Nineteen
Still bound wrist and ankle, Evie rolled screaming
across the ground to escape the terrible heat. Lazarus’ screams
from within the mill briefly resonated with her own, and then they stopped. He was still
behind her somewhere, engulfed in the blaze soaring up through the
structure of the old mill.
The little machines rushed up to her.
“Hold still!”
A machine with a whirling blade crawled onto her
back. The wire cutting into her wrists vibrated painfully. She felt the
sting of sparks. And then it snapped.
She rolled over and sat up and let the machine free
her ankles, and then leaped to her feet and turned back to the mill,
rejecting the idea that she could not hope to plunge into the inferno and
find Lazarus and drag him to safety. But, in an instant, the searing heat
singed her eyebrows, blinded her, and sucked the air from her lungs. She
stumbled back, flailing, tripping and falling and striking the ground with
brutal impact. She rolled onto her stomach and crawled away choking.
A small car pulled in front of her. Evie looked up
and cried hoarsely for help, then saw that it had no driver. Somewhere
above the river gorge, she could hear the wail of sirens.
“Help is on its way,” Billy’s voice sounded
from the car. “They’ll never let you go if you can’t get away now.
Please, get in.”
Evie dragged herself to her feet knowing he was
right. Sheriff Krueger worked for Abe. Abe would never let her go to
Billy now. She clawed at the door handle and threw herself into the empty
car when it opened.
The car backed from the thunder of the flames and
billowing smoke darkening the morning sun.
“Lazarus!” she cried in anguish.
Her cry was futile and her despair short-lived.
Lazarus would have killed her. She owed her life to Billy’s
intervention.
The engine whined and the car bucked violently on the
way up the hill. The car swung onto the highway, and the ride smoothed
out. Evie sat up and saw that the car had no dashboard or steering wheel
and that the back seat had been removed to accommodate a large number of
batteries. Whispering down the road, the car made a beeline toward the
mansion on the hill.
“I don’t have a camera inside the car. Are you
injured?”
Evie rubbed her cut wrists. “No, I’m not hurt. Is
it you this time, Billy?”
“It’s me this time.”
Evie put her face in her hands and began to sob
uncontrollably.
“You’ll be fine.” Billy sounded calm,
preoccupied. “I have things under control now.”
A moment of peaceful silence passed.
“Evie, Lazarus is alive. He got out okay.”
Relief was like a fist in her belly. She bent at the
waist and felt sick and drained of energy.
“He crawled into the bushes. I think he’s
unconscious, but it doesn’t look like he’s hurt too bad.”
Evie leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes.
Her head swam with fatigue. She wanted so badly to let herself drift into
a long, peaceful sleep.
The gate at the bottom of the hill opened. She had
never been inside the castle grounds before. At the top of the hill, the
car pulled into a garage below the house. The back wall slid away
unexpectedly to reveal a silvery chamber of subdued lighting.
Evie was stunned. A foot high machine on tank treads
appeared.
“Follow my little buddy.”
The car door opened by itself.
“Don’t be afraid.”
Evie climbed from the car, and the little machine led
the way down a corridor of silver metal. She followed it into a room
filled with television sets. Billy sat in a wheelchair in the middle of
the chamber. The years since the last time she had seen him melted away.
She ran to him, dropped to her knees, and put her head in his lap. She
sobbed inconsolably, and Billy caressed the back of her neck
He gave her a pat of assurance. “Evie, I’ve got you
a change of clothes. Go get cleaned up and we’ll talk.”
She looked up through tear-blurred eyes. “You did?”
“I said I’d bring you something nice to wear when I
came back for you.”
She wiped tears aside with the back of her arm. “I
remember. I didn’t think you’d ever come back.”
He shrugged all of her concerns aside. They were all
history and of no importance now. “I’m sorry it took so long.”
Evie grew anxious thinking of how furious Abe would
be. “Can we go to Boston like you promised?”
“Sure. Not quite yet, but we will.”
A thought occurred to her. They weren’t alone
in the big house. “Who is your friend? He sounded just like you.”
“My friend?” He said it with ice in his voice. “How
many times has he talked to you?”
“Just that once when Lazarus tried to smash the
little radio with legs.”
Billy’s brow furrowed. “I was wondering how you
managed to take my toys in stride so well.”
Evie gathered what remained of her courage. “I’d
like to thank him for helping us.”
“He’s not here right now. Evie, I’m going to have a
rough time explaining him to you.”
Evie searched his pained expression for an
explanation.
“Let it go for now. For the time being, we’re
alone.”
“Who is he? What’s his name?”
“His name is Corin. I couldn’t have done any of this
without his help, but he's ’s got his own business here. We have to wait until
it’s finished before any of us can leave.”
Evie looked about her at all the lighted televisions
and strange little machines appearing and disappearing from beneath the
walls. It all seemed so improbable, even for Billy. She snapped back to
the most important matters at hand. “I have to let Abe know what Lazarus
tried to do to me.”
Billy gave a tense nod of agreement. “I concur, but
I don’t want you to leave the house just yet. Let me and Corin handle
your brothers.”
“You’re not going into town, are you?”
“We’ll handle everything from here.”
She sighed in heart-felt relief. Billy nodded to the
machine looking on. “Follow him. He’ll show you the way upstairs. Get
cleaned up and we’ll talk.”
She stood to leave, but she found it difficult to
just turn and walk away from him. He looked so helpless in his
wheelchair. “I’m so sorry you were hurt.”
“Well, it doesn’t really hurt. I can’t feel anything
from my waist on down. I thought my spinal cord had been damaged, but
they say it’s all in my head. It sure doesn’t seem like it, especially
right now when I have no reason at all to be paralyzed. You’ll just have
to give me time. We’ll work something out.”
“I love you,” she said softly.
He looked surprised. And sad. “I love you, too.
They can’t take that from us. Not mother, or her new boyfriend, or your
brothers.
“Or even Corin,” he said.
