling, she made sure Nancy would come down and remove the towels herself. They must want me dead or severely burned. No wonder Maria had panicked. It must have shocked her to discover the scheme hadn’t worked.

So now Nancy knew for sure. Maria was part of this conspiracy.

• • •

The sun had already set when Nancy left the Fish Tank. She was to meet Ned and Cass at the dorm in forty-five minutes to go to the hospital. Then, if Marty had had any luck with the copies of the printouts Ned had dropped off, they would meet at his apartment.

There were no lights in Cass’s windows as
Nancy approached the dorm. She hoped her roommate was somewhere on campus and wouldn’t be late. The hospital was very strict about visiting hours for patients.

Nancy unlocked the door to the room, pushed it open—and stopped short. The blinds were closed, the curtains drawn over them, but even in the near-darkness she could see that the room was in shambles. Clothes were strewn all over. Books and papers littered the floor. Even Cass’s bed had been ripped apart.

Stepping into the room, Nancy felt for the light switch and flipped it. Nothing happened. Moving to a table lamp beside the couch, she tried to turn it on. Again nothing. She peered down through the hole in the lamp shade. The bulb was broken. The other lamp had met the same fate. Someone had been very busy.

A tiny sound alerted Nancy that someone was still there. She turned slowly, her eyes scanning the shadows and the farthest corners of the room. Suddenly the closet door flew open and a figure dashed for the door of the room.

Nancy threw herself into the intruder. The impact slammed the person against the wall. Stunned, the figure collapsed in a heap.

Watching for any sudden movement, Nancy opened the door wider, using the light from the hall to get a better look at her subject.

It was Maria!

M
ARIA BEGAN TO CRY
, deep, wrenching sobs that shook her small body. Nancy stared at her, astonished. Even though Maria was a suspect, Nancy simply found it hard to believe that she was capable of hurting anyone.

“I didn’t do this, I swear,” Maria gulped, then rolled onto her side, curled up.

Nancy moved around the room, trying lights until she found one that had survived the vandalism. The devastation made her angry, but she checked her temper. Now she had to talk to Maria and get some answers. Nancy sat down beside her. “It’s all right, Maria. Stop crying.”

“It’s
not
all right!” Maria pulled herself upright.
“Everything’s all wrong! Everything’s awful!”

Nancy found some tissues and crammed them into Maria’s hand. “Tell me about it. Maybe I can help. You say you didn’t do this.”

“I’d never! I sneaked in the back way to see you. When I got here, the door was open and it was—like this.” She looked around helplessly. “I started to leave, but someone was coming up the steps. I didn’t want to be seen, so I came in and closed the door. Then I heard the key in the lock and I was stuck, so I hid.”

Nancy gave Maria a long, searching look. Her instincts told her that the girl was being truthful—this time. “Okay,” she said. “I believe you. Why did you want to see me?”

Maria blew her nose. “I wanted to—to apologize. That accident with the steam pipe was meant for me, not you. I was given specific orders to keep you out of the basement. If there was any reason to go down there, I was to do it, not you.”

“Jim Pickering told you that?” Nancy leaned forward intently.

“No, no. The computer at my desk told me. I
hate
it!”

Bewildered, Nancy sat back on her heels. “I don’t understand.”

“Neither do I. It’s like some awful, evil monster, ordering me around. I don’t know who’s sending the messages on it, but it says if I don’t do what it tells me to, or if I try to quit my job, I’ll
be the next one to have an accident. I’ve been so scared, especially after what happened in the basement today.”