When Will the Dead Lady Sing? Page 7

  6

  “Lulu!” I gasped the word as I hared after Joe Riddley, who was practically running down Oglethorpe. In my mind I saw my dog as I’d found her the year before, lying in a blood-soaked nest of pine straw in the woods after she and Joe Riddley had both been shot. The would-be murderer had left her for dead, but although her left hind leg was mangled beyond saving, that plucky little beagle had burrowed into the pine straw and managed to survive until I found her.

  Save her and her pups, I begged God. That poor dog has suffered enough.

  “Did she get Lulu and the pups out?” I called after Joe Riddley’s back, clutching my stomach to keep my insides from falling onto the street.

  He looked around, his mouth grim and set. “I don’t know. Cindy’s horse, either.”

  “Did she call 911?”

  “The fire trucks were already there. Stop yapping and run.”

  I’d barely gotten my car door slammed before he had zoomed out of the lot. All I can say about Joe Riddley’s driving is, it was a good thing he’d driven those roads for fifty years. He’d never have made it home at that speed, otherwise.

  We saw smoke above the pines before we even reached the gravel road. “I’ll bet it was Tad,” I muttered.

  “What was Tad?”

  “Who started the fire. Smoking.”

  “He’s smoking?” Joe Riddley didn’t sound as upset as I was, but when we grew up, all the boys smoked. It was their contribution toward the Southern economy.

  “Martha said the girls caught him smoking in the woods. Ridd gave him a talking to, but that probably just drove him to the barn.”

  “If he set a fire, I’ll give him more than a talking to.” His hands tensed on the wheel.

  “Don’t be too hard on him. He’s just ten.” I leaned forward in dread to peer at black billows filling the sky.

  “He’s also spoiled rotten,” my husband muttered.

  “The sins of the grandparents visited on the children,” I replied. When he threw me a questioning look, I explained, “We haven’t helped Walker and Cindy raise their kids. We hardly know that little boy.”

  Until this past year, we and Walker’s wife had kept each other at a polite distance. Her family had land, money, and pedigrees going back to the English aristocracy. Her dad bred hunters and was a bigwig in foxhunts that are still held in that part of Georgia. Cindy hunted every year, and she and Walker lived in the kind of elegance Southern Living implies is normal throughout the South. Their kids had grown up spending more time at the country club than they did down at our place, and we never went to their house unless invited. It was only in the past few months that Cindy and I had discovered we had several things in common and begun to appreciate each other. I regretted those wasted years.

  Joe Riddley reached out a big hand and covered mine. “It’s not your fault, honey.”

  He turned onto the gravel drive one handed, but had to take back his hand to grab the wheel as the car fishtailed on the turn.

  I waited until he’d straightened us out before I said, “But if Tad and Jessica had grown up like Ridd’s kids—swimming in our pool, playing in the barn, riding around with you on a tractor or the forklift—” I sniffed back tears. We were passing the first of three houses on our road, and I was terrified of what we’d find when we got home.

  “Tad’s always been more interested in tennis and golf,” Joe Riddley reminded me. “When he comes to the store, he wrinkles his nose like he’s afraid he’ll get dirty. The only two things I’ve ever seen him show interest in are animals and video games.”

  “He’s still our grandchild.”

  “Which he’s gonna find out, if he set that barn on fire.” His face was grim.

  By the time we got to Hubert’s old house, the smell was so strong I could taste it. In spite of the heat, I put up my window.

  I heard somebody behind us and looked over my shoulder. Sheriff Bailey “Buster” Gibbons was following us in his cruiser. “Buster’s gonna bust you,” I warned, but I knew it wasn’t true. Buster and Joe Riddley had been best friends since kindergarten. He wasn’t there to make an arrest. He was there to stand by us if the house burned down.

  Joe Riddley squealed into the driveway and stopped up near the road. Buster screeched to a halt right behind us. He jumped out of his car and yelled, “I thought you were driving, Mac!” Then he called after Joe Riddley as he ran behind him, “Is the tractor still in there?”

  Every muscle in my body froze. Of course the tractor was in the barn. Two mowers, too, and an edger, all full of gas. Ridd kept them that way, plus an extra can of gasoline or two. Before I’d finished that thought, Buster had caught up with Joe Riddley and they’d picked up speed. Surely those men weren’t fools enough—

  Of course they were. That unfroze me real quick. “Don’t you go in there!” I yelled, leaping from our car. One of the firefighters heard me. He left the others, who were directing streams of water against the house, and ran to bar the way, motioning angrily for the men to get back. His face streamed sweat and was streaked with soot.

  Joe Riddley waved his arms. The firefighter pointed to the backyard. Buster nodded and practically dragged Joe Riddley to the shade of an oak beside the drive, out of the range of sparks. I figured the firemen had gotten the tractor and mowers out and safe.

  But where were the children? “Bethany? Cricket? Tad!” I yelled.

  “Me-mama! Oh, Me-mama!” Bethany dashed from the porch to fling herself into my arms, sobbing. Her soft brown hair smelled smoky. Tears dripped down my neck. I held out an arm to her friend Hollis, who had pounded after her across the lawn. We stood there in one big hug.

  Finally I had to draw back to cough. My nose burned and my mouth was full of the taste of smoke. When I looked at the poor old barn, I shivered in spite of the heat. Flames were shooting out its windows and roof. Anybody could see there was no hope of saving it. The house stood a good distance away, so flying sparks were landing short of it, but I appreciated the firefighters’ caution in wetting it down—especially when I felt a breeze lift my hair.

  The strong streams of water were doing a great job of dislodging the house paint, though. Poor Ridd would have a lot of work to do when this was over.

  Down in their pen, Joe Riddley’s three hunting dogs were lifting a chorus. I stopped to listen, but couldn’t hear Lulu’s soprano among them. I couldn’t hear the screams of a frantic horse, either, which was good, but it was hard to hear anything clearly with the thud of water against the house, the deafening crackle of flames, and an occasional sound like a shot when fire hit a pine knot. I strained my ears and hurried nearer the barn, to be sure I didn’t hear animals caught inside.

  “Did you get the animals out?” I called back to Bethany. She nodded, then jumped as the the barn roof caved in with a whoosh and a volcano of sparks. As far away as I was, I felt tiny sparks sting my cheek and arms and saw a little flame spurt from my pants just below the knee. I slapped it out, yelping with pain as I felt a burn.

  Hollis took a swipe at my hair. “You’re on fire!” She hit my head twice, hard, and I felt a stab of hot pain. “That got it,” she said.

  “That’s one time you won’t get smacked for beating up an old woman. Thanks.” I tried to grin, but my lips felt parched.

  I hadn’t noticed before that Hollis’s freckled face was streaked with soot and her copper eyebrows, lashes, and hair were singed. She nursed one hand where a long burn had raised a blister halfway up her arm and looked anxiously around the yard. “We’re still missing one pup.”

  “How’d you get burned?” I demanded.

  She shuddered as she considered the blazing barn and spoke in short gulps punctuated by tears. “I went in for Lulu and Starfire. But they were gone. We don’t know how they got out. And we haven’t see Starfire. We’ve rounded up Lulu, though. And all the pups but one. I locked them in the downstairs bathroom. We’re still missing Feisty.”

  “He probably got out on his own.” I comforted h
er. Feisty was the first pup to master climbing out of the box, and he’d been exploring ever since. But if he’d been exploring a dark corner of the barn when the fire started—

  I refused to finish that thought, but could tell from her eyes that we shared it. “Maybe he went toward the dogs’ pen,” she said hopefully. “I’ll go look there.” Hollis had never been good at standing still. She thudded away.

  Bethany clutched me tighter. Her teeth were chattering and her body shook all over. “I couldn’t go in, Me-mama. Not even for Lulu. But Hollis did, and she’s terrified of horses. I feel like such a coward!” She shook and cried until her knees buckled and she fell to the ground. She flung herself in the grass, sobbing and coughing smoke.

  I knelt beside her and patted her back. “Nobody expected you to go in, honey. You called 911 and got the fire trucks here. That’s enough. And the horse and Lulu got out in time.”

  Her voice came in short bursts. “I didn’t call 911. And I don’t know how the animals got out. Starfire must have kicked open her stall and the door.” She burst into stormy weeping again.

  “How’d you discover the fire?” Maybe talking would calm her down.

  She sat up and wiped her eyes on one biceps, leaving a streak of soot down her cheek.

  “The fire trucks came screaming down the road. Hollis and I were by the pool—” She looked down in surprise at her bathing suit and bare feet.

  Our pool, now their pool, was behind the house and protected by a high wooden fence. I’d had Joe Riddley install a mirror so I could see who was coming down our drive and decide whether to greet them in my swimsuit. I could imagine the girls’ fright when they heard sirens and looked in the mirror to see fire engines barreling toward the house.

  Still, there was too little of her suit to be out there in front of a bevy of firefighters. The younger ones were eyeing her appreciatively. “Go get something on.” I struggled to my feet. “Where are Cricket and Tad?”

  Bethany gave a big sniff and jumped up. “Omigosh. Cricket was napping, but he can’t be sleeping through all this. Heaven only knows what he’s getting into.”

  I grabbed her before she sprinted away. I’d done all the running I planned to do in one day. “Where’s Tad?”

  I could tell she wanted to go to Cricket. Bethany is very responsible about keeping her little brother. I tugged her arm again. “Where is Tad?”

  She frowned, as if trying to remember. “He played video games all morning, and we all swam and worked on our tans for a while after lunch, then I took Crick up and read him a story before his nap. Tad wasn’t at the pool when I got back, and I haven’t seen him since. Daddy told him to weed the garden. Maybe—” She looked across at Ridd’s vegetables.

  I stared, too, willing a slender little boy to stand erect after pulling too many weeds.

  Silly us. As if any boy in hearing distance would be weeding with fire engines in the yard. Talons of fear gripped the base of my spine. “Could he be around back?”

  She shook her head. “Hollis and I were back there looking for Feisty.” Her gaze darted a look at the smoldering remains of the barn and she gasped. “Oh, no! You don’t think he was in there, do you? Smoking?”

  “He wouldn’t have stayed once the place was burning. You go get dressed and find Cricket. If he wants to come out, tell him I need him to look after Lulu and her pups, to calm them. That ought to keep him inside. Call your folks again, too. I’ll look for—”

  A lump in my throat cut off the sentence.

  Bethany gave me a desperate look and ran barefoot across the yard, leaping when she stepped on a spark. But instead of going inside, she headed toward the firefighters. She asked a frantic question, waving her arms toward the barn. They shook their heads and said something that seemed to reassure her. She came running back, again leaping as she stepped on sparks. “They said there wasn’t anybody in there.” She hurried back toward the house.

  She didn’t see the firefighters give the barn worried looks and aim a couple of their hoses back in its direction. A plume of steam rose as they sprayed the raging fire, then subsided with the defiant hiss of a fairy-tale monster.

  Except this was no fairy tale.

  “Don’t let Tad be dead before I get to know him better,” I prayed into the smoke-laden air. But where could he be?

  I looked around the yard, trying to think like a child. A match dropped in the barn, a flash of flame, an attempt to stamp it out or beat it out with something. But what then? Would he run away and leave Lulu and his mother’s horse? I didn’t think so. Tad loved animals.

  That was probably how the dogs and horse got out—shooed or led by a frantic boy who must then have darted into the house to call 911. But where would he have gone after that?

  My dressy shoes and silk pantsuit weren’t designed for wandering around the countryside, but they weren’t going to be good for much after today, anyway. I looked at the drive, full of fire trucks and hoses and decided I’d start looking on the other side of the house. Halfway around, I saw a child’s T-shirt lying on the grass, too small for Bethany and too big for Cricket.

  I picked it up and carried it with me, a talisman that he was not in the barn. “Tad?” I called. “Honey, where are you?”

  Only an oriole replied, from Joe Riddley’s orchard out behind Ridd’s cornfield. It sounded a whole lot happier than I felt. “Oh, shut up,” I snapped. “Tad? Tad! God, help me find him!”

  The only answer I got was the deep print of a horse’s hoof over at the edge of a perennial bed. I knew it hadn’t been there the day before, because Ridd had been thinning his beds while Martha and I walked. He’d have throttled anybody who let Starfire near his flowers. The prints continued toward Ridd’s fields.

  I headed for the corn with hope. I couldn’t see anything for the tall dry stalks, but ten acres of dying cornstalks would be a good hiding place for a small boy and a nervous horse.

  For an hour I followed that horse’s tracks. As far as I could read the prints, Starfire first crashed through rows of corn every which away, then went straighter for a time, doubled back, ran parallel with the gravel road for a while, and finally turned through a little plantation of pines we’d put in for pulpwood. The tracks were real deep sometimes, less deep other times, and middle deep toward the end. I deduced that it had first been running, then slowed down, then—hopefully—Tad had climbed on its back. But I knew that was all conjecture. Why hadn’t I taken less math and at least one course in tracking animals?

  Dust and pine resin collected over my layer of soot. I was so sweaty, my clothes stuck to me from all directions. I progressed from worry to anger to plumb weariness. By now, I didn’t care what Tad had done, if I could only find him and go back home to sit down.

  I shoved my way through the little pines muttering things I’d learned from Bo. When I got to the gravel road, I didn’t know which way to turn. The horse might have gone on back to the barn, or it might have headed for the highway. I saw some scuffs on the side of the road like it had headed toward the highway, so I decided I’d walk as far as the house at the corner. It stood empty now, but used to belong to old Amos Pickens, an ornery, smelly old geezer and a dreadful neighbor. I doubted he was playing a harp where he’d gone, for he didn’t have a kind bone in his body. He would never have permitted me to walk up his drive looking for a lost horse.

  I walked wary of snakes in the tall weeds. “Starfire? Starfire!” No answering whinny came from the back, and the weeds were too high for me to go farther. The place had stood vacant since Amos died, except for a few months when a hot-shot young doctor bought it with grand ideas he couldn’t carry out. He hadn’t even gotten around to removing the galvanized stove pipes Amos had attached to his roof. They were beginning to come loose and leaned crazily in all directions. Poor Amos. He’d spent his last years terrified that alien forces were massing on Venus for an imminent attack on earth and had believed the pipes would mess up their radars if they planned to land in Hopemore.

&n
bsp; I headed back up the road toward our place. If I hadn’t been bone tired and scared for my grandson, it would have been a pleasant walk. Birds were twittering to each other about northern summer vacations. A rabbit wiggled its nose at me from the verge. This far from the fire, I could smell hay and cotton dust, and it wasn’t smoke that made my eyes smart. I remembered walking down that road with Joe Riddley on moonlit nights after the kids were asleep, walking down it with two tiny boys to see if blackberries were ripe, and strolling down it with various dogs just for the exercise. I also remembered how often I’d thought about taking a walk, then given up the idea to do something else. I wanted to shout at somebody, “Wait, I can’t move away yet—I haven’t gone for enough walks!”

  Just as I reached Hubert’s pasture between his house and ours, I heard a whinny. Whether it was Starfire or not, I couldn’t see until I’d got through the barbed wire and climbed a little rise, because the pasture rose from the fence, then dipped again to a small cattle pond. Down near the pond, a black stallion grazed. He lifted his head and whinnied again when he scented me. Heaven only knew what I smelled like by then.

  I knew him at once by the blaze on his nose. “Tad?” I called. “Where are you, honey?”

  A clump of trees stood just beyond the pond. The child had to be there, unless he were in the pond. I refused to think that. I’d jumped in that filthy pond to save somebody once and didn’t want to repeat it. “Tad? Come here!”

  I saw a motion beyond a thick oak trunk; then Tad came out wearing dust-smeared sneakers and cut-off jeans. In his arms he cradled Lulu’s pup Feisty.

  Tad was a slender, almost delicate child, with his mother’s dark brown eyes and her daddy’s blond hair. He was striking now and would be a real heartbreaker when he grew up—especially since, like his mother, he always looked good. Even with his hair tousled, dusty, and stuck to his forehead with sweat, his chest bare, and his arms scratched with bloody welts, he looked ready to pose for an upscale kids’ magazine.

  Until he got closer. His face was coated with what looked like a mixture of dust, snot, and tears, and his eyes looked so sorrowful, I wanted to hug him forever. I figured, though, that if I was sympathetic right away, he’d bolt. I let him come closer, then held out his shirt. “So,” I said in my most matter-of-fact voice, “you set the barn on fire?”