“Are those for me, Rob?”
“I guess so. They’re all boxes from The China and Glass Shoppe.”
His mother had disappeared somewhere, maybe back upstairs. Rob hesitated, wondering if there was any point in trying to talk to Darcy.
He and Darcy had never been very close. Still, she was coming downstairs and there wasn’t anyone else around, so maybe it was worth a try.
She moved past him into the bedroom, pouncing on the packages. “Dozens of them! I wonder if I ought to open this batch now? I wish Steve was here . . . it’s as good as Christmas. When your time comes and they try to talk you into eloping, Robbie, don’t listen to them. You don’t get wedding gifts like this if you elope.”
He stood in the doorway, watching as his sister opened an envelope and then, making up her mind, began to unwrap a white-and-silver-papered box.
“Darcy.”
“Oh, wow! Look, isn’t it beautiful?”
“Yeah, I guess.” He didn’t even look at what it was. “Darcy, listen. I keep trying to tell somebody, but nobody listens. It’s about Mrs. Calloway.”
“Darling, don’t talk about Mrs. Calloway. I’m sorry she got hanged, but I don’t intend to let it spoil my wedding. It’s not as if she was a friend or anything like that. I’d rather not think about her at all, Rob, please.”
The telephone rang.
“Get that, will you, Robbie? If it’s Steve, I want to talk to him.”
Reluctantly, Rob answered the phone. If Steve came over, maybe he’d listen. Steve was pretty sensible, except where Darcy was concerned. With her, he was as bad as the rest of them.
“Hiya, Robbie? Steve. Any chance of talking to my girl, or has she succumbed to the pressures?”
“She’s opening presents. They just delivered a half truckload of ’em.”
“Great! Let me talk to her, huh?”
He met his mother in the hall. “Rob, what is that ungodly smell in your bedroom?”
“What smell? I have to call Darcy, it’s Steve . . .”
“It smells like something’s died up there.”
“Was it for me, Rob?” Darcy poked her head out of the bedroom. “Oh, hi, Mom. It looks like I’ve got nine place settings of my china, and eight of the crystal! Isn’t that marvelous! Was it Steve, Rob?”
“Yes.” He stepped aside so his sister could get to the phone in the study. His mother was bearing down on him in a way that made him uneasy.
“Rob, whatever’s making that odor, you’ve got to get rid of it! I’ll get air freshener up there and I’ve already opened all the windows, but I can’t possibly put anyone in there to sleep the way it is! Go find whatever it is and get it out of there.”
“I didn’t notice anything.”
“Well, I did, and so did Aunt Grace. And you’d better find another place for that junk under the bed. Haven’t you any room in your closet?”
“It’s handier under the bed,” Rob said, but without much force. She looked about ready to hit him, and while she hadn’t done that for a long time, he wouldn’t rule out the possibility. “Maybe whatever stinks is Randolph; he’s been missing for a few days. He got loose.”
“Well, whatever it is, find it and then scrub the spot where it’s been. I hope to heaven we can get the odor out of there by evening or I don’t know what I’ll do.”
Randolph was a mouse. He’d traded an old pair of skates for him, and then the mouse had disappeared the second day he had him. Gloomily, Rob tramped upstairs.
When he got to his room, he could smell something. Very faintly, however; nothing to get all excited about. He stood in the middle of the floor, wondering where Randolph would have gone to die. That Paddy Wilson, the crumb had probably known the mouse was sick or something when he traded him.
It took him ten minutes to find Randolph; he had crawled into the back part of the bookcase, behind some books. Up close, he had a rotten smell, indeed. Rob scooped him up on a piece of cardboard, briefly considered putting him in a matchbox to return to Paddy, and then decided the smell was strong enough so there was no place he could expect to conceal the creature until Monday, which would be the soonest he could get to Paddy. Reluctantly, he flushed Randolph down the toilet.
He scooped the stuff out from under the bed . . . nothing to make a big fuss over, it was just a football and helmet and some rocks he was saving . . . and crammed them into the closet. Now maybe they’d leave him alone. It would help, too, if he could get someone to listen to what he had to say about Mrs. Calloway.
His aunt was in his parents’ bedroom, hemming. She had the dress laid out across the foot of the king-sized bed and was working on it. She looked up when she saw him, her mouth tightening.
“Did you get rid of that stink in your bedroom?”
“Yes.” He considered. Was it worth trying to talk to her? He had never had much to do with his Aunt Grace, she didn’t like him. His father said it was because she’d raised only girls and had no concept of what a normal boy was like.
Still, it didn’t matter what she thought of boys, did it? The important thing was that someone ought to know about Mrs. Calloway. Rob paused in the doorway.
“Don’t get against this dress,” she warned, although he was a good five feet from it and couldn’t possibly have damaged it. “One more catastrophe is about all we need.”
“Aunt Grace . . . is it murder to push somebody out a window, if it’s not very high off the ground? I mean, nobody’d think it would kill anybody . . . only if it does . . .”
She grimaced with distaste. “Good grief, you do have a morbid turn of mind, don’t you? It’s allowing you to watch all that television without any supervision . . . horrid things they put on nowadays. I’ve told Marge it isn’t good for you.”
“It’s not on TV, it’s Mrs. Calloway. She was . . .”
“Rob, run along. You’re distracting me, and I want to hurry and finish this. It’s a mile around, I swear, and it’s making me nervous, all this last-minute rush.”
“But I need . . .”
Her voice cut firmly through his. “Go along, do as I tell you. I don’t like talking about such gruesome things; it’s enough to give a civilized person nightmares. You might tell someone I’d appreciate a cup of tea, if they have time to fix it.”
He left then. There was little point in trying to talk to her.
Maybe it didn’t matter if he didn’t talk to anyone before his father got back. It would only be a few hours, and he knew his father would listen to him if he once got his mind off Uncle Ray going to jail or whatever they were going to do. His father didn’t think he was morbid or gruesome; even his mother wouldn’t ordinarily flip out over a simple thing like asking if something was murder.
The doorbell rang as he was going down the stairs. He wondered if his mother would kill him if he disconnected it. But it wouldn’t do any good, anyway. Whoever it was pounded on the doorframe, then pushed on into the house without waiting for it to be answered.
“Well, hi, there, Rob boy! Where is everybody? We’re all here, safe and sound! Didn’t want to miss little Darcy’s wedding, so we brought the whole family. Shall we bring our bags inside?”
Rob caught the expression on his mother’s face before the others saw her; she obviously wasn’t happy. Well, it was her own fault. Who invited them?
“Sylvester! We didn’t expect you so early!”
“Oh, we got a good early start. Didn’t want to miss out on anything. Shall we bring our bags in, Marge?”
There seemed to be dozens of them. Mrs. Mallory must have been making her own count, because she said with only a slight tremor in her voice, “Who all came?”
“Oh, the whole family, and we stopped in Studeville and picked up Elsie and Rich and little Neddy. They wasn’t planning to come because their car was broke down, but we had to bring two cars anyway, so we
told them we had plenty of room.”
His mother was looking rather pale, Rob thought, but she was welcoming them all. He withdrew as quickly as he could toward the back of the house, before any of them should decide to kiss him or something. Now that was his idea of gruesome.
He didn’t know Sylvester or the others very well, although they sometimes came over the Christmas holidays. Then they usually stayed with his Grandmother Mallory, and he hadn’t liked any of them well enough to try to get better acquainted. Little Neddy he remembered; he’d pulled up all his mother’s tulips the last time he was here, and broken a vase she especially valued.
He didn’t want to stick around long enough to get caught up with that crowd, and he knew he’d better remove the spiders before Aunt Sylvia saw them, or his cousin Elsie. Elsie was grown up, but she was a real fraidy cat. He got the jar and held it so nobody would notice what was in it, and on his way past the hall table he rescued two small vases so that they’d be out of reach of three-year-old hands. He put them on the windowsill in the kitchen.
Sonny immediately jumped up to investigate them, and Rob cuffed him sharply. “You knock those off, stupid, and they’re apt to draw and quarter you!”
Sonny withdrew with dignity, gazing at him through resentful yellow eyes.
“And if I were you,” Rob went on in a conversational tone, “I’d stay out of the way of Neddy. I’ll bet he picks cats up by their necks.”
Sonny switched his tail in a challenging manner.
“Yeah, well, you scratch the little brat, even if he is choking you to death, and his mother will kill you.”
“Who are you talking to?”
His Aunt Grace had come down for her tea, since no one had brought it up. She looked around the empty kitchen.
“Just Sonny.”
“Where’s your mother keep the tea?”
He found it for her, silently. She nearly stepped on Sonny, who stood his ground; he knew his rights. He made a protesting sound when Rob scooped him up and put him out on the porch. Aunt Grace wasn’t terribly fond of cats, either.
“Oh, Marge . . . I’m just making myself some tea. Do you want some?”
“What I really need,” Mrs. Mallory said frankly, “is a very dry martini. Which I don’t dare have. Grace, did you see that mob they brought? Sylvester and nine other people! Where am I going to put them? Does Mother have any sleeping space left?”
“No. Every corner is filled. Unless Ray’s gone . . . his room would be empty.”
“Ray? Is he gone somewhere?” Mrs. Mallory paused, frowning, in the act of reaching for a cup. “Isn’t he going to be here for the wedding?”
Nobody was paying any attention to Rob. He heard Aunt Grace start to pick up the pieces on that blooper. It would be good to see how she got out of that, but it also seemed a good time to slip out the back door with his spiders. He put them down in the grass beside the steps until he could think of a safe place for them. They moved sluggishly, climbing over one another.
It was pleasantly hot in the sunshine. Rob picked at one of the scabs on his lip and started the place bleeding again. Sonny came to crouch beside him, rubbing against his leg. Rob put down a hand to stroke the dark fur, feeling the powerful muscles beneath it. It wouldn’t be a bad life, to be a cat like Sonny.
Something hit the step between his feet with a sharp, splintering sound.
Rob glanced down, frowning, and saw that a bit of the wood had been torn away. There was a second report, and Sonny screamed in pain and fury, bounding away toward a refuge in the shrubbery.
Unbelieving, Rob sat for a moment more, staring at the drops of blood left in a trail across the concrete of the sidewalk. He dove after the cat at last, only vaguely aware of the third shell that hit the porch steps right where he had been sitting.
Eight
He hauled the protesting cat out of the bushes and ran his hands over the animal. At least he wasn’t killed, though he easily might have been. At first Rob couldn’t even find where the blood was coming from, and then his fingers felt moisture.
“Robbie! Robbie, was that someone shooting?”
His mother came to the door, her voice anxious.
“Some dumb kid shooting a .22, I think.”
She saw the blood then. Not a lot of it, but enough so you could tell what it was. “Robbie, were you hit?”
“No, they got Sonny, though. It’s just on his tail . . . scared him more than anything, I guess.” He carried the big cat toward the house. “I hope it didn’t break it . . . do you think it did?”
Anger swept across her face. “What’s the matter with anybody who’d shoot right into someone’s yard? Who around here has a .22?”
“Oh, practically everybody, Mom. What’ll I do with Sonny?”
Surprisingly, Sonny allowed her to examine him. Usually he hated being touched by anyone but Rob, unless he asked to be petted. Mrs. Mallory parted the hair, examining the area at the base of his tail.
“No, I don’t think it’s broken. I don’t think we have to do anything to it; he’ll take care of it himself. But that idiot might have killed Sonny . . . or you, for that matter, if you were right here, too. I’ve got a good mind to call the police.”
He remembered his father’s comments about calling the police when Mrs. Calloway had attacked him.
“Are you sure you want to take time to talk to the police? They come around writing out reports and everything.”
“Well . . . I suppose I haven’t got any time to spare, but if it happens again, I’ll have to make the time before someone gets hurt. Did you find what was smelling up your room?”
“Yes. It was Randolph, like I thought. He’s gone now. I think I’ll punch that Paddy in the mouth. I’ll bet he knew that mouse was going to die.”
“Give him the benefit of the doubt, and forget it. You don’t need to be any more battered than you are already.”
“Paddy’s so fat, he can’t lay a hand on me.”
“Then it’s hardly fair to hit him, is it?”
“It wasn’t fair to trade me a sick mouse, either.”
“You can’t be sure he knew it was sick. Robbie, run up and dig out those old sleeping bags, will you? We’re going to need them all, I guess, and then I’m not sure we’ll have enough to go around.”
“Dad already got them out. They’re on the upper landing.”
“Just the good ones. We’re going to need the older ones, too. And I think yours is still in your closet. Maybe Neddy could sleep in that.”
Rob looked at her in dismay. “Mom, Neddy wets his pants!”
“Well, if he ruins your bag, we’ll replace it. You need a new one, anyway. Go on, please, get the others out. I’m going out of my mind trying to think where to put everyone.”
“Didn’t you invite them all?”
“Yes, but most of them said they couldn’t come, so I told Nick he could sleep here as well as Sylvia and Sylvester. We’ll have to move you out of your own room . . . Lord knows where you’ll find a few feet of floor space to spread a sleeping bag. Oh, and we’ll have to move the wedding presents off the bed in the spare room. There’s no place to put them if we’re going to use the dining room, so people will just have to climb around them, but get everything moved off the bed, at least, will you?”
He knew it had been a mistake not to vanish when he’d had the chance. He put the cat down, and Sonny streaked along the house, retreating to a hideaway underneath where no one could get at him. Rob didn’t blame him. If he could think of a place to go, he’d hide, too.
His mother had turned to go back into the house; she paused with one final order. “Oh, and move the sprinkler, will you? Be sure to keep the water off the sidewalks.”
Cripes, if he lived through this weekend it would be a miracle. Rob turned off the water, plodded through the wet grass to pick up the sprinkler
, and moved it closer to Mrs. Calloway’s house. It was going to be funny to think of it as somebody else’s house.
He could make out the crushed spot on the grass where the old woman’s body had been before they took it away. The men had walked in her flowerbeds, too, crushing some geraniums. He could just hear her now, up in heaven, giving them what-for, for trampling her flowers.
Wow, what was he thinking? Old Lady Calloway wasn’t going to be in heaven, was she? If she got there, he sure didn’t want to join her.
He couldn’t remember afterward why he had suddenly moved away from the house. Maybe he’d heard some sound from above, he didn’t know. Just standing where the body had been . . . the corpse, he thought . . . was enough to give a guy the creeps. He jumped right in the nick of time, anyway, for whatever reason.
The pot landed where he had been moments earlier. With a sickening crack the container split on a rock that edged a flower bed, forming two halves with the dirt and some scroungy-looking plant remaining intact between the sections.
Rob stood quite still, looking at it, then gazing upward to where it must have fallen from. He didn’t think the old lady had been upstairs in years, yet she must have, because there was a window open. Right over his head. Funny place to keep a plant, when you spent most all your time on the ground floor. He scowled at it. As a matter of fact, it looked like one of the plants she’d kept on the rail on the back porch.
Cripes, the thing could have killed him if he’d still been standing there. He wondered what had made it fall.
Well, it hadn’t hit him. He shrugged, kicking at the dirt so that it came apart. It wasn’t rock-hard, like dirt that hadn’t been watered lately. He kicked the pottery pieces into the flower bed beside the house and then glanced around, guiltily. If anybody saw him and thought he’d broken it on purpose, they’d be sort of ticked off.
Just out of curiosity, he walked toward the back of the house to look at the row of pots on the porch rail. There were five of them, just like the one that had fallen from the second story. Had there been six, when he was lying out there smeared with ketchup, waiting for Mrs. Calloway to find him?