The Fire Witness

3

At first all Elisabet hears is a delicate hiss. The whisper is hardly perceptible. Then she hears words.

“It’s your turn to close your eyes,” someone murmurs.

Elisabet keeps still, staring so hard down the hall her eyes are frozen open. It must be one of the girls talking in her sleep, she thinks. Then there’s a noise, like an overripe peach dropping on the floor. Then another, heavy and wet. A table leg scrapes the floor and there’s the sound of two more peaches falling.

Out of the corner of her eye, Elisabet catches a movement, a shadow gliding past. She turns around and sees the door to the dining room slowly close.

“Wait!” she calls out, even while trying to convince herself it’s nothing; it must be the draft.

She grabs the doorknob to the dining room, but something stops the door from opening and she has to yank it before it finally gives way. Stepping inside, she can see herself in the dull reflection from the scratched dining-room table, and again in the brass fire doors of the tile stove. She checks it: the lids are all shut. The stove suddenly knocks, and Elisabet takes a quick step back, tilting over a chair. It’s nothing. Just the slipping of a log.

She heads to her room, pausing outside the girls’ bedrooms. She detects a sour, slightly metallic aroma. She searches for movement in the hallway, but all is still. To the right are the bathrooms and the alcove leading to the isolation room. Miranda should be fast asleep in there. The peephole in the door glimmers weakly.

Now, again, there’s that light voice, whispering.

“It’s time to be quiet,” Elisabet calls out.

A series of quick thuds. It’s hard to locate the noise, but it sounds as if Miranda is lying in bed and kicking her bare feet against the wall. Elisabet decides to check on her through the peephole. It is then that she sees a shadowy figure in the alcove. With a gasp, she backs away. She knows how dangerous the situation is, but fear makes her slow; her body feels as if it’s moving in the heavy water of a dream. But the creaking of the floor startles her awake, and she whirls around and starts to run.

A soft voice behind her urges her to stop, but she knows she mustn’t.

Elisabet makes it to the front door. Throwing the lock, she races out into the cool air of the night. She slips on the front steps, smacking her hip and twisting a leg beneath her. Her ankle hurts so badly she cries out, and she crawls for a stretch, losing her slippers. Then she forces herself to her feet.