by Zoey Kane
*
The family made room for Theona, adding another chair to their horseshoe seating. For several minutes they spoke sympathetically, after which, Aloise took the maid’s hand and tenderly stroked it. “How long you been a Quaker, dearie?” she asked.
Theona giggled in a high-stressed tone. “My uniform,” she said to the others.
“Now that we’re all seated together again,” Penny said, at the center of them all, “do we have any other concerns after this most unfortunate event?”
“Are the Kanes, B.B., and the maid—I mean, Theona—in on the treasure hunt?” Gavier’s face was tight, his eyes shifting between them.
“Just Theona, cousin,” Penny said. “And it would have been an opportunity for Mr. Procter too. The will mentions them both.”
That ended that conversation. A long awkward silence filled the air. Eye contact was avoided by all. Gavier stood, pulling at the bottom of his dressy striped vest. “I’m, um, going up to the third story.” He didn’t invite anyone else. Not even his wife, who looked up at him curiously. As soon as he made it to the stairway, guests started standing up, themselves, to head in separate directions. Theona was the only one to stay behind with the Kanes.
“Good luck,” Claire called to their skinny, tall friend.
Penny turned in acknowledgement, B.B. always at her side.
“We’re rooting for you,” Zoey added.
“Thank you.” Penny stepped back to them, picking at a nail. “You know, I was never close to my Aunt Mavis. But something bad happened to her. I can feel it. And I know she was a little kooky, but she was still family.” She sat back down and had a faraway look.
“What are you thinking?” Claire dared to ask.
A small smile crept up. “She used to have a beautiful garden out back. Now it’s just weeds. It’s awful. When I was a little girl, she gave me a tour of the grounds, and brought me back there. I asked her if I could have one of the roses. Instead, she cut off a sprig of lavender. She went on some rant about red roses in particular, something about them being at every grocery store, and even some gas stations. Lavender was rarely sold. She said, ‘Roses are always chosen. Give love to those that aren’t.’
“That lesson didn’t sink in with me until recently. I’ve made some bad choices in my life. Anyway, I’m trying to be a better person lately,” she said, rubbing some of her short auburn hair behind an ear. “Please do what you can to solve her case.”
The Kanes nodded, a greater sense of urgency building within. “We’ll do our best,” Zoey said.
Off she went.
Claire said to her mother, “Lavender.”
“Mm-hm,” Zoey hummed, also thinking that over.
Theona pulled up her wooden leg and clunked it onto a coffee table. Rubbing her thigh to relieve some obvious pain, she said to herself, “Zhat feels better.”
“Thank you for standing on your leg—er, legs—all day,” Zoey said. “Being of service to us, I mean. You’re a hard worker.”
“Yes,” Claire agreed, secretly eyeing her mother over the obvious slip-up.
“It’s no trouble at all,” Theona said.
“Well, there’s more investigating to do.” Zoey turned to her daughter. “Now would be a good time to go through Mr. Proctor’s room.”
“Might as well.” Claire sat up straighter and sighed. “What’s another in a long line of dead bodies in my youth?”
SEVEN
“Atta girl! Got your flashlight?”
“Yes, my iPhone.” Claire tapped at the pocket of her white fleece zip-up. “Got your gun?”
“Under my vest, and my cell phone’s in my sweater pocket.”
Mr. Proctor’s room was colder than they’d remembered. Every room was cold, but his was downright icy. Claire readjusted her ear-warmer headband, her cheeks turning pink. As her mother searched through dresser drawers, she looked around the bed and found a trunk underneath. Claire opened it. Nothing but long johns, all folded and laid neatly to perfection. She shut it and slid it back under.
A text beeped. The ladies were about to look at their phones utilized as lights, but quickly realized the tone didn’t match. “Where’d that come from?” Zoey asked, turning away from the dresser.
“I don’t know,” Claire said, scanning the bed and its bodily lump. “Over here somewhere.” She carefully pressed along the bedspread, around Mr. Proctor’s corpse.
Another text message beeped. Standing together now, they both knew the origin. Their brown eyes fixed on the man’s form. “You going to get it?” Claire asked with a gulp.
“Okay—one, two, three.” Zoey flung the bedspread off, sending it waving in a flop to the wood floor.
The graying Mr. Proctor’s horrific expression was so scary, Claire imagined him springing up and biting her neck to the sound of fast organ music. She cringed, looking away. “Did you have to do such a dramatic reveal?”
“Yes. Like ripping off a Band-Aid, it’s better that way. Did you really want me to slowly reveal that scary face?” Zoey quickly patted down his white kitchen jacket in search. Nothing. “My mother’s second husband was a mortician,” she explained. “I told you I used to live above a funeral home, didn’t I?” Her fingers felt along his pants.
“Yes, Mom…” Claire said with a hint of impatience.
“Aha! Here it is.” Zoey plucked it out of his right pocket. It was an old flip phone with a small screen. 2 new messages, it read.
They silently read the first together. Thanks for agreeing to cook for the five-night ghost challenge. Buy whatever you need to provide for yourself and the other guests; you will be reimbursed. Good luck. – Mr. Werner, Esq.
Next message, from the same number: Don’t forget that you are also mentioned in the will. Find the treasure. It could be yours.
“Hmm.” Claire hummed. They stared at the last message. “An attorney contacting Mr. Proctor. Sounds like the attorney over Mavis’s assets, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, indeed.” She continued pressing buttons. “He must be the one funding and coordinating this event. I wonder if he was a friend of Mavis to have such a vested interest.”
“That’s a good thing,” Claire said. “He’ll make sure the finding of the treasure will be handled legally. But then it makes me wonder… does he not know the mansion is condemned?”
Zoey didn’t answer, obviously distracted in her thoughts.
“Finding anything else there, Mom?” Claire leaned over, looking with her.
“Nope,” Zoey said with a huff. “I don’t see that he received the ghost text from Mavis. Why would he have acted like he did, when he didn’t?”
“Hm.” Claire opened her mouth in thought. “I don’t know. Maybe he deleted it. Since he’s dead, I guess we’ll never find out either way…”
Zoey picked up the bedspread and laid it back over Mr. Proctor, head to toe.
They resumed their search of the room, having more questions than they started with. But nothing brought them closer to knowing what had happened to the cook or his one-time employer.
When they were about to give up, Milo flew through the open door, startling them. He swooped over with his silky, broad wingspan and landed on the lump which was Mr. Proctor’s head. “Caw!”
“You scared us, birdie!” Claire pressed a hand to her chest.
His little moist black eyes shifted between looking at each of them. “Caw,” he said again and, flapping his wings, he flew to the door and stayed hovering there beside it. “Caw.”
“Milo wants us to follow him,” Zoey said, raising her brows in interest.
Claire glared at her somewhat eccentric mother. “It’s not a dog. It’s a bird.”
“He still has a brain, a heart and spirit,” Zoey said. “He knows something. I can sense it.”
Still flapping at the doorway, the raven’s calling stare intensified. “Okay,” Claire conceded with a chill at her back. “I believe you.”
They followed him up to where they hadn’t y
et trespassed. The third level. Configured around the large dome skylight were round rooms one could climb ladders up into, being the source of each capped roof. The circular hall amidst it all was wide enough to set up seating for lounging with a good book by the light of the moon. One area, beside the loft across the way, had been barred off by caution tape.
Milo flew high up to the center of the dome, cawed with his sharp charcoal-colored beak once more, then soared away, downstairs, out of sight.
“Milo wants us to search up here,” Zoey said. “But what for?”
“Treasure?” Claire offered, dumbfounded. “I don’t know. Maybe we worked ourselves up into believing something that meant nothing.”
“Do you see anything that suggests treasure?” asked her mom.
“Not unless we could run away with that window dome.”
The Kanes had fun investigating the rooms, even though they were mostly empty. A couple had dusty planks and plywood lying in disarray across the floor. Another, painted a garish green, oddly hosted a few shabby table chairs neatly facing one another. Having a keen eye for anything special and out of place, Zoey was delighted to find a hundred-year-old yellow glass bead. The moonlit windows were the most interesting, their artfully designed panes casting floral and cobweb-patterned shadows across the walls and floors. Taking pictures was a must, a couple being obligatory cheek-to-cheek selfies. Surprisingly, none of the tower rooms had attic entries.
“There still has to be an attic,” Zoey said, exiting the last round room. “I’m guessing it’s in one of those rooms by the loft.”
The large open area surrounded by windows, had a room on either side. The one to the left having double doors, one left open. The one to the right, a single door barred by nailed-up planks and caution tape.
“That’s probably an area not up to code,” Claire said, speaking of the room blocked off.
“Yes,” Zoey said. “What a shame. I wonder what’s in there.” Severe deterioration of the home caused Zoey to be greatly disappointed. The old gothic Victorian had once been immaculately beautiful and was now falling into disrepair everywhere. The walls had plywood nailed over more seriously deteriorated spots. They continued using their phones to light the way.
Milo unexpectedly flew back to Zoey’s shoulder. She gasped. “Oh, it’s just you again,” she said in relief. It had felt like the Grim Reaper clutched her shoulder with long nails.
Wings flapped a bit as he settled in, ruffling her strawberry-blond tresses. “Caw.”
“I don’t know why that bird chooses you, Mom,” Claire said with an amused smile. “Are you using sunflower-seed shampoo or something?”
“No. It’s just my Poe class I took in college,” Zoey said in an absolutely serious tone. “Come on. Let’s hurry and stick together. Remember your sense of something being unholy?”
“Right.” Claire rubbed her hands together. Milo eyed her and cawed. “Cutie!” she said, daring to give him a little scratch under his neck feathers. He blinked his eyes, liking it.
The three of them traveled down the hallway together, until Milo flapped his wings and took off into the double-doored open room, cawing as he flew. A noisy ruckus followed. The Kanes jogged over in curiosity.
They found him in a closet, his back to them, standing on a lower rung to a ladder. He was staring at the full-length mirror propped against the wall, ruffling his feathers and screeching at the bird reflecting back at him.
“That’s you, silly,” Claire said to him.
Milo turned on his rung, tilted his head and then flew up toward the ceiling. High up, patchwork quilts hung neatly over wood hangers. There was the slightest square seam, like that of an attic hatch, peeking over the edge of them.
Claire pushed the quilts back further and climbed the ladder. Milo flew out of the closet and disappeared. “Come here, Mom. I think our friend was showing us something.” She pushed against the seamed square and it lifted up on one side.
“We’ve found an attic entry,” Zoey said, pleased. She touched the ladder, looking up.
“Remind you of anything, Mom?” Claire had been up a ladder before to a scary attic. She angled her cell phone’s light at the opening, and ascended to where only below her waist was visible.
“Careful, honey,” Zoey called, placing a foot on a rung to follow.
There was a glow in the dark space above until Claire completely disappeared inside. “Come in, Mom,” her voice calmly called.
Zoey was already ascending, soon brightening the scene with her phone’s light. A large wooden chest stood on ornate legs beside a wall. Claire was getting to her knees to open it up.
“Did we find the treasure, sweetie?” Zoey asked. “Or would this be too easy?”
They looked at each other with anticipation.
EIGHT
“I don’t know. Come look.” Claire opened the heavy lid to the potent, sweet smell of cedar. Inside, amidst layers of sewing material, were framed photographs and paintings, a box of sheet music, and neatly wrapped china and porcelain figurines. Clothing that would be considered costume-y by today’s standards was also carefully stowed away. Remnants of lovely days gone by.
Claire rubbed slender fingers across pearly beads to a wedding dress. “Although there’s some pretty stuff in here, nothing looks super rich like what you’d find in a traditional treasure hunt.”
A red leather-bound diary was poking up between the framed pictures. Plucking it out, Zoey said, “Let’s take this and a couple of pictures down for the family to see. It might be fun.”
The Kanes made sure everything was put back together tight like they’d found it. Claire even went so far as to make sure the attic’s hatch was set in place, and the quilts moved back to their original place.
“I think we should leave the pictures at the door, Mom.” Claire went to set them down. “We’ll be back for them soon enough.”
“Yes, let’s go see what’s left to this third level.” Zoey placed the diary beside the pictures, and they continued their journey.
Milo reappeared, once again messing Zoey’s hair. “Hi, again,” Zoey said, a little frustrated. “You know, I think I’m going to start charging you rent. I’m not a pirate. I don’t want a pet bird hanging out on my shoulder. Even if you are absolutely beautiful.”
The raven didn’t acknowledge her.
“Fine, don’t say anything,” Zoey teased back. Speaking to Claire, she said, “Ravens can say a few words. In the farmlands they’ve been known to call ‘Gee and Haw.’ They picked that up from the farmers yelling directions to their plow horses. So while he is amazing, saying a few words isn’t unheard of.”
“Yes, Mom. I had heard about that in a class I took. In fact, I think maybe we even talked about that once before.”
They stepped up into the loft. There was no furniture; just open spaces, the focal point being another beautiful gaboon ebony fireplace, this one plain and simple. The raven flew to the black mantle and perched. Zoey said, “Too bad there’s no sofa up here, because I would like to sit and breathe in the spacious, peaceful feeling this gives me.”
Claire’s footsteps clacked and echoed across the dark hardwood. “With all of the goings on,” she said, “I ought to feel even more spooked by this house, but I don’t.”
“I know what you mean,” Zoey said in a confidential hush. “It’s the people downstairs that are the nightmare creep show. Do you think Penny knows that?”
Claire laughed because it was true. She approached a cabinet door in the wall. She opened it up. “What do ya know?” she called back to her mother. “A dumb waiter.”
“Ask him to bring up two chairs and hot chocolate,” Zoey responded dryly. “Then ask him to divide it by two and add six.”
“The service tray must be stopped at another floor.” Claire stared at the old, cobwebby cables, not wanting to touch them.
Zoey was still laughing to herself over her clever joke, when she spotted her own little find. And by little, it was about a foo
t and a half tall and one foot wide. A door, again in the wall, at eye level. She touched the crystal knob.
“Caw,” Milo said in acknowledgment, his head turned toward Zoey.
She eyed him, having the inkling that something supernatural was about to happen. Her fingers pinched the crystal knob and she pulled the door open with a slight creak. Knowing antiques, she recognized the old fashioned intercom right away. Closely resembling a Bell phone from its era, it had a receiver hanging on what was termed a hook, and a circular mouthpiece to speak into.
Zoey touched the dust-laden artifact. “Of course,” she said more to herself, “living in a three-story house, you would need one of these so as to not run up and down the stairs.”
She lifted the receiver a touch and eyed Milo again. His gaze was fixed on hers. That feeling came back. She set it back on its hook.
“Ready to go back downstairs?” Claire asked from the distance, breaking into her thoughts.
Zoey shut the little door and quickly joined her. A ringing called her back to the little cabinet.
“Whaaa?” questioned Claire.
Zoey jogged back over without another word, pulled open the little door and lifted the dusty receiver. She rubbed it clean, then held it to her ear. “Hello?”
Nothing.
“Hello?” she repeated.
A ghostly feminine voice spoke softly. “Find him, please.” Then there was nothing again.
Goosebumps prickled the back of her neck. Zoey pulled the receiver further out from its cabinet. It hadn’t actually been connected to anything. “Just got a ghost call,” she said to Claire, the receiver’s loose, frayed cord lightly swaying.
“What was it, Mom?” Claire asked, her dark brown eyes wide. “Leave this house or I will hang you from one of the towers?”
“No. It was a plea for help.” Zoey set the receiver back in the cabinet, her hand slightly shaking.
“Help?” Claire said, thinking of all manner of mayhem.
Like wind, Zoey’s scary supernatural feeling passed as swiftly as it’d come, leaving her oddly amused and bewildered. “I’m supposed to find a man for Mavis.”
