One loud yelp. The medical examiner kept pushing gently on the plunger. Then he straightened, and he looked at Slaughter. "In a minute."
"Why are these bricks here?" someone said, and Slaughter turned. Too much was going on.
"I don't-"
Then he saw where Rettig's fall had broken the partition. In there, as he shone his flashlight, he saw a wall of bricks. He glanced at Rettig who was slumped across the padded bench, his hands up to his throat.
"Are you all right? He didn't bite you, did he?" Slaughter asked.
Rettig felt all over his body. He breathed, gasped, and swallowed, breathing once again. He nodded, wiping his mouth. "I think I only lost my wind." He tried to stand but gave out, slumping once more on the bench. "I'll be okay in just a second. What bricks?"
"There behind you."
Rettig turned, still trying hard to breathe. "I don't know anything about them. I don't think they should be here."
Slaughter didn't even need to ask him. Rettig was already going on. "I guessed that this one sounded different from the others. Much more solid, heavier."
"What's that supposed to mean?" a policeman asked.
"Baynard's wife. I think we know what happened to her." The group became silent.
Slaughter felt Dunlap beside him.
They peered down at the small boy who was tangled, now unconscious, in the net.
"A little kid and all this trouble. Hell, I didn't really understand how little he would be," Slaughter said.
They stood around the boy and stared at him.
"We'd better get him to the hospital," the medical examiner said. "You too, Slaughter. Rettig, you as well. I want to check both of you."
"He never touched me," Slaughter said.
"The cat did. If this virus is like rabies, you're long due to start your shots. Rettig, I don't know. If you don't have a bite, there won't be any problem."
"But I wasn't bitten," Slaughter told him. "Only scratched."
"You want to take the risk?"
Slaughter shook his head to tell him no.
"That's what I thought. Don't worry. You've got company. I need the shots as well."
"But you weren't bitten either."
"No. But with this bloody lip, I can't take any chances. The boy is harmless now. You men can lift him. Stay clear of his head."
They looked at Slaughter, who nodded. One man held the boy's legs while another gripped his shoulders.
"Hell, he doesn't weigh a thing."
"That's what I said. A little kid and all this trouble," Slaughter answered. "It's enough to make you-"
Hollow and disgusted, he watched as the men worked with the boy to reach the stairs. "Here, someone grab that corner of the net before we have an accident," he ordered, and they moved clumsily down the stairs.
Slaughter kept his flashlight aimed before them. On the second landing, they turned, heading toward the bottom, and he heard the idling cruisers now. He saw the headlights glaring through the open door, the mother and the father out there, and the woman from the organization that ran this place, an officer beside them.
"Take it careful," one man said and paused to get a better grip around the boy's shoulders. "Okay. Now I've got him." They reached the bottom, moving across the hall toward the entrance.
"Rettig, tell that woman what we found up there. Those bricks could mean a dozen things, and none of them important."
"You don't think so."
"I have no opinion. But she should know about the damage."
They went onto the porch. The mother and the father now were running.
"Is he-?"
"Just sedated. Everything considered, he's been lucky. Stay away from him," the medical examiner said. "I don't want you contaminated. You can see him at the hospital."
They didn't look convinced.
"It's simply a precaution," Slaughter said, stepping close. "We still don't know what we're dealing with. Let's put him in the back seat of my car," he told his men.
"You'd better set him on a blanket. We can burn it at the hospital," the medical examiner said.
"Do we have to be that careful?"
The medical examiner only stared at him.
"I'll get a blanket from my trunk," the father said and hurried.
"Good. That's very good. We need your help."
They moved toward the cruiser. Slaughter opened the back door, and the father spread the blanket.
"Thank you," Slaughter told him. "I know how hard-"
He looked at where the mother stood beside the cruiser, weeping. "-how hard this must be for you."
They set the boy inside, and the medical examiner leaned in to check him. He stayed in there quite a while. When he came out, even in the darkness, Slaughter saw how pale his face had suddenly become.
"I have to talk."
"What is it?"
"Over there."
The medical examiner walked toward the trees. Slaughter followed.
"What's the matter?"
"I just killed him."
"What?"
"I should have thought." The medical examiner rubbed his forehead.
"Come on, for Christ sake. Make some sense."
"The sedative. I should have thought. The dog I found. I called a vet who came and took one look and gave the dog a sedative."
"But what's-?"
"The dog had reached the stage of paralysis by then. The sedative was just enough to kill it. That boy in your back seat isn't breathing."
"Oh, my God."
"You understand now. I'm not sure exactly how this virus works, but it's damned fast. I know that much. He was maybe on the verge of becoming paralyzed. The sedative precipitated everything. It slowed his body's metabolism until it killed him."
"You can't blame yourself."
"You're damned right I can. I should have paid attention! I just killed him. " The medical examiner closed his eyes, shaking.
Slaughter turned to see the father leaning toward the back seat.
"I don't… Something's wrong!" the father blurted.
Slaughter watched the mother crying as the father scrambled in. He saw his men, the cruisers, their headlights glaring at the mansion, saw the woman Rettig talked to start to run up toward the mansion. He sensed the moon above him and the medical examiner beside him shaking as he felt his world begin to tumble and a creature in the park below him started howling at the moon. Dunlap stood to one side, taking pictures. Slaughter didn't even have the strength for anger anymore. He let the man continue taking pictures, flasher blinking.
PART FOUR. The Ranch
ONE
Slaughter was drunk. he hadn't come back home until nearly one o'clock, and he had stayed outside just long enough to check his horses. Then he'd walked back to his house and with the porchlight on had stared down at the cooler filled with tepid water and the beer cans from this morning. There were empties on the porch as well. There hadn't been a chance to clean up. Too much had begun to happen. But he didn't clean up this time either, simply glanced out at the darkness and then turned to go inside where first he flicked the lights on to study another cooler in the kitchen before heading toward the cupboard where he kept the bourbon. That was something that he almost never drank, but this night had been special, oh, my God, yes, and he almost didn't even bother with a glass. He knew that would be too much weakness, though, and since he was determined to be weak to start with, he at least would set some limits. Reaching for the bottle and a glass, he fumbled in the freezer for some ice and poured the glass up to the top and in three swallows drank a third of it.
The shock was almost paralyzing. He put both hands on the sink and leaned across it, choking, waiting for the scalding flood to settle in his stomach. He could feel it draining down his throat. He felt his stomach tensing, and he knew that because he hadn't eaten since this morning, he might easily throw up. But then the spasms ebbed, and he was breathing, trembling. He leaned across the sink a moment longer. Then he poured some water with the bourbon, and he started toward the shadowy living room. Once, years ago, when he had learned that his wife was leaving him, he had felt emotions like this, ruin, fright, discouragement that bordered on despair. He had sensed those feelings building in him until the instant of the divorce, and going to his rented room, his legs so shaky that he didn't think he'd get there, he had stopped at a liquor store where he had bought the cheapest wine that he could find. A quart of Ruby Banquet, some god-awful label like that. And he'd somehow made it to his room where without pausing he had drunk the bottle in thirty seconds. Setting down the bottle, he had scrambled toward the bathroom, and the heave of liquid from him had evacuated more than just the wine. The sickness had been cleansing, purging all the ugliness, the hate and fear and anger. He had slumped beside the toilet bowl, and how long he had stayed there he was never certain, but when he got up and slumped across the bed, he found that it was night and that the slowly flashing neon sign outside his window was the pattern of his heartbeat, measured, weary. There was nothing in him anymore. He had passed the crisis, and he had a sense then of a new beginning. He was neutral.