The House on Creek Road

The horses had crowded close to the fence, competing for position. One touched its nose to Liz’s shoulder, pushing gently. “Hey, sweetheart,” she said softly. “It’s not fair, is it? The people have all the treats. Where’s the alfalfa? Where’s the bran mash?” All three horses listened, but the first mare kept the other two away. “So you’re top dog, are you?” Liz pulled her hand over the heads of wild oats growing near the fence, collecting seeds, and held it out flat. The horse ate, tough lips nuzzling her palm, delicately picking up each kernel.

“How can you be afraid of Wayne Cooper, and not of these two-ton beasts?”

“I’m not afraid of him. I just don’t like him.” She wasn’t sure how to explain without telling the whole story. “Wayne…likes to find your soft spot and give it a squeeze.”

She brushed the last few oats from her hand. “I need to get out of here. Do you think you could find my grandmother for me, so I won’t risk bumping into him again?”

“Sure.” Jack didn’t move. “It’s none of my business, but do you mind if I give an opinion?”

For some reason, she didn’t mind. She wanted to hear what he thought.

“I don’t know what’s going on, so I could be wrong—leaving might be the best thing for you to do. Cooper would be chasing you away, though. If you let people scare you off, you never stop being scared. That’s basic, Elizabeth.”

“Liz.” She took a deep breath and felt her muscles relax a notch. “I don’t know how to deal with him.” She knew Jack didn’t understand. Wayne must seem inconsequential to him, a little obnoxious, but harmless.

“Want a suggestion?”

“If you’ve got one.”

“Let’s help ourselves to whatever your brother’s been cooking, and then you can introduce me to your friends. Cooper won’t get near you again if you don’t want him to, I can promise you that. But he’ll see you ignoring him, having a good time in spite of him. If he’s hoping to intimidate you, it’ll be hard for him to take.”

It was, as Jack said, basic. Her instinct to put herself in a whole different time zone than Wayne Cooper had been stronger than her good sense.

Liz had been looking at Jack’s chest throughout the conversation. Finally, she looked up. Right away she could see that the image of the heartless primitive fairy was all wrong. His face was warm, concerned. “I really appreciate this. I didn’t have you pegged as a white knight.”

“That’s good. I’m no kind of knight.”

There was a touch of sadness in his smile. Launcelot exiled from Camelot, she thought, Arthur from Avalon. Instead of a violin, a lute for those long fingers to strum. Instead of a pie in hand, a shield. Could she do a story about knights, or had children already seen all they wanted of swords and dragons and wizards?

CHAPTER THREE

THE BLADE SANK ALMOST A QUARTER of an inch into the glued pages. Jack sliced in between the lines of text, removed the point of the knife and sliced again. When he’d cut three sides of a four inch square, he bent back the paper like a door. He placed an unlabelled diskette inside, smoothed a little glue on the cut edges, then pressed the pages down. He had opened the book at random, but King Lear’s line, just above the cut, would amuse Reid if he noticed. Who loses, and who wins; who’s in, who’s out… Not that the game ever really had a winner or a loser. It was the challenge they enjoyed.

The shelves of the built-in china cabinet in the dining room were full of books: paperback thrillers, textbooks of computer and mathematics theory, gold-lettered classics. Jack slipped The Complete Works of Shakespeare back in its place.

He’d spent a lot of time he didn’t really have preparing the clues contained on the disk. Reid might not even find it. He would try, though. Housebreaking was a new twist to the game, and Jack didn’t like it. He lifted the box he’d got from Daniel Rutherford onto the kitchen table. A surprising man, Daniel.

The bulletin boards were one of the things Jack liked about Three Creeks. Birthday announcements, cards of thanks, lost dogs, free-range hens, help wanted, jobs wanted. One of the ads had always made him smile. Punks a Problem? Poachers Got Your Goat? Call Daniel Rutherford…Taking Care of All Your Security Needs Since 1975. Not expecting much, Jack had decided to see what Daniel had to offer.

The older man lived alone on the edge of town, in a story-and-a-half house with crocheted doilies protecting his sofa and chair from the touch of his head and hands. Down in his basement, it was another world. Metal shelves were filled with precisely organized equipment—cameras, tape recorders and other machines Jack couldn’t identify. It turned out Daniel wasn’t a retired farmer, as he had supposed. He was a retired cop. RCMP Special Branch, long disbanded and replaced by CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. A retired spy? He couldn’t be.

Once Daniel knew Jack was there on business his tendency to gossip had stopped, just like that, like turning off a tap. Still, Jack was cautious. Taking his cue from Daniel’s ad, he’d said kids were poking around his place, not causing any real trouble, but he wanted to find out who they were. He had come away with two small cameras that could be hidden under the eaves near his front and back doors, and an electric eye to place at the end of the driveway. Anyone driving or walking in would trigger the cameras, so intruders would film themselves. Daniel liked the irony. And Jack liked knowing Reid wouldn’t surprise him again.

ELEANOR HAD SETTLED INTO THE CHAIR by the woodstove, her feet up on a three-legged stool one of her great-grandchildren had made in shop class. “Do you mind if we don’t work today, Elizabeth?”

“Of course not,” Liz said quickly. Over the past few days, they had decided the fate of nearly every stick of furniture in the house. Eleanor had struggled to be objective, but each piece held a bit of personal history, and some choices had been hard to make. “Are you all right, Grandma?”

“It’s nothing a quiet day won’t fix. You’ll find you slow down a little in your ninth decade, too.”

Liz reached for a banana muffin. Eleanor would hate it if she fussed. “I can use the day to finish getting ready for my visit to the school tomorrow.” She had agreed to show Pam’s students how a book was made and to help them make books of their own.

“That will be such a treat for the children.” Eleanor closed her eyes.

Liz felt a jolt of concern. How could her grandmother be tired in the morning, after a good night’s sleep? She’d been old for as long as Liz had known her, but she’d always been strong and full of energy.

For every bit of work Liz had saved her grandmother since she’d arrived, she’d probably caused just as much. Tonight she’d take care of dinner, something simple, soup and sandwiches. Tomorrow, she’d get up in time to make breakfast. When Eleanor came down to the kitchen she’d find tea and eggs ready and waiting.

“Are you enjoying your visit, Elizabeth?” Eleanor’s eyes were open again, and they looked clear and alert. “I hoped it would be more than work for you.”

“It is, much more.” Liz wasn’t exactly enjoying it, but she was glad to be here. She was getting used to finding ghosts around every corner. Relatives, too. People were always dropping by for a hot cup, keeping a finger on the pulse of each other’s lives. “I’m not sure how well I handled things at the barbecue, though.” Other than agreeing how attractive the yard had looked and how good the food had tasted, they had avoided discussing Saturday’s party.

“Very well, I thought.”

“Except when I saw Wayne Cooper.”

“It would have been more thoughtful for him to stay away.”

“Jack…sort of rode shotgun for me.”

“That sounds like Jack.”

There was the proprietary tone again, as if Eleanor had raised him herself and was proud of how he was doing. She acted almost as if he were her grandson or nephew. Maybe that was it. Maybe he was the unacknowledged offspring of a wandering great-uncle and he’d come to Three Creeks to claim what he thought was rightfully his.

“Nobody minded giving an opinion about Susannah’s wedding.”

“Uninformed opinions and plenty of head-shaking. Interest in Susannah’s marriage will die down soon.”

Liz hesitated. “Was there as much gossip about me?”

“When you left? No. People were very quiet about that.” Eleanor sighed. “It was all a long time ago, Elizabeth. You were angry and you wanted nothing more than to put this place behind you. But fifteen years…wouldn’t it be best for you to make peace with what happened once and for all?”

Liz looked away from her grandmother. How could she make peace with it, even if she wanted to? That was like saying it didn’t matter, all was well that ended well, water under the bridge.

“Ah, my dear. But you came to help me anyway, feeling as you do about the place. Sweet child.”

“I’m thirty-three, Grandma.”

“A baby. But you’ll grow up one day, I suppose.”

It almost hurt to see the affection on her grandmother’s face. For the first time Liz got an inkling of what tending her anger at the people of Three Creeks had cost her. “I’m sorry I didn’t come to see you before.” Uncertainly, she added, “I think you’ve been disappointed in me.”

Eleanor didn’t deny it. “It’s always a pity to waste time. Now, you need to get out and get some fresh air. Who knows how long these lovely fall days will last? Why not return that pie plate to Jack for me? I meant to do it days ago. Take the girls with you—they’ll enjoy seeing him, too.”

THE DOGS HURRIED AHEAD when they realized they were going to Jack’s. By the time Liz got to the house, all three of them were waiting for her on the back stoop. Jack looked distracted, as if he had been deep in thought or in the middle of some engrossing project, and was having trouble adjusting to the interruption.

“I should have called—”

“No need for that.” He leaned down, rubbing the dogs’ ears. “Good girls,” he said soothingly. “Fine, beautiful girls.” They rested their heads against his legs.