Burning at the Boss (A Johnny Ravine Mystery)

by Martin Roth

  We ran into the center of the field. Behind us I could see that the fire was attacking the trees that we had just left, and was starting to creep across the field. The air had become fiery hot. The sky was dark. Embers were igniting small blazes in all directions. A couple of wooden fence posts seemed to be alight.

  I looked around. Over in the distance, through more trees, I spotted what was presumably a farmhouse. I pointed. “There has to be a road near here.” Grapper was panting heavily, and I noticed he had pocketed his gun.

  We ran up a slope to the house, a one-storey building with high windows overlooking the slope and the trees. A carport capable of holding at least three vehicles was empty. A long dirt driveway extended through trees to a distant roadway.

  I banged on the front door but no one answered. The flames seemed to be leaping the treetops. We were surrounded. Already some of the trees lining the driveway were alight. Embers flew through the air. Running for the road was no option. We would be engulfed.

  “We have to get inside the house. That’s safer than staying outside.”

  I smashed and unlatched a window, setting off a fire alarm. Then I pushed myself into the house, tumbling heavily to the floor. I ran to unlock the front door. Grapper and Jonah joined me inside.

  “Down here,” I shouted, and led them along a carpeted hallway to a living room, furnished with sleek wooden chairs and a sofa in vivid black and white patterns. A throw mat and several beanbags were on the floor.

  At that moment we heard a roar as if a jet aircraft was attacking and then, with an enormous explosion, an entire corner of the living room erupted in flames.

  “We need water. Wait.” I ran back down the hallway pushing open every door. One was a bathroom. I grabbed all the towels I could find, threw them into the bathtub and turned on the water. Thankfully it flowed. I carried the drenched towels back to the living room. “Wrap these around you.” I looked around. The heat was intense. One of the chairs was on fire. “We can’t stay in this room. Those big windows might explode.”

  Showers of embers whirled through the air around us and then with another enormous explosion a long gas cylinder came crashing through the window, landing just feet from us. We ran back down the hallway looking in the rooms. Grapper was remarkably calm, and I noted at one point that he was holding Jonah’s hand. Even Jonah did not appear scared, despite the absolute devastation that seemed set to engulf us.

  “In here,” I said, choosing one room at random. It was a kid’s bedroom, with vampire movie posters on the wall. “Wait there.” I pulled the sheets and a blanket and bed cover off the bed and ran back to the bathroom. I threw them into the tub and turned on the water again. This time just a thin trickle emerged, and then stopped. I realized that the fire alarm had also stopped. We had lost water and power.

  I ran back to the bedroom and found Grapper and Jonah both beating their damp towels at the bed, which had caught fire.

  “No more water,” I panted. The heat was intense. Even breathing seemed to burn my lungs. With a sudden whoosh the ceiling above us erupted in flames.

  We ran back into the living room. Every item seemed to be burning. Then with a crash a part of the ceiling—plasterboard, girders, light fittings—collapsed, right on top of Grapper. With an ox-like groan he fell heavily, a fiery wooden beam right on top of his legs.

  “Jonah, you have to help,” I screamed. “Wrap towels around your hands.”

  Grapper screamed obscenities as we struggled to free him. I felt my hand burning and I heard Jonah shout in pain. But at last we succeeded in pushing the beam away from his body.

  My body felt as if it was ablaze and yet I realized that the heat around us had actually subsided. Almost certainly the fire front had passed. I looked at Jonah. He was pushing a still-damp towel into his hand, clearly striving to relieve the pain. I felt he was trying hard not to cry.

  “We have to get out before the whole house collapses,” I shouted. My throat burned and my voice was hoarse. “I think the fire’s passed.”

  “Help me stand,” Grapper growled. I looked down at him. His clothes were ripped and singed. Soot and debris covered his body. His face was blackened, except for bright streaks of blood running down both cheeks.

  He offered me his arm, and I dragged him up. He put a powerful hand on my shoulder and tried to walk. But he could use his left leg only with great pain. It was clearly injured, probably broken. With another loud grunt he collapsed back to the floor.

  Then suddenly, somewhere in the distance, I heard what sounded like a voice coming over a loudspeaker. “Is anyone there?” came the enquiry. “Is anyone there? Does anyone need help?”

  I went to the front door. A police car had appeared in the driveway. Small fires were still burning all around, but the fire front had passed. Way down on the road, at the end of the long driveway, I could see the flashing lights of a fire engine.

  The message was repeated.

  I waved. “We need help.”

  “No,” I heard Grapper cry from inside. But it was too late. Two young police officers leapt from the car and came running in.

  “My dad needs help,” I said. “He’s badly hurt.” I led them into the living room. The two men looked around. One was staring at Jonah.

  “Are you Jonah Reezall?” he asked.

  Jonah nodded.

  The man looked at me. “We have an alert out for three persons fitting your description.”

  Just in time he saw Grapper raising his gun. “No!” he shouted and he and his companion flung themselves out of the room. Grapper’s shot whistled wildly into the ceiling.

  “No, no!” I shouted, but the damage was done. Already the police car was speed-reversing back down the driveway.

  “What were you thinking?” I screamed at Grapper. “I’ve been trying to help you. You need an ambulance. Do you really think you can get away?”

  “Help me stand up.”

  Again I assisted him to rise. This time he managed to hobble unaided to a small side window. But then his leg gave way once more and he collapsed to the ground, clearly in enormous pain. I rushed to help, but now he glared at me.

  “Get out!” he screamed.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Get out. Right now. You and Jonah. Both of you.”

  “This house isn’t safe. I’ll help you outside.”

  He was lying on the ground, looking like a helpless, beached whale. He pointed the gun at me. “I’ll count to five…”

  “I’ll help you to get out of here.”

  “I’ll count to five. When I say I’ll shoot you should believe me.”

  “No, please…”

  “One…two…”

  I realized what was happening. I wanted to say something meaningful. I wanted to say: Dad, I love you. I wanted to give him a hug. But I knew that I didn’t love him.

  “Be careful, Dad, please be careful,” was all I managed to say. My voice was choked.

  “Get out,” he shouted one last time.

  I led Jonah outside to the driveway. My hands were burning. I’m sure his were too. But still we held hands tightly as we started walking towards the road.

  “What will happen to him?” asked Jonah.

  “He’ll go to prison for the rest of his life.” If he lets the police take him alive, I thought.

  “He wasn’t a nice man. He wouldn’t let me see my mum. I cried one night.”

  I smiled down at the boy.

  We walked through the smoke between blackened, smoldering trees, towards the police car and fire engine parked at the end of the driveway, their bright lights flashing. In the distance I could hear sirens, no doubt bringing car after car of heavily armed officers to capture Grapper.

  Suddenly Jonah looked up at me. “Are you going to be my father?”

  What a strange question. “Why do you ask?” I actually wondered if he even realized that Grapper was his dad.

  “Mum said that you like her.”

  “She said that?
”

  “She said you were asking her out on dates. And she said she liked you. But she said it was important that I liked you too.”

  “Would you like me to be your father?”

  He shrugged.

  Then he asked: “Do you love her?”

  This time it was my turn to shrug.

  Now, as we walked hand-in-hand towards the flashing lights, I reflected fleetingly on my experiences with Miriam during the past week. I thought about Rohan and his kids and Rad and his mother. I thought about Grapper, and I thought about what my pastor said, about trusting only God, about not turning our families into icons.

  “No, I don’t think I’ll be your father,” I said at last. “Fathers just mess their kids up. But if you like I could be your brother.”

  THE END

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  Martin Roth’s Acclaimed “Military Orders” Series

  In the Middle Ages, military orders like the Templars defended Christians and fought for justice. Now, in Martin Roth's latest series of novels, a church has established a clandestine new military order, to fight for today's persecuted Christians...

  * Brother Half Angel - an underground Christian seminary in China is under siege from sword-wielding members of a local cult who still pay homage to the bloodthirsty extremists who tried to expel all foreigners from China in the nineteenth century.

  * The Maria Kannon - a killer is on the loose in Japan, targeting members of a small church community. It becomes apparent that the key is a mysterious card left at each murder scene – a card depicting the Maria Kannon, a statue of a Buddhist deity that was once revered by persecuted Japanese Christians.

  * Military Orders – a missionary is murdered in India and the local police are falsely claiming that he was the leader of a gang engaged in the theft and sale of precious temple artworks. It quickly becomes clear that he was involved in something much bigger than simple mission work. But what?

  * Festival in the Desert – a US military officer is kidnapped by terrorists in West Africa and a Christian mission hospital in the region is under attack. It is time to call on the New Mercedarians, the clandestine military order dedicated to fighting for Christians under attack around the world.

  Martin Roth’s Johnny Ravine Private Detective Series

  * Prophets and Loss - when Melissa Stonelea’s born-again Christian husband is found strangled in the bondage room of the city’s classiest brothel, a page of the Bible stuffed in his mouth, she doesn’t need to hear more of her pastor’s sermons on the healing powers of forgiveness. She needs revenge.

  * Hot Rock Dreaming - Australian Christian Book of the Year finalist. The judges wrote: “Hired to investigate the death of an Aboriginal painter, private detective Johnny Ravine is drawn into a complex mystery as dangerous as it is intriguing. Environmental politics, land rights and Aboriginal spirituality are explored with subtlety. For the hero and reader alike there is a valuable lesson to be learned about the importance of discerning which voice is proclaiming life and love when all is not as it seems. A compelling novel.”

  * Burning at the Boss – a hellfire preacher is murdered and investigator Johnny Ravine learns that huge sums are missing from the charities that he administered. Was the preacher really using the money to pay off gunrunners? And, if so, why?

  Learn more, and check for new releases, at Amazon’s Martin Roth author page or at the author’s own website. Check the author’s Facebook page for special promotions.

  Read on for an excerpt from Prophets and Loss, first in the Johnny Ravine private detective series.

  Chapter One

  Forgiveness is the most attractive of the virtues. Until you actually have someone to forgive.

  When a young detective with bad breath and acne told Melissa Stonelea that her born-again Christian husband Grant had been found strangled in the bondage room of the city’s classiest brothel, his hands trussed with S & M leathers and a page of the Bible stuffed in his mouth, she didn’t need to hear any more of the pastor’s sermons on the healing powers of forgiveness and reconciliation.

  She needed revenge.

  “I’ll kill them,” she was sobbing as I let myself into her house, the only brick veneer in a tree-fringed lane of aging weatherboards in Melbourne’s east. “I’ll kill them.”

  From the hallway I could see her standing in the living room, her back to me. Marriage to Grant had gotten her off the pills and into eating at least two good meals a day, but she was still as skinny as an Olympics high jumper. A red floral blouse was half-tucked into a pair of tight blue jeans. Her silky brown hair, normally fashion-model smooth, looked as if it had been trapped in a Qantas 747 downdraft.

  She half-turned, and I saw that her long, oval face was etched with dark lines, like wavy creek-bed patterns on parched soil. Her brown eyes were bloodshot. “I’ll kill them,” she cried again.

  Killing solves nothing, Mel, I wanted to say. You just end up filled with hate and bitterness and snake-like demons, and wanting to kill more. I knew that from my own experience.

  But I couldn’t tell her. Right now Melissa was in no state to listen to a homily. She hadn’t even noticed me. She seemed to be seeking solace in the living room wall, trying to bury her face in the golden houndstooth patterning.

  I hesitated. Should I wait until she was all cried out? No. Melissa was a woman capable of a lot of crying.

  As I walked into the living room the sobs turned into a plaintive kitteny whimper. Then without warning she spiraled to the floor with a slow-motion crash, her arms flailing, like a ballerina enacting the dying of a flower.

  I hadn’t noticed the uniformed policewoman on guard by the kitchen door. She strode over to help. She was a towering, broad-shouldered woman, taller even than Melissa, a blonde Xena Warrior Princess.

  “Doctor’s on the way, sweetheart,” said the policewoman, as she manipulated Melissa into a sitting posture on the carpet. “Just a few more minutes.”

  A wiry young man in a trim blue suit walked out from the kitchen, a cell phone clutched to his ear. He surveyed the scene.

  “She’s okay,” muttered the woman. Without a word the man slipped back through the doorway.

  The policewoman abruptly looked up at me, her eyes glowing with the affection normally reserved for those garden slugs that have crawled up the drainpipe into your shower cabinet on cold mornings, seeking warmth. “You’re her friend?”

  I nodded.

  Melissa lifted her head, and for the first time she realized that I had arrived.

  “Johnny!” she called. “Johnny!” Her voice was raspy and choked. It sounded as if she were trying to cry some more, but couldn’t. I knelt down beside her and we embraced. I held her tight, and it seemed to put a little energy into her.

  “It was him, Johnny,” she said.

  It was who? I had no idea what she meant. I waited.

  “It was him.”

  The policewoman spoke: “We’ve just been to the morgue to identify her husband.”

  “It was Grant,” said Melissa. “It was him. He’s dead.”

  Now she really was sobbing again. I stroked her hair.

  “They wanted to take me to the police station to answer lots of questions,” she cried. “But I told them to bring me here.” Even in her grief she instinctively reacted against authority.

  She stood up unaided, walked to the wall, banged on it twice with a fist and then slumped on the sofa. New torrents of tears arrived. The policewoman sat beside her and held her hand.

  I wished I could be anywhere but in this house with an Amazonian policewoman and the pimply-faced young man in the kitchen who was almost certainly a detective. But Melissa had distressingly few friends left after Grant did his time in prison. She needed me.

  I made a big pretence of examining all the pictures in the living room. They were everywhere. The place looked like a
gallery. I’d seen them many times of course, but until now hadn’t fully grasped that I featured in so many. Another indication of how few friends had remained.

  Melissa had arranged everything into neat, thematic groups. That was typical. She was always putting everything into categories. Apparently all part of her attempt to gain some control over her existence. So why did everything in her life keep falling apart?

  I knew little about her past. She’d been a revue dancer once. Long legs don’t hinder your progress in that profession. I’d even spotted her one time in a high-kicking line-up of girls, in a late-night TV rerun of Countdown with Molly Meldrum. She was still a teenager, and she was great: tall, energetic, full of natural rhythm and a winning smile. Trouble was, so were all the other girls.

  So she spent a lot of time between jobs.

  As far as I could see, the only thing that had gone right for her was marriage to Grant. And now he was lying in the police morgue, his organs about to be prodded and dissected by the coroner.

  In pride of place above the unused fireplace were framed snaps of Grant and Melissa, from their wedding a few years earlier. Big beefy Grant, his round, expectant eyes sparkling, like a kid just offered the newest Nintendo game, and a grin so wide you were almost blinded by the dazzle from his teeth. And Melissa, nearly as tall, clutching Grant’s muscular arm, a smile of defiance on her face only slightly undermined by a pair of nervous eyes.

  On a side wall was a collection of photos she’d found in an envelope in my apartment one day. There I was, more than two decades earlier, looking so young and small, standing in my battle fatigues in the mountains and waving aloft my M16 semi-automatic. And there I was once more, ten years later, still optimistic, smiling and linking arms with a group of compatriots, not one of whom had escaped the brutal Indonesian army death squads.