Free Houses of Stone by KATHY Page A

it. Not that he had much choice; as he candidly admitted, he had no idea that mess of papers was worth money. But behind his rueful, charming admission of fallibility, I sensed a certain smugness. He's got something else he wants to sell. Family documents? Maybe even the house itself. And now he knows it's worth money, at least to you. I'll bet used-car dealers love you."
    "I'm not that gullible," Karen protested.
    "Your appearance is against you," Peggy said, studying her critically. "Leaving off the makeup and wearing tailored suits doesn't help. Instead of an older, professional woman, you look like a kid trying to look like an older professional woman."
    Karen scowled. "For your information, I handle used-car dealers just fine. I knew what he was doing. But when I started thinking about what he might have, I ... so, okay, I lost it." She leaned forward, her eyes shining. "More poems. A diary. Letters. Even the missing pages of the manuscript!"
    "The house has been cleared out," Peggy reminded her. "Simon already told you that."
    "Yes, but the sale hasn't been held yet. They're waiting till May—the height of the auction season."
    Peggy shook her head. "That sounds fishy to me."
    "You're just determined to throw cold water on everything," Karen said sulkily.
    "Somebody has to. You're flying high, honey. If you fall, the crash is going to hurt like hell. You have no proof that Ismene ever lived in that house. The manuscript could have been acquired at a sale."
    "There's only one way to find out."
    "That's not true. There are a lot of ways. But," Peggy admitted, "we'll have a look at the place. Weekend after this, maybe. Or the following week."
    Smiling, and outwardly calm, Karen nodded agreeably. It took all her willpower to keep that fixed smile in place, and to conquer the anger that knotted her stomach. She was sick and tired of being ordered around, treated like a child. Everybody did it. Simon, Peggy, her parents, her friends, her ex-husband.
    Especially her ex-husband. Her decision to leave Norman had stunned her acquaintances. "But he adores you," one of them had said in obvious bewilderment. "He takes such good care of you."
    His Baby.
    Karen left town at ten o'clock Friday evening, after meeting all her classes, keeping several student appointments, attending a faculty meeting, and turning down Joe Cropsey's invitation to have a drink with him. Shortly after midnight she checked into a motel outside Frederick. It would have been irresponsible to drive straight through. Unproductive, as well; she could hardly go prowling around the grounds of a strange house in the small hours of the morning.
    As she locked the door of the motel room and tossed her overnight bag onto the bed, a heady sense of escape filled her. No one knew where she was. No one could find her. There would be no knock at the door, no ringing of the telephone. This was the ultimate freedom—with no Grand Inquisitor lying in wait to drag her back to her cell.
    Her slippered feet sank deep into mud that squelched and clung. The wet, matted weeds in the center of the rutted track were slick as ice. Interlaced branches formed a canopy overhead, a dark, twisted fabric through which the rain forced passage, now in trickles, now in heavier streams. Her wet hair writhed like a living thing, coiling around her throat. She reached up to pull it away, and saw the house ahead, looming dark against a storm-gray sky.
    Karen stopped and rubbed her eyes. Her lashes were heavy with wet, but an overactive imagination, not impaired vision, must have produced those fleeting impressions. Her hair wasn't long; it was cut short, and plastered to her head by the rain that had soaked through her scarf. Her shoes were sensible brogues, not thin slippers. The skies were cloudy, but not menacingly dark; it was just past noontime.
    The house still looked forbidding. It was no typical Tidewater mansion, beautifully proportioned and painstakingly hand-crafted (by slave labor,