The Alpine Recluse Read Free Page A

alert to any emergency calls, as they signal news in Alpine. But it was only when the sirens multiplied and grew near my house that I sat up in bed.
    I looked out the half-opened window. An orange glow filled the sky. Blinking several times, I focused and saw sparks not more than a hundred yards away. Out of the corner of my eye I caught the sight of flashing lights as the emergency vehicles hurtled along Fir Street. Only a few seconds passed before the sirens stopped. I judged that the fire was no more than a block away.
    Hurriedly, I got out of bed and threw a bathrobe over my short summer pajamas. Instead of slippers, I put on sandals. By the time I reached the street, my next-door neighbors, Val and Viv Marsden, were already outside. So were several others, all cautiously moving toward the conflagration.
    “We were just getting ready for bed,” Viv Marsden said breathlessly. “It must be the new house in the cul-de-sac. You know—where Tim and Tiffany Rafferty live.”
    I knew all too well. Tim and Tiffany had been married for less than a year. They’d bought the vacant lot at the end of Fifth Street a few months before their wedding. Six months later they moved into the finished three-bedroom house that had been built by Dick Bourgette, a local contractor.
    If it had seemed hot during the day, the temperature soared as we edged closer to the burning house. The firefighters were already plying their hoses. The Marsdens and I couldn’t get any farther than a few yards from the corner.
    I peered around through the smoke, which was beginning to sting my eyes. Other neighbors were outside, too, but I couldn’t recognize them. Sparks were flying, and the crackle of the flames was deafening. Two loud explosions assaulted my ears, like back-to-back bombs. I heard glass shatter, too. The windows had blown out.
    “Holy Christ!” Val cried in a ragged voice. “It’s a damned inferno!”
    It certainly was. The night air smelled not only of smoke, but other, more repugnant odors: chemicals, plastics, fabric, food—everything that was used to make life livable.
    I winced as I heard timbers break and crumble inside the Rafferty house. “Do you see Tim and Tiffany?” I asked Viv.
    “I can’t see anything.” She coughed. “This is awful.” She turned to Val. “Let’s go back. Maybe we should use our own hoses. If the fire spreads to the trees, our house could be in danger, too.”
    “You’re right,” Val said. “Let’s go.”
    I didn’t blame Viv and Val. Only one other house was between their property and the cul-de-sac, a small rental that had stood vacant for over a year. Maybe I should follow the Marsdens’ lead. The evergreens and the wild berry bushes and the rest of the undergrowth could burst into flames at any moment. The only saving grace was that Dick Bourgette had cleared a swath of ground for a garden that had yet to be landscaped.
    While I was putting a tissue over my nose and mouth, the sheriff pulled up in his Grand Cherokee and the medics arrived from the opposite direction. Milo Dodge awkwardly got out of his vehicle, looking as if he’d thrown his clothes up in the air and run under them.
    “Anyone inside?” I heard him shout to the firefighters.
    The answer was lost in the din and the smoke. From across the street, I could hear Edith Holmgren calling frantically to her various cats. My not-so-congenial neighbors to the west, LaVerne and Doyle Nelson, were ambling down the street with one of their obnoxious teenagers.
    I stood rooted to the dirt track that passed for a sidewalk in my part of Alpine. There was something so primeval about fire. Even though my eyes hurt and my breathing was impaired, I couldn’t stop staring at the flames, licking ever upward above the roof.
    Or what was left of it. I heard more sounds of crashing timbers. Despite the firefighters’ best efforts, the house was doomed. I knew that the main concern now was to contain the blaze. I also knew that I should be