Free The Trespassers by Zilpha Keatley Snyder Page B

little strange and eerie. Or frightening. Something that might have frightened people—like Grub had said.
    But then Greta went on. “There were rumors though.”
    “What kind of rumors?” Neely asked quickly.
    “Oh, don’t know if I can say for sure. It was so long ago. Something about how they didn’t call Doc Roberts or anybody from around Monterey. Just called in some relative, and some folks said he wasn’t even a proper doctor.”
    Greta Peale stopped to think, settling her glasses more firmly on her nose and pushing back a wisp of white hair. Then she nodded again and said, “Something strange about the whole thing. Caused a bit of gossip as I recall.”
    “Gossip?” Neely prompted eagerly.
    Too eagerly maybe, because Greta looked at her with a questioning smile. “What an inquisitive child you are,” she said, and then turning to Dad, “It’s her coast blood, no doubt. We always were a nosy bunch out here, weren’t we? Guess it’s because there wouldn’t have been much else to talk about way out here at the edge of the earth, if we hadn’t gossiped about each other.”
    Dad laughed, but then he got up and said he had to get back to his books. “Come along, Neely,” he said, “before you wear Greta out with your questions.”
    Neely followed reluctantly. Reluctant, but thrilled too. She couldn’t wait to get home and tell Grub that the unfinished sampler, and everything in the old trunk, had belonged to a little girl named Monica.

Chapter 20
    O F COURSE THEY WENT BACK TO HALCYON HOUSE AFTER they’d discovered the nursery, the temptation was just too great. Even imagining being caught by Reuben and being dragged off to the police station wasn’t enough to make Neely renew her promise never to do it again—not promise and actually mean it anyway. And as Grub said, “After all that work we can’t just let it get dusty again. Can we, Neely?”
    “I guess we can’t,” Neely told him. “It just wouldn’t be right.”
    So they kept on going to Halcyon House. For the next two weeks they managed to visit the nursery on Monday mornings and Saturday afternoons, but only for a couple of hours so Mom wouldn’t get suspicious. But in July everything changed. The change was because Sam and Betty Martin went to Massachusetts to be with Betty’s mother who was very sick, so Mom and Dad had to take over as full-time managers at the motel.
    For a while it looked like it was going to be every day at the motel for Grub and Neely too. And it might have been except that Neely did some fancy talking and persuaded Mom that she and Grub were old enough to stay home alone, at least now and then. “Not every day,” she argued. “Just now and then. So Grub won’t get so bored sitting around in that old motel office.”
    “Well, Grub doesn’t have to sit in the office all day,” Mom said. “Most boys his age would love to have a chance to spend some time in town. He could get out and see people like you do.”
    Sure he could, Neely thought, but he won’t. Just because Mom thought that Grub ought to act more like other kids his age didn’t mean that he would—or could. And his mom ought to know it. But Neely didn’t say that. Instead she just kept on arguing that every day was too much time to spend in town, for her as well as for Grub. So Mom finally agreed to the two of them staying home alone “now and then.” And of course the “now and then” turned out to be on Mondays and Saturdays.
    So July was theirs. On the other days of the week they went into Carmel with Mom and Dad, but every Monday and Saturday they went to the grove early, taking along bag lunches. They hid in the fern patch until they saw Reuben go by and then ran all the way to the house, with Lion running joyfully beside them—to then sit and watch mournfully as they climbed to the veranda roof and disappeared from view. Once inside the house they hurried to the library for the key and then went directly to the nursery, to spend