He cleared his throat. “Caught some bass. Saw an otter with two pups, and about a jillion gators, as usual.” He started eating again.
“Were you there all alone?”
“Pretty much.” Duane Jr. didn’t look up from his plate.
“Your dad told me about the fire. The headmaster called me as well.”
“What fire?”
“Out at the swamp,” Duane Sr. cut in. “Now don’t act like you never heard about it.”
The boy spun some linguini onto his fork. “Oh, yeah. That fire.”
Mrs. Winship dabbed her mouth with her napkin, which she then refolded neatly on her lap. “DJ., I’m seventy-seven years old,” she said, “which doesn’t make me a dinosaur, but I’m not so young anymore, either. Time isn’t something I can afford to waste, do you understand?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“So just tell me if you set that fire. Yes or no?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Yet the police think you did it. Why is that?”
Again Duane Sr. spoke up. “They can’t prove a flippin’ thing. Otherwise the boy’d be locked up in juvie hall right now.”
Mrs. Winship shot Duane Sr. a peeved look. Gently she asked her grandson, “Did you have a chance to give your story to the authorities?”
“Yes, ma’am. I straight-up told ’em I didn’t do it,” Duane Jr. said.
“Those days are over, right?”
“Yes, ma’am. No more fires.”
“It’s not something that a future environmental scientist should do, burning a swamp.”
“No, ma’am.”
His grandmother said, “There was a field trip from Truman out there that morning. Somebody could’ve been hurt badly, DJ., or even killed.”
Duane Jr. looked her straight in the eye. “It wasn’t me, Gram. I swear.”
“All right. I believe you.”
“Thank goodness that’s settled,” said Duane Sr., scanning the restaurant impatiently. “Where did our waiter disappear to? I can’t wait to have a peek at that dessert tray.”
It was only her love for Duane Jr. that prevented Mrs. Winship from smacking his father on the top of his hopelessly thick head.
To the boy she said, “Your mother told me she wrote you.”
He seemed surprised. “I didn’t get a letter.”
“Nothing?”
“Nope.”
“Me neither,” Duane Sr. piped.
Mrs. Winship was ashamed to think that her daughter could be so selfish and neglectful. “I’m sorry, DJ. I’ll speak with her.”
“It’s not your fault, Gram.”
“How about some dessert?”
“No thanks.”
“Well, I saved plenty of room,” Duane Sr. announced heartily, patting his stomach.
Millicent Winship eyed him as if he were a cockroach on a wedding cake. “We’ve all had enough,” she said sharply, and called for the check.
Before Marta’s mother dropped them off at the mall, she asked, “What’s the name of the movie?”
Marta faked a cough and turned to Nick, who got the hint.
“It’s Spider-Man VII,” he said to Mrs. Gonzalez. “Revenge of the Web Slinger.” He had no idea if there was such a film—he’d lost count of all the Spider-Man sequels.
“PG?”
“Yeah, Mom, it’s PG,” Marta said.
“I’ll see you back here at ten-thirty sharp. Don’t be late.”
“Bye, Mom,” Marta said impatiently.
“Have you got enough money?”
“Goodbye, Mom!”
Lying about the movie made Nick and Marta feel sneaky and low, but there had seemed to be no other choice—their parents never would have allowed them to spy on Mrs. Starch’s house, especially after dark.
“According to MapQuest, it’s only 2.4 miles,” Nick said, studying the map that he’d printed out. He’d gotten Mrs. Starch’s address from Libby, who’d found a faculty directory in her father’s den after the detective had visited Dr. Dressler’s office.
Marta said, “I can’t believe I forgot a flashlight.”
Nick had brought one in a pocket of his jacket. “Let’s go,” he said, and they headed off across the vast parking lot, toward the road.
Before long, the bright lights of the mall were behind them. Sticking closely to the MapQuest directions, they walked five blocks to Mockingbird Court, then seven more blocks to Grackle Drive. When they reached Mrs. Starch’s street, Nick said, “We go west here until the road ends.”
Marta laughed. “No way! The old buzzard actually lives on Buzzard Boulevard—how perfect is that?”
“Number 777,” Nick said. “The very last house.”
“Naturally.”
The streetlights ended when the pavement ran out. As Nick and Marta continued down the dirt road, the night deepened. Nick took out his flashlight.
“Doesn’t anybody besides her live out here?” Marta said nervously.
They walked past a couple of houses that were under construction, and another that was roofless and abandoned, probably a hurricane casualty. The woods hummed with crickets and cicadas, and rustled with other, heavier sounds that might have been rabbits or raccoons. Whenever Nick heard something, he aimed the light into the woods to see what it was, but the critters always stopped moving, remaining invisible among the pines and the scrub.
Nick assured Marta there was nothing to be afraid of, but he was jumpy, too. Usually he loved hiking through the outdoors, but it was a totally different experience in the black of night.
“Do me a favor,” Marta said. “Take off the Ace bandage.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re gonna need both arms to carry me back to the mall after I pass out.”
“You are not going to pass out.”
“No, I’ll probably just drop dead from fright,” Marta said, “when a rabid bear comes chasing after us.”
“Or a panther,” Nick joked, trying to lighten the mood.
“Shut up.”
Every now and then they would glance back, watching for oncoming headlights, but Buzzard Boulevard was as quiet as a graveyard. Nick wondered if he’d be able to run as fast as normal with one arm bound clumsily behind him.
“How much farther?” Marta asked.
Nick didn’t know. The distance seemed longer than it had appeared on the map. He picked up the pace, the white beam of the flashlight bobbing ahead of them. A layer of clouds hung overhead, blocking out the stars and the moon.
When a small animal scampered across the road ahead of them, Marta let out a yip and grabbed Nick. “This was a really terrible idea. Let’s go back,” she said.
“Shhhh. We’re here.”
His flashlight illuminated a plain metal mailbox with three 7’s on the side but no name.
“Where’s the house?” Marta asked.
“This way.” Nick led her along an overgrown trail no wider than a car. He nearly stepped on a coachwhip snake that, fortunately, slithered into the shadows before Marta noticed it. At the end of the trail, he dropped to a crouch. Marta knelt behind him.
Mrs. Starch’s house stood alone in the middle of a clearing. Nick counted three stories, although the old wooden structure appeared smaller than that, hunched and frail. A bare bulb flickered from the ceiling of the porch, but no lights shone in the windows. In the yard there was no sign of the teacher’s blue Prius.
“Nobody home,” Marta said, clicking her teeth nervously.
“We’ll see.”
“Where are you going?”
“To spy,” Nick said. “That was the plan, right?”
Marta stayed close. They darted around the house to the back porch, which was unlit. After creeping up the steps, they searched fruitlessly for a window in which to peek. All the shades were drawn.
“Oh well. We tried,” Marta said, turning to leave.
“Get back here.”
“Come on, Nick. I’m totally creeped.”
&nb
sp; “Something’s not right.”
“Thank you! Now can we please go?”
“What I mean is, look at this place. She hasn’t been here for a while.” Nick shined the flashlight back and forth. “Check out all the spiders.”
Marta cringed, but she got the point. Mrs. Starch was a notorious neat freak, yet her porch looked untouched by a broom or mop. Shimmering spiderwebs hung like tapestries in the corners of the ceiling, while the floor was littered with pine needles and moth casings and lizard poop.
Nick said, “She hasn’t been home since the field trip. I’ll bet you twenty bucks.”
“Then who’s picking up her mail? And driving her car?” Marta said.
“Exactly. That’s the mystery.”
“Smoke knows everything.”
“He’s next on our list. Meantime …”
Marta ducked and covered her head. “A bat just buzzed me, I swear to God!”
“Don’t be such a wuss.” Nick jiggled the knob on the back door, which was locked.
“We should go. It’s a long walk back,” Marta said, apprehensively eyeing the sky.
Nick scanned the porch until he spotted a large clay pot that contained a wilted palm. “Give me a hand,” he said, pocketing the flashlight. “We’re going to lift that thing.”
“Okay, now you’re officially insane.”
“Hurry up. On the count of three …”
The pot budged only a few inches, but that was enough. Nick pointed to a dusty circle on the wood planks, and there lay a key. He smiled.
“Way to go, Sherlock,” Marta said.
The key fit easily into the door, and the lock turned with a crisp click.
“You coming?” Nick asked. “Or would you rather stay out here with the bats and black widows?”
ELEVEN
Nick wasn’t sure if sneaking into Mrs. Starch’s house was the bravest thing he’d ever done, or the dumbest.
But he felt certain that the world’s meanest biology teacher wasn’t really absent from school because of a family crisis. Something else had happened, something serious, and Duane Scrod Jr. had to be involved.
“What if she’s croaked?” Marta whispered as she closed the door behind them. “What if we find the body?”
The same awful thought had occurred to Nick, although he didn’t say it aloud.
“Then the cops’ll think we did it! We’ll spend the rest of our lives in prison!” Marta said.
“Keep it down, okay?”
“This is the darkest place I’ve ever been. Give me your hand.”
“I’ve only got one,” Nick reminded her, “so you carry the flashlight.”
It had been a long while since he’d held hands with a girl—fifth grade, Jessie Kronenberg. The following summer her family had moved to Atlanta, and Nick hadn’t heard from her since.
“Where do you think the old witch keeps all her snakes?” Marta asked, squeezing his fingers.
“That’s just another lame rumor.”
“Maybe it’s a true rumor. Maybe she whacked her husband, too. They say he disappeared, like, twenty years ago.”
Nick and Marta hadn’t moved three steps since coming through the door.
“I’m totally sketched out,” she said.
“I know—you’re crushing my knuckles.”
Nick pulled free of her grasp and took back the flashlight. The moment he turned it on, he saw that at least one of the many crazy stories about Mrs. Starch was true. The house was filled with stuffed animals—and not the soft, huggable type that are found in toy stores.
Marta said, “We … are … outta here.”
“Hold on.”
“It’s, like, a zoo for the dead!”
Nick, too, had never imagined such a scene—a herd of taxidermied creatures displayed in wild disorder, from wall to wall and from the floor to the rafters. There were birds, mammals, reptiles, and amphibians of many sizes, suspended in poses of coiling, leaping, lurking, snarling, soaring, and pouncing. The animals stared with blank glass eyes through Nick and Marta, into infinity.
“I told you she was a psycho,” Marta whispered.
Nick played the beam of the flashlight across the lifeless menagerie. Every mount was identified by a handwritten tag.
“I think I know what she’s done here,” he said.
“Besides losing her marbles?”
Nick approached a tawny spotted cat the size of a golden retriever. Beside it was a small mottled bird, perched sprightly on a stick of driftwood. Mounted overhead on the wall was a homely brown fish with armored ridges. Nick checked the tags on each of them.
“They’re all endangered species,” he told Marta. “That’s a panther cub, that’s a Cape Sable seaside sparrow, and that ugly thing up on the wall is a shortnose sturgeon. I know they’re endangered because Mrs. Starch has a list in her class syllabus.”
“You actually read her syllabus? Are you, what, king of the geeks?”
“She said it would be on the final.”
“Whatever, Nick. We gotta get back to the mall before—”
“Look here.” He fixed the light on a short-eared brown bunny. “A Lower Keys marsh rabbit. And there,” he said, pointing to a stubby-legged lump the size of a hockey puck, “is a baby leatherback turtle. And this little guy is a—”
“Rat,” Marta interrupted irritably. “A nasty, smelly rat.”
“Wrong.” Nick pronounced the name slowly from the name tag. “It’s a Choc-taw-hatch-ee beach mouse.”
“That was my next guess,” she said dryly.
“Hey, here’s one with a collar.” Nick grinned as he read it aloud: “ ‘Chelsea Evered.’ Must be somebody special.”
Marta looked around uneasily. “This place is too freaky.”
Nick approached a weather-beaten old steamer trunk. The lid was so bulky and warped that he was unable to raise it onehanded.
“Help me out,” he said to Marta.
“No way! What if that’s where she stuffed Mr. Starch’s body?”
“Quit whining.”
Together they prized open the antique chest, which, to Marta’s relief, was empty.
She crinkled her nose. “Smells like my grandpa’s attic.”
A car door slammed outside. Nick instantly clicked off the flashlight.
“Get down!” he said, tugging Marta to the floor.
The glow from the car’s headlights lit the edges of the window shades. Nick and Marta heard someone clomping up the steps, making no effort to be stealthy. The next noise was the rattle of the doorknob.
“We’re so busted,” Marta groaned.
Nick motioned toward the open trunk. “After you.”
“Nope. Not happening.”
“Get in!”
They clambered inside and pulled the top shut. The only sound was the thump of footsteps on the pine floor, and the footsteps were not dainty. It could have been Mrs. Starch, who wasn’t a dainty woman, or it could have been Smoke.
Or possibly some other sizeable person.
“I can’t breathe,” Marta said wretchedly.
“Yes, you can.”
“Turn on the flashlight, Nick, or I’m gonna scream.”
“Don’t tell me you’re claustrophobic.”
“Big-time.”
Nick said, “Oh, that’s great.” He, too, had a fear of confined spaces. The flashlight wouldn’t come on until he jiggled the batteries.
“Is that better?” he asked.
Marta was as pale as wax and drenched with sweat. She looked terrible.
The steamer trunk was barely wide enough for the two of them to wedge side by side, sitting with their knees against their chins. For Nick, the cramped fit was as painful as it was unnerving. His taped-up arm was pinned at an unnatural angle against his shoulder blade—he felt like a hawk with a broken wing.
Still, he was more concerned about Marta. “It’s all my fault. I’m really sorry,” he whispered.
She shut her eyes and took a deep, labo
red breath. “You’ll really be sorry if I hurl all over both of us.”
The person who’d entered the house was moving around, opening cabinets and cupboards. Gradually the sounds of the footsteps came closer, making the planks shudder beneath the trunk.
Nick wished he’d listened to Marta when she had told him to remove the Ace bandage—it would have been helpful to have two good hands available, if needed. He was furious at himself for taking such a foolish risk by entering Mrs. Starch’s house. The last thing his mom needed right now was a phone call from the police or, worse, the hospital. And how would she break the bad news to his father?
As the footfalls got heavier, Marta’s eyes popped open. “Can he see that light inside this thing?”
“I doubt it,” Nick said. The sides of the old chest appeared solid and seamless.
“Better turn it off, just in case.”
“You won’t spaz out?”
“Nope.”
Nick killed the flashlight. He could sense Marta trembling at his side. In the smothering blackness, he reached out and found one of her hands. She squeezed back fiercely. By now they could hear the cadence of human breathing outside the steamer trunk—whoever was in the house, man or woman, was standing only a few feet away.
Time seemed to stop dead. Nick felt trapped in his own skin, helpless and on the brink of panic. Taking care of Marta was the only thing that kept him steady; she was in worse shape than he was.
His escape strategy was simple because he was short on options. If they were discovered inside the trunk, Nick planned to spring straight upward, shrieking like a lunatic jack-in-the-box. The idea was to scare the pee out of the person in the room, in the hope that he (or she) would either run away or have a stroke, at which point Nick and Marta could bolt safely out the back door.
Nick figured that the shock tactic had a fifty-fifty chance of working on Mrs. Starch, who wouldn’t be expecting nocturnal intruders. He wasn’t so sure about Smoke; it was hard to picture the kid being afraid of anything, except possibly a SWAT team.
Marta’s hand went limp and clammy. Nick gave it a little pinch, but she didn’t respond. In the pitch-darkness of the steamer chest, he groped frantically for her face to make sure she was still breathing.
“Watch it!” she burst out. “Your stupid thumb went up my nose.”