Chapter XCIX

Louis and I heard the thrashing at the same time. We followed the sound until we came to a clearing, and there we found a second house. Its lower windows were boarded up, but both the outer security door and the old wood-and-glass front door were standing open.

If Eliza Michaud was in there, she would either have to wait until one of us was framed by the doorway before taking a shot, or position herself at an upper window in the hope that those magnum shells could do serious damage once we got near. But if she was still in the woods, she could shoot us in the back when we went to investigate.

Louis joined me behind a white pine that must have been at least a century old, so thick was its trunk.

"No reason for her to go in," he said. "If she did, she's trapped herself."

"Or she's waiting for someone to head in after her."

"Which is kind of the same thing."

"Unless there's a back door."

"I can find out."

It was then that we caught a flash of Eliza Michaud's red coat among the trees on the eastern side of the house.

"So who's inside?" I asked.

"Maybe no one. It might have been open long before we got here."

Still, we kept to the woods and out of shotgun range as we continued hunting Eliza, the doorway eventually gaping open to the left of us. The interior was entirely dark, yet I thought I saw something gleam for a second in the shadows.

I hit Louis hard in the back, driving him to the ground. The darkness of the house flared with light as the first of the rifle shots rang out, ripping through the leaves and branches above our heads. We scrambled for cover as the next bullets kicked up dirt around us. Then Louis was returning fire, emptying the remaining rounds of his magazine into the doorway from thirty yards while I opened fire on the red coat still visible through the bushes. Eliza Michaud, it seemed, had not been alone after all. Someone, probably her brother, had laid an ambush for us.

The rifle fire ceased. The red coat, meanwhile, remained where it was.

"Movement from inside," said Louis.

Eliza Michaud stumbled onto the porch, her white sweater now bearing a series of red, spreading stains. An Armalite hung loosely from her right hand. She remained upright for a few seconds before dropping to the boards, but by then the life was gone from her.

"What about the coat?" I asked.

"Decoy," said Louis. "She must have hung it on a bush and let the wind take it."

"Louis, there is no wind."

A man's voice spoke from the undergrowth behind us.

"Dead men," it said.

His next words were lost to gunfire.