Foul Play on Words

by Becky Clark

  “Oh. That sounds … unpleasant,” I said.

  “Not at all. I waited years before someone stepped aside so I could take their job.” Clementine must have seen the confusion on my face because she sighed again. “It’s a coveted position to be in the inner sanctum of volunteers. Perks without works. Food poisoning seems to be our way in.” She indicated Lily and Orville.

  Orville smiled vaguely. I wasn’t sure he knew what was going on, but Lily nodded emphatically. “I’m so proud that Viv called me to help! Aren’t you?” she asked Clementine.

  Clementine maintained her mask of ennui, but I could tell she felt the same as Lily. “Meh. I just wish she were here. Viv makes a lot of people mad, but she solves problems. But I guess it probably sucks to have food poisoning.”

  I was still processing the statement that Viv made lots of people mad, so didn’t think before I said, “Viv doesn’t have food poisoning.”

  Ugh. Now I’d have to come up with some other reason why Viv wasn’t at the conference. She didn’t want me to mention the kidnapping but she didn’t have food poisoning. Wait. Why didn’t Viv have food poisoning if all of her key volunteers got it?

  Lily rescued me by telling Clementine that Viv was probably busy with all of her other volunteer activities.

  “What else does Viv volunteer for?” I asked, glad for the change of topic.

  Lily ticked them off with her fingers. “Reads to the blind. Teaches Sunday school. Tutors at a middle school. And her nonprofit, of course.”

  Orville had returned to adjusting the Velcro on his shoes. Riiiiiip. Was this his first experience with the magic that was Velcro? Did he have OCD? Was he bored?

  I tried to ignore another irritating riiiip. “Nonprofit?”

  “I don’t know much about it—” Lily began.

  “It’s called Strength in Numbers,” Clementine said. “It teaches people to write fundraising appeals and how to organize letter-writing campaigns.”

  “For what?” I asked.

  “All kinds of groups ask for their help. Neighborhood groups. People who don’t want fracking. Parents fighting with the school board.”

  Orville piped up from his bent-over position. “Basically Little Guys trying to protect themselves from Big Guys.”

  I pulled a small notebook from my bag and jotted “Strength in Numbers” to remind myself to look it up online later. I’d never heard Viv mention it. Circling it with my pen, I noticed the acronym was SIN.

  Relieved I hadn’t had to make up a lie about why Viv was going to be absent from her own conference this weekend, I asked Orville how things were coming with the registration problem.

  “Still broken.” Riiiiip.

  “What did they say about it? Is it a server problem? Software? Hardware? What?”

  He sat up straight. “Didn’t say.”

  “Wait. They didn’t say or you didn’t ask?”

  “Yep.” He motioned to Lily’s closed laptop and she slid it toward him. He opened the lid and slid it back to her. “Where’s that place …?”

  I felt my eyes bug. “You mean the website? The registration website?”

  “I’ve got it right here.” Lily clicked some keys and slid it back to Orville.

  He looked at the screen, turned it so I could see, and then turned it back in front of himself. He hovered a finger over the keyboard and glanced at Lily for confirmation. When she nodded, he pressed a key and peered at the screen.

  Lily grinned up at me. “Orville is a genius with computers. Before he retired he was an expert in Excel!”

  “So I hear.”

  Orville kept his eyes on the laptop but nodded in acknowledgment of his accomplishment.

  He clicked a couple more keys. “People have been emailing and saying they’ve been billed twice. And a few people who’ve registered in the last day or so are telling me they’ve been charged $3,999.”

  “Four thousand dollars?”

  “Glad I got my fees comped,” Clementine said.

  “I am almost positive this conference does not cost four grand,” I said.

  Lily solemnly agreed.

  “Can I see?” I asked Orville.

  He slid the laptop toward me and I saw he was in the backroom administration area of the registration website, not the place where people would go to register for the conference. That he’d managed to get there was a good sign, I thought. I went to a different page, which showed the number of people who had registered, along with the money deposited directly into the Stumptown Writers’ Conference online bank account.

  I couldn’t make sense of what I was seeing. Every time I looked at the number of registrants, it fluctuated wildly, like there was a chimpanzee spinning a number wheel. “This makes no sense,” I said, scrolling through the pages. “There’s gotta be something wrong on their end.” I slid the computer back to Orville. “You have to call their tech support and figure this out. We need to know how many people are going to show up here on Friday and how much money we have. And if people have been overcharged, where is that money? Is it real money in the account or is it fake numbers on the screen?” I started to hyperventilate a bit. “You have to call them.”

  “Can’t,” Clementine said.

  “Why no—”

  She tapped the oversized pocket watch dangling from her belt. “After six. Closed.”

  “Tech support is usually twenty-four hours—”

  “Nope.” Orville squinted at the screen. “Eight a.m. until four p.m. Eastern time. I’ll call tomorrow. Figure it out.” He stretched and gathered his things. Lily and Clementine did the same.

  I wished I had his confidence. That left one day until the conference began. I looked around the room, knowing there was much to be done, but I didn’t feel comfortable asking them to stay and work. Especially when I really had no idea what specifically needed to be accomplished. I’d been to many writers’ conferences before, but I regretted not asking Viv for a list of the important things that needed to be done. Seemed like a no-brainer. You know. In retrospect.

  I waved them out the door and let Lily hug me on her way out. When they were gone, I systematically worked my way around the room looking in each box and bag, finally determining that much of it was the swag that belonged in the tote that each attendee received upon checking in for the conference.

  I cleared a table, then set up piles of the swag I’d found in the various boxes and bags—pens with the Stumptown Writers’ Conference logo, small composition books for note-taking in the workshops, individually wrapped assorted hard candies and mints, bookmarks, and the conference brochure listing all the faculty and workshops.

  Green reusable totes with the conference logo imprinted in white were stacked high at the end of a table. Placing my left arm through the handles of as many as would fit, I carried them to the table where I’d set out the swag. I shuffled around the table, one bag at a time, grabbing each item of swag and systematically, methodically, hypnotically dropping it in. In the corner of the room nearest the table, I stockpiled the loaded bags as neatly as possible, handles all pointing in one direction to make it easy to carry them out to the registration desk early Friday morning.

  Shuffling around the table, I was bent at an angle that would make my chiropractor cringe. I could hear him now. “Charlee, you’re over thirty now. Take care of yourself.” But this job needed to be done. Filling ten bags hurt my back. Twenty more made me dizzy. And by fifty, I was ready to quit. This was going to be a long evening.

  Just when I’d talked myself into a visit to the hotel bar, my phone rang.

  “Viv! What’s going on? Any news about Hanna?”

  “No. But the message you left earlier said you were in? You’re going to help find Hanna?”

  Viv sounded exhausted, so instead of telling her about the conversation I’d overheard with Jack and the mystery girl
and his denial that he knew Hanna, I simply said, “Yes. Whatever you need me to do.” I’d tell her about Jack when I knew something concrete.

  “Thanks, Charlee. I wish I knew what to do.” She took a deep, shuddery breath and I knew she’d been crying. My heart broke for her.

  Neither of us spoke for a few moments. Then Viv said wearily, “So, tell me about the conference prep. Everything okay?”

  “Um … well, I found all the freebies and I’m putting them in the bags.”

  “By yourself ? That’ll take all night!”

  “Nah, it’s fine.” I rolled my shoulders and neck. “It was late so I sent the volunteers home. They’ll be here bright and early tomorrow to help fix the—” Oops. I hadn’t intended to tell her about the problems we were having.

  “What? Fix the what?”

  “Ah, it’s nothing.”

  “I don’t believe you. Tell me.” The exhaustion in her voice turned to panic.

  “First, you have to promise to stay calm. We have everything under control.”

  “If you don’t tell me right now, I’ll—”

  “Fine. There was this little problem with double-booking of the conference rooms.”

  “Another conference was booked at the same time as ours?”

  “Kind of … it’s a dog agility competition.”

  “A what?”

  “Dog agility. They jump over things and crawl through things—”

  “In a hotel?”

  “It’s a long story. But the hotel is working on it.” I should have checked on their progress earlier. “I’m sure we’ll be able to cross that off our list tomorrow.”

  “Your list? You have a list of problems?”

  “Not problems, exactly …” Oh, who was I kidding? We had problems and I decided to come clean with Viv. She couldn’t help, but maybe she had ideas for me. “Okay, yes. We have problems. The dogs, for one. And the chef was fired.”

  “What? Why?”

  “I don’t know, but his staff seems … capable. And they’re on it. He left his notes about the conference food.”

  “Oh, geez. Is that all?”

  “I wish.” I clamped a hand over my mouth.

  “Tell me.” Viv’s voice was back to sounding exhausted.

  “Computer glitch with the online registration provider. It’s billing people twice when they register. Unless it charges them four grand.”

  Viv remained silent, taking in all the bad news, I assumed.

  “Viv? You still there?”

  “Charlee, I’ve gotta go. Thanks for taking care of everything.”

  Taking care of everything? She must have had a different definition than I did.

  And she’d hung up before I could ask if she had hired the guy in the white shirt and paisley tie. I sent her a text, then pocketed my phone and moved back to the swag table. At least rote activity wouldn’t tax my brain.

  I reached for more tote bags, but a memory stopped me mid-air. When I did a beta read for Viv’s most recent book, she’d told me that she needed my critique in a hurry so she could push the book through production to get the rest of her advance. Something about her screwing up her quarterly taxes and owing the IRS.

  Viv had been quick to end our conversation after I told her about the registration money. I boomeranged to an impossible thought that I tried to tamp down, push away, ignore. But I couldn’t.

  Was the kidnapping just some elaborate ruse to embezzle money from the conference? Was I being used?

  Six

  After Viv’s call, I talked myself back into a visit to the hotel bar. I made my way to the lobby, where I saw a commotion out of the corner of my eye. I expected it to involve one of the dogs and was surprised to see the guy in the white shirt and paisley tie grab Clementine’s arm. I gaped as she shook him off and marched away from him. He followed her and I wondered about their relationship. They certainly didn’t look friendly. I suddenly had the overwhelming sense that he had something to do with the kidnapping or whatever was going on. Which meant that Clementine did too.

  I had a terrible thought that shook me to my core. Maybe he was the kidnapper. And maybe Clementine was in danger.

  I hurried after them, no plan in mind other than finding them, or at least Clementine.

  Racing around the hallway, I poked my head in all the conference rooms. Unsuccessful, all I could think to do was travel the big square of conference rooms again, finally ending at the Clackamas Room. I opened the door again, poked my head in, and saw everything exactly as I had left it.

  Not knowing where else to look, I closed the workroom door and turned in time to see the guy in the white shirt and paisley tie exiting a hidden hallway door. Alone. I hadn’t noticed it before, even though I’d passed it several times. It was covered with the same wallpaper as the wall. The only thing that distinguished it from the wall was a practically invisible recessed handle, and even that was painted to match the wall.

  I froze. What was behind that door? Did it lead to Hanna? Was Clementine now with her?

  I knew I needed a plan, but had no time to think of a good one. So I settled for saying, “Hey. Are you here for the conference? One of the volunteers?” As if seeing it for the first time, I gestured to the hidden door. “Oh, where does that door go?”

  He didn’t respond, just cut his eyes both ways and scurried away like an enormous cockroach. As soon as he was out of sight, I yanked open the hidden door and immediately pulled it shut behind me.

  As my eyes adjusted to the dim light dribbling from a bulb in a wire cage high on the wall, I checked my phone battery. After all the time I’d spent using it today, I was down to 33 percent. I deployed my flashlight app and waved my phone around the short hallway. Surely there was a light switch somewhere.

  Maybe somewhere. But not here.

  My eyes had adjusted a bit, so I shut down my phone to save the battery and tiptoed down the stairs, keeping one hand on the wall for safety. As I got to the bottom, I stopped and listened for any sound that might guide me toward Clementine. I turned to the left, because it seemed as good a choice as any. I made my way through the labyrinth of the hotel basement, stopping every so often to listen for something, anything, to make me feel more confident I might find her.

  Suddenly a beam of light danced behind me. I watched in horror as it grew bigger. Whoever held that flashlight was coming closer.

  I hurried forward, my left hand feeling the way ahead along the wall about waist-high. If there was a doorknob, I needed to find it, and fast.

  I didn’t even need to glance behind me to see the light from the flashlight bounce around me. I was just beyond its reach, but not for much longer. I broke into a trot. Footsteps thudded behind me.

  My thumb jammed into a doorknob and I cried out in surprise. I clamped my hand over my mouth and stumbled the few steps back to the door. I yanked it open and flung myself inside, closing it quickly and, I hoped, quietly behind me.

  I leaned with my back to the closed door, listening for the footsteps and waiting impatiently for my eyes to adjust to the pitch black. I opened them as wide as I could, willing my pupils to speed into night vision mode. My heavy breathing sounded like a freight train and I took a deep breath and held it, hoping whoever was following me would pass right on by.

  As I held my breath, I heard the footsteps stop outside. Light from a flashlight danced under the door at my feet.

  Seven

  I took a chance and turned on my flashlight app, quickly scanning the small room, taking care to steady my light high on the wall so it wouldn’t bleed under the door. Stacks and stacks of boxes, all with bright white labels marked Kitchen. I clawed at one on the top of the stack nearest me, which was held closed not by tape but by the flaps of the box. I popped it open, only to find it empty. I tore open the box next to it. Also empty.

  I glanced a
t the base of the door and saw the light growing dim, as if the person had moved down the hallway. They didn’t know I was in here! I scurried across the room and opened another box.

  Aha! This one was full of pots and pans. I dug out a wobbly-handled skillet, shoved my phone in my pocket, and waited behind the door. Relief flooded me as I watched and listened. The light and the footsteps faded to almost nothing. I slowly let out a breath, then sucked it in again as the light grew brighter and bolder under the door.

  I clenched my fists around the handle of the skillet, planted my feet in a wide stance, and choked up on it like it was the bat my dad gave me when he taught me how to play baseball.

  The doorknob turned slowly.

  The door opened inch by agonizing inch.

  I crouched down into my stance and bounced lightly, skillet up next to my ear.

  Bring it.

  Light blinded me and I swung wildly through the air. I swung again immediately and connected on the backswing.

  The flashlight dropped. There was a thud that made my stomach lurch and I saw, illuminated in the eerie glow, a paisley tie rippled on the floor.

  I scrabbled for the flashlight and shined it directly into the man’s face. He raised one arm to cover his eyes. He crossed his chest with his other arm and rubbed the arm he was using to shield his eyes.

  Simultaneously, I was relieved and dismayed that I hadn’t conked him upside the head. Still shining his flashlight into his eyes, I grilled him like he was a Soviet spy. “Why are you here? Where is Clementine? Is she down here somewhere? Where’s Hanna? Are they together?”

  He didn’t respond. Just squinted with his arm across his face.

  I took a threatening step toward him. “Well?”

  Still no answer.

  I thought I had the upper hand, but maybe I didn’t. My arm holding the skillet began to tire. Both hands began to sweat and shake, part tremor, part fatigue. Keeping the light in his eyes, I sidled around him toward the door, knowing I could make a run for it if I had to.