Down the Rabbit Hole (8 page)

 

The sky wasn't quite so nightlike by the time Ingrid finally found the big rock. She was so cold, so tired by then that she hadn't noticed the coming of day,
and was even slow to recognize the significance of the fact that she could read
RED RAIDERS RULE
without a flashlight, the only way she could read it now in any case, the battery having gone dead.

“Good boy,” she said, although the dog had done nothing to help, leading her down false trails every time she'd decided to trust his animal instincts. Ingrid took the right-hand path by the rock, this right-hand path the correct one for sure, and headed for home.

Day was breaking beyond any doubt when Ingrid stepped out of the woods and into her own backyard, a gray dawn with thick clouds covering the whole sky. Ninety-nine Maple Lane was quiet. Ingrid crossed the yard, slid open the door to the basement.

“Go home, boy,” she said, very quietly.

The dog wagged his tail but didn't go anywhere.

“Go.”

Ingrid went inside, closed the door. She hurried into the basement bathroom, looked at herself in the mirror.

Oh my God. Filthy, scratched, blue lipped; and what was that in her hair? A clump of rice in congealed plum sauce? How had that happened?

Ingrid cleaned herself up, not well but quickly,
and went into the laundry room. Her yellow pajamas with the red strawberries were folded on the drier. She threw all her clothes into the washer, except for the shoes she'd been wearing and the red Pumas, which she left on the floor, and put on the pajamas. As for the red Pumas—she didn't love them anymore.

Now to get upstairs and into bed. Ingrid went up, into the mudroom, almost there. Then she heard someone coming down the hall from the master bedroom. Could she reach the stairs to the second floor? Not in time.

Ingrid slipped into the kitchen instead, sat at the table in the breakfast nook, took a banana from the fruit bowl. Mom came in, wearing her quilted blue housecoat, eyes puffy, hair all over the place. One small part of Ingrid, maybe getting smaller, was telling her to fly across the kitchen, fling her arms around her mother and say, “Oh, Mom.”

“Ingrid!” Nothing in Mom's tone was saying “hug me.” “You're up early.”

“Uh-huh,” said Ingrid noncommittally, peeling the banana. And anyway, wasn't it all over now?

Mom gave her a long, suspicious look.

“Did you wear the appliance?” she said.

T
WENTY MINUTES LATER
, Mom had gone out for Sunday bagels and lox and Ingrid was in her own blessed bed, Mister Happy tucked in beside her. Seconds after that she was asleep. Stormy seas rose all around her, but she was snug in her sturdy boat—dry, warm, safe.

 

“Hey.”

Ingrid opened her eyes, the lids almost glued together with eye crust. Ty was at her door.

“Phone,” he said, and tossed it to her.

She missed. The phone bounced on the bed, hit the wall. She grabbed it.

“Hello?”

“Ingrid? Jill Monteiro.” Ingrid sat up; Jill Monteiro was director of the Prescott Players. “I hope I didn't wake you.”

“Oh, no,” said Ingrid. “Not me.”

“We'll be auditioning for
Alice in Wonderland
Tuesday at five,” Jill said. “Hope you can make it. There're all kinds of good parts.”

“Like Alice?” Ingrid said, unable to stop herself.

Jill laughed. She had a great laugh, surprisingly deep and wicked; she'd used it once in a real Hollywood movie called
Tongue and Groove
, all about home-renovating hijinks with Will Smith and Eugene Levy. Straight to video, but
JILL MONTEIRO
was on the box, tiny but there.

Alice: a plum role. Ingrid had a copy of the book on her shelf. She took it into the bathroom, poured a huge hot bubble bath, got in, and started leafing through the pages. The trick was going to be keeping Alice from sounding like a geek. Ingrid practiced saying “he's perfectly idiotic,” “the stupidest tea party I ever was at in all my life,” “mustard isn't a bird,” and “you're nothing but a pack of cards,” trying to inject at least a bit of cool. Acting was all about cool; she'd learned that at the movies.

 

When Ingrid went downstairs, she found everyone in the TV room, Dad and Ty watching football, Mom going through some listing sheets.

“I found your cleats,” Mom said.

“Oh.”

“Don't you want to know where?”

“Okay.”

“In the laundry room.”

“Oh.”

“Try to keep track of your things, Ingrid. I put the cleats over there by the—” Mom paused, looked out the slider. “There's a strange dog in the yard,” she said.

They all looked. A strange dog—with floppy ears and droopy eyes, coat a kind of tweedy brown—but not strange to Ingrid. He stood right outside the slider, peering in, tail wagging as if he'd spotted someone, although the only thing in his line of sight was the StairMaster.

Dad and Ty turned back to the TV.

“Did you see that hit?” Dad said.

Mom got up, went to the slider.

“Go on, go home,” Mom said. The dog wagged his tail, still looking off in the wrong direction.
“He's not wearing a collar. Anyone seen this dog before?”

No one answered, Dad and Ty probably too into the game to have even heard, Ingrid because, well, because where would she start?

Mom took her cell phone out of her pocket, called the shelter, described the dog. That was Mom, organized, quick, on task. No such dogs reported missing in Echo Falls, and the shelter didn't do pickups on weekends.

“He's kind of cute,” Mom said. Ingrid saw where this might be going, tried to head it off.

“He's the dumbest dog on the planet,” she said.

Mom looked surprised. “What makes you say that?”

Uh-oh. Those feelers of Mom's: almost impossible to outthink them. “Just look at him,” she said. It was true. He was the kind of dog that in a cartoon would harrumph a lot and play second fiddle.

“I think he's cute,” Mom said. She opened the slider.

The dog came right in as if totally familiar with the place, trotted past Mom, and stood in front of Ingrid, mouth open and tongue hanging out.

“He likes you,” Mom said. “Give him a pat.”

Ingrid gave him a pat. He did that head-pressing thing, shoving his head against her hand.

“Mark,” said Mom. “Look how the dog likes Ingrid.”

Dad didn't hear: Football put males in a trance, maybe a handy fact to keep in mind.

“You know what I'm thinking, Ingrid?” Mom said.

Ingrid knew, but she said, “What?”

“If no one claims him, maybe we should at least give him a temp—”

Mom's phone rang. She listened for a moment, hung up. “We'll talk about it later. I've got to go show Blueberry Crescent.”

“What's the price on that?” Dad said, eyes on the screen.

“They're asking three thirty,” Mom said.

Mom left. A few minutes after that, Dad got up and said, “Maybe I'll go into the office for a while.”

“What about the game?” Ty said.

“It's getting out of hand,” Dad said.

“Seventeen-ten's not out of hand,” Ty said.

“I'll tell that to Tim Ferrand when my report's not ready,” Dad said. He left too.

Ingrid sat on the couch near Ty. The dog followed, stood at her feet; didn't sit, just stood there.
On the screen a player in green and gold knocked down a pass and did a funny hip-hop dance.

“You should try that,” Ingrid said.

“Are you nuts? I'd be off the team.”

“I meant after you made a great play.”

“When's that going to happen?”

Ty had never asked her a question like that, like he was leaning on her or something. “You're just a freshman,” Ingrid said. “The only one on the varsity.”

“Not for long,” Ty said.

“That can't be true,” Ingrid said. “You're so fast.”

Ty snorted.

“How were you supposed to know about that stupid flea-flicker?” Ingrid said; unless he'd listened to her, but too late to bring that up.

And maybe she should have kept her mouth shut completely, because Ty turned on her, his face going bright red. “What the hell do you know?”

That annoyed her, especially after all she'd done to try to warn him, annoyed her enough to change her mind about keeping her mouth shut. “I'd know enough not to fall for it twice,” Ingrid said.

What happened next was so fast, Ingrid didn't understand at first, didn't even feel the pain. Ty sprang across the couch and hit her. Maybe he was
aiming for her arm or shoulder; his fist did graze her shoulder, but where it landed was on her right eye. Ingrid fell sideways, hand going up to her eye, hardly aware of Ty bolting out of the room, kicking something, yelling, “I hate football.”

Now she felt the pain. Not enough pain to make her cry, but she was crying anyway. Nothing like this had ever happened. Ty's speech could be rough sometimes, and when they were much younger he'd gone through a stage of shutting her in the broom closet when Mom and Dad were out, but he'd never actually hit her, and she'd have thought they'd outgrown the possibility by now.

Ingrid felt the dog pressing his head against her leg. She stopped crying, gave him a pat. He pressed harder.

“You're pretty strong for a fat guy,” she said, brushing tears away on the back of her sleeve.

He wagged his tail, a scraggly thing with burrs in it. A TV commentator said, “That's what they call lowering the boom.” Ingrid got up and switched him off. She heard water running in the pipes: Ty taking a shower, or washing his face. She didn't want to be in the house. Confiding in Ty: She'd actually considered that?

“Come on, boy,” Ingrid said. She got her jacket
from upstairs and opened the slider.

He came out and shook himself the way dogs do when they're wet, which he wasn't, of course. “Know any tricks?” she said.

He pressed his head against her leg.

“That's not a trick.”

Ingrid picked up a twig. At the mere sight of a picked-up twig, Flanders would have been springing up and down and barking his head off. This dog didn't seem to notice. He was looking at nothing in particular.

“Here's a stick,” Ingrid said, waving it before his eyes. She flicked it backhand about ten feet away, right in front of him. “Go get it. Get the stick.”

His mouth opened and his tongue appeared. He gazed off into the middle distance. That was it.

“Come on,” Ingrid said. She walked over to the twig, picked it up. He stood beside her, watching. Watching her do the retrieving, you could almost think, like he was the one doing the training. You could almost think that, but not if you looked at his dumb face, which reminded her of Nigel Bruce, who'd played Dr. Watson to Basil Rathbone's Holmes. Ingrid had all the videos.

“Smell the stick,” Ingrid said, holding it close to
his nose. He averted it slightly, a strangely delicate movement, like an aristocrat who'd been offered a pastrami sandwich.

“Go get it,” Ingrid said, throwing it again. She pointed.

This time the dog ambled off in the general direction of the twig. He came quite close, actually stepping over it, before making a sharp turn and heading into the woods.

“Hey!”

He kept going, past the oak with the split trunk where she and Ty had built a tree house, now in disrepair, around a bend and out of sight.

“Hey. Come back here.”

Ingrid ran after him, not her fastest, no way she could run her fastest, still sore all over from the night in the woods. And the woods were the last place she wanted to be right now.

“Dog!” She didn't even know his name. “Come here.”

Ingrid tore along the path, back in the damn woods. Up ahead she caught sight of him squatting, the lower half of him all urgent and straining, his head in the clouds.

“Stay.”

But he didn't stay. As soon as he was done, he took off again, trotting in his clumsy way, like that beer-belly guy who jogged past their house every Sunday.

“Come back, you moron.”

But he didn't. The stupid jerk got all the way to the big rock before Ingrid caught up with him. He'd come to a stop, was just standing still, almost alert-looking, sniffing the air.

“Move an inch and you're dead,” Ingrid said.

The dog turned his head backward in her direction, one of those weird angles dogs can do.

“I mean it,” Ingrid said.

A man stepped out from behind the rock. He was very big, with broad shoulders and a barrel chest. The dog saw him and wagged his scruffy tail.

“Just who are you planning to kill?” the man said.

Ingrid backed up.

“I wasn't—” she began.

And then someone else stepped out from behind the rock, someone in an Echo Falls Pop Warner jacket, someone she knew.

“Ingrid?” said Joey Strade.

“Hi,” Ingrid said.

“Hey,” said Joey. He rocked back and forth a little.

“Manners,” said the big man.

“This your dog?” Joey said.

“Kind of,” said Ingrid.

“Manners means introduce me to your friend,” said the big man.

“Oh yeah,” said Joey. “Ingrid, my dad.”

“Nice to meet you, Ingrid,” said Chief Strade, holding out his hand.

Ingrid shook it, the biggest hand she'd ever seen in her life.

Joey gave the dog a pat. The dog did his head-pressing thing with Joey. “What's his name?” said Joey.

Why were all questions suddenly so hard? “Nigel,” Ingrid said.

“Nigel?”

“Yeah. He tried to get away, sort of.”

“You should put his tag on,” said Chief Strade. “In case he does it again.”

“It's in the laundry,” Ingrid said. Chief Strade gave her a close look. “The collar, I mean,” said Ingrid. “Very dirty. Dogs, et cetera.”
Shut up, for God's sake.

“Got a little shiner there,” said Chief Strade.

“Huh?”

“Over your right eye.”

Ingrid's hand went to it involuntarily. That hurt.
“I fell,” she said. “Chasing this stupid…chasing Nigel.”

Chief Strade was still giving her that close look. He had a big nose, big chin, big ears, but his eyes were small, half hidden by the kind of heavy brow ridges Neanderthals had. “You live near here, Ingrid?” he said.

“Yeah,” said Ingrid, waving vaguely.

“Whereabouts?” said Chief Strade.

Before she had to answer, a crackling sound came from his jacket pocket. Chief Strade took out his police radio and said, “Strade,” moving away a little.

Ingrid's eyes met Joey's. They both looked away.

“Nice dog,” Joey said.

“Uh-huh,” said Ingrid.

“Nigel?”

“Right.”

“How'd you come up with that?”

“Something wrong with it?”

“No,” said Joey. “It…um…”

Over by the rock, Chief Strade was saying, “Separate cells.”

“Like, fits him,” Joey said. “The way he looks.”

“Uh-huh,” said Ingrid, watching Chief Strade. “What are you guys doing here?”

“My dad's actually working,” Joey said. “I'm just tagging along. Something weird happened last night.”

“Oh?”

“Remember the woman who got killed?”

“Katherine Kovac,” Ingrid said.

Joey gave her a quick look, a little like his dad's, but Joey was much better-looking, didn't have that Neanderthal thing going on. “Yeah,” he said. “Some guy broke into her house down in the Flats. I guess he made a lot of noise, because there were like two or three calls to the station. Sergeant Pina chased the guy into the woods. My dad was hoping maybe he dropped something.”

“Did he?” said Ingrid, trying to sound casual. Sergeant Pina umped Little League and Babe Ruth baseball, also girls' softball from time to time, including back when Ingrid still played. He was a good ump, made an effort to keep all the kids relaxed, was great at learning their names and remembering them. Hers, for example.

“Not that we found,” Joey said. “But my dad thinks whoever did the break-in was probably the killer.”

“Why would the killer do that?”

“Lots of reasons.” Joey said.