The Deep End of Fear by Elizabeth Chandler

Author:Elizabeth Chandler [Chandler, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Tutors and tutoring, Detective and mystery stories, Juvenile Fiction, Family problems, Family Life, Mysteries & Detective Stories, Fiction, Sagas, Love & Romance, Horror & Ghost Stories, Ghosts, Domestic fiction, Homecoming, Mystery and detective stories
ISBN: 9780689852596
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 2003-03-01T00:00:00+00:00

160

"It's nice to meet you."

She reached into a folder she was carrying. "I have a phone number that was requested by Patrick."

I glanced down at the square of paper she handed me, surprised. "Sam Koscinski?"

"He said Sam was his friend." Her eyes brightened with amusement. "Patrick has the same demanding way as his father when he wants a phone number pronto."

"He demanded it?" I wasn't amused at the idea of a seven-year-old talking to an adult as if she were his employee. It was so easy to turn a sweet kid into a brat.

"Wel , thank you. Thank you very much." I slipped the paper in my pocket and climbed the steps to the third floor.

I had left Patrick playing a game on his computer and, upon reaching the last flight of steps, expected to hear pinging sounds against a background of music. When I heard an electronic voice asking repeatedly Hey, want to play? I quickened my pace toward the schoolroom. He wasn't there.

"Patrick?"

I checked the playroom, then hurried to my room and downstairs to his. He was nowhere in sight. I listened for footsteps above my head, in case he was hiding, then returned to the third floor to search the two storerooms.

"Patrick? If you're hiding, I want you to come out now."

Nothing in the two rooms appeared to be disturbed. The old hockey sticks, deflated basketbal , and other sports equipment lay in the same places as before. The furniture was coated with dust and bore no fingerprints or streaks.

161

I wavered between anger and fear.

He is playing games with me, being a brat, there is nothing to worry about, I told myself. But after the incidents of the last few days, al I could think of were the dangerous things Ashley had dared me to do when Joseph and my mother weren't around-jumping off a shed roof, wading into the bay during a storm, making a fire by the pond. I debated whether to go immediately to Adrian. If Patrick was simply playing a hiding game, and I created a ruckus by having everyone search for him, he and I would both regret it.

I hurried downstairs to check the coat closet. His snow jacket was gone, though not his boots. I rushed to the kitchen door and saw a set of smal footprints leading away from it.

Without pausing to put on a coat or boots, I raced out, fol owing the prints. When I got to the orangerie, Patrick's path suddenly veered around a bush, and a second trail appeared. The snow was above my ankles, so it was difficult to see the actual paw prints, but I was sure they were a cat's.

"Patrick?" I shouted.

I couldn't tel if the cat led the boy or the boy led the cat, but both routes were headed toward the tennis courts and the pool beyond it. The evergreen screen around the courts and pool obscured my view. I rushed on, passing the wal of spruce close to the pool, then stopped short.

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