thirty-four

“I’m going to park down here,” said Tom, pulling to the curb several houses down from Alberta’s place and clear of the police cruisers’ flashing lights of a fire truck, a panel truck with “Fort Wayne Police Department Technical Response” on the side, and an unmarked vehicle like the one Hutchinson drove. “There’s an umbrella in the back if you want it.”

The mist was turning into a more serious drizzle, but I declined the umbrella and pulled my hood up, trading peripheral vision for hands free to tuck into my pockets. Tom put on a cowboy hat he had brought back from New Mexico. I didn’t say a word, but he still offered, “Keeps the rain off, ma’am.” By the time we had walked the half block to Alberta’s house, I wished I had my rain pants. My jeans were soaked through and the wind was cold. I shoved my hands into my pockets and found a happy surprise. Gloves.

Hutchinson saw us coming and left an older man in a FWPD parka to intercept us. “Alberta is with Louise. Nobody’s hurt.” Hutchinson sported a butterfly bandage over a long gash under his right eye.

“The TV news says one person was hurt,” I said, gesturing toward his face. “You?”

He touched the bandage with one finger and winced. “Yeah. It’s nothing.”

“Looks like it needs stitches,” said Tom. “What happened?”

“I stopped by on my way to the station.” He glanced at the other cops and lowered his voice. “I come to see the kittens almost very day.”

“I don’t blame you,” I said, and Hutchinson nodded at me.

“Alberta’s dogs started raising hell, and wouldn’t be quiet when she told them, like they usually are.” I remembered well the power of Alberta’s quiet! command. Hutchinson continued, “So she went to see what was wrong. I looked out the window and saw a mail truck back out of the driveway, and I heard Alberta open the door, but didn’t think anything about it until she said ‘Oh my God.’”

“A package?” said Tom.

“She came back to the kitty’s room and said I’d better come see. Said it was a bomb.” Hutchinson fidgeted slightly. “Honestly, I thought she was imagining things. She’s been, you know, kind of on edge.”

Who hasn’t? I thought.

“Can’t blame her there,” said Tom.

“Yeah. Well, anyway, the box was on the coffee table, and just as I walked into the living room, there was a loud crack and the window exploded. Glass flying all over the room,” he said.

“It went off ?” I asked. “I thought they said …”

“No, not the package. Something hit the window.” He shook his head. “What a mess. I turned around and pushed Alberta back into the hallway and, you know, made sure she was okay. “I didn’t know I’d been hit until Alberta looked at me and screamed. I wanted to scream, too, when I looked in the mirror.” He started to smile but winced and raised a hand to his cheek. “Long sliver of glass was still stuck in my face.”

“Oww!” I wanted to scream just thinking about it.

“I told Alberta to get the dogs and get out of the house. Then I looked in the box and, well, it looked like a bomb, all right. Luckily Gypsy was in her carrier nursing the babies, so I just grabbed them, got out of the house, and called it in.”

“So it was the big window?” I asked, picturing the expanse of floor-to-ceiling glass at the back of Alberta’s house. Hutchinson nodded, and I said, “You were lucky you weren’t hurt more seriously.”

“But what was it?” asked Tom. “What broke the window?”

“They’re working on that,” said Hutchinson. “And yeah, real lucky. We were just coming into the room, and Alberta was behind me, so she didn’t get hit.”

“The dogs? They weren’t hurt?” I asked. Alberta’s dogs spent a lot of time in the living room, sprawled all over her couch.

“She put them out in the side yard before she came to get me. So they’re okay.”

“Why did she do that?” asked Tom.

Hutchinson shrugged. “Said she had a bad feeling. Lucky.”

“If you can call a bomb scare and shattered window ‘lucky,’” I said.

“I really thought it was a bomb,” said Hutchinson. “Scared the stuffing out of me. It had wires all hooked up to a battery pack, and a cell phone taped to it.” He leaned forward, rested his hands just above his knees, and shook his head. I laid a hand on his shoulder. “I admit it, I was scared. Now I’m just pissed off.”

A panel truck crept down the street, Handy Andy painted on its side. The driver stopped and spoke to one of the police officers. “I called them,” said Hutchinson, pointing at the truck. “Let me go talk to the lieutenant in charge, see if we can at least get some plastic sheeting up over the window while they’re processing the room.”

“Wait, Hutch,” I said. “Was there anything else? I mean, why send a message without a message?” I remembered Alberta telling me about having Crazy Cat Lady sprayed across her garage door. If this assault on Alberta’s house was meant to scare her off, it seemed to me that whoever was behind it would want to be explicit.

“Oh, there was a message. A card taped to the battery pack. I think it’s from a book or something.”

“What did it say?”

“The fire next time.”