Vic glanced at me, and I shifted in my seat. “No, Duane, if I was going to do that, I would’ve done it when they bit me and not six and a half hours after the fact.” Vic and I got out of her vehicle, and Duane made a movement to follow us. “That’s okay, Duane, I think we can handle it.”
He flipped the passenger seat forward and kept a hand on the door. “No, I better come in with you. They mind Gina best, but they’ll listen to me. I don’t want them making any more mistakes with nobody.”
I held the door but kept it blocked with my body. “You don’t have any shoes.”
He shot a look down at his stocking feet, more holes than sock. “That’s all right, I can just run into the house.”
I glanced at Vic and shrugged. “Okay.”
Duane hopped along in front of us, displaying a great deal of agility as he avoided the snow-covered junk in the walkway. He jostled the doorknob and called into the house. “Dogs!” When he swung the door wide, the two of them were standing in the entryway like twin sentinels.
The place was just as dreary as it was the other night and still mildewed, which is truly a feat in Wyoming’s high desert.
It was warm in there, and I remembered thinking that it’d felt clammy when I’d discovered Mrs. Dobbs in the kitchen. I suppose Redhills Arroyo would be my next stop; breaking the news to Betty that her boyfriend was dead and that we were likely to charge her son with some form of murder.
What fun.
Duane brought the wolf mutts closer, and they were their old selves, smiling and wagging. I raised a hand, and Butch stretched his neck out to lap at it while Sundance stood just a little to the side and studied Vic as she closed the door behind us. I glanced at the basement door underneath the stairwell to our left and gestured toward the nearest hound. “All right, are you the one that bit me, you villain?”
Duane interrupted. “No, Sundance always attacks from the front. If you were bit from behind, it must’ve been Butch.”
“And here I thought we were pals.” I reached under his muzzle and swung his collar around in order to examine the tags. They actually were updated only this year, and I decided that I could now continue with part B of my plan. “Duane, could I have a glass of water?”
“It tastes like ass.”
I stared at him for a moment. “What?”
He stood in the entryway, framed by the stained-glass side panels that led to the dining room. “The water here in the big house comes from the original well, and it’s only about sixty feet deep. It’s coal water and tastes like ass.”
Vic turned her back, and I knew she was trying to keep from laughing. “That’s okay; I’d still like a glass of water.”
He started toward the kitchen and the dogs followed, but he stopped when we didn’t. “You wanna come into the kitchen?”
I looked down at the melting snow on my over-boots and the filthy, thread-bedraggled carpeting. “I don’t want to track into the house any more than I have to.”
He acted as if he’d never heard those words arranged in that order before, shrugged, and then ducked into the kitchen with the dogs at his stocking heels.
I stepped to my left and turned the handle of the basement door—locked. I pulled out Geo’s key ring and quickly flipped through the older ones, finally selecting the smallest of the skeleton type.
Vic whispered over my shoulder. “You dog. This is all very interesting for me. I’ve heard of things like illegal entry, breaking and entering, collusion, and inadmissible evidence, but rarely does one get to see all of it at one time in person.”
“Just a little ole-time law and order. Stick around; it’s going to get worse. When I take a drink of the water, turn your head the other way and mumble help.”
She stared at me. “Is this the accessory part of ole-time law and order?”
“Just put some feeling into it.” I slipped the key in the door and unlocked it, opened and closed it, and then redeposited the ring back in my Carhartts just as Duane returned from the kitchen.
He held the glass out to me, and I couldn’t help but notice that it looked yellow and smelled like sulphur; the sacrifices I made for my constituency. “Thanks.” I stopped just as I was about to drink and shifted my ear toward the basement door. “Hey, did you hear something?”
Duane looked at me as he petted the dogs. “Nunh-uh.”
Vic shrugged.
I brought the glass back up to my lips and took a swig of what, indeed, tasted like ass. I swallowed and looked around, especially at the brunette. “I thought I heard something.”
Duane shook his head. “Nunh-uh, maybe the wind?”
I looked at Vic. “It sounded like somebody crying for help.”
The young man pushed his greasy ball cap farther back onto his head. “I didn’t hear nothing.”
Vic looked at Duane. “I didn’t either.”
I studied the rusty liquid in the glass and took a deep breath as I raised it to my lips. “Well, I damn well better.” Duane continued to watch me, probably amazed that anyone would take a second drink of the water. I got smart this time and just held the glass to my lips and shot a glance at Vic, who covered her mouth for multiple reasons.
She turned her head. “Help!”
Duane turned to look at her. “What?”
I gratefully placed the glass back into Duane’s hands and stepped forward, leaning an ear against the basement door. “I’m sure I heard it that time.” I twisted the knob as Duane’s voice called out from behind me. “That door’s locked, there’s nobody . . .”
The door swung open, revealing a stairwell that turned at a landing below and continued to the left. There was a light switch to the right, just inside the doorway, and I flipped it on. The full force of heat and humidity wafted up from the basement as I took the first step down. “Duane, it sounds like there’s somebody in trouble down here, so I’m going to have a look, okay?”
He moved to the doorway behind me, edging a little in front of Vic. “Nunh-uh, there’s nobody down there.”
I raised a hand at his protests. “Vic, did you hear something?”
“Maybe . . .” She tromped down the stairs behind me and whispered, “What’s my motivation?”
Duane called after us. “Hey, there’s nobody down there, she just yelled that.”
As I turned the corner at the landing, I looked back up at her. “What, were you going to make me drink the entire glass of water?”
She smiled the crocodile smile. “I just wanted to see if you could do it.”
There was another light switch attached to one of the basement support poles and a new, reinforced BX cable that strung on into the darkness. I put my hand on the switch as Duane joined us—it appeared the dogs wouldn’t come down the stairs.
“Hey, you can’t go down there without a warrant thing.”
I glanced back up at him. “Duane, I’ve got an emergency situtation, and you wouldn’t want me to ignore it if someone is down here and hurt, would you?”
“Well, nunh-uh, but . . .”
I flipped the switch and glanced around as I stepped onto the dirt floor. It was your usual old house basement with a low ceiling and rough-cut beams and antiquated wiring with porcelain insulators and cast iron pipes that arrived from above and disappeared below. There was an aged washer and dryer that sat in a corner, unplugged, along with an operating hot water heater and a massive, coal-driven furnace looking like a giant metal octopus with a large chute that led to an opening along the hand-stacked foundation. There was the usual junk piled against the walls along with an inordinate amount of gardening tools, supplies, and at least eight fifty-pound bags of fertilizer.
A large blue tarp was tacked to the sill above and screwed into a four-by-four resting on the floor with a number of heavy-gauge extension cords disappearing underneath. As we stood there, the air pressure from whatever was on the other side billowed the plastic back toward us.