Gone up in Smoke

GONE UP IN SMOKE   

BY ANDREA BEIERLE

I do not know any more when I became suspicious that something was wrong. Perhaps it had already started with the Stephen King novel Bag of Bones about the haunted house which I had read a couple of months earlier. I am not in the least superstitious or easily drawn into unrealistic fiction but when I read that book, I immediately removed the fridge magnets, as I was concerned that they would also convey creepy messages. Really, initially it was only small things, which made me uncomfortable; the way my husband Paul looked at me out of the corner of his eyes during breakfast or the fact that Brigitte, the hotel owner in the village, phoned late at night with some unimportant issues, or that Paul worked late without explanation. Was I going around the twist? Or was I just absentminded, sort of imagining things? In retrospect I have difficulties to pinpoint exactly where it all went wrong and why my life had turned into a living hell.



Some say it was on that  Sunday afternoon in December, yet I don’t think so. Never mind; coming back to that fateful day, when I discovered the fire too late, far too late, after having put up early Christmas decoration. I must have fallen asleep on the couch in the TV room. Or why else would I not have noticed that curtains, furniture, carpets, everything in the adjacent room, was ablaze. Huge orange flames had  already eaten into the ceiling and the smoke was so thick and black that I started to cough. Where was Paul?



“Paul!” I screamed at the top of my voice. The enormous flames had consumed most of the interior of the room and were working their way through the roof into other parts of the building. I closed the doors quickly and ran into the kitchen where I phoned the local police station. They in turn would call the fire brigade.



What now? Water? Or rescue a few things? Which ones? Run outside? Where were the dogs? Paul! The smoke was already floating everywhere and severely biting in my lungs. Panicking, I rushed outside and watched helplessly how vicious flames licked through the windows and patio doors. Meanwhile a few neighbors had seen the smoke and arrived to help. I collapsed on the grass, watching paralyzed how the farmhouse went up in smoke. The worst was when the glass in the windows started to crack. It sounded like explosions.



By the time the fire brigade arrived, a large part of the corrugated iron roof had caved in and the bedroom wing had completely burnt out. I could not remember much but would never forget the fierce smell of fire for the rest of my life. An ambulance had taken me to the hospital where I was treated for shock and smoke inhalation. My husband came to collect me a few hours later. When we returned to the farmhouse the whole household, or rather what was left of it, was standing outside in the garden like untidy forgotten toys. Somehow, people had been able to rescue a lot. Furniture, clothes, linen, books, everything was lying in the front yard. Luckily, it was already dark and I was under the impact of strong tranquilizers and did not notice much. All outbuildings, which were used as guest rooms as well as the horse stable were untouched.

When Paul and I looked at the damage the next morning we were horrified. I had never seen a burnt down house in my life. It was a ruin, at least the one side. Black, smoldering roof trusses were hanging down from the remaining roof structure like used matchsticks and the buckled roof sheets were of charcoal color instead of green. I peeped through the broken windows and gaped into a cold furnace. Depressing! Only the other day had we finished decorating the spare bedroom.



We had rented the old farmhouse last year from Shane Leyland, a local farmer, to start our own horse breeding business with seed capital from my father. He initially wanted to buy the whole farm for us but Shane Leyland refused to sell. After long and drawn out negotiations, my father eventually made him sign a lease. Afterwards I found out that he must have considerably twisted his arm since Shane was painfully uncomfortable with the situation. Every now and again he tried to interfere with our work on the property – the horse paddocks were too close to his soybean fields or the new door handles would not match the ones in the house or similar nonsense- but Paul usually managed to calm him down. Here I must add that Paul and Shane are cousins in the second degree but were never particularly close. Shortly after Paul and I got married two years ago I had picked up that the two families were at odds with each other after some trouble in the past; I believe the dispute was about an enormous inheritance which had gone in favor of the one family, don’t ask me which one. It was taboo to talk about it.



So, I decided to ignore it, as the setup was almost ideal: both our parents were close by and the investment promised to yield profits in a short period of time.

Even the guest rooms were regularly used for functions. Brigitte always needed extra rooms for her weddings and conferences. She in fact had encouraged us to convert the unused buildings into guest facilities. Paul had immediately grabbed the opportunity as his work as farm manager was frustrating, he admitted. The plan was that he eventually would also work from home once everything was established and bringing in enough money. Just perfect – but only on the surface! In retrospect, I have to admit that I always had a feeling that there was something deeply disturbing about the place. And not only the place, the whole situation was too good to be true.

Now all my dreams had gone up in smoke. What was going to happen now, I wondered? Suddenly I saw Shane jumping out of his car with bulging eyes.

“I told you so. Now you got it. What happened, Tiffany?” He screamed at the top of his voice.



I stepped a few meters back and shrugged my shoulders. Paul took Shane aside and tried hard to appease him. “We should all calm down first and leave it to the authorities. I’m sure that they will have an answer for us soon.”

“Nonsense,” Shane shouted. With a red face and pumped up jugular vein he pointed at the house. “You will pay for it, that’s for sure. I never wanted to let it to you in the first place.” After he had sped off we went into one of the guest rooms and I threw myself on the bed. “What does he mean with ‘I told you so’, Paul?” He flipped through a few files, which we had found in the garden and kinked a couple of pages. Then he lifted his head.



“I don’t know. Maybe because the house is old and had not been used for a few years before we moved in.” He carried on flipping through the files. Suddenly, there it was again, his awkward look, quick, out of the corner of his eyes.



During the next days he was busy finding storage for our belongings and making some phone calls. Shane’s secretary gave me a letter stating that the house owners’ insurance company needed certain documentation to establish the cause of the fire.

The cause of the fire? Why was this my problem? I gave the letter to Paul who followed up with the Police. They promised a report as soon as it became available from the fire brigade’s disaster management.



The next day Paul interrogated the domestic workers and stable boys-without much success. Only the gardener admitted that he had been around during the fire as a bystander because the crowds had attracted him. Indeed, a neighbour had reported that John was found with all the house keys in his pockets and that he had been drunk and of no use during the rescue operation. Why had he carried the keys around? And where were now?



Unexpectedly, Brigitte arrived. “How bad is it? Are you alright, my dear?”

Since when was I ‘her dear’? I had never enjoyed her company, she was arrogant and bossy, to say the least. Luckily, Paul managed everything when it came to the guest house aspect of the business. They were sometimes sitting over bookings until late at night, sorting out last minute issues, they said. In my ignorance, I had interpreted this as real dedication. Well, the thing was that I felt guests were messing them around and I would have lost my patience a long time ago.



Two weeks after the fire, exhaustion and uncertainty took their toll. The medication was finished and the cruel reality swept into my life like a hurricane. No home, no TV, no nice meals, no evening bath, no future, no nothing! But surely, Paul was busy sorting it out. How much longer would this take? And what about Shane? What was he doing regarding the renovations? I suggested to go on holiday for a while, just to get away from it. After all, it was vacation season. There was not much we could do now in any case and I also admitted that I felt very drained and tired.

Paul thought about it scratching his chin.



“I don’t think it’s a good idea. There are so many things, which need my attention. We just have to sit it out. It’s as easy as that.” I looked at him in surprise. As easy as that? I frowned. And what exactly did he need to attend to all the time? Everything was closed over Christmas and New Year. Since the investigation into the cause of the fire was ongoing, the insurance company had not approved any renovations. “I am not convinced that it is as easy as that,” I retorted, expressing my dissatisfaction with the slow progress. “This could take a long time because I am not aware of any action by the police or the fire brigade to establish how the fire had started. They have not even interviewed me yet for that matter.”



Paul impatiently waved his hand in dismissal.



“Leave it to them,” he said, almost shouting.



Then he mentioned some bookings for a wedding in January and that he had an appointment with Brigitte later on. I was puzzled. Paul seemed preoccupied with something, not focused but I kept quiet for the rest of the afternoon. Living together in that small room made things really difficult.



Early evening I walked over to his father’s farm to check on his horses. His father, who lived alone ever after Paul’s mother had left the family more than twenty years ago when Paul was a teenager, mentioned that he had a most disturbing conversation with Shane about the fire.



“He wants to hold all of us liable should the insurance company not cover the damage. He threatened us with legal action and that he considered the lease agreement terminated.”



I felt lightheaded. Why would Shane want to terminate the lease? He had not used the old farmhouse for years. And what has this got to do with Paul’s father?

He tried to calm me down and put his hand on my arm, which made my hair stand up in the neck. “Believe me, Shane has no leg to stand on. He is a bully. And he is under pressure. I suspect that the house is seriously under insured and that he tries to recover the shortfall from us. In fact, I heard rumors that Shane has financial difficulties because of his gambling. I am sick and tired of this man. He is as bad as his father. You wonder why the old man was murdered. I will most certainly not play his games, not again.”



I found all of this nauseating. Insurance problems, gambling, bullying tactics, farm murders, playing games. I wanted to speak to Paul -immediately- but his cell phone was on voice mail. Damned, in critical moments men were either not available, or sat on the toilet or were drunk!



Later that evening when Paul returned home, I told him about Shane’s threats. I found all these complications on top of the devastation caused by the fire overwhelming. Out of the blue, Paul turned around with slitty eyes and barked at me: “You know, I really have enough of the local politics. As far as I am concerned they all have skeletons in the closet.”



I was horrified, looked up and stopped varnishing my nails. “Skeletons? What skeletons? And who is ‘they’?” My nerves were on edge. Paul turned the other way, mumbled something and opened a can of beer with a loud crack. I shrieked. Eventually he sat down on the edge of the chair with a grim face.

“It’s about this place, don’t you get it? It is this farm why they are still at each other’s throats! Shane believes we set it on fire because it is the disputed property we are living in. In his twisted mind he thinks my family wants it back or at least make it impossible for him to reap the benefits.”



“Gee, I did not know. Are you sure?” was all I could muster.



“And by the way –maybe you want to tell me what actually happened on the day of the fire. You were just standing there in the garden! Did you play with the candles again?”

“How ridiculous. I cannot remember anything. As you know, I was in total shock. And talking about it, where have you been when the house was on fire?”

Paul pointed the beer can at me. “Ah, I was waiting for that! Come on, spit it out! What are you really saying?” His voice was as sharp and serrated as a hunting knife.

Silence.



”No answer, as usual. You know, I am actually totally fed up. You have done nothing at all. Not ever, if I think about it. At the slightest problem you run to your father. I am tired of sorting everything out for you. Just have a look how Brigitte runs her business.” And gulped the beer down in one go like a cold drink.



He did not deserve an answer to that, did he? Instead I looked at him with my forehead in deep frowns blowing at my drying fingernails.



“Don’t look at me like that. How about doing something for a change? Or do you want to end up like your mother, boring, useless and dependent on servants?”



Now, that was quite enough. Not ever had he spoken to me like that. This was not Paul the person I had married. He cracked another beer. That sound tore my already ruptured nerves apart. I jumped up and furiously lashed out at him wildly gesticulating:

“Without my father’s support we would not be able to achieve anything and his help was very welcome when we got married and you have your job only because my father used his influence and you are ungrateful, not working hard and worst of all, not interested in my activities and as far as my mother is concerned, no, I do not believe that she is boring or useless for that matter and secondly it is none of your business!” I was out of breath.



Paul looked at me with his eyes wide open, put the beer can down on the dressing table with aplomb, left the room and drove off. Immediately, I grabbed my cell phone and started to dial my father’s number but it was past midnight and it was not a good idea to disturb him. The turmoil in my head kept me awake the whole night. What was this all about? Ag, people were simply jealousy or spiteful because they couldn’t swallow that my father was the most successful sheep farmer in the area, I tried to convince myself. And Paul? Why was he so upset all of a sudden? And where was he spending the night now?



Early the next morning I walked over to his father’s house, feeling hollow, hoping to find Paul there. His father was having breakfast -alone. I did not know how to start and put in plain words what had happened the night before. But the tensions constricted my breathing and without sitting down I explained in shorthand style that Paul had left because we had a fight about the fire and all sorts of other things.



“What other things?” His father demanded to know putting the cutlery down. I burst out in tears and just said: ”Your families, the farmhouse…” He looked up from his plate, then he said in a calm but harsh voice: “This has nothing to do with you, Tiffany. Concentrate on fixing your relationship with Paul. I will not tolerate any nonsense. I have noticed that Paul is spending a lot of time at Brigitte’s place, more than necessary to sort out  accommodation, if you ask me.”



What? Was he serious? I sat down and looked at him in disbelief. He carried on with his breakfast. I knew that the topic was closed, got up abruptly and left the house without saying a word. My mind went numb. Somebody had pulled the carpet from underneath my feet and I was tumbling down into a big black hole.



Back in my room I made a cup of coffee hoping that this would calm me down. With shaking hands, I phoned Susan, an old school friend in town and asked her if we could meet. I felt shattered and did not know what to think any more.



In town, I first bought more tranquilizers and then went to Susan who did not mince her words. There was something sinister going on, she was convinced and listed the names of people who could have an interest to harm me. How could I be so naïve?Just follow the money, she said at last. My head was spinning and I popped another pill. Now thinking about it, a lot of things made sense. The signs were there all along, I just had to string them up in the right order. No, I was not going around the twist.

When I left Susan’s house I noticed my husband’s vehicle parked down the road. What was he doing there? And decided to drive past him. When I got closer I saw, however, that there were two people sitting in the car. One of them was definitely Paul and the other one a woman. Oh boy, it was Brigitte. I sped past hoping that they had not seen me.



My  mind went blank. I felt so nauseous that I could not even cry any more. It was so unfair. Now I was facing exactly what? Poverty? Homelessness? Divorce? Most probably all of that!



What must I do now? I had no idea and just felt like running away. I arranged for the stable boys to look after the horses and packed a few bags to go to my father’s beach house. I would only return once everything was back to normal, which could be... never. Well, none of that was ultimately my problem, was it?



When I loaded the luggage into my Porsche Cayainne, a Police van stopped in front of the guest rooms. Two detectives jumped out of the vehicle, noisily banging the doors.

“We have received the report from disaster management of the fire brigade. It is about the cause of the fire.”



“It's about time that you come up with some answers. Who was it? Shane? John? Brigitte? Paul? Or even his father?” I almost spat at them. “By the way, Paul is not here, he disappeared last night.”



The detectives looked at each other in surprise.



“Actually, Tiffany, it was an accident, an electrical fault caused the fire.”

I had to sit down. My life had gone up in smoke because of some silly electrical fault? I could not even feel a sense of relief that nobody wanted to kill me, because inside, I felt very dead.