This window, then . . . it slid upward with a short creak. Rob looked out, testing the possibilities.
It wouldn’t be quite as easy as he’d hoped. He’d have to climb some ten feet on the steeply sloping shingles to reach the flat part of the roof. It hadn’t looked that far from below. But if he went straight up from here, Rob saw, if he slipped he’d end up against the base of the tower, not plunging over the edge in a forty-foot drop.
It was then he heard Derek on the stairs.
Only this time he wasn’t coming cautiously, he was running for all he was worth, and Rob didn’t have as much time as he needed to get over the sill and onto the slanting roof. He was straddling the sill, one foot in and one out, when Derek burst into the tower room. The door was left open below him, and Rob thought he could smell smoke, stronger now, frightening.
Derek stood panting, staring at him.
“What are you going to do, Robbie? Fly out of the cuckoo’s nest?”
“What were you looking for, down there?” Rob countered. “Something in a brown paper bag?”
Derek’s expression sharpened, then, taking in the sack on the sill in front of Rob.
“Have you got it? How did you know where it was?”
“Is it worth a lot of money?” Rob demanded. His heart was beating very rapidly, but so long as Derek made no move toward him, he wasn’t any more scared than he’d been for the last couple of hours.
Derek licked his lips. “Yes, it’s worth quite a bit.”
“Is it heroin?”
“Little mister know-it-all today, aren’t you, Robbie?”
“I sure never thought my sister would fall for a drug addict . . . even if she did dump him after a while.”
Derek’s laughter was harsh and unamused. “I’m not that stupid . . . I don’t use the junk myself.”
Rob probed with one sneaker foot at the shingles, testing them for slipperiness. If they were, too bad, he was going to have a devil of a time getting up them. “But you were stupid enough to let Mrs. Calloway know you had the stuff.”
A dull flush swept over Derek’s face. “The old bat. I had to have someplace to hide it . . . just for a couple of days. So I thought under her porch was a reasonable place; I never saw her on her front porch, before, let alone looking under it.”
“But she found it,” Rob reasoned. “And when you wanted it back, she wouldn’t let you have it.”
“The old witch. That’s all I needed, to get caught with . . . my scholarship, my job . . . it was bad enough losing Darcy, but I couldn’t . . . I tried to reason with her, but there wasn’t any reasoning with her! And all this talking isn’t going to do you any good, either, Robbie, my friend, because the more you know the more important it is to shut you up.”
“Maybe the fire will keep you from getting out, too,” Rob pointed out. He shifted his weight slightly, ready now to swing the other leg over the sill. He didn’t think Derek was brave enough to follow him up the roof, but you never could tell. Desperate men did desperate things, and Derek was desperate, all right.
Derek gave another of those croaking barks that passed for laughter. “It’s not easy to start a fire without using gas or kerosine or something, even all those papers don’t want to burn . . . No, now that you’ve led me up here maybe this is a better, idea. You’ll just fall out the window and break your stupid neck. Give me the bag.”
Rob stared at him. Why should Derek think he would do anything he didn’t have to do? If he threw the package outside somebody might find it and put two and two together . . .
Suddenly Derek laughed. “Your own fingerprints are on it, Rob! How about that? If you pitch it out, like you’re thinking about, they’ll find your fingerprints on it! And they’ll think that’s why you panicked and ran! Not because you saw any murder, but because you were afraid the police would find the bag!”
Rob didn’t much care what anybody thought, if they thought it after he was dead. Besides, Mrs. Calloway’s prints and Derek’s must be on it, too, since they’d both handled it.
In a quick, deft motion Rob picked up the paper bag and threw it. Not to Derek, but toward the open window opposite him, the one that looked straight down to the front yard.
He wasn’t first baseman for the Cubs for nothing; it was a clear, hard shot, and it served its purpose. Derek swore, diving to catch the bag, missing it, almost going out the window himself in his efforts.
Rob didn’t wait to see what happened; his only interest was in getting out that window, out of Derek’s reach. But the motion of throwing with all his strength had put enough strain on his bulging pocket so that the seam ripped the rest of the way, and the jar of spiders popped out.
He grabbed at it, although this was no time to worry about a few spiders. He didn’t drop it, though, because he saw Derek’s face.
Derek had missed the paper bag, but that wasn’t what held his attention at the moment. He could still get out and get the bag before anyone else found it, if he could keep Rob from getting to anyone.
Both of them stared at the other occupants of the tower room, driven out of their home in the light fixture by the heat of the bulb. Spiders, too many to count, fat black bodies bulging and shiny, dropped from the fixture to the floor between the two of them.
Fear rippled across Derek’s face, but as the creatures scurried off toward darker corners, he took another step toward Rob.
Rob, for his part, had been brought to a halt, too, but not by fear of the spiders. Two shingles had broken loose when he put his full weight on them, and went slithering off over the edge of the roof. If they were all like that, he’d be committing suicide to try to climb them. A quick probe with one rubber-toed sneaker sent another shingle sliding away from him. Rotten. The whole crummy roof was rotten.
He couldn’t risk the roof. He knew that now. He might fall through it, he might slide with the loose shingles over the edge, but he didn’t have a chance of making it to the top.
He hesitated, fear making his heart pound, while his brain was racing. One hand came up to brace himself on the window frame and he drew it back, quickly, to avoid another of the spiders there.
This was the largest one he’d ever seen. He didn’t have any like it in his collection because his mother was scared to death of them.
Derek had seen it, too, and again he hesitated. “This place is full of the things!”
“They’re black widows,” Rob pointed out, in case Derek didn’t recognize the species.
“Are you sure?” Derek seemed hypnotized by the gigantic spider, licking his lips, afraid to come any closer to it.
“Sure. Turn it over, if you don’t believe me. There’s a red hourglass spot on its belly. A black widow. They’re all black widows. They like places where there aren’t too many people around.”
What was he going to do? Derek wasn’t going to stand off for long because of a few spiders, black widows or not, not when there was a car stopping out front and more voices. If he yelled, if they heard him, would Derek do anything? Would Derek push him out the window and then run, making the people below believe Rob had only yelled as he was falling?
“Their bites are fatal, you know,” he said, hoping Derek would hesitate a little longer. If only the people would come around this side of the house, where they could see him . . . surely Derek wouldn’t dare push him, then, would he? Why didn’t they notice the lights?
Derek’s face was pale under the dim bulb, but he swallowed, trying to pull himself together. He knew, as well as Rob did, that he had to act at once or it would be too late to act at all.
Derek was afraid of spiders. Could he make use of that knowledge? Could he gain time . . . just a little time?
The glass jar in his hand was slippery with Rob’s sweat. He brought up the other hand and twisted the lid, not looking at the spiders climbing over one another inside it, but watching Derek
’s face. He’d never actually counted the number of spiders he had, but there were plenty of them. If he could get them all over Derek, shake him up enough to get past him and down those stairs . . .
Derek’s expression sharpened. “What are you doing?”
“My dad knew a guy that died because a black widow bit him,” Rob said, and threw the jar of spiders.
Derek’s harsh cry might have been heard by those below, whoever they were; he dodged and the spiders didn’t come out of the jar at all, as Rob had expected. A few of them spilled onto the floor, but Derek made a savage kicking motion that sent the jar spinning across the floor.
“All right, you little creep,” Derek said, and his voice was deadly. “Out you go, and see how many bones you can break on the way down!”
For all his fear of spiders, Derek was more afraid of letting Rob escape. He lunged, and even as he yelled for help, Rob did the last thing he could think of.
He swept the gigantic spider off the window frame with his bare hand, flinging it straight into Derek’s oncoming face.
Sixteen
For a few seconds Derek was a study in horror, the bulging black body a grotesque beauty mark at one corner of his mouth. Even as his frantic hands felt for it, the creature moved, climbing into his thick thatch of dark hair.
“Rob? Rob, is that you?”
He couldn’t answer the shout from below, couldn’t manage the breath for it. He dove from the windowsill, falling to his knees among the spilled spiders, unaware of them crawling over his outstretched hands. His only thought was to get past Derek, down those stairs . . .
He heard Derek’s strangled cry as he beat at his hair, and then Rob was plunging down the stairs, falling, rolling, yelling. Somehow, he’d regained enough wind to do that.
Feet pounded on the lower stairs; when he sprawled full-length in the upper hallway, hands found him, lifted him, and it was a moment before he stopped fighting, realizing that it wasn’t Derek, but his father, who held him.
“Rob? Rob, are you hurt?”
Behind him, from the tower room, came a cry of anguish. The police officer behind Walt Mallory moved toward the stairs.
“It’s Derek,” Rob said, and wondered why his throat was sore. “He . . . there’s a black widow spider in his hair, and he thinks their bites are always fatal. He’s . . . pretty dumb about some things.”
“Derek?” Mr. Mallory’s face seemed more lined, older, than Rob remembered it. “What happened, son?”
“He killed her. Mrs. Calloway. He pushed her out the window because she found some drugs he had and wouldn’t give them back to him, I guess.”
“Drugs?” That was Fritz, the other cop, coming up the stairs with drawn gun.
“They’re in a sack out on the lawn; I threw them out the window.”
He was tired, so tired his legs were trembling, and he still had to go to the bathroom.
“What were you doing over here? Didn’t you know everybody was looking for you?” his father demanded.
“The police were going to arrest me, weren’t they? And I had to hide until you came home. Only Derek found me.”
“You saw him push Mrs. Calloway out of the window? Why didn’t you tell somebody?”
“I think he tried to, Walt.” It was Fritz, the redheaded one. “Not once, but half a dozen times, from what we’ve been able to gather. Even called the police, but until we’d done some investigating it didn’t seem very likely. He hung up before we could get any real information, and then hid when we came to the house.” He raised his voice. “You need any help up there, Riley?”
“No. He’s coming down under his own steam,” was the shouted reply.
Rob turned quickly away. He didn’t want to see Derek. Not ever again, if he could help it. “I want to go home,” he said.
“Sure, son. There’s a lot we need to know; we’ll want to ask you some questions,” Fritz said.
He felt awfully tired, and if he didn’t get to a bathroom pretty soon he was going to embarrass everybody by wetting his pants. His father and Fritz laughed when he told them.
“We’re not in that much of a hurry, son. You go ahead; I’ll be along in a minute,” Fritz assured him.
They were coming down the stairs, Derek and Riley. Rob moved quickly to the other stairway, leading down into the sad old house. “I’m hungry, too. Starved. Can I have a peanut butter sandwich before I answer questions?”
“Yes, sure.” Mr. Mallory kept a hand on Rob’s shoulder. It was a big, warm, heavy hand. It felt good.
Rob cleared his throat.
“Dad.”
“Yes, son?”
“Am I . . . under arrest or anything?”
“No. No, I don’t think you’re under arrest, or anything,” his father said, and he sounded so odd that Rob looked up at him, wondering what was the matter.
“I guess I messed up the wedding plans, didn’t I?”
“No more than anybody else did,” Mr. Mallory said with a sigh as they started down the second flight of stairs.
Rob remembered then. “Is he going to go to jail? Uncle Ray?”
“No. He’s just going to work his tail off, paying back the money he took. It may be the best thing that ever happened to him.”
Rob felt worn out, drained. “What . . . what will they do with Derek?”
“I don’t know, son. It’s hard to believe he . . . well, I guess you can have a boy in your house off and on for years and not really know anything about him. The police will take care of Derek.”
The smell of burned paper was strong in the lower part of the house, and there was a little smoke, but not much. Mr. Mallory headed toward the front door, but Rob held back.
“No . . . I’d rather go out the other way.” He didn’t want to walk out into the midst of the crowd he knew was there; he didn’t want to answer all their questions.
“The back door’s hard to get to; there was a pretty good fire going in the kitchen,” his father said gently.
“Is it all right if I go out the window, then? The same way I came in?”
They didn’t say anything when Rob pushed aside the lace curtains and climbed out into the tree. He balanced for a minute in the very heart of it, wishing he could just stay there for a few hours until everything had died down.
He wondered if it would ever be the same, if the cherry tree would ever again feel as safe and as comfortable as it had before, or if he’d always remember this one day and the things he had seen from these branches.
He heard his mother’s voice and knew she’d been crying. “Wally? Where’s Robbie? Is he all right?”
“He’s fine, honey. Just fine. Give him a few minutes in the tree and he’ll come down. He’s hungry. He wants a peanut butter sandwich.”
There were people all over the place, filling the yard, spilling out onto the sidewalks. There were three fire trucks, unreeling their hoses, running them into the house.
His cousin, Annabel, stood unsuspecting beneath the tree. He had a moment’s regret that the spiders had all been turned loose up there in the tower. That would have given her something to remember him by.
“Come on,” Mr. Mallory’s voice rose above the others. “All my crew, back into the house. We’ve got a wedding coming off tomorrow, and we’re not going to let any of this spoil it.”
Rob sat a moment longer, relieving himself into Mrs. Calloway’s flower bed. It wasn’t a gesture of disrespect, it just seemed quicker and easier than forcing his way through that crowd inside to get to a bathroom.
Sonny came bounding across the lawn as Rob slid out of the tree; the cat made a little cry and pushed against Rob’s ankles.
Rob scooped him up, rubbing his cheek against the thick black fur. He walked toward the house, slowly, stroking the cat.
They were taking Derek away; he could hear the sounds
of the police radio and see the red lights flashing. He felt very strange about Derek. He didn’t ever want to see him again, and once he’d told the police all he knew, he didn’t want to talk about him anymore, either; but he knew he’d never forget him.
He went up the back steps and into the house.
There was still that blamed wedding to get through.
About the Author
Willo Davis Roberts wrote many mystery and suspense novels for children during her long and illustrious career, including The Girl with the Silver Eyes, The View from the Cherry Tree, Twisted Summer, Megan’s Island, Baby-Sitting Is a Dangerous Job, Hostage, Scared Stiff, and The Kidnappers. Three of her children’s books won Edgar® Awards, while others received great reviews and other accolades, including the Sunshine State Young Reader Award, California Young Reader Medal, and the Georgia Children’s Book Award.
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DON’T MISS THESE OTHER WILLO DAVIS ROBERTS MYSTERIES:
Surviving Summer Vacation
Megan’s Island
Baby-Sitting Is a Dangerous Job
The Kidnappers
Hostage
Scared Stiff
The Pet-Sitting Peril
What Could Go Wrong?
Secrets at Hidden Valley
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The View from the Cherry Tree Page 14