A Stone's Throw by James Ziskin (best story books to read .txt) 📗

“Kids most likely.”

“Any chance there were horses in there?” I asked.

“No. This place has been empty for years. Since the war. The Shaws got out of breeding and racing before they moved the carpet mills south.”

New Holland had been orphaned by the Shaw Knitting Mills after World War II, ending nearly a century of carpet manufacturing along the Mohawk River. The most powerful industrialist in nineteenth-century New Holland, Sanford Shaw had built the stud farm on Route 67 on the advice of his physician, who prescribed a relaxing pastime to reduce the “nervous tension in consequence of the rigors of the manufacturing business.” This according to his biography, Carpeting the Eastern Seaboard: The Life and Legacy of Sanford J. Shaw. While Tempesta may have begun as a pleasant distraction for a captain of industry, it soon blossomed into an important breeding stable of Thoroughbreds, especially once his elder son, Joshua, took an interest in horse racing around the turn of the century. The son and heir’s passion kept the farm going even when New York State outlawed gambling and effectively killed Thoroughbred racing for three years in the 1910s. When Sanford Shaw wanted to send his best horses to France, Joshua prevailed upon him to keep Tempesta running. His vision was rewarded when, in 1913, a favorable court ruling restored betting—partially at least—in New York. But it wasn’t until the old man died in 1925 that Joshua threw himself—and most of the family’s fortune—into breeding champions in earnest. Tempesta horses won derbies and stakes races from Kentucky to England to France, and in nearby Saratoga Springs, while Joshua Shaw lived the life of a globetrotter and bon vivant.

Then came the Depression, which hit the mills hard, followed by the war. Horse breeding took a backseat to patriotic duty. Following a polo injury, Joshua was replaced at the helm of the Shaw Knitting Mills by his younger brother Nathan shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. Tempesta Farm was abandoned and the horses sold off. The grass grew, consuming the three-quarter-mile training track, jumping course, and nearly everything else on the property. The forty barns and other buildings, including the caretaker’s house and dormitories, were left to molder a stone’s throw from the August excitement of Saratoga. Forsaken and all but forgotten, Tempesta now seemed a world away from its former glory.

“So what are you doing out here at this hour anyway?” asked Frank. “Don’t tell me Charlie Reese sent you for this.”

“Couldn’t sleep. I heard about the fire on the police scanner and called him. Woke up his wife again. I think she hates me. Charlie thought it was probably nothing, but I wanted to have a look-see to be sure.”

Frank threw a doubtful eye in my direction. “These abandoned barns burn down every so often. Not going to be one of your bigger scoops.”

At length, the fire truck arrived. The ace driving the thing attempted to maneuver close to the smoldering remains and, after a couple of aborted three-point turns in the grass, declared defeat, pulled the brake, and told his mates to make do.

Having drawn about twenty yards of hose from the truck, two volunteer firemen took turns dribbling a weak stream of water over the embers. They swamped what was left of the fire in less than an hour, all the while yawning, scratching their behinds, and even smoking a couple of cigarettes. I chronicled the touch-and-go battle with a roll of Tri-X film and a dozen flashbulbs.

I wanted to get some daylight shots, but it was just five twenty, and the sun wouldn’t rise above the trees to the east until nearly six thirty. Frank offered to stand me to breakfast until then. Fifteen minutes later, we were seated across from each other at the Ballston Diner in the sleepy hamlet of Charlton, about halfway between Galway and Scotia.

I caught Frank eyeing the waitress. She was across the room, back to us, taking down the orders of four locals who were fueling up before a day of fishing. A curvy creature with bottle-blonde hair and thick red lipstick, she was about forty or forty-five. What Marilyn Monroe might have looked like in ten years, if she hadn’t died just a week earlier. Sad story, I thought, as I watched the waitress flirt with the men. She held them in her thrall, as if charming snakes, with a simpering smile and heaving bosom. Then, with a bounce and a flourish, she dotted the last i and crossed the last t in her pad and sashayed to the kitchen. The boys clearly liked her going as much as coming, if gazing at a swinging backside meant what it used to. Frank was enjoying the view as much as the anglers. I cleared my throat.

“The coffee’s good here,” he said, suddenly aware of his own distraction. “I stop in from time to time.”

“And that pretty waitress wouldn’t have anything to do with it?” I asked, ribbing him.

He blushed and said he didn’t go in for that kind of shenanigans.

Somewhere during the past five years in New Holland, I’d learned that Frank Olney was a widower. But I didn’t know the whole story. And while he was my favorite cop—one I considered a friend—I couldn’t bring myself to ask him about it now. We didn’t share intimacies. I dropped the teasing when I noticed his discomfort. Perhaps he was lost in a memory of his late wife. Or maybe he was lonely and thinking he’d actually like to go in for some of those shenanigans with the pretty waitress. Poor Frank. This was one of those moments when I wished he would loosen the cork a bit.

She appeared above us. “Hiya, Frank. Who’s your date?”

Now his ears burned beet red. “Aw, Billie, it’s not like that. This is Ellie. A newspaper reporter. Friend of mine.”

“I haven’t seen a lot of reporters who look like you,” she said. Probably a