Chapter 10: Ashes

We went down that hill faster than I've ever moved on skis.

By the time we reached the base, the whole roof of the barn was burning.

Flames poured out of the high window.

The tin walls glowed dull red and ticked in the heat.

The owner was standing in the parking lot in her nightgown and a parka, with a garden hose that didn't reach.

"Is anybody inside?" I shouted.

"No. Nobody. I checked the bunk room." She was shaking. "The cat's inside."

I knew that.

I'd parked it there myself the night before, with a full tank.

The volunteer fire truck came up from town ten minutes later, siren wailing.

Then the strays came.

Ginny's truck first, then the mill hands, then the four from Dark Moon in the liftee's rusty car.

They came in pajamas and boots and carried hoses and shovels.

The human firefighters looked at all these big quiet people showing up at midnight, and handed them hoses.

By two in the morning the fire was out.

The barn was a black frame of bent steel.

In the middle of it sat the old cat.

Its cab was melted.

Its tracks were twisted.

The engine block I'd rebuilt with my own hands was a lump of soot.

I walked into the ashes and put my hand on the blade.

It was still warm.

The owner came and stood next to me.

"Well," she said. "That's that."

"I'm sorry."

"You didn't light it."

I couldn't look at her.

"I think it's because of me," I said. "There's a man on the other side of the pass who wanted me to know he could."

She was quiet for a long time.

"Then he's a coward," she said. "And you're still my groomer."

At first light, the town came.

Not just the strays.

Humans too.

The hardware store owner showed up with a dumpster on a flatbed.

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