“So I didn’t open the plywood, just stood there inside the barricade. And I couldn’t figure out what was going on, so that was when I called you on my cell phone. That’s the only place you can get a signal, remember?”
“I stayed well away from the barricade after that,” Mr. Throckmorton added. “But I kept Rob in sight, in case he was hit by a stray bullet.”
Horace nodded and picked his way along a path through the file cabinets and boxes toward the far end of the room. The counter that ran all the way across that end had a break, where you could lift up a movable segment of the countertop to exit or enter Mr. Throckmorton’s part of the room. Rob and I followed. Mr. Throckmorton did, too, but at a greater distance, as if he more than half expected gunfire to break out again.
Horace drew the curtains to reveal the far end of the room. Some wide wooden steps led up six or seven feet to a raised area, eight feet deep, that ran the width of the basement. If I recalled correctly, the raised part was level with the part of the basement outside the barricade. The exit door was located in the middle of the wall on the raised area—though now the door was gone and a series of huge landscaping ties ran across the doorway. They appeared to be bolted into the stone, and on each end more huge timbers ran perpendicular to the barricade, braced at the other end by two of the immense stone pillars. Clearly, any would-be intruders who tried too hard to batter down Mr. Throckmorton’s barricade risked bringing a large part of the building down on themselves.
The middle of the barricade was covered with the plywood—two sheets, on hinges, so they could swing out like double doors.
“That’s to keep anyone from peeking in,” Mr. Throckmorton said, when he saw Horace eyeing the plywood. “There’s a latch at the top.”
“First things first,” Horace said. “When was the last time you opened the plywood doors?”
“Yesterday,” Mr. Throckmorton said.
Horace set his satchel down on the counter, pulled out his digital camera, and climbed up the wooden stairs. Rob, Mr. Throckmorton, and I followed, although we stayed several steps down from the top, so we could watch without being in his way. He took dozens of photos of the barricade, from the front and from both sides, and of the floor in front of it.
His face was impassive. More than impassive—grim. I didn’t expect him to leap up, grinning, to announce that he’d found some bit of evidence that would exonerate Mr. Throckmorton. But I was watching for some small expression of triumph or interest.
After the photography he began swabbing things, and apparently examining every speck of dirt through his magnifying glass.
And then he stood up and stared at the plywood for several minutes, frowning.
Finally I couldn’t stand it any longer.
“Put us out of our misery,” I said. “What have you found?”
Chapter 14
“Not much,” Horace said. “Which isn’t the worst possible outcome. I haven’t found anything good, but I haven’t found anything bad either. Just a big lot of nothing. No visible bloodstains on the floor—which isn’t surprising; since she was shot from the direction of the barricade, the heavy blood spatter went the other way. No sign that the barricade has been removed any time lately, but also nothing to prove or disprove that anyone opened the plywood.”
He went back to his satchel, removed a spray canister, and began spraying the floor just inside the barrier. Then he pulled out his digital camera and held it at the ready.
“Luminal,” he said. “Shows bloodstains. Can somebody get the lights?”
Mr. Throckmorton raced down the stairs and hurried to a bank of switches along one of the side walls. He flipped all the switches and the basement suddenly became profoundly dark. We all stared in silence for a few moments. Horace clicked away with his digital camera.
“On TV, the bloodstains give off this weird blue glow,” Rob said.
“In real life, too,” Horace said. “You can turn the lights back on, Phinny.”
“No glow,” Rob said.
“This is good?” Mr. Throckmorton asked.
“It’s not bad,” Horace said. “If there had been blood and you’d washed it off, there’d still be enough to fluoresce when it combined with the luminal. Unless you used bleach, in which case the whole area would glow blue. No signs of any blood spatter on this side of your barricade and no signs of a recent hasty cleanup. But as I said, I wasn’t really expecting any. The area just outside the barricade was clean, and so was the outside of the plywood, as far as I could tell through the barricade.”