As the guy descended the three veranda steps to the street, Dad said, “There’s a restoration project for a place as inconsequential as this?”
“To us, every place is consequential, Mr.—？”
“Fielding,” Dad said. “Dr. Steven Fielding. From the state university at Billings. History department. I’m surprised to hear that the legislature in Helena has been able to scare up funds for something like this.”
“I’m Asher Optime.” The tall man held out his right hand, and they shook, and he said, “Are there neglected sites from the period that you think should take preference over Zipporah, Dr. Fielding?”
“Not necessarily. Maybe. I’d have to think about it. I’m just pleased to hear the politicians care about preserving anything. This is my son, Colson.”
Optime’s grip was firm and dry as he shook Colson’s hand.
The man’s eyes were bottle-glass green. Although Colson didn’t drink alcohol and although tequila didn’t come in green containers as far as he knew, something about those eyes reminded him that some traditional Mexican-made brands of tequila featured a small, curled worm in the bottom of the bottle. It was totally weird that such a thing should occur to him.
“Well, sir,” Optime said to Colson’s father, “if you have any informed thoughts about other sites you recommend for restoration, feel free to contact me about them. Let me give you my card.”
The guy reached behind for a wallet, but the pistol must have been tucked under his belt, in the small of his back, because that was what he produced. He fired two rounds point-blank, head shots. In a shower of blood but not just blood, Colson’s dad—his one dad, his only dad—fell backward and lay faceup, except it wasn’t Dad’s face anymore, it was broken and twisted and horrible, and Colson looked away, into the muzzle of the pistol.
31
From the boathouse, Wyatt went to the stables, of which there were four, each with ten stalls. These were sturdily built clapboard buildings, painted white with red ceramic-tile roofs, with electric heating in winter.
The horses that had belonged to the previous owner were long gone, although Liam and Lyndsey O’Hara had intended eventually to acquire four or five gentle mares, not for breeding purposes, but only so that they and their children could learn to ride together.
The stalls had been mucked out. The half doors were all neatly closed. The air carried a thin scent of straw, the earthen smell of the hard-packed floor, and what might have been the faint fragrance of a liniment used on horses and once spilled here, saturating the soil.
He encountered nothing strange, nothing threatening, but he felt nonetheless watched.
In the five-room bungalow that had housed the ranch manager for each of the previous owners, he found nothing remarkable except the rats. He didn’t see them, but he heard them pitter-pattering across the beams and flooring in the attic. The place had been empty for some months, and the rodents had taken up residence. They were quiet when he first entered the house; however, as he prowled the rooms, searching for he knew not what, they became increasingly agitated. It seemed that minute by minute they increased in number, as if calling others of their kind out of the fields and up through the walls to race in an unnatural frenzy overhead, with some purpose that he couldn’t imagine.
From a two-foot-square trapdoor in the hallway ceiling dangled a pull cord, offering access to the chamber above. As the noise became yet more frantic but included no squeaking rodent voices, Wyatt wondered if what occupied that high space might be something other than rats. He considered drawing down the trapdoor ladder and going up there for a look.
Vermin didn’t unnerve him. A rodent was just another mammal, and even a horde of them wasn’t as fearsome as any single, tailless human rat.
He reached up and gripped the yellow plastic handle on the pull cord. Hesitated.
The escalating noise in the attic seemed to be concentrated directly over him. The trapdoor creaked and rattled softly in its frame. If rats were gathered in numbers on the spring-loaded ladder, they would spill down on him as the segments of rungs unfolded to the hallway floor.
Intuition suggested caution. He was alone on the ranch. Rather than proceed with this now, he would be better advised to call Vance Potter, so they could investigate the attic together. Rats were just another mammal, yes; however, they carried disease.
Anyway, whatever swarmed in the attic must be somehow related to the fireflies and to the thing that invaded the boathouse. He didn’t understand this place, didn’t know what power animated it, what presence ruled here, why Nature seemed to be cognizant of him or why she appeared to be marshaling her creatures against him. Until he had at least a figment of a theory, he needed to proceed with caution.