by JoAnna Carl
I picked it up warily, expecting to find a nasty note from Gordon Hitchcock or one of his fellow newshounds. But the note was from Jason Foster.
“Yikes!” I said. “If Jason came by, we should have let him in.”
The note was hand-printed on paper torn from a lined yellow tablet.
Hey, Lee! You’re so hassled I don’t blame you for not answering the door. I have an emergency request, and if you can’t handle it, I’ll understand.
The West Michigan Tourism Council is coming tomorrow to check out WinterFest. They’re meeting for breakfast at Warner Point at ten a.m. Do you have any of the ten-inch snowmen? I’d like to use ten of them for centerpieces.
The bad news is we’re starting to set up at seven a.m., and I’d need them before that. You’ll have to bring them to the front door.
Sorry to be a pain.
Jason
I was tired, and I wanted to go home—even if that home turned out to be haunted by reporters and photographers. But there was no way I could turn down Jason’s request. First, he was a friend, and you don’t let your friends down. Second, for a merchant in Warner Pier, the West Michigan Tourism Council was a big deal. I could get a lot of business from the members—if they were impressed with our product. I resolved not only to find ten snowmen, but to send along several dozen two-piece boxes of TenHuis bonbons and truffles as little gifts for the council members.
So I shooed the counter girls out, then began packing up chocolate. Luckily there were plenty of snowmen and we had lots of two-piece boxes ready, some in seasonal colors and others in the standard TenHuis box, white with blue ribbon. But ten snowmen, each weighing a pound and a half, made two sizable boxes, mainly because each snowman required so much packing material to keep it safe. I used our sturdiest boxes and tied each box up with string so that it had a handle. The two-piece boxes weighed only an ounce each, but since three dozen of them meant thirty-six tiny boxes—each box roughly three inches long, an inch and a half wide, and an inch and a quarter tall—they filled several smaller boxes. I put those in a plastic sack and tied the top so that it had a handle, too.
I loaded all the chocolate into my van, then went home. I was relieved to find that no reporters were lying in wait. I carried the chocolate inside so it wouldn’t freeze, and put it in the back hall so it wouldn’t get too hot. Joe had fixed his usual dinner of frozen lasagna and bagged salad, and that night it looked good. After we ate I stood in the shower for half an hour. Then I got in bed and put my arms around the best-looking guy in west Michigan. He responded in a suitable manner.
At six fifteen the next morning, I hit my alarm at the first tinkle, trying not to wake Joe up. It was Sunday morning, after all, and as I had told Chuck Pinkney, we weren’t regular churchgoers.
I didn’t make coffee. I figured it would take only thirty minutes to deliver those chocolates to Warner Point. Maybe I’d stop at the doughnut shop on the way back and save myself the trouble of putting the cereal box on the table.
It was, of course, still pitch-dark as I turned onto the Warner Point driveway at six forty-five. The gated entry that the property had had when it was owned by Clementine Ripley was no longer there, and I could see the lights of the main building. The silly-looking snowman still stood near the wide front door. It had snowed lightly overnight, and a dusting of white covered the broad stone steps.
I parked the van on the semicircular drive, put my car keys in my jeans pocket, and got out. I wondered idly why Jason wanted me to bring the chocolates in the front door. Ordinarily deliveries would be made directly to the kitchen. But I didn’t wonder about it too much. I simply popped the rear door of the van, pulled out the two heavy boxes of snowmen, and picked up the lighter but equally bulky sack of two-piece boxes. The handles I had tied meant I was able to carry all of them, though I had to leave my purse in the van. Then I walked up the steps, past the giant snowman, and knocked on the door.
There was no reaction. I didn’t hear anybody moving inside. Maybe I should go around to the back. But Jason had specifically said come to the front.
I knocked again. Still no answer.
The keypad that opened the restaurant’s front door was staring me in the face. I’m not a number person for nothing. Of course, Jason had probably changed the code since the days when Joe and I used to come by and check on the property. . . . .
It was worth a try. I reached for the keypad and punched in the four magic numbers.
But before I could try the handle, something moved in the corner of my eye. I turned to see what it was.
The big, silly snowman was moving toward me. And he was swinging his snow shovel above his head.
Chapter 14
I hit the snowman with twenty pounds of chocolate.
That wouldn’t have done him much harm if the chocolate hadn’t been in two solid cardboard boxes with sharp corners, and if the snowman hadn’t been standing on the snow-covered flagstone steps of Warner Point. But luckily the chocolate boxes actually were heavy and solid and had sharp corners. And the snowman was really standing on those steps, and the flagstones were covered with a light layer of snow. The combination meant my attack had more impact than might have been expected.
The snowman dodged to avoid my blow and dodging made his foot slip. His snow shovel descended through the air like some sort of enormous fan, but it missed me. I swung my boxes wildly one more time. I hit him in the head, and his feet went out from under him. He fell over backward, landing hard on his rump.
Now what should I do? The snowman was already scrambling around, trying to get to its feet. I couldn’t rely on two boxes and a plastic sack of chocolate to be effective weapons for another attack. I had to get away.
I jumped around mentally—and probably physically. How could I escape? Should I get in the van? No. The back deck was still gaping open, and I’d turned off the motor and put the ignition key in the pocket of my jeans. By the time I could get in the driver’s seat, dig out that key, and lock the doors—well, I just didn’t have time to do that before the snowman climbed in through the back deck. And if I stopped to slam the back deck, I wouldn’t have time to get in the van, dig out the key, and start the engine.
Should I run for the front gate? It was a long way away—like half a block—and I’d be in full view of the snowman all the way. That didn’t seem to be a good idea. What if he had a gun? What if he could run faster than I could?
And even if I got out the front gate without being caught or shot, I’d still be running along an open road for between a quarter and a half a mile before I could reach a house, which might be an empty summer cottage.
My cell phone was in my purse on the floor of the van’s front seat. And besides, Warner Point was a dead zone for cell phones. I had no quick way to call for help.
While my mind was analyzing the possible escape routes, my feet had already taken off running. They had decided that the smartest thing I could do was get out of sight as quickly as possible. They jumped down the steps and ran past the snowman, on a path parallel to the front of the building. When I figured out where my feet were taking me, I realized my aim was to get around the corner, where I could dodge into some landscaping.
This seemed to be as good an idea as any. I was somewhat familiar with the terrain at Warner Point, and the snowman might not be. Besides, as soon as I got off those front steps, where the outdoor light was shining, it was still night.
I pounded along the driveway for thirty feet or so. Then I cut diagonally across the snow-covered lawn. The snow was deeper there, but that early in the winter, it wasn’t too awfully deep. I lifted my feet up high and ran like a marching gazelle, past the banks of French doors that lined the main dining room.
When I got to the corner of the building, I swung around it without pausing. There were banks of shrubbery at that end—the west end—and I jumped into them. It was dark back there. The light from the porch was now fifty or sixty feet away and around a corner. I nestled into the dark and i
nched along the wall, moving toward the back of the building.
When I found myself behind a big evergreen, I stopped moving. I stood behind it, my back to the stone wall. I stayed still, or as still as I could with my knees knocking.
There was no sign of sunrise yet. It was very dark. I was well away of Warner Point’s only outside light, but I was still afraid I might be easy to see because the snow on the ground and on the trees made everything brighter. I was wearing my red ski jacket. Would it look dark in the predawn duskiness? Or would it stick out like a poinsettia tossed into a snowbank? Would my white knit cap blend with the snow on the evergreen? Or would it stand out against the shrub like a snowball in a coal bin?
Before I could decide if my hidey-hole was safe or not, the snowman appeared. I could see him through the branches of the evergreen, but I could only hope he couldn’t see me.
Actually, I could barely see him. It was that dark. Even though I had expected him to appear, all I could make out was a sort of general movement, a blob of white moving against the snow and the darker trees.
I held my breath. Then I saw a flash of light.
Damn! The snowman had a flashlight. If he turned it toward me, that red jacket was going to leap into his view.
But he didn’t splash the light around. He kept it on the ground. I realized he was following my footprints.
I couldn’t let him trap me between the evergreen and the wall of the building. I had to move.
Again the possibility that the snowman might have a gun hit me like a chunk of ice in the midriff. Then I told myself that was silly. If he’d had a gun, why would he have tried to hit me with a shovel?
Was he carrying the shovel now? I peered through the branches of the evergreen. I thought I saw the handle of the shovel. If he had the snow shovel in one hand and a flashlight in the other, I told myself, the only way he could be carrying a pistol would be in his teeth. Not too likely. Unless he had it in his pocket.
I began to edge along the wall, toward the back of the building.
As I moved, my sheltering evergreen shuddered all over. I froze. Would the snowman see the motion? Would it reveal where I was?
I couldn’t tell what the creature was doing. I just knew I couldn’t stay where I was. I kept edging along the side of the building behind the bushes, trying to watch the giant snowman as I moved. But I could see hardly anything except a quick blast of light from his flashlight now and then.
Why didn’t he simply turn the darn thing on? Was he afraid that someone driving down the road would see a flash of light where none should be? I didn’t understand what he was doing, but I was grateful he wasn’t searching the bushes for me.
I kept moving along, trying to keep ahead of the thing following me. Then I turned the next corner, and there were no more bushes to hide behind. I’d reached the big terrace outside the main dining room.
The terrace was a broad expanse of flagstones. Jason used it for cocktail parties and extra seating in the summer. Now it was empty. Its tables, chairs, and umbrellas had been stored away, tucked in for the winter in some storage shed. It was surrounded by a low stone wall, and a smoothly manicured lawn—now covered with snow—grew right up to that wall.
At the opposite end of the terrace was an evergreen hedge, a hedge that blocked any view of what was behind it. I’d been around Warner Point enough to know what was there, however; behind the hedge was a fence, and behind the fence was the kitchen entrance to the restaurant. If there was anybody at the restaurant, the kitchen was where they’d be, getting ready for the big brunch. I could pound on the door and scream. There was a chance someone would hear me.
Like the main entrance, the kitchen entrance had a door with a keypad. If I got there, and nobody was inside, maybe—if I was lucky—the code I had in my head would open that door.
But to get to the kitchen door, I had to cross that broad terrace and get around that hedge. And there was no cover, no friendly shrubbery I could hide behind.
But I couldn’t stay where I was, crouched behind the last bush on the west side of the building.
I took a deep breath and ran. I didn’t try to climb over the little stone wall. I detoured around it. The snow was deeper out on the lawn. I did my marching gazelle act again, picking up my knees in a gait that must have looked as ridiculous as doing it felt.
I could hear the squeak of steps behind me, but I kept running. I slipped in the snow, but I kept running. I tripped over something—I had no idea what it was—but I didn’t fall, and I kept running.
I passed the terrace, and I swung around the hedge. And I almost fell flat. I’d been running through snow, but the walk behind the hedge had been shoveled, so it had only a light covering of snow, the dusting that had fallen overnight. My gazelle gait didn’t work there. I slid, but I caught myself against the fence, and I kept going for that back door.
There was a light over it, and the light was on. But when I pounded on the door, no one answered. There was a window, but the light inside was dim, a night-light of some sort.
The keypad. I had to try the keypad. I punched in the numbers that I remembered from the times I’d seen Joe use them, and I hit ENTER. I turned the handle.
It didn’t respond. The door stayed locked. Had I used the wrong numbers?
Frantically, I punched them in again. Again the handle wouldn’t move. I tried a third time, leaning over to make sure I was touching the right series of numbers, pressing each button firmly.
The handle stayed solid. It did not turn.
The door was not going to open. And I was trapped in a narrow passageway with a solid fence on one side and a wing of the building on the other.
I bolted back the way I’d come. When I got to the end of it, I looked left. The snowman wasn’t twenty feet away. He threw the snow shovel at me.
It missed. I screamed.
Then I ran to my right. I crossed the service drive—it had been plowed, but I skidded in the new layer of snow that covered the concrete. Then I cut left, out into the snow-covered grounds of Warner Point.
As I ran, I cursed Clementine Ripley’s architect. Oh, I’d cursed Clementine Ripley many a time for the mean things she did to Joe, but this was the first time I’d cursed the architect who had designed her Warner Point house.
I cursed him because Warner Point is not built like a normal building. It’s not a big rectangular block. No, Warner Point is like a series of buildings held together by glass corridors that go off in several directions. I’d run around the easy part; running around the rest of it would be like tracing the outline of a spider in the snow. The structure had long legs with buildings at the ends.
So I took off across the snow, trying to judge—in the dadgum dark—just how far I’d have to go to get around the east end of the dadgum building. There was no other direction to go. If I ran out into the woods, I’d soon come to Lake Michigan or to the Warner River or to the high stone wall Clementine Ripley had built to keep out the curious. Now it would keep me in.
So I cursed that architect and ran on past that wall of glass. That particular corridor led, I knew, to a building Clementine had used as a guesthouse. The corridor was about fifty feet long, but I’ll swear that I ran at least five hundred feet to get past it. I could see the glass that lined it glinting. I couldn’t see much, but when the glinting stopped I knew I’d come to the small stone building that held four guest suites—two upstairs and two down. I moved over next to the wall and felt my way to the corner of the building. As soon as I was around that corner, I dropped to my knees—don’t ask me why—and looked back the way I’d come, toward the main building and the terrace.
There was no light, true, except for the little that leaked from the industrial lamp over the kitchen door. But there were no big trees in that area either.
Nothing was moving out there.
I knelt there, squinting my eyes, looking everywhere for that nightmarish snowman.
And far away, on the other side of the building,
I heard a car’s engine start up. The sounds of the motor grew a bit louder; then they faded away behind me.
A car had started up on the part of the drive on the east side of the house. And the car had driven away, apparently leaving the grounds.
Did I dare hope that the snowman had given up?
I got to my feet, and for the first time, I realized that I was still holding all that chocolate. I’d run through all that snow clutching about twenty pounds of chocolate.
I decided I could carry my sacks a little farther. I walked on around the guesthouse, peeking around the corners before I ventured out onto a new side. I made a wide circuit around the whole Warner Point building, being careful not to get close to a bush, a fence, or any other place where someone could be waiting in ambush.
When I got to the other end of the service drive—it wound all over the place before it got to that kitchen area where I’d crossed it earlier—I was able to see that a car had parked there and had recently driven off. I was careful not to step in the tracks of its tires, but they were not very distinct.
I followed the drive on around to the front of the house, eventually coming out on the circular drive where I’d started. I could see my van, still standing there with the back hatch gaping open.
I stood at the corner of the building for a long time, looking the scene over. There was light, of course, from that lone lamp at the entrance to the restaurant. The scene was absolutely still. Not a breeze ruffled a bush. Not an animal moved. No owls swooped through the trees.
That van stood there, enticing me, luring me. It had a heater, and I was really cold. It had locks on the doors. I could get inside, slam those doors, and be safe. I could start the motor and get the hell out of there.
Slowly I approached the van. Still nothing moved.
I walked up to the back and slammed the rear door.