Free Infinity Beach by Jack McDevitt Page A

stairs leading down.
    The floor creaked. “Careful where you put your weight,” he said.
    Everything was covered with leaves and dirt. Theground-level rooms looked empty. Kim swung her lamp beam up, trying to see through the second-floor doorways. Shadows moved around the walls.
    “I don’t think we’ll find much here,” Solly said.
    Claws scrabbled across a hard surface. An animal retreated from the light, but she couldn’t see what it was.
    “Probably a squirrel,” said Solly.
    “Or a rat.”
    The wind howled around the house. Branches creaked.
    Had she been alone, she would have called it off at that point and gone back to the flyer. She had met, and exceeded, her obligation to Sheyel. To Emily.
    But they’d come all this way and Solly would expect her at least to look in the rooms.
    Stairs first. Go up and confront the rat. Solly took the lead, testing each step as they went. The entire structure swayed and sank under their weight. Near the top a board gave way underfoot. He lost his balance and grabbed the banister, which sagged outward. Solly would have gone down the quick way had Kim not grabbed him and hauled him back. She took a moment to compare herself favorably with the young woman at the Germane Society.
    “This might not be a really good idea,” he said, shaken. They went cautiously the rest of the way to the top and peeked quickly through each doorway. In some, ceilings had given way. The rooms were filled with dirt and dry leaves. Carpets had turned to mold.
    They found a broken bed frame and a bureau with no drawers, a smashed table, a couple of chairs. The smell of the place was strong.
    Pipes stuck out from broken walls. Basins, tubs, and showers were filled with the detritus of decades.
    They went back downstairs.
    The rooms at ground level were not quite so ill-used because they were slightly less open to the elements. But here again no usable furniture was left. Cables hung out of ceilings, the floors were in a state of decay, and they found a dead, half-eaten squirrel in a corner behind a collapsed tablewhose top, when she cleared it off, had a chessboard design. Kim had read somewhere that Kane enjoyed the game and wondered whether he and Tripley had ever played here. And if so, who had won.
    She crossed to the kitchen and dining areas, found a broken chair and shattered pottery. Weeds pushed up through the floor.
    Solly was standing in the middle of the rotunda, idly shining his lamp around, bored, shivering, ready to go.
    Kim walked back to the down-stairway at the rear of the house. “Let’s take a quick look,” she said, testing the handrail.
    “Careful,” he cautioned.
    The stairs sank under her weight. “Maybe you should stay here,” she said. “I’m not sure it’ll support you.”
    He thought about it, looked at the stairway, pushed at the rail and watched the structure sway. Then he pointed his light down into the room below. It looked harmless enough, with a long table, a couple of chairs, and several trash bags stacked against a wall.
    “I think we ought to just pass,” he said.
    “Only take a minute.” She went down, testing each step, and was glad to get off at the bottom. The basement was less cold and damp than the rest of the house.
    There were three rooms and a bath. She found a broken sofa decaying in one, and some carpets stacked up in another.
    The table had data feeds, housings, and connections for electronic equipment. A mount hung from the ceiling. Probably for a VR unit.
    “See anything?” asked Solly. The beam from his lamp illuminated the stairway.
    “It was a workroom or lab at one time. I’ll be up in a minute.”
    The walls were cedar-paneled, and they’d held up fairly well. The floor was artificial brick. There were magnets where pictures or plaques had once hung.
    “Well,” she said, “ that’s interesting.”
    “What is?” called Solly.
    The stairway started to swing. “Don’t try to come down,” she said. “It’s a trash can.”