August Ansel - The Attic

“A stinkin deader,” muttered one of the two who held Handy by the arms.

She tried to get a look at Handy, but his head was down so that the curtain of his hair obscured his features. A few dark spatters of blood marked the front of his jacket. He was still solidly on his feet, but swaying a little.

The man shook his head and chuckled again. “Oh, he’s yours. We saw you down there together.” He gestured toward the gulch. “Let’s not drag this out, my dear. Why, it’s pure luck you happened to be standing up there. We’re taking you both into protective custody. It’s a dangerous world now. Safety in numbers. Don’t worry,” he said. He wasn’t a large man—five feet six or seven, perhaps, and squarely built, lean but broad-shouldered. His iron-gray hair was curly and cropped short, and his face deeply tanned under a dark scruff of whiskers. “We’ll pack your belongings, too. What’s life without our precious keepsakes, after all?” He nodded at the man in the rear, who took his cudgel in both hands and broke rank. He cut into her front yard and out of sight.

“What’s your name, young man?” Arie said, dialing up the frail and fussy tone in her voice. “I’d like to know who it is I’m speaking to. It’s how I was raised.”

The lead man smiled broadly, teeth large and even, very white in his tanned face. “I’m Russell,” he said. “And you?”

“Minerva,” said Arie.

“Charmed,” he said. “Minerva, what do you say we stop this silly shouting back and forth? It’s cold out here, and we have other business today.”

“You’re about to be sadly disappointed,” she said. “Can’t you see I’m living rough here?” Something clattered at her feet. It was the slingshot. Arie risked a flick of her eyes toward the sky panel. Renna clung to the ladder, the top of her head just below the opening. She lifted her right hand and showed Arie the knife.

A sudden volley of pounding commenced downstairs, heavy and deliberate. Renna gasped and nearly slipped off the ladder, knife and all. Arie ducked with an arm crossed over her head, feigning fear. With her other hand she snatched up the slingshot and stuffed it in her coat pocket. “Get down and cover the inside hatch,” she whispered to Renna. The thudding blows below stopped, started again in a new place. The man with the pipe had moved from the front door to one of the living room windows.

“As you can hear, we’re coming in one way or another,” Russell called up. “You don’t plan to fend off all four of us, do you? That could get…well, a little messy.” He stepped over to Handy and jerked his head up by the hair.

Arie’s fists clenched when she saw his face. His right eye was swollen shut and blackened. His nose, mashed to the side and obviously broken, was the source of the blood on his clothes. But then she saw his undamaged eye, clear and full of fury, and she knew he was shamming his stupor.

“This man is a pilgrim,” she said, voice now strong and steady. The noise from below rose to a more frantic pitch, scraping and blows that Arie felt vibrating under her. “I offered him safe harbor from the weather last night, and in exchange he promised to help me find food this morning.” She shook her head as if in disgust. “You should be ashamed.”

“Gave it up for Lent,” he said. He opened his mouth to say more, but the pipe-carrier stalked over. He put his head close to Russell’s, gesticulated furiously at the house with his weapon. Russell threw his hands in the air and paced a few steps away. He looked at the woods for a moment, shaking his head.

Arie could see something in his posture, something capricious and ready to erupt. “I have supplies,” she said. “Things you can take with you—medicine, tools. Let the young man go. It’s none of his concern.”

Russell faced her again. He was still smiling, but if there had been any humor in him, it was gone. “I truly prefer to reason my way around a disagreement,” he said. “But you can’t reason with a liar, and you’re a liar, old woman. First you claim you’re living rough. Woe is you. Now you offer a trade?” He gripped Handy by the hair again and pulled back viciously. “This one is no pilgrim. We asked him where to find you—several times. He played stupid.” He cocked his head and looked speculatively at Handy’s face. “Hell, he let us break his nose, Minerva. No pilgrim takes a beating for a stranger. I don’t think Jesus himself would do that. Do you?” He nodded at the pipe carrier.

The man swung and hit Handy squarely in the midsection. He doubled over in a silent rictus of pain.

The instant their attention was turned, Arie ran to her ammo pile and dropped to her knees. With shaking hands, she loaded her empty coat pocket. Stones tumbled around her.

“Open up,” Russell yelled. “You have one minute and then I’m going to beat him witless.”

She pulled out the slingshot and stood with it next to her body, holding a stone in the other hand, desperately willing the shakes away.

“You’re losing time,” Russell said.

Handy pulled himself upright, arms wrapped around his wounded middle. His clear green eye looked straight into hers. “Sister!” he roared. The power in it was stunning. “I sojourn, Sister. My life is my own!”

The words of the catechism jolted her like an electrical shock. All the trembling fell out of her body, and she squared her feet. “I shall not give, neither shall I receive,” she shouted, and brought up the sling.

Russell punched Handy in the face. He went down in the road, out cold. Arie fired. The rock hit Russell in the thigh. He staggered backward, clutching his leg. She drew another stone. “Renna,” she yelled toward the sky panel. “You have to get out of the house right now. Hide outside—hurry.”

The man who had been hauling on Handy’s right arm now reached behind and fumbled with the compound bow. He fired too quickly, and the arrow flew wild, catching in the branches of a tree near the house.

“Save the arrows, you ass,” Russell said through clenched teeth. He pointed at the one strapped with the bulky backpack. “Mikey,” he said. “Burn it down. Cook the bitch.”

Arie aimed at Mikey, who had pulled a brown bottle from his bag and was already stuffing a rag into its neck. She was about to fire when the man with the pipe turned on Handy and lifted the weapon over his head like someone about to split wood. She pivoted a few inches and let go as the pipe arced. The stone smashed into the man’s elbow with an audible crunch. He screamed at the low sky, and the pipe flew from him, missing Handy’s head by inches. She grabbed a fresh stone and reloaded.

Mikey had lit the rags in both bottles and was running at the house, arm cocked back. Arie swung and fired, but he was already out of range. The sound of shattering glass was followed by the immediate whumph of the explosion. A pall of black smoke and the smell of accelerant hit her at the same time. She ducked her head and hurried to the far edge of the roof, hoping for a glimpse of Renna’s escape. Even with the pipe-carrier screaming in the street over his shattered arm, Arie could hear the fire, the old redwood siding of Granny’s home catching and feeding the flames. Instead of Renna, she saw Mikey and his bag of mischief, backing away from the heat, another unlit bottle in hand. Behind him, Russell hobbled in a drag-step to where Handy lay, still unconscious.

Eyes stinging, she loaded the slingshot and stood straight. As she did, the man with the compound bow pointed behind Russell. “Look out!” he yelled, and stumbled up into the yard as a streak of gold and brown flew at Russell. Talus barreled into him. Russell hit the ground with the dog on top. Curran was right behind, machete in hand. He ran straight at Mikey, who threw out both arms in a warding-off motion.