Necessary Evil

by Killarney Traynor

  Chapter 12:

  Once she started, it didn’t seem like Aunt Susanna would stop talking. I grew stiff in my chair, one of my legs went numb, and my whole body ached for sleep, but I didn’t want to leave her alone. Several times I thought to interrupt, but whenever I opened my mouth, Aunt Susanna would start down a new track and I would find myself listening, fascinated in spite of myself.

  She started at the beginning, all right: she began with Alexander’s birth, his ancestry, and his mother’s remarriage to Obadiah Chase, an upright citizen who adopted the boy, gave him his name, yet never really liked him much. She told him about the boy’s strict upbringing, about his mischievous nature and the stories people would tell of his childish escapades with his friend, Reuben Hill. She told the story about their pranking the minister, how they’d run away and took a boat down the Exeter until Obadiah caught up with them. She spoke about how much both he and Mary Chase, his mother, loved to read, riding miles out of their way to pick up newspapers or to borrow books.

  She talked as though Alexander was someone she’d known personally, a boy who was like the son she’d never had but probably longed for, and she spoke with a quiet, desperate eloquence that took my breath away. Alexander Chase was not a dusty historical figure with a checkered past: he was a man who lived, breathed, and was loved. I listened, my wonder growing. I’d always assumed that it was Uncle Michael’s pet project – now I saw that she had been equally involved.

  Randall didn’t interrupt or ask questions. He nodded, jotted down notes, and listened. If he was impressed by her knowledge, he didn’t show it; if anything, he looked almost satisfied, as though he was getting exactly what he’d expected.

  Then, when Aunt Susanna looked about ready to wind down and I was thinking about my comfortable bed, he blinked through his large glasses.

  “Excellent,” he said. “Now, tell me about his family.”

  So she started in again.

  She knew them very well. Mary Welles Chase lost her first husband from undisclosed causes when Alexander was only a few weeks old, and married Obadiah about six months later. She was an educated woman, well regarded and lovely, but Aunt Susanna thought that Mary may have been talked into marrying Obadiah, a wealthy farmer with a leadership position in his local church. By all accounts, their marriage was perfectly respectable, but there was no indication of love on either side.

  “I think she made the best of a bad deal,” my aunt said pensively, while I found myself imagining bright, dark-haired Mary Chase, living alone in the middle of a rough New Hampshire farm, trying to adjust to the verbose and vigorous Obadiah and his little boy. “Both of them were widowed, both needed help. I don’t think Obadiah was unkind – well, I don’t think he hit her, but he never really took to Alexander, and how can a woman love a man who won’t love her son?”

  Aunt Susanna didn’t seem to like Obadiah much, so she went on to Avery, his son. Six months older than Alexander. Avery was more interesting: a reputed loner and skinflint who had never married, he died alone in the fields, still looking for a long-forgotten treasure. Despite pressure from others in the town, he’d not only refused to join the New Hampshire regiment, but actually paid for a replacement when he was drafted. That Avery would part with coin for anything was enough to excite talk in a town already overly familiar with Chase family affairs.

  “No one knew about the robbery until long after Alexander died,” Aunt Susanna said, eying the cell phone as though it would judge her accuracy. “It was only after the war ended that anyone knew about it.”

  “When was it reported?” Randall asked.

  “Um… April 1865?”

  Aunt Susanna looked to me for confirmation and I shrugged. Memorizing dates had never been my strong suit.

  “I mean,” Randall clarified, “when did the McInnis family report the robbery to the authorities? In Charleston.”

  “Oh, I don’t know! We’d have to go look at the court records for that.”

  “You’ve got those?”

  “Copies, yes. Michael and I…” Her voice faltered for a moment, but she continued. “We went down there for a long weekend. He got the copies then, read them all on the way home. I’m sure they’re in the office somewhere. Maddie will find them for you.”

  “So you got the court records from the lawsuit – did you get anything else?”

  She considered it briefly, then shook her head. “No, I think that was it. Well, that and the death certificates for Mr. McInnis and a few others. I don’t think there was anything else.”

  “All right. Hold on a second.”

  He shuffled through his things, then bent down and rummaged around in the bag at his feet.

  I checked my watch and saw that it was after eleven. I had an early morning, as usual, and I was about to suggest we stop until tomorrow when Randall popped up with Uncle Michael’s coffee table book in his hands. It was more battered since I’d seen it last, and sticky notes had sprouted from the top of its pages.

  He dropped it on the counter and pulled it open at one of the sticky notes, commenting, “Now, I need you two to fill in some blank spaces in this, if you can. A very helpful book, but it lacks references and sources. Your husband had a passion for family history, Mrs. Chase, but he was no scientist.” He paused for effect. “Now, according to this, Alexander Chase went to work for McInnis in June of 1859. Where did he get that date from?”

  “Where did he get it?” she faltered and I stepped in with, “What difference does that make? That he worked for McInnis was never in question. What made him leave is. What he did with the loot is.”

  “My dear Madeleine,” he said condescendingly, “when one sets out to solve a mystery, it’s important to make sure that you have all the dates and movements correct. I’ll admit, it’s unlikely that this particular fact will mean much in the overall investigation, but its source might prove to have other, more valuable information.”

  “Investigation? Mystery?” I asked. “I thought this was a treasure hunt, not an Agatha Christie. Aren’t you supposed to be scanning the ground with metal detectors, or analyzing soil content for South Carolinian traces?”

  “Later, perhaps,” Randall said. “But I have a rule – never get your hands dirty until you know exactly what you’re looking for. Now, Mrs. Chase,” he turned back to Aunt Susanna, who was listening to this exchange wide-eyed. “Do you know where your husband got this information? It’s too specific for me to imagine that it was just a guess.”

  She stared at the page with the look of a student who discovered too late that they studied for the wrong test. “That particular date?” she asked. “Gosh, I don’t know… Mary’s diary maybe?”

  Randall choked.

  “Mary’s diary?” he gasped. “Alexander’s mother left a diary?”

  “Yes, didn’t you know?”

  “Know? How could I know? It’s not listed in any of the source material.” He shuffled through his things for a manic moment, then gave us an accusing look. “Why is it not listed in any of the source material? It wasn’t on that show, or on any of the websites. Maddox never even mentioned it!”

  I winced at the name as I said, “It doesn’t have any bearing on the treasure hunt. Her last entry is in 1860, when she fell ill. That’s over a year before the theft.”

  “It wouldn’t help find it,” Aunt Susanna said, and gain us both another disgusted look.

  “Oh, totally useless,” he agreed, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “Except as background information. Except as a witness to the character of our proponent. Except as a window into a past we can only guess from our distance. This diary could contain the very clue that the hymns failed to provide! I can’t believe that no one thought of this! I credited you all with a sort of native intelligence in your field, but perhaps…”

  “Mark Dulles said the same thing,” Aunt Susanna said. Her eyes were flashing: apparently, Randall wasn’t getting under only my skin. “He read it cover to cover, hoping to find a clue, too.
He even quoted it during the show, but I think they cut it.”

  She looked to me and I nodded in confirmation. “They did. They wanted another shot of the magnificent Mrs. Bryant.”

  “Who is she?” Randall asked.

  “She was the best looking rider in the stables, present company excepted,” I said. “But she left when – after the accident.”

  “Good riddance,” my aunt grumbled.

  “So Dulles read the diary,” Randall said. “Did he find anything?”

  “No,” I said flatly. “He gave it back and said that it was ‘delightful’. He was a rather irritating man, too.”

  He ignored me. “Is it here? Mary’s diary?”

  Aunt Susanna nodded. “Yes, it is. All of Michael’s materials are in the safe in the office, along with his notes to the book. He wouldn’t throw away anything and neither did I. You’re welcome, of course, to look at everything.” She stifled a yawn and looked at the clock.

  Randall nodded, looking pleased. “Does that include the letter Michael found? The Secessionville letter?”

  This had direct bearing on the treasure. The last known letter of Alexander Chase, the ‘Clue Letter’, was dated just days before the battle of Secessionville, where he was killed in 1862. It had been lost until about six years ago, when Uncle Michael discovered it tucked into an old book in the attic.

  Joe Tremonti’s dig had given Uncle Michael a taste for historical research, and his discovery of the letter was the first domino in the succession of events that resulted in where we were today, for it was there that we first had what seemed to be evidence that Alexander knew of the treasure. It was Uncle Michael who first read into the letter and saw a clue. Unfortunately, like most of the clues in this “case”, as Randall liked to refer to it, it had led nowhere.

  “That,” I said stiffly, “is in the safety deposit box along with the Beaumont letter.”

  As soon as I said the name, I wished I hadn’t. Aunt Susanna, obviously fatigued, suddenly straightened up and looked at Randall.

  “Speaking of which,” she said. “I’ve been thinking about that. Someone went through a great deal of trouble to create that letter and make us stop looking for the treasure. Who’s to say that they haven’t already found it and made off with it?”

  “Aunt Susanna,” I managed through my suddenly dry mouth. “They can’t have found it. They’re still looking for it.”

  “Someone is still digging,” she corrected. “It doesn’t follow that our trespasser is the forger as well. What do you think, Professor?”

  My heart began pounding in my chest. Randall leaned over the counter, chin on hand, and studied my aunt through narrowed lids. He didn’t look at me as he spoke slowly: “I think it unlikely that anyone has found the treasure. If the McInnis report is to be believed, there are some very distinctive pieces among the collection and none have been found on the market yet.”

  “Would you know?” I couldn’t resist asking.

  “I’ve put out the word that I’m interested. I’ll be told if something turns up.”

  Randall spoke with a finality that was impressive. I thought, No way he has contacts that thorough, but I didn’t push it. The answer seemed to satisfy Aunt Susanna - but before I could relax, she asked another question.

  “But shouldn’t we expose the Beaumont letter as a fraud? Someone caused us to mislead people, including poor Professor Maddox. I’d hate to think that they’re going to get away with it.”

  Her eyes narrowed as she spoke and I fought a sudden, intense urge to run away.

  Randall spoke again.

  “I understand how you feel,” he said. “But exposing the fraud right now will only bring unwanted attention, and hamper the investigation. Besides, it would be embarrassing to admit that you were taken in by such an obvious fake. It’d be much better to release the information once we’ve discovered the treasure or at least solved the mystery of the McInnis robbery. Then we’ll have a triumph to take the edge off.”

  I stared at him in disbelief. He avoided my gaze, and Aunt Susanna - oblivious to my shock - pressed with the question: “Solved the McInnis case? What do you mean?”

  Now his eyes lit up and he leaned forward. “I mean that for all this research your husband did, we’re still not absolutely certain what happened in Charleston in 1861. The story goes that Alexander Chase went to work for McInnis and met Beaumont, a drifter with a gambling habit. It’s not much of a surprise that he and Chase would become friends. But Alexander was an abolitionist with the wanderlust and McInnis was a rabid secessionist with a habit of financially dabbling in politics. Would McInnis, the well-to-do up-and-comer, have ever invited Chase, his Yankee employee, into his house?”

  “I doubt it,” I said. “Why even ask the question?”

  “Because if he didn’t, how would Chase and Beaumont have known where and what to steal?” Randall asked. He dove for his papers, shuffled through them, then shoved the stack in front of me.

  “That,” he said, as Aunt Susanna leaned in to look, “is the list of items the McInnis family claimed were stolen: family spoons, heritage jewelry, a couple of silver candlesticks, and a few valuable nick-knacks. No cash, no coin. Not only that, but these weren’t even the ‘good’ silverware and candlesticks that McInnis family owned at the time.”

  He pulled out a scanned reprint of handwritten ledger pages, stapled together at the top corner, and flipped through them quickly before throwing it on top of the robbery report. He jabbed a finger at a highlighted line.

  “See that?” he demanded.

  We looked. In elegant scrawl, the words, Parlor: candlesticks, French, wrought gold, small, were highlighted in green.

  “What is this?” I asked, fingering the paper.

  “This is an inventory of household goods made by Mary Anna McInnis, the spinster daughter and housekeeper of Mr. McInnis in the early months of 1861,” Randall explained. “A friend of mine in Charleston found it for me. Mary Anna McInnis logged everything, including the missing items, and listed their estimated value. Why she did this, I don’t know, except perhaps she’d heard the war rumors and wanted to know exactly what she had to protect. Whatever the cause, if she didn’t exaggerate - and there’s no reason to think she did - this list proves that they had gold candlesticks.”

  He said this triumphantly. A glance from my aunt told me I wasn’t the only one who was baffled.

  “So they had gold candlesticks,” I said. “What does that prove?”

  “It doesn’t prove anything, Warwick, but it does raise the question. Chase and Beaumont break into a house to steal from their hated employer, take the silver candles sticks, and leave the gold behind. Why?”

  There was a moment of quiet.

  Then Aunt Susanna guessed, “They were locked up?”

  Randall shook his head. “According to this inventory – Ms. McInnis was very thorough - the gold candlesticks were kept in the parlor with the knick-knacks, showing off the owner’s wealth and station. If the thieves were already in the room taking the bric-a-brac, why not snag the candlesticks at the same time?”

  He put his hand up to stop my objection. “I know what you are going to say: maybe there was some rearranging after this list was made. Maybe Mr. McInnis decided to put the candlesticks in his safe or in his room. That could be. But look at the jewelry. There is twice as much listed on Mary Anna’s inventory than there was reported missing from the robbery. What was stolen was valuable, but old – Mary Anna’s grandmother’s, presumably –but there was newer, more fashionable pieces, worth much more. They were listed as….”

  He pulled the inventory out of my hands, turned a few pages, and showed us more highlighted lines. In the same elegant handwriting, someone had listed broaches, necklaces, bracelets, rings, and pins, with varying descriptions, sizes, and prices. Next to all of them, where the cataloger listed the location, was the word: Mistress’ Bedroom, Chinese Bureau, locked.

  I looked at Randall. He was grinning as though
he’d just let me in on a secret.

  “They were all in the same place,” he said, his voice dropping to a husky whisper. “A locked Chinese box in Mary Anna’s bedroom. The new jewelry mixed with the old, yet only the old was taken. Now, if you were two men, breaking into a house to rob it, would you take the time to pick through the jewelry? Take the locket and leave the garnet necklace? Ignore the gold candlesticks in favor the silver ones? Pocket half the knick-knacks, but leave the rest, all of which are in plain sight?”

  “There’s a million reasons why they would,” I pointed out. “Maybe they didn’t see the gold candlesticks. Maybe Mary Anna was wearing the garnet necklace that night.”

  It was a weak argument and we both knew it. For whatever reason, he didn’t choose to push that particular point.

  “There is another question,” he said, taking the papers back. “I’ve read some of the court papers from the lawsuit. Jarrod Carroll was the attorney for the McInnis family, and he was a most thorough man. Both Mary Anna and Mr. McInnis were dead when the law suit was brought to court, so he had to bring in a lot of outside testimony from friends, workers, business contacts, etc. One of those was the warehouse overseer, Greer, who directed both Beaumont and Chase in their day-to-day work. He didn’t like either man very much. According to him, Beaumont and Chase argued with McInnis violently, and Chase threatened to ‘smash his head’. McInnis was going to fire him, but never got the chance. The very next day, according to Greer, Chase left without notice. Just packed his things and disappeared.”

  He paused, I supposed for dramatic emphasis again. I sighed and checked my watch.

  “It’s generally agreed that McInnis and Chase hated each other, that Chase and Beaumont stole the stuff in order to get back at him,” I said. “What you just said tends to prove it, don’t you think?”

  “No, I don’t,” he said. “Let’s say the stories are true, that Beaumont and Chase get fed up. They know war is coming, so they sneak into the house, steal the second-best candlesticks, and leave McInnis, gloating that they’d one-upped their employer. That would work splendidly – perhaps they were just simply ignorant and thought the old jewelry was prettier than the newer stuff. It could be. But if it was, why does the overseer report that only Chase took off that day? Why doesn’t he say Chase and Beaumont?”