I was starting to think she’d gone on the run.
But if Agatha had gone into hiding, that was no way to deal with things. She needed to face up to what had happened. If she was guilty, then she should be brought to justice like anyone else. Hiding was only going to make things worse. I needed to find her myself.
I made myself a pot of very strong coffee and took it out to the front porch, along with my laptop, and opened it up, typing in the URL to Agatha’s blog. I was hoping I might be able to find some clue as to where she had gone. I recalled, faintly, that she had made mention of a regular vacation destination, someplace she traveled to regularly to escape her day to day life, which I found a little absurd, given that her day to day life was most other people’s idea of paradise.
“What do you make of all this, Jasper?” I asked him. But he was busy chasing gulls along the sand and wasn’t even listening to me, let alone reading the computer screen.
I read back a few weeks, then months, into the archives, trying to find the name of the vacation town she had mentioned a few times. Eventually, I just had to type “vacation” into the search bar until I found the post I was looking for.
She spoke about a town called “Rosebud” that she liked to visit, specifically mentioning a cabin a few miles out of town.
Rosebud was about an hour away, further inland, near a lake in the forest. It would take me an hour further away from Pottsville. Agatha wrote about the gardens and the greenery and the tea rooms in the town, the way that it was an escape for her. To me, it seemed strange that anyone who lived on the beach needed an ‘escape,’ but I supposed anything you got used to became mundane, didn’t it?
It hit me—going from the description, at least—that Rosebud possibly reminded her of home, of England. Maybe that was why it was an escape for her.
Jasper came back to me with a stick in his mouth, wagging his tail, desperate for me to throw it again.
I obliged, but afterward, I stood up and packed up my laptop and coffee pot and called Jasper back to me. “Come on, boy. We are going on another road trip!”
Rosebud, here we come.
A car horn honked behind me, letting me know that I was going too slow. I sighed and pulled over a little, allowing the SUV to pass. I hadn’t done this much driving in my whole entire life. And certainly not in the past few months. The engine sounded a little rattly, but I ignored it and just kept driving slow so I wouldn’t push my luck. No sense in worrying until I needed to. Jasper was more than happy to come along for another trip, and wasted no time hanging his head out the window and yapping at everything he saw as we moved further and further from the coast and started to enter terrain that was more like a forest.
I still thought it was bizarre to take a vacation away from a beach town, but I had the address of Agatha’s little cabin near the town of Rosebud, as well as directions for how to get there scribbled down on a sheet of paper and tucked away safe and sound on the passenger seat. Or, at least, I thought I did.
Jasper was sitting beside me, his head bopping around, taking in the new, unfamiliar territory and barking every time he spotted a person or a bird, or a cloud.
As we drove further inland, the air seemed to get heavier and it seemed to get warmer, more humid, without the sea breeze. I hoped I would be able to find Agatha quickly and convince her to come back with me. To face up to the consequences.
There were a lot of little cottages and cabins on the side of the road as we passed through a few small towns and then through a field of wildflowers. There were flowers everywhere, in fact. With all the greenery and wide open fields, I could see how this was a change of scenery for Agatha, and why it would make her feel more at home. It was probably a comforting spot for her.
I glanced ahead and noticed that we were approaching a small town—a sort of blink and you’ll miss it kind of place—with tea rooms and quaint little cafes with mushroom stools out front for seating. We passed through quickly, it only took a minute or two, and I had a quick glimpse out the window, noticing there was a B&B and a small hotel. “That must have been Rosebud,” I said to Jasper as we kept driving, even though I never actually saw a sign. According to my directions, the cabin that Agatha regularly rented out was two miles further down the road, past the town.
We had run out of highway and the road was now full of stones that flicked up and hit the window. I had to slow down before one of the windows cracked.
Jasper started barking when I slowed the truck, thinking it was almost time for him to jump out and explore. “Not yet, Jasper.” I had no intention of getting out in this isolated area where there weren’t even any road signs. “I think I may have taken a wrong turn somewhere,” I commented, pulling over in what looked like a semi-safe spot off the side of the road but still a hundred feet away from the forest. The truck sputtered to a halt and I remember Detective Nicholas’s warning about getting it safety inspected, that it looked like it shouldn’t be on the road. Why hadn’t I pressed Adam about taking it to the repair shop?
“Jasper, where is the sheet of paper with the directions?” I asked him, although he had no answer for me, at least not in English. But there was a sullen, guilty look on his little black and white face.
I leaned back and stared at him. “Jasper? What have you done?” I tried to search underneath him for the sheet of paper, thinking he was trying to hide it or just playing a game with me.
But there was nothing on the passenger seat. I looked down at the floor of the truck. “Oh, no.”
I noticed a scrap of paper, the last bit left, with bite marks on the edges.
“Jasper! No! You didn’t!”
I leaned back and hit the steering wheel in frustration. Jasper had eaten the instructions. I had no way of figuring out the location of the cabin unless I could get back onto Agatha’s blog.
The sun was setting. There was no wi-fi connection on my phone and only one bar of reception that kept coming and going on a whim.
I put the key in the truck but it wouldn’t turn. Slamming my fists against the steering wheel, I groaned.
“Great, Jasper. We’re stuck here. And I literally have no idea where we are! Do you?” I raised my eyebrows at him. He slunk down in the seat, his ears low, and shot me a sorry look.
I sighed. “It’s not totally your fault, Jasper. The truck would have broken down either way.”
There was no option but to walk back to the town before it got too dark to even see. I slowly popped the door open and slid out of the truck. I couldn’t see a single sign of civilization on either side of us—even the road didn’t have any other tire marks on it. That told me we’d probably driven the wrong way. And I didn’t want to be stuck on a road that no one else ever drove down. I put Jasper’s leash on and grabbed a few things out of the suitcase, my bag, in case I wasn’t coming back to the truck again that night, and my laptop, partly because it was expensive and partly because I might need it for research.
I was thankful I had Jasper with me for protection, even though I was still a little on the outs with him after he’d eaten the directions. We walked together in silence, taking the two miles as quickly as we could, before the sun set and before the noises in the forest started playing on my mind. I walked as quickly as I could.
The B&B we first walked past would have been the more ideal accommodation option, considering my four-legged companion, but there was a sign in the window that read No Vacancy, so I hurried along, trying to find the small hotel that we’d passed earlier.
It was a fancy looking place, white bricks with gold fittings, and three stories tall. There were fairy lights decorating the trees in the courtyard and the whole place looked sparkling and welcoming. And I was exhausted.
“I say we make our bed here for the night, eh, Jasper?”
I stopped outside and glanced through the window to see what we were up against. There was a young, pretty girl with long auburn hair behind the reception desk who was chewing on a pen, looking a little bored and ab
sentminded until we caught her attention and she dropped the pen. I tied Jasper up outside, in front of the lobby, but he wasn’t exactly hidden and she was staring at him nervously while I made my way toward her. Jasper watched intently from outside, wondering when it would be his time to be allowed in.
I shot her a smile and called out, “You got room for a couple of poor strangers?”
“I’m sorry, we don’t allow pets,” she stated, hurrying to tell me this before anything else. Her nametag read Rebecca and she looked apologetic, but firm about the rule that she was being forced to enforce.
“Please,” I said, glancing over my shoulder at Jasper. “It’s an emergency. My truck broke down and I really don’t have any clue where I even am.”
She looked just as confused as I did. “You’re in Rosebud.”
I nodded. Well, that was one thing cleared up, at least. “Yes. Thank you. I mean, I’m not familiar with the area. I didn’t mean to end up in town. I’m looking for a friend who is missing. I thought she might be somewhere here.”
Rebecca looked like she felt sorry for me. “That’s terrible,” she said, and she sounded genuine. “Is she from Rosebud?”
I shook my head. “No, but she stays here somewhere. Not here in the hotel, but in a cabin out of town. But I couldn’t find the cabin. Now, me and my poor dog find ourselves stranded.”
Rebecca bit her lip and looked out the window at Jasper, who was sitting up straight and acting well-behaved like he was waiting to be given a treat. “He does look like a sweet dog…” she murmured. Her sympathetic tone was giving me hope. Was she about to crack? Would she bend the rules for us, just maybe?
I put on my best smile. “Please. He’s a good boy, really. He won’t be any trouble. No one will even know he was here.”
It was stretching the truth, a bit, but I just hoped that this would be the time when Jasper truly was on his best behavior.
She sighed and nodded a little, leaning over the desk to make sure no one was watching or listening. “Okay,” she whispered. “But you’re going to have to keep him hidden. Do not let the manager, Vance, see him. And you’ll have to be out of here first thing in the morning.”
I grinned at her. She was a sweet young thing, and I was incredibly grateful. “Done! You are a lifesaver!”
Yikes. The room was super nice. Not usually something you’d complain about when entering a hotel room, but when you had a dog that was prone to jumping in puddles and mud, and even more prone to chewing things up, then it suddenly became a problem. And everything in the room was covered in white linen. Okay, it suddenly became a big problem. But I could hardly call up reception and ask for a less nice room—maybe the basement—in case my dog destroyed the place.
“You really will have to be on your best behavior,” I warned him. Him making a mess was actually less of a risk than the chance that he would bark and give himself away.
I pulled a towel out of the cabinet for him to sit and lay on. I wished I’d had a dog bed with me, but it was a bit late now. Besides, carrying a large dog bed upstairs with me might have been a bit obvious. “Now, you’re going to be on your best behavior, aren’t you, Jasper?”
He sat down and nodded at me. He seemed like he actually understood.
We’ll see, I thought, digging out my laptop while I kept a skeptical eye on him.
I called reception and asked for the wifi password so I could finally figure out exactly where I was, and, more importantly, how to get out of here.
Agatha’s blog was still on the screen when I opened it. I shook my head and wondered if it was even worth me trying to read any more of it, looking for clues. I mean, I had found Rosebud, hadn’t I? But what use had it been? Without transportation, I wouldn’t be able to get to her cabin. And there was no guarantee that she was even here in the first place. It was all kind of feeling a bit hopeless. If Agatha truly didn’t want to be found, then she wouldn’t be.
I lay back on the bed and sighed. I may as well make the most of my time here. I glanced through the room service menu and decided to order a plate of fries and a bottle of wine. I glanced over at Jasper. Hmm. Better order him a hamburger, save the bun.
When the food arrived, I made sure that Jasper was hidden in the bathroom and prayed that he wouldn’t bark. I also grabbed the door and pulled it open before the waiter had a chance to knock. Jasper almost always barked at a knock on the door. I only opened it a crack and stuck my nose out. “I can come in and set this up for you on the tray,” the waiter said, trying to edge his way in.
“No, it’s really fine, I prefer to set my food up for myself,” I said, grabbing the tray from him. “I am kind of fussy that way.”
“Okay, ma’am,” he said, looking a little unsure. He tried to catch a little glimpse inside the room, but I quickly shut the door. When I was sure he was gone, I let Jasper out of the bathroom and placed the burger patty on the floor for him. He ate it in one gulp.
We had survived detection so far. Only eight more hours to get through.
I moved back to the bed and placed my plate of fries down on the comforter, then cracked open my bottle of wine and poured a glass. After munching on my fries and downing a glass of red, I felt a bit more energized and returned to the laptop screen. I’d come this far, so I may as well keep looking.
Agatha had not been responding to phone calls or texts. Every time I tried, I got a message saying that the phone number I had called was not in service. She clearly did not want to be found. For all I knew, she was nowhere near Rosebud. She may have left the state. She may even have left the country, if the reappearance of Anthony Nicholas had really spooked her that much.
I kept thinking about the week leading up to Matilda’s death. How quiet Agatha had gone. Had she and Matilda had a falling out during that period? Had they been in a fight? I double-checked just to make sure she hadn’t posted. No. Definitely no posts from that time period.
There must have been a reason for that.
And if there was a reason, all I had to do was find it.
I read back even further, keeping an eye on Jasper the entire time, making sure he didn’t wander away from the safe spot, the towel on the floor.
The few weeks leading up to the break, there were a lot of light and fluffy posts. That was Agatha’s style. She wasn’t a Brenda, she never used the blog as a place to post her personal options, so I wasn’t surprised at all. She usually had posts and tips with a beachside or nautical theme, that was kind of her brand, and posts were often accompanied with a photo shoot of her out front of her cottage on the beach. “Ocean Themed Crafts for Kids.” “Twenty Fun Things To Do With Shells.” Lots of posts about how to turn seashells into works of art.
And she often made mention of ‘M’—she never used real or full names—her local friend that was also interested in crafting. Matilda. There were a few photos of them together, though Matilda’s face was never that clear. She was a couple of years older than Agatha, with short, dark curly hair and red-framed glasses. M was mentioned a lot further back in the archives, but the posts about M became fewer and fewer in the weeks leading up to her death.
She had also recently made a post about the best new craft blogs on the internet and kindly included me at the top of the list, of course, with a strong recommendation that other people read my work. That was how we had come to meet each other. I sat back and read over the post again with a sad smile.
I had to find her.
Jasper started to stand up, wanting to explore the room. “Jasper. Sit.” I made my voice kind but firm. I couldn’t risk him eating the thousand-dollar curtains.
I returned to the screen, lost in a tide of posts about seashells and sandcastles. But if I went back a little further than that, a few more weeks and months back into her archives, I found that the tone was entirely different.
Huh. It seemed like Agatha had a touch of the Brenda to her after all. She was suddenly posting opinion pieces that had a very strong tone to them.
�
��Troubled times in the sleepy town of Sandy Point,” she had written as the first line on a post that made me almost spill my red wine on the white bedspread. I quickly moved the glass to the bedside table and checked to see if Jasper had noticed. Yes, okay, perhaps I am the one who needs to be watching what she is doing.
I sat up straight to read the post. What were these troubled times Agatha was talking about?
She started out writing about the importance of integrity in writing, saying that even on a blog, even when you are writing about crafting, that you have an obligation to be honest with your readers, to only present things as truth if you have the facts to back them up, and that she always did her best to only write what she knew to be true.
“But there are people out there who don’t have the same type of journalistic integrity that I do,” she said. “And I feel that it is my responsibility to reveal some of these practices…”
Gosh, I thought, leaning forward. My battery warning started flashing red and I had to make a dash for the power cord. Jasper thought I was getting his leash and started jumping all over me. “Jasper, please. You need to sit.”
He lay down and sulked, turning his head away.
I returned to the laptop. He wouldn’t stay mad for long.
“The more info we get these days, the harder it is to tell the difference between the real and the fake,” Agatha wrote. “There are people out there, in this town that I live in, that seemingly can’t tell the difference. Those people are Z and M. And I intend to expose their practices here. Even if Z tries to silence me. Or threatens me.”
Oh my goodness. Was she talking about Matilda?
What had Matilda done?
Huh. These were some pretty serious topics for a craft blog.
Beaches, Blogging, and Bodies Page 6
