* * * * *
Returning to Elm Terrace, Frank drove the rental up the driveway and parked at the rear of the house. He left the vehicle and started to head for the front door, but stopped. He looked back at the garage for a moment then stepped over to the side door of the building and opened it.
Once inside, he sat in the driver’s seat of the Reo and immediately felt like he was in a time machine rolling through the Maryland countryside. He recalled images of his days in that car running errands with his grandfather and going on trips with the family. A small stain on the seat where a chocolate ice cream cone had dripped in the summer heat flashed pictures of the soda counter at the Arbutus Drug Store where old Doc Levering patrolled the aisles and never let anyone read the magazines before paying. Whiffs of aging leather, cigars, and gasoline still resided in the car’s upholstery and took Frank’s senses on yet another ride.
The scene around him brought back memories of days in that huge garage where he and his grandfather worked on cars, bicycles, skateboards, and model airplanes. Frank also remembered times when he wasn’t allowed to be in the garage; times when William had his friends over and met privately with them there. The door was always locked, and little Frank was asked to play outside while his grandfather carried out “grown-up business.” It puzzled Frank why those meetings were held in the garage and not in the house. A puzzle still unsolved, like a cold case file.
One day, when he was forbidden to enter the workshop, he had stood on a milk crate and peeked inside through a window at the top of one of the garage doors. William had entered the garage earlier with two other men in business suits. Frank saw them at first, but minutes later he couldn’t see anyone. There was a moment when they were partially blocked from view by one of the cars. A moment later they disappeared. He stayed on the crate and peered inside for several minutes, but he never caught even a glimpse of anyone again. How could they keep from view for so long? Were they in the loft? What were they doing up there?
For Frank, the schoolboy, it was the one thing about his grandfather he never figured out. But Frank, the grown detective, was determined to now.
* * * * *
A nightlight in the wall outlet put out a dim glow that cast the bedroom in long, exaggerated shadows. Frank scanned the room and studied the mahogany highboy in the corner, the matching dresser and mirror, and a small easy chair covered in a crewel fabric with a cream background. Furnishings he recalled from his stays in that same room as a kid.
He climbed into the bed with its tall, carved mahogany posts and pushed the comforter to the side and lay atop the white sheets. Weary from the day’s events, he closed his eyes and fell into a twilight doze. A niggling hunch about something in the house pervaded his uneasy rest. Vague dreamlike images played out in the thoughts that haunted him. A blaring siren grew in intensity outside, interrupting Frank’s reverie. A heavy vehicle thundered down Elm Terrace, vibrating the house.
A loud noise from downstairs sprang him upright in the bed. He shot his eyes out the doorway into the dark hall. Frank swung his feet to the floor, grabbed his Browning Hi-Power automatic from the holster draped over the headboard and switched on the brass lamp on the night table. The eerie moonshine outside the multi-paned window and the unsettling creaking of the house made Frank snick off the safety of the 9mm. He grabbed his watch next to the lamp. It was 3:17 A. M. The believed a man had been killed here, and that the killers may have returned, made the hairs on the back of his neck bristle. He rose, pulled on his trousers, and gripped the gun in his right hand.
Frank crept from the bedroom and made his way to the staircase down the hallway. Every step downward creaked as if the house was sending out an audible acknowledgement of his presence. A double-globe, hurricane lamp connected to a timer sat on a Queen Anne console table next to the stairs. It lit the foyer and the surrounding area on the main floor’s hall.
As he neared the bottom of the stairs, a short, second noise came from the parlor. Something fell, hit the floor. Frank aimed the Browning at the parlor doorway and stepped off the last riser and onto the first floor hall. He tiptoed toward the foyer, sidled up to the parlor doorway wall, and peeked into the moonlit room containing all the books.
He flicked on the wall switch and the lamp next to the sofa went on. His eyes panned the room and soon he found the source of the noise. A high bookcase shelf had partially collapsed and had spewed books onto the floor eight feet below. A few more books cascaded down as he watched. Among the fallen books, an object caught Frank’s eye. It was a small, metal shelf support. Frank began laying out a possible solution. If the support and the high shelf had been removed during the CSI investigation, and improperly replaced, the shelf could have precariously tilted and dumped the books. The passing truck could have set things into motion. Frank found no other reason to blame it on, but kept his gun at the ready.
He panned the high bookcases that covered three of the room’s walls, and took a long look at the oriel window on the remaining wall. His eyes were drawn back to the books and passed along each stack as he thought about what had been nagging at him: Had William left him one last gem behind one of those old books?
It certainly was possible since William was known for his inventive nature and his love of a good brainteaser. Even as he faced death, he would have likely been wringing his hands in delight over thoughts of his grandson finding a piece of his final conundrum and searching for its ultimate meaning. Theirs was a symbiotic relationship. Frank was addicted to figuring out the solutions to the puzzles William posed, and William loved doling them out. Frank wondered if there were one or two more waiting for him.
There were twenty, floor-to-ceiling library stacks built into the walls of the parlor. thousands of volumes teased him by their overt silence, but sent him invitations by a unique telepathy: Over here. Try me. What you’re looking for is behind me. No, not there behind that old Melville, here behind Fielding’s first edition of Tom Jones.
This new challenge was playing games with him, taunting him, like those William engaged him in so many summers ago. It was time to think clearly now and get down to business. If there is a final puzzle piece hidden within the bookcases, where should I start searching? He decided to begin with the stack on the far left.
An hour later Frank was pulling out books from the third stack. On the bottom shelf of the bookcase was a volume on genetics by Gregor Mendel. Frank pulled it out. Nothing was behind it. Nor the second, third or fourth book in that row. The fifth book was Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species. Behind it was a barely-visible, folded piece of white paper. Frank’s heart raced as he withdrew it from the back of the shelf and hurriedly opened it. The note read:
Are you dusting as you go?
Chapter 11
Frank answered the pounding on the front door to find a long-faced Alasdair dressed in jeans, dock shoes and a Baltimore Ravens football jersey. His tousled, sandy hair made a sea anemone look neat.
“For the love of God, man,” he said, storming into the vestibule. “I agreed to be your partner, but that doesn’t include hours a vampire wouldn’t keep.”
“It’s only a little after four. I’m working in the library stacks,” Frank said and disappeared into the parlor.
Alasdair followed and stood in the parlor doorway.
“I don’t smell coffee?” Alasdair said. “I slept through three beltway exits on the way over.”
“We’ll make some in a minute,” Frank said and climbed high up on one of the two library ladders in the room. “I’ve worked through one whole wall here and only found one note from my grandfather.”
“What’d it say?”
“Asked me if I was dusting as I went. Ol’ William was a hoot, eh?”
“Let’s have a look at the note,” Alasdair said entering the room with his hand extended.
“It’s there on the lamp table,” Frank said and pointed.
Alasdair examined the note.
“Looks like regular 4-by
-6 note paper,” Alasdair said squinting. “Kind of old, yellowish. Think it’s from your vacation days here?”
“I don’t ever remember seeing notes from him like that. He always used classic stationery, letter-size. This is more recent, like the note pad on the leaving table.”
“Surely you didn’t drag me away from my wife’s gorgeous behind to chat about note paper?”
“I need you to help me pull books out and see if there’s anything important behind them.
“Didn’t the CSI team check all these books?”
“Not all of them. They pulled sample batches for prints. Plus, they put everything back the way they found it.”
Alasdair stared at the pile of fallen books on the floor.
“Apparently not everything,” Alasdair said.
“Yeah, they almost put things back properly.”
Alasdair studied the enormous number of volumes in the bookcases.
“There must be a few thousand of them. We’ll be here ‘til next week.”
“Need me to call the little woman?”
“Let’s have at it,” Alasdair said as he rolled one of the library ladders to a section of the bookcases across from Frank. “Start here?”
Frank nodded and headed for the hall.
“I knew when you called, this was going to cost me,” Alasdair said.
Frank stopped.
“I haven’t asked you for a red cent,” Frank said.
“It’s costing me my sleep and my domestic tranquility.”
“Sleep’s overrated. I’ll fire up the coffee pot ... if I can find some coffee.” Frank said and left the parlor.
“If you can’t, you get your Mick hide down to the 7-Eleven and don’t skimp on the donuts.”
* * * * *
The sun had barely peeked above the trees in the front yard when Frank and Alasdair pulled out the last book. They sat facing each other, slumped down in two of the wing chairs in the center of the parlor. Four 7-Eleven coffee cups and an empty donut box cluttered the cocktail table in front of them.
“You know,” Frank said, “I hate what they say about cops on TV and in the movies.”
“Yeah, what’s that?”
“The donut thing.”
“Well, we’ll have to start snacking on bear claws. Come back to donuts when it’s safe.”
Frank picked up the four notes on the lamp table next to his chair and sorted them.
“Let’s review. This one says: Don’t give up. It’s here someplace. The next one we found says: Are you sure you’re dusting these books? And this one says: Your reward is under a Detroit wonder. You already know what the first one said.”
“We now have to go to Detroit? What’s a wonder there besides the Silverdome.”
“That’s in Pontiac.”
“Pontiac. Maybe it’s a car. Hell if I know.”
Frank’s tired eyes widened and he sat up in the chair like somebody plugged him in to a 220 outlet.
“You hit it. It’s under a Detroit wonder,” Frank said and leapt to his feet. “The 1936 Reo Flying Cloud was touted to be the wonder car of the era.”
“Isn't that what’s in the garage?” Alasdair asked.
But Frank was already gone.
* * * * *
Frank was standing at the rear of the Reo when Alasdair entered the garage. He gestured for Alasdair to join him and turned his attention to the floor near the car’s rear bumper.
“How can we get a look under the car?” Alasdair asked.
“Like this,” Frank said as he reached down and pulled open a metal door in the floor and let it rest on the gray concrete, revealing a set of steps leading under the Reo. “It’s a mechanic’s trench. A pit that lets you work on the underside of the car without needing a lift.”
Frank descended the eight narrow steps on the right side of the concrete trench and looked around the 12-by-4-foot rectangular space. There was barely enough headroom for a six-foot person to stand, but the shallow overhead space made the undercarriage of the car fully accessible. A metal utility cart with large rubber wheels was parked against one of the vertical walls. A wired light in a small protective cage hung from its hook on the cart’s push handle. Frank picked up the light, switched it on and hung it from the Reo’s chassis.
“Is there room for two down there?” Alasdair asked.
“Yeah, but watch your head.”
Alasdair descended the steps and kept his big frame hunkered over.
“Nothing much exciting under here,” Frank said scanning the car’s underside.
“Maybe it’s not on the car.” Alasdair said looking around at the walls of the trench.
“Four concrete walls painted gray, a parts cart and a 100-watt light bulb,” Frank said. “Where’s the reward?”
“Beats me. I can’t even stand up straight. Like a grave in here.”
“There must be something under this car. My grandfather wouldn’t disappoint me.”
Frank grabbed the light and inspected the walls of the trench. He went down on his hands and knees and crawled around inspecting the floor for any sign of a significant opening or secret compartment. A 2-foot-wide recess next to the narrow steps caught his eye. He crawled over to it for a closer look.
Frank knocked on the small wall with his knuckles. “It’s not masonry. It’s steel, painted gray to look like the concrete.”
Frank felt around the wall to find a possible handle or latch, but came up with nothing. Alasdair joined him by kneeling on the steps and tried his hand at getting the steel wall to budge, but to no avail. Frank sat back against the adjacent wall and again looked around the small enclosure, slowly checking out each wall and corner. His eyes finally came to rest on the tool cart.
“Move that cart,” Frank said.
Alasdair rolled the cart down to the end of the longer wall. The part of the wall concealed by the cart contained a duplex electric outlet with nothing plugged into it.
“Notice anything out of place?” Frank asked.
“You mean like the light being plugged into an outlet way across the upper garage while this more convenient outlet is down here unused?”
“Bazinga,” Frank said and moved over to the duplex. He stared at it for a moment then pushed on it. It moved into the wall for about half an inch and then sprang back to its original flush position.
A low rasping sound came from the area beside the steps. Both men looked toward the narrow steel panel as Frank held up the light.
The gray wall there creaked open about five inches.
Chapter 12
Frank tugged on the steel door and swung it fully open. Beyond the wall’s 2-by-5-foot opening, a ramped tunnel was revealed leading downward into blackness. Frank washed the narrow walls with the light, scrunched down, and held the bulb up to cut into the black space ten feet away. Musty smells wafted out from the darkness and filled the confining tunnel with smells of aging wood and mildewed masonry.
“I’m betting your reward’s in there,” Alasdair said.
Frank led the way down the sloping tunnel with the light and emerged in a large room. Alasdair scuffed along behind. Frank’s free hand groped around the walls for a possible light switch and found one on the inside wall a foot past the tunnel. He flicked it and the tiny room and all its contents became visible from a bare bulb hanging from the low ceiling.
“It looks like a safe room,” Alasdair said.
“It’s what people built in the ‘50s. A fallout shelter. William told me all about them and the paranoia of post war America.”
“Thought the Russians were going to start the unthinkable?”
“Yeah, and thought these little caves would allow them to survive a nuclear war.”
Two folded-up cots leaned against the back corners of the 12-by-18-foot room, and several five-gallon glass jugs filled with water lined the wall nearby. Four wooden folding chairs were arranged evenly around a rectangular utility table. An oak kneehole desk and swivel chair were against one long wall.
The upper wall behind the desk displayed a 1945 calendar with a photo of the Statue of Liberty over an ad that encouraged buying liberty bonds. A multi-band radio sat on the desk next to a lantern flashlight and a wind-up alarm clock. A Baltimore Sun newspaper lay on the middle of the desk dated August 14, 1945. Its huge headline read:
JAPAN SURRENDERS
“Wonder how they pulled fresh air in here,” Alasdair said. “Could use a little now.”
“My grandfather mentioned that most fallout shelters used an underground pipe that extended a distance away and came up in a remote place so no one could monkey with the air supply.”
“Monkey with the air?” Alasdair said and leaned his weight on the utility table, testing its strength.
“People who didn’t have shelters might sabotage them. They were not going to let selfish shelter owners to lock them out and live while they died outside in the radiation.”
“Nice Christian philosophy all-round,” Alasdair said as Frank pulled open a large file drawer in the desk.
“William never admitted he had one. Told me doomsday projects like this were useless and ridiculous.”
Frank fingered through several manila file folders and stopped at one labeled The Omega Formula. The file was wrinkled with age and smelled like a wet dog. He took the folder out of the drawer and spread it open on the desktop. One document inside drew his attention enough for him to pick it up and strain to read it in the poor light. It was a printed sheet containing what appeared to be a poem stapled to a photo of his grandfather and another man.
Alasdair moved over to Frank and looked in the open file drawer where Frank had removed the folder. Frank stuffed the photo back into the folder and watched as Alasdair reached into the drawer and removed a metal, 16mm film reel can covered with an amber-brown, waxy substance.
“In the ‘40s not many people had TV,” Frank said, “but they had movies.”
The Omega Formula: Power to Die For (Detective Frank Dugan) Page 5