by Karen Harper
“But you said she was desperate for stock to sell and made you a big offer for the little you have.”
“Maybe because she knows she doesn’t dare sell the stolen goods right now—that we would be on to her. So she goes to the mayor for help...and they’re having an affair. Reminds me of that poem—‘What a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.’”
“Exactly,” he said, “but we are going to get to the bottom of this and get that national treasure back.”
“Could the mayor have hidden things in Getz’s place? Maybe if it was coming to the mayor somehow in cahoots with Lloyd Witlow, since Mayor Purvis doesn’t have a Michigan connection.”
“That we know of. Maybe his original roots are in Michigan,” Bryce said. “Like maybe the loot was part of his heritage somehow. So many people in Alaska came from somewhere else.”
“Or is the cache buried or stored near somewhere that only a small plane like Lloyd’s could land? Did he mean to land there and lost control of the plane or was he headed for somewhere else nearby when it crashed?”
“We may never know,” he admitted with a huge sigh. “But I’ve got to keep poking around—riling people, which could be dangerous and why I want you to stick close to the lodge, research like you’re doing, but no more field work. I swear I’m going to get this solved soon so we can get to whatever is normal—together.”
He tugged her closer and kissed her. When they were together like this, safe, warm, he could almost convince himself that everything in this crazy case and between them would be all right.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Meg was astounded she’d managed to sleep almost seven hours, her best rest in weeks. But she still woke up early. She got ready for the day, putting on work clothes as she and Suze were going to decorate the lodge for Christmas. Bryce and Rafe were both going to help, so she was excited about that. Bryce had said since the Big Man was taking several days for his visit to beautiful Paris, France, he and Rafe could for sure take some time to decorate the lodge in beautiful Falls Lake, Alaska.
Since she had an extra hour, she grabbed a granola bar from her dresser and went immediately to her laptop. She researched Brooklyn, Michigan, in Jackson County, then looked for anyone in the Fourth Cavalry Regiment with the last name of Galsworth. Nothing, though a soldier could have been born on the maternal side and have a different last name.
The granola bar crumbled. Muttering, she had to blow pieces off her keyboard. She tried another tactic, going back to Brooklyn and scrolling through old pictures of the town. It was still small today, population 1,206 in the last census of 2010, even though it hosted a NASCAR speedway. It was in a lovely, hilly area with a lot of summer cottages on various lakes. The place was founded in 1832.
And then she found it. Not exactly what she’d wanted, because the name of the jewelry store and owners was not Galsworth, but here was an old black-and-white photo of the “downtown” of Brooklyn with a storefront window that read Fine Jewelry and Watch Repair. The owner stood before the store with his arms folded and was labeled as Mr. Starrs. Indeed the window was painted with that name with its extra r and a spray of stars.
Suze knocked and popped her head in. “Hey, busy day,” she said. “And your favorite NTSB commander is having coffee alone and wondering where you are.”
“I finally got some sleep, then had to check something out here.”
Suze stepped in and closed the door behind her. “Guess what? Rafe insisted on buying one of the oil paintings I did of the lodge last summer. He’s going to hang it in his apartment!”
“Great! But...where is that? I got the idea that wherever he is is home.”
“Here and there, he says, but right now an apartment in Seattle. He likes it here better, he says.”
Meg turned off the laptop and stood. Suze looked so happy and so—hopeful.
“Suze, you should listen to him about starting a local art club or artists’ colony here at the lodge. Like he said, maybe have several weeks when you advertise it far and wide and people come in to draw or paint the scenery. You could have him visit to teach quick sketching.”
She sighed. “Anything to get him back here...to hold on to him...” Her eyes misted. “Sorry,” she added with a sniff. “It’s just that Alex is so happy with Quinn, and they’ll be back here for New Year’s and be looking forward to a life together. You and Bryce—I know that’s going to work out, I just feel it. And you know I love Chip and sure would like a chip off the old block of my own. Meg, I love the lodge, but sometimes—and the holidays make it worse—I just... I just wish...”
To Meg’s surprise, Suze burst into tears, covering her face with her hands. Meg hurried to her, hugged her.
“I understand,” Meg murmured. “Things will work out. The lawyer was a mistake, but someone like Rafe—”
She shook her head. Her words came muffled. “He’ll be moving on soon. I’m married to the lodge—and I don’t mean I’m not blessed to have it.”
Meg reached over to yank a tissue from the box on her bedside table and gave it to Suze, who blotted her eyes and took deep breaths. Even if things worked out with Bryce—and that must mean a move to Juneau—could she leave Suze?
“You’d better go on out,” Suze said and blew her nose. “I’ll be out in a sec. Lots to do today, Christmas joy and all that, fa, la, la, la.”
“Take your time here. See you in a bit, because I can handle things out there. At least for breakfast right now.”
Feeling inadequate to comfort Suze more, she patted her shoulder and hurried out.
* * *
“We usually decorate a whole month before the twenty-fifth,” Suze told everyone assembled once the boxes of holiday decorations were brought down from the attic. “But things have been so hectic that we’re late this year. I want to thank Kurt and Rafe for going out with the sled to cut and bring in the tree Meg and I marked this autumn as well as the pine boughs for ropes and wreaths. I’ve put the tree stand right where it should go in front of the windows. Thanks in advance to everyone for your help, and we’ll be sure a big lunch is ready for everyone right after.”
Bryce noticed the Christmas spirit must be in full force here because the hoarder of all hoarders stepped forward with a string of bells in his hands. It was on a long, beat-up leather strap.
“I just want to say I did enjoy my days here,” Getz announced. “I’m leaving today and can’t help, ’cause I’ve got to decorate my own place. But I hope you can use these old sleigh bells, like on the mantel or some place. Or a door ’cause they sound really good if you shake them.”
He demonstrated. The jingling, melodious sound filled the air, and everyone clapped. It was a rare come-together holiday moment, Bryce thought, and felt a twinge of guilt for already having seen Getz’s place, even his room with jumbled Christmas decorations from who knew where. Maybe the guy was innocent, however suspicious. If Bryce could just clear the mayor and his cohorts, including the jewelry store owner the mayor was having an affair with. But no, no one in the clear yet.
After Getz left, everyone got in the spirit of things. The three dogs ran around with bows attached to their collars. The tree went up and was decorated, all six feet of it with a star atop. Everyone laughed as they untangled strings of lights. Out of the boxes and tissue paper, Meg and Suze produced beautiful ornaments and strings of blown glass beads that had been their grandmother’s. Those reflected the lights, making the tree doubly glow as it got darker outside when snow began and the entire tree shone in the windows that acted like giant mirrors.
A crèche scene appeared for the mantel with wise men and angels. On ladders, Bryce helped Meg string ropes of fresh pine nearly to the ceiling. Rafe popped corn for a midmorning snack and to make old-fashioned strings of it for the tree. Eventually, they all sat down for lunch.
In the midafternoon, everyone went their own way until th
ey gathered again for a pot roast dinner. Bryce felt the pull, the allure, of family then, the dream of having his own home with wife and kids. He smiled as he watched Meg and Chip together, happy, having fun. He’d like to think some of that was because he was here with them.
Kurt spent time on the phone before dessert and coffee talking to his wife, Janice, and family. Rafe called his parents, and Bryce overheard him praise Suze’s art work—and she heard that too, smiling and blushing. Bryce called Steve, telling him he would be bringing Meg and Chip to Juneau for a few days soon.
It was all so holiday-ish, so Christmassy, and it wasn’t any of that yet. Except in his heart. And in his fervent wishes for the future, a safe future for all here.
* * *
“Our Christmas tree smells good,” Chip told Meg as she tucked him in that night. “Wish I had one in here, ’cause my three furry friends don’t smell like that.”
“That’s one reason you and I are on give-the-dogs-a-bath duty. Soon there will be one less when Spenser goes back with Aunt Alex and Uncle Quinn.”
“Yeah. His leash is under the bed, I think. I’ll make sure he’s looking real good when they get here for New Year’s.”
“I’ll get it out now,” she said, dropping to her knees from her seat on the bed and peeking under. “Chip! There’s a ton of stuff here. Even books. You didn’t shove your school books under here, did you?”
She pulled out the leash and several books came with it—including the Wasilla High School yearbook she’d been searching for and fretting about.
“Chip! This book—it’s mine,” she said, still on her knees, holding it up. “Did you take this from my room?”
“I didn’t steal it,” he protested, which made her feel guilty because she had.
“I mean, why did you take it?”
“Mom, when you were in your bathroom once and I was supposed to wait for you, I saw it on the bed and looked at the pictures and stuff. This school had a soccer team, really neat pictures of them and a game they played. So I just borrowed it to show Commander Bryce and then forgot it, I mean with all the crazy stuff going on around here.”
“Yes. Yes, I see. Well, I need it back. I want to look through it too.”
“I sure hope I can get good enough to be on a soccer team in high school in Wasilla—if we live here then, I mean.”
She sat back down on the bed, scuffing everything except the leash back underneath the bed, while she cradled the book on her lap. She’d look through it and get it back to Bill Getz somehow without his knowing who took it. She knew Bryce felt guilty for breaking into the hoarder’s house, and she did too. Would Getz realize someone had been there? Would he know who—why?
“Mom, you’re not mad, are you?”
“I just wish you would have told me and given it back. But I’m glad you kept it in a safe place.” In a hurry now to show this to Bryce, she leaned over to kiss him good-night. “Sleep tight, don’t let the doggies bite.”
Both frustrated and relieved, she ruffled Chip’s hair, got up and went out into the hall, hoping Bryce was still waiting for her by the tree where she’d left him. Rafe and Suze were huddled at the other end of the great room, which smelled so wonderfully of pine.
Yes, Bryce was there, one arm along the back of the couch, one leg crossed over the other. His eyes seemed to glow in the reflected tree lights. He patted the place beside him, and she sat, holding up the front of the yearbook toward him.
“Where did you find that?” he asked, sitting up straighter.
Instantly, she regretted ruining the relaxed, special moment. Why did the dangerous outside have to keep impinging on the precious possibility here? She’d become part of it now, those developments, the danger.
“Under Chip’s bed. He liked the soccer team pictures in it.”
“Let’s go in the kitchen so we can look at it.”
They went into the cleaned-up kitchen, and she switched on the lights. They sat on tall stools at the work counter, and she looked in the back of the book index for Rina Witlow and Bill Getz.
“I’ll check her out first,” she said, frowning over the small print. “Yes, here’s a reference. This is her sophomore year and his—ah, his junior year. Both have more than one page reference and, oh, I see one here where they are on the same page.”
He leaned close as she riffled through the book. Bryce said, “Maybe they’re still on the same page. Someone was working together and using Lloyd as a carrier pigeon to hide the goods. I’m betting the mayor and our antique jewelry store owner, but—despite the distance—I think you’re leaning toward the charming Rina and Todd.”
They hunched over the page as she found it and spread it out on the counter. “Bingo!” he said.
“But it still proves nothing but they used to know each other—maybe even dated? I can’t believe it.”
They stared at a photograph of a young Bill Getz and Rina Witlow. Grinning, dancing together at a school event, no less. It was on a page of random student life pictures with humorous titles. The one under this photo read, Mr. Armstrong’s worst nightmare: two crazy rebels in cahoots!
“Mr. Armstrong’s picture is over here—he’s the principal,” she whispered, pointing.
“Maybe those two together are Mr. Saylor’s worst nightmare too,” he muttered, frowning. “When we saw them both at the lodge, there was no sign they knew each other.”
“Maybe, if they did date, she asked him not to let on because of Todd.”
“Or if they were on the same theft team now, they didn’t want to let on because of me—us. Getz would have warned her who I was, what I was there for—or someone did.”
“The mayor’s the one who’s been pulling Getz’s strings, had him on salary, and I have trouble believing it’s just to keep an eye on things around town. Let’s look at these other pages they’re on.”
“Okay. But whatever else we find, we’re going to talk to Getz first thing in the morning. Not to tell him we’ve been to his place before or ‘borrowed’ this book, but to tell him we heard that he used to know—or even date—Rina. We’ll just see where that goes. Again we’re pulling at loose, tangled strings here, but remember after we untangled those strings of Christmas bulbs, the lights went on. That’s got to happen for us too.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The next morning when it was barely light, Bryce drove Meg to Getz’s long, patchwork cabin. She knew he hadn’t wanted her to come along, but she convinced him it would be better, maybe keep the lid on if things got heated.
“This time we won’t park behind the bushes by the frozen stream,” she said as the truck bumped down the access road to the lonely site of the house. “But we’ll still have to cross it.”
The moment they got out, Bryce said, “Do you smell smoke?”
“A little. Not unusual, especially this time of year. Maybe it’s Getz’s chimney. A fireplace would be the only way he keeps his living quarters warm. That string of storage rooms in back were all chilly.”
“Not only smoke but fire!” he said, grabbing her arm as they started to cross the narrow ice. “Behind those trees—with embers in the sky! Unless he’s burning a lot of trash, that has to be his place. We’ve got to check on him. Besides, he could have made a bonfire to burn evidence if he thinks we’re on to him. Look—his truck is here, parked farther down the stream.”
They skidded across the narrow frozen stream, but then the snow impeded them.
“Look,” she cried. “Fire through the trees. I even hear it.”
When they tore into the clearing, they both gasped, then began to cough in the thickening smoke. The center section of Getz’s house was on fire, easy kindling with all that stuff piled within. The section where Bryce recalled old papers and magazines were stored was ablaze with ten-foot flames.
“Call for help!” he shouted and put out his arm so she wouldn�
�t go closer. “In case he’s inside, I’m going in.”
“No, you might get trapped! Those walls or roof could cave in. Surely he got out, maybe set it himself so no one could find things he had there. And I don’t think my phone will work way out here.”
“Drive until you get a signal! I’m going into the front where he lived. Go!”
* * *
She wanted to refuse, to argue more, to grab Bryce and not let him go. But she went back, slid across the ice and climbed the snowy bank toward her truck. She tried her phone. NO SERVICE IN THIS AREA.
She got in and sped down the bumpy road. Her tires crunched snow; her thoughts flew. Getz had just left the lodge yesterday. Surely he would not do this, but who would? Did Bryce insist on going in because this fire meant Getz knew something they had to know or because he feared the loss of any of the treasure in that inferno? Could this be an accidental fire—or not?
She knew one thing. Getz’s passion for hoarding, his entire life must be going up in flames. She was scared for him.
She parked on the side of the main road and tried her phone again. It worked now—she punched in 9-1-1.
* * *
Bryce told himself he was not going past the first two rooms. Where had this fire started? He tried to break down the front door with his feet. Then, when it didn’t budge, he used a big log from the stack of firewood on the front porch.
The door splintered vertically. He reached in to turn the lock and the knob. He had gloves on but he could tell the metal was hot.
“Getz! Getz, you in here? Call out, man!”
Small main room, beat-up leather easy chair with a quilt. Two hanging, unlit lanterns. In the kitchen Bryce wet his handkerchief in a plastic pail of water and held the wet cloth over his nose and mouth, but that didn’t keep his eyes from watering, let alone trying to see through the gray pall of smoke.