Young Whit and the Traitor's Treasure

by Phil Lollar

  Emmy crossed her arms with a huff. “Yeah, we met that guy.”

  “No, no,” Ben said, “not him, the one before him. He took all the boxes of their stories and promised he’d see to it.”

  “What happened?” asked Johnny.

  “Nothin’,” Ben replied. “Not a blame thing. He put the boxes in the storage room, and there they sat. Days passed ... then weeks ... months ... years ... with no word at all. Finally, some of the folks went back in and asked about it, and you know what that clerk told ’em?”

  “What?” asked Emmy, eyes as round as saucers.

  “He told ’em he didn’t know what they’s talkin’ about. Said he didn’t have the boxes and didn’t remember ever havin’ ’em.”

  “That’s terrible!” Johnny exclaimed.

  “Criminal, if you ask me,” said Ben. “He wouldn’t let ’em check out the storage room, neither. Just brushed ’em off like they was so much lint. Then he retired and died, and the present gen’leman took over.”

  “And I get the feeling he’s no better than the first guy,” said Emmy.

  Johnny sighed. “So, for all we know, the first guy destroyed the records.”

  Ben smiled. “No, they there.”

  “How do you know?”

  “’Cause before I was janitor at the school, I was janitor at town hall, right up to last year. The boxes are still in that storage room. And so is Granddaddy’s proof.”

  “But what good does it do if the clerk won’t let us get to them?” asked Emmy.

  “Well, I know he won’t let me see ’em,” said Ben. “I tried, and that’s why I ain’t workin’ there no more.”

  “He fired you?”

  “More like he had me fired, but it amounts to the same thing. So that counts me out, but what about you two?”

  Johnny shook his head. “He probably knows I’m related to G.W. McClintock by now. In fact, I think he suspected it when we first went there.”

  “And I ... wasn’t very nice to him then,” said Emmy sheepishly.

  Ben frowned. “Well, they’s gotta be somebody! Maybe someone in your families could do it!”

  While Ben and Emmy discussed who was up to the task, Johnny remained silent, his thoughts turned inward. He knew his great-granduncle was innocent. And if Ben was right, the proof could very well be sitting in the town hall records department storage room at that very moment.

  He had to see those records. They were his only hope of clearing G.W.’s name, and his family name as well. He couldn’t let some records clerk stop him. But should he do it? Was it okay to do a wrong thing if the result was something right? Besides, it was a big risk—one he couldn’t let Emmy or Ben share, but one he decided he needed to take.

  He was going to break into the town hall records department storage room.

  Tonight.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The discussion wound down, and Ben and Emmy lapsed into silence. Finally Ben said, “It’s gettin’ late. Y’all need to go on home, and I need to get back to the school to do some cleanin’.”

  They gathered their things, agreed to meet after school each day to chart their progress, and then made their way back to the front gates. After making sure no one was watching, they each slipped through the opening and parted company.

  “Say hi to Sarepta for us,” called Emmy.

  “Naw, Sarah,” Ben called back. “Sarepta’s losin’ too many strings!”

  Emmy laughed, but Johnny was still deep in thought about his plans for that night.

  “You all right?” she asked.

  “Yeah, uh, fine. Just ... thinking things through.”

  She nodded. “I know what you mean. It’s a little overwhelming, but we’ll figure it out—or you will. You’re Sherlock!”

  He grimaced, and she chortled.

  I hope tonight I’m half as clever as Sherlock Holmes, he thought.

  When Johnny got home, he went to the shed, took out his schoolbooks, put them on the workbench, and gathered the tools he thought he’d need, though he wasn’t sure what he’d need. He put the tools in his bag and left it there. He then picked up his books and went inside.

  He behaved as normally as possible the rest of the afternoon and evening. He participated in the dinner discussion, laughed at Charlie’s antics, and forced down food at supper, though he wasn’t hungry at all. He helped with the dishes, then went up to his room and tried to remain calm. Before long he heard Fiona put Charlie to bed in her room down the hall, and then Fiona knocked on his door softly and said, “Good night, love.”

  “Good night, Fiona,” he replied.

  He heard her footsteps tread down the hall to her and Harold’s bedroom. Johnny put out his own light and waited in the darkness, listening for Harold’s heavier footfalls on the stairs and down the hall. Then their bedroom door opened and closed. Johnny cracked open his door and watched. After a few minutes more, the light under their door went out.

  He closed his door gently, waited another 15 minutes to be sure, and then moved to his window, slid it open, and climbed out onto the roof of the covered porch. A heavy-duty trellis for creeping vines ran from the top of the porch roof to the ground. Johnny had wondered ever since they moved in if the trellis would hold him. “No time like the present to find out,” he muttered, and swung his legs over the side.

  The trellis was solid as a rock. Nice to know for the future, he thought as he hopped the last foot to the ground. He slunk to the shed, grabbed his bag with the tools, and ran off toward the town hall.

  The streets were deserted, which was normal for a small town at night. The eeriness of being alone only heightened Johnny’s anxiety over what he was about to do, but he knew it had to be done.

  He kept an eye out for Deputy Miller’s patrol car, and his heart nearly stopped when he saw it pass by a few blocks over and then make a quick turn in his direction. Johnny ducked behind some bushes and remained perfectly still. The patrol car pulled up near him ... slowed ... and shined its spotlight a few feet in front of him. He didn’t dare even breathe.

  After a second, the spotlight hit a stray cat, which screeched, hissed, and scurried away. The spotlight turned off, and the patrol car slowly pulled away and turned down the next street. Johnny waited until he couldn’t hear it anymore, then continued on his way.

  He was at the town hall before he realized it. The tower loomed above him, a monolithic shadow in the night sky. He went around to the back of the building and checked the windows. They were all locked, as was the door. He had been hoping it wouldn’t come to this, but he had no choice. Johnny pulled a hammer from his bag, wrapped an old cloth around its head, and drew it back to smash the window.

  “Don’t do that,” a voice behind him said.

  Johnny nearly jumped out of his skin. He whipped around.

  It was Ben.

  When he could breathe again, Johnny hissed, “You scared me half to death! What are you doing here?”

  “Waitin’ for you,” Ben whispered.

  “But how’d you know I’d be here?”

  “I saw that look in yo’ eyes this afternoon. Mischief through and through.”

  “You should leave!”

  Ben shook his head. “Naw, I don’t think so.”

  “I know what you’re gonna say, but I have to do this!”

  “Naw, ya don’t!”

  “Yes, I do.” He drew back the hammer again.

  “I meant, you don’t hafta break the window. If you gotta screwdriver, I can get us in.”

  Johnny paused. “How?”

  Ben nodded. “The back door don’t lock too well. I can jimmy it. C’mon!”

  They crept to the back door. Johnny pulled a screwdriver from his bag and handed it to Ben. Ben put it to the lock and then stopped for a moment. “You sure you wanna do this?” he asked.

  Johnny nodded. “I have to. But you don’t.”

  “Naw, if you gonna do it, then I’m goin’ with you. I know where ev’ything is, and you need someon
e to watch your back.” He twisted the screwdriver, and the door popped open. They slipped inside, and Ben closed the door after them.

  They padded quickly along the marble floor, past a door marked “Do Not Enter,” to the records department. This door was unlocked, and Johnny followed Ben inside, beyond the large mural and the front desk. They walked all the way to a staircase descending to the basement. Johnny clicked on a flashlight he’d brought.

  They took the steps down two at a time, arriving at what appeared to be a lunch area. There were a table and chairs in the center, a water cooler next to a couple of free-standing upright lockers, a countertop along one wall with a set of cupboards over it, and at the far end of the room, opposite the stairs, a door with a plaque on it that read “Storage.”

  They crossed the room to the door. “Need the screwdriver again?” Johnny asked.

  “Naw,” said Ben. He reached up, felt along the top of the doorframe for a few seconds, and then pulled down a key.

  Johnny stared at him. “If you knew where the key was, why didn’t you find the proof when you worked here?”

  “I told you, I tried!” Ben snapped. “How do you think I know where they keep the key?”

  Once they were inside, Johnny’s flashlight revealed a mess. Piles of paper stood everywhere, boxes were stacked haphazardly almost to the ceiling, and a thin layer of dust covered everything. On the far side of the room, a grimy basement window let in a dim glow from the streetlight in front of the building. “It’s even messier than I remember,” said Ben.

  “Where are the slaves’ archives?” Johnny asked.

  “Back that way,” Ben said, pointing, and they followed a maze-like path made by the stacks to the far corner of the room, taking care not to bump something that would trigger an avalanche of paper. “There! Right there!” Ben pointed again.

  Johnny shined the flashlight beam in that direction, revealing the name “HUCK” scrawled on the side of a large, beat-up box near the top of a stack. They shifted a few boxes around, carefully lifted their prize, and parked it atop a lower stack. All the boxes had seals on them, but Johnny noticed this one was broken.

  “Someone’s been in this,” he whispered.

  He removed the lid and saw several reams of old paper piled inside—hundreds of pages, all filled with small, neat handwriting that Johnny thought looked familiar. “I can’t take all of this!” he whispered.

  “Just look for an’thin’ with Thaddeus or G.W. on it!” Ben replied, digging into the box.

  Johnny joined him, and they thumbed through the old papers as rapidly as they could, taking great care with them, as they were so old. Johnny finally found several pages clipped together with a title page that read: “An Account of Captain Thaddeus Knox, C.S.A., and Lieutenant G.W. McClintock, C.S.A., in Provenance, April 1865.” He held it up. “This it?”

  Ben smiled. “Yeah! Good!”

  Johnny carefully put it in his bag.

  Ben dug back into the box. “That’s just the story, though,” he added. “We need the proof!”

  “What is it? A map? Directions?”

  Ben rubbed his temples. “I’m tryin’ to think ... keep lookin’!”

  Johnny also dug down farther into the box. There were more papers, a few drawings of animals, and a cache of pictures. He longed to peruse them, as he loved pictures of the past, but Ben urged him to keep going.

  Finally, they saw something different. At nearly the bottom of the box, they found a brown, faux leather, rectangular book. They pulled it out carefully. It was a photo album. When Johnny opened it, there were only four pictures in it, along with some neat handwriting on the pages following.

  “That’s it!” Ben cried. “I remember now! That’s the proof!”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes! Take it!”

  Johnny closed the album and put it in his bag carefully.

  Just then, they saw headlights flash by the basement window. “We gotta get outta here!” Ben said.

  They put the other papers back into the box, and then refitted the lid and put it back in its place. But when they turned to leave, Johnny’s bag bumped a stack of paper, toppling it over and almost burying him.

  Ben leaned over to help, but as Johnny thrashed around, trying to get free, Ben suddenly stopped and whispered, “Don’t move!”

  Johnny froze.

  A flashlight beam appeared in the basement window, attempting in vain to pierce the grime. The light moved away, and for a brief moment, Johnny could see the shadow of Deputy Miller’s head (the brim of his cap was unmistakable) framed in the glass. The shadow moved off, and they resumed digging Johnny out.

  Once he was free, they tried to restack as much of the paper as they could. Ben finally said, “That’s good enough! We gotta go!”

  They wove their way through the boxes to the door and out into the lunchroom. Ben quickly locked the door and replaced the key on the upper trim. They ran to the stairs, bounded up them, and hurried toward the records department door, where they stopped.

  In the crack at the bottom of the door, they saw a flashlight beam.

  They backed away from the door on tiptoes to the top of the stairs. Ben grabbed Johnny’s shoulder. “I’m gonna distract him so you can get outta here!” he whispered.

  “No, Ben!” Johnny whispered back.

  Ben put his hand over Johnny’s mouth. “Listen to me, boy. I know you’s clever. And I heard yo’ teachers talkin’ ’bout how smart you is—real smart. That means you can figger this out! Find the gold and we have the proof! This is how we fix things for both our families. It’s the only way we’re gonna get to the truth! Understand?”

  Johnny nodded.

  Ben released his grip, and they crept back to the door. He held up three fingers, pointed to himself, and then pointed in the direction he would run. Johnny nodded. Ben mouthed, “One, two, three”—then threw open the door and ran like crazy for the front entrance.

  “Hey!” Deputy Miller yelled and gave chase. “I see you, Ben Huck! Stop now! I mean it!”

  Johnny heard their footsteps echo down the main chamber, Miller yelling the whole way for Ben to halt. Ben burst through the front doors, and a few seconds later, Miller burst through as well.

  Johnny jumped up and peered out the same door Ben had just used. The main chamber was deserted. Outside, the patrol car started and took off, tires squealing. Johnny beat a hasty retreat down the hallway to the back door. He poked his head out, saw the coast was clear, hopped out the door, closed it, and ran off into the cool night air.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “I can’t believe you did that!” Emmy exclaimed. “And I especially can’t believe you did it without me!”

  It was the following afternoon, and she and Johnny were in the old shed in his backyard.

  “Keep your voice down!” he ordered. “Look, I’m sorry, but I couldn’t let you take that risk. I didn’t want Ben to take it, either, but he showed up.”

  “Yeah, and now he’s taking the fall!”

  They’d heard that morning that Ben had been arrested for breaking and entering, and for fleeing the scene. He was in the jail at the sheriff’s station, awaiting trial.

  “Poor Ben!” Emmy said.

  “I know!” Johnny replied. “And I feel terrible about it. Part of me keeps thinking I need to go over there and confess. But he sacrificed himself so I could get away. He told me to get to the truth, so that’s what I’m gonna do.”

  “So, you found what you were looking for? You found the proof?”

  Johnny sighed. “Well, Ben thinks we did. But it’s ... not what I expected.”

  “Why? What is it?”

  Johnny gestured to the workbench. “This.” On it was the photo album, and next to it, the relevant pages from old Huck’s account. He picked up the pages. “After the war, Huck found work as a photographer’s assistant. He learned the trade, saved up enough to buy his own camera, and went into business for himself. He made a decent living, suppo
rted his family, and took lots and lots of pictures. Including”—he picked up the album—“these.”

  He handed the album to Emmy, who opened it carefully. Each of the four pictures was on a page by itself: a deer, a fish, a cave, and a speck of dirt. On the pages that followed was a riddle, no doubt written in old Huck’s scratchy handwriting:

  I am power and I am force, though I am found in dust;

  It’s what happened to all of my treasures, hidden in Earth’s crust.

  I feed musicians and they feed me, and trod on me end to end;

  Lovers in love love my name, for it’s where their loves begin.

  I have a face that cannot see or hear or taste or smell,

  I have hands that cannot grasp or hold, though they can tell.

  Here at last, the final clue, and guaranteed to vex:

  To figure it out, when is an X much more than an X?

  Emmy frowned. “What is this?”

  “Clues,” said Johnny. “It’s a mystery, a mystery by Ben Huck’s grandfather that no one at the town hall believed, because they thought it was just the ramblings of an old former slave.”

  “But you can solve it, right?”

  Johnny shrugged. “Well, it’s hard. Old Huck was a very clever man.”

  “More clever than you?” asked Emmy. “I mean, what if he made it so hard that nobody can—”

  “I think I solved one,” said Johnny.

  Emmy started and then grinned. “I knew it! Which one?”

  Johnny pointed to a line in the riddle. “Here: ‘I have a face that cannot see or hear or taste or smell, I have hands that cannot grasp or hold, though they can tell ...’”

  “That’s two clues!” said Emmy.

  Johnny shook his head. “I don’t think so. All the other lines are separated by a semicolon, see? But these two are separated by a comma. They belong together.”