“I remember this house very well from when I used to visit Susan here.” Prescott looked thoughtful for a moment. “Houses like this, the really old ones, you’ve got to be careful with them. This one is heated with propane, and that can be deadly if you don’t store the containers the right way.”
Annie glanced at Susan, but she only looked bewildered.
“The tanks are out back where they should be. Tom’s always careful—”
“You put a propane tank in a closed space, like that basement down there,” Prescott continued, “and if it leaks, there’s no place for the gas to disperse. The propane itself isn’t actually toxic, but you get down in a place where it’s concentrated and there’s not enough oxygen. You drown, just as if you were in twenty feet of water.” He winked at Susan. “Or in the ocean a couple of miles off the Carolina coast.”
“I couldn’t stand it, Archer. You scared me, and I knew you’d never let me get away. That’s all I wanted. I wasn’t going to tell. You don’t have to do this.”
“It’s too late now, my darling. Your friend here has a big mouth, and I’m sure, a righteous sense of civic duty. Even if you didn’t say anything, she would. Better to settle this now and for good.”
“How are you going to explain it?” Annie forced herself to be calm and logical. “Why would we all be down in the basement?”
“Good question, and I made sure I had an answer for it when I was figuring out what to do. Something I could be sure the police would think of all on their own. Something that would let them close the books on another unfortunate accident.” Again he ran his hand along the side of the bat. “Everyone knows that if Mr. Homeowner suspects he has a propane leak, he’ll naturally want to go down to the basement and check it out. When he doesn’t come back upstairs after a while, of course Mrs. Homeowner is going to go check on him. That was going to be the end of it until you showed up, Annie. Now, of course, when Sandy sees her husband lying on the floor unconscious, knowing she can’t get him back up by herself, she’ll call her new friend to help her out. Sadly, the two ladies will also be overcome.”
Annie looked him straight in the eye. “Do you think we’re just going to go down there and wait to die?”
“That’s where my little buddy here comes in.” Prescott held the bat in both hands over his shoulder as if he were waiting for a pitch. “Tap somebody just right, not hard enough for a postmortem to find any skull fractures, and he becomes really cooperative. Like good old Tom out there in the kitchen.”
“They may not find fractures,” said Annie, “but they’ll find bruising on all three of us. No coincidence could explain that. They’ll know it wasn’t an accident.”
“Not by what’s left after a house fire. Another reason it’s not smart and not legal to store propane inside, especially in an old tinderbox like this. I remember that there’s a hot water heater in that basement. When the flame eventually catches the propane gas, that’s all it will take.” Prescott took a moment to admire the bat. “And in the fire, Exhibit A here is reduced to ashes along with everything and everyone else. No weapon, no blood, no DNA, no fingerprints … and no witnesses.”
“They’ll find you, you know. There’s always something criminals don’t account for, and the police figure it out every time.”
“Not every time. Not if you’re smart enough. Not if they’re convinced there was no crime.” His mouth turned up slightly at one side. “Not if there’s nobody left to talk.”
Stall for time. Annie knew that, as long as she could keep him talking, they’d have a chance to figure a way out of this. Maybe Tom would wake up out there in the kitchen and rescue them. Maybe the cavalry would come riding over the hill. Something. Anything. She just had to stall for time and pray. “You said you wanted to ask Susan about some things. Have you forgotten?”
“After twenty years? Not on your life.” The grin reappeared. “No pun intended.”
“You’d better ask her, then. While you have a chance. Before the police come for you.”
“You know, Annie, I can’t decide if you’re a good bluffer or just stupid. Either way, we both know that’s not happening. In a little nowhere like this? What, Deputy Fife is going to come put a headlock on me?”
Annie merely looked at him, hoping her expression was confident enough to make him wonder if she might be telling the truth.
“But she’s right, darling Susan. I have some things I want to know. You know I don’t like being outsmarted. If it happens, I want to know how it was done so I can keep it from happening again. So now you tell me how you managed to disappear like that. I wouldn’t have thought a shrinking violet like you would have the backbone to do it.”