Chapter 62. Catching the Aquatic Gopher

*Maddox*

“Where does this pipe go?”

Bill Bixby is standing near me, staring at the pipe, wearing a robe over his pajamas, his hair disheveled, and is eyes barely focusing.

“This is the drain pipe,” he says. “It lets the unusable water back out into the river.”

I stare at him for a moment. “So this doesn’t reach the spring where the water that’s used for the bottling comes from?” I have to clarify.

“No, no, no,” he says. “We can turn this pipe in reverse to make the water flow the other direction. We do that from time to time to bring in more water to run the machinery and keep it cool, but for the most part, this pipe flows into the river, not the other way around.”

“Where does the water come into the plant?” I ask.

“Over there.” He points into the distance where I can see a large pipe that actually goes into the ground. “The spring isn’t under the river. It’s under the ground there, and it flows into the location of the river through an und