by Tess Lake
I couldn’t stop now. I concentrated on Franklin Cordella, and imagined trying to find his room. I cast a finding spell. The tiny golden ball of light rose out of my hand and drifted down the corridor. It was up in the air whether this would work – usually for finding spells, you needed a photograph, or a very clear idea of what you were looking for.
I followed the glowing ball of light down the corridor. It traveled halfway along before it rose up through the ceiling and vanished. I silently cursed and headed back to the stairs, moving as fast as I could up to the second floor. I hit the corridor in time to see the glowing ball disappear through a door down the end.
I rushed down there as quietly as I could. I could hear Aveline Hardy talking in one of the rooms. She must have been changing the sheets and getting it ready for new customers. I had to move as quietly as possible. Concealment spells will hide you from people, but the more noise you make the harder they have to work, thus draining more energy. I was already feeling exhausted and there’s no way I wanted to suddenly appear in front of her.
I reached the door and found it was locked. I used more energy unlocking it.
The door clicked open and I slipped inside. The room was empty. I locked the door behind me and then let the concealment spell go.
I immediately felt better, like I’d been holding a great weight and then had put it down.
I looked around the room. The Hardy Arms is a heritage-style hotel. Lots of wood, dust ruffles on the bed, ornate bathroom taps, that sort of thing.
This room was pristine and perfectly clean. The bed was crisply made. Someone had placed a small pad of paper and three pens with the Hardy Arms logo on them and laid them out neatly side-by-side in a perfect row. Beside that they’d aligned the television and air conditioner remotes. There was a small kitchen counter, and on it lay all the tea bags and sugar sachets in straight lines.
Weird.
Sitting on the table in the corner of the room was a large black sports bag. I walked over to it and pondered committing crime.
“Okay, Harlow. This is it,” I said to myself as I looked at the bag. I’d come this far; I should finish the search.
I unzipped the bag and looked inside. It was full of men’s clothing, carefully folded and neatly arranged. Everything was color-coded. There were three red shirts, three blue shirts, three pairs of red socks, three pairs of blue socks, neatly folded jeans.
I rummaged around as best I could while trying not to disturb it too much and then shuffled everything back into position before zipping the bag back up. I opened the pockets and looked through them, finding a small plastic folder with carefully ordered receipts from various hotels across the country. The oldest one was from four years ago.
I flicked through the receipts, seeing that was no gap in between them. Franklin had been traveling and living in hotels for years on end? I pulled out my camera and photographed a few pages. There might be something here. When I was finished I put the folder back and opened the final pocket.
It held a photo. It was slightly blurry but the girl was unmistakable.
Holly.
Chapter 12
I was back in my office pacing when a message from Luce arrived: Hey, we could really use your help!
In my rush of breaking and entering and then finding a very blurry photo of Holly (and then taking a photo of it with my camera) I’d totally forgotten about Luce and Molly at Traveler.
I put the phone down and sat on the sofa, trying to give myself a moment to think.
I could call Sheriff Hardy and tell him I had gone into Franklin Cordella’s room. He’d certainly given me and my family a lot of leeway in the past, but I’m not really sure how he would feel about me breaking and entering and photographing evidence.
Speaking of evidence, this situation was definitely one of those illegal search and chain of evidence problems. Sheriff Hardy had no reason to search Franklin’s room. At best they could perhaps say that Franklin had asked in his dazed state for them to get his clothes and then they had discovered the photograph. Any lawyer worth his salt would rip that to pieces in about a heartbeat.
I was looking at the blurred photo, racking my brains, when my laptop chimed the arrival of an email. The subject was: THEY WERE MURDERED. YOU NEED TO MEET ME.
I rushed over to my laptop and opened the email.
The people found on Truer Island were murdered. The murderer lives in Harlot Bay. Meet me on top of the lighthouse tonight at 10 p.m. I apologize for the secrecy. My life is in danger.
It was unsigned. I checked the email address and found it came from a temporary email service.
A prickle of anxiety crept over my body. This definitely seemed like one of those situations where I should call Sheriff Hardy and tell him. If I did, he would insist on giving me protection. But for all I knew, the source would keep in the shadows until they were sure I hadn’t brought the police with me, and they might bolt.
My phone chimed another message from Luce.
COME TO TRAVELER RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I still had time to decide about tonight. I would talk to my cousins first. The intuition that had told me I should break into Franklin Cordella’s hotel room was telling me not to call the police. It’d had a spectacular success this morning, so who was I to doubt it now?
I locked up and drove down to Traveler. The place was packed, with a line out the front door of tourists waiting for their coffee.
“Excuse me, sorry, excuse me. I work here. Excuse me, sorry,” I said as I made my way through them and walked around behind the counter. Luce was working the coffee machine as she usually did and Molly was at the front counter with a grim look on her face.
“Three large cappuccinos, whole milk, to go, please,” the man at the front of the line said.
“Three large fat cappuccinos to go,” Molly called out, scribbling down his order and adding it to the end of the line Luce was working from.
Molly looked the man in the eye. “My Aunt Cass is the loveliest woman alive,” she said.
“Oh, well, that’s good,” the man said, nonplussed.
I grabbed an apron from under the counter and without a word, Molly and I swapped places. Molly went out to the back room and I started taking orders. I heard her yell out, “Aunt Cass is the bees knees!” and then give what I swear was a sob.
I’d like to say that while I took coffee orders I made up some amazing plan regarding tonight and the lighthouse but the truth is it was nonstop and I had barely time to breathe, let alone think. The buses just kept arriving and it seemed the line out the front of the shop would never end.
Behind the counter there were stacks of coffee beans in heavy bags and Luce kept pouring them in the top of the machine. At some point they must have rented or bought another refrigerator and filled it to the brim with milk.
Around three the flow decreased and then finally petered out. After the last customer walked outside, Luce immediately ran over to the door, put up the closed sign and pulled down the blind. She then collapsed on the sofa.
She wasn’t there five seconds before her phone chimed in her pocket. She pulled it out and groaned when she read the message.
“There’s another double-decker coming,” she said.
I joined her on the sofa, drinking a large cool glass of water. Somehow in the rush I had missed eating lunch.
“Muh,” I said.
“The bus drivers have started messaging us now to let us know that they’re coming. It’s really lovely, actually,” Luce said.
She closed her eyes and appeared to instantly go to sleep. Just then Molly emerged from the back room with a gleeful look on her face.
“Everything I’m about to say, I mean the exact opposite,” she said. A moment later, she added, “I love Aunt Cass with all my heart.”
“Curse loophole,” I murmured, feeling like I was about to go to sleep as well.
“Damn right, curse loophole. That lovely lady thinks she can curse me and get away w
ith it? Well, she probably can because she’s really clever and wonderful and I love her so much.”
The three of us sat on the sofa for the next half hour not speaking. It seemed the curse Aunt Cass had cast on Molly was possibly weakening as she managed to sit in silence the entire time.
We sat there resting until the next double-decker bus arrived and then it was back to nonstop work. Molly helped work the front counter with me, only complimenting Aunt Cass a few times.
It was closing on five o’clock and Traveler was still crowded when the coffee machine suddenly made a loud rumbling noise and shut down. Luce turned around and waved to the assembled crowd.
“Sorry, folks, the coffee machine is having a problem. We can’t serve you any more coffees today. We apologize deeply for this inconvenience.”
The crowd groaned but it seemed they understood. Soon Traveler was empty and Luce locked the door and pulled the blinds down, putting up the closed sign.
“What happened to the coffee machine?” Molly asked.
“Nothing happened to it. If I have to make any more coffees I’m going to kill myself and everyone in this room,” Luce said, slumping down on the sofa.
We followed suit, decompressing from the day.
“So how’s the curse going?” I asked Molly.
“I think it’s wearing off. How was your day before you came in?”
In the blur of work I hadn’t had a moment to think about the email and the photograph I’d found. I sat bolt upright, feeling adrenaline rushing through me.
“Oh my gosh, you won’t believe this!”
I told them about my breaking and entering into Hardy Arms and finding the photograph of Holly, which they took without comment, probably due to how exhausted they were. Then I got out my phone and showed them the email. At this, both of them woke up like they’d been doused with buckets of cold water.
“This is really dangerous. You should call the police,” Luce said, standing up and pacing the room.
“Call the police? Are you crazy? This could be a source. Someone who could crack the case wide open. And they’ve come to Harlow!” Molly said.
“It could also be a murderer who is intent on murdering her because she sticks her nose into everything and it’s as easy as ordering her out to that old abandoned broken-down lighthouse, where no one will ever find her.”
“What do you mean I stick my nose into everything?”
“You know what I mean. You’re a journalist. Reporter. Whatever. I mean it in a good way. You’re getting off the topic. Are you going to tell Sheriff Hardy about the photo or the email?”
“I’m thinking Molly is right. If we all go there together tonight, then it’ll be safe, right?”
“Oh, great, I have to get murdered. So fantastic. Just when I get a bf.”
“Aunt Cass would do it because she is brave,” Molly said. Then she stomped a foot on the ground. “What I meant to say was that we should do it. I mean, what is this guy doing with a photo of Holly in his bag? Then he gets hit over the head at the Festival of Lights? There is clearly something strange going on. This might be the only chance for Harlow to solve it.”
“Okay, fine, but if I get murdered I’m going to come back to haunt the both of you,” Luce said.
Our plan was simple: go home, shower off the coffee smell, have dinner, possibly have some naps and then get up ready for our late-night meeting. We’d go out to the lighthouse a bit early to see if there was anyone around watching us and then climb up the top to wait for the source. I put it at a better than even chance that no one would even show up.
Molly locked up Traveler and we drove home. Aunt Ro was out at yoga and Mom and Aunt Freya messaged us to tell us they’d be staying late at the bakery to work on something new. That meant Aunt Cass was down at the main house by herself. None of us were in the mood to go down there, though. Especially not Molly, who I’m sure once the curse abated would have a lot of things to say about Aunt Cass.
After showers and dinner, I set my alarm for nine and then took myself to bed, falling asleep almost instantly. It seemed like I’d only blinked my eyes before the phone was ringing next to my head as the alarm went off. I nearly whacked it into submission but managed to wake up enough to drag myself out of bed and stagger out to the kitchen. Luce emerged from her bedroom looking still half-asleep. We had to wake Molly up. She was groaning and protesting that she didn’t want to go and who cared about some stupid informant. Eventually we pulled her out of bed and she got up. I made us all strong coffee, which woke us a little more. It was about nine thirty by the time we were ready to go.
Adams was asleep on the sofa as we left. I scratched behind his ears to say goodbye and then we crept outside to Molly’s car. Luce made sure to check the trunk. The last time we’d gone out on a secret nighttime mission we’d found Aunt Cass hiding in the trunk along with her collection of possibly illegal glassware. The trunk was empty this time.
Molly blasted the air conditioner as we drove through town, the cold air helping wake us. As it did, nervous energy started to tremble in my stomach. Was this a dangerous thing to do? I mean, reporters meet secret sources all the time, right?
I couldn’t tell if my intuition was now telling me that I should reverse this and not go. Really, I didn’t even know if I had intuition worth listening to. Sure, it had been right about finding that photo in Franklin Cordella’s bag but when I was in high school, my intuition had told me to date Jason Anderson and he turned out to be a huge jerk who cheated on me with a dumb cheerleader from another school. I hadn’t entirely calculated my intuition’s success rate, but I didn’t think it was one hundred percent correct all the time.
We drove through town and out up through the rich district until we left Harlot Bay. It wasn’t long before we reached the low cliffs where the lighthouse stood. The night was almost pitch black, the moon providing the only light. We found a small turnoff before the lighthouse, where we parked the car. Anyone going past on the main road wouldn’t see it. We wanted to walk up to lighthouse without being seen by anyone.
We’d just gotten out of the car when Adams spoke up from next to my feet, causing me to squeal in shock.
“Are you going to get food?” he asked and blinked his green eyes at me.
“What are you doing here? No, we’re not going to get food. I thought you were sleeping on the sofa.”
“Are you sure you’re not getting cheese?” Adams asked.
“He’s a stomach on legs,” Luce muttered under her breath.
“I am not,” Adams said.
“We’re not going to get any cheese or any food of any kind. You need to stay in the car. Okay?”
Even in the dark I saw the crafty look come across Adams’ face.
“What reason do I have to stay in the car?”
“I will give you a slice of cheese when we get home,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Two slices.”
“One and a half slices,” I countered.
“Okay,” Adams said and jumped back in the car. I closed the door and left him in there curled up on the driver’s seat.
“We need to hurry if we want to get there before your source,” Molly said.
“You know, I think we should get one of those electrocution things,” Luce said as we walked through the forest, heading up the hill.
“Why, are we planning to make a habit out of this?” Molly sniped, still somewhat grumpy at being woken up.
Luce didn’t say anything. A moment later Molly added, “Aunt Cass wouldn’t need anything because she’s so brave she can defend herself.”
Luce sniggered in the dark and I couldn’t help smiling. It really was the perfect curse, making Molly compliment Aunt Cass whenever she spoke. In truth, although many of the compliments were exaggerated, Aunt Cass really was brave and she was a powerful witch and yes, she did have good teeth.
I was sure Molly would be plotting revenge of some kind.
The lighthouse came into view. It h
as been abandoned for probably fifty years. There have been plans to turn it into some kind of tourist attraction that have never really gotten off the ground. Every now and then a planning committee worked on it but as usual, it came down to the same problems of money and why would anyone bother?
Tourists did come out to stand in front of it and look off the bluffs into the sea below, but no one was sure there were enough of them to make money.
I looked up at the lighthouse and saw a beam of light flashing as it spun.
What? Had someone turned the light on? My cousins saw me looking up with concern on my face.
“What’s the matter?” Luce asked.
“I think I’m seeing the past. I can see the light coming out of the lighthouse. Can you guys?”
“There’s nothing there,” Molly said.
I sighed with resignation. It looked like there would be a camping trip on Truer Island coming up faster than I wanted.
We walked up to the lighthouse and found it locked. Molly cast a spell and opened the door. We had a quick whispered argument about whether we should use a magic light or not, which I won. I summoned up a small glowing ball of light that floated in my hand so it looked like it could possibly be a flashlight.
Inside the lighthouse it was dusty and smelled of mildew. It wasn’t much different from underneath the Torrent Mansion, actually. Old spaces locked up and wet at some point and left quietly to mold away. I shone the light around but there wasn’t much at the bottom to see. It was surprising the local bored teenagers hadn’t broken in to use the place as a hangout. I was expecting graffiti and empty beer bottles but there was only a single door, a few thick portholes and the rusty metal stairs leading upwards.
They creaked as soon as I stepped on them but seemed fairly sturdy, despite their age. We walked up the spiraling stairs, the lighthouse narrowing as we ascended. We pushed open a heavy rusted steel door and emerged out on a large platform that surrounded the dead central globe and lens. Thankfully the past had ceased overlapping the present, so I wasn’t blinded by light.