Roadblock X
Restored in October 2026 from a 2003 copy of the original PenBase page saved by the Wayback Machine; Pentrace’s own database copy had been cut short.
I didn’t have to wait as long as I’d expected or hoped in order to find out what the morrow would bring. The phone rang ridiculously early.
“Mrs. Euler, I’m so glad I reached you.”
I was half-asleep. The voice sounded familiar, but in my bewilderment, I barely recognized it.
“Mrs. Euler, this is Laurel. You were at my house yesterday?”
Why did she have to make a statement sound like a question?
“Yes, Laurel,” I finally responded. “What can I do for you?” I glanced over at the clock on my night table. It was a quarter to six. I’d read until a little past three. Reading was the only way I could deal with insomnia, which I’ve had since I was in my thirties. If I didn’t read, I couldn’t get to sleep at all. Now that I am old, I find that I can get by on four hours of sleep. But I’d only been asleep for a little under three, and I was having a hard time focusing.
“Mrs. Euler, Roadblock is missing.”
Roadblock? Who or what the… Oh yes, the cat. My mind had gone blank for a second. “I’m sorry to hear that, Laurel,” I replied. “He’s a very nice cat.”
“He didn’t go home with you or Miss Carswell, did he?” she asked in a tone of voice indicating that she already knew the answer was no.
“Not to my knowledge, Laurel,” I replied. “I can check around here if you like. And if you call Anita, I’m sure she’d check in her house.”
“I didn’t think so,” she replied. “Actually, I’m pretty sure that woman came back and snatched him.”
That woman? It took me a few moments to realize that she was alluding to Paula.
“I doubt that very much, Laurel,” I said. “Paula is too afraid of the cat to abduct him. Besides, we all heard Andrew drive off.”
“Oh, I don’t suspect him,” Laurel said with a slight giggle. “He’s a good guy, Mrs. Euler. But she could have come back later on her own or with someone else and taken Roadblock. I wouldn’t put it past her.”
“Did you hear someone?”
“No, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”
“No, I suppose it doesn’t. But Roadblock is a tom, and you know, tomcats aren’t known for their sedentary ways. He could very well be off…tomcatting.”
She snorted. “He’s too lazy for that. Besides, he’s never been away over night. Even when Handsome was here and didn’t let him into the house, he was always around. And since Handsome left, he’s been inside every night.” She sighed. “No, something has happened to Roadblock. I know that for certain. I just hope he’s not dead.”
I waited relatively patiently, certain there was something specific that she wanted from me. My patience was quickly rewarded.
“I was wondering if your son lives near that woman,” she said.
“She lives, to the best of my knowledge, with your husband,” I replied.
She sighed again. “I know that, Mrs. Euler. What I don’t know is if he, uh, Andrew lives close enough to take a run by and see if they’ve got Roadblock.”
“They wouldn’t have Roadblock,” I insisted. “You might check the animal shelters, both in this county and in the city. If someone did find Roadblock, that’s where he’d end up.”
“No one found him,” she insisted. “Someone took him. There’s a difference.”
“Even so. I’d still wait until the shelters open and check in with them.”
“I could run by the shelter here,” she said. “But I have to be at work a little after nine, so I can’t drive to St. Louis.”
There was a pregnant pause, during which I said nothing. Surely she didn’t expect me to drive all the way to the city to look for her cat.
She didn’t. “I was wondering if your son might have time to check in St. Louis since he lives there.”
Aha! I restrained a chuckle. This was as much about contact with Andrew as finding the missing cat. “Well, I can’t speak for Andrew. He has a job, you know. And even if he could find the time, would he recognize Roadblock among all the cats in the shelters? There is more than one shelter, if I’m not mistaken.”
She was silent for a minute. “Well, he might not recognize Roadblock, but I bet Roadblock would recognize him.”
I chuckled. “Somehow I doubt that. But go ahead and phone Andrew, if you like.”
“I don’t have his number.”
“He’s in the phone book.”
“I don’t have one for the city, just for around here.”
“Well, I don’t know,” I persisted in giving her a hard time. “I’m not sure he’d appreciate my giving you his number.”
“I wouldn’t have to tell him where I got it. Please, Mrs. Euler, I’m really worried about Roadblock.”
It took her about five minutes more of begging and arguing, but then I relented. During that interval I tuned her out and argued internally about whether or not I wanted to facilitate or encourage Laurel’s interest in and access to Andrew.
On the one hand, if he decided to take up with Laurel, it would be the first time that he’d gotten involved with a woman whose age was anywhere near his own, a commendable sign of good sense as far as I was concerned. Laurel was younger than Andrew, but the age difference was less than twenty years, which wouldn’t ordinarily make them contemporaries, but compared to what Andrew usually preferred in the way of women, well, Laurel was positively ancient.
It also counted in Laurel’s favor, I will admit, that she thought so highly of me, as did Anita’s liking her. Anita has always been an excellent judge of character.
On the other hand, I had to admit that I’d found Laurel a little silly and very high-strung, not all a combination of traits that boded well for a long-term relationship with Andrew. Or for getting along with me very well in the long run, I might add. If that seems to stand in conflict with Anita’s apparent regard, for her, I’m sorry. I trust Anita’s judgment, but not absolutely. There is one very significant caveat, and that has to do with fountain pens. I am sure that Laurel’s use of fountain pens could very well have prejudiced Anita in her favor. No matter how good Anita’s judgment, and most everyone, even those who do not find her all that appealing as a personality, admit it is outstanding, Anita is not perfect. And she is certainly less than rational when it comes to fountain pens and those who use them.
“Mrs. Euler, are you still there?” I heard Laurel ask.
“Yes, Laurel, I’m here,” I replied quickly as I realized that she’d stopped talking during my cogitation and I hadn’t even noticed.
“Well?”
“Laurel, you must promise not to…” I began and then fell silent. Not to what? Not to try to get Andrew to marry you? I snorted.
“What’s wrong, Mrs. Euler?” she asked, sounding concerned.
“It’s nothing, Laurel. Just a moment, while I find his number.”
By the time Laurel had hung up, I was wide-awake, so I brewed myself some coffee and toasted an English muffin. Lawrence had always disliked English muffins, and I never indulged in them when he was alive. So I’ve had an English muffin for breakfast at least three time weekly ever since his death. I could never argue with his description of them as lacking in character, but how much character does one need for breakfast? Aside from one’s coffee, of course, which has to have a lot of character.
As I drank my coffee I tried to make a list of what I needed to do during the day. It included, in addition to writing checks and exercising whatever supervision I could at work, writing the letter of congratulations to James. As I contemplated that task, I wished I had gotten more information from Patricia. I knew neither the name of the competition, the exact venue of the performance, nor the name of the composition, which had won. I sighed, wishing I felt more comfortable using the Internet, as I was sure all that information would be available there. Of course, I could always ask William for help, or even one of the Tonys, if they could be lured away from their perpetual arguments with each other. They were all much more computer-competent than I was.
So I packed up the few things I thought I would need and went out to my car. Though I was certain that Roadblock had not stowed away with us the previous afternoon, I looked under the car and around the small yard along the perimeter of the house. Then I got into the car and drove to work.
The Euler Funeral Home is an old building about three blocks from the town hall. It used to be the residence of the town’s only blacksmith back in the days before the invention of the internal combustion engine. Before that Lawrence’s grandfather worked out of a small building behind his home. His wife was relieved, so Lawrence told me, when the business was moved. It meant she had some extra space to store household goods.
The new building was spacious enough to allow the business to grow, which it did at a pace directly related to the growth of the town. Of course, the townspeople could have used an undertaker in the city, but no one did. It wasn’t an issue of loyalty as much as of convenience and familiarity, I believe. Also we were more willing to extend credit to our neighbors than the outfits in the city were. We still are.
When I walked in, I was surprised to see that William’s office door was closed. As I passed the small, comfortable room in which he met with grieving family members, I heard his and another voice. I was tempted to knock and find out who had died, so I could extend my condolences and, I admit it, satisfy my curiosity, but I thought better of it and went to my office to write a few checks and see to the few bookkeeping matters that couldn’t wait until Steven’s return from his honeymoon.
As I worked, I thought about the tensions in my family, between Phoebe and my sons and between my sons and me. I remembered the one and only time James had come to help out here at work. Lawrence was still alive then and eager to get the boys interested in his business. Andrew had come in the previous week and proved an indifferent worker, more interested in reading a military history of the Civil War than helping his father and me. But no matter how disappointed Lawrence was in Andrew’s indifference, that was nothing to the reaction he had when James came to work.
James, all of nine years old at the time, sat down across from his father and looked him squarely in the eye. “Tell me, father,” he began, “doesn’t it make you feel at least a little bit uncomfortable to know that you’re profiting from the deaths of your neighbors and the grief of their families?”
Lawrence was silent for a moment, growing ever more red in the face by the second. Finally he barked at James, “This business, young man, is putting food in your mouth and paying for your education at the fancy school I send you to.”
James smiled, and I had never seen such a vitriolic expression on the face of one so young. “Oh yes, my school. It fits the theme. A place where boys learn to be killers.” He folded his arms over his chest. “When I asked to go to private school, it wasn’t because I wanted to be drilled in murder and obedience.”
Lawrence stood up, spluttering. I was afraid he was going to have a stroke, so I lifted James out of his chair by the back of his neck and marched him out of Lawrence’s office.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I hissed at him in the corridor. “Do you want your father’s death on your conscience?”
James stared at me blankly and then shrugged his shoulders. “You wouldn’t understand,” he said, his voice calm, but icy. Then he turned on his heel and walked back into Lawrence’s office. I heard him say, “I’m going to walk home now, father.” Lawrence’s mumbled reply was inaudible. James came out of the office and walked past me as if I weren’t there. That was the beginning of the end for James and me. Or so I’d always thought. Only now with this music prize and Patricia’s unlikely request perhaps there could be a new beginning.
I stood up and left my office to find William. When I got to his office, it was still locked. And the voices from the little room had fallen silent. I turned towards the stairwell that leads down to the basement where the Tonys do their work. Maybe they’d be able to help me or at least to tell me where William had gone.