Lye in Wait by Cricket McRae Page A

upstairs, I'd managed to pull
Meghan aside and tell her Ambrose had at least implied Walter
might have been murdered. Her face had pinched at the news, the
fear of lawsuits replaced with a more primal one.
    Settling cross-legged onto the wood floor of the spare room, I
dumped one of the boxes of papers out in front of me. As I sifted
each individual piece out of the jumble, it received a thorough perusal and my judgment regarding any relevance to anything. All
I ended up with after an hour was a pile of charity receipts held
together with a stray paperclip and a box full of unmitigated junk.
Sure, a particular check stub or movie theater ticket might provide
the telling clue, but not with the dearth of information I had. I'd
be happy to turn the whole lot over to Ambrose.
    Just as soon as I went through the other two boxes.

     
FOURTEEN

    I WAS HAVING ONE of those crazy dreams that you can't describe
when you wake up but you know was crazy because you remember
something about Captain Kirk and a pecan orchard and someone
losing a piece of Swiss cheese. The siren in the background fit well
enough, and it took me a while to realize it wasn't in my dream.
Brightly revolving lights flashing through my window added to the
surreal effect when I got around to opening my eyes.
    Groggy, I dragged myself out of bed and looked out. My bedroom was at the back of the house, overlooking the backyard and
the alley and Walter's little house. Which now had flames licking
out the windows.
    I threw on my robe and a pair of tennis shoes and ran into the
hallway. Erin stood in her bedroom doorway rubbing sleep from
her eyes, Brodie woofing low in his throat beside her. Meghan
rushed past me to her daughter.
    "It's Walter's place," I said. "Fire"
     
    She nodded and began speaking to Erin. I went past them and
down the stairs, through the living room and kitchen and down
to my workroom. I unlocked the back door and trotted out to the
alley.
    The smell hit me like an open-handed slap. Bitter, harsh, and
acrid, it was nothing like the pleasant wood smoke from a friendly
hearth fire. This reek contained destruction. Wisps of ash floated
down like snow from hell, settling on my shoulders and in my hair.
My eyes started to burn.
    Two figures in bulky fire gear appeared, lugging a huge hose
around the corner of the little house. Another appeared behind
them, speaking into a radio. They aimed, and a column of water
gushed forth. They trained it on the roof. The hose seemed to flex
and pulse with a life of its own.
    Walter's old international Scout, painted the same bright yellow as the suspenders he'd always worn, flared like a torch. The
firefighters, concentrating on the house, let it burn.
    None of the windows had glass in them anymore; fire shot out
of one, and black smoke poured out of the others, accompanied by
flickers of flame. One of the firefighters shouted something, and
the other one nodded. They shifted the plume of water to the left.
The flames roared, as if trying to fight back, but the abundance of
water tamed them somewhat. The roofing sputtered and steamed
as water worked into the burning interior.
    Up and down the alley and on the street in front, neighbors
stood around watching in their varied night garb. Sensing movement behind me, I turned to find Meghan approaching, Erin's
hand clasped tightly in hers. Erin wore sweat pants, and a coat over her nightgown, though heat shimmered through the air and made
them unnecessary. She wrinkled her nose and blinked rapidly.
     
    There wasn't much to say. We stood and watched as the firefighters worked to contain the fire, to keep it from spreading to
any of the other homes. There was a bad moment when the siding on Mrs. Gray's house flared up near the roofline, but the
men extinguished it in seconds. The whole thing took less than
two hours, and half of that was spent soaking the dying embers.
Walter's house was a complete loss, a charred