She waded around the side of the house through waist-high grass, looking for a way inside. She stopped short when she turned the last corner. The boards across the back door had been pried loose and stacked neatly beside the house, relatively recently, by the look of it. The outer door was held open by a metal bucket filled with old croquet balls. She aimed her flashlight through the filthy screen door and into the gloom of the kitchen. She didn’t see anyone, but even an amateur detective like herself couldn’t miss the footprints that led across the floor, into the empty dining room, and out of sight.
She glanced back at the woods, which had grown ominous and seemed to have crept closer while her back was turned. She had the uncanny sensation of being watched, and despite the heat, every hair on her body stood up. Which was her being ridiculous. A person couldn’t feel someone looking at them. She knew this because she lived in a crowded city. Hundreds of people looked at her every day, and she never felt a thing. So it was absurd for her to be in the middle of a deserted farm, on the threshold of this dead house, and think she could feel someone watching her.
And yet.
“Hello?” she called into the darkness and immediately wished she hadn’t. There was no answer but the moldering silence. That was when a smart person would get out of there. Instead, she eased open the screen door, the rusted-out hinges complaining noisily. It felt like a matter of life and death, and that if she didn’t keep going, then she might as well lie down right there in the tall grass and die. There was a song there somewhere. If she made it through this, she would think about writing it.
She followed the footprints through the kitchen and out to the front hall, where they went up the wooden stairs to the second floor. She called out again, then climbed the stairs. Her hand kept touching the butt of the gun on her hip, as if reassuring herself that it was still there. The faint smell of overripe fruit grew stronger with each step, and by the time she reached the landing, it was overpowering. A hall branched off in both directions. Doors lined a corridor that was littered with trash as if the owners had fled in a hurry, dropping odds and ends as they went. All the doors were open except for one. Of course it was at the end of the hall. And of course the footprints led to it.
Con looked longingly back down the stairs, hoping to convince herself that she had her answer. She was no expert, but that wasn’t rotten fruit making her eyes water. That was the smell of death. For once, it looked like Palingenesis had been right. But she hadn’t come all this way only to turn back now. She had to be sure. So she went down the hall, careful to step only in the footprints. It felt important to leave no trace of herself in this place.
At the door, she drew and held a breath before turning the knob. It didn’t help. The smell that broke loose was rancid and viscous, a clotted fist that slammed into her. Con staggered back, bent double, and vomited in the hallway. Her vision exploded in orange fireworks, and she had to steady herself against the wall to keep from falling down. When her head finally cleared, she spat in the dust, wiped her mouth with the back of her wrist, and risked another look into the dank room.
Liminal sunlight filtered grudgingly through grimy, cataract windows. Dust hung in the air like spores from some fetid swamp. The discolored yellow wallpaper showed the faded outline of a dresser that had once been pushed up against it. On a bare metal bed frame, under a white sheet, lay a human body. Or what she guessed was a body, but if it was the original Constance D’Arcy under there, then the topography was all wrong. It looked bloated and misshapen. One foot hung out from beneath the sheet, the ankle mottled an ugly, carotid purple. Covering her nose and mouth with the collar of her T-shirt, she stepped over the threshold.
She reached out for the sheet, promising herself to pull it down only far enough to be certain. But when she recognized the eyes, the same eyes that had stared back at her since the time she was tall enough to see in a mirror, she kept going. Trembling, she pulled the sheet past the lips that had kissed Zhi for the first time; past the swirling tattoos that covered her left arm, now hopelessly distorted and warped by decay; past the hands that had learned to play guitar. Only when she saw the scars lacing across that ruined knee did she let go of the ruined sheet.
And the violence etched into her body was appalling. She had been stabbed, again and again. Deep, frenzied gashes, any one of which should have been fatal, but that hadn’t been nearly good enough for her killer. And there was a killer. That was undeniable now.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” Con whispered, but whether to herself or the body, she didn’t know. Constance Ada D’Arcy was dead.