by CoCo, Nancy
We didn’t do that now, but my guess was one hundred years ago when they were feeding hotel guests, the meat had to come from somewhere. Ugh, I didn’t want to think about it. In fact maybe the first thing I’d do when I hired a new handyman was have him remove the chains.
Side-by-side, Rex and I pressed rock after rock to no avail. Frances held Mal and watched us from beside the shelves. “Wait!” I said and walked over to them. “Rex, didn’t you say the shelves were moved last night?”
“Yes.” Rex studied the shelving. “I also remember it was too heavy for me to move by myself.”
“Then how do you know it was moved?” Frances asked.
“There were scrape marks in the dirt.” Rex pointed down and there were indeed marks in the floor that suggested the shelves were swung out and then back into place.
“Maybe the lever is in or on the shelf,” I suggested. The shelves themselves were made of metal and stacked high with old bottles and some boxes. Some of the boxes had begun to rot out. It was hard to imagine anything being a lever. “Didn’t Papa ever throw anything away?”
“Your grandmother would make him spring clean once a year, but the basement was a bone of contention to them. I don’t know why exactly, but she never came down here and he didn’t talk about cleaning it.”
“Sounds like the old man had a secret,” Rex said as he opened and closed boxes on the shelves.
“Whatever the secret was, it died with him,” I muttered. The boxes in front of me were filled with rusted things. Springs and clockwork and old locks. “I need a pair of heavy gloves if I’m going to go through these.”
I stopped and studied the shelf. Whoever came down here knew about the wall door, and they knew how to open it. Those boxes looked like they hadn’t been touched in decades. I sincerely doubted our mystery killer had gone through them. So what would he have touched?
I ran my hand down the side of the shelf. Nothing but cool metal and flakes of rust met my fingertips. I then ran my fingers under the shelves, and on the second from the bottom shelf I found a lever. It felt like the lever inside the hood of a car. I squeezed it hard and the shelf moved.
“Watch out!” I called. Thank goodness it swung out slowly or it would have run over my foot. The shelf swung out in a slow arc revealing a metal handle with a rubber grip resting lengthwise on the floor. “What is that?”
Rex squeezed out from behind the shelves and examined it. “Looks like an old railroad lever used to switch tracks.”
“There isn’t a railroad on the island.” I liked to state the obvious.
“Pull it,” Frances said. Mal barked excitedly as if to agree with her.
Rex looked at me as if asking permission.
“Hey.” I shrugged. “You’re the man with the gun.”
“And no warrant,” he reminded me.
“I doubt there’s another dead body on the other side of this door.” I waved my hand toward the wall.
“And if there is?” he asked, his eyes twinkling.
“I would not let you push that lever. I’m not stupid.” I planted my hands on my hips. “So open it or I will.”
He reached down and grabbed the lever with one hand, his shirt straining across his shoulders, and pulled. The screeching sound was horrible and exactly what I had heard the night before, only this time it was loud enough to deafen me. I put my hands over my ears. Mal barked up a storm as the wall slid back inside itself revealing a small three-foot-by-five-foot hole.
“Aye, Matey, there be treasure,” Rex muttered. I glanced at him, uncertain if I heard him correctly. “What?” he asked. “Have you never seen Treasure Island ?”
“You know there was some talk about buried treasure on island somewhere,” Frances said, petting Mal to calm her down. “When the British took it from the Americans the fort commander was said to have buried the gold and precious items to keep them out of the British hands.”
“Are you talking about the War of 1812? The McMurphy wasn’t even built yet.”
“All the better,” Rex said as he turned on his flashlight and approached the door. “This looks like it was done before the hotel was built.” He glanced at me. “Do you know what was on the site first?”
“I don’t know.” I shrugged. “Papa told me that his great-grandfather bought the land from a merchant’s daughter. The man himself died in a flu outbreak the winter before. The building was torn down and the McMurphy was built over the top.
“Maybe this is more recent than that,” he said as he examined the wall opening. “This mechanism is early twentieth century. It has the look and feel of Art Deco.”
“Like the twenties?” I asked, “Or was that the thirties?”
“My best guess it was during Prohibition, but you’d have to research it to find out exactly.” He rubbed the hinge. “There’s a patent number on here.” He took a small pad of paper out of his pocket and copied the number down. “If I had to guess, I’d say it was used during prohibition, even if it was built before that.”
“What’s inside?” I stuck my head in to see. There was a set of stairs that led down under the basement and the alley behind the McMurphy. “Stairs . . .”
This stairway was cut into the rock, and the ceiling was so low that Rex had to duck his head. The walls were slimy and cold. Water dripped as we descended into the darkness. “Good thing I’m not claustrophobic or anything,” I said.
Rex glanced back at me. “You shouldn’t be down here in those shoes.” His flashlight hit my black pumps. I had not changed since I’d been to the Jessops’ for Joe’s memorial. I still wore my black sheath dress, dark black sweater, and three-inch heels.
“Hey, if a girl’s going to find treasure, she should at least be able to look good doing it.”
“Yeah, well, you won’t be the one having to carry you out of here if you fall and break something.”
The man did have a point.
“I’m not going barefoot,” I said. “And I’m not turning around, so unless you’re going to lend me your shoes . . .”
“Not likely,” Rex said. “These are government issue.”
I scrunched up my face as he waved the light over his black shoes. “To begin with, I highly doubt they issue you shoes. And secondly, those soles look slicker than mine.”
“I guess if we go down, then, we go down together.” He waggled his eyebrows at me.
There was a noise in the distance. “Did you hear that?” I whispered, my fingers wrapped firmly in his shirtsleeve. Funny, but I don’t remember moving toward him. He had his hand on my hip, keeping his body in front of mine.
We both held our breath, but no further sound was made.
“Stay here,” he said and moved forward.
“Right.” I kept pace behind him. I didn’t have a flashlight, and I refused to stand in the dark alone. I thought I could take a robber, maybe even a murderer, but if there were rats down here I refused to wait for them to crawl by me in the dark.
The tunnel, if you could call it that, stopped maybe twenty feet from the McMurphy. If I had to guess I’d say it was the length of the alley. There were two doors at the end, one on the left and one straight ahead.
Rex shone his flashlight on the doors. One looked as if the hinges were rusted and the wood planks on the door were black with rot and dampness. The door straight ahead had fresh hinges. Both doors had old wrought-iron handles.
“Door number one or door number two?” Rex asked, both hands wrapped around his gun, his flashlight balanced on top of the revolver.
“Door number two,” I whispered. My fingers were still clutching his shirt. If we were going to be shot, I was smart enough to use his Kevlar-protected chest as a shield. If that made me selfish, well, I could live with that.
He reached down and checked the door handle. It didn’t appear to be locked. “Police!” Rex put his shoulder into the door, and it creaked open with a terrible screech.
I held my breath as he stepped into a darkened room. The sound
of mechanical humming filled the air. The musty, dusty smell was infused with the sharp scent of chlorine. His light bounced off thick pipes, thin pipes, and barrels of chemicals.
“Hello?”
There was no answer as he checked the corners of the warm, wide room. If I had to say how big it was, I’d guess the size of a swimming pool. I searched the wall next to the door and found an old-fashioned push-button switch. I pushed the top button, and two bare lightbulbs burst to light.
“I think we’re under the pool house.” I relaxed a bit and studied the door. “Papa and Mr. Thompson must have connected the buildings.”
“Which could be how your killer got into the McMurphy.” Rex holstered his revolver and turned off his flashlight. “Who would know about the tunnel?”
“I have no idea.” I shook my head. “Whoever Pete hires to work on the pool. Whoever helped build the tunnel and the pool house. It could be anyone, really.”
“Pete Thompson knows about the tunnel, but you don’t?”
“I’m guessing.” I hugged my waist. “Papa Liam sold his rights to the pool house after Grammy died. He said it made more sense to work out a gentlemen’s agreement on use instead of worrying about who would be responsible for insurance and maintenance and such. I agreed. I mean, I was more interested in fudge making than pool houses.”
“I suggest you get a lock on your side of this door,” he said.
“As soon as I hire a locksmith to do that the entire island will know about this tunnel. Sally will want to bring folks down for her haunted tours.” I shook my head. “I can’t afford that kind of insurance.”
“Add it to your list. I don’t like the idea of anyone having that kind of access to the McMurphy.” His face had that serious cop look.
“You and me both.” I blew out a breath. “I’ll talk to Pete.” I didn’t want to talk to Pete. The man was a creepy jerk. But if I were going to be a businesswoman, I’d have to suck it up and learn to talk to creepy jerks. It was all part of life.
“Let’s close the door and go up through the pool house,” Rex said. “I need to see what sort of security the Thompsons have.”
I closed the door and noted that it did have a skeleton key lock. There wasn’t any key. “What about the other door?”
“I wouldn’t worry. It didn’t look as if it’d been used in decades,” Rex said. “The door would probably fall off if you tried to open it.”
He was right of course. Besides, I’d solve the whole problem by walling off the hidden door in the McMurphy.
“Wait,” I said as he opened the door on the other side of the room. I could see that it led to stairs going up. “What if there’s really treasure behind the other door?”
Rex tilted his head and gave me a look that said I was being silly. “Do you think your grandfather or the Thompsons for that matter would be sitting on a treasure?”
I worried my bottom lip to hide my disappointment. “I suppose not.” I closed the door and crossed the room, dodging pipes and barrels. The stairs led straight up to another door, which was locked.
“Step back.”
I went down a couple of stairs and watched as Rex kicked open the door. “Wow, do they teach you how to do that in cop school?”
Rex shrugged. “If I told you all my secrets, then I’d have to . . .”
“Kill me, I know.” I rolled my eyes and followed him through the door. It did indeed lead into the pool house. The door he kicked open was marked UTILITIES and EMPLOYEE ACCESS ONLY.
Luckily it was off-season and no one was in the pool house. The water itself was still as glass. The pool was built in the 1920s. It was made of poured concrete. In the 1970s they had added a small room on the end and put in a raised hot tub. The cedar hot tub had a blue fiberglass interior, which sat empty waiting on the season. It was in strange and stark contrast to the concrete and tile style of the pool. Beside the utility-room door were two bathhouse doors. The entire building was made of cedar and smelled of chlorine and age. Old windows lined three of the four walls. They still had storm windows on them. The screens had yet to be put in place. In the summer months, the pool house was screened. The cedar board roof would reflect the water from the bottom of the pool.
I had spent days in the pool house as a kid, floating on the surface, imagining who else had looked at the cedar ceiling over the years. I would wonder what it might have been like when the pool was first poured. Papa had lined the pool house with framed old photos of guests through the decades. Those pictures still hung on the walls. It had been years since I’d looked at them.
“There aren’t any cameras in here,” Rex said as he walked around the pool. He checked the doors. “Unlocked.”
“Well, yes, it’s against the fire code to lock people inside a building. Besides, it’s the weekend and this close to the season they may have guests already,” I said.
“Is the pool house kept open year-round?”
I turned myself away from the pictures. “Not that I’m aware of. Papa used to have the pool drained in October and then refilled in April. The pool house is open from April first until October thirtieth. That’s what we have posted on our Web site and our information, but I can ask Frances. She’d know for sure.”
Pete Thompson walked up the deck and stopped and stared at us. Then he opened the pool-house door. “How’d you two get in here?”
Fuzzy Navel Fudge
4 cups dark chocolate chips
4 tablespoons butter
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 can mandarin oranges
4 ounces peach schnapps (to taste)
Soak oranges in Schnapps for at least 1 hour—drain just before use. Discard Schnapps.
Butter an 8” × 8” × 2” pan, then line with wax paper or plastic wrap. (I prefer wax paper.)
In a double boiler, fill the bottom with water and place on high until it reaches a rolling boil then turn to low. In the top pan, melt chocolate, sweetened condensed milk, and butter until smooth and thick.
Remove from heat. Add vanilla and stir until combined. Add drained oranges. Pour into pan. Cool. Tip: let cool outside of the refrigerator for 30 minutes so that no condensation mars the top. Refrigerate overnight. Remove from pan. Cut into pieces. Store in a covered container.
Chapter 20
“What did you tell him?” Jennifer sat on one of two bar stools that allowed guests to look into the apartment’s tiny galley kitchen without getting in the way.
“I didn’t tell him anything. Rex asked Pete if he knew about the tunnel connecting our two hotels.” I poured chocolatinis into martini glasses and handed her one. “It took him a minute to answer.”
“Seriously?”
“I know, right? He looked at me first as if wondering how much I knew.” I pulled down all the ingredients for fudge. I wanted to try a new recipe. My idea was to base fudge flavors on different cocktail drinks. They would be part of my 21-and-up flavors. Fudge shouldn’t be only for kids.
“Creep. He did know about the tunnel. Oh, yuck, he might have been sneaking over here spying on you.”
“I thought of that. I think that’s worse than finding a dead body in my closet.” I mixed the sugar, coconut milk, spiced rum, and white chocolate chunks and placed them in the top of a double boiler. Stirring was my favorite part; most people hated how long it took to stir and carefully heat chocolate, but I loved it. There was a certain anticipation of watching for the moment when the mixture thickened and plopped like little volcanoes.
“I’m here now,” she said with satisfaction and sipped her drink. “Let him try to sneak in and scare you now.”
I laughed. “I hired a new handyman. He starts tomorrow and the first thing on his list is to wall off the basement door.”
“Wait, so the tunnel is still open? Can I see it?”
I stirred the melting ingredients with a wooden spoon. “No, Rex sent his cousin over to board up the coal bin. But I want it walled off. I ne
ed to inventory Papa’s things on the shelves in there.”
“Darn, it might be kind of fun to check out a tunnel with a cute policeman.” She waggled her eyebrows at me.
“Not as much fun as you might think,” I said and checked the temperature of the fudge with the candy thermometer.
“We don’t believe you,” Jennifer said in a falsetto voice. She had picked up Mal and moved the puppy’s front paws as if she were talking.
“I’m a person of interest in an ongoing murder investigation.” I stirred the fudge.
“And he’s a hot cop,” Jenn said. “We like him, don’t we, Mal?” She snuggled the puppy. “Yes, we do.”
“You haven’t even met him.” I rolled my eyes and removed the fudge from the stove and poured it on to the small marble candy slab I kept on my countertop.
“He has to be hot if he’s been married twice.” Jenn played with the puppy. “Isn’t that right?”
Mal answered with a bark of agreement.
“See?” Jenn’s blue eyes twinkled.
“Don’t you think married twice means something bad?” I asked as I scraped and turned the fudge, waiting for it to cool into a solid mass.
“Only that he has baggage.” Jenn put the puppy down and picked up her drink. “Didn’t you say his first wife was his high school sweetheart? Those kinds of marriages rarely last. I mean, would you have wanted to marry anyone you dated in high school?”
I frowned at the thought of marrying Mike Beis-terfield. He’d been a cute boy with a shock of black hair and sweet green eyes who’d gone on to run for state representative with dramatically opposed political views from me.
“And didn’t his second wife decide she didn’t like the isolation of island living in the winter?”
“That’s what Frances said.” I added chunks of pineapple and pecans and continued to mix the fudge as it cooled into the perfect texture. “For that matter, I’ve never spent a winter on island either. So who knows if I will like it?”
