The vet frowned. “The horse hadn’t eaten anything?” he asked, his voice conveying his doubt.
It was Tracy who answered him. “It was Beth,” she said, her voice quivering with apparent fury. “Beth was feeding her oats this morning.”
Garvey’s frown deepened. “Oats?” he echoed. “How much?”
“A whole bucketful,” Tracy said. “They’re in that bag over there.” She pointed to the big feedsack that still sat against the wall beneath the hayloft, and Garvey walked quickly over, reached deep into the sack, and pulled out a handful. Holding the feed close to his nose, he sniffed deeply. Garvey frowned, then sniffed again.
“Well?” Phillip asked.
“Doesn’t smell right,” Garvey said. “I’ll take some of this back to my lab. In the meantime, don’t let any of the other horses anywhere near this stuff.”
There was a moment of silence as the import of his words sank in, and then suddenly Tracy’s voice, shrill and angry, sliced through the stable once more. “She poisoned her! She poisoned my horse!”
Beth gasped, and turned to look at Tracy, who was pointing at her accusingly. “I didn’t do anything—” she began, but Tracy cut her off.
“You killed her!” she screamed. “Just because you hate me, you killed my horse! She didn’t even want those oats! I saw you, and you were making her eat them. You were shoving them right into her mouth!” She lunged toward Beth, but her father grabbed her, holding her back.
“Tracy, nobody would try to kill Patches—”
“She did!” Tracy wailed. “She poisoned the oats, and then made her eat them.”
Beth stared at Tracy for a moment, and suddenly remembered the way Patches had snorted, and tried to pull away from the pail. It wasn’t until she’d taken the food in her own hand, and almost shoved it into the horse’s mouth, that the animal had finally eaten it. Bursting into tears, she wheeled around and fled from the barn.
As Phillip held his crying daughter close, he and Carolyn exchanged a long look. Finally, after what seemed an eternity of silent decision-making, he spoke.
“I’ll call Alan,” he said quietly. “I guess maybe it’s time we did something.”
As he spoke the words, he thought for a moment that he felt Tracy relax against his body, and her sobbing seemed to ease.
Tracy Sturgess emerged from the swimming pool at the Westover Country Club, grabbed a towel, and flopped down on the lawn, shaking the water out of her hair. She’d been at the club for an hour, and even though no one had told her, she was almost sure she knew why her father had suddenly suggested—even insisted—that she come here this afternoon.
They were going to move Beth out of the house while she was gone.
And almost as good as that was the fact that her father had promised her a new horse, and even given in when she’d demanded an Arabian just like Thunder. She’d had to cry, of course, and act as though losing Patches was the worst thing that had ever happened to her, but that was easy. She’d always been good at things like that.
Now she propped her head up on one arm, and grinned at Alison Babcock, who was her best friend this summer. “What’s everybody talking about?” she asked.
“Your grandmother,” Alison replied. She rolled her eyes toward Kip Braithwaite, who was sprawled on a towel next to her. “Kip thinks someone tried to kill her.”
Tracy’s eyes widened, and she turned to stare at Kip. “Why would anyone want to kill Grandmother?”
“Well, someone wanted to kill Jeff Bailey, and they did it, didn’t they?”
“Aw, jeez,” Brett Kilpatrick groaned. “Nobody killed Jeff. He tripped and fell on a pick.”
“That’s what you think,” Kip replied.
“Well, I ought to know,” Brett shot back. “I was there, wasn’t I?”
“But what did you see?” Kip taunted. “You were too chicken even to go downstairs.”
“But what about Grandmother?” Tracy demanded. “How come you think someone tried to kill her?”
Kip shrugged. “Well, she had her heart attack right on the same spot where they killed Jeff, didn’t she?”