“Tige!” shouted Aggie. And then, like Alice, tumbled down the rabbit hole into Wonderland.
Chapter Seven
A Railroad Station?
Agnes Tidemore rolled head-over-heels down a steep incline, much like a slide in a playground. She landed with an oomph! that would leave a purple bruise on her left buttock. Everybody would be all a-tizzy because the school nurse would report it as potential abuse. Good thing Police Chief Jim Purdue was her grampy’s best friend.
“Tige?” she called to the shadows.
Yip! Yip!
She inched forward, engulfed in total darkness, as sightless as a bat in a cave. “Tige?” she called again.
The Yip! was closer this time. Then she felt a rough tongue licking her hand. At least she’d recovered her dog. That mean ol’ Mrs. Beanie could make her getaway for all she cared. Chief Purdue would catch her and lock her away behind bars. That’d teach her to help some crook steal that valuable Pennington quilt.
Now how to get out? The incline she’d tumbled down was too steep and slick to climb. She clutched her dog’s leather collar and whispered, “Lead me outta here, boy.”
The dog surged forward, practically dragging her along. She had to shuffle along at double-time to keep up. The smooth marble flooring made it difficult to maintain her footing.
After a few minutes she could make out a faint glow in the distance, a fluorescent light as it turned out. She found herself in a large chamber, like a medieval dungeon with a domed ceiling. Only the artificiality of the fluorescent lighting reminded her that this was the Twenty-First Century. And that she and her dog had been chasing a dastardly art thief, one Mrs. Nancy Ann Beanie.
There had to be some way out of this underground hideaway. She looked around for an exit. In the far corner of the chamber she could see stone steps leading upward, a likely egress. “C’mon, Tige,” she said. “Let’s go find Grammy.”
“Not so fast!” came a voice.
Aggie stopped in her tracks. Even her dog hesitated. She looked around for a source of the male voice. It obviously wasn’t Mrs. Beanie speaking, but rather a hoarse baritone belonging to an unseen man.
A spook?
After all, she was wandering about in a hidden recess under a cemetery. She halfway expected to see a bony skeleton come clattering from a side tunnel, a hatchet in hand, just like in that movie Horrifying Creature from the Haunted House her babysitter had let her watch that time her mom and dad attended a dance at the VFW Hall.
But no skeletons or ghouls made their appearance. Not even any deranged mole men. She and Tige were all alone in this underground chamber.
“Stay where you are!” ordered the disembodied voice.
“Where are you?”
“Never you mind, young lady. The important thing is, I know where you are. And you’re trespassing!”
“Trespassing? I’m inside a grave.”
“Not exactly. This chamber was built in the mid-eighteen hundreds as a way station of the Underground Railroad. Escaping slaves were hidden away here as they traveled to freedom in Canada.”
“This doesn’t look like a railroad station,” said Aggie.
“Not the kind with trains,” the voice corrected.
“What other kinds of railroads are there?”
“Look, this is a historic monument. Listed with the National Registry.”
“And who are you? A ghost?”
“Of course not.”
“Then why can’t I see you?”
“Look up over the stairway. You’ll see the speaker box. I’m with an alarm company in Indianapolis. We have the contract to monitor this facility.”
“Oh. So can I get out of this hole? It’s cold and damp down here.”
“You have to wait for the police. They’ve been notified of a forcible entry.”
“I didn’t force anything. I just fell down a hole.”
“Tell it to the cops.”
≈≈≈
She did.
Chief Purdue bought her an ice cream cone at DQ on the way back to headquarters. “So you and Maddy were chasing Nan Beanie?” he said in a bemused manner. The image of Beauregard Madison’s wife and granddaughter galloping through the cemetery in hot pursuit of a suspected quilt-napper would have been quite a sight to see!
“I almost caught her, but she ducked into that railroad station. Maybe she escaped on a train.”
“No, I don’t think so,” he chuckled. “More likely she’ll try to catch this afternoon’s bus out of town. I’ll send my deputy down to pick her up.”
“Am I going to jail for trespassing?”
“Don’t worry about that. I’m releasing you into your mother’s custody. She’s on her way down to pick you up.”
“What about Grammy?”
“Maddy’s in the next room swearing out a warrant for Nan Beanie’s arrest. Mrs. Beanie’s husband backs up what you and Maddy have told me about her admission she let Henry Caruthers take her keys. We’ll be picking up Caruthers for questioning. It’s time he gets nailed for his criminal behavior.”
“But what about the missing quilt?”
“Still missing.”
“Don’t worry, Chief Purdue. The Quilter’s Club is still on the case.”
Chapter Eight
Arrival of a New Cousin
That afternoon an ancient green Subaru lumbered up Melon Pickers Row and eased into the driveway fronting the Madison household. Before it stopped working, the car’s odometer had registered 167,412 miles on it. Bill and Kathy bought the car used ten years ago in Chicago and it was still running fine. Today, the vehicle was piled full of suitcases and backpacks, not to mention three occupants. The kid in the backseat had to be N’yen, the newest member of the Madison clan. As if his eyes with epicanthic folds and yellow skin pigmentation weren’t evidence enough, the way his adoptive parents fussed over him was the clincher.
“Bill, Kathy!” came the greeting from the assemblage on the front porch. Beauregard and Maddy looked like the subjects of a Grant Wood painting, while rotund Tillie and Mark the Shark could have passed as a couple on the cover of Pregnancy Today. Aggie was wearing a dress for a change, a pretty little pinafore that made her look like an American Girl doll.
“Hi all,” called Bill as he ushered his family up the walkway, grinning ear-to-ear, like a guy who’d just won the Lottery.
Kathy presented the young boy in a striped T-shirt and baggy blue jeans. “This is N’yen, our new son.”
Everyone ooo’ed and ahh’ed, introducing themselves in a confusing Babel. No way N’yen would have caught all the names, but fortunately Bill and Kathy had rehearsed him in advance. “Happy to meet all of you,” he said, trying to suppress a giggle.
“He speaks English,” blurted Beau.
“Of course, he does, dad. N’yen was born in Chicago, not Hanoi.”
“Oh right.”
“Sorry, but I do not speak a single word of Vietnamese,” said the small boy.
“Don’t worry, I’ll teach you the two words I know,” offered Aggie. “Bun cha and pho.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Bun cha is grilled pork cop with noodles. And pho means a rice noodle soup. My mom and dad used to take me to a restaurant in Little Saigon when we lived in L.A.”
“Cool,” said N’yen. “But I prefer Big Macs.”
≈≈≈
After a sumptuous dinner of baked ham and candied yams – no Big Macs – they were having watermelon pie for dessert. It was Tillie’s favorite, Bill’s too. But N’yen and Aggie were the ones begging for second helpings.
As Maddy was pulling a backup pie out of the fridge, the phone rang. It was Bootsie, calling to report that Nan Beanie had been sighted in Burpyville trying to rent a car at the Avis office in that big shopping center.
“Did Jim speak with Henry Caruthers?”
“Nope. The former mayor is out of town, according to his neighbors. But he has to come home sometime, right?”
“I suppose he can’t afford to skip the country by selling a forty thousand dollar quilt.”
“If he stole it.”
“I think it’s clear he was involved. Nan set up an alibi lunch with Dizzy Duncan so Henry could steal the keys out of her desk, the keys to the conference room where we’ve been storing the Pennington quilts.”
“Why didn’t she just hand the keys to Henry?”
“Plausible deniability.”
“What’s that?”
“A term I heard on a TV show. It means Nan set it up so she could claim she didn’t know who took the keys.”
“Didn’t work very well.”
“Aggie tripped her up with a question.”
“That kid’s going to grow up to be chief of police.”
Maddy chuckled at the idea. “Tell Jim to move over.”
≈≈≈
N’yen was outside playing with Aggie and Tige, chasing fireflies in the backyard. It was a beautiful summer evening, the silver-dollar moon combining with porch lights to transform the neighborhood into a magical fairyland. Fireflies twinkled in the night sky like the dancing embers from a campfire.
The grownups were ensconced inside the house, enjoying a family reunion – everybody here, other than middle-son Fred who’s a fireman in Atlanta. Maddy had just served an after-dinner brandy and Beau was offering the men an imported Dominican cigar.
“No smoking around me,” Tillie warned. A health nut when it came to her unborn child.
“When are you due?” Kathy asked her sister-in-law.
“Imminently,” laughed Tillie, patting her oversized tummy. “A girl, they tell me.”
“Goodness, I wish I could experience what you’re going through. But no luck there.”
“You’ve skipped the hard part. N’yen’s going to be a great son.”
“He’s a wonderful kid,” confirmed Bill.
Beau began awkwardly. “What made you decide to adopt a kid who isn’t– ”
“ – white?” Bill finished his father’s sentence.
“What I meant to say was – ”
“Dad, you’re so obvious. You live here in a little town that’s ninety-nine percent Caucasian. Minorities scare you.”
“Asians aren’t a minority,” mumbled Beau. “There are more of them in the world than anybody.”
“Well, there’s one in the family now. I hope you can accept that.”
“Bill, don’t be so hard on your father,” interceded Maddy. “Give him a chance to get used to it. You caught us all by surprise, adopting a child. Nonetheless, we’re very happy for you.”
“Sorry, mom. Guess we’re overly protective of N’yen.”
“And well you should be. N’yen’s a treasure.”
“Thanks.”
Kathy changed the subject, trying to avoid any further tension between her husband and his father. “Tillie says the Quilter’s Club has lost a valuable quilt.”
“True,” admitted Maddy. So much for secrets. “Someone substituted a phony for a genuine Pennington.”
“A Pennington? Isn’t that the Amish woman whose fantastic quilts were found hidden away in an attic?”
“Exactly. They are considered to be among the world’s great quilt designs.”
“And you lost one? What does the Smithsonian say about that?”
Maddy cleared her throat, a nervous habit. “They, uh, don’t know yet. We’re hoping to recover it.”
“How, pray tell?” asked Bill. “You have to admit, Jim Purdue’s no Hercule Poirot.”
Maddy glanced at her husband for support. After all, it was his assistant who had let the thief have the keys. “Oh, we have a few clues.”
“Mom, the Quilter’s Club isn’t trying to solve this on its own, is it?” exclaimed Tillie.
“Well, you might say we’re looking into it. The quilt was stolen on our watch, so we have a certain responsibility.”
“Maddy,” interjected Mark, “we’ve already had to bail our daughter out of jail today for trespassing. This is not what we had in mind when we allowed her to join your silly quilting club.”
“Mark the Shark, as a lawyer you know very well that there was no bail involved. And no charges of trespassing. Aggie simply wandered off the beaten path.”
“Quilter’s Club? Are you still involved in all that needlecraft stuff?” asked Bill. He remembered his mother’s many knitting, crocheting, and quilt-making projects. He still had that turtleneck sweater she’d knitted for him as a Christmas present back when he was in the Peace Corps.
“Knitting and crocheting are relaxing pastimes. And designing quilts can be very creative,” argued Maddy.
“How does crime-solving fit in with that?” asked Tillie. Like a prosecuting attorney going for a confession on the witness stand.
“I think we’re making too much of your mother’s sleuthing,” interjected Beau Madison. “She just dabbles.”
“She – and all the members of the Quilter’s Club,” muttered Mark, not very happy at being called a shark.
“Bootsie, Lizzie, and Cookie are not exactly Charlie’s Angels,” remarked Beau, a lopsided grin on his face.
“Beauregard Madison the Fourth! Are you implying my friends are not as pretty and charming as those movie stars?”
“Now, Maddy, you know I think highly of all your girlfriends. But Bootsie Purdue is no Carmen Diaz.” He wiggled his eyebrows to show that he thought the blonde actress was hot stuff.
“Oh you.”
“Mom, dad – you have to take this seriously,” insisted Tillie. “You’re dealing with real crooks. My daughter could have been injured chasing after bad guys in a cemetery.”
“Bad guys!” snorted Beau. “They were chasing Nan Beanie, my administrative assistant. She’s about as dangerous as a parakeet.”
“I got bit by a parakeet once,” said Tillie.
“Okay, your point’s well taken,” said Maddy, holding up her hands to stave off further comments. “We won’t include Aggie on any more of our sleuthing.”
“Not include me?” came a wail from the back door. Aggie and N’yen had grown tired of chasing fireflies, returning to the house for another slice of watermelon pie. “You mean I’m kicked out of the Quilter’s Club?”
“Of course not, honey,” soothed her grandmother. “You can still sew quilts with us. Just ixnay on the detective work.”
“Grammy, that’s not fair. I was the one – with the help of Tige – who tracked Mrs. Beanie to her lair!”
“Lair?” laughed Aggie’s father. “That was just a historic structure left over from Civil War days.”
“It was Mrs. Beanie’s underground headquarters,” insisted the girl. “I’ll bet there are more clues down there. And I would have found them if it wasn’t for that man in the box.”
“Man in the box?” repeated her father.
“She means the alarm company monitor, a speaker over the stairwell,” explained Maddy. She had gone down into the cavern with Chief Purdue to retrieve her granddaughter.
“So where’s this woman you were chasing?” asked Bill’s wife Kathy.
“Dunno. She escaped. I’ll bet there’s a secret tunnel.”
“Enough of this fantasy stuff,” said Aggie’s father. “Time we took you home and put you to bed. It’s nearly ten o’clock.”
“Good idea,” said Tillie. “I tire so easily carrying this little bundle of joy.” She patted her pregnant tummy.
“N’yen, I’ll bet you’re ready to hit the hay too,” suggested the boy’s new dad. “It’s been a long day, driving from Chicago.”
“Yes, we were up at dawn,” added his also-new mom. “I think we’re all tired.”
“But I wanna help Aggie catch the crooks,” said young N’yen Madison.
“You mean help her catch more fireflies, don’t you?” Bill offered a wide smile, amused by the boy’s earnest enthusiasm.
“No, crooks. Aggie thinks she knows where they’re hiding – in their underground headquarters!”
>
Chapter Nine
Gently Down the Stream
After retiring from the bank, Lizzie Ridenour’s husband spent most of his time hunting and fishing. He held the record for the biggest catfish caught in this part of the state. Some days he would go down to a favorite spot on the banks of the Wabash and dip a hook, bringing with him a good book. Today he was reading Death of an Expert Witness, an English murder mystery by P. D. James.
Edgar Ridenour considered himself a bit of an Anglophile, always fascinated by British customs and manners of speech. Sure, they spoke the same language as folks hereabout, but they did it with such style!
Sometimes Edgar himself would say “lorry” instead or “truck.” Or “flat” instead of “apartment.” It sounded so … sophisticated.
The Ridenour family came from Germany a couple of generations back. The original name was Reitenauer, but it was handily Anglicized to help his grandparents assimilate into this small town in Indiana. Truth was, Edgar would have preferred an English heritage, and so he downplayed his forbearers. Leave that to the founding families like the Madison, Caruthers, and Jinks.
Edgar was sitting on the riverbank, immersed in the clever detective work of Adam Dalgliesh, one of P. D. James’ favorite characters. He was willing to overlook the fact that the author was actually a woman – Phyllis Dorothy James, despite her non-descriptive initials. Didn’t Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling take that same genderless approach, her publishers fearful that a woman wouldn’t sell as well as a male storyteller?
Truth was, he actually liked P. D. James’ female detective Cordelia Gray better than Dalgliesh. Women were naturally inquisitive, he felt, making them good at ferreting out facts.
His wife was like that, a nosy parker who liked to help her quilting group solve crimes. Maybe he should have put his foot down on these activities, but it occupied her enough that she didn’t complain about his solitary fishing and hunting trips. Edgar was a natural loner, content to spend time with himself.
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