Out of the Ashes

by Valerie Sherrard

  “But it sounded as if...;”

  “Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t going to back down. I just figured he would.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Because guys like Nick are really cowards at heart. It scares them when someone stands up to them. He had to be wondering why I wasn’t afraid, and that made him so nervous he couldn’t take a chance.”

  “You were bluffing!”

  “Of course I was.”

  “But what if he’d called your bluff?”

  “I’d probably have gotten my butt kicked.”

  I realized suddenly that we were smiling at each other, and a little lurch of happiness ran through me. Almost at the same time I could see that Greg had become aware of it too. His guard went back up immediately. It was as if a cloud came over his face.

  “Anyway, I’ve got to get back to work.”

  “Uh, okay then. See you.”

  He went back inside without once looking back to where I stood, even though I willed him to with all my might. Then I went home, threw myself across my bed, and cried.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Sunday was a lazy kind of day, and I decided it was a good time to do some more work on my investigation. Well, I like to call it an investigation anyway, although it’s probably just a waste of effort.

  I took out a fresh tablet and wrote down the different symptoms, with a page for each one. I spread them out on my desk, picked up my lists of names, and started through them.

  That took a long time, and I soon saw that some of the categories were going to be really hard to fill in. Like depression. How did I know if someone was depressed or not? Everyone has different personalities, and I really didn’t know if the kids who might seem depressed were just naturally quiet or moody or whatever.

  It got discouraging pretty fast. I was doing my best, but a lot of it was guesswork. I realized that it would take a trained professional to properly diagnose most of these things. They probably have tests they can give people to prove whether or not they’re depressed or withdrawn or can’t trust others.

  Still, there were a few that seemed to fall naturally into place. Like Annie Berkley. She has a suspicious attitude in general, which means she probably isn’t very trusting, and she seems really down a lot. She never changes in front of anyone in gym, but that could be because of her weight problem. It probably is. Her grades are good though, so academic problems didn’t fit. I didn’t know if she had any particular fear or dislike of certain people or places.

  Now Jane Goodfellow was easy to figure out for that one! Anyone could see that she hates her stepfather. And Jane always goes into a bathroom stall to change even though she has a good figure. I also remembered that she had to go to summer school one year, but mostly her grades are average. I hesitated and then put her name under academic problems anyway, because there are lots of times she gets ragged on for not having her homework done, and it seems as though she’s smart enough to get much higher marks than she does. Sometimes she’s really tired too, and almost falls asleep in class.

  That reminded me of something I’d read in the book, and I picked it back up and flipped through until I found what I was looking for. It was about depression, and how people who are depressed often can’t sleep or sleep too much. Being tired in class could mean she wasn’t sleeping well. Under the depression category, I added the names of every student I could think of who sometimes seemed really tired in class. Then I put a question mark after them, because I really wasn’t sure about it.

  Secrecy. That was a tough one too! After all, if someone’s keeping a secret, how would you know about it? This wasn’t even one of the things you’d tell your best friend. I tried to think of who were best friends with Annie and Jane, but drew a blank. They didn’t seem to have any really good friends, although there were a few girls they hung around with at school. That gave me a new idea.

  I decided to write the names of anyone who didn’t have at least one really close friend under secrecy. After all, if you were secretive it stood to reason that you would keep yourself somewhat distant from others and would be cautious about getting too tight with anyone.

  Then I realized that might also suggest you were withdrawn, because people who are withdrawn are generally loners. Anyone without close attachments to other people could be considered loners, at least to some degree.

  It surprised me to realize that neither Nick nor Graham had a close friend. They both seem popular but actually don’t hang out with anyone in particular. I added their names under academic problems too, because their grades are barely average. I started wondering about the fact that they both tended to date girls for a short time and then dump them. Did that mean they couldn’t trust anyone enough to become attached?

  As an afterthought, I put a little note beside Graham’s name about how good he was at mimicking a female. There are probably lots of guys who can do a girl’s voice convincingly though, so that didn’t really prove anything.

  Then I was jolted by the memory of the evening I’d done Nick’s essay. That was the same night the Lawfords’ garage had burned! Where had he really been for the two hours after practice, while I’d been working in his kitchen? I knew he’d spoken to Jane, but Nick wasn’t the sort to get into long, meaningful conversations. It seemed unlikely he’d been talking to her all that time.

  I struggled to recall what he’d said the next day, when he was explaining why he hadn’t come back to his house at eight o’clock, as he’d promised. It had been something about a friend needing help, and not being able to tell me the whole story. You couldn’t get much more vague than that. It certainly wasn’t much of an alibi. Besides, Nick wasn’t the type to go out of his way to help anyone. I wondered if my infatuation with him had blinded me to something that was right there in front of my eyes.

  Still, there were a lot more names on my lists, and I had learned my lesson about jumping to conclusions. I moved on. As I worked, I thought of some other kids I knew whom I’d missed when I first wrote out the names. I added nearly twenty names, then realized with a start that I hadn’t included Betts. That made me smile. Feeling a bit silly, I scribbled her name down, even though the idea that she could be the fire setter was ridiculous. In spite of that, I faithfully went through the information to see if she fit any of the categories.

  Betts definitely has academic problems, but then she’s just not interested in school. That didn’t mean anything. And she never changes in front of anyone, not even me when we’re sleeping over at each other’s places. Of course that’s true of lots of girls. I laughed when I looked at the word “secrecy” seeing as how Betts is such a gossip. She’d be the last person who’d ever keep a secret! It was foolish wasting my time on her when there were so many others in my lists.

  When I’d finally finished my task I went through the list of names again, putting a check mark beside each person’s name for every time his or her name appeared in one of the categories.

  Some of the kids had no check marks at all, and a lot of the others had one or two. But twenty-seven of them had anywhere from three to six out of a possible seven!

  It made me feel almost sick to my stomach. I closed my eyes and lay back on the bed, trying to calm the way things were twisting up inside me. These were people I knew, and twenty-seven of them had enough check marks to make me wonder if they’d been abused in that way. Some of them were kids I didn’t particularly like because they seemed hateful or standoffish. I’d thought of them as snobs, but now I knew I could be horribly mistaken about that. I’d never be able to look at them again without wondering whether they carried terrible, dark secrets, secrets that affected their lives and made them act the way they did.

  My head was aching from concentrating and thinking so hard, and now that I was done I had to admit that I wasn’t much closer to figuring out who was setting fires in Little River.

  All I had come up with was “maybes.” Maybe these kids had been sexually abused. Maybe one of them was t
he fire starter. Maybe, maybe.

  It wasn’t enough. I needed something solid, some actual evidence to tie one of them in. The guilty person had to be stopped before someone got hurt.

  Most importantly, whoever it was needed help.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  As the week went by I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something I was missing, something important that would point to the person who was setting fires. By Wednesday, I’d all but given up on trying to figure it out. Short of catching someone in the act, it seemed unlikely that I was going to solve the mystery.

  The stir that had been created by the scene with Nick had died down by then, replaced by the fact that he was now going out with Kelsey. She looked like the cat who’d swallowed the canary, as my mom would say, walking around with a look on her face that would have made me glad for her if she hadn’t been so mean to Annie.

  I reminded myself that Kelsey was one of the girls on my list of possible victims, and tried to feel more kindly toward her. Still, it was hard when she’d been so cruel, and for no reason. Besides, Annie was on the list too.

  Greg basically continued to avoid me, and I reconciled myself to the fact that I’d alienated him for all time. I took his books back to him on Monday, even though I hadn’t read them yet. It wasn’t that they didn’t interest me, but it seemed wrong to hang onto them considering that I’d borrowed them under false pretences. (I wonder why people say false pretences. It seems that if something is a pretence, it would be understood that it’s false.)

  Deep down I’d been hoping that we’d have some sort of conversation when I met him at his locker to return the books, but he just took them and thanked me, and that was the end of it. He didn’t ask if I’d finished them or anything, just stuck them in his locker and headed off to his next class.

  I still had the book his dad had lent me, but I meant to take that to the house sometime when Greg wasn’t home. Maybe Mr. Taylor would have some time to talk to me about my method of making up lists. I also wanted to take the blue mitten, which was still stuck under my step, in case Greg hadn’t thrown out the other one. It would be embarrassing to have to mention it again, but there was nothing I could do about that.

  On Wednesday Betts suggested that she should come over to my place for the evening so we could do each other’s nails. She’s really talented and can paint tiny scenes on fingernails. I never got onto it very well, but she didn’t care if I could only do simple designs on hers.

  I told her she might as well come for dinner too, since her folks weren’t going to be home. She seemed glad to accept, and I dropped a quarter in the pay phone at school to make sure it was okay with Mom. Of course, it was.

  When Betts got there, Mom was in the kitchen mixing up a batch of biscuits to go with the meal. When she found that out, she was keen to go and help. Betts loves to bake, and lots of times when she comes over we’ll make cookies or something just because she likes it so much. I guess it’s a big deal to her because she and her mom don’t do much baking together.

  Anyway, we went into the kitchen, and Mom gave her the job of rolling and cutting them.

  “Is this too thin?” Betts asked as she ran the rolling pin over the soft dough.

  Mom leaned over to inspect and said it was fine.

  “Be careful not to get anything on that lovely sweater, dear,” she added. I could almost have predicted that she’d say something along those lines. It’s kind of comical how Mom is always offering “advice” like that about things that any normal person would know without being told.

  But Betts was pleased at being fussed over. “I’ll be careful,” she smiled, “though this old sweater is secondhand anyway. No, actually it’s third-hand.”

  “Where’d you get it?” I asked. It looked familiar, but I didn’t remember ever seeing her wear it before.

  “I traded it with Gail for my blue striped top, the one that never fit right.”

  “So how is it third-hand then?”

  “Gail got it from Jane. She gives her all the things she doesn’t wear any more because Gail’s mom is a single parent and can’t afford that much for her. I guess even Jane has a good side. Anyway, the color of this sweater didn’t suit her, and I just loved it, so we traded.” Betts frowned slightly as she pressed the cutter on the dough. “This seems to be sticking.”

  “Just dip the cutter in flour between each one,” Mom reminded her.

  They were ready to go in the oven in no time, and we set the table while they cooked. Dinner was great, roast with potatoes and peas and biscuits. Dad buried everything under gravy, and Betts seemed to think that was a good idea because she did the same with her dinner. There was upside-down peach cake for dessert, with real whipped cream slathered over it, and we all moaned and groaned that we were too full when we’d finished eating.

  I volunteered to do the dishes, because I find it helps to get right up and do something when I’ve eaten too much. Betts came along and dried them, something she never has to do at home since they have a dishwasher.

  When we were finished I felt a lot better. Betts had brought along a book of nail designs and her nail polish collection, which is pretty amazing. She has every possible colour you can imagine, so there was nothing in the book that we couldn’t do if we wanted to. We spread it all out, along with the brushes she has for doing fine lines, and set about picking out designs.

  “Ladybugs for me,” she said pointing to a picture in the book. “On yellow backgrounds.”

  I chose drama masks against red backgrounds, and we started to work on them. Betts’s hand was steadier and her lines far more accurate than mine, but the overall results were good for both of us. We showed off the finished products to Mom and Dad, who admired them suitably.

  “No one ever offers to do my nails,” Dad complained. “Why, I haven’t had a good manicure since I don’t know when.”

  Betts grabbed his hand and inspected it carefully. “There’s not much hope for you, Mr. Belgarden,” she said, shaking her head sadly. “You’ve just let your cuticles go for too long.”

  “I’ve been meaning to do something about those,” he sighed heavily while we giggled, “but it’s so hard to find time.”

  I walked Betts halfway home after and then got busy with my homework. I was struggling through some algebra, which I hate, when all of a sudden something popped into my head.

  It’s funny how your brain works, isn’t it? All the time I’d been straining to concentrate and figure things out I’d been drawing a blank. Then, when I was doing something entirely different, it sorted itself out in my head. I’ve had that happen before with brain teasers. I’d think and think and be unable to solve them, and then a day or two later I’d be thinking about something else and the answer would pop into my head. It was just like that!

  It started with a jolt, a thought that burst into view out of nowhere. Actually, it had been there all along but I hadn’t recognized what it meant. Then other things tumbled into the picture and clicked into place. All of a sudden the pieces had all come together, and when I stopped to examine them they all fit perfectly.

  I knew who the Little River fire starter was!

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Well, it’s one thing to know something and another to prove it. When I wrote down all of the evidence, I had to admit that it was pretty much circumstantial. In a way, it was even flimsier than the case I’d made against Greg, and yet I knew I was right this time.

  I wished there was someone I could talk to about it, and as soon as that thought entered my head I realized that the person I most wanted to talk to was Greg. I knew he was the one person who would listen without acting like my idea was crazy or laughing it off. And since he’s so smart he might have suggestions that would help me decide what to do about the whole thing. That was certainly the place where I was drawing a blank!

  If only I hadn’t made such a mess of things between us. Now that I understood my own feelings I wondered why I’d ever thought he
wasn’t boyfriend material. It was bad enough to accept that I was never going to go out with him, but not being friends seemed somehow even worse.

  Still, he’d talked to me at Broderick’s last Saturday when he could have just walked away. Maybe there was a small chance I could persuade him to talk to me again.

  I couldn’t stand the idea of asking him face-to-face and having him refuse me, especially since I’d almost cried in front of him last weekend. Instead, I checked the e-mail list at school, got his address, and sent him a short note. Actually, I composed about ten before I finally had one that didn’t seem stupid or pathetic.

  “Greg,” it said, “I’d like to have your opinion on something important. It shouldn’t take long. I’ll be at The Scream Machine at 7:00 on Friday evening if you can make it. Shelby.”

  I sent it on Wednesday. That would give him a couple of days to decide if he wanted to come or not. It also gave me lots of time to worry if it had been dumb to even ask. I was hoping he might send a message back telling me if he was coming, but he didn’t.

  I’d planned the time to meet carefully, supposing he decided to come. The dinner crowd would have cleared out by then, and anyone who’d dropped in before the early show would be heading off to the theatre down the road. Those going to the late show wouldn’t normally start landing at the soda shop until after eight. I’d figured on the place being fairly quiet for an hour, giving me time to explain everything without a lot of other people around.

  Ordering a diet cola, I sat down in a corner booth at ten minutes before seven. It was hard not to look at the clock constantly and I wished I’d brought something to read while I waited for him. Every time the door opened I got a flutter in my stomach which turned into a feeling of letdown when it wasn’t him. By twenty after seven it wasn’t looking good and by seven thirty I swallowed my disappointment and left.

  My allowance was in my pocket and I toyed with the idea of stopping at Betts’ place to see if she wanted to take in a movie, but at the last minute I found myself walking past her house and going straight home. I felt irritable and frustrated. Mostly, I felt very much alone.