Chapter 2

The letter came on a Tuesday, folded in thirds, and it did not say sorry.

"After review of the fire department's report, this loss is not covered. Cause of loss: electrical failure in unpermitted wiring."

Ruth Ann read it twice at her daughter's kitchen table, where she'd been sleeping on a pull-out for two weeks. Then she put it in the notebook, on the right side, with the bills.

She called the agency on the square. A girl answered - not Marlene, a girl in her twenties, new. Ruth Ann said her name. The girl put her on hold and came back and said Mr. Traywick was with a client.

"Tell him it's about the report he read in my yard."

Another hold. Then: "He said the decision came from the carrier, ma'am. Not from us."

"The carrier got their cause from him," Ruth Ann said. "He writes my policy and he wrote the report."

The girl didn't have an answer for that.

She drove to the fire hall that afternoon.

Marlene Estep was at the desk with her reading glasses pushed up, typing. Denim skirt, red Christmas cardigan, the auxiliary vest on the back of her chair. Behind her, the filing cabinet. On the desk, a steno pad with times written down the margin in a neat hand.

"I need the run sheet for my fire," Ruth Ann said.

Marlene's fingers stopped. "The department keeps its own run sheets."

"I know. I'm asking to see it."

"I can't hand out pages." She said it quietly, watching the doorway. "The chief would have to."

"Then who was on my water supply that night?"

Marlene's mouth worked. "You'd have to ask him."

Ruth Ann walked out into the bay. Junior Purdy was coiling hose on the far side, alone, and he saw her and kept coiling.

"Junior."

He didn't stop.

"I'm not here to get you in trouble. I want to know if the tanker ever got to my hydrant."

He set the hose down. He looked at the floor, at the drain grate, at anything that wasn't her.

"I can't talk to you," he said. Then, so low she almost didn't get it, "It's not your wiring."

He walked fast into the back and a door shut.

Ruth Ann stood in the cold bay a minute. Then she got in her truck and drove home with both hands on the wheel.