Chapter 9: The Fire

The man at the gate lit a match.

I saw it flare in the window.

He dropped it into a line of gasoline that ran along the wall of the garage, and the whole line went up in one low roar.

"Out," Rafe said.

He threw the phone down and shoved me toward the kitchen door.

"Rafe, the bikes."

"Forget the bikes."

"The tarp, the whole shop."

"Get inside the kitchen and stay in the back rooms," he said. "That's the rule. Do it."

He was already running for the yard, shouting names.

I heard boots hit the gravel from every direction, and the prospect's whistle, and somebody yelling for the hose.

The back of the garage was burning fast.

Black smoke rolled across the ceiling, and the air turned thick and brown.

I got to the kitchen door, and I stood in it with my hand on the frame.

Rule one.

Stay in the back rooms.

Mabel wasn't in the kitchen.

The pots were still on the stove, a spoon swinging in one, and the back door stood wide open on the yard.

"Mabel?"

No answer.

I ran to the door.

Out on the gravel, twenty men were dragging a hose toward the fire, and the heat hit my face.

Through the smoke I saw an apron.

She was on her knees in the little storeroom that joined the garage to the kitchen, one hand gripping the shelf above her.

A rack of tools had come down across her legs.

She was pinned.

"Mabel!"

"Go back!" she shouted. "Silly girl, go back!"

I didn't go back.

I ran across the yard with my hand over my mouth and my ribs screaming and went in through the storeroom door.

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