by Jessica Beck
“That was smart thinking,” Momma said when the front doorbell rang. “Now who could that be?”
“It’s probably Hank Caldwell,” I said as I got up to answer it.
“Who is Hank Caldwell?”
“He’s the man who’s here to change all of the locks,” I explained.
“Is that really necessary?” Momma asked. She just wasn’t getting it. We were on the defensive now, and that meant making ourselves as safe as we could manage.
“You’d better believe that it is. We don’t know how many keys are out there floating around, and I want to be sure that no one tries to get in when we’re asleep.”
“That’s good thinking,” she said. “I wouldn’t have thought of doing that.”
I would take any praise I could get. “Don’t worry. It takes a while to get the hang of this, but you’re a smart lady. I’m sure that you’ll catch on,” I added with a grin, which she returned in kind.
A man in his mid-sixties was standing at the door when we opened it. His hair, as full as it was, was pure white, and while his face may have sported more wrinkles than a raisin, his back was straight, and his eyes were clear.
“You must be Hank Caldwell,” I said as I offered him my hand.
With a grin, he replied, “Well, if I must be, then I must. You wanted the locks here all changed?”
“We do. Thanks for coming on such short notice.”
“It’s a smart thing to do, but not many folks think of it until it’s too late. Besides,” he added with a grin, “my cousins are in town, and I’m eager to leave the house right now at the slightest excuse. I’ll have you fixed up in an hour, or it will be free.”
“There’s no need for you to make that promise,” my mother said.
“It wasn’t really a promise. It’s just an expression.”
“Well then, you should be careful using it,” Momma said with the hint of a grin. “Someone might just take you up on it someday.”
“I suppose they could try,” Hank said. “Now, if you ladies will excuse me, I’ll get to work.”
“I suppose we need to wait to start searching until he’s gone,” Momma said softly after we left Hank to his work.
“Sorry, but I thought this should be a priority.”
“Suzanne, there’s no need to apologize. I think it’s a wonderful idea. What do we do in the meantime, though?”
“I don’t know about you, but I’m going to keep an eye on Hank,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.
Momma laughed, and then she saw that I was serious. “You aren’t joking, are you?”
“Momma, there are only two people in Maple Hollow that I trust, and we’re both standing right here. It’s going to be smart if we keep that in mind at all times.”
“How are we going to watch him without him growing suspicious of our attention?” Momma asked.
“That’s the easy part. We’re going to ask him a lot of questions as he works, and listen intently to every reply he makes.”
“I can do that myself,” Momma said. “That way you can go ahead and search on your own.”
“Thanks for the offer, but we’re going to need to be on the buddy system while we’re here,” a suggestion I’d ignore later, much to my own regret. “Whatever we do while we’re here, we do it together.”
“I suppose that’s prudent,” she said. “But you’re better at making inane conversation than I am, so I’ll let you lead the way.”
“I’m not sure that’s a compliment exactly, but it sounds like a plan to me.”
We both approached Hank, who was on one knee removing the front door lock with a long screwdriver. “So, are you a lock specialist, or do you handle other situations?” I asked him.
“Well, I don’t shingle roofs anymore, not since I nearly fell off one a few years ago, and I don’t dig foundations, but if you have a problem with your house between the ground and the sky, then I’m the one you should call.”
“Be careful. We might just take you up on that,” I said. “This old house may need more of your attention.”
“I’d be most appreciative if you called me, then, especially for the next nine days.”
“Are your cousins really staying with you that long?” I asked.
“That’s not the worst part,” he said as he pulled off the old lockset completely.
“What is?” Momma asked.
“They’ve already been here for two solid weeks, and they are driving me stark raving crazy,” he said good-naturedly.
“Family can do that sometimes,” I said with a smile as I looked at my mother. “I don’t mean you, of course,” I added with a grin as I looked at Momma.
“I didn’t think you did,” she said, offering a smile herself.
As Hank worked his way through Aunt Jean’s locks, we chatted about a great many things, including my dear aunt, and by the time the handyman was finished and handed us the new keys, we were all old friends.
“Remember; call me if you need me, day or night,” he said as he folded Momma’s check up and stuck it in his front shirt pocket.
“We will,” Momma promised.
After he was gone, I locked the door behind him and then turned to Momma. “There, that wasn’t so bad, now was it?”
“Suzanne, I may have underestimated you.”
“What do you mean?”
“You are very good with people, aren’t you? I often wondered how you got folks to tell you things they never should have during the course of your investigations, but your questions are so sincere that people can’t help themselves, can they?”
“I’ve found that it helps if I really do want to know the answers to the questions that I ask, but that’s not the real secret.”
“Please, tell me. I’m dying to know,” Momma said.
“It’s so simple, but almost no one does it these days. When I ask someone a question, I actually listen to their answer.”
“That’s all there is to it?” Momma asked, clearly incredulous.
“That’s it,” I said.
“Remarkable,” Momma said. “Now that we’re safely behind new locks and finally alone, shall we go do a bit of exploring?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” I said as we both headed for the stairs to see exactly what clues Aunt Jean had left us before she’d taken that most unfortunate fall.
Chapter 7
“I found a locket,” Momma said excitedly as she pulled a chain from the doll’s neck. Lil Sis was residing in a handmade bed to match her size. My grandfather had clearly made the bed for his oldest daughter’s favorite doll, but Jean had just as obviously been the one to paint it. The bed frame featured a rainbow headboard while a rural scene was painted on the bed itself, featuring trees, grass, a barn, and even a bunny rabbit.
At least I thought it must be a rabbit.
I wasn’t completely sure, and I wondered how old Jean had been when she’d painted it.
“Does the locket have any sentimental value?” I asked my mother as I studied it.
“Not to me,” she said with a frown. “I’ve never seen it before in my life.”
“Open it and see what’s inside,” I said. “There might be a photograph or a note that might give us a clue as to why Aunt Jean directed you to it.”
“That’s an excellent idea,” Momma said. After a bit of a struggle, she finally got the locket opened. Instead of a photograph, though, there was a small, folded piece of paper inside.
“What’s it say?”
“Give me a moment,” Momma said as she opened it. As she read the contents, she frowned.
“What’s wrong?”
“It doesn’t make any sense,” my mother said as she handed it to me.
As I read it, I frowned as well. Written in my aunt’s handwriting was a note that said, J:P24, S5.
“What do you suppose that means?” I asked her.
“I haven’t a clue.”
“Do you suppose that it’s a lead meant for us?”
/> “What else could it be?” Momma asked.
“I’m not sure, but until we can figure it out, it’s not going to do us much good. Let’s just hope that the other clues we get are a little bit clearer than this one,” I said as I handed the paper and locket back to her.
“I agree.”
There was just one problem with that, though.
Evidently, the hidden spot in the window seat hadn’t been all that well hidden after all.
Someone had clearly gotten to it before we could.
“That’s too bad,” Momma said when she realized that the space was empty. “How did anyone know that something was in here in the first place? It certainly wasn’t that good a clue.”
“I don’t know about that. Somebody surely must have thought so to take whatever was in there. All is not lost yet, though.”
My mother looked at me oddly. “What are you talking about, Suzanne? The space is clearly empty.”
I studied the bottom of the compartment carefully before I spoke again. “Momma, is there a flashlight nearby?”
She looked puzzled as she said, “This is an old house. It loses electricity every time the storms are heavy enough, so there are flashlights everywhere. Why do you need one?” she asked me as she handed me a nearby light from Aunt Jean’s nightstand.
“I want to check something first.” I turned the light on and directed it down into the cubby. There was a bit of dust on the bottom of the space, but some of it was clean. As I changed the angle of the beam of light, I could finally make out what I was looking at, not that it made any more sense than the locket we’d found earlier had.
Outlined by the fine layer of dust, I saw a shape that was clearly a square the size of a piece of toast.
“What did you find?” Momma asked as she tried to look over my shoulder.
“Something was definitely there, and until very recently, if the absence of dust means anything.”
Momma nodded. “It has to. Jean was always complaining about how quickly dust accumulated in this old house.”
“How long would it take for a fine layer to accumulate?” I asked her.
“I don’t know. Is it important?” Momma asked.
“It could be.”
“My sister claimed that it happened overnight, but I’d guess it would take at least four or five days for any to accumulate.”
“Look down here and tell me what you see,” I told her as I handed her the flashlight.
Momma peered down into the space, and then looked quizzically at me. “Suzanne, what am I supposed to be looking for?”
“Angle the light, and then play it along the bottom of the cubby,” I said.
“Okay. Now what?”
“Do you see anything?”
“Just dust,” she said.
“Is it everywhere?”
After a few moments, she said in amazement, “I see it now. Some of the bottom is free of dust entirely.”
“It’s about the size of a piece of toast, wouldn’t you say?”
“I’d call it a slice of bread if I were describing it,” Momma said.
“It’s the same thing, isn’t it?”
“I suppose,” she said, “though if you’re expecting one and get the other, I doubt that you’d feel that way.”
“Whichever way you describe it, the thin layer of dust around it tells us that whatever was placed there hadn’t been there long. The absence of dust means that whatever was taken from it had to have happened within the last few days.”
Momma turned off the light and put it back on the nightstand. As she returned, she had a look of surprise on her face.
“What’s that expression mean?” I asked her.
“That observation was actually quite brilliant,” Momma said.
“Ordinarily I’d bask in the warmth of your praise, but it doesn’t do much to help our cause, does it?”
“I would have never thought to check the level of dust in the bottom of the cabinet in a thousand years,” Momma said.
“But what good does it do us? What else that we know of is the size of a piece of bread, or even toast, for that matter?”
She frowned. “I haven’t a clue.”
“Then we’re no better off than we were before,” I said. “Let’s hope the last hiding spot gives us more than the other two have.”
“We can always hope,” Momma said as she followed me upstairs into the attic.
The clues, such as they’d been so far, had been pretty obscure. Why hadn’t Aunt Jean left us something that said, “This is the person I suspect?” I was afraid that it wasn’t going to be that easy. Whatever we got in our investigation, it appeared that we were going to have to work for it.
“There’s nothing worth anything up here,” Momma said as we entered the dusty old attic.
“How can you seriously call all of this nothing?” I asked as I looked around at the decades of accumulated goodies from our cumulative pasts. It wasn’t just my aunt’s things. Some of it had been left for generations from our ancestors, a history of our family’s life’s flotsam and jetsam from over the years. I’d played dress-up with Aunt Jean during more than one sleepover, rummaging through the old trunks and trying on outrageously outdated clothing and having mad tea parties with her up there. I picked up a sword that one of my ancestors had carried in the Civil War and cut it through the air.
Though the blade showed some tarnish, it was still sharp.
“Be careful with that,” Momma said. “You might hurt someone.”
I put it back on the layer of clothing as I said, “This place is a storehouse of treasures.”
“Not as far as finding another clue is concerned,” Momma said.
I wasn’t about to be deterred, though. “You’re forgetting the secret.”
“What secret?” she asked me.
“Didn’t Aunt Jean ever tell you about this?” I asked. I moved a few boxes around and exposed a section of the attic’s floorboards.
“It looks just like a plain old floor to me,” Momma said.
“The floor isn’t the secret. Well, I suppose that it is, but not in the way that you’re thinking.” I found the old butter-knife where Aunt Jean had kept it and slid the blade between two boards. With a slight wiggle, I popped one board up, and an entire section came up with it.
“Suzanne, what are you doing? We’re not here to vandalize Jean’s home.”
“We’re not. She knew all about it. This is a hidden space she found,” I said. “She always told me that it was our little secret, but I can’t believe that you didn’t know yourself.”
“As I’ve said before, you and Jean had a bond all your own. The secrets that you two shared were not necessarily secrets that I was privy to myself.”
Had I hurt Momma’s feelings by the reference to her late sister? Of course I had! What an oaf I was. Instead of looking inside the compartment right away, I said, “Momma, Aunt Jean loved you so much. You know that, don’t you?”
“I do,” Momma said confidently. “You don’t have to tend to my bruised ego, Suzanne. The important question is if there’s anything there, or if it’s another dead end.”
“There’s something, all right,” I said as I reached down into the space. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t fulfilled. “It’s just her journal,” I told my mother as I unwrapped the blanket around it.
“So then, we are foiled yet again.”
I started to open it as I said, “Let’s not be hasty. We can’t be so sure of that just yet.”
Momma pulled the book from my hands. “Suzanne, those were your aunt’s private thoughts. Do you honestly think that it’s appropriate for you to read them?”
I took the journal back from her. “If it helps us find her killer, I’m certain that Aunt Jean would have approved. She did more than that, actually; she guided us here in the first place with her letter, remember? Whatever happened to her, the seeds of it all might be found in here.” I leafed through the pages and real
ized that the book was nearly full of my aunt’s smallest writing.
“This isn’t going to be quick,” I said as I studied the last page. “Momma, the final entry was written just two days ago!”
Without being asked, I began to read the last entry aloud.
“My suspicions have been confirmed at last! It appears that someone has been trying to kill me after all! I don’t know if I should be so happy about the discovery, but it proves that I haven’t been losing my mind. Someone really has been out to get me. I need to get Suzanne up here. She’ll know what to do. How proud I am of the woman that quirky little girl has become. Dot did a marvelous job with her, and I couldn’t be prouder of both of them.
I’ve had reasons to suspect all five of my prime candidates in the past, but I’m at a loss as to which one is doing this, and why. When is a motive strong enough to make someone commit such a heinous act? I don’t know, but I trust that Suzanne will find out. I’m sure that I’ve collected all of the clues I need here in my journal.
Now I need my niece up here to use them to catch whoever is trying to kill me before they finally succeed.
“This is going to take some research,” I said as I hefted the journal.
“Well, there’s no reason that you have to do it here in the attic,” Momma said. “Why don’t we go back downstairs? It’s beginning to get dark, and this area has always made me uneasy.”
I looked around, trying to see the attic as my mother did, and I could suddenly see why it made her uncomfortable. It could be scary enough in the daylight, but at night, the place was beginning to have an entirely different, and much more ominous, vibe.
We hadn’t gone up there for nothing, though.
The attic had yielded something more substantial than we’d found so far.
If we could only figure out what it all meant.
We weren’t meant to find that out, though, at least not yet.
The front bell rang just as I closed the attic door behind us.
“Who could that be?” Momma asked as we walked down the stairs.
“It’s probably the first wave of mourners,” I said. “I’ve been expecting folks to start dropping by.”
“Of course,” Momma said. “For a moment there, I forgot that Jean was gone. This investigation she’s put us up to has been distracting me from our real loss.”
