Disappearing Nine Patch (A Harriet Truman/Loose Threads Mystery Book 9)

by Arlene Sachitano

  Harriet slid into the passenger seat.

  “I’ve been thinking about that. Molly and Amber disappeared from this street, and now James has disappeared from the same street. Sandra Price’s mother owned the property where he disappeared. Doesn’t it seem like the Price name is coming up a lot in this whole situation?”

  “It does seem weird, but Sandra Price? She always says how people keep harassing her because her daughter was killed and the body was never found. Are we joining the harassers? I mean, what about the whole serial-killer thing?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe all this has nothing to do with Amber and what happened to Molly before. Molly was trying to find out what happened back then, but maybe in the process she stumbled into something new and unrelated.”

  “And deadly?’

  “Yes, and deadly.”

  Harriet tried to call James again. Again, nothing. She slammed her phone onto the seat beside her.

  “James wouldn’t be in this mess if he hadn’t been trying to help me.”

  Lauren glanced over at her.

  “Don’t even go there. James is a big boy, and he’s resourceful. You can’t run a restaurant as well as he does and not know how to deal with difficult situations.”

  “This isn’t a kale delivery that didn’t come or table linens that are wrinkled. Someone has James, and that same someone probably killed Molly.”

  “Let’s not borrow trouble. Let’s just worry about getting the camera and sending it down the vent.”

  They drove the remainder of the trip in silence.

  Lauren slid the camera and its short cable connection into a pillowcase and handed Harriet a metal reel with the cable spooled around it.

  “I’ll have to burn this pillowcase when this adventure is over.”

  “Small price to pay if we find James. Let’s go.”

  Lauren drove as fast as she dared, but it felt like an hour before she pulled her car to the curb next to the restrooms in Fogg Park. Harriet was out of the car before Lauren had killed the engine. She rushed down the path toward the homeless camp lugging the spool of camera cable. The sun had dipped below the horizon, and it was rapidly turning dark.

  She nearly knocked Joyce down when she came around a bend in the path.

  “What’s the hurry?” Joyce asked. “And what it that?”

  “We need to get back to the vent you showed us. My friend’s life depends on it.”

  Thankfully she didn’t ask any questions.

  “Let me get a decent light.” Joyce hurried back down the trail to her camp, returning a moment later with a large spotlight. “Follow me.”

  Lauren stumbled over a root and turned her ankle, but kept going as they followed Joyce through the woods for what seemed an eternity before they finally reached the clearing at the base of the bluff.

  “Hopefully, we have enough cable to reach whatever is at the other end of this opening.”

  Lauren swung her messenger bag from her back and pulled out her laptop and the camera. Harriet brought the spool of cable over, and together they hooked the camera to one end of the cable and the laptop to the other. Joyce began clearing weeds and vines from the vent opening and the surrounding area.

  “Can I help?” said a masculine voice from the trail.

  Joyce put her hand to her heart.

  “Oh, Max. You gave me a start.”

  “I was out looking for owls when I heard something crashing through the woods, so I took a deer trail over and came to investigate. And here you are, scaring the animals. Why are you in such a hurry?”

  Joyce explained, and Max helped her finish clearing the opening.

  Lauren brought the camera to the vent and set it down.

  “Here goes nothing.” She handed the cable to Harriet. “As soon as I get the image on my computer, start feeding the camera into the hole.”

  Lauren sat down and opened her computer, waking it from its sleeping state with four keystrokes.

  “Okay, we’re on board. Harriet, hold your hand at least a foot from the camera.”

  Harriet did as told; and when Lauren confirmed she could see the hand on the screen, she gave a thumbs-up, and Harriet fed the camera down the hole.

  “Can you see anything?” she asked as she stood up.

  Lauren began slowly uncoiling the spool of camera cable.

  “If I could see anything interesting, we’d be standing on top of wherever this vent leads. So far, it looks amazingly similar to the sewer in front of my apartment.”

  Harriet came over and crouched behind her.

  “What’s that white thing that looks like a snake?”

  “Based on my vast experience in the sewers, I’d say it’s a root that worked its way through a seam in the vent lining.”

  Harriet ran her hands through her hair. Joyce came up behind her and put her hands on her shoulders, massaging as she did so.

  “It’s going to be okay. Take a deep breath. You have to believe this will work.”

  “If this leads to some sort of bomb shelter or something, won’t it have filters in the vent?”

  “Not necessarily,” Lauren said without looking up from her screen. “First, if Molly crawled out of this vent, it implies the filter, if there is one, is missing. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have made it out. We’re far enough in already to conclude it probably really is a vent.

  “Second, depending on how the system works, it may rely on positive pressure. As long as the pressure in whatever this vent is attached to is greater than the outside pressure, the air inside will stay clean. I wouldn’t count on that working in a nuclear holocaust, but if this leads to an underground still or a root cellar or something like that, they wouldn’t need a sophisticated filtration system—or any filter at all, if we’re lucky.”

  Harriet stood up and started pacing.

  “Stop, already,” Lauren said. “Or move farther back.”

  “How far has the camera gone?” Harriet said as she backed up.

  Lauren glanced at the bottom corner of her screen.

  “One hundred feet and counting.”

  Max came to stand by Harriet.

  “The vent probably goes along the edge of the slope for twenty feet or so and then cuts out of the park and into the green space. It would be the easiest path to the area behind the houses down there.”

  Harriet strained to see.

  “Can you see all that?”

  Max chuckled.

  “No, I’ve just studied every square foot of this park and its surrounding area over the years.”

  Lauren leaned closer to her screen.

  “Something’s changing here. The vent is getting bigger. The light isn’t hitting both sides anymore.”

  “Whoa,” Harriet exclaimed as the camera view spiraled, flashing a rapid series of images and then going dark.”What happened?”

  “Hold on,” Lauren said. She slowly reversed the direction of the spool, backing the camera out by a foot. The LED camera illuminated the area it was looking at. It appeared to be a flat, rough surface. “I think we’re looking at the floor of wherever our vent terminates.” She backed the camera slowly, waiting each time for it to auto-focus.

  Harriet leaned closer and reached over Lauren’s shoulder to point.

  “That looks like the toe of a shoe.”

  Joyce and Max joined them, and they all studied the screen.

  Harriet startled when the foot moved.

  “Can you move the camera up and down a little to make sure whoever belongs to that foot is seeing us?”

  Lauren did as requested, moving the camera first a little then, eventually, three feet up and down, repeating several times. On the fourth try, the image went crazy, flashing light and dark. A blurry image pulsed on the screen as the auto-focus tried to sharpen it. The cable went taut, and Harriet reached over and fed more cable into the hole.

  “I think someone just grabbed the camera.”

  James’s face came into focus as she spoke. He had figured out
it was a camera and was holding it at arms-length. They could see his mouth moving but couldn’t tell what he was saying.

  “Anyone read lips?” Lauren asked.

  Harriet pulled her phone from her pocket and speed-dialed him. The call went to voicemail without any reaction from him.

  He looked up at the ceiling and then down. They watched as he crouched and, with his free hand, attempted to write in the dirt on the floor, but the floor was too rough. They also noticed as he moved the camera around that he wasn’t alone.

  “Write a note on your phone and hold it up to the camera,” Harriet told the image on the screen.

  James turned around, the camera pointing at three young women cowering on a filthy mattress. Their lips moved. He must have asked them something. The middle one shook her head and looked at the woman beside her, her lips moving as she did so. The second woman shook her head also. James shone the camera back on himself, a look of frustration on his face.

  “You cell phone,” Harriet repeated.

  He pressed his lips together.

  “Whoever put him there probably took his phone.” Lauren said.

  “No, they didn’t, I can see the shape in his front pocket. They probably knew he wouldn’t get a signal underground, so they didn’t worry about it.”

  James looked off-screen in the direction of the women, and then reached into his pocket. One of the women must have prompted him about his phone.

  The group collectively held their breath as James typed on the little screen.

  “Good grief, is he writing a novel?” Lauren said in frustration.

  Finally, he held his phone in one hand and the camera in the other, spreading them several feet apart. Lauren adjusted the focus with her computer. Harriet leaned even closer to the screen. He had typed a message using the notepad function on his phone.

  “Exploring foundation behind and between Lois’s and Price house,” she read. “Hit from behind. Woke in dark, chained to bed. Not alone.”

  Harriet’s own phone was still in her hand. She dialed Morse.

  “We found James,” she said when Morse answered.

  “Where is he?”

  “I don’t know—not exactly. He says he was exploring the burned-out foundation behind Lois’s house, and someone hit him on the head. He woke up in a dark place that’s connected to the vent in the park.”

  “Slow down,” Morse said. “You’re not making sense. We searched the foundation. There’s nothing there.”

  Harriet recounted how they’d discovered James. Lauren pointed at the screen.

  “Look, James is showing us around the space.”

  He pointed the camera across the room to a ladder that disappeared upward into the dark. He wasn’t able to get close enough to it, and the camera’s light range was sufficiently small, that they couldn’t see where it went other than up.

  He tapped a note on his phone and held it to the screen.

  Only entrance ladder up into ceiling. Round pipe?

  Harriet relayed the message to Morse.

  “I’m headed back to the foundation, and I called in the K-Nine unit.”

  Chapter 29

  Harriet watched James on Lauren’s laptop.

  “I wish we could talk to him.”

  His lips would move, then one or more of the women would move her lips. It was clear they were talking to each other, but no communication was taking place. He looked like he was trying to explain the camera and that help was coming. Their eyes got wide, and they squeezed together and away from him whenever he gestured. Clearly, they were terrified.

  “Has anyone called his family?”

  Harriet gasped.

  “I didn’t even think about his family. And I don’t have his mother’s number.”

  Lauren opened a new search window on top of the camera view.

  “Got it,” she said and turned the screen more squarely to Harriet.

  Harriet dialed his parents’ house. No one answered. She left a brief message requesting a call back.

  “Don’t you think you should have given them a little more than ‘call me please’?” Lauren asked.

  “I don’t think this is the sort of thing that should be left in a message.”

  “Whatever.”

  Lauren turned away from the screen.

  “Are we going to sit here and watch and wait to see if Morse finds him?”

  “I’d like to go look for him, but the police and the dogs are already searching the foundation area.”

  Max held his right elbow in his left hand, resting his chin on his right fist. His brow furrowed as he thought.

  “What is it, Max?” Joyce asked him.

  “I was thinking.” He paused and then started again. “I was thinking…I’ve not measured it with a device, but I don’t think the amount of cable you let into that little tunnel is enough to reach that foundation.”

  Harriet and Lauren spun around at the same time to look at him.

  “What?” Harriet said.

  Lauren turned back to her computer and started furiously typing.

  “I’m still working on this part of the software, but I think I have enough…”

  The view of James in the underground room disappeared and was replaced by a white screen with blue grid lines on it and a curvy red line superimposed on the grid. The grid was marked in feet.

  “Eventually, this will show the actually terrain,” she said. “He’s right. This is the route the camera took.”

  Max leaned over and pointed.

  “See where it turns left and then right? That’s where it had to go between two boulders that are just beyond the park.”

  “Max,” Harriet asked, “do you think you could follow this line and lead us to where the camera is?”

  “Sure.”

  Joyce held out her big spotlight.

  “You’ll be needing this,” she said and handed it to Harriet. She turned to Lauren. “I’ll stand watch over your computer if you want to go with them.”

  Lauren stood up.

  “Guard it with your life.”

  “Nothing less,” Joyce said and smiled.

  Max led the way out of the park, stopping occasionally and studying the ground around them. The moon had come out, and while not full, it was sufficient to make the spotlight unnecessary once they got out of the trees.

  “We’re about halfway—” Max stopped abruptly, holding his hand out to block Harriet and Lauren. “Down!” he ordered, and they all crouched below the weeds and berry vines. “Someone’s coming,” he whispered.

  Lauren leaned around him.

  “I don’t see anyone.”

  “Hush,” he scolded and pointed to his ear.

  When the trio was perfectly still, Harriet could hear what Max had heard. He was right—something or someone was coming toward them from the green space direction. She held her breath as the rustling got louder. She sneaked a look and saw a smallish figure in dark clothing approaching. The figure stopped and squatted.

  “That should be right where the camera is,” Max whispered.

  The figure picked up a bundle of something and moved it to the side, then repeated the motion. Lauren stretched up to look.

  “He’s clearing a hatch cover,” she whispered. “He’s about to go down.”

  Harriet stood, turned the spotlight on the figure, and hurried through the brush. Max and Lauren followed.

  “What are we doing here?” Lauren gasped as they went.

  “Stopping whoever that is from getting to James. Stop!” she shouted.

  The figure held an arm up to block the light but kept reaching down to the ground with its other hand.

  “Stewart?” Harriet asked in a loud voice. “What are you doing?”

  “Get that light out of my eyes,” he shouted back.

  Harriet lowered the light slightly, and Stewart took the opportunity to pull an ugly-looking black gun from the small of his back.

  “Turn the light off and walk this way slowly, an
d no one will get hurt.”

  Lauren pressed a couple of keys on her cell phone and hit enter. The phone chirped when she hit send.

  “Toss your phones on the ground,” he directed. Harriet and Lauren complied. “And the light.”

  Stewart motioned the two women to the small clearing he was standing in. Harriet noticed Max had disappeared. He must have faded into the background before she lowered the light.

  “Why are you holding James prisoner?” Harriet pressed. “He’s a chef. What did he ever do to you?”

  “He got in the way, that’s what he did.” He pushed the two women together. “This is all your fault, you know. You couldn’t leave things alone, could you? I’m supposed to be reading poetry tonight at a new club, and instead, I’m out here with you two.”

  “Nothing’s happened yet. You could let us go, and we wouldn’t tell anyone,” Harriet said.

  “And if you hadn’t mentioned the chef, I might have considered it. If you know about the chef, you know about the women, and we can’t have that.”

  Lauren glared at him.

  “Who is ‘we’?”

  Stewart spread his hands, palms up, gun dangling from the right one. He started laughing and then said in a singsong voice.

  “I am me and you are she, and she is he, and we are all together… see how you run in front of my gun, you better run…”

  Harriet looked at Lauren, not sure if he expected them to try to run away so he could shoot them, or if he was having some sort of breakdown.

  Stewart raised the gun and took aim.

  They heard a soft whoosh, and Stewart dropped the gun and started screaming. He crumpled to the ground, his left hand clutching his right forearm, dark liquid dripping from between his fingers.

  Harriet grabbed the spotlight from where she dropped it and shone it on him. A nasty-looking knife was embedded in his right arm. Judging by the flow of blood oozing from around his hand in spite of the pressure he was applying, if he let go of his arm to pick up the gun, he could bleed to death.

  “Don’t just stand there, call me an ambulance. And give me a belt or something.”

  Lauren stepped back to the spot where they had first stopped and felt around on the ground for her phone. When she found it, she dialed 911.