by Edie Claire
He adjusted his hold on his shotgun—an unconscious gesture Leigh could have done without seeing.
“They?” she repeated meekly.
He bestowed her with a tolerant, protective look. “You know who they is, don’t you?”
Leigh’s mind skittered through the likely possibilities. What was popular with the conspiracy theorists these days? Federal agents were always a good bet. But there were other possibilities. Communists? Aliens? Marauding gangs of hoodlums? Anarchists? Devil-worshippers? Second-rate Elvis impersonators?
Leigh played it safe and shook her head.
Joe leaned in close to her ear. “Damned IRS,” he whispered.
Bingo.
“Leigh, dear,” Lydie said sweetly. “We should finish up out here, soon. I’ve got to get back and take my medicine.”
Joe straightened up and took a step back.
Leigh threw her aunt—whom she knew perfectly well was not on any medication—an appreciative look. “Yes, of course.” She turned her attention back to Joe. “Thanks for helping out with the search for Archie,” she praised. “We all want him home safe.”
Joe assumed an avuncular air. “Yes, sirree. Don’t you ladies worry—I’m keeping an eye on this place myself from now on. The whole neighborhood.”
Fabulous. “That’s a comfort,” Leigh lied. “But you should know that I’ll be coming by regularly to put food out for the dog. So please don’t shoot me!”
She kept her tone teasing, but there was no answering sparkle in the man’s eyes. He seemed to consider a moment.
“Maybe you should wear a hunter’s vest,” he advised. “Just to be on the safe side.”
Leigh’s response stuck in her throat.
“Come on, dear,” Lydie coaxed, grabbing her arm and smiling a plastic smile. “We need to be moving along!”
Joe gave a nod of farewell and turned around. Much to Leigh’s relief, he then whistled for Scotty to join him as he headed back toward his own house.
“Charming man,” Lydie declared as they rounded the back side of the farmhouse. “How that type manages to procreate in a post-cave world is a mystery to me. And speaking of mysteries,” she continued, changing topics smoothly, “you’re right about the map being hopelessly inaccurate. The barn should have been drawn in. It’s almost certainly the same age as the house.”
“And the tool shed?” Leigh inquired, keeping an eye out over her shoulder for any sudden recurrence of her trigger-happy neighbor.
“Also left off the map,” Lydie agreed. “Let me see how old it looks.”
As Lydie prowled around the unimpressive looking structure, Leigh screwed up her courage and withdrew her flashlight from her pocket. The bag of premium dog food was still down in the cellar. All she had to do was bring it and the water pails up, and then she would be done with the place. She threw a look at Warren, who was watching her from the edge of the woods fifty yards or so away. Lenna and Ethan were up on the hill in the trees, calling for the mother dog in all sorts of imaginative (and clearly counterproductive) ways. Allison stood motionless on the edge of the woods, holding out her pad and pen and watching as Mathias walked in short, straight lines with his metal detector.
What were they up to? Leigh had a sudden image of the crumbling remains of Theodore Carr, buried all too hurriedly in a shallow grave, his rotted wooden coffin a mere yard beneath Mathias’s feet…
Cut it out.
The children were hunting for treasure, not bodies.
She summoned her willpower once more and stepped through the open cellar doors to the stairway beneath, shining her flashlight before her. To her comfort, her Aunt Lydie soon fell into step behind her.
“This is interesting,” Lydie commented.
“What’s interesting?” Leigh asked, relaxing slightly as each step down revealed more of the cellar to be vacant. When at last she reached the bottom step and confirmed that she and Lydie were the only occupants, her shoulders slumped with relief.
“This cellar,” Lydie answered, walking immediately to the nearest wall and running a finger along the stone. “The shed up top isn’t as old as the barn, but this foundation is quite old. Perhaps it started out as a root cellar.”
“You mean, a separate place to store food?”
“That’s right,” Lydie explained. “Before refrigeration, most everyone had them. Still,” she said speculatively, walking around the room’s perimeter. “It’s quite a large one. Larger than the building that’s on top of it now. Did you notice?”
Leigh had not. What she did notice now, and what shot a pang of angst straight through her heart, was a spot on the far wall that seemed to be missing something. Notably, a good bit of mortar.
She stepped closer and shone her flashlight directly on it.
“Ho there,” Lydie protested. “You’re leaving me in the dark, dear.”
“Sorry,” Leigh said, swinging the beam back into Lydie’s path until she joined Leigh at the wall. “But look at this. Someone has been chiseling the mortar around this rock.”
Lydie ran a finger in the groove to the left of the large, rectangular stone—the largest in the wall. Below the hole, on the dirt floor, lay a distinct pile of lighter-colored dust. “Indeed,” Lydie agreed. “But not just here. Look over that way.”
Leigh moved the beam across the wall and sighed. So much for thinking that their treasure hunters were actually honing in on their target. The mortar was chipped away in any number of places. One fist-sized stone near the stairs had been removed completely, then set back in. Leigh pulled it out and looked behind it, but there was nothing to see except more hard-packed, naturally rocky dirt, no different in texture or composition than the floor.
“You know, Aunt Lydie,” she said dispiritedly, “I don’t think anybody knows what the hell that map is pointing to. Including whomever is responsible for Archie’s disappearance. If the two things are even related.”
“You may be right,” Lydie said thoughtfully. “But just the same, I’d like to have another look at that map sometime, if you don’t mind.”
“Be my guest,” Leigh answered. “It’s back at the house.” She handed her flashlight to Lydie, then walked over to the dog’s water pails and emptied their remaining contents onto the ground. She then picked up the bag of food and set it on a hip, grabbed the empty pails with the opposite hand, and headed up the stairs.
Good riddance, creepy cellar, she thought to herself, secretly hoping that the mother dog would not in fact return here, but would find herself another shelter nearby—something with a less unnerving aura.
No sooner had Leigh reached the top of the stairs than small fingers clasped the pail handles and tugged them out of her hand. “I’ll refill the buckets, Mom,” Allison said sweetly, turning away with haste and skipping toward the house.
Warren appeared a few seconds later, the other three children trailing behind him.
Leigh set down the bag and threw him a questioning glance. “How long did she—”
“Ninety seconds, give or take,” he said with remorse. “Sorry, I tried. She slipped over just as Lenna tripped on a rock and cried out.”
“Did Lenna really trip over a rock?”
Warren’s eyebrows arched. “I don’t think I want to know.”
“I’ll help her carry the water,” Lydie offered, handing Leigh back the flashlight and heading after Allison.
“Were either of you saying anything… hazardous?” Warren inquired.
Leigh thought back as she watched Allison reach the house and turn on the spigot. The other children were rapidly approaching from the opposite direction. “I don’t think so,” she answered. The conversation with her aunt, whatever its details, had certainly not enlightened her in any way. But with Allison, one never knew.
“No sign of the mother dog or puppies, Mom,” Ethan reported. “But Matt found a screw.”
Mathias grimaced. “Yeah. Another epic find. Next Christmas I’m asking for the kind that goes deeper. Like…
eight, ten feet. That would be cool.”
“Ooh,” Lenna squealed. “Would that find bodies?”
Matt’s eyes met Ethan’s for only a second, but Leigh caught the tell.
Holy crap. They were looking for Theodore!
“Metal detectors can’t find bodies, dork!” Mathias snapped. “They find metal.”
Lenna’s blue eyes grew instantly apologetic. “Oh, right.”
“She knew that,” Ethan piped up quickly, grabbing Lenna by the elbow and urging her off toward Allison. “Let’s help with the water.”
In a blink, they were gone.
Mathias lifted his chin and stood his ground, looking uncannily like his self-assured, self-made father, Gil. “That girl says the dumbest things sometimes,” he lamented. “Using a metal detector to find a grave. Sheesh! You want me to put some of that food out by the woods, Aunt Leigh?”
Methinks thou doth protest too much.
Leigh picked up the food bowl that Lydie had brought from the cellar and handed it to him, along with the bag. “Sure,” she answered. “Go ahead and fill up the bowl, but bring the rest of the bag back. Otherwise the raccoons will clean us out.”
“Sure thing,” the boy answered, leaving his metal detector and heading off with pride.
Leigh’s eyes met her husband’s. “Did you see the look—”
“Oh, yeah,” he answered.
Leigh didn’t doubt his response. Warren always could read her mind. “What do you think the Pack were—”
He cut her off with a quick kiss and an arm around her shoulders. “Seriously, Leigh. Do you really want to know?”
She let out a long, tortured sigh—one that had undoubtedly been shared by countless parents of precocious tweens since the dawn of humankind.
“Hell, no,” she replied.
Chapter 13
The parade of people started walking back toward Leigh’s house along the creek, and Leigh was surprised when they reached the bridge at the Browns’ to see that Adith was not in attendance on the deck. She was even more surprised to see Harvey on the back lawn, walking slowly toward them and hailing her with an outstretched hand and a smile.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen him outside the house before,” Warren commented, putting her own thought into words.
Leigh shook her head. Although Harvey moved about more easily than his frail appearance suggested he could, the farthest she’d ever seen him away from his books and his cat was the front porch. “He probably just wants to ask me more questions about the map,” she replied. “But I should see what he wants.”
“Should I wait?” Warren asked, casting an anxious glance back toward Archie’s place.
Leigh smiled at her husband’s attempt at protectiveness. They both knew that when it came to physical danger, he spoiled for a confrontation about as much as Lenna did.
Still, the gesture was sweet.
Leigh assured him she would stay on the Brown’s property and then walk home by the road, and Warren, Lydie, and the kids set off without her. She walked uphill and met Harvey in the middle of the Brown’s backyard, where he had stopped to rest by Lester’s hammock.
“Hello Ms.—I mean Leigh,” he corrected. “Lovely day today, isn’t it?”
Leigh nodded, although she could not help wondering if, on an average day, Harvey had any idea what was happening in the world outside his room. His lack of interest in the great outdoors was further evidenced by the fact that the giant sweater engulfing his torso clearly belonged to Lester.
“I have a message for you from Adith,” he said pleasantly. “She’s asleep at the moment, but she wanted me to tell you that she saw the dog you were taking care of.”
Leigh’s eyebrows rose. “Wiley, or the stray mother dog?”
“The stray,” he replied. “The little white one. Adith said she saw her midmorning, pacing around at the edge of the woods. She might have gone back into the tool shed, but Adith couldn’t see.”
Leigh smiled. “That’s good news! I hoped she hadn’t gone far. She should get the food we left out, then.”
“That’s fortunate,” Harvey said politely.
“Is Adith having trouble staying awake again?” Leigh asked, not really needing an answer. With everything that was going on in the neighborhood, she knew that Adith would otherwise be out on the deck, binoculars and popcorn in hand, 24/7.
Harvey nodded. “Emma keeps trying to adjust her schedule so she’ll be sleepy at night, but the medication seems to affect her differently every time. Last night she was up until the wee hours. By noon she couldn’t keep her eyes open, even though she kept saying she wanted to talk to you the minute you got back from church.”
The wee hours? Leigh made a mental note. Had Adith seen or heard Lester leave the house?
“But I must confess,” Harvey said soberly, “I have my own reasons for wanting to speak with you.”
Leigh steeled herself.
“You wouldn’t happen to have a copy of that map handy, would you?” he asked hopefully.
Leigh shook her head. “Sorry. I haven’t spoken with the police yet.” At least not about that.
To her surprise, Harvey shook his head. “It doesn’t much matter,” he said gravely. “The fact that it exists is enough.” He paused a moment, scanning the horizon in every direction with pale, troubled eyes. A gust of wind ruffled the crown of white hair behind his ears, and he pulled Lester’s sweater tighter around him. “I’ve been thinking, you see. About how that map came to be lying on the ground.”
His eyes moved to hold hers. “Emma has called a couple of times today. She told Nora about an hour ago that Lester’s fever is down and his confusion seems to have cleared up. He says that he couldn’t sleep last night and went outside for a walk because it was cooler. He heard some sounds coming from the tool shed and decided to check on the mother dog. The next thing he knew, he was lying on a stretcher with paramedics hovering over him.”
“I see,” Leigh replied tonelessly, studying her shoes.
“I don’t believe that story,” Harvey said flatly.
Leigh looked back up at him with surprise. “You don’t?”
Harvey shook his head. “I think that Lester dropped that map. I think that he and Archie were looking for something together before Archie disappeared. And now, for whatever reason, Lester has gotten even more desperate to find it.”
Leigh sucked in a long, slow breath. “That’s what I think, too,” she admitted.
“What I’m trying to figure out,” Harvey continued, “is who else has the same map.”
“I gave the police the copy the children found,” Leigh explained. “I made more copies of it beforehand, though, to hang onto myself.”
“You keep them with you, then,” he said sternly. “Extras will only confuse the picture.”
Leigh studied his troubled face. “Tell me what you’re thinking,” she urged.
Harvey nodded. “If the item Archie and Lester were seeking is indeed a valuable Civil War relic, it must have come from Theodore Carr. So therefore did the map. The question is, how would a map made by Theodore wind up in Archie’s hands? If Carr made the map to preserve the item for his descendants, he would have given it to his son or daughter, and it would then have passed down through the family. But Archie is in no way related to Theodore Carr. I can assure you of that from my genealogical studies.”
Leigh caught the drift. “Then at some point, someone in the family must have given a copy of the map away to a friend, or sold it, or something.”
“The copy that fell into Archie’s hands, yes,” Harvey speculated. “It could have passed through several pairs of hands, and probably did, if the history of the farm being ‘haunted’ since the fifties is true.”
“It is,” Leigh assured. She gave a brief summary of Dora’s story, which Harvey listened to with rapt attention. “Adith told me something about that visit,” he said wryly, “but her story bore little resemblance to yours.”
Leigh grinne
d. “I expect not. Focused on the orbs, did it?”
Harvey harrumphed. “My point is, if we could determine who else might have a copy of that map, we will also know who else might be searching for the treasure.”
Leigh’s expression darkened. “And who might be determined to keep Archie and Lester from finding it first.”
Harvey nodded gravely.
Leigh tensed. “You really think it could be the hat of General Armistead?”
At her words, Harvey’s eyes blazed with an internal fire. “I can’t express to you how valuable such a treasure would be to the faithful. I’ve been doing some reading since our last chat. The hat would be of gray wool felt, what they call a slouch hat. It would have had a wreath insignia and been worn with officer’s cords. I read one account, based on an enlisted man’s journal, that claims the general wore two ladies’ hatpins hidden under the brim, one to honor each of his late wives. And of course, the genuine article would probably have a hole in the top crown, where the sword punctured through.”
Tiny beads of sweat formed on Harvey’s brow. Leigh hoped it was from mere excitement and that he wasn’t catching Lester’s flu, although seeing physical evidence of the man’s ardor on the topic was almost as disconcerting.
“It’s unlikely such a treasure could have survived in good condition,” Harvey said at last, lightening his tone a little. “It would have to be very well preserved. Air tight, without humidity. Not easy to do, perhaps. Never mind the ample evidence we already have that Theodore was not in his right mind when he died.”
“But it could have been the son,” Leigh pointed out. “Tom Carr could have made the map and buried his father’s hat.”
Harvey considered a moment. The thought seemed new to him. “I suppose so,” he mused. “But why? We know that Theodore suffered from dementia and paranoia; it makes sense that he would hide the hat from whatever imaginary threats he perceived. But would his son feel the same inclination?”
