He pounded up the cutout steps to the flagstone terrace built around the oak's massive truck. The fireglow lit up a small portion of the hill behind the garage: empty as far as he could tell. He pushed through a nest of ferns, climbed over the grapestake fence onto the slope, and ran parallel to the fence until he could see the front section of his property. The asphalt parking area, the driveway, were empty; so was the lower sweep of Rosemont Lane. He swung his head to peer up the hillside. Nothing moved up there except the wind-ruffled grass.
Which way? He stood shivering, aware but uncaring that his robe hung open and the breeze blew frigid against his bare skin. The rage in him was murderous, the gun cold and clammy in his fingers. Which way, goddammit?
He went ahead a few more yards. Trampled grass appeared on his left, an irregular trail of it leading at an angle uphill past the darkened bulk of the Bradford house, his nearest neighbors a hundred and fifty yards to the north. He started to run upward along the swath. Too late, too late—he knew that even before he heard the car engine throb into life in the distance. The tormentor had driven his car to the top of the dead-end street that ran up the west side of the hill, parked it just below the crest. From there it had been an easy walk over and down this side.
In frustration Dix slapped the flat surface of the Beretta against his leg. Part of him wanted to keep going, all the way to the top, even though the sound of the car was already diminishing. Reason and the crackle and smoke smell of the fire kept him from doing it. He turned back toward the garage.
The wind was blowing down from the west, pressing the fire in against the garage wall. Flames licked along the base of the wall, but they hadn't taken hold on it. Like the walls of the house, it was made of heavy cedar sheets treated with a fire-retardant chemical. The roof, too, was fire-resistant—a lightweight composition material that resembled shakes. There was enough time to get the blaze under control before it did serious damage to the garage. The only real danger, particularly if the wind shifted, lay in sparks jumping the retaining wall and setting off the dry grass.
Dix ran on a long slant down to the fence. The yard lights and the kitchen lights were on, he realized then. And Cecca was out in the yard, wearing one of his old robes, dragging the garden hose toward the garage. She'd already turned the water on; as soon as she reached the building she lifted the spray nozzle, squeezed out a jet that made a thin hissing noise when it struck the burning debris. He climbed back over the fence, remembered the gun, and pocketed it before he reached her side.
“Don't aim at the fire,” he told her. “The grass above the retaining wall—soak that first. There's another hose out front for me.”
She nodded and he rushed away from her, around the garage to the far front corner. The second hose lay coiled near the stairs to the vegetable garden. He turned the bib on, took the hose atop the retaining wall. Cecca, he saw, was soaking the grass as he'd instructed her. He directed his stream of water onto the prunings and lumber and bags of leaves, most of which had been deliberately clumped together to form a pyre. The fire was still contained there; it hadn't had enough time or fuel to burn hot. Between them, working with the two hoses, they kept it contained and had it out in less than three minutes.
He was amazed to find, then, that none of the neighbors had been aroused. The Bradfords' house was still dark and nobody had come up from below. It had been a frantic few minutes, but his own heightened senses to the contrary, it had all happened without sufficient noise to raise an alarm. The fire had burned in a place where it couldn't be seen except by someone close by and uphill. And the Bradfords' bedroom faced another direction.
He listened for sirens. No sirens. Then he threw the hose down, went back to shut off the bib, scuffed around among the sodden debris to make sure there were no hot spots, and finally joined Cecca.
“Damn lucky the bastard's not an accomplished arsonist,” he said. “Did you call the fire department?”
“I thought about it, but it seemed more urgent to try to keep the fire from spreading.”
“Glad you didn't. I'm not sure my nerves could stand any more upheaval tonight.”
“Shouldn't we report it? To St. John, at least?”
“In the morning.”
“You didn't get a look at him up there, did you?”
“No, dammit. Not even a glimpse. He had his car parked on High Street, on the back side of the hill.”
She hugged herself. “It's freezing out here. Let's go inside.”
He left his wet and blackened slippers on the mat, padded into the hall to turn on the heat. Upstairs, he donned a pair of slipper socks and a warmer robe. When he came back down, Cecca was making coffee in the kitchen.
“Dix … where did you get the gun?”
The question caught him off guard. “Gun?”
“I saw it in your hand when you climbed over the fence. Where did you get it?”
“I bought it.”
“Why?”
“Why? Why do you think?”
“I hate firearms,” she said. “You know how much I hate firearms.”
“I'm not crazy about them either. But this is different. Like it or or not, we have to have some way to protect ourselves.”
“Is that the only reason you bought the gun, for protection?”
“Of course. What kind of question is that?”
“If you'd caught him on the hill, what would you have done? Would you have shot him?”
“Not unless he attacked me. I'd have brought him back here and held him for St. John.”
“Are you sure you wouldn't have just shot him down in cold blood, after all he's done to us? Absolutely sure?”
“Absolutely sure,” he said.
But he wasn't. He wasn't sure at all.
TWENTY-ONE
The buildings that made up the Andersen farm—sixty-year-old one-story house, barn, chicken coop, pumphouse—looked fine from a distance. And from certain angles closer in, too, as in Owen's photographs. The setting was attractive: wooded hill behind the house and barn, eucalyptus-flanked access drive, fields of alfalfa and corn, a ten-tree apple orchard. It was only when you got up close to the buildings that you realized how much repair work needed to be done. The farmhouse wanted paint, a new roof, a new front porch; the barn had gapped and missing boards in two walls and its doors hung crooked from a sagging lintel. The wire on the coop was badly rusted and would have to be replaced, and the coop itself needed shoring up. The fences around the yard and those that bounded the fields and orchard were tumbledown. The fields hadn't been plowed or cultivated in four years, since old Frank Andersen had been diagnosed with cancer. Weeds and grass grew thigh-high under the apple trees.
From a real estate agent's point of view, it had seemed like a white elephant. Tom Birnam had taken on the listing as a favor to Andersen's widow and two daughters, and he'd asked Cecca to handle it as a favor to him. The first time she'd viewed it, ten days ago, she'd thought it was the kind of property that might well take up a lot of her time and effort and never make her a dime's worth of commission—one that would be looked at but not bought by dozens of straightforward clients and bargain hunters, all the while deteriorating more and more from lack of upkeep. One day in the far future, somebody would finally decide to take it on spec at a rock-bottom price, but it might not be her listing anymore—or Better Lands'—when that happened.
So then here came Elliot Messner, the very first prospect she'd shown it to, and it was beginning to look like a quick sale after all. As with the Hagopians, she'd sensed his positive reaction on the first showing; obviously he saw something in the place—a reclamation challenge, maybe—that she didn't and any number of others wouldn't. The fact that he'd asked for this second look was even more encouraging. He was hooked; she was fairly sure of it. If he didn't see anything today to change his mind, she thought he would make an offer as soon as the escrow closed on his Brookside Park property.
She wished she cared.
She didn't seem to care about much of anything today, including the fact that the Hagopians had come in first thing to accept Elliot's counteroffer and sign a purchase agreement. There was an apathy in her that she couldn't
