I don’t understand why he told you that I’d be accompanying him to San Elizario. It pains me to inform you that the information he gave you was false. In truth, on the twentieth of last December I met Cole Joseph on the street outside my boarding house as he was preparing to ride west. As he had mentioned earlier, on at least two occasions, he saw his future not in Texas, but in California. He was planning to travel with a young woman whose name I do not know.
Andy folded the letters again and tucked them into the poetry book.
Coley Joe had been shot and killed. His identification and his family’s money had been stolen, and a terrible lie had been told about him—a lie that would keep Felicity, as well as his parents, from hunting for him.
What am I going to do? Andy wondered. His search for Coley Joe had turned up the truth, as he had hoped. But the truth meant that Andy’s best friend’s great-great-great-great-grandfather—a founding father and leading citizen in Hermosa—had been a liar, a thief, and a murderer!
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Andy was still shaky when he arrived at the Gasper house. Although Mrs. Martinez tried to tease him as she led him to Miz Minna’s room, he couldn’t even manage a smile.
“Don’t be scared of Miz Minna,” Mrs. Martinez whispered. “She rarely bites.”
Andy didn’t try to explain. He just shook his head and followed Lila Martinez into Miz Minna’s room.
“How about a Coke? And brownies?” Mrs. Martinez asked Andy.
“No thanks,” Andy said. “I’m not hungry.” He pressed a hand against his stomach, which ached the way it had when he’d come down with the flu.
Miz Minna was seated in her big armchair, pearls draped in two long rows across her chest, a faded cloth-covered book in her hands. She bowed her head toward Andy as though she were queen and he had come to ask a favor.
“Sit down over there, Andy,” she said in a voice as warm as honey. “Be careful of the flowers. Don’t tump over that vase.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Andy said.
As Mrs. Martinez left, Miz Minna held up the book so that Andy could see it. He reached for it, but she snatched it back. “I told you I had the first James Jonathan Gasper’s journal. Remember?”
“Yes,” Andy said.
“And I told you I had proof that your Coley Joe Bonner was a thief.”
“No, Miz Minna. You don’t.”
“What do you mean, I don’t?” Her eyes darkened, and her gaze flickered across Andy’s face. “I do, indeed, have proof, and I’m going to read it to you right now.”
Miz Minna opened the journal to a page marked with a bookmark and read aloud, “ ‘Coley Joe Bonner’s parents contacted me by mail and asked if I knew the whereabouts of their son. It took me by surprise. I didn’t know he had given them my name. There was nothing to do but inform them that their son had headed west to seek his fortune in California.’ ”
She closed the book and smiled triumphantly. “There you have it,” she said. “The words are in his own handwriting.”
Andy stared into Miz Minna’s eyes. “You don’t believe what he wrote, either,” he said. “That’s why the warnings. You’re the one who’s been threatening me.”
Miz Minna gasped, her hands flying to her throat. “What are you talking about? What warnings? What threats?”
“Until a little while ago I didn’t know who wanted to stop me from finding out the truth about Coley Joe, or why it would be important to anyone.” Andy sighed. “I even wondered once if it might be J.J., because the warnings had to do with things I’d told only him. But you knew, too. You asked J.J. what I was discovering, and he trusted you. He told you.”
“This is ridiculous,” Miz Minna said.
“When you telephoned me half an hour ago, you said that this was one warning I’d pay attention to. So you knew about the others. You sent me the others.”
She smoothed down her skirt with nervous fingers and picked up a small brass bell. “You’d better leave. I’ll ring for Lila.”
“Miz Minna,” Andy said. “I have proof, too. Mine comes from a newspaper called The Lone Star. In an article in the paper that told what San Elizario was like after the last battle of the Salt Wars, the reporter described the body of Coley Joe. He’d been shot in the back of the head. His money, his ID, his shirt, and his coat had all been stolen. But the murderer had left something he didn’t know was valuable. He’d left the Bonner circle around Coley Joe’s neck.”
Andy pulled his own circle from inside his shirt and held it out so that Miz Minna could see it.
She stared, not at the circular nail, but at Andy, her face so pale that little spots of pink rouge on her cheeks stood out like a rash.
“For many years, since you and Miss Winnie were kids, you made her unhappy by telling her what you just read to me,” Andy said. “But I think that when you got so interested in the genealogy of your family and started adding things up, you realized the famous James Jonathan Gasper the First was a liar, a thief, and a murderer. Then when I began searching for information about Coley Joe, you got scared that I’d find out, too, and Miss Winnie and the rest of Hermosa would know the truth.”
Miz Minna cried out, “How can you say such a horrible thing?”
“Because it’s true, Miz Minna,” Andy said. “The first J.J. was a clerk, in a low-paying job. How did he suddenly come into enough money to move to Hermosa and establish both a store and a bank?”
“I—I … there are many ways of acquiring investment money.”
“Coley Joe didn’t ride west. Coley Joe was murdered in San Elizario by the first James Jonathan Gasper. The newspaper article, along with some letters, proves it.”
“What letters?”
“Two letters his mother had hidden and saved. One was written by Coley Joe and names James Jonathan Gasper as the friend who was leading him to San Elizario. The other letter was the terrible lie James Jonathan wrote.”
Miz Minna shrunk back and gripped the arms of the chair with bloodless fingers. “If you write the story for that contest J.J. told me about, you’ll destroy our entire family. You’ll destroy James Jonathan Gasper’s memory.”
“I know,” Andy said. “Believe me, on the way over here I thought hard about that.” He clasped his hands, staring down at them for a few moments before he looked up at Miz Minna. “But knowing the truth will make Miss Winnie feel an awful lot better. And if I win the statewide essay contest, it will make my parents real proud.”
“The Gasper name has long been honorable.”
“There’s nothing honorable about murder,” Andy answered. “And there’s nothing honorable about what you did. You knew that your family had cheated the Bonner family out of a large sum of money, and you hid the information.”
“I beg you, don’t write the essay,” Miz Minna pleaded.
“Please don’t say that, Miz Minna.” Andy squirmed uncomfortably. “You don’t have to beg. I’m going to do what I think is right, and you ought to think about doing what’s right, too.”
“Which is?”
“I’m not sure yet,” Andy answered. “There’s a lot of people involved in this story. Some of them are going to have to give up something. Others are going to come out ahead. I don’t want to hurt anybody, Miz Minna. Trust me. There’s been too much hurt already.”
Andy felt a little sick as he walked away from Miz Minna. She had shrunken into a pitiful old lady who looked at least a hundred years old. He let himself out of the house, climbed on his bike, and fastened his helmet.
“Find out what the Bonners have got to tell you,” Elton Gillie had said. Well, maybe now it was time to ask another question of a Bonner who had given him answers: Grace Elizabeth, Coley Joe’s mother.
It didn’t take long to pedal out of town and onto the highway that led to the cemetery. The gate stood open, although there was no sign of Elton.
The tombstones cast late-afternoon shadows, and the silence was broken only by soft rustles and snips among the long grass.<
br />
Andy easily found Malcolm John Bonner’s dark red stone. Next to it was a smaller, modest stone in yellow sandstone, with the name Grace Elizabeth Bonner, the dates of her birth and death—twelve years before her husband’s—and the inscription “devoted wife and mother.”
“Miz Grace Elizabeth, I got your letters,” Andy said. “And I’ve got the proof that Coley Joe was murdered in San Elizario. I even know the name of the murderer.”
As he said the words, a burst of excitement shot through his body like bubbles from a Coke that had been given a good shaking up. “Hey, did you hear that?” he shouted. “I solved a murder that took place around a hundred and twenty years ago! I really did!”
Andy could picture Miss Winnie’s rejoicing, Mom’s and Dad’s happy praise, Mr. Hammergren’s big grin. Andy saw himself beaming at the television cameras—J.J. at his side—as he said, “I’m happy to accept this Texas State History Award because I …”
J.J. at his side.
Soberly, he turned his thoughts back to Grace Elizabeth. “I’ve got a problem, ma’am,” he said. “You see, J.J. Gasper the Seventh is my best friend. I wouldn’t want to do anything that would hurt my best friend.”
Andy sat on a nearby tombstone and leaned forward, turning his bicycle helmet around and around in his hands. “I know you’d want your son’s name cleared. Any mother would. And I can do that if I tell Miss Winnie only up to the part where Coley Joe was shot in San Elizario. He didn’t run off with his family’s money. He wasn’t a thief. He was caught in a mob and shot and robbed. That’s all Miss Winnie needs to know. That’s enough to bring Coley Joe out of the shadows. Miss Winnie won’t think of asking who did it, because she won’t believe anyone could find out. So she’ll be satisfied.”
Andy cleared his throat before he could speak again. “It’s kind of embarrassing to say, ma’am, but Miss Winnie’s the only one any more who really suffers that much about the so-called family scandal. I mean, Grandma and Grandpa worry about how Miss Winnie feels, but they aren’t upset about what Coley Joe did or didn’t do. And I don’t think my parents mind one way or the other.”
The cemetery seemed even more silent than before until a bee buzzed through the sprigs of clover and sailed lazily on.
“I’m trying to say that if I write about Coley Joe’s murder, I can’t give any clues as to who did it. I can’t put in finding out anything about the first James Jonathan Gasper, because somebody else might start figuring things out. I even have to leave out parts of the letters to you and to Felicity, so it may not be much of a report when I get right down to it. So I’m asking, Is that okay with you?”
From the corners of his eyes Andy saw Elton Gillie approaching, lumbering up the rise like a short, fat bear.
“Hey, there,” Elton said, as he came near. “You still tryin’ to get answers from the Bonners?”
“Yeah, I guess,” Andy said.
“And not doin’ too good this time. I can tell from your face.” Elton chuckled. “Remember, I told you, the dead can slip you an idea or two, but there are some things, like the big answers, you got to figure out for yourself.”
The big answers. Of course. Those big answers belonged to Andy, and he was sure now what he was going to do.
He stood up and grinned. His worries had disappeared so fast, he was light-headed. If Elton hadn’t been standing right in front of him, Andy would have jumped around and yelled and laughed like a maniac.
“I found out what I wanted, so I’m going along home,” Andy said to Elton. “I’ve got something real important to tell my great-aunt Winnie, and it won’t wait.”
One Thing Leads to Another … and Another
As he had planned, Andy told Miss Winnie only the part of the story that had to do with Coley Joe’s death and the robbery that had followed. Miss Winnie shed buckets of tears for poor Coley Joe, whose memory had been so unfairly tarnished. Then she cried for happiness that finally the truth had been made known.
Grandma Dorothy made Andy his favorite chocolate cake, and Grandpa Zeke bought him a real pro basketball. For two days Andy was king in his household. But celebrations don’t last forever, so he soon found himself once again taking out the trash, doing the dinner dishes, and raking leaves.
Andy entered the statewide history essay contest by writing about his search for Coley Joe, leaving out anything that could possibly lead back to the first James Jonathan Gasper. His story ended with Coley Joe, on his way to buy cattle, being surrounded, robbed, and killed as the mob of looters escaped into Mexico.
Mr. Hammergren gave Andy an A on the essay, an A on his family’s oral history report, and an A on his report card. Andy’s essay didn’t win the first-place scholarship in the contest, but after Mr. Hammergren told the news director of the local television station about Andy’s project, the news crew came out to the school and videotaped him anyway.
J.J., as Andy’s best friend and agent, stood proudly at his side.
Miz Minna hosted an elegant tea party, at which Miss Winnie was guest of honor. Miz Minna announced that she had established a foundation honoring Cole Joseph Bonner. The purpose of the foundation would be to provide full college scholarships to worthy students in Hermosa. The first recipient would be Andrew Thomas.
The topic of conversation after the party was not the very large amount of money Miz Minna had put into the foundation. It was Miz Minna’s gracious behavior. Not even the eldest of the elderly women in Hermosa’s social circle could ever remember Miz Minna’s being so well behaved.
Andy reframed the old Bonner family photograph, this time with Coley Joe in it. He bought a small metal strongbox, locked away the letters that would have incriminated James Jonathan Gasper, and hid the box at the bottom of his closet behind his sweaty gym shoes and socks, where it would be safe for a million years.
And Andy, proud of being a Bonner through his father’s side of the family, wore around his neck, night and day, the leather thong with the Bonner family’s circle.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Texas, the Lone Star State, is large enough to fit fifteen of our fifty states inside its borders and have a thousand square miles left over. It is said that Texas folk hero Pecos Bill used a hurricane to fan himself. At one time Texas was an independent nation, the Republic of Texas. The republic’s flag, with its Lone Star, remains the state flag today. Texas joined the Union as the twenty-eighth state in 1845.
With its many lakes and streams, Texas is second only to Alaska in volume of inland water, but it has vast stretches of desert land. It’s made up of mountains and minerals, caverns and canyons, seashore and seashells, farms and forests, museums and monuments, bougain-villeas and bluebonnets, cowboys and cattle, ranches and rattlesnakes, prairies and petroleum, cities and country stores, and sunshine and swamps. Texas has dinosaur bones to recall the past and wildlife refuges to protect the future. And it’s the site of NASA and the magnificent Johnson Space Center, in Houston.
The battle at the Alamo and the Battle of San Jacinto are two of the most famous Texas battles for freedom and independence. But there were other, lesser-known battles, fought to preserve what was right. One of these, in 1877, was the Texas Salt Wars. Search for the Shadowman explores this unique and exciting period of Texas history.
JOAN LOWERY NIXON has been called the grande dame of young adult mysteries. She is the author of more than 130 books for young readers and is the only four-time winner of the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Young Adult Novel. She received the award for The Kidnapping of Christina Lattimore, The Séance, The Name of the Game Is Murder, and The Other Side of Dark, which also won the California Young Reader Medal.
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