by Edie Claire
Leigh moved her flashlight beam to the floor. There was no accompanying pile of mortar dust. Someone had obviously swept that evidence away. There were no footprints anywhere either, except her own. Someone had swept the whole floor, period.
She gripped the mini flashlight between her lips and extended both hands to the corners of the stone block. She got a grip and attempted to jiggle it.
The stone wouldn’t budge.
She took the flashlight in hand again and pointed the beam into the cracks where the mortar had been. In its deepest spot, the cavity extended only about two-thirds of the way through the depth of the block. Whatever method this person was using to attempt to loosen the stone, they had a very long way to go.
“Leigh!”
She jumped and whirled toward the steps. “What is it?”
“Come up here!”
Leigh complied. She found her cousin standing a few steps from the cellar doors, looking off into the woods up the hill.
“Is that the dog you’re looking for?”
Leigh followed Cara’s gaze. Then she smiled. At least one thing was going right this morning. “That’s her all right!”
She turned and closed the doors to the cellar, hoping she would never have cause to enter its eerie confines again. Perhaps the next time the mother dog found shelter, she would show a bit more taste.
“I’m going to grab a bowl of food and take it to her,” Leigh explained. “Can you stay on the edge of the woods? She’ll run off if we both go up.”
Cara nodded in agreement.
Leigh fetched the empty dog bowl that Ethan had left out last night, refilled it from the bag of food she had stored in the above-ground part of the tool shed, and began walking slowly up the hill. To her delight, the dog hadn’t moved. The plucky she-mutt, who in the daylight Leigh guessed to be a mixture of terrier and spaniel, stood still as a statue, her eyes locked on Leigh. Or, more accurately, on what Leigh held in her hands.
“How are you doing, Momma?” Leigh cooed as she moved closer. “What a smart dog you are to get away from all this craziness.” And how badly I wish you could talk! “Are your puppies all right? Can I see them?”
As Leigh approached, she looked around and listened for telltale squeals, but no signs of the litter were forthcoming. The dog stood her ground until her pursuer was within about six feet, then she turned, trotted off several paces, and faced Leigh again, her eyes still locked on the food bowl. She licked her lips.
“Okay, fine,” Leigh said, setting the bowl down and backing away. “You eat first. Then we’ll talk.”
When Leigh had moved about ten feet away from the bowl, the dog sprang into action, pouncing on the dish and wolfing down the kibble.
Leigh cast another glance downhill to check on her cousin, and found that Cara had followed her just far enough into the woods so that the women could keep each other in sight. Leigh offered a thumbs-up sign. Cara returned it.
The dog emptied the bowl in a matter of seconds. Then she turned tail and trotted off again. Leigh picked up the bowl and followed, looking carefully at every bush and tangle of thicket that seemed a likely hiding place. “You want to show me those, puppies, Momma? I can help you get them somewhere safe. It’s supposed to rain tonight, you know.”
The mother dog, seemingly in a charitable mood, wagged her tail slightly. But try as Leigh might, the dog would let her come no closer. After Leigh had followed her back and forth through the trees for nearly ten minutes, it was clear the dog had no intention of leading anything but a merry chase.
“She’s laughing at you, you know,” Cara said with a smirk as Leigh joined her in resting on a conveniently flat boulder near the wood’s edge. “She’s probably got those pups a half mile away.”
“Probably,” Leigh conceded. “I just hope that wherever they are, it’s got a roof over it.”
The women startled in unison as a loud beeping sound accosted their ears.
“Where is that coming from?” Cara asked. “It sounds like a truck backing up.” The women rose and walked out into the open. They rounded the tool shed and moved toward the farmhouse to get a better view up Archie’s driveway.
“What the—” Leigh was unable to complete the sentence. Backing down the gravel drive toward them was a gigantic green flatbed truck, loaded up with a piece of construction equipment that looked like a giant claw.
Just before it reached the bridge over the creek, the passenger door opened and a man jumped out. Oblivious to the women and their dropped jaws, he proceeded to direct the driver over the narrow bridge and into the wider circle of Archie’s drive, taking out a few low-hanging branches on the way. When after many false starts and retries the truck was satisfactorily parked, the man walked over to Leigh and Cara and issued a nod of greeting.
“One of you ladies Ms. Archie Pratt?”
“I’m afraid not,” Leigh answered.
The man appeared annoyed. “Well, is he here?”
Leigh shook her head. “Was he… expecting you?”
The man looked at her as though she had the brains of a marshmallow. “He’d better be!” he answered shortly, looking at his watch. “We got other deliveries to make today. Is he coming back soon?”
“I’m afraid we don’t know.” She looked again at the giant conglomeration of metal, grease, and bright-green paint. “What exactly did Archie buy?”
The man snorted. “Not buy, Lady. Rent. Not too many individuals need to keep one of these big boys around.”
The driver of the truck popped out of the cab.
“Hey, Lou!” the first man called testily. “Renter ain’t here. They don’t know where he is.”
The driver swore, then looked down at a clipboard. “Nah, man! It’s all right here. Ordered a week ago today, 9:45am. Archie Pratt, 976 Snow Creek Road. Put a deposit on his credit card—balance to be paid today. Delivery ten to twelve. Don’t go telling me he ain’t here. I ain’t backing that thing down twice!”
“If you don’t mind our asking,” Cara asked in the fake-sweet voice she reserved for men she deemed not smart enough to tell the difference, “what exactly is… that thing?”
The driver’s pique softened a little. He smiled. “That,” he answered proudly, simultaneously puffing out his chest and hitching his belt up under his belly, “is a 38 flywheel horsepower, 10,000 pound, practically brand spankin’ new compact hydraulic excavator.”
Chapter 16
“A hydraulic excavator?” Adith repeated loudly, her eyes hidden behind her giant binoculars. She was leaning over the railing of the deck and staring toward Archie’s place, never mind that the rental company had hauled the equipment away twenty minutes ago. “And I thought it was a backhoe!”
Leigh said nothing as she leaned on the railing next to Adith, staring out the same direction for no particular reason. Her head was swimming.
Maura had not picked up when she called, but Leigh was certain that her message would be relayed to the other detectives in earnest. If sinking hundreds of dollars into a deposit of rental equipment to be delivered today was not good evidence of Archie’s intentions to be home, she didn’t know what was. Surely now the police would have to take the possibility of a forced abduction seriously, regardless of whether they cared about the smashed camera and the tinkering beneath the tool shed.
“Well,” Adith said merrily, “I suppose it doesn’t matter much. They both dig, don’t they? Must be the septic. That’s the problem with living outside the city, you know—always something going wrong with the septic.”
Leigh nodded absently. Archie had indeed been planning to dig for something, but she doubted it was his septic tank. She could only hope the investigators would agree with her and bestir themselves to action, because the larger implications were distressing.
For the last eight years, Archie had contented himself with ripping out drywall and digging up various patches of earth with a shovel. He had concealed what he was doing from the neighbors, not because it was illeg
al, but because he didn’t want any additional competition. Never in all his years of puttering had Archie done anything so drastic as rent an excavator—an action which would be impossible to hide and difficult to explain. Why now?
Perhaps because, at long last, Archie had made a breakthrough. Had he found “The Guide?” If so, for the first time since his quest had begun, he might actually be able to read the map.
Which would all be well and good. Except that Archie obviously did have competition for the prize. Competition who was dead set on getting to it first.
“Yoo-hoo!” Adith called, waving a twisted hand in front of Leigh’s absently staring eyes. “Where’s your brain at, girl?”
Nowhere good. “Sorry. What did you say?”
“I asked if Harvey gave you my message yesterday. He said he would, but you know his type—they can recite the name of every president since Jesus, but they can’t figure out how to fry a damn egg.”
“Oh,” Leigh’s mind snapped back to the present. “About the dog. Yes, he told me. Thanks. I saw her myself this morning.”
“That wasn’t the only reason I wanted to talk to you,” Adith said, her voice dropping dramatically.
“Oh, no?”
Adith made a show of looking over her shoulder toward the house. “You never know who’s eavesdropping around here. Walls are thin as paper.” She motioned for Leigh to lean closer. “I was up night before last, you know. The night Lester went out.”
Leigh’s eyebrows rose. “You were?”
Adith nodded solemnly. “I’m up half the nights these days, thanks to that danged fool medicine! Doctor keeps telling me the side effects will go away, but it ain’t happening yet. I lie there and stare at the ceiling and listen to Pauline snoring like a moose and get so danged bored I can’t stand it. So that night I decided I was getting myself up, arthritis or no, and I was getting a change of scenery. And I did. I put on my bathrobe and went out and sat on the deck a bit, and you just guess what I saw!”
Leigh’s breath held. “You saw Lester leave?”
Adith frowned. “Well, no. Don’t you think I would have called out to him if I had? I didn’t know anyone else was even awake… not then. But what I saw down by the creek was clear enough, even without my binocs.”
She paused and motioned for Leigh to move closer still. Leigh complied.
“It was them orbs again!”
Leigh tried hard not to sigh. “You mean, the floating lights?”
Adith nodded. “Only one this time. Bobbing along out there by the creek, with one of those hazy, misty glows around it, you know?”
Leigh wondered if Mrs. Rhodis had been wearing her glasses at the time. She decided not to ask. “About what time was that?”
“Would have been around one in the morning,” Adith answered. “And I don’t mind telling you, it gave me the gooseflesh too, just like Dora said. Pansy knew from the beginning, of course. She wouldn’t even come out onto the deck with me. Stayed there at the foot of my bed, she did. Wouldn’t come a step closer to those evil beacons!”
Leigh also didn’t ask if the dog had been asleep.
“Well,” Mrs. Rhodis continued, “I watched that orb float off toward Archie’s place, and that was enough for me. So I went back to bed. It was later—and I can’t say how much later, because I had drifted off by then—when I heard a door close downstairs. It sounded like the back door, but I didn’t think much of it. I guess I thought it was Lester or Emma letting that dog of Archie’s out. I was a bit muddled—thought it might be morning, but in thinking back on it, I’m sure it was still pitch dark.”
Adith’s wrinkled face clouded. “Now I suspect it must have been Lester leaving. I feel real bad I didn’t wake up the rest of the way and see what he was up to. Danged medicine!”
“You can’t help it if you weren’t awake enough to think straight,” Leigh assured.
“But I should have known!” Adith lamented. “I should have known Lester was vulnerable!”
Leigh’s eyebrows rose. “Vulnerable how? To what?”
“To the lure, of course! The orbs have a power, you know. Dora says they’re harbingers, but I’m not so sure about that. I think those little floaty bits of evil have a power all their own. And Lester, he was sick as a dog and all feverish, and that makes your brain weak. If he’d looked out the window when I did and seen that same orb… why, they can turn you smack into a zombie, they can! Led him right out there to the creek, and him not half in his right mind—”
She broke off abruptly, her face paling. “I wonder if that’s how the old soldier drowned!”
Leigh straightened. “Let’s not let our imaginations run away with us. However Theodore Carr died, it was a very long time ago. I’m more worried about Archie.”
Adith bristled. “You think I’m not? You may poo-poo the supernatural, but Archie knew what was going on out here, and despite all his good-natured storytelling, deep down, it scared him. Why else do you think he went to Dora? Because he knew he was in over his head, that’s why!”
Stop. Rewind.
Leigh gave her head a shake. “What did you say? Archie went to see Dora? When?”
“A week or so ago,” Adith said dismissively. “Didn’t I tell you that?”
“No,” Leigh said tightly. “I’m quite certain you didn’t. And neither did Dora.”
“No?” Adith considered. “Well, it wasn’t a secret, for heaven’s sake. She said when I called that she’d just visited with Archie and wasn’t it nice to hear from so many neighbors. I told you that Archie asked Harvey if he could come up with a list of people who’d lived at the farmhouse since the Carrs—but Harvey’s list just had the names. I don’t know how Archie found out where Dora lives now, because I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know my friend Barbara Jean down in Bellevue. Then again, you never know who Barbara Jean knows. Why, back when Doc Shepherd’s first wife Coreen had her eye surgery—”
“Mrs. Rhodis,” Leigh interrupted, “Why did Archie want to see Dora?”
Adith threw her an exasperated look. “Because of the haunting, of course! He wanted to know what she’d seen when she lived there. When I told her he’d gone missing, she was so upset—she seemed quite fond of him. Everybody loves Archie, you know.”
“Yes, I know.” Leigh’s mind drifted back to her conversation with Dora. The older woman had indeed been concerned about Archie’s disappearance. Leigh could envision the two of them hitting it off famously, comparing notes on supernatural visitations while Archie casually threw in his actual questions. But what questions were they? And more importantly, what were her answers?
If Archie had talked to Dora a little over a week ago, that meant he had talked to her only a few days before he rented the excavator. A few days before the children found the map. A few days before he disappeared.
What had Dora told him?
Harvey… Lester’s muttered words continued to drum in Leigh’s brain. He knows, Arch… He knows.
“Mrs. Rhodis,” Leigh asked urgently. “Did Harvey know about Archie’s visit with Dora? Do you know if Archie came to see him afterwards?”
Adith’s brow creased. “Oh, I couldn’t say about that. Before he went missing Archie used to pop in here all the time, either to see Lester or to mooch from Emma’s kitchen. But if Harvey knew that Archie had already found Dora he sure didn’t tell me about it when he gave me the list. Would have saved me about a hundred phone calls!”
Leigh’s pulse rate increased. She was getting close to the truth at last. “I need to talk to Harvey,” she announced, turning toward the door to the house.
“He ain’t here,” Adith informed.
Leigh’s eyes widened. “What do you mean? He’s always here. Does he have a doctor’s appointment or something?”
Adith shook her head. “No. A friend of his came and picked him up. He said they were going to the library.”
Leigh blinked. “Has he done that before?”
Adith shrugged. “Every once in a while
. Harvey’s a book man, you know. Doesn’t care for computers. When he’s got the yen to do some researching he heads off to the Carnegie. At least I think that’s where he goes. That’s how he came up with the list of farm owners. You’d think Archie could find out that stuff for himself, with his being a teacher once, but he’s got no patience for that kind of thing. Neither does Lester. Hell, Emma wanted a recipe for pot pie one time and Lester got on her computer and came back with directions on how to bake marijuana into a graham cracker crust! Then of course Emma went back and found the right thing herself in about ten seconds—”
“Do you know when Harvey will be back?” Leigh asked anxiously.
Adith shook her head. “By dinner, I’d expect. He gets his pills at six. Why are you so anxious to talk to him, anyway? What’s he supposed to know that I don’t know? He’s not even a believer. Telling me my orbs are flashlights!” She gave a derisive snort. “Ridiculous. I ask you, how could an ordinary, everyday flashlight turn Lester into a zombie? Huh? Huh?”
Leigh’s cell phone rang. She pulled it out quickly. “Hello, Emma?”
“Yes, honey.” Emma’s voice sounded considerably more chipper than the last time Leigh had heard it. “I just wanted to see if you could come down and see Lester now. He’s asking for you, and it’s visiting hours.”
Leigh drew in a shaky breath. “I’d love to,” she said sincerely. “I’ll be right there.”
***
“Hi, Lester,” Leigh said warmly, taking a seat by the bedside of the short, stout man she realized now had always subconsciously reminded her of a teddy bear. This realization was made plain by the fact that an actual stuffed teddy bear was propped up on the table beside him, mimicking his roundish figure, protruding ears, and smiling brown eyes to a T. The teddy, however, had a small black nose, whereas Lester’s was still swollen and fire-engine red, in colorful but unhealthy contrast to the puffy, blue-black rings under his eyes.
“Hi there,” Lester returned. He gestured toward the stuffed animal. “How do you like that? Grandkids got it for me. I think they figure they’ll get to keep it for themselves.”
