Well, it would be fun if there wasn’t a possible attempted murderer around, anyway. . . .
I forgot about that as the second maid came into the lobby, followed by Poppy, who was wielding a small flashlight. “So it’s not just my room that went dark,” Poppy said to the room at large. “What happened?”
“Some kind of temporary outage,” Mrs. Gallagher told her. “We’ll have it sorted out soon.”
“Oh.” Poppy looked mildly dismayed. “I’m glad I was just reading a book and not in the shower or something.”
As she wandered off to talk to the honeymooners, Mr. Gallagher returned. Rick was with him.
“Seems to be a general outage,” the lodge owner announced. “The generator must have cut off.”
“Why?” Mr. Richmond sounded nervous. “Does this mean we won’t have any heat?”
“Please try not to worry,” Mrs. Gallagher said. “My husband and Rick will go out right now and get it running again.”
“I’ll come too,” Chet volunteered, stepping forward. “I’m pretty good at tinkering around with mechanical stuff.”
“Yeah,” I muttered to Frank with a grin. “As long as the stuff in question isn’t the engine of a certain creaky old jalopy.”
But Mr. Gallagher was nodding gratefully at Chet. “We can use an extra set of hands,” he said. “Come on.” He glanced at his wife. “Send Cody out to help us if you see him.”
“Should we go too?” Frank asked. “We’re both pretty handy.”
I shrugged, not really in the mood to plunge out into the storm. “Let them handle it,” I said. “Chet will come get us if he thinks we can be useful.”
Glancing around the room, I realized that almost everyone was gathered in one room. It reminded me of those old-school mysteries where the detective gathers everyone together and announces the identity of the murderer. Too bad Frank and I hadn’t solved our mystery.
“Where’s Stanley?” Frank broke into my thoughts. “I’m surprised he hasn’t turned up to complain about this yet.”
I realized he was right. “Who knows? With his luck, he probably was in the shower when it happened.”
As if on cue, Stanley burst into the lobby. “What’s going on?” he exclaimed loudly. His hair looked damp in the dim, flickering light, and I grinned and elbowed Frank.
“Looks like I called it, dude,” I whispered as Stanley bustled over to complain to Mrs. Gallagher.
A few minutes later Chet walked in, breathless and pink-cheeked and shaking off the snow. He stopped in the middle of the room.
“They sent me in to say the power will be back on in a few minutes,” he announced loudly to murmurs of relief and one irritated-sounding “About time!” from Stanley.
Then Chet hurried over. “They kick you out when they heard about the Queen?” I joked.
Chet didn’t seem to hear me. He glanced around to make sure nobody was close enough to eavesdrop.
“This is bad,” he whispered, running a hand through his snow-dampened hair. “The generator going out was no accident. The wires were cut!”
“What?” Frank and I said in one voice.
Chet nodded grimly. “No question about it. Somebody did it on purpose.”
“But why?” I almost immediately realized the answer to my own question. “Unless it’s to make this place look bad.”
“Again,” Frank added with a nod. “Are they really going to be able to get it up and running again?”
“Yeah, sounds like it,” Chet replied. “That Rick guy is really handy. Cody, too—he and Blizz turned up a minute ago.”
“I wonder . . . ,” Frank began.
I elbowed him when I saw Poppy heading our way. “Never a dull moment around here, huh?” she said cheerfully.
“Right.” I decided it couldn’t hurt to do a little investigating while we waited for the power to come on. “Um, so you were upstairs in your room when it happened, huh?”
She nodded. “What were you guys doing? Have you gone to any of the extra activities today?”
“No, we’ve pretty much been entertaining ourselves,” Frank said.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the chef hand Stanley a plate with several cookies on it. “Excuse me a sec.”
Leaving Poppy talking to Frank and Chet, I hurried over to intercept the chef as she left Stanley with his food. She’d been willing to talk to Chet earlier. Maybe I could get the answer to a question I’d been wondering about.
“Can I ask you something?” I said. “How do you all put up with that guy?” I gestured at Stanley, who had his back to us as he wolfed down his cookies.
“Who, Mr. Wright?” The chef glanced at him, then shrugged. “Just part of the job.”
“Okay,” I said. “But the guy is seriously obnoxious. It’s not like anyone would blame you if you didn’t wait on him hand and foot, you know?”
The chef hesitated, glancing in Stanley’s direction again. Then she winked. “Okay, I admit it. The cash helps.”
“Cash?” I echoed.
She nodded. “Mr. Wright likes to play the big spender,” she whispered. “He’s been waving cash around at all of us since he arrived.” She shot me a slightly suspicious look. “Why do you ask?”
“No reason. Just curious.” I gave her my most winning smile, then wandered off. So Stanley had been flashing money at the staff to get better service. That explained a lot—like why Josie had been so worried about him after his near miss out in the storm.
Wanting to confirm that, I glanced around. But Josie was nowhere in sight. And I didn’t quite dare go up to Mrs. Gallagher and ask if that was why they were being so nice to Stanley—because he was bringing a lot of extra cash into their struggling business.
Did it mean anything? I wasn’t sure. But I went over to fill in Frank and Chet just in case.
• • •
By bedtime the storm was still going strong, though power had been back on for long enough that most of the guests seemed to have forgotten about the outage. Frank, Chet, and I were definitely not among those guests, however.
“There must be a way to figure out who could have sneaked outside long enough to cut those generator wires,” I said as I watched Frank kick off his slippers and flop onto his bed.
He yawned. “At least we can rule out a few people,” he said. “Starting with everyone who was in the lobby with us when the lights cut off.”
“And Poppy, who was up in her room,” I added.
To be honest, I was feeling frustrated by our lack of progress on the case. How hard could it be to pick a troublemaker out of a couple of dozen people? There had to be clues we were missing.
I crawled into bed and turned off the light. Could Frank and I be off our game? I was really starting to wonder. . . .
• • •
The next morning I woke up early, not feeling particularly well rested. It had taken longer than usual to fall asleep. And my dreams had been restless, filled with barking dogs and shouting, though I couldn’t remember many details.
The snow was still coming down outside, but it had definitely slowed. The wind had died down too.
“Looks like the storm’s almost over,” Chet said hopefully.
I yawned. “About time. Let’s get downstairs—I’m in serious need of coffee.”
But when we entered the dining room, we got a caffeine-free wakeup call that jolted me to full attention. The place was a mess!
Well, not the entire place. But several tables were overturned near the kitchen door, and food wrappers and shredded napkins were scattered here and there.
“What happened?” I called to Cody, who was rushing past with a bucket in his hand and Blizz at his heels.
He stopped and looked at us, his face weary. “Raccoons,” he said grimly. “Somehow a window in the kitchen got broken, and they came in last night. Took a while to chase them all out. Luckily, Blizz smelled them before they had a chance to get any farther into the lodge. Woke me up by barking and scratching at the d
oor.”
I nodded, my weird dog dreams suddenly making a lot more sense. “Good girl,” I said, giving Blizz a pat.
“Cody!” Mr. Gallagher shouted from across the room. “A little help over here?”
Cody hurried off. “Raccoons?” Frank said. “I thought they hibernated in the winter.”
The honeymooners walked into the room just in time to hear him. “Actually, they don’t,” Nate said. “We learned all about it at the wildlife lecture yesterday. They’re less active at this time of year, but they’re not true hibernators, and . . .” His voice trailed off as he got a look around. “What happened here?”
By the time we finished explaining what Cody had just told us, the staff had most of the tables back in place. As Rick swept up the rest of the trash, Mrs. Gallagher clapped her hands.
“Attention, guests,” she called out. “Sorry for the disruption. We’ll have it cleaned up soon, but in the meantime, please enjoy your breakfast.” She gestured at the buffet table, where Josie and the other waitress were busy setting out food.
“Excellent,” Chet said, patting his belly. “Let’s go.”
We headed over, ending up at the head of the line. “How do you think that window got broken?” I asked Frank in a low voice as Chet grabbed a plate and moved forward.
Frank shrugged. “Maybe our culprit,” he replied quietly. “Maybe the storm. Or the raccoons. We should try to get a look at it if we can.”
I nodded, reaching for a plate. Chet was already helping himself to a large stack of waffles.
“Hey, is that a chocolate chip one back there?” he asked eagerly, grabbing a waffle sitting on a plate behind the others.
“Wait!” Josie exclaimed. “That’s Mr. Wright’s special order. He’ll freak out if someone else eats it!”
“Too late,” I said with a grin.
Chet’s eyes widened with alarm as he bit down on the waffle. For a second I thought he felt guilty because of what Josie had said.
Then I gasped as he spit the half-chewed waffle into his hand—along with a mouthful of blood!
OUT FOR BLOOD
13
FRANK
I HEARD JOE’S GASP AND turned to see blood dripping out of Chet’s mouth. “Ow!” he mumbled.
“Chet! What happened?” I cried, leaping toward him.
By now others had noticed the blood as well. There were screams and cries of alarm. Mrs. Gallagher rushed over and started fussing over Chet, ordering him to open his mouth so she could see inside.
“Stand back, please!” the older waitress said, gesturing to the other guests, who were gathering around looking shocked and worried. “Give them some room.”
The waffle had fallen to the floor. I grabbed it just before it got trampled by Joe, who was leaping around, telling Chet to hold still.
I punched him lightly in the shoulder to get his attention. “Check it out,” I said grimly, holding up the waffle. Several shards of glass were poking out of the ragged edge where Chet had bitten!
Joe let out a low whistle. “That’s hardcore,” he said with a worried glance at Chet.
I tapped Mrs. Gallagher on the arm. “Look,” I said. “There was glass in the waffle.”
Chet still had his mouth wide open, but his eyes widened with alarm. “Did you swallow any, dude?” Joe asked him.
Chet shook his head and closed his mouth. “I don’t think so,” he said, his words slightly garbled. “I stopped chewing when Josie yelled.”
“Good thing she yelled when she did, then.” I shot a look at Josie, who was clutching the edge of the buffet table and staring at Chet in horror. “Someone could die from a stunt like this.”
“Like Chet.” Joe stared at our friend with concern.
I nodded. “Or Stanley,” I reminded him quietly, trying not to let anyone else hear. “That waffle was meant for him.”
“Come with me, Chet,” Mrs. Gallagher said briskly. “You’ve got a couple of pretty nasty cuts on your tongue and the roof of your mouth. I want to check you out in the infirmary.”
She led him away. “Is he going to be okay?” Josie cried, her voice high and sort of fluttery.
“Looks like it,” I told her. “Where’d that waffle come from?”
Josie didn’t seem to hear me. Her eyes were wide and anxious as she stared after Chet. “This is terrible,” she moaned. “Just terrible!”
“I know,” I said. “I—”
I cut myself off as Josie burst into tears and raced away, crashing out through the side door. “Stay here,” I told Joe quickly. “Talk to anyone you can.”
Joe nodded. “On it, bro.”
I took off after Josie. By the time I burst into the hall outside the dining room, she was nowhere in sight. I jogged to the lobby. She wasn’t there, either, though the Richmonds were comforting their crying kids. I hoped they weren’t too traumatized by Chet’s bloody mouth, but I couldn’t worry about that right now. Skirting around them, I hurried down the hall leading to the staff’s quarters.
Someone was over by the side doors, but it wasn’t Josie. It was Stanley. Realizing I hadn’t seen him yet that morning, I paused. He was holding his parka, shaking it vigorously and sending drops of water flying everywhere. Nice. Making another big mess for someone else to clean up.
He noticed me looking. “What do you want?” he snarled.
“Nothing.” I rolled my eyes and continued around the corner into the staff hallway.
I reached Josie’s room. The door was slightly ajar, so I gave it a light push. The room was empty.
Okay, where could she have gone? While I stood there thinking, I heard a faint yap. Toy Toy!
Following the sound, I realized it was coming from the back stairwell. I peered in through the glass part of the door.
Josie was in there, but she wasn’t alone. She was facing off against Cody. Toy Toy was leaping around the humans’ feet and letting out an occasional yip.
I could see both Josie and Cody’s faces in profile. Josie was still crying, and Cody looked angry and appeared to be talking fast. Was he questioning her about what had just happened? I bit my lip, wishing I could hear what they were saying. But if I opened the door, they’d know I was there.
The sound of footsteps distracted me. Turning, I saw Rick hurrying down the hall. His eyes were down, and he didn’t notice me standing there in the stairwell alcove as he rushed past.
With one more glance at Josie, I turned to follow Rick. He was one of our suspects too—and a felon. He’d been in the dining room during the waffle incident. And now here he was, racing along, looking tense.
Staying out of sight, I hurried along behind him as he rounded the corner and then ducked into a closet, emerging a moment later holding a hammer and a box of nails. I hid behind a potted plant until he rushed past again.
I tailed him to the kitchen. Mr. Gallagher was already there, holding a piece of plywood. The door to the side hall was propped open, and Rick hurried in.
“Let’s do this,” he said gruffly. “It’s cold in here.”
“Yeah,” Mr. Gallagher agreed. “You find the nails?”
They were fixing the window. Okay, nothing suspicious about that. I almost left them to it, but Mr. Gallagher’s next words stopped me.
“Don’t tell my wife, but I don’t think the wind broke this window,” he said grimly.
Rick let out a snort of agreement. “No way,” he said. “It broke from the inside out. Hard for the wind to do that.”
I pressed my back against the wall, listening closely. They were silent for a moment, then Mr. Gallagher spoke again. “Let’s not mention this to anyone,” he said. “Because Stanley Wright is already threatening to sue, and if he finds out about more trouble . . .”
My eyes widened as his voice trailed off. Stanley was threatening to sue the lodge? That wasn’t good. Especially if he found out about that waffle . . .
The men had gone quiet again, so I slipped away and went to look for Joe. He was in the lobby, watchi
ng the Richmond kids run around. They seemed to have recovered from their shock at Chet’s accident, at least judging by the way they were shrieking and laughing as they chased one another.
“Find out anything?” I asked Joe.
“A little. The chef said Stanley provided his own waffle mix—gave it to her yesterday after complaining about the taste of her waffles.”
“Typical.” I snorted. “Think she got mad enough to slip some glass in there?”
“Maybe, but I doubt it. She seemed really upset.” Joe shrugged. “Although she did admit to making his waffle batter first and leaving it sitting around in the kitchen while she made the rest.” He smiled grimly. “That means just about anyone could’ve slipped in long enough to tamper with it. Or they could’ve messed with the mix last night.” He sighed. “So, not too useful, I guess. Did you catch Josie?”
“Not exactly . . .” I glanced around to make sure nobody was close enough to hear me. The Richmond parents and Poppy were there, but all of them were over near the fireplace.
So I told Joe what I’d overheard in the kitchen. “Wow,” Joe said. “Why am I not surprised that Stanley would try to sue?”
“I know, right?” I said. “I guess that’s all the more reason someone might want to shut him up.”
Just then Mrs. Gallagher arrived. Joe and I rushed over.
“How’s Chet?” Joe demanded. “Where is he?”
“He’s resting in the infirmary with an ice pack on his face,” Mrs. Gallagher reported. “I gave him something for the pain, and something to help him sleep a little.”
“Wow, he must be hurting if he actually needs help to sleep,” Joe joked weakly.
Mrs. Gallagher smiled. “Don’t worry, boys. Chet should be just fine, though his mouth will be sore for a while. Luckily the cuts aren’t deep, and I only had to pick one shard out of his tongue.”
I winced at the thought of that. Poor Chet!
A couple of the Richmond kids raced over. “We’re bored!” the little girl announced. “Do you have any more toys?”
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