The Riddles of Hillgate (Z&C Mysteries, #1)

by Zoey Kane

  “So, we are held hostage.”

  “Basically,” Claire admitted.

  “That reminds me.” Zo went over to the bed and rushed to look under. “It’s gone.”

  “They’re very smart… very smart.”

  “Oh dear, I can’t believe this is happening to us.” Her breath was short.

  They hugged for a moment in despair.

  “It’s time to de-riddle the clues,” Claire said.

  FOURTEEN

  “What clues? The Venus, sinking blind dice or whatever…?” Zo asked.

  “Yes, that must be it. Let’s think. Three blind dice. Three blind dice,” Claire repeated.

  “I wonder what these clues lead to. A treasure of some sort?”

  “Most likely, I would say…”

  “Three blind dice,” Zo said.

  “Three blind dice. Maybe we should check in Mr. Fillmore’s drawers for cards and dice,” Claire suggested.

  “Good thinking…”

  They rushed across the hall back to his room, and using their flashlights the best they could, they fumbled through old socks, money clips, belts, long johns, and so forth. No luck. They dumped out every drawer to the armoire and still no luck. “Dead end,” Zo declared.

  “Where else could dice be?” asked Claire.

  “In a game room?” Zo said.

  “But there are just the billiards. Do they ever use dice to play?”

  “It wouldn’t hurt to check.” They ran upstairs and looked all around the room.

  “This is crazy.” Claire sat for a moment. “This madman doesn’t expect us to be up all night trying to find three blind dice, does he?”

  “Darling, I am at a loss of where to look.” She sat with her.

  “This person has let us live here for over two months now and hasn’t endangered our lives,” Claire said.

  “Yes, but he artfully got rid of all the other people, even with a murder. Fanny’s death was not an accident. Whoever it is probably needs us, you know like the message said—‘Find more clues,’” Zo said. “Would you believe this person is a ghost? What if it is Mr. or Mrs. Fillmore’s spirits?”

  “Now stop that, Mother.” Claire rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t deny the chill that went down her spine.

  “But, honey, I am hoping it’s only ghosts. Ghost can’t hurt us, right? And maybe they will be gone in the morning.”

  “Oh, you’ve watched too many episodes of Mystery Night Theater. Ghosts don’t drive cars, and those cars were spick and span with running engines and up-to-date car wax.”

  “You’re right, of course,” Zo said. “I wonder if it’s all right with this intruder if we took a break for tea and thought over our riddle down in the kitchen.”

  “I don’t think it would hurt. Whoever it is hasn’t hurt us so far. They need us to continue on this journey, for whatever reason.”

  “I don’t know. That message to us on the mirror looked pretty threatening to me.”

  Zo got another boost of courage and opened the door to the billiards room, calling out, “We need a break! We are going to have some tea!” She looked at Claire in satisfaction. “There.”

  *

  Two china teacups on saucers sat next to each other on a kitchen counter. Claire went to the cupboard where she had deliberately placed her mint herbal tea about a week ago. Right next to it sat a box of almond tea. The gas stoves still worked when lighting them with a match. “Thank goodness for gas. The electricity being out didn’t take away this bit of comfort,” said Zo.

  “How do you think dice are blind, Mom?”

  The kettle came to a boil rather fast, and a whistle rang out. They didn’t like that sound under these circumstances. They wanted everything to be quieter than their nerves could take.

  Claire carefully poured her mother a cup, and then herself. Zo tried to smile. “Dear, do you mind getting me a teaspoon of sugar just to add a little something?”

  “Sugar in your tea?”

  “Sure. Tonight is a strange night. We will be English with our tea, not Asian. Why not?”

  “I don’t remember buying sugar at the supermarket…”

  “Oh, maybe we didn’t.” She sighed. “Oh, that’s all right.” She remembered back to when they first looked through the kitchen. “Bring me one of the three sugar cubes from that little bowl over there. I’m sure it’s still good, no matter how old.”

  “Like wine, huh?” Claire joked, then went over to the ornate little bowl. She removed the flower-designed lid to reveal the three little sugar cubes. She went to take one, but suddenly the metaphorical light bulb in her head turned on. She stared into the bowl as she carried it to her mother. “Look at them. Look at that!”

  “What is it?!”

  “THREE BLIND DICE! They are white, square, the same size, and they have no eyes, or no black dots!”

  “So, we now found them. What next? Oh, there must be another clue on it somewhere, if this truly is it.” Zo’s heart pounded.

  Claire gingerly took out the sugar cubes and placed them on the table, and then turned the bowl upside down. “Yes, this must be it.”

  “What does it say?” Zo stood up.

  “Sugar and Spice wears everything nice.”

  “We are so good,” Zo congratulated. “Now, we just look through the pantry and spice racks for the next clue.”

  “Wait, Mom. Sugar and spice WEARS everything nice. Do any of the spices wear anything? Is there sugar other than these cubes in the house? No, so, what else?”

  “Puppy dog tails are what little boys are made of, and little girls are made of sugar and spice… But, Mr. Fillmore’s daughter is long dead! Remember how old these clues are?”

  “Mom! Drink your tea and enjoy its warmth. We are going to have to go up to Lilly’s room as soon as we are done. On second thought, let’s take our tea cups with us.”

  A scratching at the mud porch door, also used as the laundry room, startled them. The storm outside had intensified. A few barks through whistling wind let them know it was Gunner, their dog assigned to roam the premises. Claire set down her drink, walked across the kitchen, and went right into the little room, which smelled like detergent. She could see a smeary image of him standing up on his hind feet, begging, through the door’s wet window. He impatiently scratched some more. “It’s too bad his custom dog house isn’t finished being built,” she said loud enough for her mother to hear. “The weather must make him miserable.” Claire stepped over some rotten old floorboards that hadn’t been replaced yet.

  “I’ll feel better having him inside with us anyway,” Zo said.

  Claire unlatched a lock and right as she opened the door, Gunner pushed his way through, and ran into the kitchen, slipping around in excitement.

  “Oh, boy, wet crazy dog. What’s going on, boy?” Zo stayed seated and pet the top of his soaked head. His tongue slapped at his nose and he sneezed before barking some more.

  “Do you think the weather is scaring him?” Claire said just as a thunderclap boomed, vibrating the floors of the mansion.

  All Zo knew was his behavior was adding to the scary feeling of the night’s strange happenings. “He should be used to the weather. It’s normal for the Mid-west.”

  Gunner jumped in a few circles, before running back to the little laundry room, sniffing around it in a frenzy. They shrugged away his odd behavior the best they could, quickly drinking the last of their mint tea. Zo was bringing the empty tea cups over to a sink right when lightning struck and more thunder boomed. Surprised, she dropped them, and they shattered on the ground.

  “Oh, dear,” Zo huffed, still feeling chills lace up and down her spine. The dog barked some more, as she knelt down to pick up the shards with shaking hands.

  Claire was back in the laundry room, petting her frantic dog. “What’s the matter, huh? You want back outside?”

  He shook his head and sneezed again, before giving another bark. The rotted flooring right beneath Claire started to give way to her
weight. It moaned and cracked, before she could give it another thought, and in the next second she fell all the way through, her back smacking against what felt like a mound of sticks. “Ohhh…” She sat up and breathed in the dank and moldy air. Gunner looked down at her, from the jagged hole in the floor, the floor which was now her roof. “Mom!” she called as she rubbed her aching neck. “I fell!” Instead of continuing to bark, Gunner now whimpered, and there was no sign of Mom.

  Claire gripped a couple of the sticks to help gain her balance to stand. When she was halfway up, her sights fell on the mound beneath her.

  Skeletons!!!

  They were all skeletons. Claire screamed. Gunner barked, and circled the hole.

  Claire quickly scrambled off the heap, nearly tripping a few times. Ankle deep in muddy water—the results of the rain’s run-off—she got a good look at the skeletons. The laundry room’s light softly beamed down just enough for her to see most of the bones. There were so many, lying over each other, still in their clothes. Their old-fashioned clothes. All were uniformly dressed in either gray maids’ outfits or black slacks with white shirts. Their hollow eyes stared back at her, as if begging for help.

  She shook the willies off her arms, and took a few more steps back, her breathing becoming shallow. It was such a horrifically bizarre sight. Most still had shoes hanging on their feet bones, as if string-puppets waiting to be taken up to dance. “Mom!” she called again, but this time it barely escaped her throat, coming out pathetically.

  Besides Gunner still whimpering as he pawed at the hole, there was another sound. A frightening sound. Someone other than herself was breathing. “I think there’s someone down here with me,” she uttered.

  Zo finished sweeping up the remaining, tiny shards off the floor, shaking them out of the dustpan and into a trash. “What a mess that was,” she said, but quickly realized she was still alone. She glanced over at the laundry room, and saw Gunner was strangely fixated with the floor, all the while crying his sad sounds.

  A sixth sense told her to hurry over, so she jogged to Gunner, quickly seeing the gaping hole. “Claire?! Claire, dear?! You there?!”

  “Yes!” a shaky voice answered.

  “Are you okay?!”

  Claire took a step back toward the heap of skeletons, them now feeling a thousand times more safe than the breathing in her ear. Her foot hurt, like it was sprained, but that was the last concern on her mind, as she slowly moved away, not daring to look behind her.

  A man’s voice whispered, “Did you… break somethinnnng?” And then louder, “Do you hurrrt?”

  “Mom!” Claire said. “I’m not okay. Someone’s here with me!”

  “Just a sec, honey! I’ll get something to help you out.”

  Claire couldn’t help it—she had to glance over her shoulder, to face the man. She took a deep breath, and slowly looked. He stood in the dark shadows, his beady eyes seeming to smile at her… and not in a good way. He said, “You better solve the puzzle, Claaaaire.”

  “I’m sending Gunner down! Whoever’s with you better cry home to their mama!” With that warning, the dog was thrust down into the hole, his sharp teeth already chomping, ready to tear into the fiend.

  The man disappeared. Gunner shot past her, into the blackness. The Doberman sloshed through the dirty water fiercely as he barked his threats. Claire stepped around the skeletons, and looked up, seeing her mother’s fear in her eyes.

  “You okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m okay. How am I going to get out of here? There’s a pile of skeletons with me. Do you see them?”

  Zo ducked her head down the hole, and scanned the area. “Yes. It’s Fillmore’s servants, hon. Let me see if I can get something for you to climb out of there. Just a sec.”

  Claire pulled her cell phone out of her pocket. It still showed no reception. The storm was more fierce than she imagined, even preventing her state-of-the-art smart phone from calling out. She imagined a service tower having been hit by lightning. A sudden thought came to mind, and she flicked around her cell’s screen, until a bright light beamed out from its camera. She felt some relief over remembering that little trick; she didn’t need a literal flashlight, after all.

  Claire flashed it around, and saw the man and the dog were both completely out of sight. It seemed she was in some sort of cellar, and the farther down the way, the dryer the floor. She stepped along, until she saw dusty footprints and smeared paw prints from the chase. “I hope he got you!” she growled, thinking of her dog clamping his teeth into the man and not letting go.

  She spoke too soon. Gunner squeezed himself through a little opening off to the side, coming back far too soon to check on his owner. He trotted right over, put his wet paws up on her, and licked her hand that went to pet him.

  “I’m okay. I’m okay. Where’d the bad man go? Where’d he go?”

  Gunner just gave a whimper, and then licked her some more.

  Zo called down again. “Honey, I can’t find anything long enough to rescue you with. I’m still searching! I’d drop a chair down for you to step onto at least, but you are too far down.”

  “Okay, Mom!”

  Gunner wagged his tail and trotted back over to the spot he had slid back through, to inside the cellar. He barked, as if to say, “See, Mommy—a way out!”

  Claire stepped closer to inspect. It was a narrow window, broken open, except there were no sharp pieces of glass anywhere. The glass was missing. She peeked through it, still using the beam of her cell phone to see better, and all she could make out were leaves to a large bush. She stuck her hand through, and moved the plant a bit, seeing rain pelt the earth. In the far distance was the outhouse. “I can get out here.” Claire felt a surge of exhilaration.

  Zo opened the kitchen’s back door for her drenched and dirty daughter. Quickly, she went over to the oven and pulled a dish towel off, for Claire to at least be able to wipe her face and hair drier. Gunner sat at their feet, wagging his bobbed tail back and forth.

  “That was so scary!” Zo said, rubbing Claire’s back.

  “I hate to break it to you, Mom,” Claire finished rubbing the towel through her hair and tossed it in a sink, “but things are still scary. We have to solve the riddles, and right away. The man was down there with me. He threatened me. He knows this house so much better than we do, Mom. He was with me, in the darkness, in the blink of an eye. This is freaking me out.”

  Zo embraced her daughter for a moment. “So we need to think about the last riddle again. ‘Sugar and spice wears everything nice.’ Weren’t we going to head to Lilly’s? Her possibly being the ‘sugar and spice’ the riddle is talking about?”

  *

  The Kanes stood in the middle of Lilly Fillmore’s room, when they heard the front door slam down stairs. They ran and looked over the banister. “Just as I expected, Mom—no one.”

  “He didn’t come in, because there are no wet footprints. Whoever it was, went out! We have to figure out that clue as fast as we can. If our madman ran outside, instead of staying to watch us find the next clue, he must have figured something out before us!”

  “Mother, we have looked at everything in that room before now and stared at her picture long enough. If he knows, we need to follow HIM. Let’s go!”

  FIFTEEN

  Both mother and daughter opened the front door to the relentless rain. Their nightgowns whipped in multiple directions with the confused wind.

  They could still see the dark figure, heading further and further from Hillgate, and away from the paved path, sloshing through the wet wilderness. Pretty soon they were going uphill. Zo’s lungs worked extra hard, breathing in the wet rain. The women occasionally stumbled over the riotous earth, but it didn’t slow them down. The moon was casting a continuous light on the figure.

  The silhouette suddenly stopped and turned around, as if it knew it was being followed. It had a slight hunch and was carrying something.

  “Get down.” Claire fell to the ground and pulled on her
mother’s waist. She obeyed instantly.

  They lay in the cold mud, watching him. Thunder clapped and lighting zigzagged, illuminating the gray sky. In that moment, they caught a glimpse of the shadow’s face, which had a hollow deathly appearance, like a skeleton ghost.

  “Maybe this was a bad idea,” Claire confessed, as she shivered. Claire’s pretty brown hair was matted to her face as streams of water poured down her pale face in the moonlight.

  “I can barely see, but I think he could be holding a shovel.”

  The figure walked around a radius of ten feet, pushing at the ground with his feet. Claire and Zo slithered along the mud like snakes after their prey. “Let’s head for that tree stump, over there,” Claire said. Reaching that tree stump would make them much closer, and it would be a better hiding place.

  “After we find out what he is doing out here, then we will decide what we will do,” Claire whispered. “So, for now just be patient, Mom. No running at him!”

  They reached the stump. They noticed what he was carrying was a shovel. He found the spot in the earth he was looking for and proceeded to dig. With every strike, Claire and Zo heard the grunt and suction of the shovel loosening a load of mud. He slung the mounds of mud, one after the other, as fast as he could, behind him.

  “I say,” Zo whispered, “we confront him. We know where the treasure is. Right there, where he is digging.”

  “Mother, patience is a virtue. Just hold back a little longer.”

  They watched and waited, peeking from behind the crooked old stump, as the heap of mud grew higher and higher. Claire guesstimated the heap was about three feet tall by three feet wide.

  Zo’s right knee set onto a twig, causing it to crack. The sound echoed above the rain, across the night sky. Zo and Claire clenched their jaws and tightly shut their eyes in fear. The grunting of the shovel stopped. Claire slowly peeked back around the stump and saw the shadowed face. The gaunt hollows of the eyes searched for the source of the sound. Zo could hear her breathing. It was loud and was sure to give them away, she thought. But it didn’t; the rain was louder, and the man continued his digging up of the earth.