Spoils of the Game Read Online Free

mother caught the Cooper twins and me skinny-dipping in the family pool. I don’t think my mother ever got over that. Dad was a good man. He knew when to give me some slack and when to come down like a hammer.”

    It had been a long day. Austin put a ten-dollar bill in the tip jar, grabbed a handful of mixed nuts from a bowl on the bar, and left for home.

    Austin and his wife, Susan, had built a beautiful home in an exclusive neighborhood on a lake. With no children in their lives, the house was perhaps too big for just the two of them, but Austin looked at the home as an investment, and it certainly gave them enough room for their respective projects. With Susan’s death two years ago, the home had become a house, and there was emptiness both in his life and in the house.

    When Austin arrived home, there was a note on the kitchen counter from his housekeeper. Louise had kept the home clean and organized for his wife, and she continued to do so for Austin, who perhaps needed her more.

    Austin,

    I clean this house, and I prepare meals, but I don’t do mice. There are traps in your workshop.

    Louise

    Austin had the money to have exterminators, but for something as simple as a few mice, he would do it himself.

    His workshop was on the lower level, next to the office his wife had established to run her projects. The mousetraps were on the workbench as promised, but he had forgotten to get the cheese for bait. As he returned to the kitchen he stopped by his wife’s office and looked through the glass door that had been closed since the day of her death. Nothing had changed. On her desk were phone messages and her favorite pen. One of her jackets was still on her chair. Through the large windows behind her desk was a view of the lake, and beyond the lake were the mountains.

    Within seconds there was a lump in his throat and tears in his eyes. She had died of a stroke so suddenly that he still had a difficult time understanding that she was gone. Austin opened the door and entered the office. He slowly looked around at the pictures on the wall and on her desk. She had been so alive and so very much in the lives of everyone she knew.

    There was a to-do list with words written in her own hand. Austin first studied the words for the details in the script, knowing that the woman he truly loved had formed every curve. He then studied each task that her organized mind had put on paper. Susan Clay was perhaps the most organized person Austin had ever known. Her positive attitude had disarmed many who would stand in her way, and her love for art gave her a special purpose. On the right side of her desk were two files that had been special projects. Over the years Susan had met many in the art world. She was on a first-name basis with key players in New York, at the Prado in Madrid, and at her favorite place, the Louvre in Paris. The two files defined projects for the Louvre that she had been perhaps only weeks from bringing to reality.

    Seated at her desk, Austin opened the first file cautiously. He was not concerned about the contents of the file, but with the contents of his heart. The heading on the file said “Pierre, the Museum Mouse.” Susan felt strongly that there was so much art to be appreciated by children that they were not getting in school, and anything she could do to make children aware of it was a worthwhile project. Austin slowly turned the pages in the file. There were preliminary drawings of Pierre and his adventures in the museum, with each story teaching an important lesson on art history. There were plans for a Pierre doll with a matching beret and smock, and plans for a Pierre drawing set. All of the details were covered. Susan had defined each product, the number of books in a series, and the size and manufacturing cost for the Pierre dolls, and she even had identified suppliers for the art kits. She had expanded the concept to introduce art at the school level and had meetings planned with two major