by Madelyn Alt
“Me, too,” I said. “I’ve got to get over to my sister’s house. They’ll be wondering what’s keeping me.”
I went to Christine’s passenger side and unlocked it so that I could load in the supplies I’d brought with me that Marcus had so thoughtfully packed up. Marcus came up quietly from behind and without a word began handing me things so that I could situate them in Christine’s teeny-tiny backseat. A few steps away, I could hear Tom making his call to Libby, chatting briefly, signing off. At last I had everything just so, and I pushed the passenger seat back into position. After setting my purse there, I dusted off my hands. “Thanks, Marcus,” I said, smiling up at him.
His eyes glowed down at me, an unearthly blue in the security lights. They seemed to catch the light and send it shooting back out. The effect was mesmerizing. “Anytime, sweetness,” he said softly. “Anytime.”
My stomach tightened as I realized I was still staring an embarrassingly long moment later. Clearing my throat nervously, I ducked my head down and turned away. It really was time to go.
“Okay, Minnie. Your turn,” I said out loud, turning back toward the steps at the front of the office, where Marcus had set her carrier not ten minutes before. Realization struck me, bing, bang, boom.
The carrier was nowhere to be seen.
Chapter 17
“Minnie? Minnie!” I looked around, whirling in one direction after another, frantically, desperately. “She was right there!” In her carrier. “Where could she have gone? Marcus?” I wheeled around to him, my eyes wide. When Marcus’s eyes showed only confusion, I turned to Tom. “Did you see her?”
He stepped forward and put his hands on my shoulders. “Don’t. Panic,” he said, as clearly and distinctly as he could in order to get my attention. “She can’t just have stuck her feet through the carrier and walked away.” And then, doubtfully, “Can she? I mean . . . well?” After seeing my face, he salvaged the moment by quickly back-tracking. “Of course she can’t have. Which means . . .”
“Someone took her?” My voice rose a notch with each word.
Recognizing a woman poised on the slippery edge of fur-mommy hysteria, Tom wisely backed up a step.
“Eddie.”
Frank’s calm voice broke through the icy wall of panic that was building higher by the moment.
“It had to have been Eddie,” he continued practically. “There was no one else around that could have taken her. Besides,” he said, “Eddie loves animals of all kinds. I guess he thinks of himself as their protector or something. He’ll have no intention of hurting her, ma’am. He wouldn’t ever. I’ll bet he just took her off believing he was keeping her safe.”
Safe from what? But I didn’t have the analytical where-withal just then to ask a rational question like that, and at that moment, I didn’t care. I just wanted Minnie back with me.
Marcus and Tom both started talking at the same time.
“Why don’t we—”
“Let’s just—”
Marcus bowed out, indicating Tom should speak.
“Listen, if we all band together and start looking now, we should be able to make short work of finding him. Are we all agreed that if we find Eddie, we find Minnie?”
Everyone nodded.
“Frank, do you have a master set of keys?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. I propose we start at one end of the complex and move forward, one building at a time. We all search the building with one person remaining at the door. Any additional doors should be locked immediately, before searching. Once we’ve eliminated that building, we lock the door and move on to the next.”
Marcus nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”
“You in, Frank?”
“Of course. Gotta find Eddie anyway. I’m glad for the extra hands.”
We searched the office first. It was the closest building to us and seemed the easiest to eliminate since we’d just vacated it. Next was a low-lying storage barn that served more as a garage for the various types of mobile equipment used around the place. Lots of hiding places, but none of them very good. We switched the lights off, locked the door, and moved on.
By the fifth building, I was beginning to realize just how large the complex was. Huge. Each building long and deep, with enough hidey-holes to house any number of things. The men searched high and low, leaving me in charge of the door. It was an arrangement I didn’t much like, because I felt sure if Minnie sensed my presence, she’d let out a chirrup or something, but I knew they were just trying to be sensible and protective and, well, men about the whole thing.
The sixth building proved to be the first of two hog holding barns—the first being reserved for those hogs meant for slaughter in the slaughterhouse next door, and the second serving as piggy motel for those who would be transported elsewhere. By now we all knew the drill by heart. Frank went around the building and secured the additional doors, and then we all filed inside after he’d switched on the overhead lights; they would begin the search while I stood in front of the closed door. This barn was slightly different, though. The first thing to hit us was the wall of stink, horrific and overwhelming. It had been evident outside—boy, had it ever—but inside the closed space of the barn, without the wide open air to dissipate it, the smell was a hundred times worse. My throat tightened as I felt my gag reflex start up with a vengeance. I could tell that the guys weren’t handling it much better, all except for Frank, who didn’t seem to notice anything out of the ordinary. Somehow we all managed to hold our breath long enough that light-headedness kicked in, which somehow made the odor less awful . . . or maybe it was just that our olfactory senses had been burned away like sulfur on a matchstick. Whatever, I, for one, was grateful. Regretfully, reluctantly, I closed the door behind me.
The hogs were held in two long pens on either side of a long and narrow straw-strewn aisle. Well, I thought it was straw. At least, it might have been. This morning. Now it was more like . . . pulverized manure splinters blended with pulverized manure dust. Now that I think of it, the aisle probably hadn’t been strewn with straw; the manure splinters and dust probably drifted out of the pens themselves, pushed aside by the . . . I looked over the sides of the pens . . . holy shit, the hundreds of cloven feet and massive bodies populating the pens. And the noise . . . the moment we had approached the door, the squeals had begun in earnest. More like the trumpeting of elephants than squealing pigs, I had thought. Kind of creepy, actually.
“He wouldn’t be in here, would he?” I asked.
“I don’t know why not,” Frank said. “Actually, this was my best bet. Spread out, men.”
Tentatively, gingerly, the men eased themselves over the wood-sided pens and into the midst of the big, fleshy, snouty beasties. I waited, rat-a-tatting my fingertips against my thighs and feeling more anxious by the minute.
I don’t know what it was that first clued me in to the uneasiness and apprehension that was coiling itself into a knot in my belly, and I don’t know exactly how much time had passed while the feelings amped up until I couldn’t mistake them for anything else. Ten minutes? Maybe more? This building was taking longer (wouldn’t you know it?) as the men had to wend their way carefully between and around and over the immovable meaty bodies.
Meaty . . . ooh, probably not the most PC choice of word, considering their next stop along the way.
It was right around the time that thought strummed along my conscience that the lights went out.
Every last one of them.
The cacophony of sound stopped for a full five breathless seconds. Then it began again in earnest, the sound rushing in to fill the void.
“What the hell—”
“Maggie, was that you?”
“It wasn’t her,” Frank said. “The security lights outside are off, too. See, no light coming in through the window slats?”
He was right. The entire place must be dark.
“Maggie, just stay there!” That was Marcus.
“Wait, I’ve got
a flashlight. Sonuvabi—” Tom swore as he tripped over a hog. A metallic clatter followed. “Correction. Had a flashlight.”
I dug in my pocket for my car keys, and switched on the tiny LED flashlight that had saved my butt many a time. The glow wasn’t much, but it was enough to illuminate a foot or two in front of me with a faint blush of light. “Hold on, guys. Let me find the switch.”
“Good girl.”
It was there, to my left, a great, big switch in an industrial-strength steel panel. I flipped it down, then up again. Nothing. “It’s not working.”
“Musta been a breaker,” Frank muttered. “And fine timin’, too. You just stay there and keep holding that light, and I’ll make my way over there.”
The hogs were getting restless, some muttering, some shuffling and bumping up against each other . . . and up against Tom and Marcus, who were muttering to themselves with each collision.
“Yeah, you want to hurry up there, Frank? I don’t fancy being mashed out here.”
“Likewise,” Marcus muttered.
“Hold yer horses, boys. You can’t rush these things.”
Finally I caught sight of Frank’s burly upper body as he hauled himself over the fence with a grunt. He held out his hand for my light. I was reluctant to give it up, but if it got the electricity back on, then the sacrifice was worth it.
“Breaker’s outside,” he said. “You all just stay where you are and I’ll be right—”
The anticipated word “back” was lost in a clumsy shuffle of shoulder meeting the cold metal surface of the door.
“What is it?” I asked, my nervousness growing. I heard the doorknob turn back and forth, back and forth, and then a few more thumps of shoulder against metal.
“You aren’t going to believe this,” I heard Frank mutter, “but . . . I think we’re locked in. From the outside.”
“What?”
“For the love of—”
“How?” I asked him. But the minute the question left my lips, the only possible answer presented itself. “Eddie?”
Frank sighed heavily. “Well . . . I don’t know how . . . but I also don’t know of any other explanation.”
Eddie. Sweet-natured, quiet, simple-minded Eddie. Why would he lock us in here? It didn’t make sense.
Slowly, painfully, I heard Tom and Marcus make their way back toward us. Once they had made it over the fence, they each took their turn at the door as though hoping against hope theirs would be the manpower to break through to freedom.
Futile hopes, unfortunately. The door remained intact, the locks unbudged.
“Damn,” Tom muttered. “Any ideas, or do you want me to call for backup now?”
“No . . . wait, can’t you?” Frank pleaded. “Just until I think this thing through. If Libby hears about this, Eddie’ll be out on the streets for sure.”
“Then we’d better come up with something in a hurry. We can’t stay in here forever.”
I felt Marcus’s hand rub my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Maggie,” he whispered into my ear. I nodded, grateful for the reassurance.
“Did you ever find your flashlight?” I asked Tom.
“No. I felt around for it, but it must have rolled away beneath their feet.”
Frank aimed the faint LED light toward the corner. “There’s a ladder against the wall over there. The only way out is up.”
“You trying to speak nonsense on purpose, Frank, or did you fall and hit your head out there in the pig pit?” Tom asked, trying for levity.
Which might have worked, except the hogs were starting to scream now, unearthly shrieks that chilled to the bone.
But not as much as the sudden, acrid scent that was tainting the air.
“Fire?” I whispered. Then louder, “Oh, my God, fire! Where is it? Is it here?”
“I don’t think it matters anymore if Libby finds out about Eddie, Frank,” Tom said ruefully. He grabbed his shoulder mike and began detail the situation to Dispatch.
In the meantime, I felt hands grab my shoulders and shove me toward the ladder. “Climb,” came Marcus’s voice, urgent, in my ear. “As fast as you can. Go!”
I felt-climbed my way up the slippery round rungs to a loft above, crawling on hands and knees once I’d arrived, to get out of the way for the others to follow without falling over something I couldn’t see. It was blacker than pitch up there, a soft marshmallow void of darkness. I hoped it wasn’t about to get crispy.
The others were right behind me. I moved farther out of the way, warily. Who knew if the floor was solid, or if there were spaces where a person could fall through to the pig pit below? “Where are we going?” I called out to Frank. I could taste the smoke in the air now, and I was choking on fear—my own and everyone else’s combined—but I was trying not to think about it all too much.
“Pretend you’re walking down the aisle below. Trace a line straight across the building,” Frank said, wheezing just a little bit. “Here.”
I heard the jingle of keys, felt a touch at my ankle. I reached back and felt them being pressed into my hand. The LED was still glowing away, thank the Virgin.
Mother Mary, watch over and guide us, keep us safe . . .
I started to crawl, just as fast as I could, closing my eyes to keep from focusing so hard on the blackness beyond the faint circle of light that I forgot to aim. It seemed to take forever, but I knew it had been only a minute or two. I didn’t know how far I had traveled when I heard a tiny mewl to my right. My eyes flew open.
I stopped and turned in that direction, staring into the void. “Minnie?” I whispered.
I felt something bump my ankle. “Better keep going, Mags,” Marcus urged.
“I thought I heard Minnie,” I said, hesitating.
As though sensing I wouldn’t be able to move forward without knowing for sure, he said, “Give me the light.”
I passed it to him.
“Where?”
“Just over to the right. On a line even with me.”
Marcus moved immediately, purposely, crawling on all fours toward the wall.
“What’s going on, why are we stopping?” Tom’s voice as he came upon me.
“Better keep going,” Frank said behind him. “Quick as we can.”
“Just a second,” I said urgently. “Just—”
I heard Marcus exclaim in surprise. “Did you find her?” I asked, scarcely daring to hope.
“More than just Minnie,” came Marcus’s enigmatic reply. “Come on out. It’s not safe here, we have to get out. Come on, Eddie.”
Eddie?
“But . . . but if Eddie is in here with us . . .” I said, stumbling over the words.
Who locked the door?
Somehow Marcus managed to coax Eddie along with him. The two of them—correction, make that three with Minnie, still in her carrier, poor thing—joined us as we filed along the path with Marcus now in the lead, pushing Minnie ahead of him along the floor.
“Everyone, stay together! And stay low.”
It seemed to take forever, but at least we reached the wall at the far end of the building. Beyond the walls, we could hear the sirens of the emergency crew approaching. But would they reach us in time? The air around us had a thick, palpable quality from the smoke and the terror of the animals below. I drew the neck of my shirt up over my mouth. It didn’t help much. I could only hope Minnie was still okay. She hadn’t made a peep since that single, tiny mew.
Tom made contact with his radio again to identify our location. The trouble was, we were at the far end of a very large building, pressed against the wall. “Stand by, Dispatch,” he said, before asking Frank, “Now what?”
“Let me through. Just along the wall, a few feet to the left—got it.” I heard a rattling, rumbling sound, as if an old garage door were being opened manually . . . but smaller in scale.
“A door?” Marcus asked.
“A trap door. Let’s hope no one has thought this far ahead. This loft is connected to the loft in the slaughte
rhouse next door,” Frank said. “We need to go on through and get down the ladder. The building’s not as big, so crawl as fast as you can. Once down the ladder, there’s a door right beside it.”
“No, no, no, Eddie won’t go!”
“Eddie,” Frank coaxed, “we have to. We can’t stay here.”
“Eddie don’t like the bloodhouse! Not safe there, not safe, not safe.”
“Come on, Eddie. It’ll be all right. Come on now.”
I was feeling that strangeness again, that weird feeling of being me but . . . not. The fear, the anger, the . . . hatred. “Libby’s a mean, mean girl,” I whispered to myself. “Mean, mean, jelly bean, kissed a toad, thinks she’s a queen.”
“Maggie?” I heard Marcus whisper.
It was Eddie, I realized. Eddie, whose thoughts had been invading my mind. Eddie, whose mind was locked away behind the trappings of his mental affliction. I shuffled around until I found him, cowering there beside Frank. “It’s okay, Eddie,” I told him. “Mrs. Turner’s not in the bloodhouse. The animals aren’t there either. You don’t need to be afraid.”
“Pigs in blankets,” he whimpered.
“No. No pigs in blankets. In fact, we need to get ourselves out of here, so that we can be sure the pigs are safe, too. Can you help us? Can you help us do that?”
“She’s not there?”
“No, Eddie. She’s not there. But we need to get through and get out, okay?”
He sighed, the tension in his body relaxing with the expulsion of his breath. “ ’Kay. We can go get the pigs out now. They’ll be safe now. Safe from her.”
I didn’t know what he meant, I was just glad we could all move along the path toward safety without fear of anyone falling behind trying to help Eddie. One by one we squeezed through the trap door. The last one through was Marcus, and I heard him slide it back into place.
The air wasn’t any better here. The strong scent of the hogs might have burned itself permanently into the lining of my nose, but it was infinitely better than the sickly sweet smell of blood and death that seemed to be a physical part of this place. My head whirled dizzily at the onslaught of energy, none of it pleasant.
