Wednesday's Child

by Leigh Michaels

  She had grown up in the building trade herself, after all, and she knew the joy of watching a building grow. How proud her father would have been that his company had a part in

  constructing such a piece of art. And she had no doubt that the building would be exactly that.

  She admired it from the street, wishing that she dared to walk up to the construction boss and ask for a hard hat and a tour. But Kyle would find out, and he would not like it. So she drove on by.

  As she had suspected, the caterer was wildly enthusiastic about the prospect of a garden party at Wheatlands, and he babbled on about liver pâté and watercress sandwiches and

  champagne until Layne’s head was aching. The florist was equally excited, and it took a while to convince him that she wanted only daisies for the garden party. He finally gave in, with a wave of his hand. “If that is what Madam wants,” he said, with a total lack of enthusiasm.

  “It is exactly what Madam wants,” Layne assured him. “Now for the house itself, for the dinner party...”

  He was instantly alight with charm. “For Madam, red roses,” he interrupted, and Layne

  started to think seriously of choosing another florist.

  Errands done, she turned the little station wagon towards Wheatlands. She wondered if the tree house was completed. Robbie had been pestering for the last ten days, but Kyle had made him plan and sketch and draw blueprints. It was good experience for Robbie, Layne knew, even if it did wear his patience thin.

  And Kyle was good with the child. Robbie adored him, and Layne’s one big fear, that Kyle would not discipline his son, was proving unfounded. In fact, instead of becoming the little brat that Layne had feared he would, Robbie was thriving on Kyle’s attention. And if Layne felt a little left out and unnecessary now and then — well, that was to be expected, wasn’t it? She had to keep reminding herself that in five more weeks she wouldn’t be there at all, for Robbie to depend on.

  She parked the station wagon next to Kyle’s Mercedes and looked down across the lawn to the big tree. There was no activity, and from this distance, it looked as if little had changed since she had left hours before. Perhaps the construction was going slower than planned. Or perhaps the chief worker had gone on strike and demanded a lemonade and cookie break, Layne

  speculated.

  Stephen’s car was drawn up next to the back entrance, motor running. As Layne crossed

  the courtyard, the young male nurse brought the wheelchair down the ramp.

  “Going for an outing?” Layne asked as she opened the car door.

  Stephen didn’t answer till, with David’s help, he had painfully transferred himself from chair to car. Then he looked up at Layne with a smile. “Some outing. I get to visit my doctor.

  And if I’m very, very good, David promised me an ice cream cone.”

  Layne patted his cheek. “Sarcasm does not suit you, Stephen.”

  They drove off and Layne entered the house, trying not to worry about Stephen. He’d been in severe pain the last few days, she knew, though he seldom said anything about it. But if it was bad enough that he was willing to see his doctor, it must be even worse than she had suspected.

  The kitchen was cool and quiet, only the hum of the two large refrigerators interrupting the silence. The cook was at the sink, snapping fresh green beans. She looked up as Layne came in.

  She didn’t say a word, but her eyes were frosty, as though questioning why this intruder was in her kitchen.

  And intruder was what Layne felt like, too. She supposed it was natural that Mrs. Andrews resented her; for years her kitchen had been her own and no one had interfered in her orders.

  Now this upstart of a young woman was asking questions about her suppliers and wanting to look at the menus.

  What was it about Mrs. Andrews that bothered her? The food was good; the woman

  definitely had talent. But she was rigid and unwilling to bend. Perhaps that was all it was. Robbie certainly didn’t like her, but then Robbie was used to rummaging through the refrigerator whenever he wanted a snack. Layne couldn’t blame Mrs. Andrews for not approving of that.

  And then of course there was her suspicion that Mrs. Andrews was getting kickbacks from the grocers. But Layne pushed that to the back of her mind. It was only suspicion, and she had no power to demand the receipts. That was Kyle’s business, and Kyle could not have cared less.

  “I’d like you to suggest a dinner menu for the evening that Governor Howard will be here,”

  she said. “There will be eighteen for dinner.”

  Mrs. Andrews’ fingers didn’t pause, and for a few moments Layne wondered if the woman

  had even heard. Then she looked up from the green beans again. “Whatever Madam wants,” she murmured with faint insolence. “And Mrs. Emerson? Please tell your little boy that my kitchen is not a restaurant. I am not a short-order cook, and I do not make fresh lemonade and chocolate cookies just because he expresses a desire for a snack.”

  Layne counted to ten. “Since this house now contains a small boy, Mrs. Andrews, I suggest that keeping the cookie jar full is a new part of your duties. If you don’t wish to assume it, then give Robbie an apron. He is quite capable of making his own.”

  Someday, she thought as she left the kitchen, I am going to lose my temper with that woman. And then Kyle will probably be furious.

  The doorbell pealed just then, and the little blue-uniformed maid came running past her to answer it.

  Layne arrived in the front hall at the same instant as Kyle and Robbie came down the stairs.

  Kyle was dressed in navy trousers and a light blue shirt, his jacket draped over one arm, and he was carrying a tooled-leather briefcase. He looked upset and angry, and when he saw her waiting at the foot of the steps his eyes narrowed even more.

  Layne glanced at her watch and breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn’t late; they had plenty of time to get to the airport. So it must be something else he was angry about. And the fact that she was wearing her blue sun dress again wouldn’t help at all.

  Robbie was trailing his father down the stairs, and as Layne watched he suddenly raised a fist and rubbed tears out of his eyes. Her heart melted. Poor little guy, she thought. His dad is leaving him, and he’s scared.

  At the front door, the maid said, “But, sir, if you’ll wait here, I’ll tell Mrs. Emerson you want to see her...”

  “I’ll tell her myself.” It was an impatient voice with a guttural accent.

  “Mr. Hamburg,” Layne murmured, as the little man appeared from the foyer. “Just what we needed to improve Kyle’s mood.”

  Mr. Hamburg shook a finger as he crossed the hallway to the foot of the steps. “Young

  lady, I don’t know what you think I’m paying you for, but it seems to me I’d be better off to mail my handwritten copy than to wait any longer for you to finish that typing. Now that you’ve moved into a fancy house it seems to me you just don’t care what kind of work you do. And you’re purposely trying to increase the number of pages so I have to pay you more.”

  Kyle reached the bottom step, and said, “What seems to be the problem?”

  “Would you just mind your own business, Kyle?” Layne turned her back on him. “What

  makes you think I’m cheating you, Mr. Hamburg?”

  He waved a sheaf of paper at her. “Just look at these pages! Look at the number of half-empty lines!”

  “That’s where you started new paragraphs, Mr. Hamburg,” Layne protested automatically.

  He ignored her. “And you still expect me to pay fifty cents a page for this kind of work?

  Well, I won’t do it!”

  Kyle reached for the typed sheets and flipped through them. Then he pushed them back

  into Mr. Hamburg’s hands. “I wouldn’t pay fifty cents a page for them, either,” he commented coolly.

  “Kyle! That price is more than fair, and you know it!”

  Kyle ignored her interruption. “I’d find myself another typis
t, Mr. Hamburg — one who

  understands how to work with a professional person like you. Now you just write Mrs. Emerson a check for what she’s already done...” He glanced enquiringly at Layne.

  She said faintly, “The balance right now is twenty dollars. But, Kyle...”

  “I’ll pay you ten. In cash,” Mr. Hamburg announced, and thrust a bill at Layne.

  “But...”

  “Take it, Layne.” It was an order, and Layne accepted the ten-dollar bill. She tried to argue, but everything was happening so quickly that she couldn’t get the words to come out.

  “And I certainly hope, Mr. Emerson, that you can keep her from cheating anyone else as she has me. She shouldn’t be in business!” The little man nodded his head briskly for emphasis.

  “I couldn’t agree with you more,” Kyle said grimly. “You have the entire manuscript,

  now?”

  “Oh, yes. I made sure of that before I came. She hasn’t got anything of mine left.”

  “Good,” Kyle told Mr. Hamburg, and steered him towards the door. “I’ll certainly try to keep her under control.”

  Layne thought about bursting into tears, but she was too angry. When Kyle came back into the hall, she said, “Twenty dollars was a fair price, Kyle.”

  “No, it wasn’t. Fifty cents a page to decipher his handwriting? You should have charged him five times that.” He pulled two bills from his wallet and crumpled them into her hand.

  “Here’s the rest of what he owes you.”

  “I won’t take money from you!”

  “It’s a bribe to get rid of him. And believe me, Layne, it’s cheap.”

  She wadded the bills up and threw them at him. She would have told him exactly what she thought of him, but Robbie was still there, sitting in a corner of the stairway with his chin propped in his hands. So she stormed up the steps instead.

  She was halfway up when she heard Robbie burst out suddenly, “We could at least go look for him, Dad.”

  “I don’t have time, Rob.” Kyle’s voice was firm.

  “You don’t even care that he’s gone!” Robbie accused.

  Layne started back down the stairs. “Who’s missing, Robbie?”

  Robbie met her halfway and flung his arms around her. “Beast ran away because he was mean to him.” There was a note of contempt in the childish voice.

  “Robert, that isn’t true,” Kyle countered. “You let the dog out of the kennel, and you didn’t keep a close enough eye on him.”

  “Beast ran away?” Layne pushed an unruly lock of hair back out of Robbie’s eyes. “How

  long has he been gone?”

  “Most of the afternoon,” Kyle told her. “Rob let him out while we were working on the tree house and forgot about him. The dog will come back when he’s ready.”

  “But he doesn’t know his way!” Robbie cried. “He’s been locked up in that kennel all the time, and he doesn’t know his way back. He never ran away at home.”

  Layne’s eyes were on Kyle, and she saw the fleeting pain that crossed his face at Robbie’s words. This morning, Wheatlands had been his home. It wasn’t going to be as easy to transplant the child as Kyle had hoped.

  But Layne felt no triumph.

  “And he won’t come back,” Robbie finished grimly. “Because he didn’t like it here. He

  hated the kennel.”

  She knelt beside him and wiped tears off his cheeks. “We’ll find him, Rob. Let’s go look.”

  Kyle glanced at his watch. “You seem to have forgotten that I have a plane to catch,

  Layne.”

  She stared at him. “So take your car. Or call a cab. Or hitchhike. I’m going to look for a dog. Come on, Robbie.” Neither of them looked back as they crossed the hall.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  They looked for hours, driving the winding streets of Mission Hills, stopping to talk to people on the pavements. Every time Layne braked the car beside a dog-walking neighbor, Robbie’s eyes filled with tears.

  Layne could have cheerfully ripped Kyle to shreds with her fingernails. How could he have been so callous? A missing dog was no small thing to an eight-year-old child, especially a child as sensitive as Robbie. Beast had been his companion and confidante for three years, since the day he had come home from kindergarten with the dog at his heels and said, “He followed me home, Mom. Can I keep him?”

  Until then Layne had always thought the line no more than a cartoon gag. But the little boy had looked at her with melting appeal in his earnest blue eyes, and the big dog had grinned at her, his tongue lolling and his beady eyes almost hidden by his hair, and she had found herself saying yes. It was a decision she hadn’t regretted, even in the days when grocery money was tight and Beast seemed to eat more than his share of it.

  Robbie pushed the hair out of his eyes and said, “He was mean to Beast. That’s why the dog ran away.”

  Layne caught herself and bit her lip. She’d been about to agree with Robbie, but what he had said wasn’t strictly true. It was an ideal opportunity to foster discontent between father and son. It would serve Kyle right.

  But she couldn’t do it. The same force that had made her, for all these years, be absolutely truthful to Robbie would not let her do this now. This was a way to take her revenge on Kyle for what he was doing to her — but Robbie would be the one to suffer most, if she helped destroy his faith in his father.

  “Robbie, it isn’t being mean to a dog to insist that he live outside — not a big dog like Beast. Your father might be wrong about him, but he wasn’t cruel.”

  Robbie’s eyes filled with tears again. Poor little guy, Layne thought. Right now he needs somebody to blame for it. Nevertheless, she was not going to let him blame Kyle.

  They were driving through one of Kansas City’s greenbelt parks, the long, narrow strips of parkland that brightened the city’s streets. Off to the side, behind a sculpture, Layne saw a flash of movement and slowed the car.

  Robbie saw it too. He sat up straight, peering out the window, then sat back with a sigh. “It isn’t him, Mom.”

  Layne didn’t question his judgment, but she did pull the little station wagon into the park and shut it off. “Robbie,” she said gently, “we’ve driven miles and miles and searched for hours.

  We haven’t seen Beast, but we might even have driven right by him.”

  “I would have seen him,” Robbie insisted.

  “I’m certain you think that, Rob. But the fact is, we could have missed him. We’ve hunted all over, but we just can’t cover every place.” She rumpled his hair and tried to pull his tense little body into a hug, but he resisted. “I think we should go home and call the animal pound, so that they know we’ve lost Beast. Then all the city’s dogcatchers will be looking for him.”

  “No!” Robbie cried. “I don’t want him to be in the pound!”

  “Robbie, there isn’t any way to keep him out of there.” Layne searched for a way to

  explain it to him.

  “I bet he went home.”

  “Rob, I doubt very much he went back to Wheatlands. He must be enjoying his freedom

  too much to walk straight back into the kennel.”

  “I don’t mean Wheatlands. I mean home. When you said we should go home, I thought that’s what Beast would do.”

  “Oh. The old house?”

  “Yes. He was happy there. Please, Mom?” His voice was a frantic plea.

  Layne glanced at her watch. They’d already missed dinner, so what difference did it make if they spent another half hour driving out to Clare’s? If it would make Robbie happy, it was worth it. “All right, Robbie. But if he isn’t there, then we go straight home — straight back to Wheatlands, I mean — and call the pound.”

  “All right,” he agreed. “I just know he’s there, Mom.”

  “You’re giving the mutt credit for a terrific sense of direction,” Layne murmured.

  “Don’t call him a mutt,” Robbie requested politely. “Gary always called him
that, and

  Beast didn’t like it. Gary didn’t like Beast either, but Clare did. She’ll take care of him for me.”

  Layne didn’t answer. She didn’t want to point to Robbie just how many intersections and freeways and heavily trafficked streets there would have been for Beast to cross. He might never find his beloved dog.

  But Robbie was convinced that he was right, and now that he felt it was just a matter of minutes till he had Beast back, he was happy again. He chattered as they drove along, breaking into song once. Layne didn’t have the heart to disillusion him. “This is a terrific car, isn’t it, Mom?” he asked. “A lot better than The Tank.”

  “Much.”

  “It was nice of Dad to buy it for you, wasn’t it? Maybe I can see Tony tonight.”

  “You could have seen Tony today when I came, if you hadn’t been more interested in the tree house. How is the tree house coming along, anyway?”

  “We didn’t get finished. We just built the platform and a ladder so we can get up and down till the stairs are done. But Dad promised we’d finish it this weekend. It’s going to be the world’s best tree house. Wait till it’s finished! Can I sleep out there?”

  “We’ll see, when it’s finished. And when the cast is off.”

  “Why does everything have to wait till the cast is off?”

  “Because it prevents you from getting around as you should, and it isn’t safe for you to be up a tree all night by yourself when you can’t move as fast as usual.”

  “I can climb up and down the ladder just fine,” Robbie pointed out reasonably.

  “The answer is still no, Rob.” Layne pulled the car into Clare’s drive, behind Gary’s. Oh, no, she thought. If there’s one thing I don’t need tonight, it’s Gary. “Go scout around the neighborhood, Robbie,” she suggested. “I’ll talk to Clare.”

  “So you can drink coffee,” Robbie suggested cheekily.

  “So I can see if Tony will come and help you,” Layne finished, pretending not to notice the interruption.

  Clare came around the house from the back yard. “Did you get my message?”