Hellbox nd-37

by Bill Pronzini

  I couldn’t keep searching blind like this. The dusky light was deepening, which made the footing even more uncertain; in my tired and edgy state, I was liable to be the one to suffer a harmful fall. My watch told me I’d been chasing around in these woods for nearly an hour. Kerry might have returned to the cabin by now, be there waiting and wondering where I’d gone. If she had, I’d feel like a fool for all this frantic activity-a relieved fool.

  I made my way back through the trees, and even with my eyes cast downward, I stumbled a couple of times over hidden obstacles. Once I thought I’d managed to get myself lost, then located the trail again and finally emerged at the gate in the boundary fence. I half ran around to the front of the cabin.

  The door was still locked.

  Kerry wasn’t there.

  Now I really was scared. I hurried down to the graveled parking area, drove to Ridge Hill Road. The shortest route to the main valley road was to the north; I turned in that direction. No Kerry. There was a good-sized public park on the west side of the valley road intersection, a campground a short distance away on the east side; I made looping passes through both. No Kerry. Back along Ridge Hill in the opposite direction. No Kerry. Another secondary road branched upward to the left; the signpost there gave its name as Skyview Drive and warned that there was No Outlet. I swung up there. No Kerry.

  Ahead was another intersection, this one on the left. When I neared it, I saw that the branch was unpaved and heavily rutted-an old logging road probably, that angled up through the woods. I sleeved sweat off my face as I slowed to make the turn. Follow the logging road as far as it goes, I thought, and if I still didn’t find her, go back to Ridge Hill and start knocking on doors in the vicinity and asking if anyone had seen her.

  The explosion happened just as I swung onto the logging road.

  Booming concussion, somewhere nearby. A fireball inside a cloud of oily black smoke boiled up above the timber to my right-very close. My frayed nerve endings sparked like live wires; reflexively, I jammed on the brakes. The flames were no longer visible, but the smoke kept pumping upward in great gouts, putting a black filter across the fading blue of the sky.

  I don’t believe in the kind of ambulance chasing mindset that draws people to accident scenes, but with Kerry missing and the nearness of the blast, I wasn’t about to ignore it. Christ knew what had happened over there. I slammed the gear shift into reverse, backed out in a sideways slide onto Skyview Drive pointing south. The blacktop climbed up over a rise, and when it dropped down out of the pines into several hundred yards of rolling open space, I had a clear view of the source and aftermath of the explosion.

  There was a house in a pocket backed by a humpbacked hill… what had been a house. Now it was a pulsing, squared-off sheet of flame, the oily smoke still pouring out of it and blackening the sky above. A car in the yard had been blown onto its side by the force of the blast, its blue paint scorched and blistered. Which meant at least one person had been inside the house when the place went up. Dead… no way anybody could have survived that kind of fiery eruption.

  Not Kerry. Of course, not Kerry. Not Kerry!

  I was the first person on the scene: no other cars on the road or on the drive leading up to the burning house. I accelerated to the bottom of the rise, pulled up in a shallow ditch on the far side of the driveway. There was no good reason for me to run up into the yard but I did it anyway, propelled by my half-panicked fear for Kerry. No sign of anybody inside or out, alive or dead. I couldn’t get any closer to the conflagration than fifty yards. The radiating waves of heat were intense, the smoke thick enough to affect my breathing, start me choking and hacking.

  Neither of the two outbuildings, a barn and a smaller structure, had caught fire yet, but falling embers had already ignited patches of grass in the yard and on the lower edges of the hill. The pine woods along the hilltop and on the near perimeter were untouched so far. If a fire got started in any part of them, as dry as some of the underbrush was, it would move fast enough to destroy acres of timberland and threaten any number of other homes.

  Other vehicles were arriving now-a couple of private cars, a deputy sheriff’s cruiser. In the distance, I heard the first wail of sirens. I was back on the access drive by then, away from the pulsing heat and roiling smoke, trying to suck in enough fresh air to clear my lungs.

  A fresh-faced young deputy came running up. “What the hell happened here?”

  “I don’t know,” I said between coughs. “Sudden explosion, that’s all I know. Only been here a couple of minutes.”

  “Either of the Verrikers inside?”

  Verriker. The name was vaguely familiar, but I didn’t try to place it. “Car there says somebody was.”

  “Christ. Oh, Christ.”

  I had nothing to say to that. The roof of the barn was burning now, in crawling flames like napalm. Out on the road, the oncoming noise of sirens and rumbling engines overrode the thrum and crackle of the blaze.

  The deputy said to me, “Go back to the road, stay out of the way,” and hurried off without waiting for an answer.

  I retreated down the driveway. People were still showing up; eight or nine cars were now strewn along both sides of Skyview Drive. Men and a few women had begun milling around in little groups, their faces reflecting shock and that avidity you always see in the watchers at disaster scenes-a mixture of dread, relief that it was somebody else’s disaster, and a primitive eagerness for the horrors they might be confronted with. A fat man in a stained undershirt crowded up next to me as I came out onto the road, saying excitedly, “What was it? The furnace blow up?” I shook my head at him, moved over to stand next to my car. I didn’t want to talk to anybody else. I felt bad for whoever had died in that house, but it was a distracted sympathy. All I could think about was Kerry.

  A few seconds later, the fire trucks came rushing into view, three of them with Green Valley VFD written on their sides, the one in the middle a tanker; a paramedic unit made it a caravan of four. They barreled up the access drive, lights flashing and sirens dying, and veered off across the yard. Firefighters jumped out and scurried to unload hoses, axes, shovels, and other equipment. A pair of EMTs emerged, too, but there was nothing for them to do except stand around looking alert.

  No other vehicles came down Skyview Drive; a roadblock must have been hastily set up to keep out any more gawkers. The two deputies on the scene had joined forces to disperse the ones that were already here. One of them had a bullhorn and was shouting through it, telling everyone to leave the area for their own safety. The small crowd broke up pretty fast, people heading for their cars but with their heads turned and their eyes fixed on what was happening on the property-firemen deploying with hoses that sprayed water and fire retardant foam, other volunteers swarming along the hill above and behind the burning house to dig firebreaks. I was anxious to leave, too, get back to the cabin to find out if Kerry had returned. At the same time, I was reluctant because I didn’t know for sure that she hadn’t been inside the house when it exploded. Crazy notion, the odds against it millions to one. What would she have been doing here? But I could not get it out of my head.

  I had the driver’s door open when a white van careened down over the rise, let through for a reason that soon became clear. Somebody near me called out, “Look! That’s Ned Verriker’s van.” It raced up, slewed to a stop, and a wiry, dark-faced man in work clothes jumped out and started a splay-footed run up the driveway. I knew then why his name sounded familiar: he was one of the trio who’d occupied the booth behind Kerry’s and mine in the Green Valley Cafe yesterday.

  The deputies got in his way, held him back. “You don’t want to go up there,” one of them said. “Nothing you can do.”

  “She… she didn’t get out? Alice?”

  “Looks that way. I’m sorry, Ned.”

  “Oh God, that’s her car in the yard, she must’ve just got home when… What happened? I don’t understand-”

  “Easy now. Easy.”

/>   “I had to work late or I’d’ve been in there, too. Alice… oh Jesus, Alice!”

  I felt a little sick listening to Ned Verriker’s outpouring of pain, but at the same time, his words brought a sense of relief. Must’ve just got home, he’d said. Then Kerry couldn’t have been anywhere in the vicinity when it happened; there was no sensible reason for her to have hung around an empty house.

  A sudden roaring, echoing crash drowned out the other sounds: the roof of the house collapsing into the black- and white-foamed shell. Flames and firebrands burst up and outward through fresh billows of smoke. The firefighters manning the retardant hoses continued to pour foam over the house while the water pumpers worked on saving the barn, putting out the grass fires. Keeping the blaze contained so it didn’t spread into the surrounding timber was the important thing now.

  All the onlookers were in their cars, backing and filling and jockeying into a stream that flowed uphill on Skyview Drive. I maneuvered into the middle of the pack. It crawled along; crawled along because the drivers up front were still rubbernecking. I had to resist a sharp impulse to lean on the horn, stick my head out the window, and howl at them to hurry the hell up.

  Up over the hill at last, and then the line moved a little faster to the intersection with Ridge Hill Road. That was where they’d set up the roadblock: flares and another deputy, this one a woman, directing traffic from in front of her cruiser. Ridge Hill had become a parade route, only the big-eyed watchers were inside the passing cars. It took a couple more minutes before I was past the cruiser and able to turn northbound, but the driver of the car in front of me wouldn’t go over twenty-five despite a couple of horn taps from close behind. By the time I got to the Murray property driveway, I was soaked in sweat and the blood beat in my ears was like an extended jazz drum riff.

  I slid the car into the parking area, spewing gravel, and ran up onto the front deck. Empty. I yanked open the screen door, twisted the knob. Locked, as I’d left it.

  Kerry was still missing.

  6

  PETE BALFOUR

  Nothing ever seemed to go right for him, nothing important anyways. He had no damn luck at all. Sometimes it seemed like the gods or whoever had had it in for him even before he come squalling out of the old lady. Ugly face, head like moss growing on a fuckin’ rock, no decent woman, no money except for what he could scrounge up by using his brains along with his muscles. And to top it off, Verriker’s Mayor of Asshole Valley tag. Wasn’t fair, dammit. Neither was what’d happened today. You couldn’t get anymore unfair than that.

  First the woman showing up where she had no business being, fooling around his pickup, and then calling him Mr. Balfour. Maybe he shouldn’t of cut loose and choked her the way he had, but he couldn’t just let her walk away knowing who he was. Yeah, and how the hell had she known? He’d never seen her before in his life.

  And then, just as bad, finding out Verriker was still alive.

  Oh, that bitch Alice had got hers, all right, but she didn’t matter half as much. Verriker had plenty of luck, that was for sure. Always quit work right at five-thirty, always got home before Alice did, but no, not tonight. Tonight of all nights, he’d had to get stuck working late at Builders Supply on account of a shipment of PVC pipe coming in delayed and needing to be unloaded. How could you plan against something like that happening? Something like the woman happening? You couldn’t, nobody could. Just plain lousy luck.

  Such a sweet plan, too. He couldn’t of had it worked out any better.

  He knew the Verriker place well enough because he’d done some repair work out there a couple of years ago. No other homes close by, the woods running up along the hill on one side, the old logging road that nobody hardly ever used in the daytime. And no worries about the house being empty in the afternoon. Verriker and Alice both worked in town, her in the beauty shop, which was a laugh with a horse face like hers. No kids, no live-in relatives.

  Easy as pie getting down there with his toolkit, then getting inside through the side door under the carport. Door opened straight into the kitchen, a wall switch just inside that turned on the kitchen light. He’d rigged the switch first, so it’d be sure to arc, then exposed the wires in the ceiling light fixture for good measure. Then he’d loosened the gas line connection behind the stove just enough to let the gas bleed out slow. That was all there was to it. In and out in less than fifteen minutes. Figuring Verriker might hit the switch right away even though it’d still be daylight when he got home, but if he didn’t, well, him or Alice would do it once it got on toward dark. Figuring either way, Verriker would be dead before nightfall.

  Figuring wrong.

  He’d found out Verriker was still alive and why when he walked into the Buckhorn. He wasn’t supposed to be in there tonight, or anywhere near Six Pines when the house blew up. Supposed to be in Placerville. What he’d planned to do was drive down there after he rigged the Verrikers’ kitchen and buy a few things at Home Depot so he’d have a good excuse for the trip in case he needed one. Eat an early supper and afterward hunt up a bar he’d never been in before, where nobody’d know him and he wouldn’t have to listen to any of that mayor crap. Then drive back to Green Valley late, long after the house and Verriker and Alice blew sky high.

  But the woman wandering around the woods had screwed that up. Screwed it up royal.

  By the time Balfour got done with her, he was too shaky to do anything except go home and guzzle three boilermakers, fast, to calm himself down. The drinks put him about half in the bag, and that was why he hadn’t gone to Placerville-he didn’t want to risk getting stopped by a county cop or the highway patrol, couldn’t afford to do anything that might call attention to himself. So he’d stayed put. Hell, why not? Didn’t really make any difference if he was home alone when Verriker got his. Slow gas leak, an arcing light switch, nobody would think it was anything but a freak accident. Accidents happen all the time, right?

  The Verriker place was a couple of miles from his, so he hadn’t heard the explosion. Just as well. If he’d known right when the house blew, he’d of had an urge to drive over there, try to get a squint at the wreckage with Verriker burning up inside, and that wouldn’t of been smart with all the liquor in him. But he’d heard the siren on the fire truck from the up-valley VFD garage as it shot past, and it’d told him enough to put a smile on his face and give him half a boner. He’d waited an hour or so, and then drove slow and careful into town. Thinking on the way that he’d pretend not to know who or what had blown up because he’d been busy working at home; act real surprised and solemn when he heard the news.

  They were talking about it in the Buckhorn, all right, Ramsey and Stivic and Alf the bartender, and Balfour cocked an ear and that was how he found out Verriker was still alive. Nobody said anything to him, not one word. They didn’t want nothing to do with him unless they could rag on him. It was like he was some goddamn stranger walked in off the street.

  He didn’t have to act surprised. Hardest thing was trying not to show how frustrated and pissed off he was, not that it would of mattered if he’d clapped his hands and danced a jig. He had two more boilermakers because he needed them and because maybe it’d look funny if he rushed out without hoisting a couple. He was on his second when Ramsey said Verriker didn’t have insurance or much savings, why didn’t they take up a collection to help pay for poor Alice’s funeral. Alf got a jar and passed it around. Balfour had to kick in, too-two bucks, all he had in his wallet except for twenties. Lucchesi gave him a dirty look and somebody else muttered, “Cheap bastard.” Screw ’em all. He didn’t care what they thought as long as they didn’t start up with that mayor shit.

  He was still pretty shook up when he got back to the house. More whiskey and beer didn’t help, all it did was make him fuzzy-headed. He turned on the TV, turned it off again, then just sat in his chair, drinking and trying to think what he was going to do about Verriker.

  Couldn’t just back off, let him go on living and making Pete Balfour�
�s life miserable. Had to find some other way to fix him.

  And the woman on the logging road… real problem there, too. She’d said something about a husband before he jumped her. Staying at the Murray place with her husband, that was it. Husband would report her missing if he hadn’t already. County cops’d be out looking for her sooner or later, combing the woods. Christ, what if they found her? No, they wouldn’t find her, not where he’d stashed her. But he couldn’t just leave her there. Had to find some permanent place to hide her body so they’d never be able to tie her to him. Body. Jesus. But what other choice did he have?

  Maybe he should No, forget it. Deal with that tomorrow.

  Verriker, too-tomorrow. Couldn’t think straight now, couldn’t plan.

  He poured another drink, cracked another brew.

  Why didn’t nothing ever work out easy for him?

  7

  The sheriff’s deputy in charge of the Six Pines substation was the fresh-faced young guy who’d come running up to me in the Verrikers’ driveway. His name was Broxmeyer. I waited half an hour for him; the only person in the station when I walked in just before dusk was a gray-haired woman who worked the desk and the radio dispatch unit, and she wasn’t in a position to help me. So I waited, alternately squirming on a wooden chair and pacing, sweating even though the air-conditioning was on, trying to adopt Jake Runyon’s method of blanking his mind during a downtime period. It didn’t work. All sorts of dark images kept spinning and sliding around inside my head, banging into one another. The knot that had formed in my stomach, cold and hard and acidic, kept funneling the sour taste of bile into the back of my throat.

  Broxmeyer looked draggy and worn out when he finally showed. His uniform was rumpled and stained under the armpits; a smudge of something darkened one cheek. He smelled of smoke and sweat. So did I, probably; I hadn’t even thought about changing clothes.