The Name of the Game Was Murder (2 page)

“Which is Aunt Thea and Uncle—uh—Mr. Trevor’s room?” I asked Mrs. Engstrom.

“Your aunt’s room is the one nearest the head of the stairs,” she answered. “Mr. Trevor’s is directly across the hall from the room we are in.”

“Oh,” I said, and felt my face grow warm. I gathered up my suitcase and backpack, glad that I hadn’t unpacked them, and again followed the silent Mrs. Engstrom down the hallway, which was dark in spite of the wrought-iron sconces, each of which held clusters of small, low-watt light bulbs.

She stopped outside the last door and threw it open, then stood to one side. Instead of the room I’d expected, I saw a narrow, curving flight of stairs. “It’s just a short flight,” she told me, “but the stairs are steep, and my knees aren’t what they used to be. If you don’t mind, I won’t follow you.”

“I don’t mind,” I said, and smiled at her again. “By the
way, my name is Samantha Burns. Everybody calls me Sam.”

She nodded, but she didn’t smile in return. What a household! At least Aunt Thea seemed to be glad I was here.

I shifted my suitcase into my other hand and edged into the stairway.

“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Engstrom murmured. I twisted around to tell her not to be, but she was on her way down the hall.

I wondered just what it was she was sorry about. Sorry that I had to clump and squeeze my way up this weird stairway? That I’d had to change rooms? That Augustus Trevor was a mean-minded nerd?

The stairs made only a half circle and ended at an equally narrow door that was arched on top. A large brass key protruded from the keyhole. Feeling something like Alice in Wonderland and hoping I wouldn’t shrink, I turned the key, pushed open the door, and entered the tower room.

It was perfectly round, including the part of it that was partitioned off for a tiny bathroom. Inside the room there was only enough space for one twin-size bed, a small chest of drawers, and a chair. I dropped my suitcase and backpack on the bed and walked to the narrow windows that ringed the outer curve of the room. Beyond, in the distance, lay the sea, but the view was marred by the bars set into the stone.

I rested my forehead against the glass and groaned. In spite of gentle Aunt Thea’s presence in this house, I was beginning to get scared. “I can’t believe this,” I said aloud. “I’m in prison!”

I
needed to get out of that room as soon as possible, so I unpacked in a rush, tossing my journal and stories, my shorts and T-shirts and other stuff into the empty drawers. Mom had insisted that I bring two dresses, so I hung them in a tiny makeshift closet I found in the bathroom and threw open the door of my bedroom.

I stopped with my hand on the doorknob, the cold brass key touching my fingertips, and for a moment I stared at it, a peculiar chill shivering around the back of my neck. While I was inside the room, with the door closed, anyone could have turned that key and locked me in.

Stop that!
I told myself.
It’s not just a key. It’s an ornament … maybe an interior decorator’s attempt to try to carry out a theme in this yucky castle. Big deal. Nobody locks doors inside a house.

But it didn’t matter what I’d told myself. How could I know what people did in Augustus Trevor’s house? I grasped the key and turned it in the lock, feeling it grind and grate until there came a deep and final click, then
shoved the key into the hip pocket of my jeans and took off down the winding stairs. I had to talk to someone—anyone. I needed to hear a human voice.

Unfortunately, that “someone, anyone” didn’t include my parents.

You know how awful it is when you tell your mom and dad you have to do something, and they tell you all the reasons you shouldn’t, and you say they’re wrong, only they turn out to be right.

“Take it easy, Sam,” Dad had told me when I insisted how important it was for me to visit Aunt Thea and meet Augustus Trevor. “You’ve always been like this—the minute you get an idea you want to rush right into it. Slow down and think this out. If you want to be a writer you can be one. You don’t have to depend on Augustus Trevor’s help.”

“Thea has never invited us to her home,” Mom pointed out, and I thought I could detect a slight trace of bitterness as she added, “I wouldn’t doubt that her celebrity husband has been responsible for that.”

Aunt Thea had visited our family a few times, and we’d enjoyed her visits. She went shopping with me for a Finally hot jacket, took me to the best beauty shop in town for a terrific new haircut, and taught me how to play cribbage. But Augustus had never come with her, and we’d never been invited to visit them. If it was Augustus Trevor’s fault, I honestly didn’t blame him. If you could have lunch with the Duke and Duchess of Kent and dinner with Robert Redford, why would you want to hang around with the Burns family of Elko, Nevada?

“Augustus Trevor is one of the world’s greatest writers.
He has to place a high priority on his privacy,” I said, and winced at how stuffy I’d just sounded.

“Which is all the more reason that it wouldn’t be polite to invite yourself,” Mom had insisted.

“Don’t you see?” I pleaded. “Ever since I decided that someday I’m going to be a writer, I’ve wanted to meet Augustus Trevor. If I’m in his home for a visit I can get his advice. He’ll let me know if I really have writing talent or just think I do. Whatever he tells me can influence my entire career.”

“As I remember, you sent Trevor one of your stories a couple of years ago,” Dad said, “and he didn’t bother to write to you about it or even return it.”

“But this time I’d be there in person! Don’t you see what a difference that would make?”

Dad gave me one of those looks, and I realized I was overdoing it, but Mom and Dad just didn’t understand how much it would mean to me to be guided by Augustus Trevor.

Mom sighed and said, “I suppose you could call Thea and ask if she’d want you to come for a visit. If it wouldn’t be convenient, I’m sure she’d be honest enough to say so.”

I made the call and started to talk to Aunt Thea about all sort of polite nothing stuff, but I couldn’t stand waiting to ask my question and get the answer, so I blurted out, “Aunt Thea, could I come and visit you for two weeks?”

For a few seconds there was only silence. My face grew hot, and my hands began to sweat, but finally Thea said, “Of course you can visit us, Samantha. I’d love to have you as a guest.”

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” I shouted, and
Mom took the phone away from me to chat with Thea and talk about travel arrangements.

Three weeks later Aunt Thea met me at the Los Angeles airport, and we took a taxi to the harbor. We were ushered aboard Augustus Trevor’s launch by a couple of crew members and were soon on our way to Catalina Island. His own launch! Wow!

I said something about being eager to see Avalon and the beach, but Thea looked surprised. “Oh, Samantha, I’m sorry,” she said. “Our home is on the opposite side of the island, past the Isthmus, and rather remote from the Avalon area, I’m afraid.”

“That’s all right,” I said. “I don’t mind hiking it.”

She shook her head softly. Everything about Thea was soft, from her pale gray-blond hair, through her light un-tanned skin, to her eyes that looked like reflections of the washed-out blue of the sky. “We’re not connected to the road that runs through the island,” she said. “Our only transportation is by boat.” Thea gently brushed back a strand of hair that had blown across my eyes and smiled. “Don’t look so disappointed, Samantha. We’ll see that you get a glimpse of Avalon. We’ll take you there in the launch.”

Just getting a glimpse of Avalon wasn’t quite the same as lying on the beach in my new blue bikini, hoping the lifeguard would notice it was the exact same shade of blue as my eyes. My best friend, Darlene Barkholter, spent two weeks on Santa Catalina Island a year ago, and I heard plenty about the lifeguards at Avalon, who were real hunks. I can’t say I hadn’t given the lifeguards some thought.

Darlene and I have always been interested in the same
things, from the time we met in third grade. We shared a tree house, wrote countless letters to each other in code all the way through fifth grade, and joined the same clubs in junior high and high school; so I would have shared Darlene’s appreciation of the Avalon lifeguards. However, I reminded myself that the reason for my trip wasn’t to enjoy watching lifeguards. I had a much more important, literary purpose, so I assured Thea that I didn’t mind missing Avalon at all.

She began telling me about something called the Santa Catalina Island Conservancy, which was a foundation formed to preserve the natural resources of the island, and how someday Augustus’s 1920s island house would belong to the foundation, but I’m afraid I didn’t pay much attention. I relaxed and looked out at the deep blue water and the sky in which clumps of clouds were beginning to gather, their edges darkening like watercolors that had run together. I let the ocean spray sting my face, and I thought about how someday I’d love to have an island home and a boat just like this one. Maybe, someday after
I
became a famous writer.

Catalina is just twenty miles off the coast of California, so it didn’t take us long to arrive. We swung north, went around the far tip of the island, and docked behind a motorboat at a short, covered pier in a small, narrow cove. One of the crew from the launch carried my suitcase and backpack up a steep, winding stairway to the house, while Thea and I followed.

What a house! It was so weird that I wondered for just an instant if I’d wandered onto the set of a Halloween horror movie. Spread out, with corridors rambling in all directions, this ugly stone castle sat alone on a scrubby hill
covered with a thick tangle of sage and short golden-brown grasses under wind-twisted oak trees. Beyond were higher hills, blurred purple-blue with mists, and from where we stood we had a picture-postcard view of the sea.

Thea had led me to a large bedroom and said she’d leave me to unpack. I guess I should have stayed there and waited for her, but the moment she had left I went downstairs in search of the man I was so eager to meet, the famous author Augustus Trevor.

That had been a big mistake.

Now, as I walked down the staircase to the landing, my footsteps muffled by the thick carpet, I took my time, listening intently for the sound of another human being; but the house was silent. For the first time I paid attention to my surroundings. From my vantage point on the landing I could look down on the immense entry hall and get a good view of part of the living room as well, and I was amazed to see that the house was cluttered with museum-like stuff. Besides all the heavily framed paintings on the walls, there were wood carvings of animals and people, all kinds of big and little statues (some of them pretty weird), glazed pottery bowls, china plates, and even a crystal bear which sat on a table near a window. Souvenirs from their travels? Gifts from royalty?

As I turned away from the railing my attention was caught by a pedestal which was tucked into the deep angle of the landing. A burnished gold vase with a rounded lid stood on the pedestal, and I stepped closer to examine it. The vase was close to two feet high and about ten inches in diameter, with a wide base. It was graceful and
curved and heavily ornamented with designs and markings that looked like scrunched-up little faces.

I reached out my hand to touch the lid, but someone spoke close to my ear, startling me. I jumped and the vase wobbled, but I caught it in time.

“Are you looking for something, miss?”

I turned to see a tall man dressed in dark pants and a white jacket. He was staring down at me with a bland, noncommittal expression, and I’d seen enough British-made television programs on PBS to recognize immediately that he must be a butler.

“I’m Sam,” I said. “Samantha Burns. Thea Trevor’s niece. I was just looking at this vase.”

“That is not a vase, Miss Burns,” he said. “It is a burial urn.”

“Oops.” I took a step away from it. “You mean somebody’s in there?”

“Not to my knowledge,” he said. “Considering that the urn dates back quite a few centuries and has undoubtedly traveled through many hands, I would assume that by this time it is empty.”

That was not a pleasant thought. Somebody thought his ashes would be tucked away in the urn forever, and what happened? Someone carrying the urn tripped? Opened it in a windstorm? Dropped it through an open carriage door? Gross! If my ashes had been lost so carelessly, I’d be angry enough to come back and haunt my urn.

I took another uneasy step away from it. “Mr. uh—uh—”

“My name is Walter,” he said.

“Walter, that urn isn’t haunted, is it?” I asked.

“I believe there is some sort of legend to that effect,”
Walter answered, “but you will have to ask Mr. Trevor about it. I do not believe in ghosts.” He became more businesslike as he added, “Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Yes,” I said as I shot another uneasy glance toward the urn. “Can you tell me where my aunt is?”

He gave a slight nod and answered, “I’ll take you to Mrs. Trevor. She is in the sun-room.”

There was a sun-room in this house? Great! Did that mean a hot tub? An indoor pool? Things were beginning to look up. I trotted down the stairs after the butler and followed him across the entry hall toward the back of the house.

The sun-room was formal and just as overdecorated as the rest of the house, but it did have large windows framed by sheer curtains and heavy drapes. The windows overlooked an uneven landscape of grasses, low shrubbery, and wind-twisted oaks which led steeply down to the sea. Aunt Thea was seated in a heavy wicker chair, her back to the window. Clouds had dimmed the sun, but there was enough brightness left to outline Aunt Thea with an aura of pale green light.

As I came in she looked up and placed a delicate china teacup on the silver tray which rested on the low table in front of her. “Samantha dear,” she said, “I’m sorry that you met Augustus so abruptly, without warning. He can be a little frightening, if you aren’t used to him.”

“It was my fault,” I told her. “I couldn’t wait. That is, I mean, he’s so famous, and he’s such a great writer, and I know you would have made the introduction easier.” I shrugged and added, “Dad keeps telling me I jump into things without stopping to think.”