Home Repair Is Homicide - Crawlspace Part 24

Big mistake. All that dark nothingness ... for an instant, he didn't think he could do it. It's this stopping to think about things all the time that's got you messed up, he realized. h.e.l.l, the worst it can do is kill you.

And that, he was pretty sure, Randy Dodd had already done. Just a matter of time ... Thinking this, he struck another match on the side of Sam's emergency kit.

The match flared yellow and red. Chip touched it to the pine boughs in his coat. They burst into flames, singing his eyebrows, and almost at once his coat caught fire, too, the stink from its melting fibers and plastic zipper stinging his nose.

Reflexively he flung the flaming bundle away, saw the arc it made, flaring as it swung at the end of the rope.

Then, with a calm inward smile that astonished him more than anything else so far, he hurled himself over the edge. Falling and falling ...

From above him came a brief, harsh crackling sound, like a sudden intake of fiery breath. Next, the sky exploded, so that as he fell he was chasing his own dark, out-of-control shadow.

And after that, very suddenly so he didn't even have time to be afraid, he knew nothing more.

OUT ON THE WATER, CAROLYN RATHBONE WATCHED THE eastern sky fill with light. The few remaining clouds glowed sullen orange, as if the fire came from within them.

But even from where she lay, she could tell that it didn't. Tall flames licked the sky over there, as if some giant torch had been set burning.

All the other little boats on the water had nearly gone by, while the one she was prisoner on waited silently in darkness for them to pa.s.s, only a hundred yards or so distant.

Randy Dodd crouched with his knife to her throat. He'd shut down the engine and disabled the running lights.

"Don't make a sound," he'd whispered, and she hadn't. So his ruse had worked, and as the fire over there rose higher she heard men's shouts, and the other boats' engines revving.

They were going away. The knife's pressure on her skin eased slightly. But, peeking up, she saw Randy Dodd's face contorted in a snarl of frustration.

He seized her hair, pulling her head up out of the blanket she'd been huddled in. Her breath came in shudders of fright that she couldn't control, as he scrutinized her face.

She thought he might kill her right then, but instead a new thought seemed to occur to him. As he considered it an eerie calm came over him, his expression smoothing and relaxing suddenly.

He flung her away from him, then cast another glance at the departing flotilla. They were headed toward the now-diminis.h.i.+ng firestorm on the other side of the water. When their running lights were little more than sparks afloat on it, he restarted the engine and they motored slowly toward the lights of Eastport, so distant a moment earlier but looming rapidly now.

Brighter and nearer, but at low tide under the wharves by the harbor, no light shone. Down there, the gloom was complete. He aimed the boat at the nearest one, confidently and with the air of a man who knew, now, just exactly where he was going.

And what he would do there.

She knew, too. That it was over, that like the other girls' final moments, her own had arrived. Or would very soon. But unlike the others, she didn't wonder about them. She knew. Evidence, trial testimony, photographs ... Oh, yes, Carolyn Rathbone, true-crime writer, knew only too well what was in store for her.

And she wasn't having any. Come with us, the girls in their graves crooned seductively, but she ignored them, scrambling up toward the boat's rail, full of sudden decision.

Up and onto it, where she stood for a glorious instant under a dark sky, looking out at the dark water. Startled, Randy Dodd lunged the length of the boat at her, but too late. She balanced on teetering tiptoe there, laughing and weeping.

Maybe I'm going to die now, she told the girls. Maybe I am. Or maybe not.

But that b.a.s.t.a.r.d ...he's not going to kill me.

The smell of the sea was so intoxicating, it made her feel she could fly. Spreading her arms, she did.

CHAPTER 10.

BY FIVE-THIRTY IN THE AFTERNOON, IT WAS PITCH DARK outside, and Jake had exhausted her list of immediately doable household repairs. A feeling of panic rose in her as she contemplated the was.h.i.+ng machine that no longer boiled the laundry no matter what temperature its control k.n.o.b was set on.

Ditto the leakless faucet in the upstairs bathroom, the old doork.n.o.bs that now turned without falling off in her hand, four non-creaky stair treads each cured by the application of a single well-placed grooved ring-nail, and a carpet whose dinginess had been eliminated by the simple method of throwing the d.a.m.ned thing out.

She searched her mind for yet another useful project, found none, and sat down in the telephone alcove in dismay. Just doing nothing while waiting for word about Sam was impossible, and so was calling someone-anyone-for updates.

Or just to talk. She'd already called everyone, and Ellie was the only one who hadn't made her feel that tearing her hair out was a viable option.

"I'll be here," Ellie had said. "Call any time you want. A dozen times, if you need to."

Which Jake had needed to, but she hadn't done it, because how many times could you tell even your closest friend that you were going crazy with worry, and even crazier with the inability to do anything helpful in the search for your missing son?

"They'll find him," said her father, coming in briefly to put a hand on her shoulder. "They will. Every boat in the area is out there on the hunt for him. You just concentrate on that."

"Right," she said, putting her own hand up to grasp his in grat.i.tude. But the only thing she wanted was to be out searching, too, and she couldn't be. She would only be in the way.

"I'm going to take a ride down to the breakwater," he told her. "Just have a look around."

She nodded and let him go, then wandered aimlessly around the house until she recalled that the damper flap on the furnace flue in the cellar needed replacing, and that she actually had the replacement part.

Which was why she was down there, hands coated with black, greasy soot, when the phone rang.

"Bella?" she called up the cellar steps. "Can you get it? I'm all covered with-"

But Bella didn't reply, nor did her quick-step sound on the floor overhead. The telephone kept ringing.

"Bella!" she called again, hurrying toward the stairs. Still no answer.

Jake hustled up the cellar steps, grabbed a fistful of paper towels as she dashed through the empty kitchen, and tried fruitlessly to get the grime off her hands before picking up the receiver.

Apparently, furnace soot stuck much better to hands than it did to a wad of paper towels. The caller ID box said Undisclosed.

"Listen, you," she began angrily, but then a voice broke in.

"Jake? Jake, this is Roger Dodd. Sam's here, I've found him, Randy must have-"

"What?" Relief coursed through her, as strong as a drug.

"He's here," Roger repeated. "I found him in the cellar, I don't know how-he's hurt, I called an ambulance and the county dispatcher's trying to find Bob Arnold right now."

Sam. She leaned against the wall of the telephone alcove.

"Can you come down here? He's asking for you," said Roger. "He's conscious, but I don't know how long he can-"

Another voice came on. "h.e.l.lo?" Faint but recognizable; her heart leapt. "h.e.l.lo, can you hear me?"

"Sam," she managed. He sounded awful. "Yes, I can hear you fine. You hang in there, now, honey, I'm on my-"

Roger came on again, his tone urgent. "He's losing blood, Jake; I don't like the looks of him. Maybe you'd better-"

"I'll be right down," she said, and hung up. Then, pausing only to call Ellie White and let her know the astonis.h.i.+ng thing that had just happened- "I'll meet you there," Ellie said without hesitation.

-she rushed from the house.

In the dark yard, she yanked the car door open and hurled herself in, key in hand. She'd thrown the car into reverse and was halfway out of the driveway when Randy Dodd sat silently up in the back seat and put a knife to her throat.

BELLA WAS COMING DOWN THE HALL STAIRS FROM THE third floor, where she'd been running a dustcloth over the old floorboards in Jacobia's workroom-you could vacuum all you wanted, she felt strongly, but until you got down on your hands and knees it just wasn't clean-when she heard Jake leaving the house.

So now was her chance. Two minutes later, she strode down the dark street toward the Dodd House with fear and determination warring in her heart.

She wasn't supposed to go there. Bob Arnold had been very clear about it. When the search warrant was finally obtained, the whole place would be gone over by people who were authorized to do so.

Until then, everyone else was to Keep Out. But ...

It simply was not possible to let the earring Anne Dodd had given her remain lost. Not without even looking for it. And the only place she'd been recently that she hadn't yet searched was ...

The old cellar. She'd noticed that the earring was gone on the way to St. Stephen with Jacobia, her reflexive touch for good luck to it finding nothing but her own earlobe. Since then, she had retraced her steps to the Dodd House and back, and had gone over her own domestic territory with the grim intensity of a prospector hunting for even the tiniest gold speck.

Without result. A seed pearl, two pennies, and a whole clove that had rolled away while she was sticking them into oranges for pomanders a week earlier had been her only discoveries.

So this was her last chance. If the earring wasn't somewhere in the Dodd House, she would probably never find it. And although a lost earring was not the worst tragedy, she would never be able to replace it.

Never mind that the very thought of entering the place alone made her feel small and quavery. You can quiver when you're back home, she told herself brusquely.

Because sometimes if you wanted things a certain way, you had to make them that way. And if you didn't ...

Well, if you didn't, you deserved whatever you got. Telling herself this, she emerged from the dark alley that ran alongside the Eastport Nursing Home onto the slightly less dark and shadowy thoroughfare of Was.h.i.+ngton Street.

Across it, hunkered down among the leafless overgrown trees, the Dodd House seemed to sulk behind shade-covered windows reflecting the yellowish streetlights. In the damp, chilly breeze, a patch of s.h.i.+ngles on the sloping roof made a wet flap flap sound.

No light showed from within. If it had, she might've turned tail and run. But- There's no one in there, she told herself firmly. And I'm only going to find what's mine.

At nearly suppertime there were few cars on the street. She waited until none were in sight, then crossed and hurried up the old steps, careful not to put her foot through any rotten ones. She was so intent on not being seen, she forgot for a moment how nervous she was about being inside.

But she remembered once the door closed behind her and she stood alone in the dark. With trembling fingers, she snapped on her flashlight and forced herself down the hall, past the old staircase, whose carved mahogany banister, polished with beeswax and lemon oil until it shone, had been Anne's particular pride.

Now it was hung with cobwebs. A gritty scrim moved under her feet as she crept on; the whole place smelled like a sour mop. She scanned the kitchen floor with the flashlight but found only a few hollowed-out acorns, brought in by squirrels through some hole that hadn't been patched, she supposed.

It was hideous in here, and sad. She wished heartily that she hadn't come back. Still, almost done. A few minutes more and she would know whether or not she'd lost her earring for good.

She started downstairs, to the cellar.

THE GREAT, FIERY WIND OF THE TALL SENTINEL PINE'S EX-ignition sucked the air up out of the pit where Chip Hahn lay. Waking in horror, he forced his face in under some rocks and clasped his hands over his head, struggling to breathe.

As the initial roar faded, a rain of fire began, burning embers and sizzling sticks showering all around him with a sound like hail clattering on a tin roof, the reek of smoke filling his lungs. A ma.s.sive flaming branch thudded down, inches from him.

Everything burning ... a swarm of hot coals bit through his pants and attacked his legs. He jerked up and swatted them off frantically, then doused the remaining ones with handfuls of the damp sand, heedless of the tiny burning bits in it, blistering his hands.

A sound made him look up just in time to see a ball of fire plum meting at him, a ball the size of a house... . It was the huge pine's flaming top, broken off and falling to earth like a fiery comet. Run ...

Gasping, weeping, shoeless and burn-flecked, he scrambled in terror halfway up the side of the sand pit. The ma.s.sive fireball struck the ground with a concussive whoomph of renewed flame that hurled yet another spark-storm stinging and burning over his exposed skin.

But then it fell back. What remained collapsed into itself, burning more sedately as if, having demonstrated its unearthly power, the fire was content now with snapping and popping. A few remaining flaming branch fronds floated lazily down into it.

But the big event was over, Chip realized as he watched it. Already the yellow flames were subsiding to a ma.s.s of red coals, glowing in the dark.

He steadied himself as best he could on the unstable slope of the old sand pit. His streaming tears made the blisters on his face and hands sting like acid burns, and the smoke and hot gases he'd inhaled turned his breathing into torture.

And he was still bleeding, possibly a lot. He didn't dare to check, but the waves of light-headedness he felt was.h.i.+ng over him were probably not all from the fire and his terrified flight from it.

His ears rang like gongs. Gagging, he hacked up sour gobbets of soot. His voice was gone, only a faint croak emerging when he tried it, and his throat felt like pins were being stuck into it.

Christ, what a mess. But under all his pain was the exultant realization that he'd done it, he'd lit the d.a.m.ned thing on fire. Someone would see ... .

Someone would come. Now if he could just get to the top of the pit, find Sam, and try to help him until their rescuers got here... . He dug his stockinged feet-where had his shoes gone? He couldn't remember-into the sand slope. But when he did that, it started sliding again and he couldn't hang on, to stop himself. So he slid with it all the way down to the bottom again.

And again. On his third try, or maybe his fourth, he was no nearer the top than before. His fingers bled stickily from digging into the stony, s.h.i.+fting earth, and every so often an ember from the fire still sulking at the pit's bottom sailed up and zinged him; by now the exposed back of his neck felt like-and probably was, he realized-cooked meat.

He collapsed onto his face, spread-eagled on the steep hill. Again, he had to try again. Because the whole tree had exploded, for G.o.d's sake-somebody would've seen it. Surely they'd be curious.

But not about Chip, because no one knew he was here. No one but Randy Dodd, and he sure as h.e.l.l wasn't going to tell anyone. So people might come to find out about the fire, but they wouldn't be here to save some poor injured fellow from out of this pit.

For all Chip knew, they'd never get anywhere near it. If they approached what remained of the sentinel tree from its other side, they might not even realize the sand pit existed.

And with his voice gone, he couldn't even yell to alert them. So he had to try to climb. Cold, hungry, thirsty, bleeding, burned-everything hurt now, banging and cras.h.i.+ng with pain, so he had no way of knowing which parts of him were severely injured and which were just beat to h.e.l.l- Climb, d.a.m.n it. It's easy. Put a hand out, dig in. Push with the foot. Again. Up, big fella.

Chip smiled in the darkness, remembering how he used to tell Sam Tiptree that same thing whenever Sam fell-running for a fly ball or a long, spiraling pa.s.s-on the lawn in Central Park. Or when Sam tripped over his own feet trying to make an easy layup or return a marshmallow serve ...

Back then, Chip had been the athlete, not Sam, and the clear admiration in Sam's eyes when Chip knew how to throw a curveball, tie a slipknot, or get them both into a video game emporium with just one ticket had been, in Chip's pathetically lonely, solitary adolescent life, worth a million bucks.

He'd have given a million to see it again, too. But he was never going to, he realized bleakly as a cascade of stones from above showered down on him, loosened by his efforts at climbing. Sam was dead, either from the gunshot wound he'd had or drowned by the rising tide.

And I'm the only one who knows. The thought triggered a fast mental snapshot of Chip's mother, before she'd walked out on the Old b.a.s.t.a.r.d.

Walked out on Chip, too. He grabbed another handful of sand. Walked, and never came back. His fingers seized a root clump as he went on thinking about when the cards from her stopped coming.

The Old b.a.s.t.a.r.d's sourly delivered explanation was that she'd gotten tired of them, but Chip never believed it completely. He feared something bad had happened, that something had simply erased her from the face of the earth.

Chip thought that if only he knew what specific disaster had befallen his mother, which terrible event out of the many that capered in his imagination-if indeed any of them had happened at all-he might not feel so bad about it.

The way Sam's own mother was going to feel about Sam: just a big hole full of awful questions that would never get answered. Just nothing. Which plenty of people would say was probably for the best. Easier not to know the details.

But Chip knew better, and so did all the families of all those girls he and Carolyn had written about.