going to hurt, but you have to ignore the pain,” said Diane.
“How do I do that?” asked Hector.
“You just do it,” she said. “Scream if you have to, but don’t thrash about, just hold on to the rope. Let us know when you are ready.”
“You know,” he said, “I’ve been thinking about the physics of hauling a weight up, and-”
“Hector, we have the math worked out. Just concentrate on hanging on to the rope,” Diane said. “Remember what I do in my leisure time.”
“Fishing?” he said.
Diane smiled. She watched him as he struggled to stand and she wondered whether she needed to go down into the well to help.
“You doing all right?” she asked.
“It’s not so bad. I can do it,” he said.
She winced as he held on to the side of the well to steady himself.
Hector got his foot in the loop and held on. He started to say something when a stone dislodged from near the top edge and fell with a crash as it hit the rotten wood.
“You all right?” she said. “Were you hurt?”
“No,” he said in a voice that could be called squeaky at this point. He definitely sounded scared. “But, I’m ready to get out of here-now. Just don’t drop me, okay?”
“You’re going to be fine. You’re in good hands. Here we go.”
Diane signaled for them to pull. They leaned into the rope as if they were in a life-and-death tug-of-war, and Hector rose toward the surface, screaming at the top of his lungs. When his shoulders cleared the top, Diane and Neva pulled him to the edge and dragged him over the tarp and onto solid ground.
Scott ran over to him. “Hector, are you all right? Are you in pain?”
Hector lay on the ground breathing hard.
“I’m fine. Not much pain, really. It’s just that, when Dr. Fallon suggested it, screaming seemed like such a good idea.”
Diane opened the blade of her pocketknife and ripped Hector’s jeans while David held the flashlight. His skin was bruised and swollen, but it wasn’t an open fracture. What was most noticeable, however, was the broken tibia he held next to his chest.
“You brought a bone up with you?” said Scott.
“Well, hell, yeah. I wasn’t going to have all that be a wasted trip. What is it, Dr. Fallon? Tell me it’s not a deer or a dog,” said Hector.
“It’s not. It’s human,” said Diane. “It’s relatively small, but judging from the epiphyseal union, I’d guess it was from a teenager.”
“Dang,” said Scott. “Wow.” And then the realization: “A small teenager. Dead. In the well.”
They heard the siren come up the driveway and stop in front of the house. David had cleared a path to the well by taking down some of his string and stakes. The two policemen led the paramedics around the back of the house to the abandoned well. The local firemen arrived with them. The paramedics set the stretcher down and began attending to Hector.
“We were thinking,” said one of the paramedics as he began taking vitals, “that maybe we would just drop by here every morning and evening. Save a lot of time.”
They were the paramedics who had taken Marcella to the hospital, as well as Officers Hanks and Daughtry, and the late Ray-Ray Dildy-and now Hector. They probably decided the house was cursed.
“His vitals are good,” he said.
“My granny always said this old witch house is haunted,” the young paramedic said.
“You know this house, then?” asked Diane.
“A little. Granny says when she was a young girl, some crazy rich woman, an artist I think she said, lived here. She had all these demon creatures all over the roof,” he said, as he immobilized Hector’s leg.
“Gargoyles,” said Diane.
“Is that what they were?”
“Supposed to ward off evil,” said Diane.
“I’ll have to tell Granny. From our workload over here the last few days, they needed to be working overtime. Okay, we’re ready to go. Don’t you worry, fella. You’re going to be fine. But these old wells are a bitch, aren’t they?”
Hector groaned.
“Do you know her name?” asked Diane.
“The crazy lady? No, but I imagine Granny does. I’ll ask her,” he said.
Diane reached in her pocket and handed him one of her cards.
After the paramedics took Hector and Scott to the hospital, one of the firemen, a tall, sturdy guy who looked as if he could have just reached down and hauled Hector up with one hand, began lecturing Diane about doing the rescue herself.
“One of you could have ended up in the well with him,” he said. “Or made the whole thing fall in.”
“I take your point,” said Diane. “But Mike Seger and I are certified in cave rescue and we’ve had a lot of experience. We were aware of the dangers in this situation, and we took steps to make it as safe as we could. Our biggest concern was to get Hector out before the walls caved in on him. After he fell through the top, the sides were unstable and began to fall in before we started pulling him up.”
The fireman paused a moment and looked into the well before he spoke. “Okay, then,” he said. “I’m glad you’ve some experience and that everything worked out. Some people attempt a rescue and have no idea of the things that can go wrong.”
“Thank you for coming,” said Diane. “All of us appreciate it.”
The fireman looked at all the string he had to step on and over to get there. “What you people doing here?” he said.
“This is a crime scene,” said Diane. “We’re searching for buried human remains.”
“Crime scene? Don’t you guys use yellow tape?” he asked.
“Sometimes. This is… was… a search grid,” she said, indicating the layout of strings and stakes.
He squinted at Diane. “You’re the crime lab lady,” he said.
“Yes.” But Diane wasn’t sure about the lady part.
The fireman left and Diane went to the front porch to sit down and rest. David, Neva, and Mike went with her. David turned on the porch light and they pulled up chairs. Neva sat on the glider with Mike, who put his arms around her to warm her.
“What are you guys doing here?” Diane asked the two of them. “Shouldn’t you be out to dinner or something?”
“Andie said you and David were here,” said Neva. “I need to tell you some odd stuff about the crime scene I was just on.”
“And the other thing,” said Mike.
“Yes. I’m not sure, but I think I’m being followed,” Neva said.
Chapter 35
“Followed?” said Diane.“Neva, someone is following you?” Diane gripped the arms of her chair and leaned forward.
“I think so,” said Neva. “I may be wrong.” Neva frowned in a way that put a crease between her eyes at the bridge of her nose, a small expression of insecurity that she made when she was undecided or afraid to commit to her own analysis.
“But you may be right,” said Mike, urging her to talk.
“I noticed it yesterday. I feel really silly. It’s just that I kept noticing the same vehicle, a black SUV with tinted windows. I know, that sounds so cliched. I’ve tried to get behind it and check out the license plate, but I
