by Marja McGraw
I answered with my friendliest and most disarming, “Hello?” If the caller was John, I wanted to start our conversation on a positive note.
“Pamela, this is Janet. Sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner, but I’ve been busy with another case.”
“That’s okay. We thought you should probably know about the letters though.”
“Your message said you found them behind a bookcase? I wonder how they got back there.”
“Personally, I think someone stashed them there. We checked it all out, and there’s no way they could have accidentally ended up behind the bookcase.”
Chris and Big D came in carrying the cedar chest and headed up the stairs.
“What did they say? Have you read them yet?” Janet asked.
The thought had never crossed my mind that I could open the letters and read them – at least not more than a dozen times.
“I haven’t read them. I wasn’t sure if you’d approve or not,” I said, oh, so innocently. “They’re still sealed.”
“You might as well open them since you and Chris are ‘helping’ me.”
The inflection in her voice put quotes around the word helping. I smiled broadly. “I’ll do that today. What do you want us to do with them?”
“I’ll come by and pick them up soon. Maybe today, if I have the time. More likely tomorrow though.”
“Well, Janet, I should probably keep you up-to-date with what we’ve been doing. I’m sure you need to know what’s been going on.”
“Something’s been happening?”
“We found out that a woman named Mildred Chance Murphy owned the house during the forties. She goes by the name Chance. She lives in a retirement village now and we met with her and her nephew.”
“What was she like? She must be way up there in years.”
“She is, and she’s pretty interesting. At ninety she still wears make-up and clothing that you’d normally see on a younger woman, and she wears her hair up in a ponytail. Her nephew mentioned that she seems to have dementia, but we couldn’t really see any sign of it. In fact, I almost got the feeling she puts on an act for her nephew – maybe to get her own way. I don’t know for sure. Her personality didn’t remind me of any ninety-year-old I’ve ever met.”
Janet turned away from the phone and said something to someone. “Sorry. One of the guys is looking for a file, and I happened to know where it is. So go on. She’s pretty spry for an old woman, is that right?”
“I guess spry would be a good word for her. It turns out she has a good memory of those years – and here’s the kicker – she kept excellent records about the boarders when she ran the boarding house. She even had their dates of birth and social security numbers. Chris has already started trying to track down some of the people on the list.”
I could hear Janet blow on what I thought might be hot coffee. “I’m going to want to see that list,” she said.
“I figured you would. Chance’s nephew made us copies of the pertinent pages. I’ll make copies for you.”
“I’ll probably want to get the original ledgers from her, but I’ll start with the copies.”
“There’s an incident I should probably tell you about, too. Someone broke into our house yesterday.”
“Did they take anything?”
“That’s the odd part. They didn’t take a thing. Blank checks and cash were sitting out and they didn’t touch those things. The TV is still here, the stereo is here, and nothing is missing. They searched the house though. Chris thinks they were after the ledger pages.”
Janet and I were both quiet for a moment. “How could someone have known about the ledger pages?” she asked.
“I don’t know. That’s what we’re going to try to figure out. Maybe Chance or her nephew blabbed to someone. Chris called John, the nephew, and left a message for him to call us. We haven’t heard back yet.”
Chris and Big D headed back out the front door for another load.
“Let me know what he says. And go ahead and read the letters before I pick them up. Maybe you’ll find information that will lead in a specific direction. I’ll try to come by later if I can.
“By the way, Don and I wondered if you and Chris might like to go out to dinner one night soon.”
“We’d love it,” I replied. “And when we open the restaurant, I hope you two will be our guests.”
“You’ve got a deal. Now, I’d better get back to work. This latest case is high profile, and it’s taking up all of my time.”
We hung up just as the boys brought in the bookcase. Mikey had apparently heard them and was now following along, trying to help.
“Where do you want this?” Davey asked.
“To the left of the fireplace,” I directed. “where I cleared some space.”
The two men carried the heavy bookcase while my son gave directions.
“Coffee table behind you, Big D. Watch it,” Mikey said. He swung his arms around like a traffic cop.
A warmness passed through my heart and head as I watched the three of them place the bookcase, stand back to see if it was straight, and then move it a quarter of an inch on one side. I truly cared for all of them, Big D included. He was a good friend.
And then I remembered Sharon!
“What about Sharon?” I asked. “Did you tell her about the letters? Boy, that’s the last time I ask you for a favor.”
Big D had the courtesy to look embarrassed. “She wormed it out of me. We were talking about the restaurant and I slipped and said something about finding things behind the bookcase. She was relentless. I couldn’t help myself.”
“Okay, okay. I get it.” I sighed. “I’ve been on the receiving end with her before.”
“So you’ll let this one go?” He appeared worried about my reaction.
“Yes,” I said, letting him off the hook. “She hasn’t called me yet, so maybe she’ll let it go. But please be careful about what you say to her in the future.”
Yeah, she’d let it go like a dog lets go of a tasty bone. I’d be willing to bet she was sitting at her desk figuring out her strategy even while Davey and I talked. Wait a minute! Could Sharon have broken into our house? No, she wouldn’t go that far. Would she?
Chris glanced at Big D and then me, and shook his head. “Pamela, we’re going to take your desk and the highboy over and put them in the office instead of leaving them here and then having to move them again. We’ll be back in about an hour.”
“Don’t forget to lock up the restaurant when you leave,” I said.
He didn’t even bother to respond to that.
“Can I go with them?” Mikey asked.
“If it’s okay with them, then it’s okay with me.”
“Come on, slugger,” Chris said.
The door closed behind them and I took a deep breath. “Wow,” I said to the walls, “a whole hour of peace and quiet. Whatever will I do with myself? Ah, I know. The letters.”
I heard one of the dogs bark.
“Nope, they’re fine out in the yard.”
I retrieved a letter opener, a pad of paper and a pen from the spare bedroom and sat down on the couch with the letters. I sorted them by the incoming letters and who they were addressed to, and the outgoing letters and who’d written them. Deciding to start with the incoming stack, I picked up one that was addressed to Sam Shipley. It was the only one addressed to him.
I carefully slit the envelope with the letter opener and began to read. It was from his sister, Karen, who lived in Michigan. She shared all of the family news with him and then wrote briefly about the war. And then she shared her big news. Frankie Dutton and she had become engaged. He’d asked her the big question in a letter she’d received the day before. I smiled when I recognized the joy she was feeling while she wrote an upbeat letter to her brother.
And I recognized information that might help us. If we couldn’t find Sam Shipley, maybe we could find his sister Karen, if she was still in Michigan. If she’d married I could look for
Karen Dutton. If things hadn’t gone the way she planned, I might be able to find Karen Shipley. It was something anyway, which was better than nothing.
I felt my own joy now as I realized that the letters might be more help than I’d imagined. I neatly folded the letter and placed it back in the envelope, after making a note about Karen and where she might be located.
Next I picked up one of the two letters addressed to Dudley Long. I decided to hold Blakely’s letters for last. Opening the first one I found that it was from a girlfriend named Natalie who said she was sorry for what she’d said to him and she wanted to know if they could get back together. She said if she didn’t hear from him by the end of the week, she’d understand his decision and move on with her life. She said that since he was planning to join the Navy, she felt they needed to talk before he left. I could almost feel her sadness while I read the letter. I made a note of her name on my list, folded the letter and returned it to its envelope.
I sat quietly for a moment, feeling like an unwanted intruder in these people’s lives. That didn’t last long though. These letters were over sixty years old and whatever the problems were back then, more than likely they would have been resolved one way or another at that time.
I picked up the other letter addressed to Dudley. It was from his mother, who lived in Northern California, and I read it, sharing a mother’s heart with her. She told him that Natalie had told her about his plans to join the Navy. She wished he had told her himself. She said that his decision saddened her, but that she understood his need to defend his country. She added that since she’d lost her younger brother to the war, she wondered if Dudley’s decision had anything to do with that. She asked him to come visit her before he had to go to boot camp. And, lastly, she told him how proud she was to have such a patriotic son.
One comment that she made toward the end of the letter caught my attention. She said she was sorry to hear he was having problems with someone at the boarding house and she suggested he move home instead of just visiting. Actually, it was more than a suggestion and she sounded pretty insistent about it.
I folded the letter and put it back in the envelope because I felt like crying. The woman’s letter was so loving and so caring, and I couldn’t help but picture myself and Mikey under those same circumstances.
That only left the two letters addressed to Charles Blakely. One was from a sister named Charlotte, and I couldn’t help but wonder if this was Midge’s mother. It was full of family news, including the fact that she’s just found out she was pregnant. With Midge? I didn’t think so because Midge appeared to be a bit younger. Other than that, there was nothing interesting in the letter.
I picked up the last incoming letter. It was from a friend, Sarah Smith, who was responding to Blakely’s last disturbing letter – her words, not mine. She wanted to know if he’d found out who’d been going through his things and if he’d received any more threatening notes.
Pay dirt!
Chapter Twenty-one
I read Sarah’s letter three times before I set it aside. I couldn’t glean anything else from what she’d said, but it was interesting to know what Charles had been going through. Why on earth did Sarah have to have a name like Smith? I’d never be able to find her, but I made a note of the return address on the envelope, just in case.
So Dudley’s mother had made a comment about him having problems with someone at the boarding house, and Charles’ friend had mentioned threatening notes and someone going through his things. Now I felt like we were cookin’ with gas. This fit in with the letter that Charles had started that Janet found in his wallet. Were the two men having trouble with each other or was there a third party involved? I couldn’t wait for Chris to come home so I could share this information with him and get his input.
The phone rang so I left the outgoing mail to be dealt with in a few minutes. I answered and found that it was John returning Chris’s call.
“John, how are you?” I asked.
“Good. I’m returning your husband’s call. Is he there?”
“Not at the moment, but I know what he was calling about. Did you happen to tell anyone about giving us the pages from your aunt’s ledger, or do you know if she told anyone?”
“I didn’t mention it to anyone, but why would I? As far as my aunt, I have no idea. Is it important?”
“It could be. Do you know if your aunt is still in touch with any of the people from the boarding house?”
“Pamela, what is this all about?”
I wasn’t sure whether to tell him or not. I decided not to, at least until I talked to Chris. “We’re going to try to reach some of these people and we’d actually prefer to take them by surprise. We’d like to see what their first reaction to Blakely’s death is instead of giving them time to think about it.”
“I see. Well, if my aunt is still in touch with anyone, she’s never mentioned it. You’ll have to ask her.”
I had a mental picture of John in my mind while we talked and something suddenly struck me. His age. He didn’t look old enough to have been around when all of this was going on.
“John, you said you’d met a few of the boarders. Was that during the time period that we’re interested in?”
“Oh, no. I remember people from the late forties, and I don’t remember them well. I was a baby during the early forties.”
“Just thought I’d ask. I didn’t think you were that old, but you could take after your aunt. Look how young she looks. Never in a million years would I have guessed she’s ninety.”
John chuckled. “She does take care of herself. If her mental faculties were better, she’d be quite a gal. You’re lucky that you caught her on a good day.”
“I hope we’re that lucky the next time we see her. Thank you for calling back, John. I’ll visit your aunt and ask if she’s spoken to anyone from the boarding house.”
He gave me her phone number. “Call before you go over there. Besides, if you call first you’ll have an idea of her state of mind. Let me know if you need anything else.”
We hung up and I sat down to look at the rest of the letters. The dogs began barking. Interestingly, they have different sounding barks for different things. This one told me that Chris and Mikey were home. The letters would have to wait because I didn’t want to discuss what I’d found in front of Mikey.
Our printer had the capability to copy, so I took the unread letters into the spare bedroom and copied them, just in case Janet showed up before tomorrow. I didn’t want to lose the information in the letters.
I could hear Chris and Mikey talking and my son sounded excited. He loved being included in events with the big boys, but he’d never admit it.
Walking out to the living room, I gave each of them a hug. “So how did my desk fit into the office? The room looked so small when it was empty. Was there room for the highboy?”
“They fit perfectly, and you still have room to do whatever you want to,” Chris replied. “We’re going to own an exceptionally nice restaurant. Big D is going all out on this job, although I’m sure he would even if we weren’t friends.”
“I can’t wait to see the finished job.”
“It’s way cool, Mom. And I got to look at the yard without the dogs distracting me,” Mikey said.
I smiled at my seven-year-old son. “Yes, those darned dogs can be so distracting.”
By that time it was late afternoon, so I threw together the spaghetti as planned. It was a simple dinner when I added a salad and garlic bread to it. Chris fed the dogs while I cooked and Mikey did yard duty, which consisted of picking up what we called doggie bonbons, not his favorite job.
After dinner we spent a quiet evening. Chris and Mikey watched a television show while I filled the bookcase with my favorite mysteries and other books. I added a couple of knick knacks and stood back to look at my work. The bookcase added a sense of comfort to the living room, making it feel homey. Of course, it could have been my love of books that made it feel like that.
Mikey finally went to bed and I sat down with Chris, letters in hand.
“You opened those?” he asked. “I thought you were saving them for Janet.”
“I didn’t want to discuss these until Mikey went to bed. Janet called while you were gone and said to go ahead and read them. Since we’re helping her, she felt it would be okay. She’ll probably pick them up tomorrow.”
“Oh. Did you find anything interesting?”
“You bet.” I handed him the pad of paper with my notes. “First, if we have trouble finding Shipley or Long, we might at least be able to find someone mentioned in the letters. Secondly, both Dudley Long’s mother and a friend of Charles Blakely mentioned problems at the boarding house. Long’s mother didn’t mention anything specific, but Blakely’s friend commented on someone going through his things, and she mentioned that he’d been receiving threatening notes.”
“You learned quite a bit from those letters,” Chris said. “What about the outgoing letters? Was there anything pertinent in those?”
“You and Mikey came home so I haven’t had a chance to read them yet.” I handed Chris one of the letters. “Let’s read them now.”
“You know, if we hadn’t found the letters on the same morning as the break-in, I’d be wondering if those were what the intruder wanted.” Chris tapped his finger on the envelope he was holding.
“No one except Janet knows about those yet, so that couldn’t be the case.”
“You’re forgetting someone,” Chris said, grinning.
“Sharon,” we said in unison.
“I don’t think she’d be dumb enough to break into our house though,” I said.
“I don’t either. It was just a joke.”
I opened the envelope I was holding after looking at the addresses. This one was from Dudley Long to Natalie Clairmont. Apparently both parties were sorry about having had words. Dudley wrote to her apologizing for losing his temper and walking out on her. He said he knew she hadn’t meant the things she said, and he commented that he shouldn’t be so thin-skinned. Neither letter ever mentioned what had actually happened, and I couldn’t help myself – I was curious.