by Erik Carter
The next time he’s in here? Unless Jimmy’s family planned on holding his wake on a cathouse stage, he wasn’t coming back. Evidently Fannie hadn’t gotten the news. I didn’t have the heart to tell her. She’d hear on her own soon enough.
I said, “I’m not so sure I should believe you about Jimmy not telling you anything. Since you lied before.” I gave her a hard look. Truthfully, though, I did believe her. Fannie wouldn’t hold out on me when a man’s life was at stake. “And you never answered my question, by the way.”
“What question?”
“Why’d you lie to me?”
She ran a finger down my shirt. “Gotta keep you on your toes.” She stood up and called out to a couple of the nearby girls. “Anne, Carrie. Accompany Mr. Wilcox to room six.”
Two girls scampered over. Begrudgingly, I stood up. Fannie walked away.
“Fannie.”
She stopped and turned to face me.
“Last chance,” I said.
“Another time.”
I watched as she left, that butt of hers all wrapped up in that pretty blue dress. I thought of the lace I’d just touched, that leg. Mmm, good gracious. Silly vixen. That woman was always messing with me.
Damn. I really thought I had a chance this time.
I looked at the two young ladies standing before me. They smiled at me. Very attractive, the both of them. By conventional standards you’d call them knockouts.
I glanced past them. Fannie was out of sight now.
I sighed and looked back at the girls. “All right,” I said. “Let’s go.”
We entered room six. It was only a matter of minutes before Anne, Carrie, and I were in the bathtub. There were white suds to our shoulders. The hot water felt fantastic. I hadn’t had a bath in days, let alone one with fresh water. The gals were busy working their magic. Fannie had taught them well. But I was a million miles away. I looked to the side, deep in thought.
It was time for rumination.
So … Macintosh had paid the Blue Eagles to intercept the kettle on the way to the kidnappers. But how did he know about the kidnapping? I suppose you could assume that someone like Macintosh—someone with “dirty shoulders,” to use his own terrible pun—would hear of such things through the grapevine. But then why hadn’t I heard about it? My esteemed associates were, I was sure, just as grimy as his. It’s how I got ahead in this business. When I questioned Mory about the whole affair, he didn’t know about it either. Granted, I couldn’t say I should trust Mory. He—
My concentration was broken. Carrie was giggling. She had been kissing on my cheek, and my mustache tickled her lips.
“Please,” I said and turned my head the other direction.
Whether or not Mory, or any other lowlife, knew about the kidnapping was beside the point. Macintosh and the Blue Eagles knew too much. They knew too many specifics. They knew precisely where the kidnappers were and precisely when Lilly was bringing them the kettle. There was no way in Hell they could have gotten that information from the slow-minded rumor mill of the Desecho underworld. The only way they could have known was … if they were involved in the kidnapping themselves. And the common factor in all this?
Connor Macintosh.
Could it be that Macintosh hadn’t just paid to have the kettle intercepted? Maybe he’d organized the whole thing. But … but why? What would make Macintosh plan it out this way? Why not just have Cosgrove killed? Why the kidnapping? What did that gain him?
Anne dipped down through the suds and below the waterline.
Macintosh would have gotten the kettle in the inheritance anyway. Why pay the kidnappers? Who were the kidnappers?
Anne came up for air. I looked down. She winked and went swimming again.
As I pondered the potential identities of people Macintosh would hire as kidnappers—thinking, naturally, that they could be additional members of the Blue Eagle gang—a new, darker thought came to me. If Macintosh had coordinated this whole thing, there would be no need for real kidnappers. If this whole business were indeed the doing of Connor Macintosh then the kidnapping scenario was just a ruse. The ransom note that Lilly found at her front door would therefore have no legitimacy. It was just a way to get her out into the open with the kettle so that it could be intercepted. Macintosh wanted Cosgrove dead. Creating this kidnapping scenario, and using the Blue Eagle gang gave him two layers of separation from accountability.
It was all very clever and calculating. It reminded me of something Mory would do.
If all this was true, one thing was certain. Lionel Cosgrove was already dead.
Chapter Fourteen
It was five o’clock in the evening, and I was back at the Cosgrove mansion tying Bob up to his now familiar bench on the front lawn. He lowered his head to the ground on the right side of the bench and discovered the bare spot he’d chewed previously. He then moved to the left and began work on a fresh area of grass.
I was clean, and I looked sharp. My skin felt tingly and cool, the way it does after you’ve taken a good bath. I’d also washed my shirt in the bathwater after the girls and I had gotten out. It was nice to be spruced up before I had to go to Lilly and open the floodgates of bad news upon her.
Pattison had told me that Lilly would be returning in the evening. Five o’clock being the earliest of the evening hours, that’s when I chose to arrive. There were only seven hours until midnight. Lilly and I needed as much time as possible to identify and locate the kidnappers.
That is to say, we needed time if there were any kidnappers at all, if Macintosh hadn’t just made the whole thing up and killed Cosgrove already. But I had to keep the hope alive. For Lilly.
Now the time had come for me to talk to her. It was the conversation I’d been dreading all day. I had done a lot of things that took some guts but few that required as much backbone as I was going to need now—having to face a young gal and tell her that the only hope of saving her father’s life was to find the kidnappers she hadn’t been able to identify in the first place.
I gulped down a breath and knocked on the door. A few moments later, Pattison opened it. Earlier in the day, he’d been riddled with anxiety, worried silly that his young charge was out in the big world all by herself. Now his face was clear, his little sneer a bit more relaxed. I knew before asking that Lilly was back home again.
“Mr. Wilcox,” he said. “You return.” He gingerly took a watch from his pocket. “And quite early.”
“Time is of the essence, Pattison. I reckon you realize that. I need to see Lilly.”
“Yes, Lilly has returned,” he said, answering the question I hadn’t asked. “If you’ll follow me.”
He led me through the labyrinth of hallways to one of the many expansive rooms, this one being in the back of the home. I suppose you’d call it a living room—or maybe a family room? Great room? Hell, I don’t know.
Lilly was sitting in one of the armchairs by the fireplace, which was alight with a handsome fire. She was wearing pants and her cheeks were ruddy. Must have been riding earlier in the day. A tiny book sat in one hand, and she fanned her face with the other. If the fire was making her hot, I wondered why she didn’t just move a little farther away from it. She looked up when she saw me. Her eyes were wet with tears.
Oh no.
She was already emotional about everything, and I hadn’t yet told her that the kettle was likely gone forever. This wasn’t starting out well. Yet she smiled when she saw me. Evidently the tears were the result of whatever book she was reading. Yikes.
“Barnaby!” she said and stood up. “Come in.” She gestured to the matching chair beside the fire.
I walked over to her. Pattison stayed behind, standing erect with his hands placed delicately behind his back.
Lilly said, “Pattison, leave us, please.”
“But, Miss Cosgrove,” Pattison said, concerned. “Are you certain that would be a wise idea?” He flicked his eyes toward me.
“I’m the one who hired him,” L
illy snapped.
“Don’t worry, Pattison,” I said. “I don’t bite.”
Pattison scowled and turned to leave. As he closed the door, he looked back at me. I chomped my teeth at him.
I sat down in the chair. The term plush doesn’t begin to describe it. The chair ate me alive. I suddenly became very self-conscious as I could feel my long legs come up to my chest. Half an hour in this position would be enough to cause permanent back problems.
Lilly beamed at me. “So what did you find out?”
Oh boy. Here it was. This was going to be painful. I took a deep breath. “Well, we now know for sure that Macintosh has the kettle. He admitted to it.”
“That’s great!” she squealed. Her expression changed to a scowl. “Why don’t you seem excited?”
“As you can imagine,” I said, “he wasn’t too keen on giving the kettle back.”
Lilly nodded. “What does he want with it?”
“Well, it’s … it’s not just about the kettle. He wants your dad … dead. He wants the kidnappers to kill him so he gets your dad’s collection.”
“What are you talking about?” she said.
“Your dad willed all his artifacts to Macintosh.”
Lilly grappled with this for a moment, her pretty face contorting in rapid succession from looks of confusion, to anger, to panic. “You’ve got to go back and find it,” she said finally.
“I looked, Lilly. I checked out the museum. I broke into his house and checked there.”
“But it could be in storage at the museum or in a closet—”
“Or it could be buried in his yard, or it could be in a safety deposit box. It could be anywhere. What we need to do is focus on I.D.-ing the kidnappers before it’s too late. Do you remember anything at all about what they look—”
“No,” she said. “Tonight’s the night. They’re going to kill him at midnight. I’m going to Tucson!”
“Lilly …” I reached out and put my hand on her arm.
“No! I’ll find the kettle myself.”
She sprinted from the room.
“Lilly, wait!” I tried to bolt up and stop her, but I tripped over my own tangled legs. I sank deeper into the soft cushion. I flung myself from the chair and bounded out the door in the back of the room.
The door led to the gardens I’d visited the other day with Lilly. I leaned up on my toes, looked out over all the hedges and flowers and sculpted bushes. No Lilly. I did see a stable, though, way at the back of the property. I bolted for it.
I couldn’t let her do this. Yes, she was a full-grown gal, but she wasn’t prepared for this. Even if she survived the trip to Tucson, how would she compose herself at the museum or Macintosh’s mansion or wherever else she thought she might find the kettle? One way or another, she was going to land herself in some trouble.
As I was running for the stable, I saw its front door open. There was some movement, and then Lilly emerged with a horse—Mr. Francois, no doubt.
“Lilly, wait!” I yelled. I was about a hundred feet from her.
She hastily climbed into the saddle.
“Wait.”
She smacked the horse’s side and rocketed away just as I got up to her. Her dress billowed behind her. It smacked me in the face as she went by, knocking the hat from my head.
I watched as she disappeared down the trail that led from the stable and around the west side of the mansion to meet up with the drive in the front. When she was out of sight I could hear the rapid hoof beats of her horse laying siege to the pretty gravel drive.
I picked up my hat.
Lilly Cosgrove was gone now, forging a new path well outside the grounds of the Cosgrove mansion.
Chapter Fifteen
It was very dark, but I could clearly make out the figure in front of me. She shrieked as I came up behind her and clamped my hand around her mouth.
“Shh …”
I put a finger up to my mouth. Lilly’s eyes were wide as saucers, but when she recognized me, she jumped on me and kissed my cheek.
We stood in the darkness outside the Macintosh mansion. I’d caught her just in time before she did something really stupid. Yes, I made the trip back to Tucson again. Yes, just for her. Yes, I’m a schmuck.
“You didn’t think I’d let you go at this alone, did you?” I whispered.
She smiled.
“Come on.” I led her over to the side of the house, where I once again retrieved my lasso and threw it up to the roof. We climbed to the second floor. Lilly was wobbly. Her arms shook badly, and her fancy shoes slid about on the siding.
“Careful,” I said.
When we reached the second floor, I took out the lock-killer and opened a window. I entered and then helped Lilly through.
There was growling.
My old friend the dog was there to greet us. His teeth were bared. Strings of saliva fell from his fangs.
Lilly started to scream, and I cupped my hand over her mouth again.
“Not to worry,” I said.
I reached into my knapsack and retrieved a string of sausages. I slid them to the dog. He attacked them voraciously. I then got the dark lantern from my sack, lit it, and motioned for Lilly to follow. The dog continued eating, and we tiptoed away.
“It’s going to come after us when it’s through with those,” Lilly said.
“Keep your voice down,” I hissed. “It’s all right. I added my own special ingredient.”
“What’s that?”
“Rum.”
We crept away.
Flickering light from below came up the spiral staircase. And snoring. It was pretty early still. Macintosh must’ve fallen asleep in a chair or something.
“Stay quiet,” I said. I adjusted the lantern. We began our search.
We tiptoed down this hallway and that hallway. Looked in every closet, behind every door. When we had covered the upstairs, we carefully slipped down the staircase to the second floor.
We found the light source—the office. Macintosh was at his desk snoring, his head tilted back, drool dripping down his jowls. A lantern sat beside him.
Just like we had on the upper floor, we searched every square inch of the downstairs. Every possible place the kettle could have been. I mean to say, Lilly and I scoured that place like perverts raiding an underwear drawer. No luck.
I was beginning to get frustrated. Maybe I didn’t want to see Cosgrove live as much as Lilly did, but I sure wanted to get this ordeal over with.
“Okay, enough of this,” I said. “We’re going to the office.”
Lilly’s eyes got huge. “We can’t go in the office. He’s asleep in there.”
“Never you worry,” I said and patted my gun.
“No, don’t hurt him,”
“I’m not going to hurt him, for cryin’ out loud,” I said. “But it’s there if we need it.”
“Barnaby …”
“Come on.”
We headed down the hallway toward the open door of the office. Macintosh was mounded in his leather desk chair, the orange, twinkling light of his lantern playing off his shiny, white skin.
We were almost to the doorway.
Macintosh convulsed violently with his snoring, large tracts of flab quivering.
And his eyes opened.
I grabbed Lilly and yanked her to the side. We hid behind a four-foot vase outside the doorway. I put out the dark lantern. We peered into the office from behind the vase.
Macintosh stood up, stretched, and wiped drool from his face. He was wearing a flannel robe with silk edging. He walked over to the doorway. The floorboards moaned.
He was two feet away from us. We pulled in close, trying to remain as hidden as possible. Lilly’s breathing was loud. He’d certainly hear it.
His foot was right in front of me. It was hairy. I could smell it. Stinky.
He stood in the doorway listening for the source of the sound that woke him.
I held my breath. Lilly closed her eyes.
He strummed his fingers on the doorframe, grumbled, and went back into the office.
We exhaled.
He went back to his desk and picked up some papers. He flipped through them then turned to the bookshelf that was recessed into the wall behind the desk. He grabbed one of the shelves and pulled.
The whole wall began to move. It swiveled on a pivot point in the center. A hidden door. There was a small room behind the desk.
Lilly and I looked at each other.
He walked into the room and lit a large lantern that hung from the ceiling … revealing shelves housing a hidden stash of very elaborate and expensive looking artifacts.
And there it was.
I’m not sure what I was expecting exactly, but to say I was underwhelmed would be a gross understatement. It was a kettle. Very small, maybe six inches across. Just a simple black kettle. Yet even though it was among a variety of very elaborate artifacts, it didn’t seem at all out of place. It fit right in somehow. It drew your eye.
Lilly pointed excitedly. I motioned for her to keep quiet.
Macintosh approached the kettle. He wore a smile, and the smile grew larger as he drew closer to it. He ogled it greedily then ran a finger along its side. Then he put out the lantern and stepped back into the office, closing the trick door behind him.
There was a noise from the other end of the hallway. Macintosh turned to look. So did Lilly and I.
Another man bolted down the hallway toward the office and stopped at the doorway right beside Lilly and me. We squeezed in tight again to hide.
The man was wearing dark clothes. And a bandanna over his face. It was the mystery man.
Suddenly, the mystery man became a little less mysterious to me. I understood. What the mystery man had wanted this entire time was the kettle, like everyone else. He’d been following me since I first took the case, and now the bastard was here at the very brink, just when things were getting interesting. The kettle was within his reach.