I hung up and pulled over to the side of the street. I stopped in a pool of shadow between two streetlights, ten yards from the house. There was a light on inside. But no other vehicles outside. He must have had one in another garage. I scanned the nearby houses. There was nothing to suggest which one it could be. I took the gun from my waistband and focused on the front door. Nothing happened for twenty seconds. Then the lights went out in the house. I wound down my window, ready to shoot if the guy ran. But he didn’t appear. The door didn’t open. Ten more seconds passed. Another ten. I opened the phone. Found the button to return the last call I received. Hit it. Sonia answered on the first ring.
I said, “Anything?”
“The lights went off. Did he come out your side?”
“No. Did he come back out yours?”
“No.”
“Sure?”
“A hundred percent.”
“OK. Keep your eyes open. If he approaches, shoot first. Questions afterward.”
Chapter 35
I closed the phone, slipped it into my pocket, and got out of the car. Mansour must have seen me tailing him after all. Or maybe he spotted Sonia’s car. But whatever it was, something had spooked him. That was clear. Because he was staying inside. I could wait him out. There were no creature comforts in the house. And he didn’t strike me as a patient kind of guy. Not as patient as me. I was pretty sure of that. But appearances can be deceptive. I had no idea how long he would stay. Every minute he lay low was a minute Fenton might not have. And there was no guarantee he would come out my side. He could sneak out of the back. Make me get involved with chasing him. Or he could go after Sonia. I didn’t want to end up with two hostages to rescue. So I decided on a different approach.
I cut across diagonally from the sidewalk to the front right-hand corner of the house. Ducked down. Crept beneath the window. Past the door. Around to the far side. Ducked below the first bedroom window. And stopped outside the next room. The bathroom. The best room to break in through. The place you’re least likely to find anyone hanging around. And if someone does happen to be there, they’ll be in the least favorable position to fight back.
I took the knife I’d captured from the guy at the Border Inn out of my pocket. Discarded its sheath. Found its largest blade. Unfolded it. Heard it click into place. It felt solid so I reached across and worked the blade up into the gap between the two sash panels. I found the lock. It was stiff. I increased the pressure until it rotated far enough to disengage. I put the knife away. Switched the gun to my other hand. Raised the lower pane. Just an inch. And peeked in. It was dark. The room seemed empty. There was no movement. No breathing. No running water. Just a regular drip, drip, drip, like I’d heard earlier.
I opened the window the rest of the way and climbed through. I stood and listened. I couldn’t hear anyone. Couldn’t sense anyone’s presence. I didn’t move for five minutes. I needed my eyes to adjust to the dark as fully as possible. Then I moved to the main room. No one was there. I tried the large bedroom. The small bedroom. The kitchen. No one was in any of those places. I tried the external doors. They were locked. I found a light switch. Flicked it on. Saw nothing that helped. Which just left one place to check.
I went back into the bathroom and pulled the front off the medicine cabinet. The whole thing was a mirror. It was old. Its silver was tarnished in places. But it was good enough for what I needed. I approached the hole in the main room’s floor. Stopped three feet from the edge. Used the mirror to look down. Saw the furnace. The water tank. But not Mansour. I worked my way around the circle. Started to the left of the ladder. Moved clockwise. Examined the space below. Inspected it from every angle. All the way around to the right of the ladder. No one was there. The guy had disappeared. There was no trace of him at all.
He must have heard me breaking into the bathroom and used the opportunity to escape. I figured I’d better check in with Sonia in case he went out the back and found her. I put the mirror down and reached for my phone, and I noticed something on the floor. It was faint, but definitely there. A footprint. It was large. Size eighteen, at least. Maybe twenty. Pointing toward the front door. I scanned the path whoever left it should have followed. But I couldn’t see any other prints. I crouched down and looked from every angle. And realized why. The trail stretched in the opposite direction. The guy had come in through the back door. He’d walked around the hole. Got to the top of the ladder. Turned around. And gone down. His feet must have gotten soaked at Dendoncker’s building. By the sprinklers, or all the water the firefighters had hosed in. They must have still been damp when he climbed down. They must have dried out the rest of the way while he was in the cellar. Then when he came back up, they left no more prints.