Steve was the first to move. “Stay here,” he said to Elsie and Daisy, but of course they didn’t. They ran after him to the living room, stopping abruptly at the sight of fire. It raced along baseboards and swept up the front wall. It quickly gained momentum, crackling and hissing as it destroyed everything in its path.
Steve pushed Elsie and Daisy back into the kitchen. “Call the fire department and get out of the house,” he said, giving the phone to Daisy. He hooked his hand around a kitchen fire extinguisher and ran back to the living room.
Seconds later Daisy was beside him with an extinguisher from the family room. In minutes sirens screamed in the distance and the house shook with the rumble of fire trucks.
Elsie was standing her ground with the garden hose when Fairfax Number 4 broke into the foyer. “I think I’ve got it licked,” she said, “but it’s nice of you to come to help out anyway.”
Half an hour later the house was certified safe to reenter. The fire had been pretty well confined to the living room. The front windows had been blown out by the blast, and the rug and walls were charred, as were the few pieces of furniture. Gray sooty water pooled on the floor and spilled out the front door, down the steps. Elsie, Daisy, Kevin, and Steve stood on the scarred lawn and looked at the smoke-blackened exterior of the colonial.
“Firebomb,” Steve said. “If we’d been in the living room, we’d be dead.”
Daisy had her arm around Kevin. She was ready to pay serious attention to the threats. The phone call had been almost laughable, and the intruder might have been a random burglary, but this vicious act of vengeance couldn’t be denied.
There was a dark blue-and-white squad car angled into the curb, behind the one remaining fire truck. A tan late-model sedan pulled in next to the squad car and two men got out. Detectives, Daisy decided, noting the street clothes on the men and the antennae on the sedan. They approached a uniformed cop and a discussion followed. Daisy caught one of the men looking over at her. His face was impassive, his mouth grim. His shirt had lost its starch hours ago, his suit slacks had begun to bag in the seat, his brown shoes carried a film of dust. He’d had a long day, Daisy thought.
FairfaxCounty wasn’t exactly the crime center of the universe, but she supposed it had its share of break-ins, forgeries, and occasional arson. Probably it didn’t get many firebombings. Maybe the detective in the baggy pants would be excited to get a firebombing assigned to him. From the slump of his shoulders Daisy guessed excitement wasn’t part of his present emotional makeup. He flicked her another speculative look, and she decided pain-in-the- behind was about the way he’d sized her up. When he started across the lawn toward her, she plastered her best social-worker smile into place.
“Lieutenant Walker,” he said, extending his hand, first to Steve, then to Daisy. “I understand you’ve been threatened before?” he said to Daisy. “I’ll need a detailed statement from you.”
Twenty minutes later he whistled through his teeth and closed his notebook. “You consider going on a cruise? Maybe spending a month in Disneyland?”
“I’m this close to my doctorate,” Daisy said, measuring the air with her thumb and forefinger. “I can’t leave now. I’m in the middle of my dissertation. And who would take over my crossing-guard job or my job at the nursing home? Who would do the traffic reporting?”
“Lady, you don’t leave town, and you’re going to be doing the traffic report from graveside.”
Daisy narrowed her eyes. “I’m not going to be intimidated by some sleaze.”
Walker gave a long, loud sigh. “How’d I know you were going to say that?” He looked at Steve. “Can’t you talk some sense into her?”
Steve gave Walker a what-are-you-from-the-moon? look.
“Yeah,” Walker said.
Elsie stepped up to him. Her hair sprang from her scalp in tufts, flecked with foam from the extinguishers, her face was splotched with black soot, and her sneakers were soaked.
“Elsie Hawkins,” she said, holding out her hand. “Rough and Ready Security Guard. Don’t you worry about a thing. I’m on duty here. And not only am I going to protect Daisy, but I’m going to get this guy. He’s gone too far this time. I waited all week to see that show on giraffes, and that son of a squirrel made me miss it. Blew up the living room during the opening credits. Some people have no consideration.”
Daisy could see the incredulity register on Walker’s face, and she watched in amusement as he lifted his eyes to Steve in silent question.
Elsie noticed his skepticism. “Listen, sonny,” she said to Walker, “I may be old, but I’m not stupid. I know my way around the block pretty good. As long as it don’t rain I’m almost as good as new.”
“Rain?” he said dully, eyes slightly glazed.
“Arthritis, you ninny. Old people get arthritis when it rains. Never had it so bad before, but this dang steel hip isn’t all healed over yet…” She made an impatient sound and waved him away. “I got better things to do than to stand here gabbing. I bet everything I own smells like it’s been barbecued.”
Steve stood in the shower and let the water beat against him. He shook his head like a dog in a rainstorm and ordered his body to wake up. Firebomb or not, this was Daisy’s fun day, and he intended to be downstairs making French toast when Daisy came back from jogging. He couldn’t remember if he’d washed his hair, so he washed it again.
Daisy had been assigned twenty-four-hour protection. Steve thought about the cop who had accompanied Daisy on her jog, Officer Schmidt. The man had been on duty all night. Steve felt a little better knowing the poor guy was undoubtedly in more agony than he was. He toweled off, dressed in khaki shorts and a black T-shirt, and padded down to the kitchen.
He had the table set and the French bread sliced when Daisy returned. She’d tied her hair back into a ponytail and her face was free of makeup, slightly flushed, glowing with health and a sheen of perspiration. Steve felt a ridiculous stab of guilt over his body’s instant and soon-to-be-obvious reaction to a woman who could easily be mistaken for sixteen. Schmidt was just five steps behind her, breathing hard.
He offered juice to the cop, but the man waved it away. Steve saw his eyes slide to the coffee brewing on the counter. “Coffee?”
The answer was an affirmative grunt. The cop was wearing jeans and running shoes and a T-shirt that was soaked through. He had his gun and a walkie-talkie clipped to his belt. “No one told me I was going to have to run a damn marathon at five in the morning,” he managed between breaths.
Daisy sipped her orange juice. “Usually Elsie runs with me,” she gleefully lied, “but I thought I’d give her the morning off since she was up so late doing laundry last night.”
“The old lady?” That elicited another grunt. “You’re kidding, right?”
Steve gave him the coffee and clapped a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. “The Roach trial’s only a month away.”
“I’ll never make it.”
There were light steps on the stairs, and Elsie came into the kitchen. “Smelled the coffee,” she said. She looked over Steve’s shoulder. “French toast? Isn’t that a nice treat on a Sunday morning.” Her eyes fastened on the cop at the table. “What happened to him?”
“Went jogging with Daisy,” Steve said.
Elsie made a derisive sound. “They don’t make cops like they used to.”
Steve mounded half a loaf of fried bread on a plate, poured syrup over it and gave it to Bob. He mixed up more egg while the next batch sizzled in the skillet.
He was beginning to get excited about his plans for the day. When he’d proposed a fun day he hadn’t really had anything specific in mind. Then the perfect day had come to him in a flash in the middle of the night. He was going to do something he’d been wanting to do for fifteen years. He was going to take everyone to an amusement park. Every summer he had the urge to go, but he’d never been able to come up with a comfortable excuse for indulging himself. Now he had a fourteen-year-old kid, an overworked woman, and Elsie. He didn’t know how to categorize Elsie. Elsie was in a class all her own.
He handed over a plate of French toast to Daisy and groaned when Kevin thundered down the stairs. Good thing he’d bought lots of bread.
By eight-thirty everyone was fed, showered, properly clothed in shorts and sneakers, and assembled on the front lawn.
“My partner and I will follow in our own car,” Schmidt said. “Try not to lose us.”
