Read Online Tin City Tinder (A Boone Childress Mystery) by David Macinnis Gill - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: David Macinnis Gill
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in kindergarten.
I carried the plate to the porch and flung the cookies into the yard. “Bon appetite, birds!” The crows would eat them for sure.
Bzzt. My pager went off.
The call codes indicated a house fire in Nagswood, a wide place in the road on Highway Twelve. Only ten miles away. Nobody had a chance to get there before me.
“No heroics this time,” I admonished myself as I started the truck. My turnouts were on the floorboard, and the hooligan tool was on the gun rack. “Rules and regs, just like Lamar wanted. You’ll even follow the speed limit. Sort of.”
I radioed Julia, who was working dispatch. “I’m 10-76 and running 10-39. ETA, ten minutes.”
“You’re first responder,” Julia replied through the static. “You know the drill. Status report only. Don’t take action till the Captain has boots on the ground.”
“Roger that.”
“I mean it, Possum.”
“So do I. Out.”
I swerved around a fresh load of horse apples in the middle of the dirt road. If I needed any motivation to behave, the apples were there a reminder of all the stalls I’d have to muck if I screwed up again.
There was nothing like a pile of steaming manure to inspire you to do better, even when you knew in your heart that you hadn’t learned your lesson.
2
Like the Tin City and Duck properties, the house in Nagswood was set well off the highway, down a mile long dirt road that was so overgrown with cedar trees and white pines, it was difficult to navigate. If not for a For Sale sign marked SOLD from Landis Commercial Real Estate, I might have driven past the road, and I definitely would’ve missed the sharp left turn through a hedge row, even though there was a thick column of smoke already rising into the blue sky.
A stream cut the boundary between properties. The ground was scorched. The yard was lined with electrified wire and two large signs warning trespassers that violators would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. No Trespassing signs were ubiquitous in this part of the county. The growth of the towns in the east had forced wildlife west. Hunters followed along behind, and property owners found their quiet weekends destroyed by the baying of Treeing Walkers, a dog breed known for their ability to flush out small game by making enough racket to wake the dead.
“Number Seventeen reporting in. Julia, I’m on site.”
“Roger that.”
I parked next to an old tobacco barn a hundred yards from the house. There was another truck already on site, a half-ton pickup with dual rear wheels. Three firefights stood beside the truck. They were dressed in yellow turnouts with orange piping. Atamasco Volunteer Fire Department was stenciled across their backs.
How had they gotten there before me?
“Atamasco VFD’s already on the scene,” I told dispatch.
“That’s real quick,” Julia said. “Lamar called in right before you. He says to radio in a status check.”
“Roger that.” I pulled on my turnouts. Grabbed my helmet and the hooligan. Walked across the patchy grass field toward the other firefighters.
The leader spoke to the other two vollies, and they moved toward the house. They wore hand-me-down turnouts and sweat-soaked T-shirts. Their hair was stringy and hung down past their necks, and unless I was mistaken, they were twins.
They split up and took either side of the building.
Something didn’t seem right.
“Y’all got here quick,” I said. “Thought I’d be first responder.”
The leader sported a mop of black hair and a threadbare beard. He wore a blood-red shirt under his unbuttoned fire coat. His head barely reached my chin, but he was broad and stump-shaped, which made him seem bigger. There was something familiar about his face, the way his teeth jutted forward from a pronounced prognathism.
“Looks like you thought wrong.”
“Atamasco’s a long way from here.”
“We’re out hunting the Black River. Not that it’s any of your goddamned
I carried the plate to the porch and flung the cookies into the yard. “Bon appetite, birds!” The crows would eat them for sure.
Bzzt. My pager went off.
The call codes indicated a house fire in Nagswood, a wide place in the road on Highway Twelve. Only ten miles away. Nobody had a chance to get there before me.
“No heroics this time,” I admonished myself as I started the truck. My turnouts were on the floorboard, and the hooligan tool was on the gun rack. “Rules and regs, just like Lamar wanted. You’ll even follow the speed limit. Sort of.”
I radioed Julia, who was working dispatch. “I’m 10-76 and running 10-39. ETA, ten minutes.”
“You’re first responder,” Julia replied through the static. “You know the drill. Status report only. Don’t take action till the Captain has boots on the ground.”
“Roger that.”
“I mean it, Possum.”
“So do I. Out.”
I swerved around a fresh load of horse apples in the middle of the dirt road. If I needed any motivation to behave, the apples were there a reminder of all the stalls I’d have to muck if I screwed up again.
There was nothing like a pile of steaming manure to inspire you to do better, even when you knew in your heart that you hadn’t learned your lesson.
2
Like the Tin City and Duck properties, the house in Nagswood was set well off the highway, down a mile long dirt road that was so overgrown with cedar trees and white pines, it was difficult to navigate. If not for a For Sale sign marked SOLD from Landis Commercial Real Estate, I might have driven past the road, and I definitely would’ve missed the sharp left turn through a hedge row, even though there was a thick column of smoke already rising into the blue sky.
A stream cut the boundary between properties. The ground was scorched. The yard was lined with electrified wire and two large signs warning trespassers that violators would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. No Trespassing signs were ubiquitous in this part of the county. The growth of the towns in the east had forced wildlife west. Hunters followed along behind, and property owners found their quiet weekends destroyed by the baying of Treeing Walkers, a dog breed known for their ability to flush out small game by making enough racket to wake the dead.
“Number Seventeen reporting in. Julia, I’m on site.”
“Roger that.”
I parked next to an old tobacco barn a hundred yards from the house. There was another truck already on site, a half-ton pickup with dual rear wheels. Three firefights stood beside the truck. They were dressed in yellow turnouts with orange piping. Atamasco Volunteer Fire Department was stenciled across their backs.
How had they gotten there before me?
“Atamasco VFD’s already on the scene,” I told dispatch.
“That’s real quick,” Julia said. “Lamar called in right before you. He says to radio in a status check.”
“Roger that.” I pulled on my turnouts. Grabbed my helmet and the hooligan. Walked across the patchy grass field toward the other firefighters.
The leader spoke to the other two vollies, and they moved toward the house. They wore hand-me-down turnouts and sweat-soaked T-shirts. Their hair was stringy and hung down past their necks, and unless I was mistaken, they were twins.
They split up and took either side of the building.
Something didn’t seem right.
“Y’all got here quick,” I said. “Thought I’d be first responder.”
The leader sported a mop of black hair and a threadbare beard. He wore a blood-red shirt under his unbuttoned fire coat. His head barely reached my chin, but he was broad and stump-shaped, which made him seem bigger. There was something familiar about his face, the way his teeth jutted forward from a pronounced prognathism.
“Looks like you thought wrong.”
“Atamasco’s a long way from here.”
“We’re out hunting the Black River. Not that it’s any of your goddamned
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