Knockdown: A Home Repair Is Homicide Mystery

by Sarah Graves

  Although soon she wouldn’t be able to for other reasons; already her neck and shoulder muscles felt as if lit matches were being held against them. Soon she’d be too stiff to move quickly.

  Don’t even think about lit matches.… A trickle of sweat ran down her face, into her good eye. The cellar blurred, only the line of light at the head of the cellar doors leading outside was still visible. When her vision cleared, he stood at the edge of the lamplight’s circle with the gun’s barrel pressed to his head.

  The rest of the cellar was in darkness. His finger was on the trigger. “I could do it,” he said in tones of discovery.

  Please, she thought. Spare me your freaking drama.

  He turned slowly, gun still raised. The instant his back was to her, she made her move, anguish shooting through her joints and ligaments after their long immobility.

  I will never, ever make fun of Bella’s rheumatism again, she decided as she rushed into the darkness. She couldn’t see where she was going, but it had to be better than—

  His outraged shout gave her another few instants of moving safely, unheard; when it faded she held herself very still in the gloom, waiting.

  The bulkhead doors were perhaps twenty-five feet away; she kept her eye on the thin gleam leaking through them.

  He plowed into something heavy, blundering in the darkness. “Filthy little brat, I’ll get you, and when I do, by God I will make you so—”

  Sorry, she finished for him silently. Something about his voice made her feel sorry for him now, too, though.

  Because it sounded unreal. As if some other person’s voice were saying the words, expressing resentments not his own.

  A person even less sane than he was … It made her flesh creep. “I swear,” he went on, “the first day I saw you was the last decent day of my life …”

  She crept sideways as his rant grew more intense. “… dirty, ugly, disgusting, sinful …”

  Hey, watch it with the insults, she advised him silently.

  She was so thrilled at not being strung up by her wrists any longer, though, she could almost overlook everything else.

  Almost. Because that propane was still thickening, probably seeping through the floor by now as well as through the cellar door.

  A string of profanities poured out of him as he searched for her, stumbling and falling, hauling himself up again. She crept away from his lantern, toward the cellar hatchway. Then:

  “Don’t worry,” he crooned, “I’ll get you.” And at that, the hairs did stand up on her neck.

  Because he was right. He had the lantern, and the reality was that the old cellar doors were too far away for her to reach without him shining its betraying beam on her, sooner or later.

  Besides, the idea was to get out through those cellar doors, but for all she knew they could be locked, or even chained shut.

  Or the partial collapse of the house could’ve jammed them. Still, what choice did she have? So until a better idea suggested itself, she went on creeping sideways toward the doors, her hands flat now on the damp, gritty wall behind her.

  “I know you’re here,” Garner said quietly.

  The smell of gas was a lot stronger again suddenly. In her mind’s eye she saw the fireball of its ignition, superimposed on the explosions she’d already seen tonight.

  Because of them, it was entirely possible that Wade and the rest of the downtown crew thought she’d gone home, while Sam and Bella believed she was still on Water Street.

  In other words, maybe no one was even looking for her.

  He raised the lamp, still holding the gun in his other hand. Behind him, the broken beam sagged. The lamp found her.

  She froze as he smiled tightly at her, raising the weapon. “This isn’t how I planned it,” he began. “But …”

  And pulled the trigger.

  Nothing happened. Misfire, she had time to think, unable to believe her luck. That gun, unfired all these years …

  But in the next instant a loud whuff sounded all around her. Through the flash, she saw the cracked beam snap, half dropping, the other half springing up before rebounding downward again.

  The shock hurled her into the concrete cellar-door hatchway, under the slanted bulkhead doors. As debris began raining down she crouched reflexively, huddled up against the doors.

  Crazily, the battery lantern was still on, casting a weird glow through the clouds of dust. Garner tried to run, but there was nowhere to go as more and more of the house fell into the cellar, one floor joist after another snapping and the old nails popping out with a series of reports like firecrackers.

  Suddenly an avalanche of wreckage poured down. Through the dust, she saw a timber fall, heard him cry out again.

  Choking dust filled the cellar, along with an occasional rustling slide of the loose plaster as it cascaded, the house still groaning and settling.

  For now. Any instant, the rest of it could pancake down onto him and pull this end of the foundation in with it.

  Right on top of her. That is, if I don’t suffocate first. She reached up for the thin line of light coming tantalizingly through the bulkhead doors, then pressed her face to it, trying to suck fresh air through it.

  Which was how she found the big, rusty padlock on it. Panic shot through her.

  Okay. Just stop and think now. You didn’t die in the blast and he’s not holding a gun on you anymore. So …

  So those were good things, ones that meant she still might escape. Still a chance …

  Then she saw the flames flickering back there, near where he lay under the debris. The sight sent frantic energy through her; she forced her body harder up against the doors, now the only way out.

  There hadn’t been enough gas, and it hadn’t been compressed enough, to blow the place to kingdom come, as Bella Diamond would have put it.

  But what gas there had been had ignited the house, and more gas could be escaping right now, into some other more confined space. So …

  Hurry. If she couldn’t open the doors, maybe she could push through them, break the old wood they were made of, or—

  “Help.” She squinted in disbelief at the faint sound coming from behind her. “Help …”

  Hardly even a word. More like a whisper … but it was there. Garner was alive back there.

  Trapped, maybe, with flames rising behind him. As the dust cleared slightly and no more debris fell for the moment, she saw the battery lamp lying on its side on the dirt floor.

  Still working, its yellow glow thickened to nearly orange by all the dust in the air, but … a hand reached out, scrabbled for the lamp, and seized it weakly.

  “Please … somebody …”

  Oh, for Pete’s sake, Jacobia thought in disgust. Her face was drenched with sweat and tears; the tape he’d slapped over her mouth hung soggily.

  Rubbing the side of her face with her forearm, she rolled the sticky mess sideways until it peeled away from her lips. A hunk of skin went with it, and she tasted blood.

  “… help … help … help …” He sounded injured.

  “Steven?” He went silent. “Steven, I’m coming to get you, but I need you to toss that gun out here first.”

  No answer. But just because it had misfired once … “I mean it, Steven. I’ll come and drag you out of there, get us both to a safe place if I can. But not if I think you might shoot me.”

  More silence. Then came a groan, after which the weapon slid with a dull clatter across the dirt cellar floor.

  She hustled down out of the bulkhead enclosure and snatched it up, then peered further into the dusty gloom. The lamp lit one small area of the cellar, and he wasn’t in it.

  “Steven, make a sound so I can find you.”

  Nothing. Maybe he’d lost consciousness. She crept forward and grabbed the lamp, held it high. Or as high as she could with the ceiling now a good four feet lower than it had been.…

  A low moan came from her left, another ten feet or so deeper in the collapsed recesses. Rushing forward in
the shadowy gloom, she just missed impaling herself on a long, dagger-like splinter.

  “Help me.…” His hand, filthy and blood-streaked, stuck out from beneath a heap of fallen brick.

  It was part of the chimney, she saw with a chill. And if the chimney was down, the rest was sure to follow soon. She grabbed his hand; a thin scream of pain erupted from him.

  “I’m sorry,” she told him. But it couldn’t be helped; he was no doubt badly hurt. Moving him could be agony for him.

  Leaving him here, though, would be abandoning him to his death. And she couldn’t do that—not quite.

  Not and hope ever to be able to sleep at night again. “You and I, Steven, we’re going to get out of here.”

  I hope. She pulled as much of the debris off him as she could, meanwhile hearing the old house parts disintegrating over her head: walls, floors, ceilings.

  And the roof, and the rest of that chimney … a howl rose up from him as she hauled his shoulders out of the broken boards and heavy pine framing pieces.

  Suddenly one of his hands came free. Then it shot out and grabbed the gun back from her.

  He aimed it at her. And at this distance he could hardly be expected to miss. His finger tightened on the trigger.

  But just then, over his head, the snapped beam sagged suddenly another alarming six inches. Plaster dust poured down, whitening his face and turning to red mud in the blood soaking his shirtfront.

  “Steven,” she said warningly, but he just smiled dreamily at her. She kicked him and flung herself sideways as he fired, the sound deafening in the enclosed space.

  Another gunshot ker-whanged off the stone foundation behind her, inches from her head; she flung the battery lamp toward him.

  Still holding the gun, he staggered and collapsed, then vanished behind the fallen beam.

  Not much more time … Any moment, something else would happen, something that would stop either of them from getting out of here. Grimly, she crawled back to the old bulkhead enclosure and up its concrete steps.

  Try, try again … Putting her whole back against the cellar doors, she strained to stand upright. An old nail gave way, then another. One board in the door structure moved, partly loosened, then split lengthwise all at once.

  Putting her face up to the resulting open slit, she tried shouting through the gap, but the silence she got for an answer said no one was around to hear her. Probably they were all still down on the waterfront, dealing with the fireworks debacle.

  With a hideous creak, another old nail gave way, and then the board did. Fresh, cool air poured in, sharp with the smell of sea salt.

  Salt and wood smoke … upstairs, the house was on fire.

  “Steven!” Torn, she peered back down into the murky cellar wreckage and spotted him, still hunkered behind the fallen half-beam. In the failing lantern’s weak gleam, his eyes were wide.

  With hope, she thought at first. “Steven, just crawl toward me. We can get out, do you see? I’ve got the …”

  But then she saw. He wasn’t staring at her or at the escape route she’d forced nearly open. The flames now rising brightly behind him didn’t seem to have captured his attention, either.

  Instead, he was frozen with terror at something inches from his face. Perched on the fallen chunk of support beam, sitting up on its hind legs, gazing beady-eyed …

  A mouse. As he stared, another one joined it, and another. In moments an army of them had appeared, running across the beam, leaping, and heading across the floor in a dark, squeaking wave.

  Before she could move, they swarmed up the bulkhead steps and over her body, tiny little scrabbling clawed feet, furry bodies, wiggling and poking.…

  A shriek escaped her, but all she could do was shrink into as tight and impenetrable a ball as possible, crushed into what little headspace there was, eyes and mouth clamped shut until at last the horrid living wave of vermin had passed.

  When the last one had wiggled through the gap behind her, she dragged in an agonized breath, straightened, and shoved the next loose board off the door. In the next moment, her head popped out into the clear, chilly night.

  “Help! Someone, fire, help!”

  Above, the stars shone clear and bright in the indigo sky. A horn honked somewhere, and a dog barked. But if anyone heard her, they gave no sign of it, and no cars went by in the street.

  Below, the fresh air hit the fire, whose light now filled the cellar, orange-and-red flames dancing behind the crouched form of Steven Garner Jr.

  Rather, Garner and a mouse. Even from here, in the firelight she could see it was dead, its tiny form inches from his face.

  Maybe it had been injured earlier in the propane blast. Or maybe it had suffered a teeny heart attack; she didn’t care.

  Garner went on staring at it, transfixed. “Damn it, Steven, I’ve had about enough of you.”

  Somewhere in the distance a siren began wailing, but she had no way to know if it was coming here. Wincing—somewhere along the way she’d sprained her ankle, and her head felt like bombs were going off in it—she made her way yet again back down the cellar steps and across the floor toward him.

  Just not all the way. Because for one thing, she couldn’t see the gun; where the hell was it?

  And for another, as she approached, the beam still hanging over his head moved.

  First downward. Then up again, maybe a half-inch. Clearly, it was getting ready to do something.…

  To fall. And above it, the whole house waited to come down, too. “Steven. Do you hear me? Listen to me now. You have to come toward me. I mean it, Steven, there won’t be any more—”

  Chances. His gaze flickered at her. He seemed about to obey.

  But then some crazed script in his mind started playing again. “Don’t,” he whimpered. “Don’t put it on me. I’m scared of it, I’ll be good, please don’t—”

  His voice rose to a scream before subsiding in a pathetic whine. “I will,” he whispered fiercely at her, “be good.”

  “Yeah, great. That’s great, Steven.” Dust filtered down from the fractured mess hanging hair-triggerishly above.

  She backed cautiously toward the fresh air gusts puffing in through the bulkhead. Each time a breeze came in and down, those flames silhouetting Garner’s form leapt higher.

  Now she could hear the crackling sounds, flames munching the dry, stick-thin pieces of lath that had once supported plaster. A low whump! from above said the blaze had expanded upstairs.

  Abruptly the cellar flames spiraled, inferno-like through the door above into the kitchen. He looked up sharply, seeming to remember who she was.

  And aimed the gun at her. So there it was. She thought he’d fired three times, earlier.

  One a misfire. No way to know if it would malfunction again, or if …

  But there was no point thinking about that. “Look at me,” she said.

  He did. “You know, there’s something I’ve always wondered,” she told him, easing a little closer.

  To him and the gun. Not to mention that damned fire, and an imminent old-house avalanche that would bury them both, now or in the very immediate future.

  But if she could get near enough to fling that mouse corpse away from him, she could still get them both out of here.

  And she had to. She’d abandoned him to his fate once. But not this time.

  Not again. “It’s about afterwards,” she said. “When you and your dad left my office that day, remember? Sunny and warm, that day. I remember you were wearing a baseball cap.”

  That day … it was the only subject in the world that still interested him. A tear leaked from his eye, drew a track in the grime on his face.

  She eased closer, readying herself to grab him.

  CROUCHED BEHIND THE FALLEN BEAM, HE WATCHED HER approach. Oh, she thought she was clever. She thought she could fool him.

  “Do you remember, Steven?” she asked. “Coming to my office with your dad? You must have other fond memories of him, too.”

 
He could see her trying to hide her fear of the gun he held. The sight, and even more, what she’d just said, nearly made him chuckle.

  He felt his lips curl back in fury. From the outside, he imagined the expression resembled a smile.

  “You do remember,” said Jacobia Tiptree, seeming pleased.

  Yeah, I remember, he thought. Because of her, his father had been taken, the one who had controlled him, kept him supervised and confined.

  The one who, alone among all the rest, truly understood his unusual son: what he was, and what he might do.…

  The one, the only one, who’d kept him safe.

  Yeah, he remembered, all right. He remembered every little thing about that day, and afterwards. He lowered the gun.

  Stupidly, she crept nearer still.

  Stupidly … and conveniently.

  “… BECAUSE, STEVEN, HERE’S THE THING. IF I MADE THE wrong decision that day, I’m sorry.”

  His face didn’t change. But then, she thought, why should it?

  So she was sorry. Big whoop, as Sam might’ve put it if he was in as bad a mood as Steven looked to be at the moment. More important, though, was the situation they were in right now.

  Leaking gas, collapsing house, a fire in the cellar, and …

  Oh, yeah. An angry guy with a gun. “Steven, I realize you’re still pretty mad at me. And I don’t blame you. But we need to get out of here.”

  He watched her alertly. “Now, I’m going to turn around and go in a minute. But I thought …”

  She moved forward again; he shrank back. “I thought maybe I could help you out of there first. And we could go together.”

  Still no change in his expression, a fixed smile that showed his teeth. Then it occurred to her that maybe it wasn’t a smile.

  That it was a grimace. The mouse corpse on the dropped beam lay motionless, stiffening, she supposed, by the minute.

  The battery lamp’s glow kept fading. By its dying light she scanned the area around him, saw that he wasn’t trapped.

  Not physically. She should get out right this instant; the creaking and groaning overhead made that clear, as did the fire.