The next day, the two most important tasks on Amanda’s agenda were to find out where the sugar had gone and explore the wider area around the garage. Once again she enlisted Simon’s help in shadowing the cook, and she and Nick decided to explore the blast area.
The garage was surrounded by gravel in the front and lawn and shrubs on the other sides. Inside, in addition to the parking area, the school had built an auto shop and a storage area. Amanda and Nick started with the outside, then worked their way inward, crunching broken glass and other debris in the process.
“This is why we keep shoes under the bed back home,” said Amanda, eyeing all the junk on the garage floor. “If there’s an earthquake in the middle of the night, you need something to put on your feet.”
“That sounds dreadful! Have you been in an earthquake?” said Nick.
“No. My parents have, though, and they told me about it in excruciating detail.”
She thought about what they’d said about the 1994 Northridge quake. A huge jolt knocking everything off shelves, opening cupboards, and spilling the contents. Jars and bottles had broken all over the kitchen, spewing everything from ketchup to pickles all over the floor and mixing it with shards of glass. They said it had taken them an entire day to clean just that room and they’d cut themselves many times. The situation hadn’t been helped by the fact that the electricity, gas, and water had all been shut off. Amanda shuddered just thinking about it.
“I’m glad you’re away from there,” said Nick, stepping around a piece of wood with nails sticking out. “It sounds unsafe.”
“Right. Like this is so safe.”
“I suppose you’re right. But you have a choice here, don’t you?”
Not really. Not when your parents make you go to the school and the only alternative is . . . what was it, anyway? Being declared incorrigible and sent to reform school? Running away and living on the street? Going into foster care? Amanda had no idea.
She looked down. She didn’t think it was a good idea to destroy evidence this way, but what else were they supposed to do? If they cleaned up the glass they’d be disturbing the scene. Of course by walking on it they were also affecting it. It seemed that there was no satisfactory option. If only there were a way to build a walkway above the ground, but that was a ridiculous idea. Or was it?
“We shouldn’t be walking on this stuff, you know,” she said, eyeing a particularly nasty piece of jagged glass. “We’re disturbing the evidence.”
“I know, but there’s nothing we can do. Just try to step as carefully as possible,” said Nick.
“What if we were to build a walkway above the ground so we could look but not touch?” She motioned as if pointing out an invisible platform.
“Ha ha! Great idea. Exactly how do you propose to do that?”
“I don’t know. But it seems like there should be a way.”
“Fly?”
“Very funny.” She looked down and to the left, reaching into the right side of her brain for an answer, then glancing at Nick. “We could build a scaffold out of chairs.”
“That’s a lot of chairs,” he said.
“Wait. I’ve got an idea. What about placing a bunch of ladders end to end?” She motioned to where the ladders might go.
“Don’t you think the rungs and the frames will crush things?” he said.
“Yes, they will, but some of the evidence will be preserved better than if we walk on it.”
“That seems a bit farfetched. Although I like it better than the chairs. Fewer pieces.”
“Stepping-stones?”
“Again, won’t they destroy more than if we just tiptoe through the debris? And where are we going to get them?”
He had a point. The only stepping-stones on campus were huge and probably as heavy as she was. Heavier, maybe.
“Argh. There has to be a solution to this. How about a clothesline-type thing that will hold our weight? We just roll along it using some kind of pulley.” She acted out what that would look like.
“You’re determined to do this, aren’t you?” he said, smiling at her through the dust.
“Of course. Aren’t you?”
“Not every question has a good answer.”
“I refuse to believe that. How do they do archaeological digs? I know they have to map everything where they find it and make sure they don’t break things.”
“This isn’t an archaeological dig. Do you know how much those things cost?” He whistled.
“I know, but we have an opportunity here. We could revolutionize the way crime scenes are processed.” The right side of her brain was all fired up now.
“Ha ha. You really are something, you know that?”
“As a matter of fact I do. Hang on. I want to look up archaeological investigations.” She took out her phone and did a couple of searches. “Hm, it seems that archaeological sites involve digging way down. This is different.”
“Yes,” said Nick.
“But they do take stuff away from the area they’re interested in. They describe where they found it, then they remove it for further processing. We could do that.” She looked at him. She was sure he’d go for this one. It was the most practical, and archaeology was also romantic, not like chairs and ladders and pulleys.
“With what? Where would we take it?” he said sweeping his eyes over the area.
“I’ll admit there’s a lot of stuff here. But what if we only removed debris where we put our feet? We could create a path and leave everything else as it is.”
“I still don’t see . . .”
“I think it would be pretty easy. We make a couple of footsteps where the debris starts and carry it out in a carton. One of us catalogs it, then scoops, and the other holds the box. We do this little by little until we’ve cleared a path. We put the boxes in an outbuilding.”
“Hm, that doesn’t sound like a bad idea. Then the evidence is there for the others to examine. It could work. Well done, Amanda. I’m impressed.” He high-fived her.
“Let’s get started,” she said.