Constance (Constance #1)(48)
She took the water and flashlight, and clipped the gun to her jeans. Then she ducked under the gate and walked up the long, curving dirt road. Was it a good idea coming here alone? Probably not. But simply because a person recognized the law of gravity didn’t mean they could ignore it and fly away. The pull to know everything was simply too strong.
Greer had asked if her original could still be alive. Looking around, Con wanted desperately to imagine a happy reason that she might have come here but couldn’t think of a single one. Where to start looking? She didn’t relish the prospect of bushwhacking across these fields, an overgrown tangle of weeds, thorns, and tall, wild grasses. She could wander around out here for days without stumbling across anything besides wild animals. Did Virginia have poisonous snakes? That would end badly. And then some poor bastard would stumble across two identical dead bodies. Yeah, best if she started indoors.
The silo was a hollow echo chamber. The doors to the barn were padlocked, but she found a gap between two loose boards and squeezed inside. The musty smell of petrified hay greeted her, and the ancient barn groaned like an old man at an unwelcome knock on the door. Slats in the broken roof threw piano keys of light and dark across the floor. Wiping sweat from her brow, she searched upstairs and down for any sign of human activity.
The floorboards above her head creaked. She froze. She’d only just come from up there—she was alone, she told herself—but it was enough to make her break out in a sweat. Shaken, she decided that concluded her search of the barn. She emerged blinking back into the sunshine and stood in the shade against the wall, drinking from a bottle of water until she could hear the hum of the cicadas above the thud of her heartbeat. That was reckless, she told herself—go back to the car and call the police. This was their job, after all.
Her need to know just laughed. You’re not calling the shots here, it mocked. Now finish your water and go check the house.
The farmhouse sat on a low rise with a view of the property. It was a modest two-story Colonial, psychotic in its rigorous symmetry: twin chimneys at either end, four columns supporting a portico shading the front door, five perfectly spaced windows all boarded shut. Ivy had twined around the columns and spread as far as the second-story windows. There was no way to open the front door without disturbing it, but Con reached through the ivy and tried the handle anyway. The door didn’t budge. She couldn’t say if that was a relief or not.
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.