He nodded. “Okay. We'll talk to them after you've gathered the information you need and made what arrangements you need to make,” he said softly. He nodded at Lieutenant Rowling, who turned reluctantly and followed him out of the barracks.
“Gia and Dr. Foreman are dead, girls,” Alex said as soon as they were gone. “And so are the girls assisting Dr. Foreman.”
“Gia got trapped in her own fire,” I said, realizing.
“No, she went into the building after she began the fire.”
“Why did she go into the building after she started the fire?” Teal asked.
“To spread it inside as well, probably,” I said.
“No, not only for that. It looks like she went in to prevent Dr. Foreman from getting out.”
“How can you tell that?” I asked, grimacing.
“They found a chain around Gia's waist. The chain was around Dr. Foreman's waist, too, and there was a lock on it preventing her from just slipping out of it. She was caught in bed, sleeping apparently. There was a struggle of some sort, but dragging Gia out along with her was too difficult, and by then the fire must have been consuming the hallways, the rooms, and all the exits.”
“You're saying Gia wanted to die with her? She sacrificed herself to be sure Dr. Foreman couldn't escape?”
Alex nodded. “It certainly looks that way, I'm afraid. You girls are telling the truth? You knew nothing of this, nothing of her intentions? You didn't know she hated Dr. Foreman that much, enough to be responsible for her death?”
“No, ma'am,” I said.
“We all got so we hated Dr. Foreman,” Teal told her, “but maybe Gia had reason to hate her more.”
“No maybe about that,” Robin said. “I guess Mindy was the breaking point.”
“Gia wasn't right from the start, was she, Phoebe? She was living in her imagination, creating a girl named Posy. I guess for a while that was her escape,” Teal said.
I watched Alex Patterson's face as they spoke, then I leaned forward. “Was it all her imagination, ma'am? I mean, everything in that notebook^?”
For a long moment, I didn't think she would reply, but then she shook her head. “No. What she wrote in that notebook was true. It's all very sad.” She stood up.
“All of it was true? She was Dr. Foreman's adopted daughter?” I asked.
“Exactly,” Alex said. “You're right,” she told Teal. “This Posy she created was her way of dealing with all that, her escape I imagine.”
“How desperate she must have finally become,” Teal thought aloud.
Alex nodded. “I'm going to arrange for the three of you to be taken to a facility in Phoenix. You'll be questioned further there and I'll be on the phone with the various justice agencies you've all been involved with and that have had stipulations as to your dispositions. There is a lot to do, so we'll have to get started soon. I don't imagine you have anything much to gather up and take with you.”
We shook our heads, our voices trapped inside our thoughts.
“I should have a car here within the hour. Don't wander too far,” she advised.
We watched her leave.
“Wander too far?” Robin muttered.
“We could run away,” I said, looking at Teal.
She started to laugh, her shoulders shaking, and then that laugh turned into a sob. We joined her like a chorus, all three of us crying for so many reasons it was impossible to center on one in particular.
Afterward, before the car arrived for us, I left the barracks and went to find Natani. He and his nephew had rounded up the horses and gotten them back into the corral. They were still nervous, the stench of the fires filling their nostrils and rekindling their recent traumatic horror. Wind Song looked at me as I approached the railing. He snorted and patted the ground, but he didn't walk over as he usually did. I didn't blame him for distrusting humans who were supposed to protect him.
I saw Natani's nephew filling the water trough and was about to ask him where Natani was when I heard the drumbeats coming from Natani's hogan. I hurried over to it, knocked on the frame of the door, and peered in. He was squatting on the floor, the drum before him, those magical rocks spread around it. He said nothing, but I saw him greet me with his eyes so I entered and sat across from him.
“What do you have in your healing bag that can fix all this, Natani? Who knows where we're going to end up now?”
He closed his eyes and stopped his drumbeating.
"Once, when I was a young boy, my mother took meby the hand and made me sit and watch a mother wren care for her newborn babies. She brought me back day after day and I watched how hard the mother worked to feed and care for the newborns, who never stopped demanding.
"They grew quickly. I was surprised at how quickly, and soon they became more adventurous and began to explore the world outside their nest. Everything frightened them though and they returned, hovering beside each other and waiting to be fed and protected.
"And soon they were too big to be in the nest, but they tried to stay. I saw that. I saw the mother drive them out of the nest. She refused to permit them to return. They looked very lost and afraid to me, but after a while, they flew off and my mother had me bring the empty nest down and keep it and think about it until I could answer for myself why the mother wren drove her own babies away.
"I had trouble with the answer for a long time. And then my grandmother died, my mother's mother, and after she was gone, my mother came into our hogan and sat beside me. I was very, very sad. I was my grandmother's favorite.
" 'What has this taught you about the birds?'
