Threaded for Trouble Page 17

  “You only missed one.” He stood up and shook my hand. “Congratulations. And welcome to Elderberry Bay’s volunteer fire department.”

  I had a feeling I was supposed to be enthusiastic, not burdened by dread. “So what do I do?” I asked. “Like when the fire siren goes off?”

  “Drive to the station. If you get there in time, hop on the truck with the rest of us. If not, you’ll see directions on the message board. Don’t speed, though, before you get yourself one of those flashing blue lights. You could be pulled over and miss most of the fire.”

  I had visions of Chief Smallwood lurking near the fire hall in hopes of catching speeding firefighters. What had I gotten myself into?

  Isaac went on, “The first few times, you’ll be observing and learning. We’ll expect you for training drills at the old ball field the next three Tuesday evenings. After that, you’ll be full-fledged, whether you attend fires in the meantime or not.”

  My dread began to resemble panic. “Did I give the same wrong answer the boys did?”

  “Nope. You missed a different question.” He showed me my error and told me the correct answer. Not millions of pounds of pressure per square inch in those hoses—it would only feel like that. He gave me an encouraging nod. “And I’ll bet you’ll be better than they will at actually coming to fires.”

  “I won’t be able to fight fires when my shop is open,” I warned him.

  “You can help out nights and Mondays when your shop is closed.”

  “There’ve been a lot of fires recently, especially at night. Do you suspect arson in any of these fires?”

  He looked down at his feet. “Plug says none of them are arson,” he mumbled.

  “What about you?”

  “He doesn’t look at the evidence, says he trusts his gut.” He shrugged, displaying the palms of his hands. His fingers were long and narrow. “Gut. Ha. That’s no way to investigate fires. But as he points out, if someone throws a cigarette from a car when the fields are dry, is it arson? Or litter with unintended results? What about careless use of candles or do-it-yourself wiring? Are those arson, or unfortunate circumstances?”

  I asked, “Have you seen any of those things causing fires?”

  “Yes. And sometimes we get investigators in from the state to verify it. There are so many ways that fires can start.” He threw his arms out to his sides like he was measuring something huge. “And they can go out of control. This happens in rural areas. Firefighters sometimes have to travel far.”

  “These field fires. Have they been close to each other, or spread out?”

  He tilted his head. “Spread out. Not to the north, because that’s the lake.” He flashed me a goofy grin. “You’ve given me an idea, though. I’m gonna plot this summer’s fires on a map. If they’re clustered near one particular farm…” He flushed.

  Was he thinking about Russ Coddlefield and his friends? One of them had said that somebody had given them extra time to finish the exam—had he meant the teen who left the training session early? Had they expected their friend to cause a diversion? I asked, “Can some of our training sessions be about things like detecting arson?” Maybe I could actually be useful to the fire department.

  “Plug likes them to be more about physical things, like, you know, actual practice. People donate wrecked cars, and we practice cutting them open, then we torch the cars, then we put the fires out.” His eyes shone with a glee he probably didn’t know he was showing.

  “What about obvious arson? Can’t investigators tell by the way the fire burned if someone used gasoline or another fuel?”

  “Could be, but who’s to say someone didn’t accidentally kick over a can of gas? Someone could ignite a pile of oily rags and say the rags caught fire by themselves. Or they could light a match to old, dry timber in their shed and drive off to town. By the time we respond, the matchstick would be long gone, along with the rest of the shed.”

  So much detail, like he’d spent a lot of time thinking about it. “Have you ever suspected anything like that in fires you’ve fought?”

  His eyes lit up as if from fires within. I was obviously asking questions he’d been hoping to hear. “Not fought. No.”

  “Or seen after it was too late to fight?” I prompted.

  “There was one like that. Last summer. Plug lost a barn. Got quite an insurance settlement out of it, too, judging by the two bigger barns that replaced it. Strange, huh?”

  I nodded. Plug had also, if I’d understood Chief Smallwood’s hints correctly, purchased large amounts of insurance on his wife’s life, and then she had died under suspicious circumstances.

  Isaac went on. “Now that you’re on the force, you’ll want to be sure not to miss a fire except when your shop is open. Tell you what. I recently installed a system that automatically dials volunteers whenever there’s an alarm. Very handy for firefighters who live out of town or who sleep too heavily to hear the siren on the fire hall. We’ve got your phone and cell numbers, of course, from your application. Want me to add you to our system?”

  His enthusiasm was contagious, so I agreed, though I wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of being awakened by both a siren and an insistent phone.

  “Great! Plug says the phone system won’t do a lick of good, but we’ll show him!” Judging by the width of his smile, he was overjoyed. “And can we depend on your help setting up the firefighters’ booth at the Harvest Festival on Friday evening?”

  “I can help for a few hours, but the Threadville store owners have a booth, too, and we’ll be putting it together at the same time.”

  “No problem. Our booth is next door to yours.”

  “In the handcrafts tent?” Did rummage qualify as handcrafts?

  “It’s a big tent.” He beamed. “When I found out that you and Haylee might join the firefighters, I pulled some strings so our booths would be together. It will be easier for you two.”

  His innocence was boyish and charming. To hide my grin, I bent over to leash Sally-Forth and Tally-Ho. “That was very thoughtful.” I pointed at the leashes. “The dogs need a walk.” We all went out the front door.

  Isaac got into a black pickup truck, made a U-turn in the middle of Lake Street, flashed his blue light, waved at me, and then sped away.

  I half expected Opal, Edna, and Naomi to trot out of their apartments to ask what Isaac had been doing in Haylee’s and my shops, but they didn’t. The dogs and I took a leisurely trip to the beach and back. After supper, I played with them in the backyard before we finally went to bed.

  It seemed like only minutes later that Sally and Tally woke me up. They bounded out of the bedroom and raced to the back windows. I jumped up, followed them, and turned on floodlights. No one was out there.

  The dogs ran to the door to the stairway leading up to the store. We all barged into the shop. As far as I could tell without opening the front door and going outside, no one was anywhere near.

  “False alarm,” I told the dogs. They trotted downstairs and pointed their noses at the cupboard where I kept their treats. “Yes, you deserve these,” I said. Wagging their tails, they took the treats in their soft, gentle mouths.

  We all went back to bed. I awoke to the sound of thunder. I got up, hoping to see rain. Nothing.

  I fell asleep, but apparently the night was destined to be an interrupted one. Another noise socked me out of a deep sleep.

  The fire siren howled, calling volunteers to rush to the station and clamber onto the truck for a wild ride. At two in the morning.

  I leaped out of bed. My cell phone signaled that I had a text. Fire, it said. I threw on jeans, a sweatshirt, and sneakers, then patted the dogs good-bye and jogged down the street to my car. The fire station was close, but if the trucks had already left, I’d need to drive. Besides, I wouldn’t actually be fighting the fire, only observing, and I could come back whenever I wanted.

  The fire hall doors were rolled all the way up, and both trucks were gone. I ran to the chalkboard.

&n
bsp; I would have no trouble finding the place.

  The Coddlefield farm.

  The ominous word House was scrawled beneath the address.

  30

  A HOUSE FIRE AT THE CODDLEFIELDS’. Eight children, four of them under the age of twelve. Hardly aware of anything besides my fear for the kids, I sprinted to my car and sped south.

  The smell of summer-dry grasses blew in through the open windows. To the east, another siren’s call rose and fell. A fire truck from the next township? The sound dwindled, and the orchestra of insects took over.

  I half expected to see other volunteers, their blue lights flashing, rushing with me to the fire, but I was alone with the night, the stars, and the dry, crackling lightning between distant clouds.

  Headlights came toward me. As a car whooshed past, I caught only a glimpse of a light-colored vehicle shaped like Susannah’s VW. What could she have been doing out at this time of night near a fire?

  Ahead, bright lights spangled trees surrounding the Coddlefields’ farm. No flames, no orange glow, but smoke burned my nostrils.

  I passed a dark sedan parked on the right shoulder. A fireman in full gear opened the passenger door and reached toward the seat. His casual, unhurried pose reassured me. The worst of the crisis had to be over. The children must be fine.

  But I needed to be certain. I drove farther and parked on the shoulder beside the Coddlefields’ rural mailbox. Its door gaped open, but I didn’t take time to investigate. I scrambled out of the car and pelted up Plug’s driveway toward his house. Pickup trucks had been left helter-skelter on the lawn. I recognized Clay’s truck, red with Fraser Construction printed in white on the doors. Plug’s fire chief SUV and Russ’s truck were parked in their usual spaces, close to the house.

  I had to find those children.

  All I could see nearer the house were firefighters, fire trucks, and water pouring from hoses into the top of the dark house. The tallest firefighter would be Isaac or Clay. The short, wide one, made even wider by his bulky jacket, had to be Plug.

  Smoke, panic, and running made me gasp and wheeze.

  No flames.

  Also, no children.

  I had to dodge a tanker racing down the driveway away from the fire. Would nearby ponds yield enough water, or would the truck have to go all the way to Lake Erie to fill up? Russ was driving, with his fourteen-year-old brother as passenger.

  Surely, they wouldn’t have left if any of their brothers and sisters had been hurt.

  Then I heard the familiar crying and made out the other six Coddlefield children huddled in blankets on the lawn. I’d have seen them sooner if my eyes hadn’t been dazzled by lights from the tanker still on the scene.

  I stumbled to the mass of blankets.

  The twelve- and fifteen-year-old sisters sat cross-legged on the ground, each with a quilt-wrapped child on her lap and another in the shelter of one arm. The tiny girl and the two little boys bawled. The eight-year-old sobbed. Their faces startlingly devoid of emotion, the two older girls stared at me. I could have been a tree.

  I squatted and asked the oldest girl, “Can I do anything?”

  She shrugged, looked away, and pulled the eight-year-old closer.

  The littlest girl shouted at me, “Nasty lady in my house!”

  The oldest girl corrected her. “Darla, no one’s in the house. We’re all here.”

  “Is, too!” She pointed at her own little chest. “Darla seed her. Sleeping in Tiffie’s room when Daddy carrying me and blankie. Nasty lady.”

  Smoke drifted out of the front sewing room window. Men shouted. The tall firefighter who could be Clay or Isaac helped two shorter men aim a hose. Near them, Plug stared through his mask toward the water arcing into a hole in his roof. I ran to him and grabbed his arm. He shook me off.

  I screamed, “Your little girl says there’s someone in the house.”

  He made a backhand gesture at me. If I didn’t leave him alone, he would swat me.

  I dashed to the taller firefighter and waved my arms in his face. The man was Isaac, not Clay. I yelled that there might be someone in the house.

  Isaac shook his head vehemently, glanced toward Plug, and motioned with his head for me to go away.

  Where was Clay? And why was Plug so insistent on not hearing about someone in his own home?

  Darla had said there was a nasty lady in the house, sleeping in Tiffany’s room. Tiffany had told Edna and me that she now lived here. Tiffany took the littlest kids on excursions, like to the beach and the library. She’d used Darlene’s sewing machine to help teach little Darla her letters. She’d promised to make the girl new dwesses. She wouldn’t abandon her charges in the middle of the night after a fire broke out.

  The black car that Tiffany drove was in the driveway, more or less in the way of the firefighters and fire trucks. Tiffany had to be here. However, Darla seemed very fond of Tiffany and called her “Tiffie,” not “nasty lady.”

  Where was Haylee? Had she come to the fire? Her pickup wasn’t here, but what if she had hitched a ride with other volunteers on the fire truck, then had helped evacuate the children, and had not made it out of the house? If Plug had indoctrinated his children to believe that all of the storekeepers in Threadville were nasty, would the youngest child refer to Haylee as a nasty lady?

  Sleeping in Tiffie’s room…

  Sleeping?

  It felt like a door in the base of my heart unlatched. I sprinted to the other side of the fire truck where the firefighters’ outfits were stored.

  I did not have enough training to fight a fire or to pull someone from a burning house, but I knew how to don the gear. And I had a fierce determination to rescue my best friend. Besides, the house was not actively flaming, and the damage, from what I could see, was mainly to the roof. A lightning strike?

  Plug and the others would surely explore the house later, but all I could think of was Haylee, perhaps injured and unable to escape or call for help.

  Sleeping…

  I pulled on the pants, boots, and jacket. I loaded an oxygen tank onto my back, adjusted the mask, tightened my helmet’s chinstrap, and made certain that both my respirator and radio were on and functioning.

  I didn’t dare go in the front way. Plug might see me and stop me.

  Pulling on gloves, I clomped through the woods to the back of the house.

  The back door wasn’t locked. Lights were on in the kitchen, and everything looked normal. The basement door was open. Lights were on down there, too, and voices came from a radio or TV. The fire must have been in another part of the house; probably, judging by what I’d seen from outside, in the attic above the original part of the house, near the sewing room. Using a flashlight, I checked the dining room, playroom, and living room. I found no apparent fire damage, and no ladies, nasty or otherwise.

  Where was Haylee?

  She would not have stood around wondering if I were trapped inside a smoke-filled house. She would have searched for me. I would never forgive myself if I could have saved her and didn’t.

  The child had said the nasty lady was in Tiffany’s room. When Edna and I delivered Tiffany’s sewing machine, I’d seen bedrooms one flight up. The floor beneath my feet seemed sturdy.

  Heartbeat accelerating, I grasped the railing with one gloved hand and carefully climbed the stairs. Water dripped through the ceiling. Wet plaster might break off and cascade down on me, but my helmet would protect my head, and I refused to think about the possibility that the house might collapse around me.

  On the second floor, I shined my light into bedrooms. The pink frilly quilts and blue race car quilts were now outside, wrapped around kids. Fleecy blankets trailed across the floor from the beds as if trying to crawl out of the bedrooms by themselves. In the master bedroom, the fabulous quilt covered the king-sized bed.

  Little Darla had to have been wrong. No one had remained in the house.

  A mostly closed door might lead to a bathroom or closet.

  Something th
umped behind that door. I rammed it open with my shoulder and stumbled into a small bedroom. Tiffany’s?

  I aimed my light down.

  Felicity Ranquels lay in a heap on the shiny oak floor.

  31

  “FELICITY?” I SAID.

  No answer. She simply lay there dressed in the jacket she’d worn to the presentation in my store, and matching pull-on pants. The day after Darlene’s death, little Darla had referred to Felicity as a nasty lady who had taken her dwess. Darla must have been referring to Felicity this time, also, not to Haylee.

  Smoke swirled. A few seconds before, Felicity must have been conscious enough to kick the floor with her sturdy shoes. Now she wasn’t moving.

  Either something was still smoldering or leftover smoke was trapped in the house, shadowing and blurring everything. I had to get Felicity outside where she could breathe fresh air.

  I didn’t dare take time to radio for help. Even a second’s delay could harm her more and might prevent me from escaping, too. I bent over, grabbed her by the armpits, and pulled.

  The bed came, too.

  I shined my light. A strip of pink fabric was tied tightly around Felicity’s wrist, with an extra loop that went around the leg of the bed. The fabric was printed with tiny lavender flowers, matching the dwess that someone had cut out for little Darla.

  Determined to get Felicity out of the house as quickly as possible, I didn’t let myself think about how she’d ended up in this predicament. I lifted one corner of the bed, toed the loop of Darla’s dwess fabric out from under the leg of the bed, then grasped Felicity’s upper arms again. This time, the bed stayed put. I hauled the woman out of the room and down the stairs. Her feet bumped on each step. My clumsy firefighter’s gloves and the wet carpeting didn’t make the job easier.

  The back door was too far away. I heaved Felicity out the front door and onto the porch.

  Uniformed firefighters gazed at the water they were spraying at the roof. I couldn’t move Felicity one more inch. Where had the strength come from to bring her all the way down from the second floor?