The Darkest Evening of the Year

fumes.
    He has dripped nothing on himself. As he walks away from the house, he cups his hands around his nose, and they smell fresh.
    From a pocket of her leather jacket, Moongirl has extracted a box of matches. She uses only those with wooden stems.
    She strikes a match, stoops, and ignites the wet trail on the walk-way. Low blue-and-orange flames dance away from her, as if the magical night has brought forth a procession of capering faeries.
    Together, she and Harrow walk to the west side of the house, where they have a view of both porches. The only doors are at the front and back. Along this wall are three windows.
    Fire leaps high across the front of the house, seethes between the railings, and dispatches more dancing faeries along the drizzle that connects the porches.
    As always, after an immediate whoosh, the flames initially churn in near silence, feeding on the gasoline, which needs no chewing. The crunch and crackle will come soon, when the fire takes wood in its teeth.

 
    Chapter
11
    F ollowing the hallway to the living-room archway, Amy said, “Hello? Who’s there?”
    Golden retrievers are not bred to be guard dogs, and considering the size of their hearts and their irrepressible joy in life, they are less likely to bite than to bark, less likely to bark than to lick a hand in greeting. In spite of their size, they think they are lap dogs, and in spite of being dogs, they think they are also human, and nearly every human they meet is judged to have the potential to be a boon companion who might, at any moment, cry “Let’s go!” and lead them on a great adventure.
    Nevertheless, they have formidable teeth and are protective of family and home.
    Amy assumed that any intruder who was able to induce three adult goldens to submit without one bark must be not foe but friend, or at least harmless. Yet she approached the living room with a curiosity that included a measure of wariness.
    When Amy had answered Janet Brockman’s plea to rescue Nickie, she had not left Fred and Ethel in a dark house. One lamp in her bedroom and a brass reading lamp in the living room provided comfort.
    Now the hallway ceiling fixture blazed. Also, ahead and to her right, the front room loomed brighter than she had left it.
    When she passed the open bedroom door on her left and stepped through the living-room archway, she found no intruder, only three delighted dogs.
    As any golden would do in a new environment, Nickie had gone exploring, chasing down the most interesting of all the new smells, weaving among chairs and sofas, mapping the landscape, identifying the coziest corners.
    Filled with pride of home, Fred and Ethel followed the newcomer, pausing to note everything that she had noted, as if sharing with her had made the bungalow new again to them.
    Sniffing, grinning, chuffing with approval, tails lashing, the new girl and her welcoming committee rushed past Amy.
    By the time that she turned to follow them, they had vanished across the hall, into her bedroom. A moment ago, only a nightstand lamp had illuminated that room, but now the ceiling fixture burned bright.
    “Kids?”
    Matching plump sheepskin-covered dog beds mushroomed in two corners of the bedroom.
    As Amy crossed the threshold, Nickie bumped a tennis ball with her nose, and Fred snatched it on the roll. Nickie checked out but didn’t want a plush blue bunny, so Ethel snared it.
    The bedroom and the attached bath lacked an intruder, and by the time Amy followed the pack to the study, the fourth and last room in the bungalow, the ceiling light was on there, too.
    Fred had dropped the ball, and Ethel had cast aside the bunny, and Nickie had decided not to stake a claim to a discarded pair of Amy’s socks that she had fished out of the knee space under the desk.
    Paws thumping, nails clicking, tails knocking merrily against every crowding object, the dogs returned to the hall, then to the kitchen.
    Puzzled, Amy went to the only window in the study and found it locked. Before leaving the room, she frowned at the wall switch and flipped it down, up, down, turning the ceiling fixture off, on, off.
    She stood in the hall, listening to thirsty dogs lapping from the water bowls in the kitchen.
    In the bedroom again, she checked both windows. The latches were engaged, as was the one in the bathroom.
    She peered in the closet. No boogeyman.
    The front-door deadbolt was locked. The security chain remained in place.
    All three living-room windows were secure. With