1 Lost Under a Ladder

by Linda O. Johnston

  As always, the sidewalks were crowded. One of these days I’d have to stop in City Hall and see if there was any printed literature or website that kept track of numbers of people who came here. Maybe even that guy Derek’s weekly paper, the Star, collected statistics. I’d need to check.

  I enjoyed my walk—although I was more in a hurry than most of the pedestrians so I had to squeeze around them, even as I tried to avoid stepping on cracks as I noticed others did, too.

  Why were so many people interested in finding out about superstitions? Was it only curiosity about this little town that made tourists flock here?

  How many others came as I did, hoping for answers in situations where it looked as if some superstition came true?

  Maybe I’d learn that on my tour.

  I walked until I reached Luck Street. I used a crosswalk to get to the opposite side of Destiny Boulevard. Did people ever cross their fingers for luck when they got into crosswalks?

  I smiled at my own silliness as I proceeded up Luck Street to a building with a large parking lot where several tour vans were parked, all labeled, “Destiny’s Luckiest Tours.”

  I glanced at my watch. My tour wouldn’t leave until ten, and I still had about twenty minutes. I decided to wait in the building.

  As I pulled open the glass door at the front of the smooth concrete building, I saw Evonne Albing, the owner of the tour company whom I’d met at Wishbones-to-Go, behind the front counter. A lot of people were in line, presumably signing up for tours or checking in like me.

  Evonne, in another smooth and attractive business dress, seemed somehow to sense my presence. Ignoring the people in front of her she stood, smiled, and called out, “Hi, Rory. Welcome. Are you ready to experience some of Destiny’s greatest luck? Get ready for your tour!”

  seventeen

  “Thanks, Evonne.” I hurried to the front of the line and shook the hand she held out. She grasped mine warmly for an extra second before letting go.

  I smiled at her, all the while wondering how she knew who I was. Sure, she’d recognized me, but how did she know my name?

  When I’d met Evonne in the Wishbones-to-Go line, she’d introduced herself, but when she told me to give her my name and a time I wanted to take a tour, I’d demurred. She’d left before Carolyn Innes from the button shop indicated she recognized me for assisting Martha after the Destiny Welcome show.

  Well, this was a small town, and I was now more than a tourist. Besides, Arlen knew who I was. But even if he’d described me to Evonne, that didn’t mean she would recognize me.

  Heck, why did I care? This was Destiny, home of superstitions. Maybe there was more woo-woo stuff here, too—like inherent psychic abilities.

  I considered asking her how she knew my name, but Arlen stepped through one of the doors behind the long counter. “Hi, Rory,” he called, then joined Evonne.

  She was looking at a computer screen in front of her. I noticed that Arlen had an earbud in. I couldn’t tell whether Evonne did, too, but they both had similar electronic gizmos clipped to their shirts that could be microphones.

  Was there a camera here somewhere? Probably. This could have been as simple as his seeing me on a screen in a back room and telling Evonne, via the electronics, who I was.

  Impressive to superstitious tourists, maybe, if they pulled the same act on them. I wasn’t impressed.

  “Hi, Arlen,” I finally responded. “I was just over at your aunt’s—upstairs. We had breakfast together.” I considered telling him about the wishbone but decided against it. He was supposed to be the expert on superstitions around here, not me.

  Besides, depending on what happened today on our tour, if neither Martha nor I had any particular good luck, that might prove to me that superstitions had no merit.

  “How is she?” he asked. His red shirt with the Destiny’s Luckiest Tours logo on the pocket hugged surprisingly buff arm muscles.

  “Improving, I think.”

  “Great,” he said. “Now excuse me while I gather our tour group together.”

  Arlen meandered around the crowd for a little while. I saw a display of tour brochures and others for Destiny shops, plus a stack of Destiny Star newspapers.

  I picked up a paper as well as information on some of the shops and restaurants that I recognized, noticing that the Broken Mirror Bookstore was represented here, but the Lucky Dog Boutique was not. I’d already started considering ways to increase the shop’s business. If such a thing didn’t exist, I’d have to do something about it.

  Arlen made an announcement requesting that everyone on the ten o’clock Meet Our Destiny tour get together outside at the van in the parking lot nearest the door. “I’m your guide,” he told us. “Follow me.”

  The van seated a dozen passengers. Arlen directed me to the driver’s side, right behind him. “You should be able to see fine from there as we drive, and you can get in and out quickly at our stops. Oh, and feel free to ask me any questions. I might even have answers.”

  The other seats filled quickly. Considering the number of kids and couples and the Destiny totebags carried in, I figured that everyone else was a tourist.

  Arlen ran through a list of people who’d reserved seats. Then he further introduced himself. “Hi, everyone. Welcome. I’m Arlen Jallopia, and for the next couple of hours I’m going to give you Destiny’s Luckiest Tour.”

  He quickly explained that he had roots here thanks to a family member who’d moved to town years ago—Martha, I was sure, but he didn’t identify her. He’d only been here a comparatively short while but had been enthralled by Destiny’s origin and history and all the superstitions personified by stores and people’s beliefs.

  “We’ll mostly drive past points of interest, although we’ll get out and look around at a few sites. Feel free to ask questions anytime … although if the place and timing could bring any of us bad luck, I reserve the right to let you know that and refuse to answer.”

  He gave a big wink and a wave, then said, “Everyone have your seat belts on? Good. It’s bad luck around here not to wear one while riding in a car or driving. So … let’s go!”

  He got behind the steering wheel, put on his own seat belts, and started the engine.

  As he drove out of the parking lot, he tested his elongated van’s public address system. Everyone could hear him.

  Sitting beside me was a guy who appeared to be in his twenties, with longish blond hair and a short beard. “Is this your first time in Destiny?” he asked, his smile wide.

  “Yes,” I said. “Yours?”

  He nodded. “I’ve wanted to come here ever since I was a kid and first learned to cross my fingers for luck. I’m here with some other guys majoring in sociology at Cal State Fremont. We’re all doing papers on offbeat things people believe, and coming here is part of our research. My name is Barry.”

  He held out his hand expectantly, and I shook it. “I’m Rory.”

  Our van was about to turn onto Destiny Boulevard in the area of town I assumed was its civic center. I’d been there at the nearby Break-a-Leg Theater for the Destiny Welcome, and next door was City Hall. Beyond that was a matching, though smaller, building I assumed was the police station. A bunch of official-looking cars were parked in front of it.

  That must be where Chief Justin Halbertson hung out when he wasn’t harassing old ladies or chatting with—or interrogating— younger ones.

  Okay, maybe that wasn’t fair. He was just doing his job. And I had an urge to talk to him and ask how their investigation into Tarzal’s death was progressing.

  Instead of turning toward town, Arlen turned right. “We’ll come back this way,” he said into his microphone. “But first thing I want to show you is Destiny’s most hysterical—er, historical—area.”

  I knew Arlen was supposed to keep his tour light and even act as a comedian, so maybe there actual
ly would be hysterical humor in what he first showed us.

  For now, he started telling the story I’d heard previously about the origin of Destiny: Its founding by two California Gold Rush Forty-Niners who’d found gold after dashing to the end of a rainbow and had fallen in love with superstitions.

  “Now, you may have heard that story before, including that where those panners found gold wasn’t around here. But did you know that they chose the location for Destiny after chasing the end of another rainbow?”

  That part I hadn’t heard, and I gathered that most, if not all, others on the tour weren’t aware of it, either.

  “Where I’m taking you now,” Arlen said, “was where they ended up—way up in the surrounding mountains. Settling there and planning a town would have been difficult, if not impossible, so they looked around and found a much more suitable locale, which is where Destiny is now. But I’m going to show you a place beloved by those of us who are true superstition freaks, where Destiny could have been located.”

  I assumed the miners hadn’t suffered bad luck by choosing a slightly different location or Arlen would have mentioned it. We went up winding roads that sometimes made me hold my breath in fear that we would tip over and roll down some pretty steep mountains even with guard rails at the edges. But eventually we reached a flat and paved area that was also surrounded by cliffs. A few other tour vans were parked there, too.

  “Let’s all get out and breathe deeply,” Arlen said. “And close our eyes and think of how superstitions can come true.”

  We exited the van, and, along with a crunch of the tourists here from our group and others, I looked at a large sign posted at the end of the parking lot, near a path up the side of a mountain. It described the Forty-Niners, their luck in finding gold thanks to rainbow number one and their decision to found Destiny near the end of rainbow number two—which they happened to claim was right here.

  Interesting. I closed my eyes, breathed in the light, fresh mountain air, and tried to open myself to the possibility that superstitions really were real.

  But when I opened them again, I still—unsurprisingly—had my doubts.

  Arlen came over to me. “What do you think, new resident of Destiny? Are you convinced?”

  “Convinced enough to tell customers at the Lucky Dog Boutique how lucky they’ll be if they buy stuff for their pets there.”

  He laughed. “Fair enough. And now I can tell why Aunt Martha picked you to manage the place. I guess.” His smiled appeared to turn momentarily bitter but he looked away quickly. “Okay, my gang,” he called out. “Let’s get back into the van and continue our tour.”

  The rest of the tour was pretty much what I expected. On the way back to town, Arlen spouted tales of other superstitions that had supposedly come true for residents over the years, indicating that carrying a rabbit’s foot, or wearing the traditional something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue at a wedding brought good luck. Black cats crossing the paths of some people had supposedly caused things to go terribly wrong in their lives—and the worst wrong of all was that several people had had to move away from Destiny thanks to the evil caused by nasty, road-crossing black cats.

  Including the one I’d seen?

  All very interesting, and I could understand why people who believed in superstitions could assume that their good or bad luck resulted from some occurrence they’d been warned about.

  But I still didn’t hear anything that made me certain at last that Warren’s ladder incident had definitely led to his death. Or that it hadn’t.

  If he’d believed in that superstition, then maybe so—since he’d be expecting something to go wrong. But that would also mean he’d have been more careful and would not have walked under that ladder in the first place.

  I sighed as I often did while thinking about my loss. My confusion. My Warren.

  At least this time I didn’t cry.

  Before heading into the heart of town, Arlen drove by some landmarks in the civic center that I hadn’t seen before, including the local library. I promised myself to tell my friend Gemma about it. Better yet, I’d visit it first.

  There were also schools near there, from elementary through middle school and high school.

  “Do the schools here teach superstitions?” asked my seatmate. I imagined that would be important to his research for his sociology paper.

  Arlen responded that each grade level did, in fact, teach something about superstitions appropriate to the age of the children. “I have to admit,” he said, “that from what I’ve heard the students are told that even though Destiny is built around superstitions, they may not be real, so the kids are advised to think for themselves.”

  “I’ll bet they believe in superstitions anyway,” called a female voice from behind us.

  “I’ll bet they do, too,” Arlen said with a laugh.

  Soon, Arlen reached the beginning of Destiny Boulevard again. Once more, everyone got out. This time, we received a brief tour of the Break-a-Leg Theater where the Destiny Welcome had been. Arlen recounted tales of performers over the city’s history who had or hadn’t given the standard exhortation set forth in the theater’s name to one another. Some shows had done well—but the actors or musicians in others had met mysterious fates that the locals of the time had chalked up to someone instead wishing them good luck and thereby bringing on just the opposite to those in that highly superstitious profession.

  Back in the van, Arlen drove slowly down the street, pointing out various stores that I had already noticed or visited, describing their wares, their owners, the superstitions behind their names—and encouraging the tourists to visit them and spend money. All good for the town’s economy, I was certain.

  We reached the area where the Lucky Dog Boutique was, followed by the Broken Mirror Bookstore. Arlen immediately launched into a description in a deep, mournful tone about the town’s foremost superstition expert Kenneth Tarzal, who’d written the most famous book ever on superstitions. And how, somewhere in the middle of the night only a short while ago, he had gone into his store and actually broken a mirror.

  And how a shard from that mirror had given him the bad luck he then expected—when someone used it to kill him.

  There were gasps and nods and murmurs from the time Arlen began his sad, if exaggerated and partially made-up, spiel. Of course everyone there must have heard the story. But what I heard in this group of strangers wasn’t going to help me figure out the truth behind Tarzal’s murder … was it?

  I listened as people speculated. Asked questions, like who had the most to gain by using that piece of mirror to kill Tarzal. Was he married? No. Did he have a girlfriend? Not then. How about his business partner? Yes, he had one but the town’s speculation was that the man had had more to gain by keeping his superstition-expert partner alive. Were there other people who’d fought with him? Well … that was still being investigated.

  I was glad that Arlen didn’t get into that any further. Maybe that was because one of the primary people who’d quarreled with Tarzal was, of course, Arlen’s aunt.

  Then … how about someone no one would suspect, someone who had been harmed by a superstition that, if he’d known about it, or hadn’t known about it, could have protected himself ? Someone who might blame the world’s superstition expert and decide to avenge him or herself on the book’s author.

  Now, that was an interesting angle that I hadn’t previously thought about. But if it was the actual situation, how would I ever learn who had that kind of grudge and acted on it?

  Still … well, it was a different approach. It gave me a reason to go, after this tour, to the police station we had passed a second time a while ago and check in with Justin, mostly to say hi.

  But also to throw this additional idea into the mix of suspect-seeking.

  eighteen

  The tour was over. Arlen par
ked in the lot beside the Destiny’s Luckiest Tours offices, then stood, thanked everyone for coming, and wished them all the best of luck during their stay in Destiny and forever after.

  He climbed out of the van and helped people down the steps—accepting tips from some of them.

  I didn’t give him one. After all, I was becoming a friend—sort of. Besides, I’d treated him to dinner.

  In the parking lot, I said goodbye to my seatmate, Barry—and invited him and his fellow students to the Lucky Dog Boutique after telling him that I was its manager. He admitted to having a dog at home. “Who knows?” I said into his grinning face. “You might find some of the superstitions about pets represented in our goods interesting enough to include in your class projects.”

  I didn’t mention its proximity to the Broken Mirror Bookstore, but Barry’s friends who were hanging out with us kept checking a tour brochure of Destiny’s Luckiest Tours, including a map depicting the town’s layout. If they hadn’t noticed before, they’d now see how close the two shops were.

  Maybe curiosity about the murder would bring them in, even if shopping for doggy gifts didn’t.

  As that conversation ended and people drifted out of the parking lot, I stepped up to Arlen to say goodbye. “This was a really great tour,” I said to him. “And do come by the Lucky Dog anytime to visit.” Maybe I’d find a way to get his aunt to agree to let me hire him part-time to see how he worked out—the better for giving me more flexibility to go home sooner if all went well. If nothing else, seeing him around there would give me a better way of eliminating him—or not—as a murder suspect.

  I started walking back toward the edge of town—to the home of the Destiny Police Department.

  As I walked, I pondered what to say to Justin, assuming the police chief happened to be at the station. How should I approach the subject of whether he’d finally wised up and realized for certain that Martha was innocent, and figured out who’d really killed Tarzal?