by Ana Bisset
“Can we stop talking about men and start eating the pizza?” I said as I got out plates and we dug in. Once our stomachs were satisfied, I was ready to talk through my plan with my BFFs.
“Alright, I am not sure how, but Diego’s murder has something to do with me or mine. Whether it is in my family’s past, something in the carriage house, or something I was doing in Boston that has come to haunt me here, I do not know. But I need to find out. I want to make sure you two are alright with this,” I said.
“I think I may be more alright with it if I knew more about what ‘it’ is,” Nikki said.
“I’m okay with anything you dream up, Libby,” Mel said. “I know Nikki is too. But, she is skittish lately.”
“I’ve never been skittish a day in my life. I am cautiously anxious. Everything I’ve ever wanted is starting to happen. Let’s make sure we don’t screw that up,” she said. “Let us be sure we won’t get into trouble doing this by having a good back-up plan should we get caught.”
“First, we won’t get caught. There is no one there. Second, the backup plan is that we wanted to make sure there wasn’t too much damage to the place since you are thinking of buying it. Very simple,” I said.
“That sounds all fine and dandy, but what if Sheriff-Doesn’t-Believe-You-Didn’t-Know-the-Dead-Guy shows up? You just got back in town. How am I going to explain you being put in jail to your Grammie? I’ve been there once, and I do not want to do that again,” Nikki huffed.
“Sheriff Kyle is not going to be looking for people to break into the old Smith house. Why would they? He is out running down things the state wants him to do,” I said.
“Let’s hope whatever he is doing keeps him busy and us out of trouble,” Nikki said, looking at me.
"Okay, okay. I get it. But I need to know what happened at that house. I told you, I don't know how to explain it, it doesn't make any sense. I feel as if I am tied to this mess. So I have to know what happened," I said.
“What are we looking for tonight?” Nikki said quizzically.
“That’s just it. I’m not sure. There are a ton of questions and no answers. Who had access to the kitchen? What was used to blow it up? Why was it a small explosion? Was it a diversion or was it done to cover some clue? We know that the casket was closed at the Smith house or Richard Miller would have known. Then, it was moved to the funeral home. Was it reopened? Where?”
“That is a lot of questions,” Mel said nodding, “I hope we can find a few answers before somebody catches us,” she shrugged.
I looked over at Mel. “You too? What is going on here? You were just saying it anything was okay with you.”
Mel blew her lavender bangs out of her eyes and slumped down on her couch. “I’m struggling between being supportive and being worried about you. I did four readings today, with different tarot decks and everything! You are in more trouble than you are letting on-or that you know. I’m not sure if going along with this is protecting you or making you further exposed to… to… whatever we don’t want you exposed to.” She threw her hands in the air.
“So, this isn’t about us being ‘adventure rusty’?” I said, making air quotes. They shook their heads. “I’m open to suggestions.”
“Right. That is the crux of it,” Nikki said looking at Mel, “There is nothing to do but this. We need answers that can be found there. So, I vote we go.”
Mel sighed. “I know we have to go. I do not have to like it.”
“Okay, suit up girlfriends, it’s cold outside,” I said.
We all had the right gear to snowmobile, although I had not done it in a long time. Thank goodness I hadn’t gained any weight in the last few years.
“What are you wearing?” Nikki asked Mel.
"My lucky snow boots, they’re warm," she said.
"They’re also pink, bright pink! And they have sparkles! Drivers are going to be able to see you from the road. Heck, they are going to be able to see you from the interstate," Nikki said.
“Let the adventure begin!” I laughed, “we won't be walking near the road. There's a snowmobile path that crosses behind the house. We will snowmobile until we get to the property, pull off to the side, and walked the rest of the way.”
“Wait. What about old Mr. Cratchit, the caretaker?” Nikki asked.
“He is at the church tonight pretending to be a bull for the kids, according to Grammie,” I said, smiling. “It’s Mexican Hat Dance night.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
We left town on our machines and winded around the snow mobile trails towards the Smith house. We arrived in about ten minutes, came up from the back of the property and tucked our machines behind the woodshed. The Smith yard was mostly a clear open space at the center of it, with large pines along the sides of the property line. The night sky was beautiful with a big moon and plenty of stars shining.
This was good and bad. Good, because we could see without our flashlights. Bad, because others could see us, if there were others looking. So we hightailed towards the house along the pathway, leaving fewer footprints. Then, we headed around to the back of the house. We unlocked the back door with the key Nikki got from her Realtor.
The door opened directly into the kitchen which wasn’t as burnt as I thought it should be. Then I opened the door the whole way and turned on my flashlight. It seemed the entire kitchen hadn’t been a part of what had taken place. More the microwave and the area near the window which had been broken and temporarily repaired.
I moved to the center of the room, with Mel following close behind. Nikki went directly to the area that had the worst damages, took out her phone and start taking pictures.
“They are going to need to come down in price for this.” She stepped on glass pieces with her boots. “Be careful over here, there’s glass on the floor,” Nikki said, pointing around the area she was standing.
“That’s odd,” I said. “If the explosion was here,” I pointed to the microwave, “you would think the glass would have broken out.” I looked out the window, noting that these were old, with a window inside and a storm window on the outside. Trying to get a look above the repair job to see the pane of glass that belonged to the storm window. No jagged edges left on the wood pane. I’d have to go outside to see it. I took a quick trip out and looked up at the window and went back inside.
“Someone else came in here after it was locked up. There are footprints in the snow under the window. They pushed the glass that was left on the pane in, so they wouldn’t get cut as they climbed into the kitchen,” I said.
Stepping back from the window I walked over to the microwave. The door had been blown clean off and was sitting across the room on the floor. There was a dent in the wall where it had hit. The floor in front of the unit was burnt and melted with things that looked like batteries stuck to it. I knelt on one knee to get a closer look. They were batteries, 4 clumps of them. Twenty-two volts could be seen in the middle of one clump.
I looked up at Mel who was watching me, “Well, someone definitely did this damage on purpose,” I said.
I walked through the doorway. It was a swinging door into a large dining room, which was open to the living room, a set up like my Grammie’s house only the kitchen was half the size. The dining room table had been moved from where the family had used it for centuries. It was now placed up against the far wall to accommodate the laying out of the casket for John Smith.
The dining room and living room were separated by an open arch. There, paying no attention to me whatsoever, were two ghosts. While I could see them clearly, they were less corporal than that of the ghost of Mr Diego that I had seen earlier in the carriage house. They were in late 18th or early 19th century dress and appeared to only have eyes for each other. I watched with rapt attention, wondering if there was something I was to learn here.
I recognized her as being the sad lady on the porch the day I picked up Mel and Nikki. She was sitting on the duvet, he was standing before her with his hand held out. She took it,
stood, and they began to dance, twirling around the room as if it did not have other furniture in it. Smiling and enjoying the music only they could hear, they faded until all I was looking at were nick-knacks and empty space.
I tried not to be disappointed that there was no message from beyond for me to decipher. But I remembered my grandfather telling me not to expect too much from the dead. They aren’t here for you, he had said. They have their own path.
I turned back to the dining room and noted a server up along the wall with the door that held the family’s china, dinnerware and crystal. There was a closet on the back wall that must have been blocked by the casket itself when it was here. I opened the closet door to see what was inside and was surprised to find it held nothing. Not one thing - totally empty. I stepped in, noted a circular notch about waist high to the left of me, and felt cool air on my face as if the wall was not insulated. The placement of the closet put it above the basement steps, maybe the cool air was coming from there. But my feet were not cold. I put my hand on the back wall and noticed it was cold to the touch. I pushed at the notch and felt a handle. Turning it, the wall opened, and I lost my balance. I fell forward, three feet down into a pile of snow.
I must have let out a yelp as I heard Mel and Nikki in unison, “Libby!”
But that isn’t all I heard. There was also the cocking of a shot gun. It drew my attention away from something shiny in the snow.
“You want to explain to me why your snooping around, little lady?”
“If you point that thing the other way, Mr. Cratchit, I’ll tell you all about it,” I said.
He huffed, “Me putting this gun down is going to depend on your answer.”
“This is the Sheriff. Put it down, Mr. Cratchit,” Kyle said as he walked up behind him.
Cratchit lowered the gun and said, “I wasn’t going to shoot her. The gun is not even loaded. Although, it would be my right since she is trespassing. That’s twice now I saw someone up here at night since Mr. Smith died.”
Picking myself up out of the snow now that I didn’t have a 22-gauge pointing at my head, I noted the various areas of my body that were going to hurt later, but nothing was broken. I turned and looked up at the doorway where Mel and Nikki were still standing. I was lucky I didn’t get hurt as I had fallen a good 3-feet.
“Well, we’ve only been here tonight, this one time,” I said.
“Which is one time too many, considering it’s off limits,” Sheriff Kyle said as he pointed it out. “Did you not remember that when you were breaking in?”
“We didn’t break in. I have a key. The real estate agent said I could check the place out,” Nikki offered.
“I’m sure that was before what happened,” Kyle said, “You two get out here and don’t touch anything on your way out!”
“You sound frustrated,” I said, turning the screws on his bad mood. I know it was petty and wasn’t going to get me out of this situation, but it soothed my inner left-at-the-alter demons.
“Not now, Libby,” he said. Good to know he could still read my mind when I wanted him too. “What is taking them so long?”
“Probably trying to figure out how to put the bloody drop cloth back under the kitchen sink,” I said.
He looked at me to gauge if I was serious, closed his eyes and shook his head. Then, he took a deep breath. “Follow me, both of you.”
He walked up the back porch steps and into the kitchen. I followed directly behind him - which was always a good view - and Mr. Cratchit was behind me. He closed the door.
“Is there a light in here that is working?” Kyle asked Cratchit.
The old man went into the hall and turned on the switch. The light illuminated the kitchen in the doorway but didn’t go much further. “Best I can do for now. With the fire and all, the wiring for the kitchen lights are fried.”
Nikki took out her notebook and wrote that down. “Okay, you are not doing a real estate buy right now. Show me where you put the drop cloth.” She went to open the cabinet. “No!” he said, “just point.”
Mel and I stood to the side of the room trying to look small and stay out of the way while Kyle checked the cabinet. After he got a good look at it, her turned to me and said, “Where is that door you fell out of?”
“In the dining room, in a closet.” We all went out the side kitchen door and into the dining room. It was cold because the door was still open. Kyle walked over to the doorway, holding on to the side wall, he reached out, grabbed the handle and closed the door. He took a step out of the closet and stared at the spot where the opening had been.
“Mr Cratchit, do you have any idea why there is a door to the outside in this closet,” Kyle asked.
“Yeah, that’s the death door.”
“The death door?” Kyle said.
“Right, the death door. You can’t carry out the dead using the same door that the living walk in. You’d darken the soul of your home.”
We all turned and look at Cratchit as if he were crazy.
“Geez,” he shook his head, “don’t tell me not one of you knows how your great grandfathers handled their dead? Before there were funeral homes, you laid out your loved ones at home. Paid them the respect they were due. Then, you carried them out feet first through the death door,” he said.
“Why is this one in the closet?” Mel asked, looking in the closet as if something else was going to pop up.
“Well it’s been there on the back wall since this part of the house was built. When they dug the basement and needed a way into it from inside the house, they added the steps along the back of the house, added this wall, and made the dining room a little smaller, but they kept the death door by putting a closet door there.”
He took off his hat out of respect when he started talking about his recently deceased boss. “The current Mr. Smith had it sealed when his new bride told him she didn’t like it. Made her get a chill. Well, she’s long gone and time has gone by, I guess. About a year or so ago, he had it reopened because he wanted to be laid out and carried out the door of his home like his grandfather was when he was a kid.”
“Does anyone else know about the door?” Kyle asked.
“I expect many of the old folk in town do, they would have had death doors in their homes too. Anybody that was here when he was carried out, like the funeral director,” Mr Cratchit said.
Kyle nodded, then asked, “When I was walking up outside, you told Libby that it was the second time she was here?”
“Yeah, early the night of the service someone was out there skulking around. I checked in the undertaker lady and she said she hadn’t seen no one. So, I left.”
“Leah? Was she by herself?” I asked.
“Yup, said she was doing last minute checks and straightening up,” He said.
“But…” I began.
Kyle looked at me, annoyed. “If you don’t mind, the press can get the story when it’s all said and done,” he said.
“Mr. Cratchit, I’m going to need you to come down to my office tomorrow and give us a statement. Okay?” Kyle asked.
“Sure Sheriff, if you think it will keep people off the property, I’ll do that.” With a nod, he took his shot gun and left. But not before adding, “You girls wait until the police are all done, then come see me and I will show you around the property. That way you can see it proper, the way it’s meant to be seen. Then, you decide if you want to buy it.” And he walked out the door.
“That was really nice of him to offer,” Nikki said, looking confused. Mel bit her lip and looked to be in deep thought.
“Really, what got into him?” I said.
“Considering he had a gun on you earlier, I wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” Kyle said. “Now what am I going to do with the three of you?”
The mention of the gun being pointed at me reminded me that I thought I had seen something before hearing it cocked. “I don’t know what you are going to do with us, but I know what I need to do.” I walked over to the c
loset, opened the death door and jumped.
“Are you totally insane?” Kyle yelled out of the door.
“It’s only three feet, and I wanted to be where I landed.” I sat down in the snow and, using my flashlight, I looked off to the right. I saw something glint, like metal reflecting off the flashlight beam. “There it is,” I pointed. Kyle jump out of the house and walked over to where I was pointing.
“Nikki, can you go out front and get me the knapsack out of the trunk of my vehicle?” Kyle asked, handing her his keys.
“Sure thing,” Nikki said, Mel went along too.
Kyle looked impressed, “What did you do to tame her?” he said.
“Wasn’t me. I think we are all just tired,” I said.
Nikki and Mel came around the corner with the knapsack and gave it to Kyle. He took out gloves, a plastic evidence bag, and a large pair of tweezers. He picked up the item and put it in the bag. “Looks like a cuff link. Got a diamond chip in it. I’ll have to give it to the state forensics when they get here tomorrow,” he said.
“Shame the state gets all the fun,” I said.
“Well, I don’t really think murder is fun. So, I would rather not have to chase around after it,” Kyle said, trying to make some sort of point. “You ladies need to get on your snow mobiles, turn them toward town, and head on home. I’m are going to be here awhile putting up police tape to keep others from stomping all over my crime scene. I’ll catch up with you all tomorrow. Be ready to answer a few questions.”
I couldn’t help but think that was a warning aimed directly at me.