Read Online Nightshades (Nameless Detective) by Bill Pronzini - Free Book Online
Authors: Bill Pronzini
Ads: Link
windows were either boarded up or sealed with tacked-on sheets of tin.
Kerry seemed impressed. “This is some place,” she said. “I’ve never been in a ghost town before.”
“Spooky, huh?”
“No. I’m fascinated. How long have these buildings been here?”
“Well over a century, some of them.”
“And people have been living here all that time and nobody ever tried to restore them?”
“Not in a good long while.”
“Well, why not? I mean, you’d think somebody would want to preserve a historic place like this.”
“Somebody does,” I said. “The Northern Development Corporation.”
“I don’t mean that kind of preservation. You know what I mean.”
“Uh-huh. It’s a good question, but I don’t know the answer.”
She frowned a little, thoughtfully. “What kind of people live here, anyway?”
“That’s another good question. I guess we’ll find out pretty soon.”
The four fire-destroyed buildings had been set apart from the others, on the south side of the road. That, along with the facts that there had been no wind on the night of the blaze, that the meadow grass was still spring-green, and that Jack Coleclaw and the other residents had spotted the fire right away and rushed to do battle with it, had saved the whole of the abandoned camp from going up. As it was, there was nothing left of the four structures except stone foundations and timber fragments like blackened and splintered bones, with a wide swatch of scorched earth and a hastily dug firebreak ringing them.
I stopped the car at the edge of the firebreak. Kerry said, “I suppose you’re going to go poke around over there.”
“Yup. Come along if you want to.”
“In all that soot? No thanks. I think I’ll go back and look at the ghosts.”
We got out into the hot sunshine. It was quiet there, peaceful except for the distant yammering of a jay, and the air was heavy with the scent of wildflowers and evergreens. Kerry wandered off along the road; I took out the old, soot-stained trenchcoat I’d worn in Redding, put it on and belted it, and then went across the firebreak to the burned-out buildings.
The county sheriff’s investigators had been over the area without finding anything; I didn’t expect to have better luck, any more than I had at the remains of Munroe Randall’s house. But then, I’d had some training in arson investigation myself, back when I was on the San Francisco cops, and I read the updated handbooks and manuals put out by police associations and insurance companies. I had also had a handful of jobs over the years involving arson. You have to keep checking and double-checking: that’s what detective work is all about.
The first thing you do on an inspection of a fire scene is to determine the point of origin. Once you’ve got that, you look for something to indicate how the fire started, whether it was accidental or a case of arson. If it was arson, what you’re after is the corpus delicti—evidence of the method or device used by the arsonist.
One of the ways to locate point of origin is to check the “alligatoring,” or charring, of the surface of the burned wood. This can tell you in which direction the fire spread, where it was the hottest, and if you’re fortunate you can trace it straight to the origin. I was fortunate, as it turned out. And not just once—twice. I not only found the point of origin, I found the corpus delicti as well.
It was arson, and no mistake. The fire had been set at the rear of the building farthest to the north, whatever that one might once have been; and what had been used to ignite it was a candle. I found the residue of it, a wax deposit inside a small cup-shaped piece of stone that was hidden under a pile of rubble. It took me ten minutes of sifting around and getting my hands and the trenchcoat completely blackened to dredge up the stone. Which was no doubt why the sheriff’s men hadn’t been as thorough as they should have been; not everybody is
Kerry seemed impressed. “This is some place,” she said. “I’ve never been in a ghost town before.”
“Spooky, huh?”
“No. I’m fascinated. How long have these buildings been here?”
“Well over a century, some of them.”
“And people have been living here all that time and nobody ever tried to restore them?”
“Not in a good long while.”
“Well, why not? I mean, you’d think somebody would want to preserve a historic place like this.”
“Somebody does,” I said. “The Northern Development Corporation.”
“I don’t mean that kind of preservation. You know what I mean.”
“Uh-huh. It’s a good question, but I don’t know the answer.”
She frowned a little, thoughtfully. “What kind of people live here, anyway?”
“That’s another good question. I guess we’ll find out pretty soon.”
The four fire-destroyed buildings had been set apart from the others, on the south side of the road. That, along with the facts that there had been no wind on the night of the blaze, that the meadow grass was still spring-green, and that Jack Coleclaw and the other residents had spotted the fire right away and rushed to do battle with it, had saved the whole of the abandoned camp from going up. As it was, there was nothing left of the four structures except stone foundations and timber fragments like blackened and splintered bones, with a wide swatch of scorched earth and a hastily dug firebreak ringing them.
I stopped the car at the edge of the firebreak. Kerry said, “I suppose you’re going to go poke around over there.”
“Yup. Come along if you want to.”
“In all that soot? No thanks. I think I’ll go back and look at the ghosts.”
We got out into the hot sunshine. It was quiet there, peaceful except for the distant yammering of a jay, and the air was heavy with the scent of wildflowers and evergreens. Kerry wandered off along the road; I took out the old, soot-stained trenchcoat I’d worn in Redding, put it on and belted it, and then went across the firebreak to the burned-out buildings.
The county sheriff’s investigators had been over the area without finding anything; I didn’t expect to have better luck, any more than I had at the remains of Munroe Randall’s house. But then, I’d had some training in arson investigation myself, back when I was on the San Francisco cops, and I read the updated handbooks and manuals put out by police associations and insurance companies. I had also had a handful of jobs over the years involving arson. You have to keep checking and double-checking: that’s what detective work is all about.
The first thing you do on an inspection of a fire scene is to determine the point of origin. Once you’ve got that, you look for something to indicate how the fire started, whether it was accidental or a case of arson. If it was arson, what you’re after is the corpus delicti—evidence of the method or device used by the arsonist.
One of the ways to locate point of origin is to check the “alligatoring,” or charring, of the surface of the burned wood. This can tell you in which direction the fire spread, where it was the hottest, and if you’re fortunate you can trace it straight to the origin. I was fortunate, as it turned out. And not just once—twice. I not only found the point of origin, I found the corpus delicti as well.
It was arson, and no mistake. The fire had been set at the rear of the building farthest to the north, whatever that one might once have been; and what had been used to ignite it was a candle. I found the residue of it, a wax deposit inside a small cup-shaped piece of stone that was hidden under a pile of rubble. It took me ten minutes of sifting around and getting my hands and the trenchcoat completely blackened to dredge up the stone. Which was no doubt why the sheriff’s men hadn’t been as thorough as they should have been; not everybody is
Similar Books
