Mary put her arm around Betty. “We’ll both make it to supper time,” she promised.
Sheriff Whitfield rubbed his beard, checked his gun, and then looked at Mary and Betty. “Okay, ladies,” he said, “I’m going to break into the pantry and see what we find. In the meantime, you girls keep an eye on that man.”
“You mean we’re not going to part ways again?” Betty asked in a hopeful voice.
“From this point forward,” Sheriff Whitfield assured Betty, “we’re staying together. Now, stand back. I’m going to shoot the doorknob off.”
“Oh dear,” Betty said and hurried away from the pantry door with Mary.
Mary stepped close to Sam, glanced down at the creepy old man, and then watched Sheriff Whitfield shoot the doorknob off the pantry door. “Okay,” Sheriff Whitfield said, “let’s see what’s inside.” And with those words, the brave man reached out, grabbed the pantry door, and cautiously pulled it open. “Well, will you look at this,” he said and shook his head. “What a surprise.”
Mary and Betty ran over to the pantry door and looked inside. Mary gasped. Betty fainted.
Eric Dalton lay unconscious on the pantry floor. A can of peaches was sitting next to his head. “He’s breathing,” Sheriff Whitfield told Mary, checking the man’s head. “How is Betty?”
“Coming around,” Mary said, fanning poor Betty’s face. She threw her eyes at Sam. Sam was easing over to the kitchen door. “Don’t you dare!” Mary yelled.
Sam jerked, looked at Mary, and then quickly ran back to his seat and sat down. “I was…” he began to speak but then shook his head. “I don’t want to die.”
Sheriff Whitfield grabbed Eric’s arms and dragged him out of the pantry. “I’ll hunt you down if you run,” he warned Sam.
Sam watched Sheriff Whitfield drag Eric’s body to the wooden table and then pull out a pair of rusty handcuffs. “What are you going to do?” he fretted.
“Get over here,” Sheriff Whitfield ordered.
Sam gulped, slowly stood up, and walked his old body over to Sheriff Whitfield. “You can’t—”
“I can,” Sheriff Whitfield said and quickly slapped one of the cuffs on Sam’s right wrist and then attached the second cuff to Eric’s left wrist. “He’ll come around soon enough,” Sheriff Whitfield explained, taking his gun out. “You two can try to run, but you won’t get far. Mr. Dalton is still young enough to make good ground under a full sun, but you’re an old man who will only slow him down. If you run, I’ll track you down.”
Sam gulped again. “What if you’re wrong…what if he’s the killer?”
“Mr. Dalton isn’t the killer,” Sheriff Whitfield promised Sam and pointed at Eric’s shoes. “Look at the bottom of his shoes.”
Sam studied the bottom of Eric’s shoes. “I don’t see anything.”
“Exactly,” Sheriff Whitfield said. “Before Mr. Dalton locked me in the basement, I made a quick trip back to Dr. Cappes’s office. I found shoe prints in the flour I spread on the floor. I wasn’t sure who the prints belonged to. Now I do.” Sheriff Whitfield looked at Mary. “Albert Malone was in Dr. Cappes’s office after he was killed. The only question is, why?”
“I don’t know,” Mary answered, fanning Betty’s face.
Sheriff Whitfield looked down at Eric. “I was meaning to tell you, but we’ve been discussing a lot. It wasn’t until I looked down at Mr. Dalton’s shoes that I remembered. Reckon old age creeps up on me sometimes.”
Betty let out a low moan. “Wake up, honey, please,” Mary begged.
“Mary?” Betty whispered as her eyes fluttered open.
“I’m right here, honey.” Mary sighed and looked up at the ceiling with tired eyes. As she did, a sudden thought struck her mind. “Hiding places…”
“What?” Sheriff Whitfield asked.
“Prison…escapes…hiding places,” Mary whispered.
“Mary?” Betty asked.
“It’s okay, honey,” Mary promised and quickly helped Betty stand to her feet. “Sheriff Whitfield, we need to check Uncle Albert’s room again. Also,” she added, rubbing her nose, we need to see what room is under Uncle Albert’s. If I’m right, I believe the room might just be the office Dr. Cappes was found dead in.”
“Oh my,” Betty said in a strained voice as her mind tried to latch back onto the land of conscious thinking. When her eyes spotted Sam handcuffed to Eric Dalton, she nearly fainted again. “Is that man…dead?” she gasped.
“Nah,” Sheriff Whitfield said in a calm voice, “someone just knocked him silly with a can of peaches.”
“Oh…well, that’s good…I think.” Betty sighed.
Mary patted Betty’s hands. “We need to check Uncle Albert’s room, honey. Are you up to climbing the stairs?”
“I think so,” Betty said in an uncertain voice.
“First let me check that hidden cellar you said was in the pantry,” Sheriff Whitfield told Mary. He walked into the pantry on brave legs and vanished.
Mary bit down on her thumbnail and waited. A few minutes passed, and then a few more. “Maybe I should go and check to see if the sheriff is alright?” Mary said to Betty.
Betty spotted the wooden rolling pin resting on the floor. She bent down and picked it up. “I…guess we should.”
Before Mary could take a step toward the pantry door, Sheriff Whitfield appeared smelling like raw earth. “Located the cellar,” he said and began brushing dirt off his pants with his left hand. “I also located Dr. Cappes’s body.”
“Oh my,” Betty gasped.
Sheriff Whitfield pointed into the pantry with his gun. “I found the dumbwaiter,” he continued. “I also found a hidden tunnel. I want to explore the tunnel, but I figured you ladies might be getting worried about me and thought I’d better peek my head up first.”
“A hidden tunnel…golly,” Betty whispered.
“Well, this hospital was once a prison,” Mary pointed out. She focused on Sam. “Do you know anything about the tunnel?” she asked.
Sam shook his head no. “I didn’t even know about the cellar.”
Mary could feel that Sam was speaking the truth. She looked at Sheriff Whitfield. “Sheriff, Betty and I will explore the tunnel with you.”
“I thought you might,” Sheriff Whitfield told Mary. “Before we do, I need to tell you that I found footprints in the dirt covering the cellar floor. I also found traces of flour in some of the footprints.”
“Uncle Albert has been in the cellar,” Mary said.
Sheriff Whitfield nodded his head. “Looks that way to me. Footprints with the flour in them match the same print sizes I saw in Dr. Cappes’s office.”
“Oh, Uncle Albert,” Betty whined, “you…fooled me. I was feeling so sorry for you. Sure, you’re crazy, but I was…oh, what does it matter?” Betty looked at Mary with upset eyes. “I wish we could go back and live in the days Mother grew up in,” she said. “Mother grew up in a time when people could trust one another.”
“How old is your mother?” Sheriff Whitfield asked.
“About your age,” Betty replied.
Sheriff Whitfield nodded his head. “Well, I admit the old days were better, but we sure had our share of outlaws,” he told Betty. “Even before my time folks had problems…Jesse James, Henry McCarty—”
“Who?” Betty asked.
“Billy the Kid,” Mary explained.
“Oh,” Betty said and curled her lip. “I read about him…awful little fella.”
Sheriff Whitfield nodded again. “There’s been some real bad men through the ages, Betty. The Old West was full of bad men. But that didn’t mean bad men were contained to the west or a certain area. Right here in Georgia we had to put down some dangerous killers.” Sheriff Whitfield looked down at his gun. “In 1878 my pa and a group of men tracked down a man who shot and killed a farmer and his family. Why? Just some for trail supplies and nothing more.”
“How awful,” Betty said.
“Yeah, it was,” Sheriff Whitfield ag
reed. “Murder has been around since the days of the Bible. Cain murdered his brother Abel. Seems like men just don’t care that much about peace. Wish men would just do right by each other and stop all the ugliness. Don’t seem to be that way, though…sure can’t imagine what the world will be like, say, seventy years from now.”
“Let’s see…it’s 1943…plus seventy…why, it would be the year 2013…golly,” Betty gasped.
“Let’s just get past today,” Mary pleaded in an urgent voice. “We need to find Uncle Albert and Nurse Ellie.” Mary pointed at Eric. “Uncle Albert surely has Nurse Ellie.”
“Yeah, but I don’t think he’ll hurt her,” Sheriff Whitfield pointed out. “But there’s no sense in standing around and running our mouths. We have work to do. Come on.” Sheriff Whitfield pointed at Sam. “We’re leaving you alone, old man. You can try and run, but I wouldn’t recommend it.”
“How can I run anywhere?” Sam asked and yanked on the cuff wrapped around his wrist.
“See to it that you stay put,” Sheriff Whitfield ordered Sam and walked back into the pantry. Mary and Betty followed. “Be careful,” he said, “ladder going down into the cellar is old.”
Mary watched Sheriff Whitfield stop at a dark hole in the ground, drop down onto his knees, and then begin climbing down into the earth. “Honey, you don’t have to go down into the cellar,” she told Betty.
Betty looked down at the wooden rolling pin in her hand. “Maybe I should…stand guard?” she asked.
“Maybe you should,” Mary agreed and gave Betty an understanding smile. “You’ve never liked caves.”
Betty sighed. “Please don’t hate me, Mary.”
“I could never hate you,” Mary promised, hugging Betty. “You go keep an eye on Sam. If Uncle Albert shows up,” Mary nodded her head down at the wooden rolling pin, “knock him into next week.”
“I could never—”
“You better, honey,” Mary warned, and without saying another word, she hurried down the weak wooden ladder. “Sheriff?” she called out.
“Right here,” Sheriff Whitfield said. “Let me help you down.”
Mary nodded her head and let Sheriff Whitfield help her feet touch raw earth. An old lantern was lit, hanging on a hook attached to the far right wall, casting an eerie glow down onto the cellar floor. Dr. Cappes was lying on the floor with a brown sheet covering his body. “Betty…is staying in the kitchen,” Mary told the sheriff, feeling a cold chill walk down her back.
“I figured as much,” Sheriff Whitfield replied and nodded his head toward a wooden door standing on the north wall. The door was open. “Ready?”
Mary looked at the open door and spotted light coming from inside the dirt tunnel. “I guess so.”
Sheriff Whitfield checked his gun and then, without wasting a second, walked through the open door and entered a long, narrow tunnel. Old lanterns, spaced out at even intervals, gave light to the tunnel. “I have a feeling where this tunnel is going to end up.”
“Me, too,” Mary whispered, closely following Sheriff Whitfield and carefully sniffing the air. “I smell the cologne I detected upstairs.”
“Yep,” Sheriff Whitfield said, “and look down at the floor.”
“I know,” Mary said in a miserable voice. “Footprints with flour in them.”
“The second set of prints belong to a woman,” Sheriff Whitfield explained as he maneuvered the tunnel.
“Nurse Ellie.”
“Yep,” Sheriff Whitfield said, “and it doesn’t look like she’s taking a moonlit stroll through this tunnel, either. From what I’m seeing it appears that she was putting up a fight and…” Sheriff Whitfield suddenly came to a stop.
“What is it?” Mary asked, alarmed. The last thing in the world she wanted to do was stand around in a creepy tunnel. The tunnel was narrow and very intimidating.
“Look,” Sheriff Whitfield said and pointed down at the dirt floor. “Nurse Ellie’s prints stop. Looks like Albert Malone began dragging her body from this point forward.”
Mary studied the dirt floor. “Oh my, you’re right,” she said in a worried voice. “Do you think Uncle Albert…killed her?”
“Most likely the guy had to knock the poor woman unconscious,” Sheriff Whitfield explained. “I don’t see any blood.”
Mary drew in a deep breath. “We better hurry.”
“Yep,” Sheriff Whitfield agreed and got his legs moving. He didn’t speak again until the tunnel ended at a set of steps that led up to a small platform in front of a closed wooden door. “Careful, now,” he whispered, motioning to Mary to follow him up the stairs.
“I will be,” Mary whispered back.
When they were both on the platform, Sheriff Whitfield quickly checked his gun and then cautiously eased the wooden door open. He stepped into a dark closet. “Easy now,” he whispered to Mary. Mary nodded her head and stepped into the closet. “Ready?”
“Ready.”
Sheriff Whitfield slowly opened the closet door and peered into Dr. Cappes’s office. “Just like we thought,” he told Mary and stepped out of the closet. Mary followed. “Empty.”
Mary studied the empty office. “Uncle Albert sure knows his way around,” she told Sheriff Whitfield. “And if I’m not mistaken,” she added, “there should be another hidden door in this office somewhere that leads straight up to Uncle Albert’s room.”
Sheriff Whitfield walked his eyes around the office. He didn’t spot any area of the office that appeared to be concealing a hidden door. “Where?” he asked.
Mary searched the office but came up empty. “There has to be another hidden door…somewhere,” she insisted.
Sheriff Whitfield rubbed his thick beard. “Mary, I don’t see any place in this room that can be hiding a door.”
Mary felt confusion grab her mind. “Uncle Albert has to know we’re searching for him by now,” she told Sheriff Whitfield. “He’s going to stay hidden.” Mary looked down at the floor. “Uncle Albert has been in this office…you can see where he dragged Nurse Ellie through here.”
“Then let’s follow his tracks,” Sheriff Whitfield told Mary and walked out into the hallway. “There,” he pointed down at the hallway floor, “tracks are leading into the head nurse’s office. Come on.”
Mary hurried after Sheriff Whitfield and made her way into the head nurse’s office. “Look,” she said and pointed toward the tall filing cabinet sitting up against the wall, “the tracks end there.”
Sheriff Whitfield handed Mary his gun, grabbed the filing cabinet, and yanked it away from the wall. “Well, will you look at that,” he said.
Mary stepped up beside Sheriff Whitfield and spotted a metal door holding a square hole covered with rusted bars. “Goodness,” she said.
“I guess Dr. Cappes kept some of the old prison intact,” Sheriff Whitfield told Mary. He walked up to the metal door and tried the handle. “Locked,” he said and quickly peered through the square hole. “Dark…can’t see a thing.”
Mary bit down on her lower lip. “I think I know where that door leads,” she told Sheriff Whitfield in a quick voice.
“Albert Malone’s room?”
Mary began to nod her head and then stopped. “Or maybe not?” she said and began thinking about Sarah Maybrook. “Mrs. Maybrook said she heard Uncle Albert’s door open first, before Nurse Greta was killed, and afterward she heard Mrs. Dalton’s door open…I wonder.” Mary looked up at the ceiling. “Mrs. Dalton was attacked…” Mary closed her eyes. “Uncle Albert tried to kill her because…because Mrs. Dalton knew about the hidden door.”
Sheriff Whitfield took his gun back from Mary. “You’re a smart lady,” he told Mary. “Let’s go see if you’re right.”
Mary looked at Sheriff Whitfield. “Are you going to…kill Uncle Albert, sheriff?” she asked in a worried voice. “I know Uncle Albert has killed two people…but he’s not mentally…healthy.” Mary sighed. “Oh, who am I kidding? Uncle Albert is insane.”
“Not insane,” Sheriff Wh
itfield corrected Mary. “Albert Malone is lost in a war of his own, that’s all…a war he doesn’t want to lose.”
“Are you going to—”
“I have no intention of killing a lost soul,” Sheriff Whitfield assured Mary and hurried her out of the office.
As he did, Albert Malone’s face appeared in the square hole on the metal door.
9
Albert eased out of the metal door with a large grin on his face. “We’re in the clear, my love,” he told Ellie.
Ellie stood very still in a dark, spooky hallway. “Albert, I’m not Erin.”
Albert turned and looked at Ellie. In his tormented eyes he was not seeing a scared old woman. Instead, he was seeing a young, beautiful woman who had died many years before he was ready to let her go.
“Don’t worry,” he told Ellie, “I’m going to defeat the enemy. Yes, indeed, my sweet Erin, I’m going to win this war and never lose you ever, ever again.”
Ellie looked down at her hands. Albert had tied them together with a very strong piece of string. “Albert, please,” she pleaded in a weak voice, barely able to remain conscious, “I’m not Erin.”
Albert reached through the metal door and gently pulled Ellie into the cold office. “I stabbed one enemy soldier in the back and put a poison needle into the shoulder of another enemy soldier. I have to kill the rest, and then we’ll leave.”
“No,” Ellie begged, “no more killing, Albert, please.”
Albert didn’t hear Ellie’s plea. Instead, his insane mind was focused on Sheriff Whitfield and Mary. “They threatened to take you away from me…I can’t have that…no, not ever,” he said and quickly yanked a pack of playing cards from the pocket of his tuxedo and began shuffling them. The fear of losing Ellie had finally caused his mind to snap. The Albert Malone who had been maliciously creating a brilliant scheme to rid himself of all his enemies was now being controlled by a man who was trapped in fear and desperation. “I’ll have to eliminate them. My sweet Erin…they have to die.”
Ellie struggled against the string holding her hands together. “Albert—”
Finding a Killer Page 13