Murder Under the Mistletoe

by K. J. Emrick

  “Oh, please do. Our business depends on word of mouth to a large degree. By the way,” he said, slapping his hands against his knees. “I did mean to ask if you had anything planned for the kids as far as Christmas? Opening of presents or that sort of thing?”

  “Actually yes, we do. We’re checking out Thursday. That will be the morning of Christmas Eve, and we’re going to open a few gifts here before we go back home. Why do you ask?”

  “Well, I was hoping to have a little celebration that morning for you and your family, if that’s all right? A little holiday breakfast, a little gift for each of the kids. It would be my thank you for staying here. We truly do enjoy sharing our stories with people, and you’ve been so interested in my family that, well, I think it would be nice to reciprocate.”

  Darcy didn’t know what to say at first. It was a truly nice gesture, and at the same time it was oddly out of place with the anger that had stirred in him just a moment ago. “That’s very kind of you,” she finally told him. “I’ll ask Jon about it, but I think that would be fine.”

  At least, it would be fine until she knew more about the mystery of the ghosts, and what had happened to them all. It could be nothing, she reminded herself. The ghosts could be here simply because they wanted to be. The fact they were nowhere to be seen now could mean they had all moved on, or that they didn’t really want to talk to her no matter how it might look. And, Maxwell Bylow could simply be an eccentric man who didn’t know how to relate to people.

  Then again…maybe it was best not to make promises with this man until she knew more.

  Closer.

  It wouldn’t be much longer until she was able to contact Darcy Sweet.

  There was danger. She needed to know there was danger.

  Closer. Closer.

  Darcy Sweet needed her help. She just needed to reach her…had to reach her…

  Reach her…

  Chapter 7

  There was a lot less people at the fun center this afternoon. They were closing tomorrow, one of the employees explained to Darcy and Jon. Business always slowed down this time of year and it just wasn’t worth it to stay open. Most of the tourists had already left for home. The owners of the place wanted to give the employees the chance to be with their families over the holidays as well. It was a good place to work, the server said as she placed their pizza on the table. The name printed on the little plastic rectangle, pinned to her blue polo shirt, was Virginia. She seemed way too enthusiastic about her job, in Darcy’s opinion.

  “Hope you enjoy the pizza,” she told Darcy with a big smile. “We’re known for our pizza across three counties.”

  She set the four large sodas from her carry tray to the table, with individually wrapped straws next to them, and then practically skipped away in her tight jeans. Darcy watched Jon and felt more than a little satisfaction in the fact that he didn’t give Virginia a second look. Not even out of the corner of his eye. She was young, and attractive, and those jeans left exactly nothing to the imagination, and her husband wasn’t interested in the least.

  “Not your type?” she asked him, a little smirk playing on her lips.

  Jon looked up from the slice of pizza he was putting on his plate, brows knit in confusion. He looked over in the direction Virginia had gone, then back at Darcy. “Who, her? I haven’t been interested in teenagers since I was one myself. Besides. I already have the woman of my dreams sitting across from me. My eyes don’t need to wander.”

  “That’s the right answer, husband of mine.” She reached across the table to hold his hand. “I love you, too.”

  Colby and Zane were still off playing in the trampoline section, and they decided to give the kids another ten minutes before calling them out to dinner. The pizza was a thin creation, mostly cheese and slices of pepperoni, and it wasn’t going to be any less tasty if it sat for a little bit. That way, they would have time to finish their conversation.

  “So what do you think about Swanson being put in the graveyard?” This had been the question they were discussing before Virginia brought their dinner over. Darcy made sure to stop talking about the ghosts in the Hideaway Inn whenever anyone came close to their table. For now, they were alone. “I mean, Maxwell didn’t say anything about it directly, but it sure sounded like the handyman had been…you know.”

  “Getting it on with the wife?” Jon said as he jabbed his straw into the top of his soda cup.

  Darcy felt her face blush. “For Pete’s sake, Jon. That’s a little crude, but…yeah. That. It’s not even what Maxwell didn’t say, so much, as it is the way he didn’t say it. Then there’s the inscription on the gravestone, remember? How the handyman should keep his hands to himself?”

  “Well, that’s not exactly what it said…”

  “Sure, but again, it’s more about what it didn’t say.” Darcy took a slice for herself, but then she left it sitting on her paper plate. “I think it’s obvious that Swanson was having an affair with Jennifer Bylow. Orson finds out what his wife is up to, and in a rage he kills her, and some time later he kills the handyman.”

  “And kills his one son?” Jon asked as he chewed. “I don’t know. It still seems to me that the other son is the right choice for the killer. Maybe Peter Bylow found out what Swanson was up to with his mother, and he killed them both. Then the other son, Rupert finds out and objects to his mother being dead. The two brothers fight, and Peter ends up killing Rupert, too. Peter lives, and moves down south after Orson passes away, and the rest is history, right? It’s like that whole story of Caine from the Bible.”

  Caine killing his brother Abel, he meant. Brother killing brother. Was that worse or better than the idea of a father killing his wife and son? “But there’s still the mother-in-law’s death to factor in. Don’t forget about her. What motive would either Orson or Peter have for killing Millicent Cussington?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “And here’s another question. When the police went to look at the room on the third floor the night Jennifer Bylow jumped out of the window, they found the room locked from the inside with the chain in place. If she was killed, then how did the killer get out? You can’t put a chain lock in place after you’ve left a room. One way in, and one way out, was what the article said. How could someone even get in there to kill her?”

  “Okay. So are we back to thinking it’s a suicide? If Orson did find out about his wife’s affair, that might be a reason for her to kill herself. Not that there’s ever a good reason but in her own mind…maybe?”

  She thought about it, and then shook her head. She had to go with her gut instinct. “No. I’m sure it’s a murder. It just…has that feel.”

  Jon knew better than to argue with her about things like this. If she felt it was a murder, then chances were better than even that’s exactly what it had been. Had there been times when she was wrong? Yes, but not very often. Her sixth sense really was a gift. Well. Most of the time.

  “So the question is,” she continued, looking around to make sure they were still alone, “how did her killer get in that room?”

  “Assuming it wasn’t suicide, you mean.”

  “Exactly. Assuming it was in fact murder, then how did the killer do it? Have you even seen a set of stairs leading up to that room? I haven’t. Yeah, this is a real mystery. I’m starting to think the ghosts really might be talking to me, in a way that I’m not always understanding, trying to tell me what really happened back then. At least they were. Now it’s like they’ve all packed up and moved away or something. Now that I’m looking for them, they’re gone. If they would just come out of their hidey-holes and answer these questions that keep mounting up all around us—”

  She stopped suddenly, with her drink halfway to her mouth. A thought, sudden and unexpected, had just blossomed in her mind, grown out of all the little facts and bits of information she had gathered up to now. What she was thinking…it was crazy. It was just too…well, too ‘haunted house.’ It would be like somet
hing out of a Vincent Price movie. Still, put everything she’d learned so far together, and if she was right about the handyman’s ghost trying to reach out to her…

  Oh, wow. This just got really, really interesting.

  “Hey, Jon? Let’s get the kids in here for dinner. Then we should get back to the Hideaway Inn. I think I may have just figured something out about this mystery.”

  He lifted a second slice of pizza over to his plate while licking his lips. “Can we let them play themselves out first? This mystery you’ve stumbled into is two centuries old. It can wait a few hours, right?”

  She sighed, but she knew Jon was right. The ghosts could wait. Her kids were having fun, and that’s what this whole trip was about. They could get some pizza, and play some laser tag, and some of the arcade games, and build a memory that they would enjoy for years to come. That was more important than anything else to Darcy. She wanted her kids to grow up knowing they were loved, and that in the eyes of their parents they would always come first. Always, and forever.

  Yeah, the ghosts could wait. After all, they hadn’t been around all day for her to talk to. Obviously they weren’t in a hurry.

  Darcy wanted to test out her theory as soon as they got back to the Hideaway Inn. Calmer voices—Jon’s, specifically—convinced her to wait until the kids were tucked in bed. Getting them asleep before eleven o’clock on a vacation was nearly unheard of, but after a second day of running around the fun center they had their eyes closed almost immediately.

  Jon wasn’t far behind, actually, but he stayed awake long enough for her to tell him her plan. He kissed her cheek and told her she was pretty amazing for coming up with the idea. The pride in his voice lifted her spirits in ways he probably would never understand.

  He was asleep before she left the room. At the door, she blew him a kiss. Then, she gave the antique ring on her right finger a twist for good luck. It had been her Great Aunt Millie’s, and now it was hers. Just like the family legacy of helping others, even after death.

  Part of her expected to see Swanson the handyman as soon as she stepped out in the hallway but once again there was no sign of his stumbling, bumbling self. The hallway was clear.

  The ghost of Orson Bylow’s mother-in-law wasn’t in the library, either.

  Just like earlier, it was as if the ghosts had gone back to some secret hiding spot. They weren’t interested in talking to her anymore, for whatever reason. It was almost like they sensed some sort of trouble coming. Was that even possible? She thought maybe it was. Ghosts were in tune with things like danger, and emotions. It was part of their existence, living on that side of the veil between life and death.

  So, yeah. Maybe the ghosts were hiding. If that was the case, she really would need to do a spirit communication to talk to them. What other choice did she have?

  The books on the shelf in the corner of the library drew her eyes, all stacked neatly in rows, all different heights and thicknesses and colored spines. She wanted to find the books on the family and read through them, but not now. She wanted to spend a whole week in here and just explore what books had been collected over the two centuries this house had been standing, but not now. She had other plans in mind that needed her attention first.

  Jennifer Bylow wasn’t ascending the stairs when Darcy came down, either. Her ghost was missing just like all the others. Somehow, the absence of the ghosts that had been previously popping up from every nook and corner made the place seem truly empty.

  The Hideaway Inn still had its Christmassy feel, though. The numerous sprigs of mistletoe that Maxwell had hung everywhere lent their healthy scent the air, as did the pine tree candles. The fireplace had been put out for the night, but the lights still twinkled on the artificial tree. Tinsel and paper decorations helped make the place festive.

  Only a few of the electric sconces had been left on, in case any of them came down this late at night. Maxwell Bylow should be off in bed, hopefully, and she would be able to move about undetected. So far, so good.

  Through the main room she snuck, and then into the hallway for the West wing of the building, to the second of the two rooms kept in their original state. Millicent Cussington’s painting stared down at her in disapproval, as if she knew what Darcy was up to.

  This was where Swanson had tried to get her attention, over there at that section of empty shelves. It hadn’t meant anything to her at the time, not really. After seeing him trip over himself in the upstairs hall and bang into a closed door, she thought maybe this was just more of the same from a clumsy ghost. Then she’d second guessed herself and thought it must be a message of some kind. Then, she didn’t know what to think.

  Now, she did.

  Something had occurred to her at the fun center while she’d been talking the whole thing over with Jon. If the shelves were nothing more than what they seemed—empty relics of what used to be a fancy mansion—then why had Maxwell been so quick to grab her hand away? She couldn’t have hurt them unless she unleashed a karate chop on them, and she was no Jackie Chan. What would it have hurt for her to run her finger through a layer of dust? Nothing.

  There must be something here that she wasn’t getting. Swanson had drawn her attention here on purpose.

  The answer, if she was right, would be truly bizarre.

  She stood there for the longest time, trying to find the answer with just her eyes. When that didn’t work, she reached out with one hand, and slapped it down on the middle shelf.

  Nothing happened. The shelves were solidly put together, even after all these years, and it left her hand stinging. They really built things to last in those days. Now, everything came from Ikea or Walmart with pegs and screws and fell apart in a few years.

  She tapped the underside of the next shelf up. Ran her hand along the side of the shelving unit. Got down on her knees and tried to look underneath the tight space between the bottom and the floor.

  There was nothing to see. Sure, the shelves had sagged a little after all this time, but short of climbing up on a chair to check the very top, this was turning out to be a waste of time. Had she been wrong? All the clues seemed to point to this as the answer but what if it was something else entirely? This plan of hers might be over before it even started.

  She ran her hand along the edge of each shelf, from left to right, just to be sure. The bottom one had a barely noticeable depression in the center, and then the next one up was worse, and the next as well, and the next one was visibly warped with time and use. The next one, the last shelf, was flat and level. Then even the top had a slight curve that she could feel with her hand as she felt along it in the dust…

  Wait a minute.

  She went back to that top shelf, the one with no sign of warping, and felt her fingertips across it again. It was just over her head, so she didn’t have to reach up very far. Why was this shelf still perfectly straight when everything else was starting to sag?

  This time, she looked at it closer. There was something different about this one shelf. The color, she finally decided. The stain was lighter. Almost as if the wood underneath had been a different variety, which affected the coloring…yes. Now that she was thinking about it there was a different feel to this one shelf. It was smoother. It wasn’t rough-cut lumber like the others.

  And unlike the other shelves, there was no dust on this one.

  She grabbed ahold of it by the front and tugged on it.

  It moved.

  Just a little, but it definitely moved in place. It was loose! She tried again, and again, but there was just the same little bit of play and no more. She pushed up, and then down. She looked for a secret catch or a latch or something like that, anything to indicate why this one shelf was different than the others. Were carpenters capable doing that two hundred years ago? Well, sure. The founder of the Singer Sewing Machine company had a mansion built for himself in the 1800s on an island in the St. Lawrence River off the edge of New York State, complete with sliding walls and hidden wine cellars. There
was a reason all of those haunted house tropes existed. There really were things like that in the world.

  And Darcy was sure the Hideaway Inn had the same sort of secrets. This was a secret doorway. That was what Swanson had been trying to tell her.

  But if there was a secret passage here, or a hidden compartment full of answers, or anything of the sort, she couldn’t find it. The shelf was loose, but it wasn’t budging no matter how she tugged on it. Her need to be quiet was making this harder than it needed to be, too. If she could really crank on it, rattle it in its frame, then it might come out and reveal what it was hiding.

  Exasperated, she folded her forearm against the front of the shelf and slumped her body against it.

  And the shelf pushed inward.

  With a soft scraping, the thick wooden plank that formed the shelf slid along whatever crafty mechanism was holding it in place and recessed itself into the wall behind. She had to move her fingers quickly to keep them from getting pinched.

  Then, with a double metal snick-snick the empty shelving unit moved.

  Hinged on the inside, it swung into the space behind the wall, opening up to a deep darkness that continued forward, away from Darcy. A cool breeze wafted out, smelling of must and cobwebs.

  An actual, for real secret passage.

  And if this went where she thought it did, the answers to how Jennifer Bylow and the others died were just a short walk away. Down there, in the dark.

  Well, it wouldn’t be the first haunted house she’d gone exploring in. She thought back over her many adventures. No. This wasn’t even the first secret passage she’d ever found.

  It might just be the coolest, though.

  Taking out her cellphone, she activated the flashlight app and pointed it inside. The walls, to her surprise, were made of tight-fitting, interconnected stones with ancient white mortar outlining the thin spaces between each one. Above her, the ceiling was the same. Spiders had been busy in the corners. It was colder here, and the whisper of wind that caressed her cheek was chilly against her skin. In that breath of air, she could almost imagine she heard a whispering of words.