Part 12 (1/2)

”I'm all right,” I told him quickly, before he could question me.

Gail came to meet us at the dining room door, looking trim and self-confident, having changed from her Levi's to green jumper and blouse instead of her uniform.

When she greeted me, I looked at her with no expression at all, and Hillary touched my arm. ”Are you really all right, Laurie? You're ent.i.tled to fall apart a bit, you know. Don't try to be too controlled. Let go, Laurie.”

”Is that what I am-controlled?”

”You do look a bit frazzled/' Gail said. ”Perhaps hot food will help and something to drink. Lunch-dinner, reallyseems to be ready, so let's sit down.” She slipped her hand easily through my arm and drew me into the dining room as though we were good friends.

Caleb was already there, looking as displeased as ever, though he pulled out my chair courteously. Hillary took the place next to me and gazed about the room in enjoyment.

”What a good stage setting this would make,” he said. ”I must remember that old fellow up there over the mantel. Laughing Boy. I'll bet he could tell a few stories if we got him to talk.”

His light note didn't relieve my mood. For me the elk's head over the mantel seemed a thoroughly melancholy touch, and not anything I could laugh about.

While plates of thick roast beef, browned potatoes, and homegrown b.u.t.ter beans were pa.s.sed down the table, Gail spoke again.

”It's very odd about your memory, Laurie. It seems to be so selective. Don't you remember anything about this room?”

I made an effort to behave normally. ”Very little. There's a lot I can't remember. But there is something I've wanted to ask you. When I went into the back parlor today and turned on the lights, I saw something strange. Mostly the cobwebs and dust hadn't been disturbed in years. But someone had been in that room recently. There were other footprints besides mine, and I could see where a few things had been moved, as though someone had been searching. Was it you, Gail?”

Her surprise seemed genuine. ”I've been in that room only once, and hardly any farther than the door. I was curious, but it gives me the'creeps and I didn't stay.”

”Someone searching for something, Laurie?” Caleb repeated. ”How extraordinary! Mrs. Morgan closed that room off years ago, and I've looked into it rarely.”

148.

”Someone has been in there,” I said. ”And not long ago.”

Caleb and Gail exchanged a look that seemed to carry quick suspicion of each other, but no one said anything more about the back parlor.

As we started to eat, Gail went on. ”Mrs. Morgan must have held up a lot better than she usually does for you to have stayed with her that long, Laurie.”

I knew how curious she was to learn what had occurred in Persis' room, but I didn't mean to satisfy her.

”I think she can hold up when she wants to,” I said. ”I don't think she has any intention of dying.”

”Sometimes she talks about a change in her will,” Gail mused.

Caleb looked at her sharply. ”What does she mean by that?”

”Probably she's thinking of her granddaughter.”

Caleb said nothing more, but I found myself watching him again, wondering why he seemed so much of an enigma..He was a man who waited in the background, never seeking the spotlight, but watching rather ominously. And perhap^ manipulating more than I had guessed?

In any case I didn't care about my grandmother's will or Gail's casual gossip. My only regret was that when Persis Morgan was gone, whoever was left would probably sell out quickly to Mark Ingram. Perhaps that didn't really matter. Times changed, and she couldn't sit forever across the right of-way that a man as strong as Mark Ingram coveted. Jon Maddocks' words came back to me-the thing he had said about the house Malcolm and Sissy had built in Domino. That it ought to belong to me. A curious remark. I wanted neither that house nor this one. Especially not this one. I only wanted to know those things my grandmother had skimmed over, avoided, or distorted. I was ready to open the door wide and walk through it.

”Grandmother Persis has explained what happened in the back parlor,” I told Gail.

149.

”Can't we stop talking about that?” Caleb said.

Hillary disagreed. ”Perhaps now is the best of all possible times,” he said quietly.

Gail gave in. ”All right then. I'm sure this is a subject that is more upsetting to you, Laurie, than to the rest of us. Which of the stories did she tell you?”

So that was it-an a.s.sortment of fabrications? Was that why memory hadn't stirred in me?

”She said that my father was shot by an intruder who got away with some family jewels. I think I must have been there in that room when it happened.”

”I understand that you were,” Gail agreed, and threw a look at Caleb that seemed faintly challenging. ”Of course that was the official story,” she went on. ”I grew up hearing it since my family lives not too'far from Jasper. My brothers are still there. That was the story that got into the papers and was accepted by the police.”

I hadn't been aware that she'd lived in these mountains as a child. Now I understood why she had so much gossipy information.

We managed to go on eating as though this were an ordinary conversation. But then this was all old history for Caleb and Gail, and no longer something that had just occurred to a living man.

”Where was Noah Armand when this happened?” I asked Caleb.

He put his fork down carefully, as though I had startled him. ”Noah walked out of this house a week before your fatherdied. And he was never seen again. He had been quarreling with your grandmother for some time, and I think she probably told him to leave.”

Gail made a small explosive sound of derision, and Caleb looked at her coldly.

”Take care,” he said.

150.

I asked another question. ”My father was Noah's stepson. How did my father get along with his mother's new husband?”

”What does any of this matter now?” Caleb stared at his plate.

”Perhaps it does matter.” Hillary spoke so softly that I think we were all startled, having forgotten his presence. ”Perhaps it matters if, as Mrs. Morgan says, Mark Ingram was Noah's friend. So why don't you tell us, Caleb?”

”All right-if you must know, it's true that Richard Morgan, Laurie's father, never liked his mother's second choice as husband. Sons hardly ever do. Armand was a great deal younger than your grandmother, Laurie, and your father was protective of his mother and suspicious of Armand's motives in marrying her.”

”Then what happened to Noah?” Hillary asked in that same soft tone that seemed somehow persuasive, so that his questions were answered.

”We don't know,” Caleb said shortly. ”We believe he must be dead.” *

Hillary pressed him further. ”Why do you think that?”

”Because of the sort of man he was,” Caleb answered. ”Bad pennies always turn up. If he's alive, he's still Mrs. Morgan's husband. It's hard to believe he wouldn't make claims, put on some sort of pressure.”

”What if he has?” Hillary asked, his tone gentle, almost amused.

We all stared at him, startled, and he laughed.

”Don't look so shocked. It's just a thought. Why don't you check with Mark Ingram?”

”Let it alone!” Caleb said sharply. ”Don't go digging Noah Armand up-if it's really a grave he's in.”