the clouds parted again and gray-white moonlight flooded the meadow.
Jesus God in heaven. There was a small figure making its way to the creek, and it was carrying something. A bottle? I couldn’t tell. There was something else I could discern, but did not want to accept.
It was Arch.
CHAPTER 28
When the three of us reached the shed, Fritz ordered Pom to go in first and turn on the light, with the warning that I would be shot immediately if the light did not come on. Pom did as he was told and we walked in. Surprise. Between the shelves loaded with supplies there was just enough room for a car. A blue Volvo.
“I knew you had her car,” I said to Pom.
“I was supposed to be fixing it,” he said.
“I already figured out that you were looking for the evidence she had against Fritz. Just tell me what you were doing at the athletic club the other night,” I said.
“I told you two to shut your mouths,” said Fritz.
But then I scanned the shelves in the shed, and I knew what Pom had been looking for Thursday night.
“Okay, this is how it’s going to work,” Fritz announced. “Goldy, you get over—”
“FIREBALL, FIREBALL, COME TO THE AID OF THE LICH!” shouted Arch’s young voice from outside.
“Shut up!” shouted Fritz. “Hey, who is that? Come out here! Hey!”
Through the air from the blackness came some kind of a projectile, whizzing, ablaze … It was a Molotov cocktail.
“Get out!” shouted Pom. He grabbed my arm and shoved me out the shed door. I heard the bottle shatter and explode. Pom was on the ground beside me. Fritz was nowhere.
And then I heard what sounded like a low roar, beginning slowly and rising, louder and louder.
The bees. Arch had pulled the rope.
“I’ve got to get one of the smoke pots going to get rid of the bees,” Pomeroy cried into my ear. “They’re going to sting Fritz to death. Go around back! Get Arch!”
The warm weather had dried the grass to straw. Already smoke was billowing heavily from one side of the shed, and flames were licking the grass.
“Arch!” I screamed. “Arch! Where are you?”
A gust of wind fanned the flames into a roar that swallowed my voice. The smoke stung my eyes and nose. My breath caught in my mouth. A bee landed on my arm and I screamed.
“Arch!
The smoke was so thick that my eyes felt as if they were on fire. My own tears blinded me as I stumbled toward the meadow. The air was hot. I felt wildly with my hands for trees, bush branches, boulders, anything by which Arch might be huddled. Pine tree branches whacked and scratched my face. I fell over a clump of rocks.
“Arch!”
A thin voice called, “Over here, Mom!”
I jumped and ran in the direction of that sound. Branches again clawed my face. Twice I stumbled on snake holes and fell into black straw. The air was thick, unbreathable with the smoke. From time to time I would feel the brush of a bee. I ran for Arch, calling. His responding voice was my beacon. Finally I could see the cabin.
Then came the sound of vehicles cracking over small trees. Who? Twirling red and white lights flashed through the web of branches and pungent air. What was it?
Oh, God. It was the fire department.
“Arch!” I called. “Arch! Arch!”
Turning back to the shed I could see some flames, mostly smoke.
“Arch!”
“Here, Mom,” came a small voice by a tree. I stumbled over to the sound.
I pulled him to me. “Arch,” I said, “Arch.”
He said, his voice muffled by my squeeze, “Is Fritz dead?”
“I don’t know,” I cried. I could hear men’s voices shouting. Figures were running down to the shed. “What were you trying to do by throwing that bomb?”
Arch said, “I just wanted to scare him. He was acting so weird!”
I shook my head, hugged him tighter. “And did you call the fire department before you started this blaze?”
He pulled back from my chest.
“Of course,” he said matter-of-factly. “Pom showed me how to use his radiophone once. The fire number is on it.” His face was shiny with sweat. Despite his apparent calm, his voice was shaking. “And I told the fire department to call Tom Schulz.”
At that moment, I was so glad to have him alive and with me that I did not care whom he had called.
“Thanks, Arch,” I whispered into his ear. “You probably saved my life, you know. Pom’s, too.” I paused. “Hon, I’ve been so worried about you. Potions and revenge and weapons. It’s not the same as life, you know, real life.”
He let his head bob forward. “I know,” he said, barely audible over the din from the firefighters. “But”—and now his eyes behind the thick glasses implored me—“it was just because of the kids at school. Todd and I were going to put a curse on them. But it didn’t work I mean we sort of chickened out. You know? We had a curse and a weapon, but the milkwort potion was too gross. I got to make the Molotov cocktail anyway, because I remembered where Pom keeps his extra gasoline tank. And I, uh, let the bees go by pulling the rope that warns of an intruder. Man, I can’t wait to tell Todd about that.”
What could I say? He was my son. He didn’t cater to anybody either. Still. The games were his escape from reality. What he had done was brave, but much too hazardous for a boy of eleven. I hugged him again.
“You’re really great,” I said. “But when all this is over we’re both going to go see the school psychologist. We need to have a long chat.”
He looked up at me. The smoke stung my eyes to tears again when he said, “All I need is you, Mom.”
By the time we made our way back up to the cabin, Tom Schulz, still in his clown costume, was sitting on a tall stool boasting about having the situation under control. Fritz, he informed us, was going by rescue squad to a hospital in Denver. He had stings over half his body. And Schulz had sent an investigator to the Korman house to confiscate the records of injections the doctor claimed to have given Vonette. He was going to see if it matched the toxicological report he was ordering.
“I’ve got a cop with Korman now,” Tom said. “Because we don’t even have to wait for those records. That doctor is under arrest.”
“Finally,” interjected Pomeroy, who had reentered his cabin, covered with soot.
I sank onto the couch and pulled Arch down next to me. I never wanted to let him out of my sight again. For the next few hours, anyway. The muscles in my legs and arms ached. A sudden wave of exhaustion swept through my body.
“And you, Miss G,” Tom said as he wagged a heavy finger at me, “are in one load of trouble for making that food.”
“Tell me what you arrested Fritz for,” I demanded weakly.
He puffed out his chest. “Investigation of first-degree murder. Man, I am so smart. I got that scalpel checked for blood
I gave him a questioning look. “I thought there were surgical gloves …?”
“Oh, Goldy,” Tom rejoined, “you got a long way to go before you become a grown-up detective. Not to mention that your ability to follow orders needs some work. Man wears surgical gloves, touches his forehead or something, picks up some body oil which has some kind of enzymes or something in it, hell, I’m not too sure myself. Anyway, then he touches something and some of that enzyme and oil stuff comes off and bingo, the print comes through the glove.” He smiled proudly. “I sent that scalpel down to Denver for a laser picture, got a print, matched it with the Department of Motor Vehicles print of Fritz Korman’s right index, and what do you know.”
