Vestavia Hills. Christian Perego

I want you to explain to me why you didn't tell me anything about the interrogations you did last week. I thought I was clear. "

      Nicholas could have justified himself in some way, but he knew it would only make the situation worse. Therefore, he kept quiet and let the reprimand pass.

      "All the information needs to go by me," Flitter yelled, "especially the ones about an investigation that I wanted."

      Flitter stopped without speaking any more: with that tone, he had made things clearer than he would have done by spending more time talking.

      Nick said, "Of course, sir. My mistake. I'll report back tomorrow when I'm back on duty. "Then he added hurriedly," I want to ask you to deal with a case. "

      Flitter blinked as if he had been annoyed by a bug: "What?!"

      "I want to investigate the boy found dead."

      "Wolf is already working on that."

      "And the latest alleged cases of violence in the county," Nick continued as if he had not heard Flitter's statement.

      "I said Wolf is already working on that case."

      Nick insisted: "I want to investigate, even privately. I promise you that I will not take time away from my other duties; you should reduce them a little. "He concluded like that with a smartass look on his face.

      The two looked at each other for a few long seconds.

      Then the captain said, "To hell with it. I know that even if I didn't permit you, you would do it anyway. Also, Wolf just let us know that he is not well and won't be for a few days, that bastard."

      Getting some of the other idiots out there to do his job means wasting time." Finally, he added authoritatively: "But you will have to report everything to Wolf and me when he returns. Understand?"

      "Understood," Nick said and then slipped out of the office. After all, Flitter was a good cop.

      He decided to keep the half-day he had off and spend some time with Anna: before facing death and violence again, he needed something beautiful that would show him what else life can reserve.

      The next morning he woke up early, even before his wife. He went out to scout the city.

      He would begin to visit all the public businesses once again: the shopkeepers were good informants, even involuntary; thanks to all the people they met each day, and those they could notice walking up and down the street. Never underestimate the disconnected look of a butchery owner who observes what people, who walk past him, do and how they behave.

      As soon as Nick found himself on the main road of Vestavia Hills, he felt it wasn't going to be a day like any other at all.

      There was incredible fibrillation in the air, a palpable heaviness as if someone had spread a wet blanket over the shoulders of the whole town.

      It did not take him long to understand why people exchanged inquisitive looks and had a sort of interest that one noticed as soon as one set foot on the street.

      Once around the corner of Hickory Road, Nicholas saw in the distance, towards Church Yard, a column of black smoke that had nothing reassuring.

      He quickened his pace. Then he decided to let go of all restraint and started running.

      Once there, he found several people still staring astonished at the burning rubble. Several small groups had formed throughout the Church Yard: people talked to each other to give themselves the courage and try to understand what had happened, but without raising their voices, as you do at a man's deathbed.

      The burning building was the church. The fire must have developed very early in the morning, and the fact that the construction was slightly away from all the houses had perhaps contributed to delaying the alarm.

      Then action was taken, probably with a human chain, to try to put out the flames using buckets of water.

      Flames had burnt more than half of the church, and the embers were still hot and kept under control by a group of citizens. The vicarage wasn't too damaged, although the part closest to the church had the signs of the flames, similar to enormous dark fingers that stretched to grasp it.

      Nicholas was surprised that he didn't realize something was going on, but probably the wind blew in the opposite direction to his house, so neither the smoke nor the screams of fear had reached it. Also, his home was on the other side of Vestavia in respect to the church, and that agitation around it left no traces in his neighbourhood.

      However, the first thing that occurred to him was to ask the first person within range, "Didn't the fire bell ring?" the sound of that would have reached his home as well.

      "No," said the man, "I don't think they played it because a lot of people started running right away, and they started throwing water buckets."

      Safety practice, however, should not have been ignored: ringing a fire bell was a matter of common sense.

      "It was tampered with," said a man with a beard, who had inadvertently heard the conversation between Nicholas and the other man.

      "How?" Nick said with an already challenging look.

      "This is what I heard: they immediately took action to put out the fire, and someone went to ring the fire bell, but they were left with the rope between their hands and the bell off from the turret and chipped."

      "Are you sure?"

      "Hey, that's what I heard, I'm not a firefighter."

      Nick was already lost in a thousand thoughts.

      It made no sense to destroy the fire alarm, even for a criminal town.

      The spreading of the flames would have damaged himself, his eventual home or those he could aim to rob; not to mention the cultivated fields that were located just outside the town, just behind and not far from the church, which was a source of sustenance for thieves and criminals as well. Maybe it could have been the act of a deranged man who doesn't even have any survival instinct. Or perhaps a firefighter himself, unstable or vindictive?

      A thousand hypotheses could be made. But for a crime, you always need a motive, and who could have something against the Reverend? What did he hope to achieve? It had to be for revenge: what interests could a humble person like a shepherd have affected?

      Nick didn't like to attend church very much and only sporadically had he been dragged to the service by Annabeth's persistence; however, he knew the Reverend, and he could not believe any revenge against him.

      The obvious next thing to do now was to look for who had experienced the fire firsthand: the Reverend Johnatan Abblepot himself.

      By the way: why hadn't he given the alarm immediately? Why wasn't he in the square gathering at least the signs of solidarity of his congregation? Was he dead trying to fight the fire himself?

      Nicholas cursed himself for his curiosity of an unmarried woman who had fixed him to a thousand assumptions without having taken a step, and for wasting time with those men in the square as if he was an ordinary passerby.

      He made his way through the crowd, asking if they had seen the Reverend. But they all said no.

      He continued to go further, and, as soon as he was near the fence that surrounded the lawn of the church, he could still feel the terrible heat that sprang from the damage of the fire even though it had been extinguished.

      The planks of the fence were still white, and contrasted with the black remains, as if they were a crooked and mocking smile towards the tragedy that had happened.

      "I'm police officer Nicholas Abbot, and I want to speak to Reverend Abblepot right away," Nick said to the first fire officer he met.

      "I'm sorry, sir, but I don't know where he is," replied guiltily.

      "He is not here?!" Nick yelled

      "No, sir, I mean that the Reverend is not here. We couldn't find him in the vicarage. Nor in the surroundings. And believe me, I was one