Red House Blues (27 page)

“Shit,” she said under her breath. The door
had been unlocked and she had just locked it. She turned the key
back the other way, and eased the door open a crack to check out
the foyer.

“All clear,” she whispered, sending a silent
prayer to whatever angels were in charge of breaking and entering
that she wasn’t missing something important.

The foyer was shrouded in shadows, the
twisting staircase ascending from a tangle of coats, bicycles and
discarded junk mail. Half way up, a trickle of gray light seeped
through a narrow window but the light illuminated little beyond the
first few feet of the landing.

They carefully skirted the clutter to the
stairs, Suzan’s heart nearly stalling in her throat as Nick thumped
the cast against the first riser. They stopped dead still and
listened. Nothing. Keeping close to the wall they climbed toward
the first landing. Nick’s bedroom was off the second landing. It
was a frustrating, long slow climb in semidarkness, Nick going
first, taking each step with agonizing care. If only they could
have bounded up the stairs, grabbed the notebooks and made a
lightening escape. No matter how careful they were, each tiny creak
of the wooden stairs was deafening.

At last they reached the first landing,
overlooking the foyer. Suzan shivered involuntarily. The landing
was meat locker cold, utterly freezing. She gripped Nick’s arm and
sent a wordless question to him. Her breath was white in the
air.

He nodded. This freaky chill was not new to
him. Claire gave her a gentle push from behind. They didn’t dare
stop now.

Their progress was agonizingly glacial, each
step a fresh peril. But the old house seemed to be holding its
breath as they crept toward the second landing to Nick’s attic
bedroom, the room where her husband had spent the last days of his
life. A fine dust hung in the air like volcanic ash. Nick squeezed
Suzan’s hand as they made the landing.

“This is it,” he whispered,
unnecessarily.

“Shhh,” said Claire, as she stepped aside
for Nick to open the low door.

He turned on the overhead light, stepped
aside to let the women enter, then closed the door behind them. It
was an oddly cheerful little room wedged under the eaves. It might
have been an attic storeroom at one time, or a servant’s quarters.
Suzan put the decor down to Nick because she hardly thought Ferlin
could have been responsible for the rich butter yellow walls or
draped the large porthole window in the gable with red and yellow
sari cloth. No question in her mind that it hadn’t been Sean’s
idea.

“Have to sit down,” said Nick, collapsing
onto the bed.

“Tell me where to look and I’ll get the
notebooks while you rest,” said Suzan, though she wasn’t feeling
all that perky herself.

“You got a gym bag or something, Nick?” said
Claire. “I was thinking we ought to pack up some of your clothes in
case we run into a housemate.”

“Yeah, good idea. There’s a laundry bag on
the closet floor and a backpack on the shelf above. I’ll help you
in a minute.”

“You stay put. I don’t want to have to carry
you out of here,” she said, stuffing the contents of one dresser
drawer into the laundry bag.

“Suzan, right under where Claire found the
bag there is a loose board. Pull it up and you should find the
packet of notebooks. At least you will if Ferlin hasn’t been back
up here.”

“A loose floor board,” Claire snorted. “I
seriously wonder what happened to Sean’s thought processes.”

Pulling up the board cost Suzan the
thumbnail on her right hand. She gingerly felt around in the dark
space below the floor, hoping she wasn’t putting her hand into
mouse droppings or spiders or . . . there were lots of things she
didn’t want to be grabbing with a bare hand.

“Got it!”

“Great,” said Claire. “Toss it in the bottom
of this backpack and let’s get the hell out of here.”

“No, give it to me,” said Nick. “I’ll
flatten it and wedge it down my cast. It won’t be comfortable but I
think I can manage until we get to the car. It ought to be safe in
case we get stopped.”

“Okay. Makes sense,” said Suzan, reluctantly
releasing it into Nick’s care. After all the trouble the notebooks
had caused, what she actually wanted to do was sit down and
hungrily read every line but that would have to wait.

Claire zipped up the backpack, shouldering
it and the laundry bag full of underwear and socks.

“We better get going,” she said. “All set,
Nick?”

“Piece of cake. Just help me up, okay?”

With Suzan’s assistance he got to his feet
and put the crutches under his arms.

Claire reached out for the doorknob, then
paused.

“Do you guys smell incense?” she asked.

“What?”

“You know, like sandalwood or patchouli.
Kind of smoky.”

“Smoke,” said Nick, stiffening.

“Probably a back draft from the fireplace
downstairs,” offered Claire.

“The chimney is cracked. There hasn’t been a
fire in that fireplace since the sixties,” said Nick.

A tendril of smoke wormed its way under the
door.

“Oh shit . . . fire! Don’t open the door,
Claire!” shouted Nick. “Stuff something in the cracks!”

Suzan grabbed the bedspread and packed in
into the crack beneath the door.

“I suppose it’s stupid to ask if there is
another way out of this room,” said Claire.

“Just the window. It’s big enough to squeeze
out of but it’s three floors down,” said Nick.

“Everyone get on the floor,” said Suzan.

They pulled the blankets from the bed and
covered themselves, inching away from the door on their
stomachs.

“We could tie some sheets together,” said
Nick. “Worse comes to worse I lower you two out the window as far
as possible. It’s a chance.”

“And leave you up here? Are you nuts?” said
Susan. “Claire, do you have your cell phone?”

“Of course!” Claire fumbled in her jacket
pocket as the smoke continued to seep around the door frame.

Nick started to cough. Suzan imagined they
didn’t have very long before smoke inhalation made everything else
a moot point. Her eyes were already stinging, tears blinding
her.

“Got it!” said Claire, punching blind what
she hoped was 911. As she connected to the operator they heard
something that sounded like a small explosion from the
stairwell.

“Oh my god, what was that?” shouted
Suzan.

Nick clutched her hand in the gathering
darkness. “It sounded like a gunshot.”

“What’s your emergency?” asked the
operator.

Where do I start?
thought Claire.

* * *

Alexis knew before she came in the back door
that there was something wrong in the house. She had been unsettled
and uneasy all afternoon, another sick headache chewing at her
nerves, sending sparks of light in her field of vision. No use
trying to ignore it. She put away the pile of bills she had been
logging into her computer. No chance of getting any more work done
today. The migraine would only get worse and it always meant the
same thing. There was trouble at home. Alexis thought of it as the
Gray Lady or one of the other lost spirits in the house
telegraphing emotions to her. Could be she was crazy. Maybe not.
But either way she needed to get back to the house.

The first thing she noticed as she came in
the kitchen door was that the door leading down to the basement was
ajar. The stairs disappeared into the dark.

“Ferlin?” she called, softly, not expecting
an answer.

Where was the old man? One of the kitchen
chairs was on its side. Yes, something wrong. Then she knew what it
was. Shit, she thought, how dare he let that woman into the house,
her house. What the hell was he thinking? She had warned him over
and over. Alexis went to the swinging door that lead from the
kitchen to her studio. What used to be the dining room in the early
days of the house, the Gray Lady’s room, as she thought of it.
There was someone moving around in there. Some small object fell to
the floor. Probably a paintbrush, by the sound of it. Alexis wanted
to storm into the room and confront the woman. There was no doubt
in her mind who it was but Alexis was also curious to know what the
intruder was up to. She listened by the door, waiting for the right
moment to burst in and confront the woman. She realized she had
waited too long when she smelled the paint thinner and smoke.

Alexis ran to the refrigerator, pulled open
the door and grabbed Ferlin’s 9 mm from its hiding place in the
hydrator. She unzipped the protective pouch and checked that the
pistol was loaded.

By the time she reached the foyer Marla was
heaping thinner-soaked paint rags and newspapers onto the growing
fire beneath the staircase. Thick smoke billowed up through the
ornately turned balusters toward the second floor.

Holding the pistol with both hands Alexis
took aim at the woman’s back and pulled the trigger. It went off
with a deafening explosion, its kick knocking her off balance for a
second.

The bullet buried itself in the banister
inches from Marla’s right shoulder. She spun toward Alexis.

“You bitch!” she screamed, lunging at her,
seemingly oblivious to the smoking pistol.

Alexis steadied herself and fired again.
This time the impact hit Marla in the upper chest, throwing her
against the blazing staircase in a shower of sparks.

In an instant the foyer was
an inferno, the ancient fir planks of floor and stairs engulfed in
mountains of flame. Alexis dropped the gun and slumped to the
floor.
No, get out! Crawl to the door!
Nothing left, crawl, get out!

Alexis was inches from the door, a scant
foot from the knob when something struck her solidly from behind,
sending her sprawling, driving the breath from her body. Smoke
enveloped her. Alexis felt a weight pressing her to the floor, felt
strong fingers digging into her throat before she sank into a
welcoming oblivion.

* * *

Suzan was flat on her back on a patch of wet
shaggy weeds, a carnival of red, white, and blue lights playing
over her face. The fact that no medical professionals were working
on her she took to be good sign. Either they had given up or she
was relatively unhurt.

How had she gotten out of
the house? The last thing she knew they were trapped in Nick’s
attic room with smoke billowing in through cracks around the door.
She gingerly turned her head to see what was going on. A sledge
hammer of pain walloped the back of her neck, her chest
constricted.
How am I still alive? Where
are the others?

The street in front of the house was clogged
with fire trucks, aide cars, police cruisers and media vans. She
could hear a siren approaching. How would they ever get another
vehicle on the block, she wondered. The air was thick with the
acrid stench of wood smoke, burnt rubber and something that smelled
like barbeque. Suzan tore her mind from speculation of what that
might be.

Clouds of white steam rose into the setting
sun as fire hoses played over the structure. From what she could
see, most of it was still standing. She wasn’t at all sure how she
felt about that.

Then she saw it, a
blanket-draped form on the ground beside the front porch, ignored
by the firefighters manning the bucking hoses.
Please, please don’t let it be Nick or Claire!

“Good, you’re awake,” said a male voice from
behind her. “How you feeling? Sorry I had to leave you alone just
now. We’re bringing out another person.”

She coughed and struggled to sit up.

“Take it easy, miss. Here, I’ll help you,”
said the firefighter.

She tried to speak but nothing came out but
a raspy cough.

“Easy,” he said, patting her on the
back.

“Wheeer . . . where?”

“Where are the others?”

She nodded.

“There is a woman talking to the officers
over there by M.E.’s truck. That’s probably your friend.”

The Medical Examiner? Her heart did a flop.
“Nick! Where’s Nick?”

“The man with you upstairs? Don’t worry,”
said the medic. “He is already on his way to Harborview to get
checked out. It’s your turn next.”

Two paramedics with a stretcher hustled in
from the ambulance at the curb.

“I can’t go. I have to talk to Claire.”

“I’m sure she’ll be along to the hospital
just as soon as the police get her statement.”

“Can’t she go with me?”

Something sorted itself out in her
smoke-fogged brain.

“Wait, how many people were brought out?
There were just the three of us upstairs.”

Her eyes gravitated toward the shrouded form
on the grass. And at the side of the house a trio of fire
department medics working on yet another person. Oh my god, she
thought, if there were at least two others in the house, two they
knew nothing about then . . . then the woman talking to the police
might not be Claire at all and the man on the way to the hospital
might not be Nick!

“The man they took to
Harborview, did he have a cast on his leg?”
Oh please say yes.

“Yeah. That was one of the reasons they took
him in. He looked like he had been through the wringer even before
the fire,” said the medic. “So do you, by the look of those
bruises. No more talking. Let these guys get you loaded in the
ambulance.”

He turned Suzan over to the paramedics
without answering her question.

Cops were stringing yellow crime scene tape
around the front yard as they loaded her into the ambulance.

Chapter 25

The sun had set. The coroner's van had taken
the body to the morgue. All but one fire truck had left. There was
still a crew of firefighters putting out hot spots in the house. In
the street, police and TV news reporters were falling over each
other to interview the crowd of neighbors that had gathered to
watch the excitement