To Helvetica and Back

by Paige Shelton

  “Hi,” I said.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Not great, but I’m fine.”

  “Can I walk you in?” Seth said.

  “That would be nice,” I said.

  Once inside and without my prompting, Seth walked around and looked in all the nooks and crannies of Little Blue. When he was done, he joined me on the couch in the front room.

  “Why did you do that?” I asked.

  “I’m not totally sure, but with everything going on it seemed prudent to make sure there were no surprises waiting. Can you tell me what happened with the police?”

  “There was an attempted murder—Homer Mayfair, the town’s old newspaper editor and the person Mirabelle bought her typewriter from a long time ago. I’m worried about Mirabelle and sad and scared about Homer. He might wake up, he might not.”

  “Why are you worried about Mirabelle?” Seth asked.

  “She’s not at her house, and she doesn’t carry a cell phone, and her old No. 5 was found with Homer. No one knows where she is at the moment. She doesn’t check in with anyone.”

  “The typewriter with the numbers scratched on the key bars?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hang on. Homer who?”

  “Mayfair. Why?”

  “Something sounds familiar. Like I’ve read that name recently. I can’t quite place it.” He looked toward the front door or perhaps beyond.

  “Go ahead. If you think you should check it out, I’m fine. Call me if you find anything. Please,” I said.

  Seth nodded. “I think I should.”

  I didn’t think I would be able to fall asleep. I thought I would toss and turn with images of Mirabelle and Homer in my head. But after I locked all the doors and windows in Little Blue, I climbed into my bed under the stars. I made sure my phone was close enough to hear if Seth, or anyone, called or texted, and then fell into an oblivious sleep.

  Only to be awakened by pounding on the front door.

  I rolled over to see that it was almost eight o’clock. I’d either missed my seven a.m. alarm or turned it off at some point.

  The list of people who could be at the door was too long to speculate, but the bright light woke me to attention.

  I quickly slipped on my glasses and grabbed a sweatshirt and jeans and threw them on over my pajamas. Through the glass, I saw it was Seth.

  “Hi,” I said as I flung the door open, bed hair and pillow face creases and all.

  “Hi,” he said. “You weren’t at the store.”

  “I overslept. Did you call?”

  Seth laughed. “No, I didn’t even think about it. I wanted to talk to you in person so I went there first.”

  “Come on in. What’s up?”

  “I have some interesting news,” he said as he held up a manila folder.

  We moved to the couch again as he placed the folder on the coffee table and began.

  “At first, I couldn’t place where I’d read the name Mayfair, but I knew I had, recently. There was something about it that stuck with me. It isn’t a particularly unusual name, but finally I remembered these.” He pointed at the short stack of papers. “They’re mining permits.”

  “They look old.”

  “They are. Very old. Anyway, I won’t go into too much detail. These are permits that were granted to miners to mine. They’re all expired now, but the man who was hurt, Homer Mayfair, was listed on some of them.”

  Seth fanned a few of the permits over the coffee table and pointed.

  I leaned forward, readjusted my glasses, and inspected the papers. They all had Homer’s name and signature.

  “I don’t understand,” I said as I sat up. “Homer wasn’t into mining. He was a newspaperman. Are these part of the Star City Silver Mining Company? Was Homer somehow part of that company?”

  Seth shrugged. “Not that I could find. Hang on, though. Most of these permits are for mines that weren’t really mined. Again, I know you’re smart enough to understand all this stuff, but to keep it quick, I’m going to give you a summarized version.”

  I nodded.

  “When you mine, you have to get rid of the water that’s in the way. It’s not an easy thing to do, and it can be very expensive, prohibitively so sometimes, so there are places where items could be mined that never get mined because in the long run getting rid of the water turns out to be too expensive considering the value of what could, in fact, be extracted. Homer owned rights to some smaller potentially mineable areas and some small actual mines. I have no idea how or why he got the rights. Perhaps he could see value where other individuals couldn’t back then. Perhaps his family had the rights before him, but I didn’t take the time to search historical documents beyond these—which happened to be in my new office in a junk drawer and why the Mayfair name sounded familiar. I’d come across them while I was getting situated.”

  “All right, so Homer was into mining, but how did that almost get him killed?”

  “Still not exactly sure, but I played with the numbers from the typewriter key bars and came up with something. Put together in a certain way, they signify the location of what might have been a potential mine—a very small one.” He pointed at one of the permits. “So small, in fact, that I couldn’t even find it on any of my lists of possible reclamations, Clare. It seems that this might actually be a forgotten location.”

  “Forgotten?”

  “Well, as in no one, at least in an official capacity—someone like me or someone from the United States or Utah Geological Survey, for instance—has done anything with, or perhaps even seen, the mine. It could be a danger, or it could be so out of the way that it’s just been there, not causing any harm at all, so it was forgotten.”

  “Where is it?” I asked.

  “About a mile past an area called Purple Springs Valley. It’s up a bit, probably not easy to get to and not well traveled because it’s not part of any groomed land.”

  “Over past the goat relocation?” I said.

  “You did mention some goats, but I never got the details,” Seth said.

  It was too much to explain. “I need to call Jodie.”

  “Okay.”

  Jodie was at my house only seven minutes later. Seth recounted what he’d told me. She listened with her cop intensity.

  “I’ll take a drive out that way and have a look,” she said when Seth finished.

  “Can I . . .” I looked at Seth. “Can we come with you?”

  Jodie gave me her “I don’t think so” squint, but then she seemed to rethink. “It’s daytime and we can keep a decent distance. You really want to?”

  “I do.” I looked at Seth.

  “From a geologist’s standpoint—well, you might want me there to evaluate possible safety concerns anyway,” he said.

  Jodie blinked as if she wasn’t sure if he was serious or not, but when she realized he was, she said, “All right, let’s go.”

  I climbed into the passenger seat and Seth took the back. As we steered out of town and toward Purple Spring Valley again, Jodie radioed in our destination, explaining that she had two civilian passengers with her and telling dispatch that she would call for backup if anything seemed suspicious.

  The woman at the other end of the radio actually hesitated when Jodie said she didn’t need backup quite yet. I thought that was a bad sign, but I didn’t point it out for fear she’d rethink my going along. Seth must have noticed the hesitation too. He and I glanced briefly at each other but kept quiet.

  “All right, once I’m over the pass on the other side of the valley, we’ll have to go off-road, right?” she said to Seth in her rearview mirror.

  “Yes, I think so. There might be some old access roads over there, but I’m pretty sure I haven’t noticed any on any maps.”

  “All right,” Jodie said.

  We r
ode mostly in silence. Jodie didn’t want to answer any of my questions now, but I wasn’t sure if that was because Seth was along or if she was just deep in her thoughts, trying to sort through facts and details. Our task at hand didn’t make any of us think small talk was in order, but before long we were through the valley. The compound and monastery were quiet, and my heart ached when I glanced toward Homer’s house.

  “Homer has a dog,” I said. “Did you get him?”

  “Yes, he’s at Omar’s house right now,” Jodie said. “I’m sure he and Star are getting along great.”

  When we reached the bottom of the pass, Jodie stopped the truck and looked out the windshield and up the steep, rocky slope.

  “It’s only about twenty feet up. It’s flat up on top, right?” she asked Seth in the rearview mirror.

  “According to the maps I looked at, yes, it’s flat.”

  “All right. Hang on,” Jodie said as she put the Bronco into four-wheel drive and steered us over the rocks, the tires slipping a little but not much, not enough to make my stomach drop like some of the Jeep rides I’d taken with Marion on the slick rock in Moab.

  It didn’t take long before we were over and on top of an expanse of fairly flat but untamed land.

  Jodie stopped the Bronco again. “Look, right there is an old road. It won’t be easy, but it will get us over to the other side better than if I just drove over all the rocks and brush. Seth, from there do you think we’ll only be a hundred feet or so from the mine location?”

  Seth concentrated out the side window a long moment and then said, “I do.”

  “Hang on tight.” Jodie turned the steering wheel hard and forced the Bronco over some thick brush and in between lots of rocks. Bumpy, jarring, stomach-clenching might be good descriptions of what the ride felt like. It was all those things. Once she hit the old road, which had been mostly covered by encroaching organic matter, the ride was a little better, but not much.

  As we moved, I looked ahead. We were traveling toward two small peaks that were more like mounds.

  “Stop!” I said.

  Jodie slammed on the brakes, and though we weren’t moving too quickly, we all were caught by our seatbelts.

  “That’s the scene.” I pointed out the front window. “That’s the scene on the last door, the one Marion inspected.”

  Jodie and Seth both leaned forward and looked out of the front window.

  “What does that mean?” Jodie asked.

  “I have no idea,” I said, “but maybe it’s something important.”

  “Good to know.” Jodie stepped gently on the gas again.

  We had trudged along another fifty feet or so when the space between the small mounds suddenly came into view.

  “No, no, no,” I said as I reached to my seatbelt.

  I knew Jodie was strong, but I’d never truly seen her combine her strength with her quickness. Before my fingers hit the button for the belt, she’d sprung out of her seat and tackled me against mine.

  “Don’t even think about it, Clare,” she said in my ear.

  “What’s going on?” Seth asked.

  “That’s Marion’s Jeep,” Jodie said.

  “Uh, okay. Whose dirt bike?”

  There was a bike parked right next to the Jeep. It wasn’t a motorcycle, but a dirt bike, something made for off-road travel only.

  “I don’t know,” Jodie said. “Listen, Clare, I’m going to call for backup, and then I’m going to go see what’s up with Marion. You are going to stay here. I have a gun. You don’t. Seth, you will sit on her if you have to. Got it?”

  “Of course,” Seth said.

  “Oh, Jodie, what if she’s . . . hurt or worse?” I whimpered.

  “I’m going to find out,” Jodie said. “Remember, I have the gun. I can help her. Seth, is that mound the location listed on the permit? Or the entrance to it, whatever?”

  “I’m pretty sure it is, but if there’s an entrance, it’s grown over.”

  “How deep will it go?” Jodie asked as she was still on top of me.

  “I wish I could be sure, but I don’t know.”

  “Damn. All right. Now, I’m getting off you, Clare. Seth, grab her arm and break it before you let her get out of this truck, okay?”

  Seth’s fingers wound tightly around my arm. “Got it.”

  Jodie picked up the handset to the radio and talked into it. She asked for immediate backup.

  “Repeat your location,” the dispatch officer said.

  Jodie repeated.

  “Please do not approach any suspicious activity. We will have other officers on scene as soon as possible. Repeat, do not approach.”

  Jodie looked out toward Marion’s Jeep and the dirt bike, she looked at the mound, and then she looked at me. “Negative. I have no choice. Civilians might be in harm’s way. I will approach.”

  “Negative. Do not approach.”

  Jodie replaced the handset and looked at Seth and me one more time. “Stay here.”

  I took a deep, shaky breath as she got out of the Bronco.

  “She’s a good cop, Clare. She’ll take care of your niece,” Seth said.

  I nodded but was afraid to say anything else.

  The noise was out of place—a small boom, some sort of brief whistle, and then a ping. Inside the truck, all the sounds were muted, but still very real.

  I watched Jodie go down, as if she was a puppet whose strings were cut.

  “Jodie!” I said as I got away from Seth and flew out of the truck.

  Without any logical thought at all, I ran to her and went on my knees. Seth was right beside me.

  “I told you to break her arm first,” Jodie said. “Get down!”

  In tandem, Seth and I flopped and flattened ourselves next to her.

  “You were shot?” I said.

  “I’m fine. It barely grazed my arm.” She had her right hand over the top of her left arm, but she removed it with an intake of breath through clenched teeth. She swung herself up to a standing position and pulled out her gun and yelled, “Police, come out now! With your hands up!”

  I lifted my head and looked toward the mound. My glasses had tilted on my nose. When I straightened them, I could distinguish the hole that looked like a cave opening.

  “Put your head down, Clare,” Seth said.

  I lowered it a little.

  “Jodie!” It was Marion’s voice.

  “Marion,” I said to Seth. He nodded and put his hand on my shoulder.

  “Marion, come out,” Jodie said.

  “He’ll only release me if you release him,” Marion said.

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Tell him to show himself and we’ll talk about it,” Jodie said.

  An eternity passed before two people came out from behind the overgrowth that covered the opening.

  A man had my niece, one arm around her neck and one arm holding a gun forward. Marion looked fine—a little dusty, but totally unharmed.

  “Brian O’Malley!” I said with a loud whisper.

  “Let her go,” Jodie yelled.

  “Let me go first,” he said.

  “What’s your name?” Jodie said.

  “That’s Brian O’Malley,” I said, recognizing the man who’d broken into the empty shop.

  “That’s not Brian O’Malley, Clare. Hush,” Jodie said.

  I was perplexed. That wasn’t Brian O’Malley? I was certain that was the man I’d seen break into the shop. Jodie said she’d talked to Brian and that he’d had an alibi though.

  I hadn’t see him in a long time, five or six years at least, and this man, the one I thought was Brian, was maybe the same age as the younger Brian that I’d know those years ago. They looked alike.

  Didn’t they?

  Maybe not
.

  Was it possible that I’d identified the wrong person because I subconsciously thought Brian was a bad enough guy to be involved in these heinous crimes and his father happened to have sold typewriters years ago? That, plus I hadn’t wanted to date him. And now this man had my niece. Guilt churned in my gut.

  I lifted my head a tiny bit more and looked at the man, and I suddenly realized that he truly wasn’t Brian O’Malley, that he didn’t really look much like him at all, that he just had the same build and the same hair color the younger Brian O’Malley had sported years earlier.

  “That’s not Brian,” I said.

  “No. Hush. Tell me who you are and what you want,” Jodie yelled.

  “I just want what’s rightfully mine: this land and whatever is on it or in it.”

  “If it’s rightfully yours, you can have it,” Jodie said. “No one will fight you for it.”

  “No one would have if you’d all just left it alone, given my brother the stupid typewriter.”

  Jodie paused a beat or two. “Who are you?”

  “Doesn’t matter. Just let me go. Let me get what’s in there and go.”

  “He wants to get what’s in the mine?” Seth said. “It’s not that easy. Jodie, ask if he’s a Mayfair, if he’s related to Homer. That might help.”

  “Or not!” I said. “What if that scares him?”

  “That’s a Mayfair mine,” Jodie yelled. “It’s yours if you’re a Mayfair. You a Mayfair?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then release the girl and I’ll let you go. It’s your mine. I mean it. I’m all about you getting what’s yours here, I promise.”

  “Uh-oh,” I said. Jodie didn’t believe in making promises. It was one of her few life rules, along with never again drinking tequila after that incident a few years back.

  Seth’s hand pushed on my shoulder a little more.

  Jodie slowly lowered her weapon. “Let her go, man. We’ll call it good.”

  Another eternity came upon us as we watched the man think about what to do next. Marion didn’t squirm, but her blue eyes were big and her face was sickly gray. I wanted to run to her so much. I wanted to tackle the Mayfair man. Actually, I wanted to kill him.