Authors: Carlene Thompson
Within half an hour, though, Ames had drunk two
glasses of brandy and turned into a different man. He’d spent most of the night pacing, talking to himself, and drinking. Ames rarely took so much as a glass of wine, and the strong brandy had a frightening effect on him. He cursed Christine as a traitor for giving the diary to the police. He’d yelled until Pom-Pom shivered. He dashed an expensive crystal ashtray into a fireplace. Patricia had taken refuge in her room, clutching the terrified Pom-Pom, knowing this was one night when she wouldn’t sleep. Ames’s ranting, threats against Christine, and eventual stormy sobbing over his lost daughter had made Patricia wonder if he was having a nervous breakdown. In the ten years since she’d met Ames, she’d never guessed he could be so fierce or so vengeful, and for the first time, she felt fear of him.
A bright red cardinal sitting on a fence post caught her eye. He cocked his head at her, and suddenly thoughts of Ames flew from her mind. In the summer, cardinals would flock to the garden feeders. Jewel-colored hummingbirds and gentle doves and obstreperous blue jays and melodious warblers would come. It would be lovely. And it would now be Patricia’s garden, no longer Eve’s.
As she walked the long path to the barn, which sat about a hundred yards from the house and was partially hidden from it by a stand of evergreens, Patricia was still careful not to look back. Ames had left hours ago and said he wouldn’t return until dark, but if for some reason he’d decided to come home early and spotted her headed to the barn while repeatedly looking over her shoulder, he might get suspicious. But she had no qualms about him coming to the barn without a good reason. Ames didn’t like horses, couldn’t even stand the smell of them. He’d probably only been in the barn a few times since it was built fifteen years ago. And Jeremy would be completely obsessed with the sandbagging operation. She didn’t have
to worry about him following her like a faithful pet. No, all she really had to think about was seeing
him
. It had been almost two weeks and she longed for his touch, his smell, the aura of romance he created even more than she longed for the sex.
The dark red barn loomed in front of her. She hated the Pennsylvania Dutch hex symbols that decorated the outside. She thought they looked garish, but they had been Eve’s touch, so naturally Ames would not allow them to be removed. One looked like it was in danger of falling off. Good, Patricia thought. Maybe within the next couple of years they’d all drop to the ground, and Ames would never replace them. Of course, she wouldn’t be living here then, but she’d still like to see them all buried in the mud.
Abruptly the sun appeared through the low cloud layer and the landscape turned surprisingly bright. And cheerful. Patricia smiled. It’s shining for us, she thought, not caring that she was being silly and romantic. He made her feel silly and romantic, and she had no trouble believing the sun had emerged just for them.
Rather than opening the big main doors of the barn, Patricia entered the side door. The smell of hay and horses washed over her, and she breathed deeply. Unlike Ames, she loved the scent of horses, and the boy they’d hired to tend to the animals kept the stalls scrupulously clean. A sophisticated ventilation system also prevented the unpleasant damp mustiness that could spoil hay. The barn was large, with a vaulted roof and a concrete floor. It was at least ten degrees cooler in here than outside, and she drew her barn jacket tighter around her.
Patricia saw no sign of her lover, yet, so she stopped to admire the horses, who’d neighed greetings as soon as she entered. She went first to her own horse, Sultan. He was gray, approximately fifteen hands, or sixty inches, tall, and weighed around nine hundred pounds. Patricia
loved the Arabian, which research had taught her was the oldest recognized breed, similar to horses of Assyria and Egypt written about as early as 1,000
B.C
. The lineage was impressive, but what she loved most about the Arabians was their intelligence and good nature. “Hello, my Sultan,” she crooned. “Have you missed me? The weather has just been too horrid for riding. Wait until the rain stops and the ground dries. Then we’ll fly like the wind.”
Sultan looked from side to side, pawed the floor of his stall, and nudged at her hand, blowing air out of his mouth and making his lips flap. As he’d expected, she brought out an apple from her pocket. “Not too many of these, my lad,” she said, “or you’ll be getting soft teeth.”
Next she moved to Fatima. Unlike Sultan, the smaller brown Fatima seemed downright nervous, looking around constantly. “What’s wrong, girl? Weather getting you down?” Patricia made a point of riding Fatima as much as she did Sultan because Dara was no longer here to care for her horse. Patricia knew she should have offered to let Christine ride Fatima, but she never had, not out of pettiness but out of convenience. Letting Christine ride the horses might encourage her to drop by during the day to ride, and Patricia needed her solitude. Maybe this summer I’ll invite her, Patricia thought, although that would be problematic if the barn was still being used as a rendezvous point for her and her lover. She hoped he would have his own place by then, a place she would be sharing with him in the next year.
Fatima kicked the side of her stall and snorted. “Okay. I guess my very presence isn’t enough to satisfy you.” Fatima snorted again, then pulled back her lips and showed her teeth. “It’s an apple you want.” Patricia pulled a second apple from her other pocket. “And an apple you shall have—”
The wood overhead creaked and Patricia looked up. A
low inside ceiling created an upper room that was the loft, one end of which was neatly stacked with bales of hay. The other remained empty, a cool and private spot for meetings with her lover. A large, square hole in the center of the ceiling, several feet away from the stalls, allowed for hay to be pitched down for the horses. A sturdy ladder led up to it.
“Darling?” she called, her heart beating harder.
For a moment, nothing except silence answered her. Sultan blew air, flapping his lips and tossing his head. Patricia glanced at him. “You want another apple, but no more.” He snorted again at the sound of wood popping and kicked the side of his stall. “Darling?” Patricia called again, looking up.
Suddenly music floated down to her. Music from Prokofiev’s ballet
Romeo and Juliet
. A thrill rushed over Patricia. How she loved ballet. How she loved this music. How she loved this man who could make a secret meeting in a horse barn romantic. “Thank you for him, God,” she whispered, temporarily forgetting that she didn’t believe in God.
In an instant, the horses she cared for so deeply were forgotten. She strode toward the ladder leading up to the opening in the loft, then took a deep breath, bracing herself. This was the only part of the rendezvous she didn’t like. Heights bothered her. Not to the point where she couldn’t brave the ladder if her motivation was strong enough, but she was always relieved to reach the top or the bottom. She let out her breath and started up. One step. Two steps. He would have brought liquor, she thought. He always did. And something to snack on. One time expensive caviar, another time oysters. She’d tasted the food in her mouth for hours and imagined she smelled it for days.
“And what are we having today, darling?” she called.
“Festive champagne? Pale, golden sherry? Or are you going to lead me into the depths of sin with absinthe?”
“Something better!” he called, his voice muffled by the music.
Another step and another as she tightly grasped the sides of the steep ladder. “I can already smell something delicious!”
“Vanilla candle wax.”
“Aside from that, silly!”
“Hurry!”
“I am. We need an elevator in here. Exactly how many steps are on this blasted ladder?”
“Too many.”
Slightly out of breath from climbing twenty feet, Patricia was blinded as she stepped into the loft. Dust motes swam in the light streaming through two windows in the roof. The light of candles flickered at the eastern end of the barn, away from the hay bales. The floating hay dust, candlelight mixed with the strangely bright sunlight, and the smell of vanilla tinged with that of straw gave the scene a surreal quality. Patricia stood still for a moment, trying to adjust. “Well, here I am. Where are you?”
“Stand still and close your eyes. I have a surprise for you.”
“Close my eyes? I really . . .” Patricia was embarrassed for abruptly feeling old and tottering as she stood beside the hole in the loft. “I have to close my eyes? I . . . well . . . I feel slightly dizzy.”
“Trust me.”
“Okay,” she sighed. “Anything for you.”
Patricia closed her eyes. She heard the whisper of footsteps coming across the wooden floor. She heard one of the horses whinny. She felt the strong hands clamp on to her shoulders—
The fall seemed to go on forever. One minute her bootencased
feet stood firmly by the opening in the loft. The next she was plummeting down, hitting the ladder a couple of times with a force that sent excruciating pain up her arm as a bone snapped. Then she slammed against the concrete barn floor, her head angled oddly to the left, and all pain ceased. She saw a long-legged spider creeping through a tiny shaft of sunlight. She heard one of the horses kick the side of its stall. She smelled a faint mustiness seeping up from the cold concrete. But she felt nothing. Absolutely nothing. Physically. Mentally, her mind spiraled into a black pit of shock and panic.
The rungs of the ladder creaked. A horse kicked again and Sultan whinnied. She knew Sultan’s sound. Human knees popped as ligaments snapped over bone, and someone knelt beside her.
“Still alive? My God, you
do
have stamina.” Patricia tried to open her mouth, but the effort was too much. She lay crushed, bleeding, and barely breathing as her vision darkened. “You’re turning blue, you know. You’ve broken your pretty neck.” A long sigh. “I’d hoped the fall would kill you instantly, but do you want to know something? This is even better. Now I get to
watch
you die. I guess it’s true that all good things come to those who wait.” A flutter of movement near her forehead, maybe a kiss. “Good night,
darling
.”
Patricia heard one last frightened neigh from Sultan. Then a fantastic thought popped into her dimming mind. She’d found the note asking for this meeting in Eve’s “magic” garden, under the statue of Persephone. Persephone, who in Greek myth had been carried away to the underworld by the lord of the dead.
Christine had known that Jeremy had told Ames about their finding Dara’s diary. From Michael she had learned that Ames now knew the diary was in the possession of the police. The deputy’s description of Ames’s behavior let her know he was enraged.
What did I expect? Christine thought. She’d known he’d be angry if she gave Dara’s diary to the police. But being honest with herself, she had to admit she’d thought the attack on her would elicit some sympathy that would dissipate his wrath, or at least weaken it. She now knew that she’d been fooling herself. Ames cared about her, but he’d adored his daughter. Anyone who hurt her, or her reputation if she was dead, would suffer Ames’s everlasting ire.
The thought hurt. Ames had been so good to take in her and Jeremy. It wasn’t as if he and her father had been close in the years right before the deaths of her parents. Christmas cards and an occasional phone call were all that remained of the old law school friendship. But Ames had honored the promise he’d made to her father right
after the birth of Jeremy—that if anything happened to him, Ames would step in. He had. And although he hadn’t been able to show her and Jeremy love, he’d provided a home and unfailing consideration. And what had she given him in return?
After Michael left, she had time alone to brood on the matter. By afternoon, she was miserable. Restless, she started to watch television, tried to take a nap, wandered around her house like an uncomfortable visitor, and finally ended up listening to music while absently downing the last, lonely doughnut as her mind churned. She should give Ames time to calm down, she told herself. She should just leave the situation alone for a couple of days, maybe even a week. . . .
Patience had never been one of Christine’s virtues. She rose from the table and went for the phone. Without thinking, she called the law office, because it was a week-day afternoon. The receptionist told her Mr. Prince had come in for an hour, then left saying he wouldn’t return for the rest of the day. Christine wondered if Sloane could give her a reading on Ames’s mood, but when she asked to talk to him, the receptionist said he was out on a deposition. Frustrated, Christine hung up and wondered what to do next. Ames had already taken one bad blow when the body was found. Now he’d suffered another. She felt desperate to talk to him, to explain why she had turned over the diary to the police.
Perhaps he was at home, she thought. If not at home, then maybe at Streak’s. She called the Prince home first. She listened to the answering machine message, which did not mean Ames wasn’t around. He could just be screening calls. She felt compelled to drive to his house first. If she didn’t find him there, she would try Streak’s.
The drizzle had stopped just as Michael left. A short while later two men arrived in separate vehicles—a
pickup truck and a car. The car was a rental from the garage where her Dodge Neon was being repaired, they told her. Ames had arranged the rental for her yesterday. Ames thought of everything, she thought. Her eyes filled with tears. She felt lower than low.
Right after the men drove away in the truck, a blazing sun had mysteriously appeared, then vanished half an hour later, leaving the day gray and dismal. She had the doleful feeling that she’d seen the sun’s last gasp. It would never shine again. At least it would never shine so brightly as in the past. But she was being maudlin. She was being scared. She’d never realized until this day how much Ames’s good opinion of her meant.
Ames’s silver Mercedes was not in the driveway, but the windowless doors of the three-car garage were shut. The car could be in there. Christine went to the front door and rang the bell. Nothing. Of course Ames could merely look out a window, see it was her, and decide not to answer the door. And she had no idea whether or not Patricia was home. Even if she was, he could order her not to answer the door, either. But perhaps she was making the scene more dramatic than it was. Maybe Ames or Patricia was merely behind the house in Eve’s garden. Although this didn’t seem likely on such a dreary day when nothing bloomed except a few misguided crocuses, it was worth a try.