Dust to Dust (31 page)

It wasn’t anything she needed to attend to. They would just have to return during civilized hours to ring the doorbell. Diane closed her eyes again.

The doorbell rang again. This time they leaned on it. They banged the door with their fist.

“Okay, this is obnoxious,” said Diane. She submerged a moment, then came up and rubbed her hands over her hair, squeezing the water out of it.

It must be a drunk
, she thought. Or someone who had the wrong address. Or maybe it was a process server for some unknown thing someone was suing her for. Whatever it was, she decided not to face it naked. She got out of the tub, dried off, and slipped on underwear and sweats. She dried her hair with a towel. All the while, whoever it was banged on the door and rang the bell.
Damn it. What the hell?

She slipped her feet into her fleece-lined house shoes and walked into the bedroom. The ringing stopped. Great, she should have waited longer. She started for a front window to see if she could get a glimpse of a car. The outside security lights came on in the yard on the bedroom side of the house.

The pissant was coming around the house. She turned out the light in the bedroom, walked to the stairs, and peered down to the foyer. She heard someone rattle the back door. Time to call the police and ask them to send a car.

She nearly fell down the stairs when the gunshots were fired. Someone was breaking into the house with a very large gun. Diane didn’t hesitate. She ran to the chest of drawers in the closet and got her gun and ammunition clips. She carried them and her cell up to the attic. She closed the door at the top of the attic stairs and pulled a large chest in front of it. Light from the security lamps shined through one of the dormer windows, giving the attic a spooky glow. She called 911 and explained to them what was happening. She held the phone to her ear with her shoulder, shoved a clip into the butt of the gun, loaded a round into the chamber, and clicked on the safety.

“Stay on the line, ma’am,” the operator said.

“Can’t. I think he is in the house. I’ll call back when I can.”

“Ma’am, stay . . .”

Diane hung up and called Chief Garnett for good measure.

“I’ll make sure they are on their way,” he said. “You have a gun?”

“Yes. I’m holed up in the attic. This is some bold home invader. He must know the police are about to come,” she said.

She listened for footfalls. Frank’s house didn’t have carpet. He had polished wood floors and sound reverberated off them. She heard the footsteps downstairs. Diane took up a position behind a large trunk near the wall. She knew it was filled with Frank’s old
National Geographic
magazines. They ought to be a fairly decent bullet stopper. This vantage had a view of the door but was not in front of it. If he came up the stairs and began blasting through the lock and moved the chest of drawers, she would have time to shoot before he got to her. It seemed like a good plan.

Only now did Diane notice that her heart was racing and she was sick to her stomach. She heard footsteps on the main stairs. Maybe he wouldn’t find the attic stairs. They were hidden in the bedroom closet.

Her cell rang. Damn, she forgot to put it on vibrate. She answered with a whisper.

“Diane, are you all right? You sound hoarse. This is Vanessa. Mother remembered—”

“Can’t talk now, Vanessa. I’ll call back.”

A booming gunshot slammed against the attic door.

“Is that gunfire?” said Vanessa.

“Yes. Got to go.”

Diane dropped the cell, rested her shaking arms on the trunk, and aimed the gun at the doorway. If he came straight through the doorway, he might not think to turn to the right until it was too late. He would have to lean into the door to move the chest. He would be off balance. That would give her time—if she was lucky. He hit the door with another earsplitting shot. What if there were more than one of them? Damn, she hadn’t thought of that. Why hadn’t she thought of that?

The chest jumped as another bullet slammed through the back. It sounded like an elephant gun, it was so loud. Diane checked to see if the safety on her gun was off. It wasn’t.
Shit
. She would get killed if she didn’t start thinking. She moved the switch with her thumb.

Sirens whined in the distance.
Hurry
.
Please, hurry
.

The intruder shot the door twice more. The sound was so loud the entire neighborhood should have heard it. She thought she could hear him reloading—
clink, clink
.

The chest began to inch forward. He was pushing on it now. Diane steadied her gun. He apparently put his shoulder into it, for the chest moved forward at least three feet and he stumbled into the room—facing Diane. He raised his shotgun toward her as she fired three times and ducked behind the trunk. She felt the floor shake when he fell. At the same instant, a blast from his shotgun shook her eardrums and the wall behind her exploded, debris falling over her. Diane lay still a moment, stunned. When her head cleared, she wanted to peek over the trunk, but she was afraid it was a trap. What if he was playing dead? What if he had backup? She was stuck. She crouched behind the trunk and listened to his breathing. It came in gasps, sounding real enough, but she didn’t believe it.

“Help me,” he whispered.

She was too scared to move, too wary to trust. She tried to think what to do, but her brain was too panicked.

Damn
, she thought.
I’ve been in bad situations before. Why am I suddenly such a coward?

She stayed low and moved slowly to look around the side of the trunk next to the wall. There was a six-inch opening between the wall and the trunk she could have seen through, if it weren’t so dark. The only significant light reflected through the windows from the security lamps. They had suddenly gone dark. The motion detector outside had timed out. Only dim light from the floor below seeped up the stairs and through the open doorway. It did little to illuminate.

The sirens were louder. Help was coming. But the sirens were too loud. She wouldn’t hear him if he moved. Diane stayed still and listened hard through the noise. She stared through the space beside the trunk until her eyes became adjusted to the darkness. She saw a booted foot moving, trying to get up. She shot at it and he yelped.

She heard him whimper and mutter something she couldn’t make out. He seemed to be down, but Diane didn’t trust him. She waited, tempted to shoot him again.

Get some backbone
, she told herself.

She heard banging on the door downstairs. The police. But what if it was Frank? He wouldn’t know what he was walking into. She rose slowly, keeping her back flat against the wall, and surveyed the darkened attic. She saw the dark form of the intruder squirming on the floor. The shotgun was within his reach. She aimed her gun at him and made her way slowly to the downed form and kicked the shotgun aside. She stepped over to the door, keeping him in sight, keeping her gun trained on him, and flipped the light switch.

The sight startled her. The man on the floor looked like Ray-Ray Dildy. No, it looked like a slightly younger and different version of Ray-Ray Dildy.

“Police!” Muffled voices came from downstairs.

Diane walked around and picked up his gun. She looked down at his face. He was scared and suffering. She could see he was wearing a bulletproof vest, but one of her bullets had managed to hit him through the arm opening and another in his leg.

“Help will be here soon,” she said, and walked out of the room, down the attic steps, and out to the stairs. She stood his shotgun in the corner of the stairwell.

“I’m up here,” she called.

She heard running through the house from the rear. They had found the broken back door. She walked down the stairs, her hands held high where they were clearly visible to the police. The first person she saw was Douglas Garnett. He met her at the base of the stairs.

“The intruder is wounded on the attic floor,” she told him.

Diane sat on the living room couch, leaning forward with her head in her hands while the police secured the house. The intruder had wanted her to answer the door. He was going to shoot her and walk away. Frank would have come home and found the door open and her lying on the floor, dead. She took a deep breath and stood up when she heard the paramedics coming down the stairs with a stretcher. They were the same ones who had been making the runs to Marcella’s house.

“Didn’t we just take this guy last week . . . and wasn’t he dead?” one of the paramedics asked Diane as he and his partner passed with the stretcher.

“Must be the same family,” she muttered.

As they went out the front door, she thought she heard one of them mumble that he was going to write a book.

Frank came in a moment later, alarm and bewilderment on his face. Diane looked at him with tears in her eyes. He had gotten away early. What if he had arrived when the intruder came blasting through the door? She put a hand over her mouth, trying to gulp back the fear.

“Sweetheart, are you all right?” He ran over to her and she hugged him hard.

“There are a couple of doors you’re going to have to fix,” she said.

“What happened?” he asked.

Garnett came down the stairs with the police officers. He stayed inside and sent the other officers to search the grounds. Garnett, Diane, and Frank sat down in the living room.

Diane sat trembling on the sofa. “Jeez,” she said, “I can’t seem to stop shaking.”

Frank put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her to him.

“Can’t say as I blame you,” said Garnett. He was wearing a suit. She wondered what he was doing in a suit this late. He should be in pajamas. He handed her her cell phone. “It was on the floor.”

“Oh God, Vanessa,” she said. “She must be worried sick. She called just before . . .”

She dialed Vanessa’s number. It was picked up at half a ring.

“Diane, are you all right? We could hear the gunfire. Harte is here with me,” she said.

Diane remembered now. She had dropped her phone as the intruder came into the room. Vanessa must have heard most of it.
Damn
.

“I’m fine. I had an intruder, but he’s gone now,” said Diane. “The paramedics took him away.”

“You had an intruder? Dear, it sounded like a fire-fight.”

“There was an exchange of gunfire, but I’m okay. I’m sorry to have hung up on you,” she said.

“I think you need a good stiff drink, girl. You are sounding way too calm, and that’s not good,” said Vanessa. “What? Just a minute. Harte is mumbling something.” She paused. “Harte says she will bring you one of her special tonics if you need it. I can recommend them.”

Diane smiled. “Thank her for me. I’m fine. Just rattled. Did you say your mother remembered something?” Diane asked.

“Yes, but I can talk to you later about it. I’m sure the police are there,” said Vanessa.

“They are, but I’d like to give them the information,” she said.

“Okay. Mother remembered Edith Farragut. Farragut was the woman’s maiden name. Mother didn’t know her well. My grandmother said the family were merchants, and she didn’t associate much with them. Grandmother could be a bit of a snob. Anyway, she also said Edith’s husband gave her the creeps when she saw them in church—just something about him. She didn’t say what. She also said he had a lot of pride. The whole family did. I’m not sure what she meant by that either. They divorced, but the two of them lived near each other for a long time. They didn’t live in Pigeon Ridge, but in Rosemont, near here. They purchased the old Gutemeyer estate. Mother said they had a daughter named Maybelle Agnes Gauthier.”

“Maybelle Agnes Gauthier,” repeated Diane. MAG.

“Mother said the daughter was an artist,” continued Vanessa. “She may have lived in Pigeon Ridge—in a sort of artist’s cottage. Mother didn’t know Maybelle very well, even though they were contemporaries. She said she was a strange girl, but painted very well indeed. Mother thought that at one time she may have had a painting of hers. A landscape, she thought. She said if you go to the courthouse, in the corridor where all the portraits of Rosewood politicians are hanging, you can see one of her paintings. She signed with the picture of a little bird. Mother has no idea why.”

“Do you know what happened to her?” asked Diane.

“Mother didn’t know. We lived in Europe for a while, so we didn’t know about a lot that went on in Rosewood. When we came back in 1957, Mother said that Edith Farragut had died and the Gauthiers were gone.”

Diane hung up with Vanessa, but not before Vanessa again told her to get herself a good stiff drink. From the way Diane felt at the moment, anything in her stomach wouldn’t stay down. She sat quietly, collecting her senses before she spoke. Garnett didn’t push.

“I guess you need my gun,” she said, gesturing to the weapon lying on the coffee table. “I shot four times.”

Garnett nodded. “Just procedure,” he muttered, and took possession of the gun.

There was a jumble of things going through her mind, but what rose to the surface at the moment was the thought that if she had waited any longer to get out of the bathtub, she would have gone though all this naked. “Hell,” she muttered.

“Can I get you something?” said Frank.

“Vanessa recommends Irish whiskey or Kentucky bourbon. I think I’ll pass for now,” she said.
You never know when I may need a steady hand and good aim
.

Garnett asked her what happened and she gave him a description of the evening’s events.

“Why did he target me?” she asked.

“That’s the question, isn’t it?” said Garnett. “If he had been successful, the investigation into the attack on Dr. Payden would have gone on. The well would have still been excavated. I don’t know what was supposed to be accomplished.”