“So I ustin’s scared, too?”
“Yes,” Sara said. “If Justin honestly thought he could do a better job than you he’d go ahead and do it.”
“So what do you expect me to do?” I asked. “Just let Dave Walker win?”
“If everything we do is based more on winning some undeclared war… my god, Baptiste… then we’re screwed.”
“I can’t let him win.”
“He’s not going to win. It’s a long time before this is over.”
I nodded.
And I gave her a kiss.
“What,” Graham said, “nothing for me?”
“Kiss the stove,” I said. “I heard it’s hot for you.”
Sara groaned.
That was nice to hear.
Today is Wednesday, December 26th.
I know that Justin wants to go back to Silver Queen, with or without me; part of me hopes he won’t come back.
I decided to take Graham and Matt with me to Bondy Lake to check on the Girards. I wasn’t about to take Sara back there, and I knew that she and Kayla and Fiona would be safe with Lisa and my magic guitar case.
After breakfast the three of us left in the cart; three guys, three sets of armour… we’d save the diesel for farming, if that ever happens.
Bringing Matt would be an irritation, and it left less room for whatever we found and wanted to take back with us, but I wanted to make sure my only job while we were there was to keep a hand on my gun. Matt and Graham would handle the lifting.
We went through the open gate and after another couple of minutes we reached the house.
I noticed right away.
“Someone’s been up on the roof,” I said, pointing to the bare wood where shingles should have been.
“They had solar shingles,” Graham said. “They must have stripped them down to take with them.”
“That’s a heavy load.”
“Probably too heavy,” Matt said.
“Someone took them,” I said. “But I doubt it was the Girards.”
Aside from the stripped shingles, the old Girard house looked like it always did, aside from the fact that the door was propped open. It wasn’t until we got inside that we noticed that some of the pipes had burst; whatever heat had been in that house was long gone, especially with the front door wide open. The damage was minimal, though, and it didn’t get in our way.
The dining room set was still there, a beautiful hand-carved oak table that I found pretty tempting, along with eight matching chairs, six around the table and two lined up along the wall.
There was no food left, and aside from the furniture the only other items that remained were too large and heavy for us to bring home. There was also no sign of their ATVs or the two-ton diesel truck they’d used whenever they could get it to start on homebrew.
“At least they weren’t killed by marauders,” Matt said as he and Graham checked some cupboards in the mud room.
“Lot of clothes left behind,” Graham said.
I saw what he was talking about; there were winter clothes still hanging on the wall. Some of it was in childrens’ sizes.
Graham continued:”They had a few kids, right?”
“Two or three,” I said.
“Does that mean something?” Matt said.
I nodded. “If the clothes are out here and hanging up they probably still fit. It’s only getting colder out there, so you’d think they would take all of it with them.”
We went upstairs to check the bedrooms. I was pretty sure there was no one else in the house, so feeling the urge to pee I found the bathroom. It smelled like the last visitor hadn’t flushed, despite the window being wide open. When I lifted the toilet lid I saw that the bowl was filled with a clean and clear block of ice; my guess was that stuck somewhere in the wall was a very shitty flavour of homemade popsicle.
I was pretty sure their pump wasn’t running anymore but I took a piss in their frozen toilet anyway; it wasn’t like they were around to complain.
I felt a little dirty after, since there was no water to wash my hands, and when I checked the medicine cabinet for disinfectant all I found were a few scented soaps and an old toothbrush on the top shelf.
That got me thinking.
I realized that the toothbrushes were still out in a little holder on the sink, even though the toothpaste was missing.
I guess it didn’t mean anything, really, since they wouldn’t be doing much brushing on the road. They might have been saving some new toothbrushes to take with them.
I still had the feeling that something was off.
As I closed the mirrored door to the cabinet, I caught a patch of dark in the porcelain tub behind me. I turned around, pulling my gun from its holster and holding my breath.
It was a pile of brown and black fur.
Two dogs.
In a shallow puddle of frozen blood, mixed with what might have caused the terrible smell.
I pulled the shower curtain closed and then I left the room.
I found Graham in the hallway.
“Check for blood,” I said.
“What?”
“Blood. There are two dogs in the bathtub. Looks like they were slaughtered.”
“Why would they kill their own dogs?”
“I don’t think they would.”
We checked the upstairs first, looking for any sign of violence to go with the dead dogs. We didn’t find anything up there, but I noticed that there were too many things left around that people wouldn’t usually leave behind. There were family photos in each bedroom, and on a toddler bed that was still covered by a pink unicorn comforter I found a cute little plush kitty.
I remember what it was like to have a kid; the stuffed kitty wasn’t an item you couldn’t find room for. There’s not a parent on earth who’d make that mistake. If that little girl’s favorite things were left behind, chances were that she was left behind, too.
Once we were done in the house, I took a quick look around the grounds. There was no sign of a fresh grave dug into the frozen ground, but it wasn’t a given that they’d have taken the time to dig a hole in winter. It was hard enough for us to bury Ant when the ground wasn’t even fully frozen.
Like everything else I’d seen it told me nothing for sure.
We loaded up the dining room set and started back home; while we rode we talked things out, trying to understand what could have happened.
“Maybe the little girl was mauled to death by the dogs,” Graham said. “They wouldn’t have wanted to bring those dogs with them after something like that.”
“Sounds like too much of a coincidence,” I said. “The dogs kill her right around the time they decide to leave?”
“There’s no way the Girards were murdered,” Matt said. “They’re armed to the teeth. If there had been any shooting we’d have seen something… broken glass or shell casings… something, at least.”
“That’s true,” Graham said.
“I know it doesn’t make any sense,” I said. “But there’s no way they would pack up the supplies, leave all their keepsakes behind, then slaughter their dogs and toss them in the bathtub.”
“People do crazy things,” Matt said. “It sounds messed, but I think it’s the simplest explanation. Do you really think a gang of marauders is going to somehow trick the Girards into leaving their house so they can kill them all without making a mess?”
“And why bother going to so much effort to hide it?” Graham asked. “Why hide the bodies?”
“There may be a way to find out,” I said. “I think we should go back and take another look.”
Graham and Matt were just as curious, so we returned to the Girard homestead. They followed behind me as I wandered around the yard, poking my head into the chicken coop and doing a quick inspection of the barn.
“There’s nothing here,” Graham said. “There aren’t even any footsteps left to see in the snow.”