Out of Tune

by Norah McClintock

  “Thanks for nothing!” she said to Ashleigh. She started to go after Brendan, but he came out again before she reached the door. He was carrying Zak, who had wrapped his arms and legs around him. He was still crying.

  “I want Alicia,” he said over and over again.

  “Hey, buddy,” Brendan said softly. “We talked about that, remember?”

  “I miss her.”

  “So do I,” Brendan said. “So do I.”

  He walked past Tina without so much as glancing at her. He was too busy comforting Zak. Ashleigh snickered. Tina glared at her before hurrying after Brendan.

  “Looks like Tina has a thing for Brendan,” I said.

  “Who doesn’t?”

  It made me wonder.

  “Okay, so Alicia quit the Reading Buddies program and arranged for a replacement on Tuesday, the day before she disappeared. According to everyone who would know, she didn’t come here after school the next day, and she didn’t go home. So where did she go?”

  “She must have gone to the woods,” Ashleigh said.

  “But why?”

  Ashleigh had no answer.

  We parted company. Ashleigh went home. I went over to Carrie’s.

  SIX

  Carrie answered the door before I knocked and showed me through to the back porch. “None of the nosy neighbors can see us here,” she said. “Did you find out anything?”

  “The cops were at school today. They found a note you wrote. Haven’t they talked to you about it yet?”

  “What note?”

  “I didn’t see it, but the rumor is that someone found a note threatening to kill Alicia. It was written the day before Alicia died, and it was signed with a big C.”

  The color drained from her face.

  “Did you write it, Carrie?”

  “Where did they find it?”

  “In the music room.”

  She slumped lower in her chair. “Oh my god.”

  “Apparently they sent it to a handwriting expert to see if it matches your handwriting.”

  “I’m dead.” Carrie’s voice was dull, flat, hopeless. “They’re going to arrest me for sure.”

  “So it’s true? You really wrote it?”

  Her eyes met mine. “I wrote it, but I didn’t mean it literally. I was just mad. It was right after Mr. Todd announced that Alicia got the first violin position, not me. But I didn’t mean I was really going to kill her. People say stuff like that all the time. It never means anything.”

  “Unless the person ends up dead,” I said. “Then people think it means a lot.”

  She moaned.

  “Did you pass the note to anyone?”

  “Tina.”

  “I asked Tina about the note. She says she never saw it.”

  Carrie’s smile was barely perceptible. “She was just trying to protect me. But yeah, I wrote the note, and I passed it to Tina. She didn’t like Alicia either.”

  “But she read it.”

  Carrie nodded.

  “What did she do with it after that?”

  “I don’t know. I thought she’d thrown it out.”

  “Thrown it out where?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “The note was found inside some sheet music. How do you think it ended up there?”

  “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask Tina what she did with it.” She shook her head. “Do you think they really believe I meant what I wrote?”

  “They might. Why did you put the date on it, and the dagger?”

  “It was how I was feeling.” She shrugged. “You have to tell them to talk to Tina. She’ll tell them it’s no big deal. We were always trashing Alicia. People are always trashing other people. You know what it’s like at school.”

  I did. But this was different. This time someone had been murdered.

  “I tried to get my parents to give me back my cell phone or at least let Tina or Desiree call the house. But they won’t. Because it’s something I want, they won’t do it.”

  “I’ll talk to Tina. But you have to level with me, Carrie. Is there anything else the police are going to find that you haven’t told me about?”

  “No, I swear. Riley, you have to believe me. I didn’t kill Alicia. I was home all night. I wish I had someone to back me up, but I don’t. I didn’t know I was going to have to prove where I was. Nobody expects that.”

  I said it was okay. Then I asked her to tell me everything she could about the note.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Just what I said. Everything.”

  She drew in a deep breath. “We were in music class. The announcement about the youth orchestra had been made the night before, and Mr. Todd launched into this speech about how proud he was of Alicia for winning the spot, even though everyone knows how hard he promoted her and how much he favored her. He went on and on about how Alicia was a natural talent, but that she didn’t try to coast on that, she practiced all the time, she put her music first, she realized that was the only way to get ahead. He looked at me when he said it, like he thought I don’t practice enough. But I do. I put in a couple of hours every night.”

  That surprised me. Sure, I knew she was in the regional youth orchestra. I knew she’d had to try out to get in, so that meant she had to be pretty good. But the way she cruised around school with her buddies, sniping at girls she didn’t think were cool enough—well, that just didn’t compute with someone who cared more about her music than anything else.

  “It made me angry. So I wrote that note to Tina. If I’d known the police were going to use it against me in a murder case, I never would have written it. But I didn’t know because I had no intention of killing anyone. I was just venting. I was angry, that’s all.”

  “But you said it was Mr. Todd who influenced whoever made the decision. Why weren’t you angry at him instead?”

  “Because Alicia did everything she could to suck up to him. She took lessons from him. She wormed her way into his family.”

  “His family?”

  “Simon. You probably don’t know him.”

  “I know who he is.”

  “He’s all about his music. His life ambition is to be a concert pianist, and the word is that he has the talent and the contacts to make it. Alicia knew it. That’s why she hung out with him so much. She’s the only person in school who can stomach him—at least, that’s what she wanted everyone to think. If you ask me, she only got close to him to get Mr. Todd’s attention. Simon used to invite her over for dinner all the time. They were best buddies. What chance does that give someone like me? Simon looked down at everyone else in school, especially anyone in the school orchestra. He was slightly nicer to me when I made it into the regional youth orchestra, but only slightly. He used to sit in on rehearsals sometimes. The conductor knew Simon and his uncle really well. Simon never missed a chance to point out any errors I made. Even when I didn’t make any mistakes, he made sure to tell me that my playing was mediocre. He actually said that. Mediocre. Whereas Alicia…” She shook her head angrily.

  “I don’t know how that note ended up inside that sheet music,” she continued. “Maybe Tina dropped it by accident. Or maybe she slid it under her music when Mr. Todd came around. He was always wandering around, looking at what we were doing. She must have forgotten about it. God, I wish I’d never written it. You have to believe me, Riley. For sure no one else will—not now.”

  I promised to keep on trying to find out what really happened. I even believed her—she seemed too anguished to be lying to me. But, like her, I wished she’d never written that note. It was going to make things a lot harder for her—and for me.

  SEVEN

  The reminder announcement came over the school PA system the next morning: A memorial service was going to be held for Alicia that evening. Those who knew her were urged to attend.

  “I have to go,” Ashleigh said at my locker at lunch. “I don’t suppose you want to come with me?”

  “Sure,” I said. I had planned t
o attend anyway. I pulled a hoodie out of my locker.

  “What do you need that for?” Ashleigh asked. “Aren’t we going to the cafeteria?”

  I had also decided to check out the woods where Alicia’s body had been found. The police had already been over the area with a fine-tooth comb and collected whatever evidence there was. What drew me there were the woods themselves. We had been fairly deep into them when Charlie found Alicia, yet no one had thought to look for her there in the first place. Clearly it wasn’t somewhere she had been known to frequent, or someone would have pointed that out earlier and looked for her there sooner. It had taken a random sighting by a passing truck driver to alert her parents and the police to this possibility. So what had she been doing there in the first place? Where had she been going?

  I told Ashleigh where I was going. “You want to come with me?”

  She was shaking her head before I even finished. “No way. There’s creepy stuff in there.”

  “Creepy stuff?” I hadn’t considered that. “Like bears?”

  “Not lately,” she admitted. “But it has happened. Trust me, Riley. There are things in there that are scary. And big. And I don’t like being places where I can’t tell if something is lurking out of sight, ready to attack me.”

  I stared incredulously at her. “But you’re a country girl.”

  “Not by choice, believe me. And if you’re smart, you’ll stay out of there too. A person could get lost.”

  “I have a compass.” I always have a compass with me. It’s attached to my key chain, and I know how to use it because Grandpa Jimmy drilled it into my head when I was a little kid. You can’t get anywhere if you don’t know which direction to go, he always said.

  Ashleigh held up a hand. “I pass. I’m sorry. I get claustrophobic in all those trees.”

  “It’s creepy and scary and you’re going to let me go on my own?”

  “Why don’t you ask Charlie to go with you? He’s all gung ho about her. He’s had a crush on her since first grade.” The bitterness in her voice surprised me.

  “He was in one of the kindergarten skits with her, wasn’t he?”

  “Yeah, the little weasel. And he knew I didn’t have a part. Anyway, he’d love to be the white knight who helps solve Alicia’s murder. Why don’t you ask him to go with you?”

  “Because you’re my best friend.” I wasn’t trying to flatter her. The words just popped out.

  Ashleigh grinned. “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. So please come with me.”

  Ashleigh’s eyes narrowed. “With great friendship comes great responsibility, is that it?” She pondered the words. “Maybe I’m not ready to be anyone’s best friend.”

  “Please?” I did my best sad-puppy eyes.

  “Why do I have the feeling I’m going to regret this?” Ashleigh said. That’s when I knew I’d won.

  We speed-walked to the woods and, after a compass check, plunged in where we had started on Sunday morning. I was sure I would remember everything and that I would have no problem locating the place where Charlie had found Alicia. In actual fact, it took a lot longer than I’d expected to find the spot, and I recognized it only because of the crime-scene tape, which had come loose in a couple of places and fluttered listlessly in the gentle breeze.

  “Now what?” Ashleigh said.

  I stood in one spot and turned a slow, full circle. “Where was she going?”

  “Or coming from,” Ashleigh added. “There’s not much around here.”

  From where Alicia had been found, I searched the ground for any clue as to what direction she had come from. Ashleigh was almost out of sight before I found it—another path.

  “This way!” I called.

  Ashleigh joined me, and we followed the path until it ended in a massive rock outcropping. I stopped, discouraged. Alicia could have come from any direction to get here. Ashleigh stumbled to a stop behind me.

  “If we’re going to get back to school before the late bell, we’d better go now,” she said.

  We’d barely had a chance to look around, but I knew she was right. Reluctantly I turned to go back in the same direction we’d come from. A frantic rustling somewhere nearby froze me. I glanced at Ashleigh, who was standing perfectly still, her eyes the size of dinner plates. She mouthed one word—bear—and took a step backward with her arms straight out in front of her as if she were bracing to repel an attack.

  I stayed where I was and listened. The rustling stopped for a few seconds and then started again.

  “Sounds like a small animal,” I said.

  “Probably a baby bear. You don’t want to get between it and its mama, trust me. Let’s get out of here.”

  She was probably right. I didn’t know anything about this place. I nodded reluctantly and started to turn away. That’s when I saw it.

  Not a bear.

  A rabbit.

  A rabbit in a snare that cut deep into one of its rear legs. The poor thing was thrashing around, desperately trying to shake off the wire but succeeding only in tightening it even more.

  I picked my way toward it, poking and prodding the ground in front of me with a thick piece of windfall in case other snares or traps lay hidden under fall’s debris.

  “What are you doing?” Ashleigh’s voice was tinged with fright. “We should go.”

  “It’s got its leg caught in a snare. Is that even legal around here?”

  Ashleigh didn’t know. Nor did she seem to want to know.

  “We should help it,” I said.

  I tiptoed toward the scared rabbit, but my presence only seemed to panic it even more. I crouched down to make myself less threatening and talked softly to it. It didn’t do any good. I crept the last few feet, knelt beside the rabbit and reached to grab it in both hands. I thought if I could calm it down and stop it from pulling the snare any tighter, I might be able to free it. I still think I could have done that if Ashleigh hadn’t screamed.

  “It’s just a bunny, Ash,” I said, glancing over my shoulder.

  I froze again. Ashleigh’s hands were straight up in the air over her head, and she was staring at the same thing I was—the rifle pointed directly at us.

  “Finally caught you!” said the man holding the rifle. I recognized him from the day of the search. He was wearing dirty denim overalls, a plaid flannel shirt, an old hunting hat with its flaps sticking up and away from the ears, and heavy boots. He glowered at us from a heavily bearded face.

  “I—I didn’t do anything.” And, yes, I put my hands up too. “I was going to let this rabbit go.”

  “Uh-huh.” He gestured with the rifle. “Stand up. Slow now.”

  I stood and backed away from the still-struggling rabbit.

  “I’ve seen you before,” I said, hands above my head. “You joined the search party to look for Alicia Allen last Sunday. Your name is Rafe.”

  “Rafe MacAusland,” he said with a curt nod. “You?”

  “Riley. And this is Ashleigh.”

  Ashleigh moaned when I said her name.

  He kept his rifle steady on me for another few moments and then slowly lowered it and approached the trapped rabbit. He knelt beside the trap and engulfed the poor creature with one of his massive hands. With the other he released the rabbit’s rear leg from the snare. The wire had cut through the skin almost to the bone.

  “The little critter is going to need some TLC before he goes his own way again.” He tucked the rabbit into a leather bag that hung from one shoulder. The bag jerked once or twice before the rabbit settled down. At least, I hope it settled down.

  Tentatively I lowered my hands. Ashleigh kept hers high. Her eyes were glued to the man with the rifle.

  “Are you a ranger or a game warden or something like that?” I asked.

  The man snorted. “These woods are my front yard and backyard,” he said, “and I take it personal when anyone hunts or traps here illegally. I seem to be the only person who does. The so-called police sure don’t do much.” He spat on the g
round.

  “Did you know Alicia Allen, the girl who died?” I asked him.

  “No.”

  “But you joined the search party.”

  “I don’t know that rabbit either,” he said. “But I still care what happens to it.”

  “Did you ever see her here in the woods?”

  His eyes narrowed. “You sound like the cops. I don’t like cops. Useless. Never do a damned thing when I tell them what’s going on in here.”

  “I bet you know these woods pretty well,” I said.

  “You bet right.”

  “Do you ever see people in here?”

  “Sure. All kinds of people. There’s a nature trail that runs through here, marked with blazes. Different times of the year, people do that walk.”

  I doubted that Alicia had come to the woods that day for a nature walk.

  “Is there anything else around here? Any reason people would maybe cut through the woods on their way to somewhere else?”

  He snorted. “You’re new around here, aren’t you?”

  I nodded.

  “Kids fool around in here all the time. I know. I’ve seen them. Then there’s people who do things like that.” He nodded at the snare that had ambushed the rabbit. “The Pines is that way.” He jerked his head back over his shoulder. “Get a lot of kids from there exploring these woods every summer, most of them city kids who don’t know their asses from their elbows when it comes to being in nature.” He shook his head in disgust. “There’s at least one lost kid every year, and none of them has the sense to stay put. They all wander around and make it that much harder to find them. I blame the parents for that. The Trading Post is off that way.” He jerked his head in another direction. “You go that way”—another jerk of the head—“and you get to Broom’s Corners. And off in that direction, you’ll eventually get to the farms out on Route 20.”

  None of these seemed to be likely destinations for Alicia. So what had she been doing out here, especially so close to dusk?

  “Can we go now?” Ashleigh asked in a tiny, frightened voice. Her hands were still up over her head. “We’re going to be late for school no matter what.”

  There didn’t seem to be much reason to stay. I had to ask Rafe to point me in the right direction to get back. Ashleigh was not impressed. She stalked silently beside me all the way back to school and remained silent when we reported to the office for late slips. When we were about to step into math class, she said, “You owe me.”