Worried about the elderly woman, Summer lunged forward to help steady her and asked, “Are you all right?”
“Damn door,” Ms. Midnight said with spite, and then addressed Summer with, “of course I’m all right.” She brushed Summer’s helping hand away. “It’s about time you got here. What don’t you understand about ‘urgent’?” Ms. Midnight turned and mumbled something under her breath as she waddled to another room. Summer wondered if she should follow or wait there until called upon. She decided to follow. The entry was decorated and furnished elegantly in what had probably been the height of fashion when the mansion was built. Though it could use a good cleaning, it was like walking through a door into the past.
Summer followed the mutterings of Ms. Midnight into a beautiful room she could only assume was a sitting room or salon. The room was dusty and worn with age, but beautiful art adorned its velvet and foil wallpapered walls. A huge stained glass floor lamp that looked to be an original Tiffany shed light on a well-used velvet cushion of a Victorian fainting chaise. By the tall stacks of books within an arm’s distance from the chaise, and the gorgeous thick afghan that looked like it had just been flung back, Summer guessed this was where Ms. Midnight spent most of her time.
Ms. Midnight was clearing a stack of books from a chair near the chaise, making a place for Summer to sit, and Summer rushed to help her. Out of breath, Ms. Midnight fell with a thump into her spot on the chaise.
“Are you okay, Ms. Midnight? Can I get you water or something?” Summer asked.
The scowl on Ms. Midnight’s face answered her question in volumes. Once she caught her breath and covered her legs with the afghan, she focused on Summer—who wasn’t sure if she should start the conversation or if she should just keep her mouth shut.
“Per our agreement,” Ms. Midnight started with a raised eyebrow, “I’ve asked you here to have you find something of mine that is of great value. You need to find this item immediately. No other task is more important. I don’t want you dilly dallying with this like you have been with the garden.”
“Ms. Midnight, I do have a job, I can’t just—”
“NOTHING is more important than finding this item. Your silly job is trivial. You need to drop everything and get to finding my item,” Ms. Midnight said forcefully.
“Okay, well, I suppose I have some vacation coming. I’ll see if I can work something out with Dr. Stuart, if it’s so urgent,” Summer offered.
“I don’t care how you do it—just do it and immediately,” Ms. Midnight demanded.
“I’ll do my best. What is the item you’ve misplaced?” Summer asked. To Summer’s surprise, the comment seemed to anger Ms. Midnight. Her face reddened, her eyes bulged and her lips tightened into such a thin line Summer could barely see them any longer. A wash of fear came over her. What had she said that angered the woman so?
“I do NOT misplace things,” Ms. Midnight exclaimed, then continued to mutter under her breath words Summer couldn’t make out.
“I’m sorry if I’ve made you upset, Ms. Midnight. It certainly was not my intention. Please tell me what you would like me to find.”
After a moment more of incoherent grumbling, Ms. Midnight said as she got up and headed to the stairs, “You are to find the RAT immediately and Ms. Ash has gone missing too, but the RAT…you must find the RAT or the BROOM will have my head.”
“The rat, Ms. Midnight?” Summer called up the stairs after her.
Ms. Midnight turned on the landing and looked down at Summer, clearly irritated by her question. “Yes, girl. The RAT!” she shouted and then clapped her hands together twice and said a shrill, “Now chop, chop…get to it!”
Before Summer could respond or ask another question, Ms. Midnight was out of sight, stomping up stairs and slamming a door shut.
Summer stood astonished and befuddled. A rat? She wants me to find her rat? Not sure what else to do, she shrugged her shoulders and headed back to work.
*****
Summer thought about the strange conversation she’d had with Ms. Midnight all the way to the office. She couldn’t make heads or tails out of anything the woman said. How was she ever going to appease the woman with her vague instructions?
Summer must have had a very confused look on her face when she walked past the front desk because Tori was on her in an instant.
“What’s up? What did the old bat want?”
“Well, the whole thing was rather strange. Apparently she’s lost her pet rat; at least I think that’s what she lost.”
“You think so? What do you mean?”
“She said she wanted me to find a rat and someone named Ms. Ash, but she was very distraught about the rat. She wants me to take vacation and look for the rat full time until I find it. Then she said something very weird.”
“Stranger than finding a rat in a ramshackle old mansion?”
“Yes. She said if I didn’t find the rat, the broom would have her head. What do you make of that?”
“What do I think of that? I think she’s lost her marbles.”
“I know, right? It’s bizarre. How am I going to find a rat?”
“A trap?”
“Possibly, but somehow I’m thinking there are more rats in that place than just one. How will I know which one is hers?”
“Don’t know,” Tori said with a shrug.
“Me neither,” Summer said when the delivery bell buzzed.
“Can you get that, Summer? I need to check Snowball in for his appointment.” Tori pointed as a woman came in with a kitty carrier and its howling occupant.
“Sure,” Summer smiled and headed back to the stockroom, but when she opened the door she was shocked to see a demon behind it. He too seemed surprised to see her.
“Hi,” Hunter said.
“Hey. How are the stitches holding up?” she asked.
“Good,” he said, rubbing the stitches through his shirt.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I’m taking over for Tommy Sinclair. He fell off a ladder and broke his leg the other day,” Hunter explained. “I guess this is where you work?”
“Yes,” she said when a growling came from behind her. She turned to find Sully with his hackles up and showing teeth.
“I see you still have the hellhound,” Hunter noted with amusement.
“I wasn’t going to leave him out there all alone waiting for the reaper and whatever else awaits him down there,” she said.
“It’s where he belongs. You are a fool to think otherwise. How are you going to explain him to people?” Hunter said, moving his hand truck through the door and depositing boxes in the corner of the room.
“I’ll tell the truth, like I already have, and fool or not, I think he’s sweet,” she said, rubbing Sully’s head.
“Yeah! Real sweet,” he said with sarcasm.
“So far, you are the only one he doesn’t seem to like. I wonder why that is?” she said.
“Haven’t a clue,” he said, handing her the clipboard for her signature, but it was Tori that grabbed it from behind, surprising them both.
“Who’s this?” Tori said, smiling and eyeing Hunter.
“This is the dem…I mean, this is Hunter. The guy I told you about? The one from last night,” Summer said.
“OOHHH! Hmm.” Tori took in a long look at Hunter from head to toe and back to head again. She winked at Summer and smiled. Summer went four shades of red. Hunter smiled at this wordless exchange.
“Hunter, this is Tori.” Summer tried to shrug off the blushing.
“Nice to meet you, Tori,” Hunter said, shaking her hand.
“Nice to meet you too,” Tori said as she signed the paperwork on the clipboard and handed it back to him. “So tell me, Hunter. Are you stalking my friend here?” She waved a hand towards Summer.
“Tori!” Summer said, embarrassed again.
“Uh no! I’m just delivering some supplies you ordered,” Hunter explained, eyeing Summer as he did.
&nbs
p; “So you say…” Tori teased.
It was plain to see that he was confused by Tori’s sense of humor, not knowing if she was really concerned for Summer’s well-being or if she was just teasing him all along, but Tori refused to let him know anymore at this point and loved that she had confused him so.
Hunter grabbed his hand truck and clipboard and quickly made his way out the door. Tori waved as he got in the truck and shut the door, and then rolled her eyes and laughed.
“Tori, you are terrible,” Summer said, smiling.
“I know,” Tori said. “Isn’t it great?” Tori held her head high and proud, loving every minute of it.
*****
Thinking of her conversation with Ms. Midnight, Summer was distracted as she helped clean up after Dr. Stuart’s last patient, and this did not go unnoticed by the good doctor. Sully had found himself a corner where he could see the doctor, Summer, and just barely, Tori, then fell fast asleep as all puppies do.
“Is everything okay, Summer?” Dr. Stuart asked.
“Oh,” she said as if coming out of a deep thought. “Yes. I guess so. I just had the strangest conversation with Ms. Midnight at lunch, and I’m still trying to decipher what was said,” she said.
“And what did she say that has you so puzzled?” he asked pulling off his gloves and leaning against the counter, giving her his full attention.
“Everything…every word. I don’t understand anything she relayed, and just like that,” Summer snapped her fingers, “she was up the stairs and behind closed doors, so I couldn’t press the issue.”
“Well, if you pass it by me, maybe I can make heads or tails of it,” he said, smiling.
“I would be so grateful, but I’m concerned that she’s not…all together…you know…that her faculties are…”
“You think maybe not all her pistons are firing?” he said, making her sigh with relief. “Tell me what she said.”
“She said that her rat was missing, and that the broom would have her head. Does that make any sense to you?”
His brows furrowed and his thumb and forefinger stroked at his chin as they often did when he thinking. Then he shook his head and said, “Nope…I’ve got nothing. Ms. Midnight doesn’t seem the type to keep a rat as a pet, but then, I also wouldn’t put it past her.”
“Hmm,” she said. “Oh, and do you know any families in town by the name of Ash? She told me she thought Ms. Ash was missing too. Do you know a Ms. Ash?”
“No, I don’t. No Ashes that I can think of. My wife’s family were Ashtons and there are still one or two around, but no Ashes,” he told her. After thinking more he added, “Are you sure that’s what she said? Could you have been mistaken about the rat and the broom?”
“I suppose I could be mistaken, but I’m quite sure that’s what she said. She was very distraught about the rat though. She told me I should start looking immediately and that I should make it my number one priority above my work here or anything else. She said it was very important.”
Still puzzled, he repeated, “a rat?” as if trying to coerce himself into understanding some hidden meaning in the statement. Then he said, “At least you can look for a rat, but being so close to the woods and the house being so run down, I suppose there’s many rats around, not to mention the graveyard.”
“Please, don’t,” she pleaded.
“Please don’t what? Mention the graveyard?”
“Yes. It’s a little creepy having a graveyard outside your door,” Summer said, half whispering and checking to see if Tori was listening.
He too looked in Tori’s direction as he smiled, knowing exactly what Summer was thinking. “I’m sure Tori would disagree with you,” he said.
“You think?” she said. “The night I moved in, she was skipping and twirling in the graveyard as if it was the most enchanting place in the world.”
“You gotta love her. She’s one of a kind, that one,” he said, shaking his head.
“She certainly is,” Summer agreed. “So what do you think I should do about Ms. Midnight’s request?”
“Well, now. I don’t know what to say about the broom taking her head, but you can certainly take some live traps home with you and see what you catch and run them past her. Even if it isn’t her rat, you’ll at least have a chance to ask her some more questions and see if you can get any more information out of her as to this broom and rat thing.”
“That’s true.”
“And take a couple of days off. Show her that you are making this issue a priority. That should gain her trust a bit. I know she’s grown a bit gruff in her old age, but she’s quite a remarkable woman. I think if she would open up to you, you could learn a lot from her.”
“You said you’d tell me a bit about her someday; can you give me a little insight on her now?”
“Truthfully, I don’t know a lot about her. She’s kept to herself since her fiancé died,” Dr. Stuart said.
“I hadn’t realized,” Summer said.
“Oh, yes. His name was Robert Mayhew. He was a very wealthy man, from an even wealthier family from back east. He died, though, before they could marry.”
“How awful,” she said.
“Yes. It was quite the scandal. He’d put her in his will before they were wed and many speculated she killed him for his money the eve before the ceremony. I never believed a word of it. The Midnights were well off on their own. She didn’t need his money. No one who killed for money would have mourned as long as Myrtle mourned Robert. My dad was the town doctor back then and so he examined the body for the family. He said the cause of death was an aneurysm, but you know how small towns are with gossip.
“Poor thing was heartbroken. She locked herself in that house away from the world. Within months of Robert’s passing, she lost her sister Ivy. She and Ivy were very close. After that, no one ever saw her and sadly, no one really ever checked on her either. By that time, rumors had grown to such extents that they called her a witch. Some even told stories that she had hung herself from the guilt she felt for killing her husband and sister and that her ghost haunted the grounds.”
“But she didn’t kill her sister, did she?”
“Of course not. She loved Ivy, but they were all so convinced that she had killed her husband—from there the story grew and took on a life of its own.”
“That’s horrible.”
“It is.”
“Do you think that maybe she’s gone a little crazy being in that house all alone all these years and having gone through all that heartbreak?”
“I think it’s possible, but only talking to her and getting to know her will get to the bottom of that story. She’s reached out to you and she hasn’t reached out to anyone in a very long time, and that’s saying something, don’t you think?”
“I guess so,” Summer replied, unsure.
“Good,” he said, patting her shoulder. With that he headed to the front office to close down for the day.
Chapter 9
After her talk with Dr. Stuart, she went home with a few live traps that the doctor kept around for customers who had stray animals around their homes. They could trap the animal then bring it to a shelter or, if hurt, they could bring it in to be checked out by Dr. Stuart. Feeling it was highly unlikely she’d catch Ms. Midnight’s rat outside, she did want to show her she was indeed trying to look for her lost pet.
She set a couple of the traps around the perimeter of the mansion and one on the porch. Later she would knock at the door and see if she could put a couple in the house, but for now she didn’t want to disturb Ms. Midnight.
Within an hour, she had caught a whopper of a brown rat almost the size of a small cat. Not wanting to waste time, but pretty sure the occupant of the trap was not Ms. Midnight’s pet, she grabbed another trap and headed for the front door of the mansion.
She knocked timidly at the door, holding the full trap in one hand, and then reached down for the empty one when she heard Ms. Midnight making her way to the door.
When the door jerked open, she exclaimed, “Ms. Midnight, I caught—”
Ms. Midnight shrieked in horror. “Dear Lord, girl, what is THAT?”
“It’s a rat, Ms. Midnight. I caught it round back near your cellar door. Is this your pet?”
“Get that, that, THING, out of my sight. Why would you show me such a thing? Are you trying to give me a heart attack? And what is that for?” Ms. Midnight pointed at the empty cage. “You don’t plan on torturing me again with such a disgusting prize do you?”
“No! You said you were missing your pet rat, Ms. Midnight. I’ve set up some traps around the perimeter of the house and this one is for the inside. It’s much more likely your pet is still inside the mansion.”
“I most certainly do not have a pet rat. The thought of such of thing!” She shuddered as she said it. “You are not coming in here with that dirty rat cage and you can take that…that…that THING away as well. How disgusting! A pet rat, how absurd! How could someone think I, of all people, would own a rat?” Ms. Midnight was still ranting as she slammed the door—before Summer could get a word in edgewise.
“Well, that didn’t go well,” Summer said, looking at the rat that was pacing the cage, looking for an opening.
She schlepped down the porch stairs and headed for the woods behind the cottage. Summer was sure this would be a good place to release the big brown rat and also it would give her a chance to go to the cottage and see if Sully had awakened from his nap yet.
She let the thankful rat go near a fallen rotted log a few yards into the woods and then she deposited the two empty cages in the back of the dog mobile.
What could Ms. Midnight have meant by a rat, then, if it was not a pet? Was she speaking of gangsters and referring to some bad man? If so, why would she care if a bad man was missing? She figured she would let Ms. Midnight cool off a while and go and talk to her again as Dr. Stuart suggested.
Finding Midnight Page 7