Winter Moon

would have a harder time finding him at night. She restrained herself from breaking into a run. "Now, last winter," Paul continued smoothly, unaware of her trepidation, "was on the dry side, which probably means we're going to take a shellacking this year."
        As they reached the stable and as Heather was about to cry out for Toby, he reappeared. He was no longer playing airplane. He sprinted to her side through the unmown grass, grinning and excited. "Mom, this place is neat, really neat.
        Maybe I can really have a pony, huh?"
        "Maybe," Heather said, swallowing hard before she could get the word out. "Don't go running off like that, okay?"
        "Why not?"
        "Just don't."
        "Sure, okay," Toby said. He was a good boy.
        She glanced back toward the caretaker's house and the wilderness beyond. Perched on the jagged peaks of the mountains, the sun seemed to quiver like a raw egg yolk just before dissolving around the tines of a prodding fork. The highest pinnacles of rock were gray and black and pink in the fiery light of day's end.
        Miles of serried forests shelved down to the fieldstone bungalow. All was still and peaceful. The stable was a single-story fieldstone building with a slate roof. The long side walls had no exterior stall doors, only small windows high under the eaves. There was a white barn door on the end, which rolled open easily when Paul tried it, and the electric lights came on with the first flip of a switch. "As you can see," the attorney said as he led them inside, "it was every inch a gentleman's ranch, not a spread that had to show a profit in any way."
        Beyond the concrete threshold, which was flush with the ground, the stable floor was composed of soft, tamped earth, as pale as sand. Five empty stalls with half-doors stood to each side of the wide center promenade, more spacious than ordinary barn stalls. On the twelve-inch wooden posts between stalls were castbronze sconces that threw amber light toward both the ceiling and the floor, they were needed because the high-set windows were too small-each about eight inches high by eighteen long-to admit much sunlight even at high noon. "Stan Quartermass kept this place heated in winter, cooled in the summer,"
        Paul Youngblood said. He pointed to vent grilles set in the suspended tongue-and-groove ceiling. "Seldom smelled like a stable, either, because he vented it continuously, pumped fresh air in. And all the ductwork is heavily insulated, so the sound of the fans is too low to.bother horses."
        On the left, beyond the final stall, was a large tackroom, where saddles, bridles, and other equipment had been kept. It was empty except for a built-in sink as - long and deep as a trough. To the right, opposite the tackroom, were top-access bins where oats, apples, and other feed had been stored, but they were now all empty as well.
        On the wall near the bins, several tools were racked business end up: a pitchfork, two shovels, and a rake.
        "Smoke alarm," Paul said, pointing to a device attached to the header above the big door that was opposite the one by which they had entered.
        "Wired into the electrical system. You can't make the mistake of letting batteries go dead. It sounds in the house, so Stan wouldn't have to worry about not hearing it."
        "The guy sure loved his horses," Jack said. "Oh, he sure did, and he had more Hollywood money than he knew what to do with. After Stan died, Ed took special pains to be sure the people who bought all the animals would treat them well.
        Stan was a nice man. Seemed only right." the lights. "Name's Lester Steer, and he owns the Main itreet Diner in town."
        "He's a man!"
        "Well, of course he's a man," Paul said, rolling the door shut.
        "Never said he wasn't." The attorney winked at Heather, and she realized how much she had come to like him in such a short time. "Oh, you're tricky," Toby told Paul. "Dad, he's tricky"
        "Not me," Paul said. "I only told you the truth, Scout. You tricked yourself." -"Paul is an attorney, son," Jack said.
        "You've always of to be careful of attorneys, or you'll end up with no ponies or cows." Paul laughed. "Listen to your dad. He's wise. Very wise."
        Only an orange rind of sun remained in view, and in seconds, the irregular blade of mountain peaks peeled it away. Shadows spread toward one another. The somber twilight, all