THAT OLD HOUSE
by ardavenport
- - - part 3 - - -
When they got there everyone was standing around among a collection of various police cars, an ambulance on standby and them. The bomb squad was still going through the premises and the Sheriff's department hadn't exactly figured out what they needed the fire department's help with. But detectives had arrived to take their statements. They would be prosecuting old man Crandall. That kept them busy for almost an hour, but after that they were left standing around again.
Johnny and Chet entertained themselves with talk about what a nice cozy second alarm fire Crandall's house would make until Captain Stanley told them to knock it off and then went to find someone in charge.
"Don't scratch."
Gage grimaced back at his partner. "These are starting to itch."
Roy looked. The bite marks were hardly swollen at all, but they were a little redder, especially where Johnny had scratched.. "Well, put on some of that ointment that Dixie gave you."
Grumbling, Gage went back to the squad where he'd left it. He squeezed out a blob of white onto the largest spot on his forearm and started to rub it in as he walked back to where the others were standing within the yellow police perimeter tape. Neighbors gathered beyond it on either side of the house, talking and pointing. And a news truck rolled up.
Sitting down on the running board of the engine, Gage took his fire helmet off to put some ointment on his forehead. It felt cool on his skin and smelled faintly like antiseptic hospital soap. When he looked up, he saw everyone else's attention on a gathering of police and men in suits. Captain Stanley had joined them.
The group of officials finally broke up their conference and Stanley went with some of them up the shaded walkway onto the front porch and into the house.
Roy and Marco sat down next to Johnny. Chet expressed what they were all thinking.
"I hope that means something's going to happen."
"Or maybe they'll decide they don't need us." Stoker leaned on the engine. He pushed his helmet back. The two paramedics could at least be comfortable in their blue short shirt-sleeve uniforms while the engine crew wore their heavy turn-out coats. DeSoto watched Gage rub ointment onto the tiny welts on his arms.
"Do you need any help with that?"
Johnny shook his head. "Nyaah, I got it. I just wish this run was over." Roy silently agreed, resting his elbows on his knees.
It was already after four in the afternoon. Some of the curious neighbors had left while others arrived and stood craning their necks, trying to see what the excitement was about. Beside the news truck a man in a suit and tie was speaking into a microphone front of a cameraman, but they couldn't hear what was being said.
Captain Stanley emerged from the house and raised his arm.
"Marco, Kelly! We're going to need some pry bars and an axe!"
"Right away, Cap!"
The two unloaded the tools, then ran up to the front door and went in with it. Roy looked up at Stoker with sympathy.
"I guess they're not finished with us yet."
They waited. More neighbors gathered behind the yellow tape, now attracted just as much by the TV truck as by whatever the police were doing.
Both paramedics perked up when they saw one sheriff's deputy helping another out of the house. DeSoto went to meet them while Gage went to the squad for their equipment.
"What happened?" Roy took the deputy's free arm. He was middle aged, with thinning blond hair.
"He got stung by some bees up there." His younger and taller cop was more excited than his partner
"They weren't bees. They were wasps." The injured man made it to the engine and they sat him down on the running board. "There was a whole attic full in that place. And I'm not allergic, okay."
"You could of fooled me. Look at his arm." The other deputy leaned over him as Gage put the drug box down and opened it. Roy pushed back the officer's sleeve. His whole forearm was puffed up almost twice the size of the other arm.
"That's a pretty strong reaction there for one sting. Are you having any trouble breathing? Feel light-headed"
The deputy shook his head. "No. And it's not just one sting. Those little buggers got me four times I think."
Johnny wrapped a blood pressure cuff around the man's upper arm.
"Is this really necessary? I mean it's a little swollen," he wiggled his fat fingers, "but that's it."
Holding the biophone receiver to his ear, Roy looked up at him. "Well, allergic reactions can get pretty dangerous pretty fast. We'd better check with the hospital just in case. I'm Roy DeSoto and that's my partner, John Gage."
The deputy glanced at the other paramedic who was taking his pulse. "I'm Sargent Dave Albright. And this green kid is Sam Choo. You might want to check him for dampness behind the ears."
"Sarge. . . . "
The older officer just chuckled. "Been on the job for nine whole days."
"Oh, just starting out." Roy smiled up at him, but the rookie officer suddenly looked sullen. "They seem to start them younger all the time."
Albright heartily agreed. "You're telling me."
"Uh, Rampart this is Squad Fifty-One." A few seconds later, Doctor Brackett's voice answered.
"Fifty-One this is Rampart."
"Roy, vitals." Gage reached over and gave Roy a piece of paper with the information to relay to the hospital. Albright pointed at Johnny's arm.
"Hey, looks like something's taken a bite out of you, too. How come that's not swollen?"
Gage touched his arm. "Well, people don't always react the same way to insect bites."
"You're not the guys who were in that house earlier, were you?"
"Yeah, unfortunately. And that house," Gage pointed accusingly, "tried to kill us."
"Well, it looks like your men might have taken a bite out of it themselves." Gage looked to where Albright pointed. Stanley, Lopez and Kelly came out the front door while the deputy went on. "You wouldn't believe what we found in there. That old man was some kind of survivalist waiting for World War Three to break out."
"Yeah?" Gage sat up straighter for another look at the house, but there was nothing new.
Albright's vital signs were normal, but because of the swelling Doctor Brackett advised them to bring in their patient for observation. Albright moaned.
"That's not necessary? Take me to the hospital for a little thing like this?"
"Hey, Sarge. Better safe than sorry."
Albright moaned. "I've got to watch what I say in front of this kid."
Johnny stood up and offered him a hand. "Hey it's just a precaution. If it gets any worse while you're at Rampart, you can get treated faster than if you were waiting around here."
"You've got a point there. Not much to do while the evidence guys are collecting their things." The Sargent got to his feet and pointed at Choo. "You stay here. I'll be back."
The three other firemen arrived as Johnny collected the drug box. Stoker, who had been quietly watching while the two paramedics worked, greeted them. "How'd it go?"
Kelly stopped and leaned on his axe. "Oh, just a little breaking and entering for the boys in blue. And you'll never guess where the old guy was stockpiling his gasoline."
Gage and DeSoto looked at each other, but Stoker guessed first.
"Next to the water heater."
"Nope. Furnace."
"Are you serious?" Gage's tone rose in surprise and a little disgust.
"Dead serious." Lopez came up alongside Kelly. "As soon as the weather got cold, that whole place was going to go up in a huge fireball."
"Not that that would have been much of a loss." Kelly immediately looked as if he wanted to take the words back as his eyes guiltily went to the Captain. But Stanley said nothing about the crack since he had been thinking the same thing after seeing such a gross fire code violation.
"Well Sargent Albright here had a bad reaction to some stings from the wasps in the attic." Roy closed the biophone and handed the case to Gage. "We're going to go with him to the hospital."
Stanley nodded and pointed a thumb behind him at the house. "As soon as the county gets a truck in here to take out the old man's stockpiles of guns and the fuel, we're done here, too."
"Can't happen too soon." Kelly hefted his axe and went to put it away. Stanley and Lopez followed.
Gage went with Albright to the ambulance. The deputy declined to lie down on the stretcher and since he still seemed to be fine except for his swollen arm, Johnny didn't insist. The two attendants rode in front while they sat facing each other in back.
"What was that about sending a truck to pick up guns?"
"Oh, old man Crandall had guns stashed all over the house. Along with a lot of canned food and water. He was really stockpiling for the apocalypse."
"Whoa." Gage shrugged. "Crazy."
"Yeah. But he had help. He's got three grown kids and the detectives are going to be looking them up. No way that old guy fixed his house up like that without help." Albright sat back, resting his hands on his knees. "The guy's supposed to be pretty rich, but he spends it all turning his house into that horror movie you walked into. What kind of a life is that?" Albright scratched the sleeve above his elbow.
"Hey, don't scratch." Gage took the man's hand away and looked at the stung arm again. "Is it starting to itch?"
"Yeah. Not just this arm. Feels like I'm getting it on my whole body."
Gage put his hands of Albright's neck, checking for swelling. He didn't feel any, but the deputy's skin was looking a little blotchy. "Are you having any trouble swallowing or breathing?"
Albright looked thoughtful this time. "No. But I don't feel quite right either."
"Really, " Not finding any swelling, Gage dropped his hands, "feeling light-headed or faint?"
"No. . . . I don't think so. Maybe a little queasy." The Sargent's bravado seemed to subsided, perhaps because it was just the two of them in the back of an ambulance and he didn't have to look strong in front of a fresh recruit.
Gage checked his blood pressure again, but it was still normal.
Albright frowned down at the cuff on his arm. "I just wish I had your stamina with this." He waved a hand at Gage's arms, spotted with pink sting marks. "I got stung a few times by bees when I was a kid and it wasn't anything like this. Do you lose your resistance when you get older?"
"More like some people get more sensitive with age." The cop's expression turned distasteful at the word 'sensitive'. Johnny told him about the dark, infested room he got trapped in while Crandall was subdued. Dave Albright told him about what they'd found in the house, the hoarded food (rats had broken into it in the basement), piles of boxes of junk and magazines, a locked safe, closets of guns, stacked and dusty furniture, another tiger trap in a hallway on the first floor by the back door which was boarded up. But Crandall had a hired gardening service to maintain the yard, completely masking the decay inside his house. Normal on the outside. Rotten on the inside.
Gage felt familiar turns and deceleration. He saw Rampart's vast parking lot through the windshield in the forward cab of the ambulance. The vehicle backed up and a moment later the attendants opened the doors. Gage collected his drug box and biophone and stepped out. He kept an eye of Albright, but he didn't appear to be having any trouble walking. The squad backed in next to the ambulance.
"Hey Doc!" Brackett and a young nurse turned to Gage.
"Is this your wasp strings?"
"Yeah. His arm's swollen up pretty bad, and he says he's starting to feel a little queasy. And he's starting to itch."
Albright held his stung arm out for the doctor.
"I hope you can do something about it, Doc. Pain I can stand, but I don't know about itching."
Brackett's eyes briefly widened when he pushed back the sleeve and examined the swollen arm. Looking up, he pointed a warning finger. "Don't scratch. And we're all set up for you here." The young nurse pushed open the door of a treatment room for them.
"Do you need me for anything, Doc?"
Brackett waved Gage off. "No, that's fine. We'll take it from here."
Roy strolled up as Johnny turned around in the emergency department hallway. Doctors in white coats and women in white uniforms and nurses caps passed them. They went down the hallway to the bay station to collect supplies. The young nurse there nodded, but went back to reading her chart. The paramedics helped themselves to what they needed and put it all in a small box. Roy picked up the drug box and biophone, Johnny took the supplies.
"Well, hey I didn't think we were going to see you two back here so soon." Dixie greeted them as they were leaving. Both paramedics responded with smiles and, 'Hi Dix.'
Roy gestured toward the treatment rooms down the hall. "We just came in with a deputy who got stung pretty bad back at that old man's house."
"Worse than Johnny here?"
"Well, he didn't hyperventilate," Johnny grimaced when Roy said that word, "but he had a bad reaction to some wasp stings. Brackett's with him now; he'll be fine."
Dixie put a hand on her hip. "Well, it looks like it's been a full day for you at that house."
"Yeah, don't we know it." Johnny nodded back. "I don't ever want to see the inside of that old man's house ever again."
McCall looked curious. "Well, what happened to the old man?"
"Crandall? The cops have got him now. Unless you have room for him in your psych ward." He filled her and Roy in about what Albright had said about what the Sheriff's deputies had found. The guns, the gasoline, the stockpiles.
Dixie lowered her eyes before looking back up at them. "Sounds like he led a very lonely life."
"Looks like he worked pretty hard to make it that way for himself." Roy spoke softly, but Johnny felt no sympathy for him.
"Yeah, well if you spend all your time barricading yourself inside your house and setting traps for anyone coming to visit, it shouldn't be a surprise that you don't get very many." He rubbed his arm with his free hand.
Dixie pointed.
"Don't scratch."
Gage quickly pulled his hand away and held it up. "I'm not. I'm not."
"Come on." Roy touched Johnny's arm and turned to go. "See you later Dix." They left through the hospital emergency entrance, got in the squad and drove back to Station Fifty-One. They speculated about what would happen to Crandall, his children and his house.
It was late afternoon as Roy backed the squad into the station garage.
Roy sniffed the air. "Hmmmm, something's cooking."
"Yeah, I'm staved." Johnny walked into the dayroom first. It was a spartan rectangular space with big, plain windows, utilitarian brick walls and just enough furniture and chairs for six firefighters on duty and a guest or two.
"Hey, guys, you're just in time. Set the table." Standing in the kitchen end of the dayroom with the others, Captain Stanley pointed at them with a wooden spoon.
"Sure, Cap." Johnny went to comply. But Roy paused to look around at the big, empty space of the firehouse. There was hardly anything there in it at all. No traps, no bugs, no boxes. Just five other guys who were usually happy to see him.
Roy joined the others to help with dinner.
^^%%%^^ END ^^%%%^^
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Universal, Mark VII and whoever else might own the 1970's TV show Emergency!; I am just playing in their sandbox.