by Lynn Bohart
The way the room was laid out made my heart bleed. The crib, which sat next to the rocking chair, was made out of oak and had the distressed stencil of a teddy bear at each end. I glanced inside. Rats had made nests out of the mattress, so it was chewed up and stained with urine. The smell made me gag.
Most of a large, braided rug, which covered the central part of the floor, had been shredded, but one corner of it had been charred by fire. A stack of dusty cloth diapers still sat in a box, also chewed up and stained. And several baby toys, including a baby’s bottle and binky were strewn across the floor. At one time the cot had been made up for someone to sleep there. But now the blanket, sheets, and pillow were in the same state as everything else.
The rocking chair was draped with a tattered, crocheted shawl. A book of children’s poems lay on the seat. A heavy brass candlestick holding a thick, half burned candle sat on an up-turned milk box next to the rocker. Next to the candlestick was a book, opened and turned upside down. It looked as if someone had been reading it and then was interrupted.
I moved over and glanced down. The book was an old Nancy Drew mystery, The Secret of the Old Clock. I fingered the cover, remembering reading this very book when I was a little girl and thinking of the full collection of Nancy Drew books I had in my apartment.
“What is this?” Mr. Piper asked from over my shoulder. “Do you think someone just stored this stuff in here?”
“No,” I replied. “Look over in the corner.”
I flashed the light to where there was a stack of old, dirty dishes. “I think someone may have lived up here.”
“She died here,” April murmured from where she stood behind Mr. Piper.
I spun around to find my friend with her hands clasped to her temples. “April, are you okay?”
Mr. Piper stepped aside.
“She died here,” April said again, her dark features laced with pain.
April’s legs gave out, and she nearly crashed to the floor. Thankfully, Mr. Piper grabbed her elbow just in time.
“Let me get her downstairs,” he said. “Barry, give me a hand.”
Barry stepped over and took April’s other arm. The two of them helped April out of the room, while I remained behind. I took a minimal breath to help reduce the stench and studied things more closely.
The atmosphere inside the room was more than oppressive. It felt as if someone had placed an anvil on my chest. And it was difficult to breathe through the pervasive, rank smell. I felt I could almost taste rat droppings.
There were no windows to let in light or air, and no light bulb or electricity. As I moved around, my foot rolled over something, throwing me up against the crib. I regained my balance and glanced down to where another half-burned candle lay on the floor. I waved the flashlight beam back and forth across the room, but there was no second candle holder.
That’s when I heard the faint sound of whispering.
I whipped around, forcing the light to bounce erratically across the walls.
Nothing. No one.
I was alone, so I waited and listened.
The whispering continued. There seemed to be two voices. One made a clucking sound. The other voice was saying something, but I couldn’t make out the words.
Then it stopped.
Footsteps brought me back to attention with a jolt. Mr. Piper was back.
“Is she okay?” I asked.
“Yes, Ma’am,” he said from the doorway. “She said to tell you she was going to go lie down. Have you found anything else?”
“No,” I said, my voice shaking a bit.
“What do you want us to do with all the stuff in here?” he asked, gesturing to the crib and rocker.
“Do you have to move it right away?”
He shrugged. “The floor in this area has been badly compromised,” he said, gesturing to where the wood had buckled and splintered beneath our feet. “There’s been quite a bit of water damage. Between that and the rodents, we should replace it. Besides, it looks like the access to get under the roofline is up there.” He pointed to the ceiling where there was a recessed door. “We’ll have to check under the roof for damage. However, I just got an emergency call from the other side of the island. I’ll finish up here today, but I’ll have to take care of that job tomorrow and probably the next day.”
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s leave everything where it is for now.”
He nodded. “Sounds good.”
I stopped him as he began to turn away. “Mr. Piper, were you and Barry talking downstairs just a few minutes ago? Right below here? I heard voices.”
He shook his head. “No. We got your partner outside, but by then she was feeling a little better and insisted that she could make it to the guest house on her own. So Barry went out to the truck to get our big shop vac to clean out all this rat mess. And I came back up here. I did take the phone call when I was on the landing though. Maybe that’s what you heard.”
“Maybe,” I said skeptically. “Thanks. I’ll go check on April.”
I left the attic, ignoring the small chill that rippled down my back.
You’d think that after all the ghostly encounters I’d had over the years I’d be immune to them. But, in fact, each and every time was much like the first. My heart raced. I got chills. And my breathing would speed up. These were natural responses. After all, we’re talking about contact with the other side.
So as I descended the stairs, I felt the adrenalin still pulsing through my veins. What were those whispers? They seemed different than anything I’d encountered before, which made me think they weren’t from our resident ghosts, Elizabeth, or her daughter, Chloe.
So who was it? And why was there such a bad feeling up in that attic?
CHAPTER THREE
I emerged into the fresh air and took a deep breath, hoping to wash away the rat smell. I walked over to the guest house, which sat on the far side of the property, next to the garage. I climbed the porch steps and tapped on the door. There was a weak, “Come in,” and I stepped inside. April was reclined on the sofa in the front room, an ice pack on her forehead.
“Wow, that looks bad,” I said, crossing to the sofa. “Can I get you anything?”
“No,” she said, looking at me through half-open eyes. “It’s starting to fade.”
“A headache?”
“Yeah. A bad one. It felt like electrical jolts shooting through my brain.”
“Ouch! I’m sorry.” I sat down on the arm of the sofa and reached out to grab a throw, putting it over her legs. “Well, you stay here. I’ll finish the scones.”
She smiled. “Thanks. They’re ready for the oven. Three hundred fifty degrees for 15 minutes.”
“Okay. But what happened? You said someone died up there. Who died?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. I only heard those words.”
“Do you know if it was a man or a woman talking?”
“It was just a whisper in my head. And then the pain got so bad I couldn’t see.”
I sat back, thinking. “Something’s weird up there. When Mr. Piper was gone, I heard whispering, too. It sounded like two different voices, but not as if they were talking to each other. It was more like one voice was, I don’t know, just babbling. And the other voice was saying something, but I couldn’t make out what it was.”
April pulled the ice pack off of her forehead. “I heard that, too.”
“I wonder if the babbling could have been a baby,” I said, shifting my gaze to the window above the kitchen sink. “I mean it looked as if someone kept a baby up there. But why would they? There’s no window in that room and no electricity or plumbing. It had to be cold in the winter and hot during the summer. Why would anyone keep a baby up there?”
April sat up, wincing at the pain in her head. She swung her legs around so she could lean against the back of the sofa. “You would if you wanted to hide for some reason.”
“Hide? You mean like from the law?”
She shrugge
d and rubbed one temple. “I don’t know. There are probably lots of reasons someone might need to hide. Maybe they were in the country illegally. Maybe it was a woman running away from an abusive marriage.”
“Maybe it was a criminal,” I added.
“Right. Maybe they were hiding from the law.”
“Damn! Another mystery.”
“But one we’re not likely to solve,” she said. “Too much time has gone by.”
“Hmmm,” I murmured.
She glanced at me. “What are you thinking?”
“Nothing. It’s all just so curious.” I stood up. “Like I said, I’ll finish the scones. Don’t forget we have that art class tonight.”
“I think I’ll pass. You and the rest of the old maids will have to go on without me.”
April was referring to a concept our book club had adopted after our friend, Ellen Fairchild, had driven her Lexus off a cliff the year before. Moments before she died in the hospital, she warned the rest of us not to become old maids. What she’d meant was not to give up on life, to keep trying new things.
To honor her, we’d embarked on a series of adventures that each of us had wanted to do since childhood. Blair took us karaoke singing. Rudy enrolled us in horseback riding lessons, and we went skydiving with Doe. Right around the time it was my turn to suggest something, Martha Denton, my neighbor and member of the book club, was killed. As an avid mystery reader, I decided to solve her murder.
But Martha died before ever having the chance to suggest her own adventure. She’d often talked about taking an art class, so we’d signed up for an art class in her memory. It started that night.
“I hope this is what she would have wanted,” I said, thinking about Martha. “She never got to tell us what she really would have chosen.”
April smiled indulgently. “I’m sure she’d love what you’re doing.”
“Sure you don’t want to go?”
“No. I’m going to rest and then see if I feel well enough to clean the oven over there.”
“Sheesh,” I said. “Take it easy. The oven will always be there. By the way, Mr. Piper got called to another job for the next few days, so I told him to leave everything where it was in the attic. But he said they’ll have to replace the entire floor in that little room.”
“Oh, great. More money,” April lamented. She slapped the ice pack back to her head. “That’s enough to give me another headache.”
I left April and went back to the bakery. It took me almost an hour to finish four batches of scones for the next day’s breakfast. I was coming through the rear kitchen door of the inn with a bakery box of them when I heard the front door jingle. I slid the bakery box onto the counter and almost bumped into my friend Blair, a member of the book club, as she came through the swinging door off the breakfast room.
“Whoa! Sorry,” I said after we almost collided. “What time is it?”
“Not quite noon,” she replied. “I came by to see if you wanted to have lunch. Mr. Billings is out of town and that new Mexican restaurant just opened downtown.”
Mr. Billings was Blair’s husband, even though their last name was Wentworth. That’s another story for another time.
I’m only 5’ 2”, so Blair towered over me at 5’ 8”. She normally wore three-inch heels, which made it worse, but was dressed more casually today, wearing tight jeans, a muslin top, and sandals.
“I can’t leave right now,” I said. “April isn’t feeling well. But I have some leftover chicken chili and cornbread in my apartment. Would that do?”
“I love chicken chili,” she said with a smile. “Do you have cheese and sour cream?”
“Of course. Besides, I have something to tell you. Let’s go.”
Blair reminded me of what Marilyn Monroe might have looked like if she’d lived to be sixty-three. Her figure still made most men salivate, and she purposely accentuated it with tight pants and revealing tops. Add to that the blond hair and blue eyes, and voilà – Marilyn Monroe.
We passed my daytime manager, Crystal, who was busy folding clean towels at the reception desk.
“We’ll be in my apartment,” I told her. “April is taking a break. She’s in the guest house, so call me first if you need anything.” Crystal nodded and continued with her work.
I let us into the apartment where we were greeted with an immediate barrage of high-pitched barking.
“Hello, wieners,” Blair said, leaning down to pet the dogs dancing around her feet.
Fortunately, all my friends loved the dogs, or at least tolerated them. That was a good thing, since I adored them. They looked like a coordinated set: Mickey was black with red accents, while Minnie was just a burnished, copper red. But right now they were climbing up Blair’s leg.
“Okay you two, get down,” I admonished them, leaning over to whisk them away from her ankles.
“No problem.” She followed me to the kitchen and sat on a barstool on the opposite side of the counter, while I heated up lunch. “Hey, I saw where they found a body washed up on shore down by the bridge. It made me wonder how Angela’s relationship is going with Detective Abrams.”
I turned to her with a scowl. “A dead body made you think of my daughter’s romantic relationship?”
She shrugged. “Actually, it just made me think of that hunk of a boyfriend of hers.”
My daughter was an assistant prosecuting attorney for King County. We’d all met Detective Abrams during our first murder investigation, only to find out that Angela already knew him. She’d worked a case with him when he worked for the Seattle PD. They’d shared one intimate date and then broken it off. During the course of Martha’s murder investigation however, they’d rekindled their relationship.
I went to the refrigerator and pulled out the container of chili. “You know his name is Sean, don’t you?”
“Yes, but his official title makes him so much sexier,” she said with a smile. “Along with those broad shoulders and that Army Ranger tattoo.”
Blair’s relationship with most men – okay, all men – was like a hummingbird to nectar. She responded to the opposite sex the same way I responded to chocolate.
“I find him a bit intimidating,” I said. “In fact, I’ve seen him smile just a few times. I’m not sure what the two of them talk about.”
Blair grinned. “My bet is they don’t…talk that much, I mean.”
“That’s my daughter you’re making jokes about, you know.”
“She’s an adult,” Blair said with a shrug.
“Well, I don’t think Angela knows what she wants yet. So I wouldn’t be surprised if this doesn’t last.”
I spooned some chili into a bowl, placed it into the microwave and turned it on. Then I went back for the cheese and sour cream.
“Are you saying that because you hope it won’t last, or because you suspect Angela will move on?”
I stopped and thought for a moment. “Both, I suppose.” I went back to cooking. “I’m not sure Sean is the long-term relationship kind of guy. He seems so distant.”
“Well, at least he’ll keep her life interesting,” Blair said.
A chuckle erupted from my throat. “I’m not sure that’s a problem. She does work for the prosecuting attorney, you know.”
“True. There is that. So what did you want to tell me?”
I perked up. “Oh, we found a secret room.”
“What do you mean a secret room? Where?”
“Above the bakery. We had some water damage out there. We hired Mr. Piper to do the repairs, and in tearing out the drywall he found this little room hidden behind a locked door.”
Blair had sky blue eyes that would change color, depending on what she wore. Right now, they looked like two glacial pools, opened wide to reflect the color of her blouse. “Really? How mysterious. What was in it?”
“That’s what’s so weird. There was an old crib, a rocking chair, a bed, some books and an old chest.”
“So, just storage?”
�
��No. It was all set out as if someone had been using the room as a bedroom or a nursery.”
The microwave beeped, and I pulled out the chili and began spooning it into bowls. Blair slipped off her stool and came around the counter to get napkins and silverware.
“Why would anyone create a nursery up there? Do you know if anyone ever lived over in the barn?” she asked.
“Not that I know of. While there is one overhead bulb in the attic, there’s no electricity to this little room. But what’s even weirder is the door to the room was locked with a padlock, and then the door had been covered over.”
Blair turned to me as she set the table, her perfectly penciled brows clenched. “What do you mean?”
“The door to the room was hidden behind some drywall.”
Blair paused, staring at me across the table. “No kidding? Okay, that’s even more mysterious.”
We had just sat down and begun to eat when my cell phone rang. It was Rudy, another member of our book club.
“Julia, I’m at the Crate & Barrel in Bellevue,” she said. “They have that big chafing dish you were looking for. Do you want me to pick it up? I can give it to you when we meet tonight for the art class.”
“Yeah, thanks, Rudy.”
“Hey Rudy!” Blair yelled into the phone. “We have another mystery to solve. Better get over here.”
CHAPTER FOUR
While Blair normally dressed for sex appeal, Rudy often looked like she’d just walked off the golf course. She came over after lunch in Bermuda shorts, a cotton shirt and a pair of Adidas.
“Did you golf today?” I asked her.
“No. Elliott and I were shopping. His ninety-year old mother’s birthday is coming up.”
Elliott was Rudy’s ex, and Blair and I glanced at each other.
“Are you two getting back together?” Blair asked.
Rudy threw us an exasperated look. “No. But I love Nana, and she probably doesn’t have too much time left.”
“Right. And you had lunch with him last week just to discuss the shopping trip,” Blair said with a roll of her eyes.