The Trap (9 page)

I found the glasses right away, and the game went on,
but I couldn’t help wondering how much of my computer Millie Lee had investigated. My Internet password was automatically stored, so anyone could have gone into my e-mail. But surely there’d be no reason for her to do that.

“Julie, pay attention,” Gabe said impatiently. “I just ginned. How many points do you owe me?”

“Too many,” I said. I began to count, putting Millie Lee and my laptop out of my mind.

I was lonesome for someone my own age to talk to, so I was glad when Luis arrived in the early evening.

I brought him some iced tea, which Uncle Gabe called the national drink of Texas, and two of the cookies from the package we’d served for dessert after supper. We sat on the front steps to talk.

It was a lot easier to talk with Luis than it was with Ashley.

Once I’d told him I had brought my laptop, Luis talked on and on about computers, describing programs I hadn’t even known existed. As the trees cast long, ragged strips of shade across our porch, he began describing the way computer graphics were used in major movies. “I’m going to do that someday,” he said. “Computers are going to make me rich.

“It’s great to imagine all the things I can someday do with computers,” he added, “and with my life—if I only make the right moves.”

I was afraid to ask what he meant. It might mean another long explanation. So I changed the subject. “I haven’t been to the stables yet, and I love to ride. Come horseback riding with me,” I said.

For an instant Luis looked surprised. Then he said, “Not yet. Julie, you forget. I’m a repairman. I’m a gardener.”

“What difference does that make?” I asked.

“It makes a difference to people who own private stables,” he said quietly.

“It doesn’t to me.”

“You’re just a guest here. You can’t change the rules.”

Stubbornly, I said, “I don’t believe anyone wrote rules that would keep you out.”

“Someday I’ll make my own rules and decide for myself who gets left out.”

“Why should
anyone
be left out?” I demanded, ready for an argument.

But Luis raised his glass of tea in salute and smiled. “It’s good just being here with you,” he said. He drained his glass and said firmly, “Now I must go back to work.”

It was clear that I’d been dismissed, so I wandered back into the house. Gabe had gone to sleep in his chair, his magazine spread across his lap, and Glenda sat at the kitchen table, working on a crossword puzzle. The more I thought about going riding, the more it appealed to me. I’d ridden before and knew how to handle a horse. There was no reason I couldn’t ride by myself.

“Is it all right if I drive down to the stables?” I asked Glenda.

“Um-hmm,” she murmured without looking up.

I took the car keys and drove to the stables. The groom saddled a horse for me and held it while I mounted. “It’s getting late,” he said. “Follow the trails.
Don’t stay out too long. Be sure you bring Duffy back before dark.”

Duffy was broad, a little bit overweight, and obviously lazy. He plodded along the trail, snorting in disgust when I tried to guide him or get him to move a little faster. In many places the trail paralleled the road, and we passed a few homes I hadn’t seen before. Although the houses were large, two even quite elegant, there were no lawns or gardens and nothing of the beauty women try to give their homes. Along the trail I saw no one. The loneliness, the deep silence of the ranch depressed me.

I lost all sense of time, and when the trail passed through a grove of trees, I realized with a start that the sun was going down and darkness was closing in quickly.

I turned Duffy in the direction of the stables. I hoped he’d pick up speed, heading toward home, but instead he raised his head, eyes wide, shying from the nearby trees on our left.

As I soothed him, firmly gripping the reins, I glanced over to see what had spooked him. Inside the dim grove, I could barely make out the shape of another horse and rider—someone who seemed to want to stay out of sight.

My heart began to thump loudly, and my good sense skittered right out of my head. With a yell of fright, I dug my heels into Duffy, who surprisingly shifted into overdrive and began to run.

I could hear the other horse behind me. I bent low, urging Duffy to run faster, but the other horse was
upon us. His rider reached out, roughly smashing against my shoulder as he grabbed the reins from my hands. He quickly brought Duffy to a stop.

“You have to be a fool to race a horse in the dark!” he exclaimed.

I looked up at Cal Grant and rubbed my shoulder. “You didn’t need to be so rough.”

The anger in his voice didn’t lessen. “You could have injured both your horse and yourself.”

“I had to run! You were hiding from me! You scared me!” I snapped back at him. “What were you doing there?”

Cal handed me the reins and drew his own horse back without answering. He wheeled his horse around and rode into the darkness.

I urged Duffy on, and he trotted directly to the stables, where the groom gave me another scolding for coming back so late.

Shaken, I drove home to Glenda and Gabe.

Glenda met me at the door, and she was obviously upset. Her hands shook as she reached for me and pulled me inside the house.

“I’m sorry I’m so late,” I began, but she brushed my apology aside.

“Eugene Barrow died a short time ago,” she said.

“Ann Barrow’s husband? What happened?” I asked. Glenda led me to the sofa, and we sat together. Gabe, a worried frown on his face, watched us from his reclining chair.

“All I heard from Mabel, when she called me, was that they’re guessing that Eugene mistakenly took too much of his heart medication. The bottle was lying on
the floor, nearly empty. Even a normal dose made him dizzy if he stood up too suddenly. A stronger dose would have had a worse effect.”

“His medication killed him?” I asked.

“Oh, no, Julie. It just made him dizzy, so it’s no wonder that he fell.”

A shiver ran up my backbone. A third husband falling—two of them to their deaths? What was going on?

Glenda continued. “He struck his head on the ledge of the stone fireplace. Just think, he built that fireplace himself two years ago when he and Ann came here to live.”

“I’m so sorry it happened,” I said. “Was Mrs. Barrow with him when he fell?”

Sighing, Glenda answered, “Ann wasn’t home. She had gone to play bridge at the clubhouse, as she and Eugene have done every Friday night. He complained that he didn’t feel like going, so this time she went without him. That makes it even more terrible for her. She blames herself. She said she should have been with Eugene, supervising his medication, but Mabel told me what she had told Ann—that Eugene has been relatively healthy and has never needed supervision before.”

Glenda clutched my hands, pleading, “Julie, will you drive me to see Ann Barrow? I want to pay my respects and bring a pound cake I’ve got in the freezer.”

I cleaned up in a hurry and was dressed and ready to leave by the time Glenda’s cake was on a plate.

“Are you sure you’ll be all right by yourself for a little while? We won’t be long,” she told Gabe.

I could hear the worry in her voice. I was a little worried too. I felt torn in two directions, but Glenda was in no state to drive herself.

“I’ll be fine,” Gabe answered.

“Should I try to get hold of Millie Lee? Maybe she’d be free to sit with you.”

Gabe’s eyebrows ran together like a shaggy caterpillar and he thundered, “You think I need a babysitter? At my age?”

“I just—”

“I’ll be all right by myself! Now go!”

Although Glenda had told me they rarely locked the outside doors, since they felt so well protected on the ranch, I noticed that she carefully locked the back and front doors as we left the house.

Quite a few people were crowded into the Barrows’ living room when we arrived. Glenda hugged Mrs. Barrow tightly and they both cried a little as we told her how sorry we were about her husband’s sudden death.

I recognized the women who had been at the luncheon, and I was introduced to a number of husbands. Casseroles, salads, platters of cheese and sliced ham, and plates of cookies and cakes filled the dining room table, and people were helping themselves to coffee from a large urn at one end of the sideboard.

I said hello to Millie Lee, who had come to help out in the kitchen, and was glad to see that Ashley was with her.

“I was hoping you’d come to see me yesterday or today,” I told Ashley.

She watched her grandmother pull the wrap from a plate of brownies and head with the plate toward the dining room before she answered. “Gran took on a new job yesterday. She had a spot open after Mrs. Crouch left so she gave it to the Hodges. It’s extra work at first, so I went with her to help her.”

Ashley didn’t give an excuse for not coming with her grandmother to our house that morning, and I didn’t push it. I just grinned and said, “I’d love another chance to beat you—backstroke or butterfly.”

She smiled in return. “How about Monday?”

“You’re on,” I said. Then I got a sudden idea. “Aunt Glenda told me she’ll only be here a short time because she doesn’t want to leave Uncle Gabe alone for long. Why don’t you come back to their house with me, and we’ll see what Gabe’s telescope can do with the stars.”

Ashley’s eyes lit up, but she had no chance to answer.

Millie Lee, returning to the kitchen, spoke for her. “That would be nice,” she said. “Ashley, you go with the Hollisters when they leave, and I’ll pick you up at their house about ten or ten-thirty.”

“Won’t you need me to help you?” Ashley asked.

Shaking her head, Millie Lee said, “I’m used to doin’ just fine without you. There’s not that much work here besides puttin’ out the food people bring. Then, after they all leave, makin’ sure that what needs keepin’ cold gets put in the refrigerator.”

“I’ll help you until the Hollisters leave,” Ashley insisted. She picked up a plate of bite-sized sandwiches and carried it toward the dining room.

I said, “See you in a few minutes,” then wandered
back to the living room. I found a seat near the fireplace—an area everyone seemed to be avoiding. I couldn’t help looking at the brick ledge around the fireplace, where Mr. Barrow had fallen and hit his head. There was no way of telling what had happened. The bricks must have been scrubbed clean. I glanced next at the nearby table where I’d seen the company paperweight that meant so much to Mrs. Barrow and was surprised to see that the paperweight wasn’t there.

She’s showing it to someone, I thought, but for some reason I had to make sure. I got up and edged over to where Mrs. Barrow was standing, being comforted by some of her friends.

“I’ll be going home—back to Houston—soon as I can sell this house,” she was saying. Her smile wobbled, and I could hear a strange note of eagerness in her voice. “My son and his family live there, you know. Three darling boys and one girl. I just can’t see enough of them. Annabelle’s six, just the right age to begin going with her grandmother to the symphony’s First Concert programs for children.”

Everyone in the group began telling grandchildren stories, and I left the group. Mrs. Barrow wasn’t holding the paperweight, and it wasn’t on the table near her. I slowly circled the living room, looking in every possible spot, and convinced myself that the paperweight was no longer in the living room.

No one was paying any attention to me, so I slipped out of the room and made a quick trip through the two large bedrooms and the bathrooms. No sign of the paperweight. Why was it missing? It couldn’t have
meant anything to anyone but the Barrows. I wondered if Mrs. Barrow had already packed it away.

I saw her enter a bathroom, so I waited for her. The moment she stepped back into the hall, I stopped her. “I was looking for your paperweight,” I said.

“Paperweight?” She looked puzzled for a moment. Then she said, “Oh, the company paperweight. It should be where I always keep it, on the table by the fireplace.”

She didn’t know that her paperweight was missing. So of course she wouldn’t know who had taken it.

I jumped as someone rested a hand on my shoulder. Turning quickly, I saw that it was Millie Lee.

“Julie,” she said, “your aunt’s lookin’ for you. She said it’s time to get home to make sure your uncle takes his medicine.”

Glenda and I said our goodbyes to Mrs. Barrow and to some of the others. Ashley joined us, and we drove home.

As we came in the door, Uncle Gabe pushed himself upright in his chair, rubbed his eyes, and tried to pretend he hadn’t fallen asleep.

After he had greeted Ashley, I asked, “May we please use your observatory, Uncle Gabe? It’s a clear night, and we’d love to try your telescope.”

He beamed with pleasure. “I wish I could be with you. The moment this old ankle is healed …”

I took the key from the board in the kitchen and a flashlight from the drawer Glenda had shown me. Then I led Ashley down the path from the front door to the stairs to the observatory. I kept my eyes straight ahead.

I was surprised when Ashley said, “It’s so spooky out here. At least in the trailer park we have plenty of light.”

Our weight on the wooden steps caused pops and creaks that seemed really loud. Ashley pressed close to me as I inserted the key into the lock and pushed the door open.

Once inside, with the lights on and the door firmly closed, we both relaxed. Ashley leaned against the door and giggled. “Don’t mind me,” she said. “When I was little I thought a monster lived under my bed.”

I laughed, then rested my hand on the gleaming brass telescope. “Let’s see what this beautiful thing can show us,” I said. “You first.”

We raised the blinds on all the windows, turned off the lights, and took turns with the telescope. It must have been top of the line, because the clarity was wonderful. Ashley knew more about astronomy than I did, so she pointed out a couple of constellations that were new to me. At least, thanks to my fifth-grade teacher, who had given me my first taste of astronomy, I could find the Big and Little Dippers and Orion’s belt.