Gone to Ground (10 page)

Luck was shining on O’Reilly’s head, because inside the door to the coop, he found a fifty-five gallon drum half filled with chicken feed which he scooped out and scattered on the dirt floor of the enclosure. From all corners of the barnyard chickens came at a run, kicking up dust and squawking like a bunch of school kids, reminding him all over again why he didn’t like the noisy things. Then he laughed. Twenty minutes ago he had been fussing over the silence, now he was fussing over the noise. Guess there was no pleasing him, just as his mother sometimes said.

Waiting until every visible chicken entered the coop, he shut and latched the door. Looking in, he was able to count somewhere around ten hens and three roosters. The damn things wouldn’t hold still long enough for a good count, but however many there were, it should make Maggie happy
if
he managed to get them back to her without either ringing their necks, or killing himself.

Finally, with all outside chores done, and having procrastinated as long as possible, O’Reilly turned to face the nearest of the three ranch houses, one of the two meant for the families of the hired hands. The owner’s house, a larger redwood and granite affair, was further away, just visible on the side of a nearby hill.

The best plan of action, he thought, was to head for the closest house, go through it from top to bottom and collect all the items needed near the front. Maggie had given him a “shopping list” of things she felt she needed.
Like I’m running out to the grocery store
, he snorted. But he’d better keep an eye out for those things to keep her happy.

After one house had been thoroughly scoured, he’d move to the next, then the next. Once he was finished with all three, he’d know how many horses he’d need to carry all the supplies, or whether he’d have to cache some things to retrieve later. If he could complete clearing all the houses that afternoon, he planned to saddle the horses, load the provisions, gather the chickens, throw them on the last horse in line, as far away from him as possible, and head back home. The abandoned ranch filled him with an ill defined dread, and he didn’t want to spend the night there if at all possible.

He felt a little start at the thought of Hideaway as “home.” No place had been “home” for an awful long time, and he wasn’t sure if he liked thinking that way now. Home implied a place where you had roots, where you wanted to stay. In this case, though, home was a primitive building at the bottom of a canyon. Hidden, but still vulnerable to attack, and housing an exceptionally stubborn woman and her son.

Home is where the heart is, indeed,
he snorted.

The back door to the first house was weathered brown wood, blending well with the graying green paint. When he tried the knob, it opened easily. He wasn’t surprised that the door was unlocked. Often this far out in the country people left their doors unlocked much of the time. You never knew when someone might need shelter from bad weather, and the next time it might be you needing to shelter somewhere else. When he was a kid, his parents had never locked their doors. However, with the encroachment of city people further and further into the rural landscape, some of their city habits, good and bad, were bound to come with them.

Years ago he’d nearly died laughing when a friend of Sarah’s came to visit at their home far out in the country. After getting out of her car, the woman had flicked the electronic lock button on her key ring. The
whoop-whoop
of the car’s locking and alarm system was so out of place in the country that it seemed to come from another planet. He’d badly wanted to ask her if she was concerned that a jackrabbit with a submachine gun was considering stealing her Camero, but one look from Sarah had squashed that question in his throat.

Of course, the city people did bring more crime with them, and looking back at how things had turned out, maybe that woman wasn’t too far off the mark when she’d engaged her car’s security system.

Opening the door, O’Reilly stepped into a mud room that opened into a small kitchen. Green and white linoleum covered the floors, spotted here and there with colorful hand braided throw rugs. The sun shone through bright yellow curtains hanging in the windows, giving the kitchen a warm golden glow. A wooden table with two chairs was tucked into one corner, while on the sideboard sat two coffee mugs, waiting to be washed. The entire atmosphere gave him the eerie feeling that the residents of the house were merely out of the room and would be back momentarily. A closer look, however, revealed a layer of dust had coated everything with at least two month’s worth of accumulation. No one had been in this room for quite awhile.

O’Reilly headed for the pantry and began gathering the goods that he would need to take back to Hideaway with him. Fortunately for him, it appeared that the residents had made a trip into town shortly before being forced, either by disease or authority, to leave the home. He found a twenty pound bag of flour, and one of sugar, both unopened. A ten pound bag of cornmeal, as well as a container of a generic brand of shortening; some yeast; a large, mostly full sack of rice; and two five pound bags of potatoes, beginning to go to seed, were also added to his stash.

In a plastic grocery bag he found under the sink he placed bottles of spices, salt and pepper, as well as any other small items he thought might be useful. He didn’t bother to look in the refrigerator. Since the power had been out, anything in there would have turned long ago.

Coffee,
he said to himself
. Where do these people keep the damned coffee.
He figured his life wouldn’t be worth spit if he didn’t come back with at least some form of caffeine, so he felt a huge sense of relief when he finally located two plastic containers of ground coffee under the sink and reverently added them to growing heap, along with a box of tea, a bottle of dish soap and another of laundry detergent that he found nearby.

Leaving the kitchen, he headed for one of several closed doors on the far side of the living room. Opening the first door he reached, he found himself in a bathroom where he helped himself to the towels in the linen cabinet, as well as those hanging on the towel holders. He also picked up the soap and toothpaste. Eventually they would have to make due with homemade, but there was no sense in letting this go to waste.

After taking these items back to his pile in the kitchen, he returned to the next door in line, finding himself in a bedroom. He gathered the blankets from the bed, as well as some that were folded neatly onto a shelf in the closet. These he also took back to the kitchen and his growing stash.

As quickly as possible he finished going through the last bedroom, managing to find some jeans and shirts that would fit him, as well as more blankets and sheets. Then he returned to the kitchen for the final time and carried his treasure trove out into the yard to await loading onto the horses.

Glancing at the sun, he realized that there was no way he was going to gather everything, pack and head back before dark. The feeling of dread intensified and he briefly considered heading out into one of the nearby pastures and camping there for the night. The thought was discarded quickly, since the time wasted going out, setting up camp, then returning in the morning could be used more wisely.

I’m not staying in one of those empty houses, though,
he thought.
I’ll just bunk down in the barn with the horses. These buildings give me the creeps.

Hurrying to get done before dark, he moved on to the second house. As before, he headed for the back door, walking into a mud room and kitchen that was a twin to the first. This house was also neat and well cared for, though there was an undefinable odor permeating the building, reminding him of a septic tank that needed pumping. It was similar though not quite the same; faint but irritating nonetheless.

Duplicating his search pattern from the first house, he moved through the kitchen, gathering supplies, then ventured out into the living room.

As he stood, hand on the door knob to the bathroom, he heard it.
Thump, whump
. Followed by a high thin cry from the bedroom furthest from the bath.

What was that
?

Turning toward the distant bedroom, hand reaching for the gun at his hip, he called out.

“Hello? Is anyone there?”

Receiving no answer, O’Reilly began to walk toward the far door, drawing his weapon as he went. Quietly he approached the door, holding the pistol in his right hand, he reached out with his left and turned the knob. In an abrupt movement designed to take any attacker off guard, he quickly swung the door open, bringing the gun to bear on the room, quickly scanning for any assailants.

The smell struck him first, like a solid wall; a putrid stench of human waste and illness. A split second later his eyes registered the sight of a form lying on the bed underneath a thin sheet, other blankets tangled and kicked into a pile at the foot of the bed and on the floor.

She might have been pretty once, but it was hard to tell. Her facial bones jutted out under her skin, reminding him of a piece of paper mache where someone had laid tissue paper over a sharp frame. Her brown hair was matted with sweat and tangled on the pillow.

Her eyes were closed and at first he thought she was dead, until he heard her deep raspy breathing, slow and irregular. Holstering his weapon, he softly approached the bed, watching the still form as he came closer.

Apparently this was a late victim of the flu that had ravaged the world’s population. Most people who had fallen victim, had done so early on in the onslaught. However, the disease moved in waves, and some who had managed to avoid contagion during the first or second wave, fell victim later on. It appeared this woman was one of those. Either she had been able to remain isolated here on the ranch, or more likely, she was a ghost who had run when the order for concentration came, carrying the disease with her. From her appearance, he would never know. Most people who made it to this stage of the illness never recovered, even with extensive medical intervention, none of which was available here. Unfortunately he had seen an uncountable number of people in this condition during his last months as a sheriff’s deputy, prior to the reorganization and his rebirth as an Enforcer.

Hoping against hope, he leaned over the still form, and gently touched her shoulder. He wasn’t concerned about his own health. Apparently he was one of those for whom the flu virus held no danger. Surely if he were going to catch the disease he would have done it long since. From what Maggie said, she was in the same boat; immune to the bug. Mark had already caught and developed an immunity to the virus as well, so although he felt a high level of reluctance in approaching the still form, he didn’t think he was taking a risk.

“Ma’am,” he said quietly, softly shaking her shoulder. Her breathing caught, paused, then started again with a bubbly cough, but she didn’t open her eyes. He tried again, louder and more insistent. “Ma’am, can you hear me? Open your eyes if you can hear me.” He shook her more urgently.

A low moan issued from her throat and O’Reilly found himself looking down into a pair of dark brown eyes, foggy with illness. The woman began to cough violently, the force of the paroxysm doubling her over and squeezing tears from her eyes. Kneeling on the edge of the bed, he tried to support her and help her through the attack, though he knew ultimately it would do no good.

Finally, collapsing back on the bed, the woman closed her eyes, her breath becoming more labored and irregular with each passing moment. O’Reilly knelt there, hand on her shoulder, wondering what he could do, knowing that there was no saving her, but loath to walk off and leave her to die alone.

After a few minutes passed, the woman again opened her eyes and looked up at O’Reilly. Fighting to draw breath, she managed to choke out a single word “Lindy.”

“Your name is Lindy?” O’Reilly asked.

She shook her head slightly and again struggled to take in a breath of air. She lifted a right arm that shook like a leaf in a strong wind and pointed toward the pile of discarded blankets on the floor, repeating in the weak voice, “Take care... Lindy...” her voice so quiet at the end that he could barely understand her. Another coughing spell, worse than the first, grabbed her. It twisted and wrung her like a dishcloth until she fell back on the bed showing no spark of life except for the occasional, irregular bubbling respiration which was growing weaker by the second.

Rising from the bed, O’Reilly walked toward the pile of blankets with a feeling of trepidation. A brief hopeful thought passed through his mind that maybe “Lindy” was the lady’s little pocket pooch. One of those yapping little dogs that women these days liked to dress up in bows and carry in little shoulder bags; in which case he could stick it in with the chickens, take it back to the Hideaway and leave it for Maggie to take care of. He had a feeling, though, that he wasn’t going to be that lucky.

Taking a deep breath, which he instantly regretted, he looked down into the pile of blankets and saw a small girl, about two years old, curled up asleep with her thumb in her mouth. How she’d ever slept though the noise that he’d made upon his entrance, and that created by her mother’s coughing spells, he’d never know, but there she lay, breathing the deep, slow, quiet breaths of sleep.

Quietly he knelt down beside her, reaching out to brush a soft reddish-blond curl from her cheek. The little girl opened her large brown eyes and looked up at him. He expected her to react with fright upon seeing a strange man hovering above her, but instead she simply lifted her arms to him in the universal sign of small children wanting to be picked up and held.

He reached out and gathered her into his arms, and instantly regretted the move. She was undoubtedly the filthiest child he’d ever encountered. It appeared her mother had been too ill to attend to basic hygiene for longer than he wanted to think about, and much of the odor in the room emanated from the child’s food smeared clothes and overflowing diaper. The little girl didn’t seem to notice, though, and simply put her arms around his neck and looked at him.