The King of Clayfield - 01 (29 page)

When I got downstairs, Sara and Jen were standing in the kitchen.

"What's up?" I said.

"I was apologizing. Sara was right--it
is
really gross. We can find a different house. It's not like we'd ever be able to clean that room enough."

"Okay," I said. "But we can come back. We know this is a house we can take stuff from."

"Like that Escalade out there," Jen said, picking up the keys from the table. "Let's leave the truck here, and we'll go house-hunting in style."

Jen wanted to drive. She didn't care where we looked for a new house. Initially, I wanted to stay near Blaine's, because of the familiarity, but if we found a perfect place, it didn't really matter where it was. We drove around for another hour, staying away from the city limits and exploring back roads.

We saw a few people stumbling around outside, but they never threatened us.
 
We passed
 
an open tobacco barn and saw a whole group of them crowded together inside for shelter. They weren't completely mindless. They did, as the saying goes, have enough sense to get in out of the rain.

"We ought to torch that barn," Jen said, driving by slowly. "That would be one group we
 
wouldn't have to worry about."

"So we're going to be exterminators?" I said.

"I'm not talking about hunting them," she said, "but why pass up an opportunity?"

"It's too wet," Sara said. "But I agree; they all need to go."

That was surprising. Sara didn't talk much anyway, and we'd never
 
had any indication that she was in a hurry to hurt anyone.

"See?" Jen said. "Sara's on my side."

"From what we've seen, there's no guarantee that anything will kill them forever," I said. "You might just piss them off."

"One thing I've been thinking about," Jen said. "We should all probably try to find
 
some handguns.
 
We're going to keep scaring
 
survivors when we knock on their door and we're all obviously armed. We need to be armed, but we need a way to
 
hide it so they aren't afraid of us. I know I wouldn't answer the door if there was someone outside with a shotgun. If I did, I'd
 
probably answer with a shotgun myself."

"We have the twenty-two. We also have that
 
thirty-eight and the nine millimeters that we found at city
 
hall," I said. "But we
 
need ammo."

"Just something to think about," she said.

We had traveled in a big circle, and we were headed back towards Blaine's place from the opposite direction when we came across something promising. There was a sign by the road that said LASSITER STABLES: HORSE BOARDING, FARRIERING,
 
and RIDING LESSONS.

The entire property--probably thirty or forty
 
acres--was enclosed in a white board fence, and then subdivided by more fences to form smaller pastures. The long driveway cut right up the middle, and was fenced on either side. There were horses in a couple of the fields.

"This looks pretty good," I said as Jen pulled in the driveway. "We could put a gate up there at the entrance, and I think that fence should discourage the infected."

The driveway led to an old, two-story house. The house reminded me of watching reruns of
The Waltons
 
with my mom when I was a kid.
 
There were two barns and a little greenhouse. The property was immaculate. The owners had kept the place maintained and tidy.

There were five
 
pickup trucks
 
parked around the barns, including one with a horse trailer attached. There were also a couple of tractors,
 
a
 
four-wheeler, and a golf cart.

"Sara," I said. "Hand me that revolver."

She passed it over the seat to me.

"I'm going to go up to the house and check it out," I said. "You two stay here."

"Since
 
when did we become the frail, little women?" Jen said.

"Since your conversation about handguns," I said. "We only have one, so only one of us will go knock on the
 
door."

She
 
just stared at me without expression.

"But please do cover me with the rifle from here," I said. "And stop looking at me like that. This was your idea, wasn't it?"

"Whatever," she said.

I got out, put the weapon in my pants, and then covered it with my shirt.

I went up to the porch, opened the
 
screen
 
door
 
and knocked. After waiting a few seconds and knocking again, I tried the door. It was open.

"Hello? Anyone home?"

No one answered, so I motioned for Jen and Sara to join me.
 

The interior of the house was just as clean and neat as the
 
property outside. The decor in the living room was a
 
western motif. In the
 
dining room, I found places set for
 
four people. There were days-old biscuits, sausage, and gravy in the plates. Next
 
to one plate was a copy of
The Clayfield Chronicle
. It was dated last
 
Thursday.
 
The only thing out of place was one dining room chair that was overturned and a cup of orange juice was spilled.
 

"No one has been in here in a long time," I said. "We can check upstairs, but I think we're good here."

"There's a
 
fireplace in the living room," Jen said.
 
"I
 
like this place."

"What about all the horses?" Sara said.
 

"I love horses," Jen said.
 

"I do, too, but how are we
 
going to take care of them?" Sara said.

We all stood there staring at each other. This was not something I had considered.
 
Did we, by taking a
 
property, become responsible for all of the livestock
 
on that property? And what about all of the other livestock all over the countryside?

"We can't take care of them," I said. "So what do we
 
do with them?"

Jen walked over to the window and
 
looked out into the pasture.

"Eventually, we'll need horses won't we?"

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe
 
in a
 
year
 
or more. We
 
have plenty of vehicles and gasoline around for a while--until the gas goes bad, I guess.
 
I can't see the need right now."

"How many do
 
you think there are?" Sara said. "I saw five on that one side. I wonder if there are any in the barns."

"There
 
are
 
seven over here," Jen said. "Can't they just eat grass?"

"That's the thing," I said. "I don't know. I don't know anything about horses. I see big troughs out there. So someone has to give them water."

"Could we just let them go?" Sara said. "Would they go?"

"Let's search the rest of the house. Then we'll go out to the barns and see what we're dealing with," I said.

The house had two bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs and another bedroom downstairs. The fireplace was clean and didn't look like it had been used in a while. There was a big propane tank out back, so we'd be able to use the stovetop in the kitchen. The gas line was likely hooked into the water heater and central heat as well, but the
 
furnace had a blower and
 
they both
 
had thermostats that required electricity, so they'd be useless to us.

There was more pasture
 
behind the house, and more horses, too. One of the pastures had a small pond. It had been raining enough that the horses
 
were getting some water in their troughs, but when the rain stopped, they would probably go through that quickly--I figured a horse could drink a lot. We'd have to let them out so they could find food and water on their own.
 

"There's going to be a problem with all these animals," I said. "I've been thinking about this off and on since this started. Domesticated animals have relied on people for a long time. Now the people aren't there for them anymore."

Jen nodded.

"I got to thinking about that when we found that dead cat today,"
 
she said. "My aunt has a house full of cats."

"Think about all the indoor pets--cats, dogs,
 
hamsters, and goldfish." I said. "They'll all eventually die of thirst or starvation trapped in their owners' houses. Then,
 
there are
 
farm animals. They'll have a better shot, but not much better. Eventually, they'll start dying. I would think with all of the death, we'll have more disease to worry about. Canton B won't be our only problem."

"Let's check the barns," Jen said. "If there are more in there, then they've been in there for almost a week. Let's hope they've had enough food and water."

The three of us went out. On the way, Sara looked in the horse trailer.

"Aww," she said. "There's one in here. I think it's dead."

We joined her and looked inside. There was a gray horse in the floor of the trailer. It's head was stretched up, still secured to the front of the trailer by a halter and lead rope. Its eyes were open and its tongue was hanging out of the side of its mouth. It broke my heart to see it.

Jen started crying.

"I'll check the barns," I said, taking the shotgun from Sara. "There's no need in you two having to see anything like this."

"I've told you before," Jen said. "I'm not a child, and I don't need you to
 
coddle me."

I nodded and started toward the nearest
 
barn. She grabbed my arm, and I looked back at her.

"But thank you for offering," she said.

I nodded again and proceeded to the barn.

The building was cleaner than my house. There was a corridor down the middle with five stalls on
 
the left side
 
and four stalls on the right. On the right side, where the fifth stall would have been, there was an office. The barn also had a big loft stacked with hay that ran half the length of the building.

We were glad to find all of the stalls empty.
 
Jen
 
went into the office.

"Old Mr. Lassiter really cracked the whip, didn't he?"

"What do you mean?" I said.

"Look how clean it is in here," she said. "Textbook
 
Virgo. Can you imagine working for this guy?"

"You believe all that zodiac stuff?" I said.

"It doesn't matter if I believe it," she said. "It's
 
truth, and truth is truth whether you believe it or not."

"My pastor says that
 
astrology
 
is evil," Sara said.

Jen started to speak, then looked at me, and held her tongue. I smiled at her.

"Could be that Mr. Lassiter's
employees
were all Virgos," I said. "Maybe Mr.
 
Lassiter was a messy
 
Pisces like me."

"See? Pisces are supposed to be messy, so it
is
true."

"I think it's just a coincidence," I said.

"There's no such thing," Jen smiled. "So, a
 
Pisces, huh? No wonder I like you so much."

The second barn was just like the first except instead of an office it had a tack room full of saddles and bridles and farriering tools.
 
There was
 
a pleasant smell of
 
hay, leather, and...well, I guess the other smell was horse.
 
One of the stalls was occupied by a
 
billy goat. There was still a little water in
 
his trough. I climbed up in the loft and threw down
 
some hay for him.