Haunting Danielle 27 The Ghost and the Mountain Man

by Bobbi Holmes

  “It’s our treasure!” Caitlin said. “This isn’t fair. All those times we looked for it, and they find it?”

  “I thought you would want to know,” Cory said.

  “You need to follow them up there,” Caitlin said. “Which should be fairly easy since you know what day they’re going.”

  “I don’t know when they’re going on Sunday,” Cory pointed out.

  Caitlin looked at Cory and narrowed her eyes. “Please don’t make me do everything. You always do that.”

  “What do you mean?” Cory frowned.

  “You know they’re going up there on Sunday. I have to assume they’ll want to get an early start to give them time to get up there, get what they can, and then return. So obviously, you need to camp out over by Marlow House early on Sunday morning. When they head up to the mountains, follow them. They’ll lead us to the treasure.”

  “Then what?” Cory asked.

  “I’ll take over from there,” Caitlin said.

  Cory frowned. “I don’t understand?”

  “You don’t have to understand, Cory. Just do as I say. Follow them up to the mountains.”

  “What are you going to do when we get there?” Cory asked.

  “That treasure is rightfully mine.” She paused a moment and then smiled at Cory and added, “Some of it is yours if you continue to help me like you always have. But they have no right to it.”

  “I don’t understand what you plan to do when we get up there,” Cory said.

  “Just do as I say, remember that. Follow them up to the mountains!”

  “But—” Before Cory could finish his question, Caitlin reached over and gave his back a shove, sending him tumbling off the pier into the water below.

  Cory’s eyes flew open, and he sat up in bed, the blanket falling off his bare chest. Darkness covered his bedroom, save for the moonlight slipping through his window, its blind open. Absently combing his right hand through his still damp hair, he sat there just a moment longer before climbing out of bed, barefoot and wearing just boxers. Cory stumbled to the window and looked out. Caitlin’s house was dark. But it was not Caitlin’s house anymore, it was Ginny’s house. He continued to stare out the window when he noticed headlights coming up the street. Standing in the darkness of his bedroom, he peered out the window into the night. A moment later, the headlights turned into Ginny’s driveway. He recognized the car. It was Ginny’s. The garage door opened, and then the car disappeared inside before the garage door closed.

  Cory turned from the window and went back to bed.

  Joe worked late on Friday, and instead of Kelly picking him up, he hitched a ride with one of his co-workers. When he arrived home, Kelly was already in bed, sleeping. After taking a shower and climbing into bed, he reached over to give her a kiss, but she groggily rolled away, apparently still asleep. With a sigh, Joe gave her a little pat, turned off the bedroom light, and then grabbed his pillow, giving it several punches with a fist before shoving it under his head.

  He fell asleep quickly, but he didn’t stay asleep long. Something woke him up, and when he reached out toward Kelly, she was no longer there. He glanced at the alarm clock on the nightstand and saw he had been sleeping less than an hour.

  Rather than trying to go back to sleep, he lay quietly in bed, waiting for Kelly’s return. The time ticked away. Eventually he looked back to the clock. Another hour had passed. With a sigh, Joe climbed out of bed.

  He found Kelly in the study, curled up on the sofa with a blanket around her, the lamp on the end table on, but the overhead light off.

  “Are you coming back to bed?” he asked in a soft voice.

  Kelly looked up at the doorway. “In a while.”

  Joe frowned and walked over to the sofa and sat down with Kelly. “Is something wrong?”

  Kelly shrugged.

  Letting out a sigh, Joe leaned back on the sofa. “Are you mad at me?”

  “I’m not mad at anyone,” Kelly muttered unconvincingly.

  They sat there in silence for a few minutes. Finally, Joe blurted, “I don’t really want six kids.”

  Kelly frowned at Joe. “Excuse me?”

  “I lied. I don’t really want six kids. That’s why you’re out here, right?”

  “Why would you lie about something like that?” Kelly asked. “Were you trying to scare me? Did you want me to break off the engagement? Are you having second thoughts?”

  “No!” Joe groaned. “Brian said you’d think that.”

  “Brian? What does Brian have to do with this?” Kelly sat up straighter, the blanket no longer pulled tightly around her body.

  “Brian has nothing to do with this. And I don’t want to break off our engagement. I’m in love with you, Kelly. I want to marry you,” Joe insisted.

  “Do you love me as much as you loved Danielle?” Kelly blurted, immediately regretting the question. She hadn’t meant to voice it, but it had been in her head.

  “Danielle? I was never in love with Danielle,” Joe said.

  “Yes, you were,” Kelly argued.

  “I will admit I was infatuated. And I thought she needed me,” Joe said.

  “Needed you?” Kelly frowned.

  “I don’t want to talk about Danielle. She’s not the one I want to marry.”

  “Okay, then what’s this about six kids? Wanting them and then not. What was that all about?”

  “I do want kids someday. And I will admit that I have been thinking maybe we shouldn’t wait to start a family, considering—”

  “My age?” Kelly finished for him.

  “No, actually, my age,” Joe grumbled.

  Kelly sat up even straighter and leaned toward Joe. “Your age? Guys can be fathers when they’re a hundred.”

  “That’s not what I’m talking about. I just realize I’m getting pretty set in my ways, comfortable. And if we wait much longer, maybe I won’t want kids.”

  “So that’s why you said you wanted six kids?” Kelly frowned.

  “No. I said that because…” Joe let out a sigh and reached out and took Kelly’s hand. “I was just trying to get your mind off everyone else’s business.”

  “What do you mean everyone else’s business?”

  “Just sometimes you get a little overinvested in other people’s lives. Like wanting to play matchmaker for Brian or worrying about who’s babysitting for Connor.”

  “It’s just that I care,” Kelly insisted.

  “I know. But sometimes…” Joe didn’t finish the sentence.

  Kelly slumped back on the sofa, Joe no longer holding her hand. “Sometimes it’s annoying?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t say annoying, exactly.”

  “And you thought giving me six kids would take care of it?”

  Joe shrugged. “I really wasn’t going to give you six kids.”

  They sat there for a few moments. Suddenly, Kelly laughed.

  Confused, Joe asked, “What’s so funny?”

  “Oh, I totally missed my chance.”

  “Chance for what?” Joe asked.

  “When you said you wanted six kids, I should have…” Kelly flew into Joe’s arms and squealed, “Oh yes! Six kids! I am so glad you said that! That’s what I want too!” She peppered his face with kisses before abruptly stopping and sitting back on the sofa.

  “You want six kids?” Joe squeaked.

  Kelly frowned. “Oh, hell no.”

  Joe chuckled and put his arm around Kelly, pulling her closer. They sat in silence for a moment before Kelly asked in a quiet voice, “You really weren’t trying to get me to break off the engagement?”

  “Absolutely not. I want to marry you,” Joe insisted.

  “I wasn’t really sure of that. Even before you said you wanted six kids.”

  Joe pulled away from Kelly for a moment and looked at her. “Why did you think that?”

  Kelly shrugged and said, “We’ve been together for over three years, and you never really talked about marriage before. And I was the one who fi
rst suggested us moving in together.”

  Joe let out a sigh and pulled Kelly back closer to him. “It’s what I was talking about. I was comfortable.”

  Leaning against Joe, Kelly said, “I don’t understand.”

  “I was comfortable with our relationship. Comfortable living together. Real comfortable. And I was afraid I might get too comfortable, and I might decide I want nothing to mess up what we have.”

  “You think kids will mess up what we have?” Kelly asked.

  Joe shrugged. “It will change things.”

  They sat in silence for a few minutes. Finally, Kelly said, “I ran into Heather at the grocery store.”

  “And?”

  “She knows I talked to Lily and Ian about her babysitting.”

  “They told her?” Joe asked.

  “She said they didn’t. I assume Lily said something to Danielle, who told Heather,” Kelly said.

  “Was she mad?”

  “Actually, no. She said she understood and that if the situation were reversed, she would probably feel the same way.”

  “Really?”

  “And you know what else?”

  “What?”

  “If Heather had wanted to hit Ginny, she could have.”

  Thirty-Three

  Stretched out leisurely on the tree branch, his tail swishing back and forth, Max the cat looked down at Sadie, who raced across the side yard of Marlow House in eager pursuit of the tennis ball Walt had just pitched. Max didn’t get it. What was this fascination dogs had with balls? Yarn he understood—but a ball? And to make it more perplexing, once Sadie caught that ball, she would give it back to Walt. Why? What was the point? If Max ever managed to snag the yarn, he certainly wasn’t going to drop it at Walt’s feet. After all, it wasn’t a dead mouse.

  He looked toward the house and spied Lily sitting with Danielle, chatting. With a yawn, he closed his eyes and rested his head on the branch for a nap.

  “Maybe Caitlin moved on,” Lily suggested after Danielle told her how Marie and Eva had gone over to Ginny’s the night before but hadn’t found the restless spirit.

  “I suppose it’s possible, but considering her tantrum at the museum, I suspect she wandered off somewhere else. I don’t see her moving to the other side in her state.”

  “Maybe she stayed at the museum?” Lily suggested.

  “Eva wondered that too. They headed over there after leaving Ginny’s but couldn’t find her,” Danielle said. “Plus, Eva had stopped by the museum after Caitlin’s outburst and hadn’t seen her. Of course, at the time she wasn’t aware of what had happened at the museum earlier that day.”

  Lily glanced out at the yard and watched Walt and Sadie. “I’m not sure who’s enjoying that more. Walt or Sadie?”

  “Good exercise,” Danielle said as she sipped her tea.

  “Now I feel guilty just sitting here,” Lily grumbled.

  “Meh, you get plenty of exercise running around after Connor.”

  “I keep waiting for you to join me,” Lily said with a grin.

  “We are trying. Walt is especially enthusiastic about the project.”

  Lily laughed and said, “He always was a good sport.”

  Danielle giggled.

  Lily picked up her tea and asked, “So you guys going up there tomorrow?”

  “Yeah. Walt wanted to go today, but Brian has to work this afternoon. I really don’t want Walt wandering around in the mountains and getting lost again. I suppose we could get Marie or Eva to go with him, but if they want to find the spot where they first ran into Bud, it’ll be easier having Brian and Heather there. Together they should be able to find it.”

  “What does he hope to accomplish?” Lily asked.

  “It’s about Bud’s accusations regarding Walt’s father. It’s bad enough for Walt to learn his parents were probably murdered. Murdered by someone they considered a close family friend. Now, another close friend is accusing Walt’s father of murder. But we don’t see how that is possible. Even if Bud didn’t die in the mountains, someone obviously buried him up there, if he’s right about finding his body. We need a better understanding of the timeline. If Bud talked to Teddy hours before Walt saw him at Marlow House, there was no way Alex had time to kill Bud, take his body to the mountains, bury him, and get back to Teddy’s house. It took hours to get from Frederickport to where Bud was by horseback.”

  “I still don’t understand. Why did Teddy murder Walt’s parents? Assuming he did,” Lily asked.

  “Bud told Walt that when he found out about Teddy’s girlfriend, he discussed it with Alex, and they decided what to do about it. Yet Bud claims that instead of doing whatever that was, Alex murdered Bud.”

  “What did they decide?” Lily asked.

  “Bud left before he could explain. But Walt’s sure it has something to do with his father saying he was going to bring Maddie back with him and Anna to Marlow House the night of the fire.”

  “I’m sorry, Dani,” Lily said.

  “We need clarity on the timeline and on what Bud thinks he knows.”

  Danielle’s cellphone rang. She picked it up and answered it. A moment later she hung up and told Lily, “That was Millie Samson. She wanted to let me know the newspapers arrived yesterday, and they’ll be on display today, if I wanted to come down and look at them.”

  “I knew how anxious you were to see those newspapers,” Millie told Walt and Danielle as she led them to the far end of the exhibit room on Saturday afternoon. “We’re so excited to have a complete collection of the Frederickport Press. And the Glandon Foundation paid to have them digitalized, so if something were to happen, like another fire, God forbid, they won’t be lost.”

  “Heather mentioned that,” Danielle said.

  “Oh, Heather, did you hear?” Millie asked. “Not that I’ve been telling people, but I know you and Heather are friends.”

  “I assume you’re referring to the incident between Heather and Ginny,” Danielle said.

  Now standing by the table with the newspapers, Millie shook her head and sighed. “I really don’t understand what happened. I like Ginny Thomas, and she has been most generous with the museum, but I don’t know her well. Yet she seemed sincerely upset, considering the way she clung to me the other day. It was right after Brian Henderson left and not long after the supposed incident.”

  “Sorry you had to be put in the middle of this,” Danielle said, because she didn’t know what else to say.

  “Yet, if I’m totally honest, Heather can get a little snippy. And it wouldn’t surprise me to hear she lost her temper and threw something. After all, I have seen her punch Chris’s arm a few times when he annoyed her. And he’s her boss,” Millie said.

  “Heather has been working to break that habit,” Walt said, resisting the urge to smirk.

  “But the thing is, I find it hard to believe Heather would throw something that belonged to the museum,” Millie said. “She used to be a docent, and she was always respectful of the displays and would get quite annoyed when someone came in and picked something up.” Millie lowered her voice and added, “Frankly, a couple of times I thought she was going to smack one of our visitors who picked something up when there was a no-touching sign posted. It’s one reason I was rather relieved when she said she couldn’t docent anymore. We really can’t have our docents hitting visitors.”

  “What you’re saying, you can imagine Heather throwing something at Ginny if she annoyed her, yet just not throwing something from an exhibit?” Walt asked.

  “Exactly!” Millie chirped. “Plus, she’s been instrumental in getting the Glandon Foundation to fund many of our projects.”

  There had been changes made to the newspaper section of the museum that Danielle hadn’t noticed before today. Along the back wall, behind the table, they had installed a new bookshelf to store the additional volumes of newspapers, and no longer were any of the volumes stacked on the table. The table, now bare, provided a space for researchers to set volumes they wan
ted to read.

  After Millie left Walt and Danielle alone, they located the volumes with issues from 1904 and set them on the table. Danielle sat down on a chair, while Walt took the second one.

  They each spent the next twenty minutes looking through the newspapers and reading the various articles.

  “Oh my,” Danielle muttered, looking down at the newspaper before her. “I found the article on the fire. There’s a picture of the house. Burned to the ground.”

  Walt stood up and walked around the table to Danielle’s side. He looked down at the newspaper and its grainy black-and-white photograph.

  “I remember that article,” Walt said as he returned to his seat across the table from Danielle.

  “You do?” Danielle frowned.

  “Yes. It tells about the furnace exploding, and how my parents were attempting to carry Maddie out when a beam fell, trapping them.”

  “You were just a little boy when this article came out,” Danielle said.

  “My grandmother kept a copy of it. I found it later in her things, after she died. I remember reading it. It gave me nightmares for days. Such a hellish way to die. But perhaps they were already dead. While no one wants to hear someone might have murdered his parents, I suppose it comforts me to think that perhaps their death wasn’t as horrific as I imagined. Oh, still horrific, but you know what I mean.”

  Danielle looked down at the article and reread it. She flipped the page and found another article discussing the victims. “There’s a picture of your parents with Maddie, taken at a picnic. Maddie was a tiny little thing.”

  “I don’t remember. My only memories of her are going to visit their house with my mother, but she was always in bed.”

  “Your father, he was a tall man,” Danielle said.

  “Yes, I remember that. Of course, I suppose from the perspective of most small boys their fathers are large.”

  Danielle looked up at Walt and said, “I suspect someone staged the scene of the fire.”

  “Why do you say that?”