“So let’s go get him!” Teeny clenched her little fist with determination.
“I don’t want to go up there if he’s lurking in the trees.” I lowered my voice. “Wallace might be the killer. It’s not safe.”
“Oh yes it is.” Teeny pulled a large bottle of hot sauce from her purse. “This stuff is way more potent than the olive oil spray. One splash in the eyes? Blinded for life.”
I opened my mouth to list all the reasons hot sauce was an inadequate means of self-defense, but Miss May spoke before I had the chance. “We waited this long. We might as well hang out a few more hours. Once Wallace shows up in town, we’ll follow his path up into the woods. And we won’t need to blind anyone with any condiments.”
“Fine,” Teeny said. “But I’m ordering scrambled eggs. I’m going to use this hot sauce for something.”
By the time Teeny finished her eggs, there was still no sign of Wallace, and everyone in town seemed to have noticed his disappearance.
Arthur, the owner of the gas station, commented that he hoped Wallace had moved somewhere new. Petunia agreed. A few others remarked that they missed Wallace’s dance moves but not his angry outbursts. And the consensus was that Wallace’s absence was a good thing.
But the longer Wallace stayed missing, the more anxious Miss May, Teeny, and I became. Only we knew that Wallace was the number one suspect in Rosenberg’s murder. So only we knew that Wallace’s absence could portend something devious.
We feared that Wallace might have detected our stakeout the prior night. Maybe he’d made a run for it. Worse yet, maybe he was disposing of evidence. Worse even still, what if Wallace had moved on to his next victim?
After a few hours of patience, all three of us had grown weary of waiting.
“We can’t sit around until Wallace makes a run for it,” I said. “We should go see what’s up in that forest. Or tell the police what we know.”
Miss May shook her head. “Chief Flanagan has no interest in solving this murder. Whatever happens next, it’s up to us.”
“So do you think we should go up there?” I asked.
“We should have gone up five hours ago,” Teeny said. ”I wasted half my weaponized hot sauce on my eggs. If we wait much longer I won’t have any left for blinding.”
Miss May nodded. “Okay. Let’s head up now, while we still have plenty of light left in the day. If we spot him, we’ll act like we’re up there on an innocent hike.”
“And what’s our plan if he tries to kill us?” I asked.
Miss May shrugged. “We run.”
Teeny hoisted the hot sauce in the air. “Or we fight.”
Neither option made me feel great. But the plan was in motion. So I leaned in.
THE PATH THAT WALLACE took up the hill started on the side of the road and cut into the trees after a few feet. Wallace’s footsteps had flattened the grass near the road. But once the path took us past the first thicket of bushes, the forest grew dense on all sides. And the streets and stores of Pine Grove felt hours away after less than a minute of walking.
“The forest is so green,” I said. “You never see this color in the city. I missed it.”
Teeny swatted at her arm. “Did you miss the mosquitoes too?”
“We had mosquitoes. Just not the forests,” I said.
“Gross,” Teeny said. “That’s like having coffee with no sugar.”
“Or cream.” Miss May reached into her purse and pulled out a bottle of bug spray. “Here. Don’t use it all. We may need it for blinding our foes.”
Teeny took the spray with a sardonic “har-har” and applied the repellent in a broad sweeping motion over her body. She handed me the bottle, and I went through the same ritual.
We walked a few more steps, then I spotted a few does and fawns up the path about twenty feet. The does were alert, ears twitching and eyes wide. The fawns, however, were nibbling at the leaves without a care in the world.
Ah, the innocence of childhood.
“We didn’t have deer in the city either,” I said.
Teeny smiled wide. “Oh my goodness. Look at those at babies. Chelsea go crawl up next to them and pretend to be a baby deer.”
Miss May laughed. “Now that I would like to see. Chelsea, go eat the leaves! They look tasty.”
“A little salt and I’ll eat anything,” I said. “Or maybe some hot sauce? Still have that bottle in your purse, Teeny?”
Miss May laughed. Teeny joined in and the deer skittered away.
“You guys! Your laughter at my expense scared them away,” I said.
”You should rejoice,” Miss May said. “More leaves for you.”
Teeny slapped her knee. Miss May doubled over. I crossed my arms, tiring of their charade. Then I spotted something moving a little further up the path.
“Shhhhhh!” I said. But they kept laughing. I pulled at Miss May’s sleeve and pointed. “Be quiet. I think there’s more wildlife.”
Miss May covered her mouth. “That’s a coyote.”
Teeny stopped laughing. She turned white. “That’s a whole herd of coyotes.”
I gulped. “The correct term is pack.”
22
Forest Fortress
EIGHT LARGE, WIRY COYOTES huddled together five feet up the hill. The canines were malnourished yet beautiful. Like runway models, but more deadly.
The alpha male bared his teeth in a warning snarl. My eyes widened. Although Miss May and I had investigated several murders in the prior year, that moment was the most scared I had been since moving back to Pine Grove. The depth of my nature and wildlife knowledge didn’t help. My mind raced through coyote facts...
- Coyotes do not attack humans often. But they have.
- A single coyote has the potential to kill much larger prey with its powerful jaw.
- Although one coyote by his or herself isn’t much to fear, a group of coyotes could be dangerous if threatened.
I also knew that when faced with a coyote the best course of action was to throw sticks and stones to scare them away. Unfortunately, at that moment my fear paralyzed me. And it looked like Teeny and Miss May were also frozen by fear because neither moved.
Teeny spoke through clenched teeth, “Should we call animal control?”
“I don’t know,” I whispered, also through clenched teeth. “But coyotes are usually diurnal or nocturnal hunters, so it is odd for them to be roaming around like this in daylight. They must be extremely hungry. Or something else is wrong.”
“Oh my goodness, speak English, Chelsea,” Teeny said.
“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Miss May said. She barely moved her lips at all as she spoke, and I had the thought that she’d be the best ventriloquist among us. “There’s no phone service up here.”
“That’s great,” Teeny muttered. “Comforting.”
We fell quiet again, handing our fates over to, well, fate.
After about sixty seconds the alpha broke his stare and stalked into the brush as if nothing had happened. The other coyotes followed, breaking off one by one to fall in line behind Snarly McSnarlson.
Once the last of the animals disappeared into the brush, Miss May exhaled. So did I. And so did Teeny. Then we pressed forward, continuing our silent march through the forest.
Fifteen minutes later, we found ourselves outside an abandoned cabin at the top of the hill.
The cabin was a single story, single room house that had seen better days. Heck, it had probably seen better centuries. The siding was made of long wooden planks. The roof had fallen off, but for three sad shingles. A half-collapsed chimney rose along the left side like a gnarled finger.
A crumbling doorway and a broken window revealed snapshots of an equally shabby interior.
Next to the cabin, a toppled 1950s refrigerator was splayed like a wildebeest corpse, racks jutting like ribs from the rusted out remains. And the quiet sounds of a raven’s wings overhead provided an eerie soundtrack to the scene.
I gulped. “I don’t
think I believe in ghosts, but does anyone else feel like this place is haunted?”
“Oh this place is crawling with spirits,” Teeny said. “Look at the chimney! That thing has ‘ghost portal’ written all over it.”
Miss May turned to us. “You two stop. This place isn’t haunted. But I think it might be where Wallace lives.”
“I hope it’s not where we die,” I said.
Miss May took a step toward the cabin. “Hello? Anybody home?”
No answer. Miss May stepped through the doorway. I followed but Teeny lingered outside. “I’ll hang out here. Stand guard. Avoid the ghosts.”
“Whatever you want, T,” Miss May said. “Holler if you need us.”
Once through the door, I witnessed an absolute horror of interior design. Or should I say interior resign?
The dirt floors were dusty and uneven. Old records and newspapers were strewn everywhere. And a hammock suspended from the ceiling formed a makeshift bed.
Miss May took careful steps as she surveyed the perimeter of the room. “Wallace has been staying here. That’s a fact.”
“How do you know?” I asked.
“For starters, that’s a new hammock. Can’t be more than a few months old.” She picked up a can of food off the floor. “And this empty can of black beans smells like beans, not rotted maggot trash.”
“OK. Those are good clues. But how do you know it’s Wallace?”
“I suppose it could be anyone. But we saw him walking in this direction. So... if it quacks like a duck...”
I nodded. She had a point. “So what do we do now?”
“Leave?” Teeny called from outside.
“No,” Miss May said. “We look for clues. If Wallace committed that murder, there’s evidence in this room. And if he burglarized anyone in town, there should be evidence of that too.”
“I don’t see any of the stuff that was stolen from the bakeshop. None of the other junk looks stolen either. Unless you count taking stuff out of the trash as stealing.”
“Legally, yes. Morally, no,” Miss May said.
Teeny poked her head inside the cabin. “Hey. What’s going on in here? Need to borrow my hot sauce? Blind a ghost in the face?”
“Why don’t you come in and find out?” Miss May asked.
Teeny shook her head. “I don’t do haunted cabins. Just let me know if you need the sauce.”
Miss May shook her head with a small chuckle. I doubled down on the mission and did a second inspection of the ramshackle shack.
Much of the debris seemed to be left over from when a family lived there. There was a Christmas sing-along record from the 1950’s. There was a porcelain doll with vacant eyes, missing an arm. And there was a yellowed newspaper dated from 1953.
I squatted down to sift through some artifacts and noticed that the floors weren’t dirt after all. Beneath layers of caked-on mud, there were actually thick, oak planks. “These were beautiful floors once,” I said.
Miss May grunted a reply. She was too interested in sifting through her own pile of detritus to pay much attention to the floors.
“I mean, like really beautiful,” I said. “These were not standard for the time. This wood was brought in special. Is that not odd for a little house like this?”
“Sure, it’s a fun interior design fact,” Miss May said. “But I don’t think it tells us too much about Wallace. Keep your eyes open for actual clues.”
I moved more debris away and cleared a large swath of floor. “I think I’m onto something,” I said. I didn’t totally think I was onto anything, but I wanted to prove my aunt wrong for once. I pushed even more junk and dirt away, and then more. And within thirty seconds I had a five foot by five-foot swath of floor clear of debris.
I stood up to get a bird’s-eye view. Or, I guess a human’s eye view, in that scenario.
I felt a thrill of pleasure. The nice oak planks only covered a tiny portion of the cabin floor. The wood was not original to the house.
“The oak doesn’t match the rest of the floor,” I said. “See?”
“So the previous owners did some renovations,” Miss May said.
“I don’t think that’s it,” I said. I got back on my hands and knees and ran my fingers along the wood. And that’s when I felt it. A few of the panels were slightly uneven, but only by a few millimeters.
“I think this is a trapdoor,” I said. “Is there a crowbar or something around?”
Miss May grabbed a fire iron from the fireplace and handed it to me. “Now I’m interested.”
I shoved the fire iron under the patch of floorboards and pried. Sure enough, the floorboards swung up and opened like a door, revealing a dark basement below.
I looked over at Miss May. “My interior design always comes in handy. Doesn’t it?”
“It does.” Miss May held up her hands and bowed her head. “Mea culpa.”
“I accept your apology,” I said.
“It wasn’t exactly an apology, but OK.” Miss May leaned over the trapdoor and looked down into the basement. “Who’s going first? You or me?”
I thought back to Master Skinner’s instructions and swallowed down my fear. “I’ll go first.”
Miss May nodded. “OK. Don’t have too much fun.”
I tried to smile, then swung my legs into the hole.
Each step of the rickety ladder into the weird cellar creaked as I climbed down. A wretched stench wafted upward, and I resisted the urge to hold my nose. The hole went much deeper than I expected. I jumped off the last one or two rungs of the ladder and landed with a soft thud.
Miss May descended the ladder behind me, flipping on the flashlight on her phone and shining it around the small, damp room.
The room was stacked with stolen goods. Along the far wall, I spotted all the stuff that had gone missing from the bakeshop. A mixer. A vintage sign. A wad of cash splashed on the floor.
Along another wall were boxes of rotting produce. I assumed those were the stolen goods from Petey’s restaurant.
Cluttered in the middle of the room were computer monitors from the town library.
Then there were lawn gnomes. Birdhouses. Mailboxes. You name it, Wallace had stolen it and hoarded it in his creepy little basement.
“Look at all this stuff,” I said. “This guy has been way busier than we thought.”
“You’re telling me,” Miss May said. “Half this stuff is from the library. I didn’t even know the library had been broken into.”
“These are old monitors,” I said. “Probably from storage. Maybe the librarians don’t even know it yet.”
Miss May shook her head. “Or maybe Chief Flanagan is keeping people quiet at the mayor’s orders. Anything to protect Pine Grove’s image as a Top 10 Destination for Bed and Breakfasts.”
“And look at the stuff from the bake shop,” I said. “It looks so sad down here. And it doesn’t seem like he’s tried to sell anything. It’s all gathering dust and worms and cellar slime.”
Miss May took me by the arm. “OK. Keep it down. Remember. This guy could be dangerous. We know he’s a thief. That makes it even more likely that he’s also the killer. And he could be lurking anywhere. “
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Boots pounded on the floor above us. Then someone shined a powerful flashlight down into the basement.
“Who’s down there? Let me see your hands!”
Miss May shot me a nervous glance. “That doesn’t sound like Wallace.”
I shook my head.
Click-click. The unmistakable sound of someone loading a gun.
“I said let me see your hands!”
23
A Surprise Visitor
WHEN MISS MAY AND I emerged from the basement, we were face to gun with a large, imposing man. He looked to be about fifty, he wore all black, and he had his hair pulled back in a ponytail. When the man spoke, he had a thick, Bronx accent.
“Who are you and what are you doing here?” The man kept his gun trained on us as
he spoke.
Miss May held up her hands, palms out. “We’re friends of Wallace. Up here looking for him.”
The imposing man narrowed his eyes. “Wallace doesn’t have friends.”
Miss May let out a nervous chuckle. “Are you telling me you’re not here on a friendly visit?”
The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a badge without moving his gun. He flapped the badge open. “James Johnson. Parole officer. NYPD.”
Miss May and I exchanged a nervous glance.
“Did Wallace have a history of arrests in New York?” I asked.
“He got arrested once every couple of months for twenty years. For petty stuff. But who’s counting?”
“Any chance you’d be willing to lower the weapon?” Miss May asked. “I’m an old lady. I could drop dead at the mere hint of danger. We’re no threat to you. I’m sure you can see that.”
Officer Johnson lowered his gun one inch at a time. “Fine. But no sudden movements.”
Miss May laughed. “I couldn’t make a sudden movement if my life depended on it. Knees. Hips. Ankles. You get it. Like I said, I’m old.”
“And I’m clumsy,” I said. “In case you were wondering.”
Johnson looked from me, then back to Miss May. “You two are strange. I’m picking up on that now. An odd duo of some kind.”
“If you want to know a secret about who we are,” Miss May said. “I’ll tell you.”
“Everyone likes a secret,” Johnson said.
“We’re amateur sleuths. Wallace is a suspect in a murder that occurred down in Pine Grove a few days ago. We want to ask him some questions.”
“You said he had committed a lot of crimes in the city? Do you think he could have killed?” I asked.
“Nah,” Johnson said. “The guy is a little opossum. Ugly. Not fun to be around. But mostly a gentle offender.”
Miss May exhaled a sigh of relief. “Great. So... Not a killer.”
Johnson chuckled. “I didn’t say that. He has a bit of a history with violence. Not murder. But listen, you met the guy. You tell me what you think.”
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