Murder on Main Street

by Shannon Kaper

  “Hold the light so I can see where I’m aiming this hammer, but stand back far enough that it won’t hit you,” he instructed me.

  “Toby, I really don’t think this is a good idea,” I was actually shaking.

  “It’s okay, just stay close.” He swung the hammer and broke through the door. I guess having been down in the damp underground for who knows how many years, the door wasn’t solid. Before I knew it, he grabbed my hand, and we went through what was left of the door into a cold, dark, damp tunnel.

  “Okay, are you satisfied now? It’s a tunnel, it could be unstable, so maybe we should just turn around and go back and call the Sheriff,” I pleaded.

  “That door was locked but there were fresh footprints in the cellar and on the steps; someone has a key and recently used this. I want to know where it goes. It might lead us to whoever was in here and that, my dear, might just tell us who killed the old man,” he whispered to me.

  “Okay Mr. Murder mystery, this isn’t one of your books where you can keep the main characters safe; this is real, and it could be very dangerous.”

  It didn’t seem to matter what logic I tried to use, he was determined to press forward, and I couldn’t let him go alone. We went a short distance and then down some rough-cut steps to another flat area followed by more rough-cut steps. That pattern repeated 4 times.

  “Where do you think we are?” I asked, having lost all sense of direction.

  “I think we must be at about the high school. If I’m right, each level we went down was a street - you know the way this town is built like a set of stairs. Four blocks down would be the high school, right?”

  “Yes, that makes sense.” I agreed with his idea of where we might be. All of a sudden we came to another door, but this door opened when he turned the handle. We went through the doorway on tiptoes, holding our breath, so we were as stealth as possible. Almost immediately, on the other side of the door, was a set of stairs leading up. Toby shined his flashlight to the top of the stairs only to see another stupid door.

  “Let’s go.” He pulled me along after him.

  When we got to the top of the stairs, we could hear voices arguing. It sounded like a man and a woman.

  “Where are we, do you think?” I whispered.

  “No idea, but for some reason, I don’t think we are under the high school,” he whispered back to me.

  “Maybe we should go back.”

  “Someone used this tunnel to get into the jewelry store; I need to know who is on the other side of this door. Whoever it is might have information for me,” he hissed.

  “Or it could be the killer, which is all the more reason to leave,” I hissed right back.

  “All the more reason to see who it is,” he argued.

  The door handle turned when he tried it, which made my heart beat faster. What if whoever was on the other side had a gun? I wasn’t ready to die.

  Toby slowly opened the door as I crossed my fingers and prayed it wouldn’t make any noise. I watched as he peeked through the crack. Just as I feared, all hell broke loose when he quickly backed up, he bumped into me, making me drop my flashlight which made a sound far louder than it should have.

  “Hurry, let’s go,” he said, grabbing my hand and starting to run.

  I heard someone behind us yell for us to stop, threatening to shoot us if we didn’t. We ran as hard as we could, tripping up the steps that were misshapen and unequally spaced. We finally climbed the last set of steps that led to the door to the cellar area under the jewelry store. Breathing hard, we climbed through the hole in the door and made our way to the stairs that would lead us out of the cellar.

  Toby pushed on the trap door, but it wouldn’t budge. He tried again and again, but it wasn’t going anywhere.

  “What now? She’s coming, and she has a gun,” I yelled.

  “I don’t know; I can’t believe another door stuck behind us,” he said in a panic, before spotting the hammer and the saw he used earlier.

  He went to the tunnel doorway to get the tools and stopped dead in his tracks with hands raised. Joan caught up to us and was waving a gun around like a lunatic.

  “Joan, what is going on?” I asked in a calm voice.

  She looked at me like she’d never seen me before and didn’t answer.

  “Joan, can you put the gun down before you hurt someone?” I quietly suggested to her.

  “I’ll put it down after I’ve gotten rid of the two of you,” she screamed.

  “There is no reason to hurt us, we haven’t done anything,” Toby tried.

  “You were sneaking around down here where you don’t belong and trespassing onto my property. I have every right to shoot you both,” she snarled.

  We heard Stuart coming through the tunnel, calling Joan. I was hopeful he would be able to talk some sense into her, but then again, they were arguing when we found the door that evidently led to somewhere on their property.

  “Don’t come any closer or I’ll start shooting,” she warned, as we heard Stuart’s voice get louder in the tunnel.

  “Joan, don’t shoot. Come home with me. We’ll figure it all out,” Stuart yelled, as he came up behind Joan. His approach behind her startled her enough that she pulled the trigger bringing an avalanche of dirt, wood, and rocks down.

  I felt Toby push me to the ground and land on top of me as the cellar filled with dust. The noise was deafening. Just as fast as it started, it stopped.

  “Are you okay?” Toby asked.

  “I think so; I just can’t breathe,” I said.

  “It’s the dust and dirt; try putting your arm over your nose and mouth,” he suggested.

  “No, it’s because you are on top of me, dummy.”

  He laughed. “Sorry about that.” He moved and helped me up.

  We shined our flashlights toward the tunnel, but all we could see was a pile of dirt.

  “We need to get out of here before anything more happens,” I told Toby, as I went up the stairs to find the trap door was closed. I tried pushing it open but it wouldn’t budge.

  “It must have fallen shut while we were in the tunnel. Step back, I’ll take a couple swings with the hammer. That should do it,” he said, moving past me.

  Relief flooded over me as I saw daylight begin coming through the splintered wood of the trap door. Fresh air soon followed, and before I knew it, Toby was helping me through the door and into the jewelry store.

  “Call 9-1-1 and tell them they’ll need an excavation team. I’m going to gp down to Stuart’s to see if I can get through from that side,” he said quickly and left.

  Within minutes the street in front of the jewelry store was full of emergency vehicles and onlookers. Unsure if the building was stable, one of the rescue workers guided me out of the building to a nearby bench. When the sheriff finally arrived, I directed him toward Stuart and Joan’s house, explaining that is where Toby went. It was chaotic as more and more people came either to help or observe.

  “Abby? Oh my gosh, I’m so glad you are okay,” Paula yelled, as she hobbled toward the bench. “Where’s Toby?”

  “He went to Stuart’s house to see if he could find the opening of the tunnel at that end,” I explained to her.

  A murmur went through the crowd as one of the deputies pushed his way through.

  “Abby, there’s been another cave in,” he said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Chapter 25

  “I have a feeling it’s going to be a long night,” I sighed. I was worried about Toby, Stuart, and Joan. As the sun started setting the crowd diminished, with only locals sticking around. I asked the deputy if I could go into the bakery and make coffee and sandwiches for the rescue workers. He was agreeable to that, so Paula and I got busy. Dan from the leather shop dropped in and stayed to help us. We fixed simple sandwiches and offered coffee, tea, water, and soda.

  As the evening dragged on, the workers rotated through. The warm building, hot coffee, and a sandwich helped to refresh them before
they headed back out into the cold weather. I kept the coffee pots full and the sandwich trays stocked. By midnight I was making cookies and starting to pull things together for breakfast sandwiches.

  We kept the pace throughout the early morning hours. The clock slowly ticked off the minutes and hours as we waited for news. The workers that came in only said that they were slowly making progress; they had to shore up the spaces then clear the debris, so it was slow work. They weren’t able to go under the jewelry store because the century-old footings weren’t stable enough, so all the work had to be done from Stuart’s house. We knew Joan and Stuart were at this end of the tunnel but had no idea where in the tunnel Toby was, and no one knew if any of them were even alive.

  “What in the world is going on?” Julia cried when she showed up for work at 4:30 am. I was trying to stay awake and stay busy by making bread, rolls, and other breakfast items. Paula pulled Julia aside and told her the whole story including the parts where Toby spent the night in my apartment, and that Toby and I spent the night locked in the storage room. She left nothing out and even added in that she thought there was a spark between Toby and me. Julia laughed, but agreed. Now the two of them would start conspiring to push Toby and me together, and I would have to find time to tell Julia that I wasn’t interested and Toby was planning on leaving town, if he’s even alive.

  As time went on, my hope for a positive resolution diminished. I excused myself for a few minutes to go upstairs and freshen up. Frosty was confused by the sudden change in our regular schedule, but a handful of treats and some love quickly calmed him. I changed my clothes from the ones I’d worn all night, refreshed my make up and ran my fingers through my hair, hoping I was presentable for the day ahead.

  When I reached the bottom of the stairs a cheer erupted in the bakery. Toby and the Sheriff were making their way through the crowd that had once again gathered. People all around town were anxiously awaiting news. It seemed it was better to wait together than it was to be alone, plus it made an excellent welcoming committee when one of the missing returned.

  I’m not sure what came over me - maybe relief, maybe exhaustion. Whatever it was drove me across the bakery and into Toby’s embrace. I didn’t care that he was covered in dirt, I was just glad that he was alive.

  “Careful, people might begin to think you like me,” he teased, as he hugged me tighter.

  “I’ll set them straight, don’t worry.”

  “The Sheriff said you’ve been working all night; you must be exhausted,” he said, letting me go.

  “I have, and I am, but what else was I going to do? I had to know if you were all right. Any word on Stuart and Joan? Did you get to them? What happened?” I asked.

  “I’ll tell you in exchange for one of those breakfast sandwiches and a cup of coffee. I’m starving,” he laughed.

  “Tell me again how much you don’t like him,” Paula teased, as I joined her behind the counter to fix Toby some food.

  “I don’t in the way you think I should,” I smirked at her.

  “That hug said otherwise my dear, and it wasn’t just one-sided either. That man’s face lit up when he saw you,” she elbowed me.

  “I’m sure he was just relieved to be alive and where there is food and coffee,” I told her, as I picked up Toby’s food and walked over to where he was sitting.

  “Okay, here’s your food. Now, what about Stuart and Joan?”

  “They found Stuart; he was hurt pretty bad, so they took him to the hospital. I don’t know what his condition is, but I know he was awake when they put him in the ambulance. I’m afraid Joan didn’t make it; when the gun went off, either the bullet triggered the cave-in, or the noise triggered it,” he shook his head.

  “They said you were trapped. How far in were you?” I wanted the whole story, but I was obviously going to have to pull it out of him bit by bit.

  “I only got about halfway in; it took a while to find the entrance. I don’t know what caused the cave-in behind me, but luckily I had just gone up the second set of steps, so was on a different level,” he explained, between bites of his sandwich. People stopped in to say hello and introduce themselves after finding out who Toby was. I was surprised at how many people said they remembered him from school and were glad he was back in town, but no one recognized him as the best-selling author.

  “I’m glad you are okay. I’m worried about Stuart though,” I sighed.

  He reached over and patted my hand, holding it a bit longer than what someone would expect for just a friendly gesture.

  “Thank you for everything. You were right, we should have gone back. I can’t believe I put you in danger like that; I’m just glad nothing happened to you.” He gave me a lopsided smile.

  “That will teach you,” I laughed. “Can I get you anything else?”

  “A hot shower and a comfortable bed?” he winked.

  “You are more than welcome to use my shower and crash upstairs if you want. I have a full day in here yet, today,” I offered, making it clear that I was not interested in joining him in either the hot shower or the comfortable bed.

  “Are you sure you don’t mind? Otherwise, I’ll go see if Bev is around and can give me a room. I’m not sleeping another night on the sofa in the old man’s house.”

  “Help yourself; the rumors are already swirling, so you might as well give everyone something more to talk about.”

  “Rumors of what? Us? Oh, like…,” he laughed, “welcome to small town living.”

  I watched as he went out to the curb to his car to get his duffel bag. Holding his head high, not making eye contact with anyone, he walked through the bakery and upstairs. I laughed to myself; that man was full of attitude and afraid of nothing. I caught Paula and Julia watching me, watching Toby. They looked at each other and nodded. I just shook my head and went about cleaning off tables and gathering trash.

  By 11 am the bakery was finally empty and quiet. Paula left to go home to rest after being up all night with me, and Julia was busy getting ready for lunch. I sat down with a cup of coffee to rest my feet for a bit. Julia offered to cover lunch if I wanted to go upstairs and rest, but I thought it was best for many reasons to remain in plain sight downstairs. I told her I would go upstairs after we closed for the day and asked if she would be able to handle the morning crowd so I could have a little time to myself. I did so much baking during the night waiting on word from the tunnel that she wouldn’t have to do any right away in the morning.

  While I was enjoying a bowl of soup in the quietness, Travis the contractor dropped in wondering why the jewelry store was taped off with yellow caution tape. He was shocked when I told him the story.

  “We still don’t know anything about Chicago, San Francisco, the boxes of books, or who killed old man Sampson. The mysteries continued to pile up without any of them being solved,” I told Travis and Julia.

  “But doesn’t it make sense that Stuart killed the old man? The tunnel went right from his house to the jewelry store, they had a long-standing feud, and he has all those weird plants.” Julia recapped the growing list of suspicious things involving Stuart.

  “It totally makes sense to me, I just don’t know if it’s enough for the Sheriff.” I agreed with her and prayed it would be enough to get me off the hook.

  “I hope for your sake answers start pouring in soon,” Julia said.

  Travis and I talked about the different projects he would be doing while the lunch crowd made their way in. It was a larger crowd than usual, with people wanting to know more about the tunnel and what happened. It was one of the biggest things to happen in this little town in a long time. I smiled and told what I knew without going into great detail.

  Luckily lunch was over rather quickly. I had to sleep. My entire body ached, and I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer, so I asked Julia to close up, and I headed upstairs. Frosty was in his usual spot at the foot end of the bed where Toby was sound asleep. I was happy to lay down on the sofa; I purposely bought a long
, wide sofa that would be perfect for napping. As quietly as I could, I tossed some wood into the stove, closed the curtains, grabbed a couple of blankets, and laid down.

  “Ahhh,” I sighed. I couldn’t help it, it felt so good to finally lay down.

  “It feels amazing, doesn’t it?” Toby laughed from the other end of the apartment.

  “Shhh, go back to sleep,” I said before nodding off.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Chapter 26

  First, there was the smell of coffee, then there was a phone ringing somewhere and the sound of a man talking. The combination unwillingly brought me out of a deep sleep. As I tried to wake up, pieces of the past few days flooded into my head. The hope of finding answers finally forced me to sit up to begin a new day.

  I couldn’t believe it was almost 6 am. I’d been asleep for the past fourteen hours. “It’s about time you woke up and stopped being so lazy,” Toby appeared in front of me with a steaming hot cup of coffee.

  “Thank you,” I said, taking the cup. “Have you been awake long?”

  “Not really. I woke up in the night for a couple hours, did some reading, then fell back to sleep.”

  “So, what is going to happen today?” I shook my head. I didn’t want anything to happen. I wanted a nice, normal day, but with all the unsolved mysteries lingering I was sure it would be anything but normal.

  “I got a text from the Sheriff - he’s going to come by around 8.” He held out his phone so I could see the text message.

  “Could he be vaguer? Any idea why he’s coming by?” I asked.

  “No idea. Remember that guy that locked us in the storage room? The one that wanted to inventory everything in the store?”

  “How could I forget?”

  “Evidently most of the inventory in the store belongs to a company in Chicago. My attorney was able to verify that, so the guy does need to do the inventory. Then I guess he’ll pack up what needs to be sent back and the rest is mine to do whatever with,” he shrugged.

  “So, I guess that means you won’t be re-opening the store?” I asked, hoping he would elaborate a bit more about his plans for the buildings.