“That really you, Captain Jim?”
“Yeah. Where’s Lori? And the twins?”
The voice came from higher up, as if Ramon got up off the floor. “Not good news, Captain.”
Those four words were like a stiletto of ice piercing Jim’s heart. During the difficult trek to Tahoe Drive, he’d seen nothing but death and horror, but he’d clung to his hope that somehow things would be different back home.
“Can I come in?” whispered Carrie, hearing voices from inside the house.
For several heartbeats he didn’t answer her. He’d heard her but he hadn’t listened. She had to repeat the question.
“Oh, yeah. Come in.” He holstered the revolver. “Ramon, can we sit down and talk?”
The voice drifted ahead of him, into the big living room with its long bookshelves and the stone logs in the fireplace. There was the scratching sound of a match being struck, followed by the flicker of light.
“We keep drapes drawn, Captain. Not many candles left now.”
Carrie was at his heels, so close he could smell her sweat.
The single stump of candle gave only a quivering pool of light. Ramon was barely visible behind it, and the rest of the long room remained in deep shadow.
Jim perched his hip against the back of his own favorite armchair. He could just make out the pale shape that was Carrie Princip, standing by the picture window.
“Tell me, Ramon.”
“You been in space?”
“Yeah.”
“Now you back.”
“So you see. Just tell me. We know something about this Earthblood that killed all the plants. Just tell me first where my wife and daughters are. That first, Ramon.”
“My wife dead.”
“Oh, I’m real sorry.” But he wanted the man to hurry up.
“She was such a big…you know… woman.” There was the shimmer of Ramon’s hands describing the shape of his wife’s hips in the still, dark room.
“Please,” said Jim softly.
“Come see.”
“Shall I come?” said Carrie.
“No,” he said on a sigh. “No, just wait here for me, will you?”
“Sure.”
Ramon had already gone out the other door into the corridor that led to the bedrooms. There was a time when Jim could have followed him, surefooted as a mountain goat. Not now. Twice he stumbled over furniture that shouldn’t have been where it was.
“You all right there, Captain?”
“Yeah.”
Now he could see another light. Another candle, steady and still, in what had been their bedroom.
Jim bumped his elbow against the corner of the door, nearly falling. His shoulder hit a picture on the wall.
A print of Christina’s World, by Andrew Wyeth. He’d bought it as a present for his wife on their tenth anniversary, just before the Aquila had soared from the launching pad.
“In here. Keep hushed, Captain.”
“Lori.” He wasn’t even sure whether he’d really whispered her name, or whether it had been whispered inside his mind.
“Is not Mrs. Hilton. Is Andrea.”
Jim’s eyes were adjusting to the faint light in the room, and he could make out a shape on the bed, lying still under their bright-patterned quilt.
“Andrea? Where’s my wife? Where’s Mrs. Hilton, Ramon? And Heather? I don’t understand.”
There didn’t seem to be enough air in the silent bedroom. Jim swallowed, mouth dry.
“Andrea, baby,” he called softly, moving until the bed touched his knees. He was aware of a foul smell hanging around him.
“I think you too late, Captain.”
He spun round, reaching out and grabbing Ramon by the wrist, conscious of how thin and frail the gardener had become, the tiny bones feeling like a trembling sparrow in his fingers.
“What the fuck? Too late!”
“Please, you hurt me.”
Jim let him go and knelt by the bed, his hand touching the figure beneath the covers. The smell of excrement and vomit was much stronger.
“Baby,” he whispered.
“I think she has gone, Captain.” Then Ramon leaned closer, his ear to the still figure’s mouth. “Just barely there, but no help for it. Not long now…”
His daughter’s arm rested on top of the quilt, and he touched it. Touched the shrunken fingers with his own.
“Oh, no. No, God.”
“Cholera. Mrs. Hilton, she left about three weeks back.”