A Moment in Time

by Judith Gould

  "Hayden? Hayden!" she began to cry. "Where are you, darling?"

  She removed her hand from the cage and closed the door. How on earth? she asked herself in a panic. I'm certain I had the cage door secured when I went to bed last night. Or did I?

  Then another thought occurred to her. Oh, dear! Maybe Hayden's loose in the house somewhere, she worried. He's very enterprising and may have ventured out of his cage. She'd often let him out at night and let him explore the kitchen, so it wasn't altogether strange territory for him. But the kitchen door was open to the porch. She rushed over to it and looked about the screened-in porch. No sign of Hayden there.

  She closed the kitchen door firmly and began searching the baseboards around the room. He always seemed partial to the baseboards, she thought, exploring the perimeter of the room. She looked and looked, but there was no sign of Hayden.

  With a sigh, she turned to the notepad she kept on the kitchen counter to look at the list she'd started yesterday. All the things she had to do, the groceries and other items that she had to shop for.

  Iced tea, she remembered. She had intended to make a big pitcher to have on hand for herself and Val, if she happened by later today. It was a green tea jazzed up with a delicious, rather rare kind of honey. She put the to-do list down and decided to get busy.

  She retrieved a big glass pitcher on the ancient Welsh dresser, then going to the side-by-side refrigerator-freezer, she held the heavy pitcher in one hand and opened the freezer compartment with the other. She always filled the pitcher to the brim with ice cubes to start. Reaching her hand into the pile of ice that the ice- maker had churned out, she took a handful from the reservoir and put it in the pitcher. She took another handful and placed it in, then reached in for another.

  "Merde!" she cried aloud. She must have nicked her hand on a sharp piece of ice. She removed her hand with the offending ice from the ice-maker's big reservoir and started to toss it in the pitcher, looking down at it first to make certain she hadn't gotten blood on it from her hand.

  Suddenly her eyes grew enormous, and she dropped the pitcher of ice to the floor, where it shattered into dozens of pieces at her feet. Puff Puppy barked in alarm, but she didn't hear him. Her mouth widened into a blood-curdling scream of shock and fear and horror, and she dropped the piece of ice in her hand— no, not ice! she told herself—to the floor, where it landed amidst the broken glass and ice cubes.

  Colette stepped back, the scream still rising from deep within her. Looking down at the floor, her screams turned to wails of anguish, then into sobs of utter despair. She clutched the lapels of her bathrobe as if hanging on to them would somehow protect her from whatever evil had done this. Tears began to pour from her old eyes, running down her face in rivulets of sorrow.

  On the floor, atop the broken glass and ice, lay Hayden, frozen to death, his quills as hard and sharp as knives, his beautiful gray color frosted pale, his tiny dark eyes open in a look of eternal horror.

  Colette covered her own eyes and continued to sob, choking on her sorrow, until she could finally make her way to the kitchen table, where she sat down heavily in a chair, the tears still flowing.

  Who could do something so demonic? And why, oh, why? She had no answers to her questions, but they continued to roar at her.

  She had no idea how long it was before she quietly rose to her feet and methodically took a tea towel from the kitchen counter, then picked up Hayden's lifeless little body and wrapped it in the towel. She placed the bundle in his cage and closed the door. Then, retrieving a broom and dust pan from a closet, she cleaned up the broken glass and ice. Puff Puppy mustn't hurt himself, she thought.

  That accomplished, she picked up the Maltese, clutching him to her as if she were still on automatic pilot, and went out onto the screened-in porch and sat down, staring off into the garden. She had to call Val at the clinic, but she felt so dispirited that she decided to wait a while. Nothing Val could do would bring Hayden back. She would spend some time alone with Puff Puppy, trying to come to terms with the evil that she'd been forced to confront.

  Valerie had just finished her morning rounds of the local horse farms and had gotten out of her dirty coveralls and boots and changed into a fresh lab coat and sneakers. She was washing up, getting ready for the rest of her day, when Tami rushed into her office.

  "Val," she gasped, "it's your mother. She says it's an emergency."

  Val's eyes widened in alarm. She turned off the water at the sink in the little bathroom. "An emergency?" she asked, stepping into her office. "What is it?"

  "I don't know," Tami said, "but she seems to be in an awful state. She's on line three, okay?"

  "Thanks, Tami," Valerie said. "Tell her I'll be right there."

  "Will do."

  Valerie quickly buttoned up her lab coat, then approached her desk with trepidation. What could the emergency be? she asked herself, wondering if there really was an emergency at all.

  Seated at her desk, she pressed the button for line three and picked up the receiver. "Hello, Mother," she said as calmly as she could. "Tami tells me there's an emergency. What's going on?"

  "I must talk to you at once, Val," her mother said in a voice that was uncustomarily anxious. "Before you cut me off, I must tell you that it's of the utmost importance."

  "What is it, Mother?" Valerie asked.

  "I thought you were going to marry Teddy," her mother began, "and—"

  "I don't want to discuss that, Mother," Valerie said in no uncertain terms.

  "That's not what I want to discuss, either," her mother hurriedly said. "Please, Val, hear me out for a minute before you rush to judgment. It's vitally important."

  What on earth? Valerie wondered. "Okay," she said, "I'm listening."

  "What I'm trying to say," her mother continued, "is that because I thought you were going to marry Teddy, I signed a power of attorney and turned over my entire stock portfolio for him to manage. I—"

  "You what?" Valerie asked, not quite believing her ears.

  "You heard me correctly," Marguerite replied with a heavy sigh. "Because I thought you were marrying him, I turned everything over to Teddy to manage. I took it all away from Dock Wainwright."

  "I can't believe you did that," Valerie said. "Dock Wainwright has always handled the family's affairs. And quite conservatively, like Dad wanted him to, I might add. You know as well as I do that Teddy trades in dangerous territory. Maybe he's had success. I don't really know anything about it, but I do know that Dock always seemed to take very good care of you and Dad."

  "Be that as it may," Marguerite said, "I've done what I've done, and now I'm . . . well, frankly, I'm a little disturbed. I don't think I would be if I knew you were marrying—"

  "I said I don't want to discuss that," Valerie said with fire in her voice. "If you've made a decision you regret, I'm not taking the blame for it. And if you're trying to talk me into marrying him just because you've invested with him, then you might as well stop right there. There is not a chance in hell I'll marry Teddy."

  "I'm well aware of that," Marguerite said, "although I don't think you have to use such harsh language to get your point across. In any case, that's not what I'm trying to do. I'm certainly not trying to convince you to marry him because I've invested with him." She sighed.

  "Okay," Valerie said. "Then what is it? What can I do?"

  "I'm telling you because I'm beginning to worry about the whole thing," Marguerite said. "I've just had a talk with Suzy Brooks. She and Harry have taken their account away from Teddy, she told me." Marguerite paused as if gathering the courage to go on.

  "I guess people do that all the time," Valerie said. "I mean, you just did it with Dock Wainwright."

  "Yes," Marguerite said, sighing again, "but in any case, Suzy said that Teddy had been handling a substantial amount of money for them, several million dollars, in fact. She said that everything had gone swimmingly for a while, but that lately their statements had been arriving late or not at all.
"

  "You mean they hadn't been getting anything from him?" Valerie asked. "Are you sure?"

  "Absolutely," Marguerite said. "Suzy would never have made this up. She said that when they asked Teddy about it, he assured them it was all due to some sort of new accounting procedure they were switching over to in the office. Anyway, to make a long story short, they finally decided to bail out, and it's taken them months to recover their money from him. They practically had to threaten to file a lawsuit against him to get him to pay up."

  "I see," Valerie said, genuinely alarmed now.

  "Not only that," Marguerite continued, "but when they got their final statement and check, all sorts of highly debatable charges had been made to their account, reducing it by several thousand dollars."

  "Oh, my God," Valerie moaned. "Are they going to try to do something about it?"

  "They haven't come to a decision," Marguerite replied. "But I have. I want my money to go straight back to Dock Wainwright and as quickly as possible. I was going to try and get Jamie working on it this morning, but I can't find him."

  "What do you mean you can't find him?" Valerie asked. "Where does he go?"

  "I ... I don't really know," Marguerite confessed. "He has friends nearby, I know."

  "Look, Mother," she said. "I'm sure it'll be just fine. He's only had your money a very short time, right?"

  "Yes," Marguerite said, "but I can't help worrying after Suzy's call. I thought I was doing the right thing, and having Jamie as a sort of watchdog over everything, well, how could I go wrong?"

  "Jamie as a watchdog?" Valerie asked. "What do you mean? How's he involved?"

  "He was transferring some money to Teddy as well," Marguerite replied. "And Jamie knows a thing or two about money management, so I signed papers giving Jamie the power to make decisions regarding stock trades and such. He is supposed to be consulted before Teddy makes any final decisions regarding changes in the portfolio. That sort of thing. But I haven't been able to reach Jamie. He's visiting friends in Saratoga, I believe."

  It gets more Byzantine by the minute, Valerie thought, but didn't say. "In that case," Val said, "everything ought to be all right, Mother. If Teddy can't do anything without Jamie, then you should be okay until a transfer back to Dock is made."

  "I hope so," Marguerite said. "I just don't know. Teddy is certainly an underhanded schemer."

  Pot calls kettle black, Valerie thought. Did it never occur to her mother that if those two would scheme with her, they might very well scheme against her?

  "I don't know how I can help you," Valerie said, "but if there's anything I can do, say the word."

  "I was hoping that you might be able to talk to Teddy, and tell him I've changed my mind," she said. "Tell him it's because your father would be terribly disappointed to know that I'd transferred control to someone other than Dock. I certainly don't want Teddy to think that I'm suspicious of him. It might offend him. I want this done in a very civilized way."

  The way you planned my wedding, Valerie couldn't help thinking. "Well," she said, "I don't think there's a chance that I'll get to talk to Teddy before you do, but if he calls I'll broach the subject."

  "That would be awfully helpful, Val, dear," she said. "I've already talked to Dock Wainwright, by the way, and told him that I want the money transferred back to his firm. So he said he would get the paperwork ready at his office, and he's waiting to hear from Teddy. He's already left word with Teddy's secretary."

  "Okay," Valerie said. "Is there anything else?"

  "No," Marguerite said, then she added, "but it wouldn't hurt if you'd be nice to Teddy, only until this is over, I mean, so that it works out smoothly."

  Valerie wanted to scream, but instead she said, "Of course, Mother. I'll be nice to Teddy. For your sake."

  "It's for your own as well," Marguerite pointed out. "After all, Val, dear, you are my sole heir."

  "I'll do my best," Valerie said. "Now, I'd better get off the phone because I've got a very busy day."

  "Yes," Marguerite said. "I won't keep you. Goodbye, then."

  "Bye, Mother," Valerie said and hung up the telephone.

  She put her head in her hands and massaged her forehead as if to wipe away the worries that her mother's telephone call had brought on. Life is never simple, she told herself, but can't there be days with little reprieves? She lifted her head again and looked down at Elvis, spread out in his bed beneath the desk.

  "Elvis," she said. "We need a vacation. Just the two of us." Elvis wagged his tail in response. "Wait. Not so fast. On second thought," she said, "make that the three of us. You, me, and Wyn. Oh, scratch that! What am I thinking? Make that. . . what? The eight of us. You, me, Wyn, the four wolfhounds, and Mina, the cat. How does that sound, Elvis? A vacation for eight. Maybe on some nice quiet, sunny island with no telephones or faxes, no pagers or cell phones, no E-mail, no TV. Just us animals."

  She leaned down and gave him a few strokes, then straightened back up. "I like the idea, Elvis," she said. "I like it a lot, and I think you will, too."

  Wyn paced in the library, the dogs watching him idly, the cat perched in regal solitude on a high-backed baroque chair. He had already called Dexter Willingham IV, his lawyer in Palm Beach, and had a long discussion with him about finalizing the divorce.

  Willingham had been relieved because, although he could have billed for many more hours if the case had been dragged out, he was utterly sick and tired of Arielle Conrad and her screaming tantrums. She had even approached him at a grand charity function, pointing her finger and shouting obscenities at him in front of dozens of white-tied and ball-gowned grandees in one of Palm Beach's finest ballrooms. He had spoken to Myron Goldman, Arielle's lawyer, a number of times about the situation, but Goldman seemed incapable of controlling his client.

  The whole process could be virtually over by the end of the week if all went well. Neither Wyn nor Willingham anticipated any problem in instantly resolving the case. However, the telephone hadn't rung in the last hour, and Wyn was beginning to get nervous.

  What if Arielle had changed her mind about something, and decided to throw some final wrench into the process? She might hold out for more when she discovered that he was ready to settle.

  Santo walked into the room on virtually silent feet, and Wyn caught sight of him out of the corner of his eye. "Where've you been, Santo?" he asked. "I haven't seen you all morning."

  "I overslept," Santo said honestly. "I know that if you need me, all you have to do is call the cottage, so I guess my usual mental alarm clock just didn't go off this morning. I'm sort of under the weather."

  "You have the flu or something?" Wyn asked.

  "No," Santo replied. "Just. . . like a little cold or something."

  "I happened to notice that you've been out late a lot recently," Wyn said with a smile. "You found somebody up here that's hot to trot?"

  Santo averted his eyes, then turned his gaze to Wyn. "Aw, not really," he said. "Just been working out a lot. Gone to a couple of bars with some of the guys from the gym. You know, just shooting the shit."

  The telephone rang, and Santo hurriedly picked up the receiver. "Stonelair," he said.

  He listened for a moment. "Please hold," he said. He turned to Wyn. "It's Dexter Willingham for you," he said.

  "I'll take it," Wyn replied, sighing with relief. He took the receiver from Santo. "Hey, Dex," he said. "What's going on? I was beginning to get a little worried."

  "I've spoken to Myron Goldman," Willingham said, "and he foresees no difficulty bringing this to a very quick close. The only problem at this point is that he can't seem to locate Arielle."

  "What do you mean, he can't locate Arielle?" Wyn asked.

  "Exactly what I said," Willingham answered. "She's not at home. In fact, no one picks up at all. He said he'd made some phone calls, but so far he's had no luck. He'll get back to me as soon as he's spoken with her."

  "Aw, shit," Wyn said in exasperation. "This could take forever, knowi
ng Arielle."

  "Or it could take an hour, Wyn," the lawyer replied reasonably. "She could simply be at the hairdresser or out shopping. Who knows? We'll probably find her in very short order."

  "I hope so," Wyn said, "because I want to get this over with."

  "I understand, Wyn," Willingham said, "and I'm glad you've reached that decision. However, our hands are tied until we've located Arielle."

  "I realize that," Wyn said with a sigh. "I think I'll make some calls myself, Dex, and you let me know the minute you hear anything."

  "Will do," the lawyer said. He chuckled then. "Don't worry about it, Wyn, if she's in Palm Beach, we'll find her in the next hour or so. You know how small this town really is."

  "That's for sure," Wyn replied. "Okay, Dex. I'll talk to you later."

  Wyn hung up the receiver and stared off toward the pool for a few moments, wondering where he should call first to try to locate Arielle.

  "Trouble?" Santo asked, looking over at his boss.

  Wyn turned to him. "They can't find Arielle, and we need to get hold of her right away. Wouldn't you know it? I decided to go ahead and get this divorce business over with, and what happens? Arielle suddenly does a disappearing act."

  Santo stared at Wyn, his mind thrown into a maelstrom of conflicting thoughts. Should I tell him that I know where Arielle is? No, he immediately decided, because then Wyn would wonder how I know, and I certainly don't want Wyn to know that I've met with her behind his back. And what about Arielle's little plot? He'd have to get hold of her as soon as possible to let her know what was going on. That would put a stop to it. Or would it? He really didn't know.

  "What's wrong with you?" Wyn asked. "This is what you've wanted me to do, and now that I've done it, you don't have anything to say?"

  "Sorry," Santo said, clearing his throat. "I was just wondering where she might be. This is good news, though. I think it's the smartest thing you've done in a long time."

  Wyn nodded. "Well," he said, "I guess you could say that Val, you know, the vet, had something to do with it." He smiled, almost sheepishly.