Where Echoes Live Read Online Free PDF Page B

city.”
    â€œThen I’ll check up on them when I get back there.”
    â€œGood.”
    Ripinsky stood, stretched his tall, lean body. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but it’s been a long day. And McCone’s had quite a drive; she probably wants to turn in.”
    Gratefully I stood, and Anne-Marie followed suit. We made plans to meet back there in the morning, so I could outline my plan of action—assuming I’d developed one by then—and Ripinsky, Anne-Marie, and I left together.
    As I drove away, I could see Sanderman through the still-lighted window of the trailer; he was once again playing with his computer.
    I followed Anne-Marie’s Subaru to the lodge and pulled up beside it at the edge of the grove. She got out and said, “Sorry Ned went on like that. I think he may have been trying to demonstrate that he has the situation under control and doesn’t really need you.”
    â€œI take it he wasn’t in favor of an outsider coming in.”
    â€œHe might have been, if Hy hadn’t supported the idea.”
    â€œIs there some ill will between them?”
    She took a small flashlight from her bag and shone it on the ground as we walked downhill to the cabin. “More like competitiveness, at least on Ned’s part. Hy was perfectly civil to him at first, but now relations are definitely strained. All I could think of for the last half hour was how much I’d like to get out of there and have a brandy. Fortunately, I’ve got some in the cabin. Join me for a nightcap?”
    â€œYou’re on.”
    We climbed the steps to the cabin’s porch; she got the door unlocked, reached inside, and switched on an overhead fixture—two bare bulbs attached to a horseshoe-shaped piece of hammered metal that cast garish light over the room and accentuated its more obvious flaws.
    â€œUgh,” she said and went to turn on a table lamp. “Switch that overhead off, will you? Brandy’s in the kitchen cupboard to the right of the sink. I’ll get the wood stove going—it’s cold in here.”
    I did as she asked, then went through the swinging door to the kitchen and located a pull chain for the light over the sink. The room had knotty pine cabinets, worn green linoleum, and cracked tile countertops in an unfortunate shade of orange. The appliances were as old as the fifties-vintage ones in the kitchen at All Souls. Still, if Sanderman’s kitchen was as clean as this, I had to dispute his claim of germs lurking within. Probably his complaints were merely an indication that he was unhappy at being here.
    I found the brandy and two glasses that looked as if they had originally contained olives or maraschino cherries and carried them back to the living room. Anne-Marie stood with her back to me at one of the windows that opened onto the porch. She half turned, and I saw a peculiar frozen expression on her face.
    Quickly I set the bottle and glasses on the coffee table. “What’s wrong?”
    â€œThe window. That’s why it’s so cold in here.”
    â€œOh, I’m sorry. I opened it earlier and forgot to close it when I left.”
    â€œBut you didn’t take the screen off, did you?” She pointed to where it was supposed to hook at the bottom; the hook was still in the eyelet, it had been ripped off the screen’s frame.
    She started to say something else, but I held up my hand, listening. It was very quiet in the cabin—but such silences can be deceptive. I crossed to the wood stove and picked up the poker, then moved toward the bedrooms.
    I swept the curtain aside from the archway leading to the room I was occupying. Nothing except the cheap maple bureau and single nightstand between twin beds. There was no closet where anyone could hide. My weekend bag sat on the bureau; I glanced at it as I moved toward the bath that connected this room with Anne-Marie’s. The bag seemed to be the