No Ordinary Hero

by Rachel Lee

  He shook his head. “Not sure. I’m getting low voltage on the electrical lines in the bedroom, but I can’t figure out where the bleed is. And if you have a short, you should blow a fuse. You are going to replace this box with circuit breakers, right?”

  “Of course,” Del answered. “Code.”

  “Yeah, code.” Jimmy shook his head, peering at the fuse box with a flashlight.

  Del felt a tingle along her nerve endings. “Jimmy?”

  He looked at her. “Yeah?”

  “Could this cause a fire?”

  “It’s always possible. But you remember when you bought the place?”

  Del nodded.

  “There weren’t no bleed then. And I’m not finding one in the rooms where you took out the walls. Damn.” He stepped back from the fuse box, closed it and scratched his head. “I don’t like this, Ms. Del.”

  She stood there uncertainly. “Jimmy, my strong suit isn’t electricity, but how could something be causing a power drop in Colleen’s room? I mean, just plugging something in for example…something that really sucks power…wouldn’t that cause just a temporary drop? Like when a major appliance turns on? The way the lights dim when I first ramp up my table saw?”

  “You’d think.” He looked at her, shrugging.

  “And a short would blow the fuse?”

  “It’s supposed to.” He scratched his head again. “I don’t like this,” he repeated. “Something in the wiring ain’t right. Something’s bleeding power steadily, but not enough to be an outright short.”

  “Does that make it any less dangerous?”

  “Can’t say. Gotta find the problem.”

  “What do you suggest?”

  His answer was short and to the point. “Don’t sleep here.”

  She swore softly and turned to find Edgar just standing there, listening. Well, of course. Edgar was a plumber. This probably made just about as much sense to him as it did to her. She wasn’t totally ignorant of electricity, but she couldn’t for the life of her imagine how this could be happening.

  “Okay,” she said, looking at Jimmy again. “Try to find it. In the meantime, I’m going to help Edgar with the shower. If you need me, just holler.”

  Jimmy nodded and turned his flashlight back to the wiring that emerged from the fuse box, beginning to follow it along the basement ceiling in the general direction of Colleen’s room.

  “Oh, and Jimmy?”

  “Ma’am?”

  “We discussed using conduit for the new wiring, right?”

  “Yup. Surely did. Beginning to think we may have to tear it all out.”

  “I’ve suspected that from the beginning. I doubt any of this would meet code.”

  “Likely not,” he agreed.

  Edgar helped her open the box containing all the parts of the new shower enclosure, then together they carried the foam-wrapped panels upstairs to Colleen’s room.

  She and Edgar leaned the panels carefully against the walls then made one last trip for the bottom and assorted odds and ends. During that time, Jimmy had moved back upstairs and was following a meter along a wall.

  Unlike the old tub, the new shower came with a pan that sat below the enclosure’s tile floor to catch any overflow and prevent water damage. Edgar attached it to the floor and then sealed any possible gaps around screws with thick, gooey caulking. Once they got the wall through which the plumbing lines would project firmly in place, the rest went swiftly.

  By two, the shower was completely installed and the water was running. Edgar flashed her a grin. “Tomorrow the toilet.”

  Rubbing her lower back, Del leaned one shoulder against the wall. “I’m thinking about taking the fixture I bought back and exchanging it for something that would be easier for Colleen to use.”

  He lifted his brow. “You’re not going to turn this house over like the rest?”

  Good question, she thought. Good question. She had promised Colleen she wouldn’t have to live here until she got rid of the noises, and she hadn’t been able to find out a damn thing about the noises. Cool. Very cool.

  “I don’t know,” she said finally. “I probably should. Either way, yeah, we can put in the new toilet tomorrow. And maybe the sink.”

  He nodded. “Okay. See you in the morning.”

  But he didn’t pick up his tools, and she knew why. In this business, payment didn’t wait.

  He followed her into the kitchen, where she took her business checkbook out of a drawer and wrote him a draft for the day’s labor.

  As he was leaving, Jimmy came down from the upstairs.

  “Did you find anything?” she asked.

  “No.” He didn’t look happy. “I’m coming back in the morning. Something’s wrong and I don’t like it. Just don’t you sleep here tonight, Ms. Del.”

  “I won’t,” she promised. She asked what she owed him and he shrugged it off.

  “Ain’t fixed nothin’ yet,” he said. Then he nodded, picked up his tools and left.

  And she was alone in the house. A glance at her watch told her she needed to race to pick up Colleen. No time for even a quick wash.

  Hurrying, she checked all the locks, then set out for the school.

  Colleen seemed a lot happier knowing she didn’t have to go back to the house. A quick call to Sally resulted in a short shopping list, so they hit the grocery. She even yielded to Colleen’s pleas for some diet soda.

  And by the time she got everything taken care of, it was after four and Mike still hadn’t come home. Almost as soon as she thought of him, though, her cell phone rang.

  “Hi, Del,” Mike said. “I’m sorry, but I had an emergency. It might be an hour or more before I can get home.”

  “That’s fine. I think I’m almost done with work for the day. I may go back and clean up a bit, though.”

  He paused. “Why don’t you wait for me?”

  “I’m just going to get some trash out. It won’t take ten minutes. I’ll see you soon.”

  There were words she wanted to say, words she wanted to hear from him, but she gathered he wasn’t alone. Last night he had called her darling, and sweetheart, but over the phone she was Del again.

  She felt a pang as she said goodbye, then told herself not to be ridiculous. Now, if he came home and didn’t call her darling or sweetheart, she’d have something to wonder about.

  “Sally?”

  “Yes, dear?”

  “I’m going over to the house to carry out some trash.”

  “That’s fine, dear. I’ll get started on dinner soon.”

  As she crossed the lawn, she decided to call Miss Emma at the library.

  “Still haven’t found a single thing about that house,” Emma responded cheerfully. “Apparently nothing news-worthy ever happened there. At least nothing I’ve found yet.”

  “I can’t thank you enough for looking.”

  “Actually, I think I’m having fun, and probably taking longer than necessary because I keep getting distracted by other stories.”

  Del had to laugh. “Would you like to search something else for me?”

  “Sure, why not?”

  “Who was Madeline James?”

  “Hmm.” Emma’s tone grew thoughtful as Del climbed the steps and started to unlock the front door. “Now that does sound familiar. Did I go to high school with her?” But she apparently didn’t expect an answer. “I’ll look her up. Why do you need to know?”

  “I found her diary.”

  “Oh! I bet she would love to have that back. Those things look so silly to us when we’re young and look back on them, but when we get older they can be downright fascinating. I’ll let you know what I find.”

  “Thanks, Miss Emma.”

  “My pleasure, Del. I’ve actually been having a ball.”

  Del wished she could say the same. Instead she headed for the basement to pick up the cardboard that had encased the shower enclosure. She could have asked Edgar to help get rid of it, but she hadn’t wanted to pay for the extr
a time. Pulling a utility knife from her pocket, she snapped it open and began to cut cardboard to manageable sizes.

  A fire hazard because there was a power bleed somewhere in the house. That really shook her, because she’d had Jimmy check it out before she bought the place. She’d been worried about the wiring from the start, given the place was so old. And while she might expose Colleen to the dust and mess of renovation, she would not expose her daughter to a dangerous dwelling. She’d had the building inspector in, and Edgar and Jimmy both before she’d even made an offer. No one had thought the place dangerous then.

  She had guessed she would probably need to replace the wiring, given the age of the place and the fact that she was bound to do damage tearing out the rotten walls, but to learn she had a voltage drop in Colleen’s room, something which Jimmy couldn’t locate, seriously troubled her.

  As she cut cardboard and stacked it neatly, she tried to remember anything she might have done to cause the problem. The only trouble with that, of course, was that Jimmy should have found the bleed easily enough in the walls she’d already torn out.

  So what else was there?

  She went back to the fuse box, opened it and studied it with the help of a penlight she always carried in the breast pocket of her work shirt. Maybe there was something wrong with it. Well, there had to be, didn’t there? She couldn’t imagine how she could have a power bleed somewhere without blowing a fuse. The very idea struck her as counterintuitive.

  When the refrigerator compressor came on, the lights dimmed just briefly until the current draw leveled out again. It happened fast, something she almost didn’t notice. So how could you have a persistent bleed that wouldn’t be compensated for unless you had a major short, one that should blow a fuse?

  All the fuses looked okay, as they should considering she had put in fresh ones when they moved in.

  She squatted, flashlight in hand, staring up at the fuse box as she tried to remember her all-too-brief studies in wiring and electricity years ago.

  What could create a persistent power drop that couldn’t be compensated for? Some kind of resistor?

  Yeah, a resistor. But they made heat, which was how they expended the energy they pulled out of the system. Light and heat, just like a lightbulb.

  Well, how could something like that have happened all of a sudden and all on its own?

  She knew she should wait for Jimmy to come back in the morning. He was the expert, after all, the one with the license and years of experience.

  But she hated problems she couldn’t solve.

  Straightening, she started to follow the wiring from the fuse box, just as Jimmy had. Not that she really expected to see anything. If it was obvious, Jimmy would have found it.

  Walking slowly, she peered up at the wires. They all were insulated, and she didn’t see any breaks in the insulation. A couple had been capped off with plastic, having been cut and thrown into disuse. A couple headed for the overhead bulb fixtures that were attached to the overhead joists, and which cast little enough light in the basement.

  Everything looked absolutely normal, and she was just about to give up when her flashlight trailed across one wire.

  It went behind the brick wall.

  Her opinion of the person who put up that wall sank another notch lower. Not only lousy mortar that was crumbling, but unevenly laid bricks, too. And now, apparently, the builder had just sealed up an outlet box. Stupid.

  She considered cutting and capping the wire right then and there and couldn’t understand why the guy who had built the wall hadn’t done it himself. If water got in there…

  Sighing, she traced the wire back to the fuse box and tried to determine which fuse it was attached to. Well, of course, the basement fuse. She’d have to turn out all the lights down here if she wanted to cut that one wire.

  Shoot.

  Well, it had survived this long.

  She shoved her knife back into her pocket and pulled out her cell phone to call Sally and tell her she’d be over in a few minutes, that she just wanted to take care of a bit of business first. Like tearing down enough of that wall to see where the wire went. As crumbly as the mortar was, the only thing she needed to fear was carelessness.

  But just before she could flip her phone open, it rang.

  “Hi,” said the voice of Emma Dalton, the librarian. “I found Madeline James!”

  “Really? Where is she?”

  “Well, that’s the thing. She left town about fifteen years ago, and other than a couple of postcards she sent to her husband and friends, nobody’s heard from her.”

  “Nobody? No family?”

  “Her parents died right after she got married. And then after about two years, she took off. The story is she couldn’t stand life around here anymore, that she wanted more adventure and more money. She was certainly pretty enough to marry it.”

  “But…” Del’s mind balked. “That’s weird.”

  “Well,” said Emma, lowering her voice a bit, “I was thinking that, too. Jimmy reported her missing about two days after she left, and then a week later he got a postcard, so they stopped looking for her.”

  Del’s heart seemed to stop. “Jimmy? Jimmy who?”

  “Jimmy Morton.”

  Her neck prickled. Del turned slowly and looked at the brick wall, dark and ugly in the light from two sixty-watt bulbs. “Jimmy Morton, as in the electrician?”

  “The same. He divorced her about a year later, but they couldn’t even find her to deliver the notice to. Not the first time this has happened.”

  “I’m sure.” Del hesitated, a chill creeping along her spine even as her mind refused the thoughts that were trying to surge to awareness. “Did anybody else ever hear from her?”

  “According to the report I read, two of her best friends got cards, too. Hold on, it’s in one of these old police reports.”

  Del waited patiently until she heard a rustle as Emma came back on the line. “Yes. Several of her friends received postcards, too. It seems she’d been thinking of leaving Jimmy for a while, so none of them were surprised. Anyway, the report said they verified the handwriting was hers, so no question of abduction or anything like that. The girl simply kicked up her heels and left.”

  “Well, her diary said she was going to leave.”

  “A shame we can’t get it to her. She’d probably look back at it now and laugh.”

  I doubt it, Del thought as she said goodbye to Emma.

  So Jimmy had lived in this house once, with his wife. Odd that he’d never mentioned it.

  Or maybe not so odd. Why would he want to bring up such a humiliating, painful memory?

  Stop it, she told herself. Cripes, why was her imagination running away from her? The woman had said in her diary she was leaving. She’d told her friends she was leaving. She’d sent postcards from wherever she’d gone, and her friends said it was her handwriting.

  So no mystery, right?

  “Right,” she said aloud to the empty basement.

  Except there was a mystery now. A mystery with the electrical power, a mystery with strange noises, and Jimmy himself who had said it wouldn’t be safe to stay in the house until he found the electrical problem.

  An electrical problem that made no sense whatever to her unless someone had created it. Or invented it.

  Her phone rang again, jarring her, and she looked at it. Mike. “Hello?”

  “Hi, sweetie.” Apparently he was alone now, and the endearment made her smile. “I’m still hung up, but not for much longer, I promise.”

  “What happened?”

  “Dog meets car. As usual, the dog took the worst of it.”

  “Will it be all right?”

  “I’m pretty sure, but we had to do some extensive surgery and I’m going to help clean up. I’m also waiting for one of my assistants to come in to watch the poor guy overnight. Forty-five minutes. Maybe an hour. Tell Sally I’m sorry, if she made dinner.”

  “She did. I’ll tell her. She’ll
understand, Mike.”

  “I hope so. Be there just as soon as I can.”

  She disconnected and called Sally to let her know.

  “Not a problem,” Sally answered. “Casseroles keep well. When are you coming back?”

  “I just need to check something. Is Colleen okay?”

  “She’s doing just fine. She did ask for that LMNO music thing of hers.”

  “Her MP3 player. Tell her I’ll bring it. I can’t believe I forgot to get it for her yesterday.”

  “She’ll live. She’s watching some comedy reruns right now.”

  Del’s cell began to beep. “Sally, my phone’s dying. Be there as soon as I can.”

  She shut the phone, turned it off to save the last of the battery and shoved it into her pocket. Okay, get the cardboard out, go clean up for dinner and wait for Mike.

  Except she no sooner reached the foot of the basement stairs when her neck started prickling again.

  Was this what Mike meant when he said the house felt sad to him? Or was it something else?

  She turned slowly, looking around the basement, seeing absolutely nothing except some tools, ladders, the stack of cardboard she’d just made and a couple of boxes holding bathroom fixtures she intended to install tomorrow.

  An empty room that certainly didn’t feel empty.

  And a brick wall that made absolutely no sense.

  No, she wasn’t going to start that job tonight.

  Oh, yes, she was.

  Okay, just around the wire, just to see if maybe it was capped off right behind the brick. That much she could justify. If there was any place in this house that could have an electrical drain that Jimmy hadn’t noticed during his first inspection, that would be it. After all, it had rained a lot over the past few days. Something back there might be damp.

  Picking up a hammer and chisel, she dragged a stepladder over to that end of the wall. She could have reached the top bricks while standing on the floor, but she didn’t want to risk the possibility of bricks falling on her head when the mortar crumbled.

  Just before she struck the first blow, she had a thought. More light would be useful. Very useful.

  Sighing, she climbed down and went back upstairs to get a couple of her work lights. Back in the basement, she hung them to the side on nails in the rafters so they were in a position not to blind her as she looked at the bricks.