Hidden Motive

by Alexander, Hannah

  For some reason the huge old room seemed darker than it had a few minutes ago. And colder.

  Hulking shapes of heavy furniture loomed around and over her. For no good reason she developed an acute case of goosebumps. She raised her lantern high, dispelling a few of the shadows.

  A small squeak echoed in the darkness and she paused to listen. Probably a mouse. She shivered.

  Jerri's laughter rang out from below and Sable relaxed. She had never been afraid of mice before, no reason to start now.

  The tall mirrored bureau stood at the edge of the top step. She turned, caught the reflection of her movement in the mirror, and jumped.

  “Stupid,” she told herself impatiently. The fear in her eyes reflected back at her in the glow from her light. Did she appear this obviously spooked to the others?

  Her safety and Murph's depended on how well she kept her fear in check, and how well she remained prepared for attack from any side.

  Floorboards creaked beneath her feet as she stepped past the looming furniture. Many pieces had been covered with sheets to protect them from dust.

  She stopped between the dormer windows and looked at the boxes and chests stacked in rows. Somehow, it looked different. The others had taken several of the smaller clothing boxes downstairs but there was something else…

  She inspected the filing boxes in front of the safe. Had they been disturbed? She stepped closer and lifted the top box to the floor, held the lantern up high. The safe was tightly closed, lock in place. But something…she glanced over her shoulder with a frown and saw an empty spot between the two windows.

  The map was missing.

  But how could that be? She’d been the last one to walk out of here.

  Feeling less and less comfortable, she went to the file cabinet. What else was missing? What if there had been someone up here besides Bryce, Audrey, Perry, and Jerri? There were places they might hide…

  “Stop being ridiculous,” she whispered to herself. She needed to trust her own sense of hearing. Anyone would have had to pass her door. She would have heard them.

  So who took the map?

  There was another rustle somewhere in the darkness—the skittering feet of a tiny mouse. Big deal.

  But it sounded strangely like breathing. She held her own breath and held perfectly still. She heard breathing.

  Someone was in the attic with her. She studied the huge area again, her gaze roaming over sheet-covered furniture and boxes. There was something different about the bulk of a tall pie safe covered by a paisley print sheet. It wasn't hanging right. The noises she'd heard earlier had come from that direction. She crept quietly across the floor, the hairs at the back of her neck prickling. When she drew close enough to reach out and touch the sheet, a board squeaked beneath her foot.

  The sheet moved with a jerk, lifted, came toward her and over her head. She’d opened her mouth to cry out when a rough hand shoved a wad of the sheet into her mouth. Her attacker jerked the material tightly around her body and shoved her to the floor. She rolled over, kicking the air, struggling with the bonds as someone raced across the attic and down the steps. Her elbow slammed against the hardwood floor. By the time she was free of the sheet, it was too late to pursue her attacker.

  Chapter 19

  Murph tossed another log into the furnace in the basement and closed the heavy iron door. He’d chop more wood if the weather didn’t break before long. But not alone again.

  He touched the aching welt on his face and thought again about Sable’s reaction when she thought he was badly injured or dead.

  He smiled. Every time he looked at her, she was more beautiful than before, even with the darkness of grief and fear that had tightened the delicate features of her face over the past forty-eight hours. He wished he possessed the power—or at least the knowledge—to ease her pain.

  “Lord protect us.” As Noah used to say, it was especially good for a man to be forced to depend on the strength of Jesus Christ alone. That was where a man found his power…and his humility.

  The clatter of footsteps reached him from above and Sable came racing down the basement stairs to him, holding her elbow. Her face was flushed, eyes wide.

  “I was attacked in the attic.”

  “Attacked?” He rushed to her. “Who did it? Are you hurt?”

  “I didn’t see who it was. I only bumped my elbow.”

  “You went up there alone?” She exasperated him.

  “It should have been safe. I could have sworn no one came past my door. You know how the stairs creak. I apparently surprised someone and they hid. When I got too close I was attacked.”

  “Where’s Dillon?”

  “I don’t—”

  “Come upstairs with me.” Murph took her hand. “Did you see anyone when you came downstairs?”

  “Most of the doors are closed—everyone’s either trying on clothes or resting.”

  Murph led the way cautiously up the steps to the living room. “Dillon,” he called.

  Canine toenails clicked on the hard floor in the kitchen. The German shepherd came through the doorway at a trot, ears perked forward, water dripping from his chin. Even a watchdog had to eat and drink.

  “Come, Dillon.” Murph urged Sable up the stairs to the second floor. “I don’t suppose you would agree to stay in your room with the door locked while I check this out.”

  “Nope.”

  Murph reached for the gun beneath his shirt as they crept along the hallway. “You could at least stay behind me.”

  She did as he suggested, much to his surprise.

  When they passed Audrey’s closed door, Murph heard feminine laughter. Jerri and Audrey. That eliminated the suspect list.

  Maybe.

  He felt the rush of cold air when he opened the attic door. He went up the steps into the huge cavernous room, gun at the ready.

  The attic was deserted. Dillon sniffed at a colorful sheet on the floor.

  “Somebody must have sneaked past my bedroom door,” Sable said. “He hid under this sheet until I came close, then threw it over my head, knocked me down, and ran.”

  “He?”

  “Audrey and Jerri were in Audrey’s room. I heard them when I came down.”

  Murph checked the shadows thoroughly with his flashlight. He found nothing.

  He returned to Sable’s side and reached for her. She stepped into his embrace and rested her forehead against his chest. He found himself wishing this were happening under different circumstances. And then he stopped that train of thought.

  “Did you get any sense of who your attacker might have been?” he asked. “Size? Even smell?”

  “Nothing. I was too startled.”

  He pushed up her sleeve and examined the welt on her elbow. “You didn’t try to give chase, did you?”

  “I didn’t get untangled in time.”

  “Sable, they could have—”

  “I know they could have killed me.”

  Murph resisted the urge to take out his anger on the victim, even though she did tend to put herself in harm’s way. “They could have, yes,” he said at last. “They didn’t. Thank God.”

  She looked up at him. “Speaking of God, why aren’t we being protected from all this?”

  “What makes you think we aren’t? We’re still here after all that’s happened.”

  “So far,” she whispered. “Someone’s stalking us to find out what information we have.” She drew back and looked up at him. “I might have found a big clue.”

  He released her with reluctance.

  “There’s a deed of trust to this place with Boswell’s name on it,” she said.

  He shook his head. That didn’t make sense.

  “Grandpa apparently borrowed money against this place when they purchased the Seitz mine,” she said. “There was also a letter attached to two analysis sheets, one for galena and one for sphalerite. The letter mentioned three sheets. The other must have been for the silver. I’m not sure why he would hav
e had them analyzed.”

  “Unless he suspected they were native to the mine.”

  Sable turned away. “Or unless he planned to use them to dupe—”

  “Don’t say it. Stop allowing your circumstances to cloud your deductive reasoning. He was human and he made mistakes, but I still believe there are pieces to this puzzle that we haven’t seen yet.”

  She was silent for a moment. “I thought I could depend on my knowledge of my grandfather.”

  “We need to keep collecting pieces. I wonder if Boswell knows the results of those analyses.”

  “I believe he has his ways of finding out. For all I know Grandpa had the ore analyzed so Boswell would think this place was worth more than it is and would loan the required amount of money.” Her voice wobbled. “How’s that for trying to make the pieces fit?”

  “But he didn’t confess to doing that, did he? It seems to me that if he confessed one thing he would confess everything.”

  She stepped to a dormer window and looked out. “Boswell has been after my grandfather to sell this place for a long time. He might be willing to do anything to get it. Now he could call in the loan. He could have controlled Grandpa, holding that mortgage over his head.” She glanced up at Murph. “The copy I saw of the mortgage contract had a note jotted atop it. It was a ‘reminder,’ but it seemed like almost a taunt.”

  “A reminder?”

  “I believe Boswell coerced him into all this,” she said.

  He stood beside her at the dormer window and voiced a suspicion he’d had for some time. “Do you recall how many accident patients you’ve seen from the mines since you went to work at the clinic?”

  She shrugged. “A few. The other docs see more because they have more patients. I see more of the miners’ wives and children. Why do you ask?”

  “Because one of the reasons Noah suggested I go to work at the clinic in Freemont was because he thought there might be some safety issues in the mines.”

  “Safety issues?”

  “He thought Boswell cut corners to save money. We received more accident victims at the clinic than I would have expected in the six weeks I worked there.”

  “I saw some results of stupid actions,” Sable told him, “but I always reported them properly. I’m sure the other docs did, too.”

  “Of course you would do the right thing,” he said.

  Sable looked up at him.

  Murph had never realized the sensuality a woman could bring to a single glance. “Are you going to look for anything more tonight?” he asked. “Because if you are, I’m sticking to you like Dermabond adhesive.”

  “I'd like to try to make some sense out of what we already have.” She spread her hands in frustration. “I knew my grandfather placed himself in deep debt putting his three grandchildren through college. We were all paying him back, but if I’d known he was struggling, I’d have applied for a school loan and never allowed him to pay for my education.”

  “We're missing something,” he said.

  “I think we’re missing a lot.”

  “If you insist on going down into the cave in the morning, I’m going with you.”

  “Bryce will be with me. I want to check a hunch.”

  “Is it important?”

  “It could be,” she said. “I’d like to check out the crystal cavern and I want to look for a sinkhole my grandfather mentioned. The map had some new markings on it.” She placed her hand over Murph’s and looked up at him earnestly. “I think it had the outline of a clock face.”

  “A clock?”

  “Or a watch.” She touched the pocket watch. “Our intruder took the map and I’m not sure about the location.”

  “Then we’ll look for it together. I want you safe.”

  “You want to play bodyguard.”

  “You have a problem with that?”

  “Not anymore.”

  “Good. Your strength and independence are admirable. They are two of the many things that attract me to you.” He lowered his head and kissed her quickly, before she could stop him—before he could stop himself. The touch of her soft lips on his were almost his undoing. The big shock came when he felt her response. He pulled back, overwhelmed by what he’d done.

  “But in this case it would be stupid to go lone wolf on me,” he said, trying to keep his voice under control. “Ask for my help before you get into more trouble.”

  He saw the surprise in her eyes, the sudden vulnerability, and he was even more amazed that he’d kissed her like some impetuous teenager. In the fleeting expressions that washed across her face, he saw something else—something he knew she would not want him to see. He saw attraction. He couldn't stop the grin that spread across his face.

  Sable pulled from his grasp and spun away without a word. He watched her bulldoze past a stack of boxes, a dresser, a washstand. He followed meekly behind her. Time to play it cool for a while.

  * * *

  This time Sable couldn’t hear the squeak of the attic floor over the roaring in her ears as she rushed across the darkened room. She was no longer afraid of the shadows.

  Instinctively, she raised a hand to her lips, vitally aware of Paul Murphy’s nearness and desperate to concentrate on the danger—and the puzzle—at hand. It was difficult.

  Murph picked up the sheet, shook it out, searched around the edges of the pie safe. “You’ve told me about some of the records you found up here. Where is the confession note?”

  Sable reached into the front pocket of her slacks. “I’ve kept it on me.” She spread it open in the glow from Murph’s flashlight. Together, they began to read it again.

  Sable caught something significant quickly. She looked up at Murph, struggling to temper a powerful surge of hope. “I don’t think this is a confession at all.

  “What do you mean?”

  She pointed to the first paragraph. “He says it’s been more than eleven years since Grandma died. Grandma died twenty years ago. That's a lot more than eleven. I was so stunned by the confession that these other things didn’t register.”

  “What could it mean?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said. “The first sentence hints for us to look closely at the words he uses. She pointed to the second paragraph. “He says here that by the time we get this letter, we will have already heard the story. Murph, he only used that term when he was telling a fictitious story. He would trick us that way, tell us a long fun story about his past, have us believing him, then explain that it was all made up. Fiction.”

  “But why write the note at all?” Murph asked. “Why not talk to you in person?”

  “It seems he would only do that if he thought he wouldn’t be able to talk to us,” she said.

  “Keep reading. What else do you see?”

  She continued scanning. “Here it says he’s sorry to miss my birthday party this year because he knows how much I love them. He knew I hated birthday parties.”

  “So why mention your birthday? And why use the number eleven when it should have been twenty? He also mentions the watch being a combination Christmas/birthday—”

  “Combination!” Sable exclaimed.

  “And look—it says, 'Don't worry, I'm safe in the afterlife.”

  Sable slid the note back into her pocket as she led Murph through the shadows to the far wall where the dark gray mass of the old safe loomed.

  “Does anybody besides family know about this old safe?” Murph asked.

  “I don’t think so, except maybe for Craig.”

  Murph raised his flashlight to illuminate the numbers on the dial. “We have the number eleven and your birthdate. Let me see the note again.”

  She pulled it out of her pocket once more and spread it in the light. “Try turning it clockwise to eleven.” She held the paper out for him. “See the word forgive? That could mean forward. Then turn it back, counterclockwise to two, because he uses the word back. Then clockwise to one, counter to five.”

  “Got it.”

  “Di
d it click?”

  “No.” He tried again, adding her birth year. “Nothing.”

  There was a squeak of floorboards on the stairs coming into the attic. “Sable? You up here?” Audrey called. “It’s Jerri and me. Think we could look see more clothes? Jerri needs—”

  “I need fat lady clothes.” Jerri chuckled.

  Murph turned while Sable stuffed the note into her pocket. So much for clue finding tonight. She was disappointed, yet at the same time vastly and infinitely relieved.

  Fiction. It was all fiction. Her grandfather wasn’t guilty.

  Soon it would be time for bed. First thing in the morning they’d be searching the cave for more clues.

  Chapter 20

  Sable scrambled over a ledge of limestone and straightened inside the cave. She aimed her light along the passage and to the mouth of the rocky pit she and her brothers had always been warned to avoid. It was the most dangerous place in the cavern system.

  She stepped forward so the others could come through, and as she waited for them, she reacquainted herself with the dark secrecy of the cavern. She had so many good memories here, when she and Peter and Randy—and many times Craig and his sister, Candace—had explored and played and shared the wonder of this special playground.

  Bryce joined her in the dripping silence. Murph and Craig followed as they walked single file into the hovering darkness. For Sable it was a homecoming.

  Murph played the beam of his flashlight over every inch of the cave. The light paused at a cluster of quartz crystals in the cave, then moved back to the pit.

  When they’d descended a ten-degree decline to the next cavern, Bryce stopped and stared in awe at a room of rust-colored formations. “This is great.” He reached out to touch a tall column, its sides glistening with moisture. “Oops.” He jerked his hand back. “I almost forgot. I learned in science class that you aren't supposed to disturb a living cave. Even our walking here changes its growing patterns a little.” He gestured toward the multitude of stalactites and rising stalagmites colored by iron deposits.