Nine
TESS MOVED AWAY from the hole in the ceiling and huddled in the corner farthest from it as she listened to the footfalls.
“Qui est là?” a voice said from above. Who’s here?
A male voice. Not a child’s but not old enough to be the man in the truck.
“Il y a quelqu’un?” Is someone there? Then a grunt, as if in disgust, the voice growing stronger now as he said in French, “I know someone’s here. You took my flashlight. Come out,” followed by something she couldn’t translate.
The footsteps stopped. A clatter. The flashlight turned on. A curse then. Or she presumed from his tone that it was a curse, though such vocabulary had not been part of their French lessons.
A thump. A dark figure appeared over the hole. He shone the light straight down at first, as if looking for a body. Then he moved it aside, and she saw a boy, her age or a little older. Straight dark hair fell around his face as he leaned over the edge of the hole. He wore a denim jacket, frayed at the collar and cuffs. In one hand he held the flashlight. In the other…
He moved the beam, and it glinted off a switchblade. Tess shrank back and held her breath, but as soon as he shone that light around the small room…
“Merde,” he muttered and eased back onto his haunches with a deep, aggrieved sigh. Then he leaned forward again and spoke rapid-fire French. It was clearly a question. When she didn’t reply, he said it again, and Tess decided that whatever the situation, cowering wasn’t going to help.
She rose and brushed herself off. “Do you speak English?”
“Not if I can help it.” His English was thickly accented but much better than her French, so she ignored the sentiment and said, “I fell.”
“No kidding.” Another grunt, as aggrieved as his sigh, and he pushed to his feet. “Get out of there and find your own place for the night. This one’s mine.”
“There’s no way out.”
“Sure there is. It’s called a door.” He started walking away. Tess hurried over to the hole as he said, “Don’t ask for my flashlight either. If you need light…”
He tossed something down. She caught a book of matches.
“Just don’t burn the place down,” he said. “You’ve done enough damage.”
“You don’t understand,” she said. “There’s no door.”
A snort. Boots clomped as he returned to the hole and shone the light down. “It’s right—”
The beam passed over four solid walls. Then it crossed them again, slower.
“No door,” she said. “If you spot a secret hatch, though, I’ll be happy to take it.”
She couldn’t see his face very well, given the angle and the shadows and the hair falling around it as he leaned down. But when he looked her way, she could see his eyes—gray-blue and narrowed, as if it was her own fault for falling into a doorless room.
“How much to get you out?” he asked.
“What?”
“I thought you said you spoke English.”
“I do. I—” She realized he was being sarcastic. “A dollar.”
“Two.”
“One-fifty.”
“Throw it up.”
Now it was her turn to snort. Which she did—and tossed up two quarters. “You’ll get the rest when I’m out. And only if you throw me the knife first.”
“What?”
“The knife. I’m not climbing up there while you’re holding a knife.”
He scooped up the quarters. “Then I guess you aren’t climbing up here.”
“Do you want the dollar?”
“Rescued, yes. Mugged, no.”
More eye narrowing. “Do I look like a mugger?”
“You just demanded payment to rescue someone trapped in an abandoned basement.”
“Payment for services rendered. Not theft.”
Tess could argue that, considering her alternative seemed to be slow death by dehydration, it certainly felt like robbery. But she settled for saying, “Still, you can see where I’d be concerned, being rescued by someone with a knife who seems determined to turn a profit in the matter.”
“And you can see where I’d be concerned, giving my knife to someone who obviously doesn’t think I deserve to turn a profit in the matter.”
“You think I would—” She paused. “You have a point.”
His brows lifted, as if surprised she’d admitted it. He hesitated, then drew back his hand—the one holding the knife. If he’d been a moment slower, she’d have ducked and probably yelped, but fortunately for her ego, he threw it before she realized what was happening. The knife shot to his left and landed with a thwack, embedded in the wall.
“There,” he said. “Out of both our reaches.”
“Thank you.”
He grunted and walked away. To find something to haul her up with. Or so she hoped.
Tess stood a reasonable distance from the hole and struggled to catch her breath. He’d located a rope, which sounded like the obvious way to pull someone out of a basement, but again, it hadn’t been as easy as it seemed in books. She’d climbed and he’d pulled—less than she climbed, she suspected—and now they were both recuperating from the operation.
He was smaller than he’d seemed looming over that hole. Shorter anyway. Billy was five foot nine and lamenting his chances of reaching six feet. This boy was about the same age but a couple of inches shorter. He was slender and wiry—he’d pulled off his jean jacket for the rescue operation. When she’d first come up over the edge, she’d thought he was Native Canadian, with his straight black hair and light brown skin, but those gray-blue eyes suggested there was more. Métis was the word that sprang to mind, courtesy of a history teacher who’d been enamored of the Louis Riel story.
Métis were originally the children of French trappers and Native women. Of course, the days of trapping were long past, but the Métis remained a distinct culture. Whether this boy was Métis or simply of mixed race was irrelevant though. Anything about him beyond the fact that he’d come by at a very good time was irrelevant.
“Thank you,” she said, graciously she hoped, as she passed him a dollar bill.
“I’m Therese,” she said. “Tess.”
He gave her a cool, level stare. “And I’m the guy who had to rescue you. Let’s leave it at that. The exit is over there.” He pointed at the broken window.
“Can I ask you—”
“No. Whatever it is, the answer is no. I’m tired, and this is my place. Go find your own.”
“Can I just ask—”
“Did I say no? Now unless you want to rent a room from me…”
Her expression must have answered for her.
He chuckled. “Thought so. Go away, little girl. You’ve caused enough trouble tonight.”
He went to retrieve his knife, and Tess decided to do as he asked.
Tess spent the night in the forest, as close to the house as possible. Given the alternatives, it seemed safest, which proved exactly how unsafe her life had become since leaving Hope. She was exhausted enough that she barely had time to consider her surroundings before she dropped into as deep a sleep as if she’d been home in her bed.
At dawn she was back in the house, sitting in the least smelly armchair, waiting for the boy to wake up. He finally opened one eye, spied her through a curtain of hair and jumped up, one hand brushing his hair back, the other fumbling for the knife that was, apparently, not where he’d left it. That’s when he finally recognized the intruder and started swearing in a creative mix of English and French and possibly a third language.
“You left it over there.” She pointed at the blade by the fireplace. “You must have been as tired as I was last night.”
“What part of go away wasn’t perfectly clear?”
“I went away. Then I came back.” She hopped from the chair and walked over. “I have a proposal for you.”
“A what?”
“A job. I would like to hire you to—”
He cut her off with a sputtered laugh. “And what makes you think I’m in the market for a job?”
“You demanded money to rescue me last night.”
“Maybe I just didn’t appreciate the inconvenience.”
“You’re living in an abandoned house, which means you’re a runaway. Unless you’re eighteen, which makes you a vagrant instead.”
His eyes narrowed. “A vagrant? Why would you say that?”
“One look at you.”
More narrowing. “Is that right? So you just presume, based on my looks, that I’m a vagrant.”
“Yes. You need a shower. Desperately—”
“What?” He seemed genuinely surprised. Apparently, he hadn’t seen a mirror in a while.
“Shower. Water plus soap. Shampoo would be nice. Your T-shirt is dirty and your jeans look like they could stand up on their own.”
He said nothing.
“What?” she said. “If you don’t believe me, I’m sure there’s a mirror—”
“That’s what you meant when you said I look like a vagrant?”
“Yes. Your hair is too long, but you don’t look like a hippie, which is always another excuse for the lack of showering.”
“Uh-huh…”
“If I had to pick—”
“Please do.” He crossed his arms.
“I’d say runaway, not vagrant. You don’t look eighteen, and even if you were, you’re too well educated to be a vagrant. Despite the accent, your English is perfect.”
“That’s not education. That’s growing up with an English mother.”
“Which would not explain your level of diction.”
His face screwed up. “My what?”
Tess sighed and returned to the chair. “If you wish to pretend you’re a tough kid from the wrong side of the tracks, go ahead. I can see the advantages of the ruse if you’re living on the streets. But take my advice. Use smaller words.”
“You think you’re clever, don’t you?”
“Not particularly. Better than average perhaps.”
He shook his head.
Before he could speak, she continued. “I’m not interested in the specifics of your situation.”
“Really? Could have fooled me.”
“Have I asked you a single question? No. I simply offered you a job. I do have questions about this house, though, which you may or may not be able to answer. If you cannot, I’ll ask for your help obtaining them in town, as your French is significantly better than mine. I’ll pay you five dollars for a day’s work.”
He stared at her.
“It’s a lot, I know,” she said.
“I wasn’t thinking that. I was wondering if you’re as crazy as you seem.”
She tried not to flinch. “Probably. But I have money. So in this case, crazy is to your advantage.”
He pushed up from the floor, walked to the fireplace and picked up his knife. Then he took three slow, deliberate steps toward her. “And if I’d prefer the money without the work?”
“I don’t have it on me.”
He seemed to bristle at that. “Because you expected me to steal it?”
Tess sighed. “You threaten to take my money at knife-point and then get offended at my suggestion that you’re a thief. More advice? If you’re going to affect a persona, you have to stick to it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Liar. As I said, your story is none of my concern. I hid my money as a general precaution because I don’t know you. All I have is this.” She took the five from her pocket. “You could steal it, but you said last night that you don’t steal money. You earn it. I’m offering you the chance to earn it.”
“You’re crazy.”
“I’ve heard that. So…” She waggled the five. “A fair day’s wages.”
That familiar narrowing of his eyes. “Half now.”
She ripped the bill and handed him half. “So, where do we get breakfast?”