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Marian nodded in agreement. “A real loner, for sure.”
The only time the boy seemed visible was when there was trouble of some kind, but she was willing to give Scotty some leeway. He’d been running the streets most of his life. No father in the picture and a mother strung out on drugs most of the time. Scotty might have ended up serving time in a juvenile facility if a homemade bomb hadn’t plunged him into deafness and made him a ward of the court.
“Maybe after a few weeks in the program we’ll see a change for the better,” Marian told Rob. She was encouraged because she’d seen one good sign already in his behavior. For some inexplicable reason, the tough, streetwise Scotty had appointed himself protector of Mindy Simpson, a small, shy eight-year-old girl who had been deaf since birth.
Scotty had met her in class for the hearing impaired which he’d been required to attend when he was turned over to the court. It was because of the dark-haired, curly-headed Mindy that Scotty had mastered any sign language at all. Unfortunately, he seemed only willing to try signing in order to communicate with the shy little girl. Most of the time he got along as best he could with lip-reading, defying all orders to practice communicating with any of the other students.
“I’ll check with the nurse,” Marian told Rob and then walked across the room to a table where several girls were involved in an activity of following directions. They were making Indian god’s eyes out of yarn and sticks. Because a field trip was planned to the nearby Mesa Verde Indian ruins, the teachers had decided to incorporate some of the activities, stories and art around an Indian theme.
Nancy Collins, a chubby, round-faced teacher in her early forties, was busily moving around the table, smiling, nodding and signing her approval. Marian had worked with Nancy before and was delighted when the outgoing, good-natured teacher had applied for the summer program. Together they had developed a program of activities to help hearing-impaired children develop language, speech and listening skills.
Marian stopped at Mindy’s chair and lightly touched the little girl on the shoulder to get her attention. As she looked up, her smiling eyes were a sparkling blue and full of life.
“I’m looking for Scotty,” Marian signed. “Do you know where he is?”
She shook her head and her fingers flitted like butterflies as she responded, “I haven’t seen him since lunch. Is he in trouble again?”
I hope not. Marian sighed silently as she nodded approval of the rather lopsided god’s eye that Mindy held up for her approval.
Even though a building uneasiness urged Marian to find Scotty as soon as possible, she took time to look at all the girls’ handiwork. Marian knew these children wanted so much to connect with other people that sometimes they were like puppies willing to do anything for a pat on the head.
“We’re going to make one to hang in your office,” Nancy told her with a grin. “It’ll keep all the problems away from your door.”
“What a lovely idea. The sooner the better.”
“What’s happening?”
“I feel as if I’m holding on to a dozen horses going in all directions,” Marian admitted. “New-job jitters, I guess.”
“Relax, everything’s under control,” Nancy assured her with her usual optimistic grin.
Marian gave her a grateful smile as she left the room and headed down the hall to a small sitting room that had been changed into a nursing station and dispensary.
Bertha Higgins was a large, motherly-looking woman in her fifties who was not only a registered nurse but also a certified teacher, trained in speech, auditory development, sign language and lip-reading. Marian had hired her because she was qualified to take turns relieving Nancy and Rob with the students so the two teachers might have some free time. When Bertha wasn’t tending to medical needs or handling a class, she took it upon herself to instruct individual students about specific health habits they were ignoring.
Marian knew Bertha had playfully threatened to wash Scotty’s ears and neck for him. Much to everyone’s surprise the boy had given her a big grin as if he wasn’t used to anyone paying that much attention to him.
Maybe he was just faking the stomachache so he could get Bertha’s attention again, Marian thought as she politely knocked on the door.
“Come in.”
The nurse had her back to the door, putting some medical supplies in a cabinet. When she turned around, she gave Marian a cheery smile as she said, “What can I do you for?”
“I’m looking for Scotty.”
“I haven’t seen him. Was he supposed to check in with me?”
“Well, Rob excused him and told him to see you because Scotty said he had a stomachache.”
Bertha chuckled. “The oldest ploy in the world. Better than a headache. I bet he knows every trick in the book, that one. He’s probably stretched out on his bunk waiting for dinnertime. I bet the kid’s been starved a lot of his life. He’ll put on a pound or two while he’s here.”
“Well, if he’s hiding out, I just might find a job or two that will help his appetite.” As she turned to leave, she said, “If he shows up, hold on to him.”
“Will do.”
Heading down the hall, Marian intended to go up to the second floor where the boys had assigned beds, but another youngster, Peter, came bounding down the center staircase just as she reached it.
Putting out her hand, she stopped him. Knowing the ten-year-old was a good lip-reader, she looked straight at him and carefully mouthed her words, slowly and evenly. “Peter, did you see Scotty upstairs?”
He shook his head. “Nobody up there. I went to get this,” he told her in a flat but understandable tone as he held out a small electronic game. “You want to play?”
“Not now, Peter. Maybe later,” she answered.
He nodded to show he understood and then bounded down the hall toward the activity room.
Marian decided to check the kitchen, since Scotty had already been caught stealing food between meals. The cook, Elsie Mullens, had threatened him with a week’s dish-washing detail if he did it again and Marian had approved the promised punishment.
She liked the hefty, gray-haired cook who had been hired to prepare the meals. Once, Marian had heard Elsie on the phone arguing with a Denver dietician about the menus they had sent her to prepare. Elsie had spent most of her life cooking for ranchers and was used to preparing meals for hardworking men with healthy appetites and not finicky youngsters.
“Yeah, he was here,” Elsie replied when Marian asked her if she’d seen Scotty. “Hanging around, he was, waiting for me to turn my back. He’s got sticky fingers, that one. Lordy, he’s snitched more than one pastry right out from under my nose.” As she talked she vigorously patted flour on a bread board and wheeled a rolling pin over fresh dough. “I shooed him out of here fast like.”
“Do you know where he went?”
Elsie shrugged her solid shoulders. “He left by the back door.”
Marian mentally groaned. She knew it wasn’t Elsie’s duty to supervise the kids, but she wished the cook had stopped him. It wasn’t an easy job to supervise all the activities inside the house. One kid like Scotty could create a crisis in spite of their best efforts. Making certain none of the children wandered off was a number-one priority. She’d have to talk to Rob about not letting any of the children run around unsupervised, even for a few minutes.
“If the kid shows up again, I’ll sit him down till you come after him,” Elsie promised as if she’d read Marian’s mind.
“Yes, please do.” Marian thanked her and left quickly by the back door.
As she stood on the top step of the wide back porch and surveyed the surrounding foothills carpeted with thick drifts of evergreen trees, her chest tightened. She’d had enough experience in her hiking club to know how treacherous climbing slopes like those could be. A small city boy scrambling up the side of the rock-strewn slopes could easily lose his footing. Steep cliffs fell away to a swift-flowing mountain stream bordering one edge of the property, and in her mind’s eye, Marian unwittingly pictured Scotty tumbling into the current. He’d be swept downstream and—
Stop it!
Taking a deep breath, she stilled her rising apprehension and vivid imagination.
I can handle this!
She’d been telling herself that every time a crisis arose that demanded her attention and decision. The heavy responsibility of being in charge had come home to her the minute the busload of children had unloaded at the front door. Her intense week of preparation at the house to get ready seemed inadequate for the instant demands put upon her with their arrival.
Almost immediately, a myriad of unexpected problems challenged her on every level, none of which resembled those she’d experienced in her former administrative position at the day school. Scotty Tanner was one of those challenges. It was imperative that she get the belligerent boy under control without delay.
She left the porch and quickly made a circle walking around the stone mansion. No sign of him standing on the flagstone terrace nor on the wide-veranda front porch.
A large garage stood at the end of the driveway. She peeked in and saw a couple of cars and one pickup truck. Some old bicycles and garden equipment were stored there. No sign of Scotty.
Maybe the caretaker, Henry Ziller, had seen the boy snooping around. The older, rugged, sharp-tongued man lived in the apartment above the garage and it was clear he was less than pleased about having a dozen kids running all over the place.
She knew Henry had been with the Wentworth family since his youth and was very possessive about the property. Already there had been problems about letting the children play in certain places on the grounds and he’d raised a fuss about having any play equipment scattered about.
She quickly climbed the outside stairs to the small apartment and knocked on the door.
No response. A knot in her chest began to tighten. What now? There were a hundred places in the mansion alone where a small boy could hide and enjoy the uproar of people looking for him. She wanted to do her best to make sure Scotty wasn’t somewhere on the grounds or in the mansion before she organized an official search party. The uproar that would cause was something she couldn’t even bear to think about.
The only places left to look on the immediate property were a small barn and stable built a short distance from the back of the house and almost hidden by stands of cedar and pine trees. She knew horses had not been stabled there for several years but maybe Scotty was scouting these empty buildings like a hopeful pack rat.
As she headed across a green meadow in the direction of the buildings, she brushed back a strand of reddish-blond hair and shaded her eyes from the bright sunlight. At first she thought her eyes were betraying her when she glimpsed a shadowy movement in the trees. She stopped and shaded her eyes with her hands. A moment later, she glimpsed a small figure running into the stable.
Scotty! Thank heavens!
Was he trying to hide from her? At the moment, she didn’t know what kind of discipline was appropriate, but she was determined to make sure this kind of thing didn’t happen again. Even as she cautioned herself not to lose her temper, she knew she was way too uptight for any game of hide-and-seek.
The stable door was ajar and as she stepped inside, the interior was dark and smelly. Shadowy horse stalls stretched the length of the building on both sides. As she stood there searching for any flicker of movement, a hushed, dusty silence greeted her.
She knew calling out Scotty’s name was a wasted effort. If the deaf boy wasn’t looking in her direction, he wouldn’t even know she was there. Once more, if he was deliberately hiding from her, he wouldn’t give himself away. The open stable door and small windows at both ends of the stable were the only source of a feeble light.
As she walked past the stalls, she could see inside each one because the half doors were hanging open.
All the stalls were empty.
She saw a door ajar on one side of the stable that looked as if it might open into a tack room. Maybe that’s where Scotty was hiding. She pushed the door fully open and stepped inside.
A high narrow window gave shadowy light to the small room and she could see bridles and harnesses hanging from ceiling hooks. Saddles of various kinds were mounted on wooden racks and a long table was loaded with ropes, saddle blankets and various tool kits. It was obvious to Marian from the stacks of boxes and clutter that the room was being used for storage now that there were no horses stabled there.
As she looked around, her gaze settled on some feed sacks piled in one corner. At first she thought her eyes were playing tricks on her when they registered the slight movement as a small head ducked down behind one of the sacks.
Scotty! Instant relief sped through her. She’d found him! Everything was under control. She’d lay down firm rules and consequences and keep a tighter rein on him. Since she’d gone out on a limb to include Scotty in the program, no one needed to know about this little escapade.
When she pulled away one of the sacks, she exposed his cowering body and was stunned by the look of terror that flashed in his eyes. She realized the boy was trembling with fright. Her anger quickly dissipated.
“It’s all right, Scotty,” she mouthed as she bent close enough for him to read her lips. “Nothing bad is going to happen.”
He shook his head in denial. His eyes were wide and filled with fear.
“I’m not going to punish you.” She guessed that he was probably expecting the kind of discipline heaped on him by an abusive father and drug-addicted mother. No wonder his first reaction was to hide from any authority figure. “We’ll talk. Now let’s go back to the house.”
“No.”
He drew back and she wasn’t prepared for this kind of rebellion. “What do you mean, no? You’ll do as I say.”
His fearful eyes darted to the door of the tack room. “Have to hide.”
Hide? What was he talking about? He’d been hiding from her and she’d found him.
“Why do you have to hide, Scotty?” She mouthed the question with deliberate slowness.
“They might find me!”
As she searched his fearful expression, she realized he hadn’t been hiding from her. Maybe he hadn’t even seen her coming toward the stable. “Who might find you, Scotty?”
“The one who did it.” He grabbed her hand and held on to it as if some unseen hands were trying to pull him away from her.
As the terrified eleven-year-old boy clung to her, she knew with sickening certainty he wasn’t making something up. No child could pretend the kind of fear she saw in his eyes.
“The one who did what, Scotty?”
He swallowed hard. “Killed the man.”
“What man, Scotty? Tell me where you were.”
“The small house…by the creek,” he mumbled.
She knew there was a log cabin on the estate about a mile downstream. A kind of guesthouse. As far as she knew, the place wasn’t being used this summer.
“You were inside the little house?”
“But I didn’t take nothing,” he said with a rush.
“Tell me exactly what you did do, Scotty. Everything.”
He kept his hand in hers as he told her about breaking a window, trashing the kitchen and going to hunt for some loot in the rest of the house.
“Then I saw the dead man and ran.” He fixed terrified eyes on her face. “I ran before they caught me.”
“Who, Scotty? Who was there?”
He shook his head.
“Are you sure there was someone?”
He raised tear-filled eyes to hers. “I felt them coming around the house. The boards moved. We have to hide.”
“No, Scotty,” she said with a sickening plunge of her stomach. “We have to call the police.”
Chapter Two
The Rock Creek Police Department was a stone building just off Main Street. Detective Ryan Darnell was sitting at a scarred desk in his small office when the switchboard relayed a call to him. At first, Ryan didn’t understand exactly what kind of crime the woman was reporting.
“My name is Marian Richards. I’m the director of an outreach program for hearing-impaired children. We are in residence at the Wentworth estate for the summer. I have a situation here that I need you to look into as soon as possible.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he replied. He had heard something about old lady Wentworth letting some nonprofit foundation use the property. Apparently she’d hired a female executive to run it. Ryan pictured the caller as a middle-aged, uptight spinster used to ordering people around.
“What kind of situation would that be?” he asked, leaning back in his chair. He wasn’t about to drive five miles up a canyon road because some authoritative director didn’t want to take care of some piddling matter.
“I think there may have been a crime committed on the property.”
“You don’t know for sure?” Ryan’s tone was slightly mocking.
