by Gerry Boyle
“No,” Rita said, rekindling some indignation. “But he didn’t see this guy’s eyes. Like a dog has, just black and burning. Him and the dog, they’re sort of the same.”
The wind shifted and embers floated over our heads and away. Some people in the crowd were covering their heads, like it had started to rain.
“Having emotional problems because of combat doesn’t mean you burn people in their homes,” I said.
“Who knows what goes on in that spooky bastard’s head,” Rita said, clapping manicured fingers over her mouth. “I can’t believe I said that.”
“So the patrol,” I said, turning to Tory. He shook himself loose, looked at me.
“Uh-huh.”
“You all gonna go knocking on this Longfellow guy’s door?”
“Police knock, Jack,” Tory said. “We just patrol.”
“Can I go along sometime?” I said.
I glanced at him, saw a flicker of doubt.
“I don’t know,” Tory said. “I mean, there’s the liability. What if something happened?”
“I’ll sign a release.”
There was a crackle, a billow of flame. Tory and Rita took a step away. I stayed with them.
“Ask the committee,” I said.
“Sure, Jack,” he said. “Sure.”
At 11:35 the roof collapsed, flames billowing, sparks cascading down, the crowd saying “Ooohh,” like it was fireworks, the grand finale. The firefighters stayed outside the house, pouring water on the mess. The shed was half-burned, the shell of a vintage car visible through the charred doors. They saved the barn—with Dr. Talbot’s Mercedes sedan inside.
I texted Roxanne and she texted back. I called. She answered. She had news.
The doors were locked, she said, and Sophie was asleep, in bed with her.
“But that’s not the news,” she said. “They found Alphonse’s lady friend.”
“They got him?”
“Foley called,” she said, as I plugged an ear and bent to hear Roxanne’s whisper over the fire noise. “New Bedford police broke down the door of an apartment. This woman Snoopy was hiding under the bed.”
“And Alphonse?”
“She said he wasn’t there. Never had been. She said he turned out to be a jerk, so she dropped him off in Portsmouth.”
“So he’s out there.”
“The whole time they were chasing the phone.”
“So she was bait,” I said.
“If he’s that smart,” Roxanne said.
“Nobody has ever said he wasn’t. They have any idea where he is?”
A pause.
“No,” she said.
The implications raced through me. Portland. Or New York. Or Prosperity, Maine.
“You tell Clair?”
“I will.”
“He’ll need to know. That now we have two of them out there.”
A crackle on the line. Roxanne’s voice garbled. I made out the word “somewhere.”
“Something happened down here,” I said. “Can you hear me?”
There was no reply, just static. I told her not to worry, that it would work out, but she was already gone.
I put the phone away, stood for a minute.
Two fronts. Two very different crazies, one calculating and vicious, one distraught and angry and vengeful. Two different minds to try to fathom, two people with very different capabilities. Beth might drive her car through our front door. Alphonse might try to work it for money. But both of them knew our soft spot, the place they could hurt us most, gain the most leverage, make us kneel before them.
Sophie.
I swallowed. Tried calling Roxanne back, but the phone beeped, the screen saying UNABLE TO PLACE CALL. I put it away and looked around, the fire scene reappearing like I’d just come to. I took a long breath and went to work.
Working my way through the crowd, I picked out Frederick standing on the running board of a pumper, talking on the radio. I walked toward him and he saw me and turned away. I needed somebody more official than the real estate people to say something, and the chief was as official as I could find. I stood and waited, and a minute later a maroon Suburban pulled in, blue strobes flashing, and Davida Reynolds got out.
There were two fire marshal’s office investigators, Reynolds and an older man—chunky, thinning gray hair, mustache—both of them wearing blue jumpsuits and black boots. They opened the side doors of the truck and took out hard hats, and they were putting them on when I approached them.
“Inspector Reynolds,” I said.
“Mr. McMorrow,” she said. “You are the newspaper’s man on the scene.”
She turned to the other guy. “This is Jack McMorrow. New York Times.”
The other investigator looked at me warily.
“Long way from home,” he said.
“About twenty miles,” I said. “And you are?”
He glanced at Reynolds. She nodded.
“Derosby,” he said.
I put my notebook in my left hand, held out my right. He was holding a video camera and he switched it to his other hand and shook gingerly, like I might have a disease.
“Filming the scene?” I said.
“Most serial arsonists like to admire their own handiwork,” Reynolds said.
I looked at the burning house, thinking there wouldn’t be much left of Dr. Talbot if he was inside.
“Upped the stakes this time,” I said.
“Either way,” Reynolds said. Derosby panned the camera across the line of townspeople. I started to take notes.
“Hard to picture a murderer being in this crowd,” I said,
“They look just like the rest of us,” Derosby said. “Except they kill people.”
I scribbled, catching up, flipped the page.
“Pretty cold-blooded,” I said. “If they knew a man was in there.”
“May not have thought the owner was home. For-sale sign and all.”
“Still,” I said.
“I know,” she said. “Upping the ante. They can’t control it. Any more than a serial killer can just stop.”
Reynolds turned to the back of the Suburban and began putting on a jacket and gloves. She took a headlamp out, strapped it to her hard hat like a miner.
“Who retrieves the body?” I said. “If there is one.”
“We do,” Reynolds said. “This is our crime scene.”
A grisly task, pulling a body from the ashes. A skeleton? A torso? I wondered if you ever got used to that, picking at a charred body that had just been a person. Dr. Talbot, the sweet old gentleman. Call me Bert.
I watched Reynolds, then realized Derosby was watching me.
“Been to a lot of these fires?” he said.
There was an edge to it, and I looked at him.
“Last two,” I said. “Don Barbier’s barn and this one.”
“Made it quick, for someone who lives out of town,” Derosby said.
“I got a call, soon as it was reported.”
“Who was that?” Derosby said.
I looked at him, surprised.
“A confidential informant,” I said.
“You know this person’s name?” he said.
“Sure I do,” I said. Our eyes locked, held. Derosby looked away, out at the crowd, nodded to me and said, “Good meeting you,” like it wasn’t. And he walked off, the camera held low against his calf. I watched as he sauntered to the far end of the house, turned back and started filming.
18
Once the roof was gone, the fire gave up quickly, the building collapsing on itself. The boys poured a steady stream of water on the smoking rubble.
Frank Derosby filmed the bystanders and then he filmed the fire. Then the bystanders again. I looked around to see if anyone new had arrived. I saw Russell and Don Barbier, one of the high school girls from the store. She was with her boyfriend, a big doughy fellow, and he kept his arm around her waist, like someone might steal his date.
I heard barking behind me, headlights coming up t
he drive. We all turned. It was a dark Crown Vic, gray, unmarked. There was a dog in the back, a black Lab that was bounding from side to side. The car parked and the driver—thirtyish, blue jumpsuit, baseball cap—got out and walked past the crowd to the far end of the house, where Reynolds and Derosby were pointing up at the burned and teetering wall. They talked.
The dog was at the side window, a metal grille where normally there was glass. The guy opened the door and the dog went still as the lead was snapped onto his collar.
“They gonna use the dog to find the bastard?”
I turned. It was Lasha. I smelled alcohol, heard a barely perceptible slur.
“I guess. Maybe he came out of the woods, lit the place, and went back that way.”
She looked at me, her eyes vague. The mane of hair, a dungaree jacket, a loose-fitting white blouse, a baseball cap that said NYPD.
“Or she,” Lasha said.
“Thanks for the tip on this one,” I said.
“You’re welcome. I’ve got a lot more. Your way home, stop at the house.”
“Anything good?”
Lasha stepped closer. I could smell perfume, mixed with the alcohol. Lasha was drunk.
“Yeah. Something very good. It may—”
“You know somebody might be in there,” I said.
Lasha froze, her mouth open. “Oh, my God,” she said, and then the dog bounded out of the car, woofed a couple of times, and put his nose to the ground and began to course. He moved toward the house, the handler trotting behind. I took a picture, the strobe going off like a muzzle flash. They went to the back of the house, the walls half collapsed, and turned the corner. They were on the side that faced the woods.
We watched and waited. Then they came back, the dog first, the handler in tow. He let out more lead and the dog ran past the house, toward the crowd. He slowed and began sniffing each person he passed. Two firefighters moved past him, dragging a hose, and he gave them a sniff and bounded on. Rita and Tory and the women, Russell and Harold from the store, the teenage girl and her boyfriend, the girl leaning down to try to scratch his ears, the handler saying, “Please don’t touch him, miss.” The dog continued toward us. He sniffed at Lasha’s feet, red-painted toenails on display in her sandals And then the dog moved to me.
Sniffed my running shoes, one, then the other.
Stopped. Looked up.
Sat down.
“He likes you,” Lasha said.
“Accelerant dog,” I said. “He smells gas.”
The handler moved up behind the dog, leaned down and said something. He tried to pull the dog away but he wouldn’t move. Just sat and looked at me and panted.
“He’s got a hit,” I said.
The guy looked at me. He was young with a chiseled face that showed nothing. The dog looked at me, his mouth open, tongue lolling. My new best friend.
“Good job, pup,” I said. He whined.
“Is he gonna just sit there?” Lasha said.
“Until they release him,” I said, looking up to see Reynolds and Derosby approaching.
I waited. They walked up to the handler, looked at him, the dog, me.
“Mr. McMorrow,” Reynolds said, smiling. “What you got on your shoes?”
“Gasoline,” I said.
“How’d you do that, sir?” Derosby said, like we’d never met.
“Filling up my truck on the way over here. The pump at the store didn’t shut off right. Some spilled on the ground. I probably stepped in it.”
Lasha moved close by my side, slipped her arm through mine. “Hey, wait a minute, officers. I was the one who called him to tell him about the fire. He was home.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “They have to ask—”
“Well, sure, but they’re making it sound like you’re a suspect or something.”
“Everybody’s a suspect,” Reynolds said, half-smile in place, “until we cross them off the list. It’s like musical chairs. You eliminate people one by one, and after a while there’s only one person left.”
“But he told you what happened,” Lasha began.
“What store was this?” Derosby said.
“The one on 17. The Quik-Mart.”
“How long ago?” he said.
“I don’t know. An hour, maybe.”
“Do you know who he is?” Lasha said. “Jack works for the New York Times. He’s not some—”
“Anyone see this happen?” Derosby said.
“Yeah. There was a guy there, filling up, too. He said, ‘Don’t light a match.’ Or something like that.”
“You know him?” Derosby said.
“No.”
“Your truck here?”
“This is nuts,” Lasha said. She pulled me closer protectively.
“It’s parked on the road, just north of the driveway. Blue Toyota four-wheel-drive.”
Derosby nodded at the handler. He pulled on the lead and the dog leapt to his feet, shook his head. Another yank and they were off, moving past the last of the bystanders and then down the driveway. Lasha turned and watched them go, then turned back. She hadn’t let go of my arm.
Reynolds looked at us and smiled, like she’d caught us necking behind the barn.
“So,” Derosby said to Lasha. “You are?”
“Lasha Cabral.”
I felt her arm slide out from mine. I hoped she wouldn’t take a swing at the guy.
“And you called Mr. McMorrow because—”
“To tell him there was another fire.”
“And you heard about it?”
“On the scanner.”
“And what did you tell Mr. McMorrow?”
“That there was another one,” Lasha said.
“Another—”
“Another arson fire. Somebody torched another one. You know he’s writing a story, right? I thought he’d want to know.”
Derosby looked at her, eyes narrowed, like he was trying to see through her disguise.
“And what made you think this was arson, ma’am?” Reynolds said.
“This is Sanctuary, Maine,” Lasha said. “What other kind of fire do we have?”
Lasha moved toward the fire, joining the crowd.
I turned away, started down the driveway. I was thinking of headlines: MAINE TOWN BANDS TOGETHER AS ARSONIST FINALLY KILLS. But what would the subhead be? With a kid beaten into a coma; a bunch of vigilantes turning their sights on the next outcast.
The woods on both sides were dark and deep, and I found myself staring into the rustling blackness. I could hear the noise of bugs and frogs, scratching of a mouse or mole in the leaves. An owl slipped across the drive and into the woods. It was a dark shape, a blur and gone. I thought of the arsonist, moving just that way through the dark woods. And then a flicker, a dot of flame.
There were a few trucks still parked in the grass along the road, four-wheel-drives rammed into the ditch. I got into the truck, put my gear on the seat beside me, started the motor. Moths and bugs swarmed the lights and I drove through them and onto the road. There was an intersection fifty yards up—right to the town center, straight along the ridge. Lasha’s house.
I slowed and then caught it. Movement in the brush to my left. I pulled over and backed up. Looked into the woods and this time saw nothing. Put the truck in gear.
Saw it again.
Someone was standing there, at the edge of an opening cut into the brush. I saw a hat when the head turned. A car was coming up behind me and its headlights were reflected in the woods.
I pulled ahead, drove a hundred yards up the road, over a rise to the right. I pulled over into the brush and killed the lights. Got out and started back. Halfway down the hill, I stopped. The person was coming out of the bushes at the side of the road. I stepped to one side, stood in the grass at the edge of the trees. It was a man, coming toward me, a big dog beside him. He moved quickly, in a half-crouch, something between a walk and a trot. I watched as he turned, looked over his shoulder. Headlights came over a rise in the dist
ance and he and the dog moved to the side of the road, against the woods, and froze. Disappeared.
The car approached, then turned right at the intersection, headed for the town center. There was a moment when we both stood in the darkness and then he and the dog moved out of the grass, onto the road. The same half-trot.
Twenty yards. Boots tapping the pavement. Quick economical movements.
Ten yards. A guy. Dark hat, some sort of dark jersey.
I stepped out.
He moved to his right, across the road. I crossed, too. Held up my hand like a crossing guard.
“Louis,” I said.
It froze him. The dog, too. It didn’t bark.
I stepped closer.
“I’m Jack. Can we talk?”
He unfolded from the crouch, grew a foot. The dog circled him, stopped and looked at me. The guy from the gas pumps. Tall, thin, dark beard and the black deep-set eyes. Jaw that stuck out, like it was perpetually clenched. An old-fashioned face like something from a daguerreotype, a farmer on the prairie. He took two steps to his left but I moved, too, and blocked him.
“Louis, I’m a reporter,” I said. “I’ve heard them talking about you.”
He took a step backwards.
“The patrol,” I said. “The guys in town looking for the arsonist. You’re the next suspect.”
He looked at me. Didn’t answer.
“Why are you out here?”
A moment and then, “We walk at night.”
“Why here?”
“Why are you here?” he said.
“The fire.”
“Me, too. We could see it from up on the ridge.”
We. Him and the dog.
“You know they think someone died in this one?”
“No,” he said, and he withdrew to a place somewhere behind the black eyes.
“Some people in town are thinking you might be the one.”
“The one what?”
“The one setting the fires?” I said.
“Why would I do that?”
“I don’t know that you would. But they think maybe ’cause you’re a troubled combat veteran.”
He looked away, scowled. He shook his head, like it was one more thing.
“They don’t know shit about combat. They don’t know shit about trouble.”
Echoes of Woodrow.
“I don’t want to be in the newspaper.”
