Dogs chase cars. But woe to the mutt who catches one.
—Anonymous
THE ECHO OF the doorbell’s ding-dong barely faded when I heard a sharp pop, like a single firecracker exploding. Then came a loud slam that shook the whole house.
Someone had crashed through a door at the side of the house!
I flew down the concrete steps, practically jumping into the purple blossoms below. I raced around to the side of the house where the sunporch stood. I pushed through some unpleasantly wet evergreen branches, frantically looking for the person fleeing, but I saw no one.
What I did see was a tall line of bushes along the yard, separating the well-kept lawn from the wild, wooded area beyond. Some of those hedges were still shaking, as if someone had just passed through—and the ornamental birdbath was so recently overturned that tiny birds still squabbled around the fast-seeping water.
If I had any doubt someone had run into the woods, it vanished when a huge flock of startled birds suddenly flew up from the trees and took off into the blue sky, squawking angrily.
“Norma!” I cried as I crashed through the hedges. “If that’s you running, please stop! It’s me, Penelope McClure! I only want to talk to you!”
I could hear but still couldn’t see someone crashing through the tangled brush ahead of me. Though the trees were mostly bare this late in autumn, high bushes, saplings, and evergreens blocked much of my view.
The lawn had been slippery from the storm last night, and I nearly fell when I’d crossed it. The forest floor was twice as treacherous, more mud than solid ground, and I began to slip and slide.
“Norma! Stop! Please!”
The noise ahead suddenly ceased.
“That’s it! Wait for me to catch up,” I called, slogging forward.
Unfortunately, I was dressed for work in a bookstore, not a hike through mushy woods. The sucking mud slowed my progress and threatened to pull off my ankle boots.
“Wait, Norma, I’m coming!”
At last, I pulled free from the sludge and lurched forward—only to have three shocking things happen in lightning succession. First I heard a firecracker pop. Then a cold wind whipped around me. The invisible force blew a thick dead branch in front of me so fast that I couldn’t stop myself from tripping over it. My arms flapped like the wings of those angry birds, only I didn’t take to the sky.
A split second before I landed facedown on the muddy ground, I heard another firecracker pop, then something slapped a tree where my head had been before I fell.
Showered with wood splinters from the trunk, I realized with a shock that someone had taken two shots at me!
That’s right, doll, Jack roared in my head. Lucky for you I was here to knock you clear!
“Jack!” I cried (fully out loud).
Are you nuts? Running through the woods after someone with a gat in their hand?
“I thought I was chasing Norma!”
Well, think again, honey.
That’s when I realized there were footprints in the mud. More accurately, boot prints—and big ones, too.
That foot’s the size of a U-boat. Unless Norma joined the circus and got herself some clown shoes, those aren’t her prints.
Again, I heard the snap and crackle of someone moving through the woods. I wanted to stand up for a better look.
“The shooter is getting away!” I rasped.
Stay down! Jack commanded.
Splat!
Another arctic blast pushed me back onto the ground—in the nick of time, as things turned out. Another pop and another slap followed. This time the bullet dinged a tree not two feet away.
I sputtered but stayed flat on my stomach until the sound of movement in the woods finally faded. I had no choice really. The branch I tripped over was now pressing on my back, applying just enough pressure to keep me pinned to the soggy earth.
Finally, the cold press eased.
Groaning, I pushed off the branch, rolled over, and sat up. I was shivering, a combination of post-traumatic shock and the fact that my clothes were soaked—the ones that weren’t covered in thick mud the consistency of wet plaster, anyway.
“Are you crazy?!” I cried.
Me? You’re the one acting like you ought to be fitted for a straitjacket. So don’t argue with someone who knows better than you.
“Hmm,” I replied. “And just what do you know better than me?”
I know that the person with the gun wins every argument. It’s the law of the jungle. So, unless you’ve got a .38 tucked between those two—
“I get it! I get it!”
I climbed unsteadily to my feet. “Okay, Tarzan. Let’s get out of these woods and call 911. I’ll report the shooter, and if we’re lucky, we’ll get some answers about Norma’s so-called next of kin. The local police should be able to confirm who lives here. And if we find Dorothy Jane Willard inside, maybe she’ll have some answers.
I slogged my way back to the hedges and pushed through the narrow gap the shooter had created.
The backyard was still peaceful, almost serene. Purple flowers bobbed in the breeze on high stalks. The tiny birds had given up on the overturned birdbath and flown away. That’s when I noticed the sunporch screen door was standing open. And when I saw the inside of the porch, and what lay there, I stopped dead in my tracks—and dead was the operative word.
I was speechless.
Not Jack.
If that’s your Dorothy Willard, she’s not giving anyone answers, not with her brains scattered all over her nice, neat potted plants.