Now Playing: The Silent Child
Episode Seven concluded with:
Two bodies lay on
the floor, a man and a woman. Dehner lifted the woman’s body, placed her over
his shoulder and ran back to the doorway. He held his breath again and charged
into the streaming smoke.
Gunshots greeted him as he ran off the porch and onto the yard of the ranch
house. Dehner hastily placed the body down then dropped to the ground himself.
From the corner of his eye, he could see an explosive flash which cut the night
like a monstrous lightning bolt. A massive fireworks display of red then
covered the sky as the roof of the house collapsed.
The detective glanced backward at the rampaging fire. The man he had left in
the house was beyond rescue.
Episode Eight
The
flames continued their destructive rampage. The corral beside the house was now
on fire. Dehner wondered how long Clint Bolger could remain safely behind the
boulder which fronted the coral.
As if answering the question, Bolger
moved cautiously from behind the large rock. No shots came from the mountain
area. “I think they’ve gone, Rance,” Clint shouted. “I heard hoofbeats riding
off when the house came down.”
Dehner sprang to his feet. No one
fired, but the beast behind him seemed to be growing. He picked up the body of
the young woman and carried her away from the flames.
“Is she still alive, Rance?” Clint met
the detective several yards in front of the burning house.
“Don’t know,” Dehner coughed as he
gently laid the woman on the ground.
“You okay?” The sheriff asked.
“I’m fine.” Both men crouched over
the body.
“This is the Thompson woman,” the
sheriff said.
Dehner coughed once again, his eyes
were still watering from the smoke. “She was shot at close range. Someone
killed her and then set fire to the house.”
“Why would they do that?”
“Don’t know. Her husband was
probably shot too.” Dehner glanced back at the inferno which now raged where a
house had been. “It’ll be a while before we can retrieve his body.”
When Dehner turned back, he saw the
sheriff lift Judy Thompson’s arm. “Have you seen many corpses, Rance?”
“Yes.”
“Me too. I don’t think Judy Thompson
was killed recently. She’s been dead at least a few hours.”
The detective took a closer look at
the corpse. “I think you’re right. That means Judy Thompson and her husband
were probably killed this morning. About the time I found Pixie,--or she found
me.”
“But why would the killers come back
and set fire to the house?”
Dehner shook his head. “I can’t say.
All we know for sure is that someone murdered the parents of a little girl. And
now they want to kill the child.”
Tomorrow: Episode Nine of The Silent
Child
