“Did you tell them my thoughts on Luke and Holly?”
“Yes, and they are both high on their suspect list.” He smiled down at me. “Show me what you found out today.”
I pulled out my notebook and showed him the copied pages from the few known paragraphs of the speech. “Here are a few pages of the Lincoln-Douglas Debates and the beginnings of a few speeches. I searched as much as possible but found nothing more. The speech is mentioned in a few textbooks but with the same outcome. The scholars claim Lincoln threw it away.”
“We don’t have anything new. We’re kind of back where we began, aren’t we?” Aaron sat straighter, then glanced at the clock. “It’s time to get ready for work.”
“What about those concentric puzzles?”
“Why not try and figure them out tonight? That should keep you busy.” He winked. “Just sayin…”
“You know I’m puzzle-dysfunctional.” I grinned. “Almost completely, but not totally dysfunctional. I guess it’s worth a try.”
“Yeah, give it a shot.” He stood up. “See if you can make any sense out of them.”
“Okay…I’ll get started on them and also do more research on the symbols. I need a better grasp on what I’m diving into.” As Aaron walked down the hallway, I said, “What time will you be home?”
“Around midnight.”
“I might go in to the store to rearrange a few items. I feel jittery.”
“Call or text, if you do. Be careful.” Aaron stopped. “I want to know what you’re doing all the time, all windows covered and doors locked.”
“All right. I’ll be careful.”
I didn’t want to be home alone any longer than necessary because it made me feel anxious. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
I reached for the drapery drawstrings and pulled them shut. The possibility of passersby seeing me through the windows only added to my uneasiness.
After Aaron left, the quiet totally unnerved me. “That’s it. I’m outta here.” I slipped into a heavy flannel shirt and jeans. As I walked through the house, I switched on some other lights to make it look as if someone was indeed home. In the kitchen, I slipped into my heavy jacket, started the car with the remote key, and then sent Aaron a short message as to my whereabouts. Before marching out the door, I made sure the other doors were locked. I headed in the car toward Main Street and soon parked behind the store. It occurred to me as I stared up at Max’s back window that he should have been contacted to know I would be working tonight. I texted him, knowing he would see it soon since he always kept his phone in his pocket.
As I walked to the back door, something didn’t seem right. I glanced at some nearby parked cars. Is that the white car that had followed me earlier today? I walked over toward it, slipped out my cell phone and snapped a couple pictures of the license plate. While backing away from the car, the back door of the Brew Café opened, startling me.
“Luke, you’re open,” I said. “I was just going to come for a cup of coffee, on the off chance you were still there. It’s hard to stay awake until Aaron gets home from work, and watching reruns is tiring. I thought some fresh air might do me good.” I was rambling on like an idiot so I tried to slow myself down. “Anyway, are you?”
“You sound like you’ve had enough caffeine, Liv.” Luke laughed at me and came closer. “I’m locking up. Suni and I did some shelf-stocking this evening.”
“Tomorrow, then,” I replied, slowly moving away. His grin made me anxious. I didn’t want to turn my back toward him, so I watched as Suni appeared. “Hi. I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“You, too.” She raced to her car and opened the door, clenched her teeth and said, “Bye. Bye.” Then she ducked into the white car.
“Good night.” Luke climbed into his car.
As soon as they drove away, I felt relieved and finished walking toward my store. I punched in the code numbers, opened the door, and stepped inside. With the lights flipped on, I went into the workroom and removed my coat, stomping the snow from the bottom of my shoes. The silence of the empty building was unnerving. I turned on the radio, tuned to a jazz station from Chicago, and adjusted the volume. My cell phone was void of messages, which was surprising. Why hadn’t Max replied?
I pressed the call button and waited while his phone rang, but there was no answer. In a few short minutes, I was up the steps to his apartment, banging on his door at the top. Through the crack in the door it was apparent there were lights on, but no movement was detected. Since I owned the building, I had the master key and unlocked the door.
“Max,” I shouted, running through the living room and down the small hallway. “Max!” Still no answer. I hustled to his bedroom, nearly tripping on the piles of clothes strewn across the floor. Max was face down on his pillow, fully dressed. “Max! Max!” I went to his side. He didn’t appear to be ill. I reached down and touched his forehead, it felt cool, and then I placed my fingers beside his neck to feel for a pulse. I let out a sigh of relief when I felt a weak pulse. I quickly called the emergency number, and then called Aaron to explain the situation. After covering Max with a blanket I went to fetch him a glass of water, should he regain consciousness and was thirsty.
I had just returned to the bedroom when sirens blared down below. I went to the door and shouted down to the medics. “Up here!”
Within minutes the small apartment was flooded with medics and police. Aaron came up beside me. We stood to the side as the medics performed their tasks.
“Did you see anyone?” Erlandsen asked upon entering the room. I was seated on Max’s couch.
“No, but Aaron filled you in on what happened earlier, right? I’m sending Aaron two pictures of a license plate, and he can forward them. The plates, I believe, are from a car driven by Suni, Luke’s wife. I’m sure she was the driver of the white car that was following me… and there was a passenger in the car.” I watched Erlandsen write it all down before pulling out my phone to send the photos. “I just witnessed Suni drive away in it.”
Erlandsen checked his phone. “Got ’em,” he said. “We’ll look into it.”
We all sat silently and watched as the paramedics wheeled Max to the door on a gurney. The head medic looked at the detective, and said, “There’s bruising across his neck.”
My eyes opened wider as I looked from Max to the medic. “It’s like a karate chop on his right side, under his ear.”
“Thanks,” Erlandsen said. “Much appreciated. Now we have a little bit to go on. He’ll come around in due time.”
“There doesn’t appear to be any forced entry.” When Mergens entered the room, he looked ready to drop.
“Maybe we should go downstairs to take a look around the store,” I suggested. “I haven’t walked through it yet. I had texted Max and tried calling him. The fact that there was no answer brought me upstairs.”
“Still have a coffeepot?” Erlandsen cocked his head and yawned.
We hiked down the stairs and went inside the store. Aaron brewed the coffee while the detectives wandered through the showroom. I listened to them mumble. Even though I could pick out a word only once in awhile, I gathered they were just as perplexed as I. Why would anyone want to hurt Max?
“How in the world does this have anything to do with Max? He’s completely innocent of having anything to do with the desk or houses. He should be all right, shouldn’t he?” I said to Aaron as he filled the four coffee cups. “I don’t understand the motive behind injuring him, do you? We need to get to the bottom of this.”
“Yes, asap.” He shrugged as he lifted two cups. I picked up the other two and we walked into the showroom and handed two to the detectives.
As I strolled around the room, my eyes were drawn to the desk where I had set the stuffed bear. I gasped as I saw that the bear was ripped apart. Tad’s uniform was still hanging intact. I almost dropped my full cup of coffee. “Oh no!” My eyes opened wider. “This isn’t happening.” Aaron followed with the boxes and set them on th
e counter.
“The miniature Lincoln house is in ruins,” he said.
“I can’t believe this.”
“Oh my God,” I said. “That display was just set up. The bear was Tad’s, and you already know about the desk.”
“It’s funny that the intruders didn’t take it,” Mergens said. “Let me take a look at the other items.” He shook his head. “We better have it all fingerprinted.”
“President Lincoln all over again, right?” I took a deep breath. “I’d just purchased that miniature dollhouse.”
“What on earth is going on around here? That’s what I’d like to know,” Mergens said. “The Civil War has been over for how long?”
“Let’s get some photos.” Erlandsen scratched his head. “Why did they leave the little uniform alone? Why not rip that all apart too?”
“Not sure.” I took a deep breath. “I brought my own mini house collection in this morning, and it’s untouched. They only destroyed the Lincoln dollhouse. Weird.”
“It shows they know exactly what’s important, and where to look.” Erlandsen glanced around the room. “They have a mission, and I bet they’re after that speech.”
“It sure seems like it. Maybe they searched for clues and left the uniform as an incentive or warning,” Mergens said.
“Something like that,” Aaron said.
I went to pick up the remnants of the bear. “The rear end had an embroidered oak tree on it. The limbs almost looked like the images you see of a family tree, like when you record your ancestry. I’ll take a look through the seams in the uniform, just like I did with the dresses. Who knows? Maybe we’ll hit pay dirt.” I took the uniform down and went to sit by the sewing machine. I focused my bright sewing light on the seam and began to slowly finger the stitching on the pant legs. It took quite awhile for me to examine every stitch. I got up to join them when finished. “Nothing that I could see.”
Erlandsen wiped his forehead. “Do you have anything new to tell me about any of your discoveries?”
“No. I spent the morning in the university library and didn’t find out anything different than what I already knew.” I shook my head. “Someone did shift the books around in the study carrel when I left for a few minutes.”
“You did learn something new,” Mergens said.
“I did? What?”
“You need to keep a sharp eye out, wherever you go.”
Does this mean my life span is on a short timeline?
Chapter Eighteen
A bright morning sun masked my mood, causing me to squirm further under the blankets. After last night’s discoveries, Aaron had taken the remainder of his shift off.
“Let’s get dressed and get out of here.” Aaron flipped back the covers.
“No choice but to get up,” I groaned. Reluctantly, I dressed.
Together, we walked down the hallway to the kitchen “There’s a weird feeling snaking through me, like do I need the extra set of car keys?” I shook my head. “Can’t figure out why.” I went to the kitchen junk drawer and grabbed the extra keys, along with the memory stick. “Oh, and look at this.”
“Let me see.” Aaron rubbed his chin. “Where did you get it?”
“It was on the sidewalk outside the shop, the night Blanche was murdered.” I placed it back into the drawer, and Aaron made sure that the house was locked before climbing into the car. “Mergens will want to hear about that memory stick.” Could it be yet another clue?
My mind spun in circles about all the clues and how they might fit into the Lincoln Puzzle as we drove to the hospital to visit Max.
“Hey, you. You’ll do anything to get out of work, won’t you?”
I felt funny as we stepped inside Max’s room. Max had tubes hooked into him and he looked pale. I’d never seen him look so haggard and it was awful to see him this way—the opposite of his usual vibrant self.
“I’m all right, really I am.” Max looked back at me through cloudy eyes. “I feel like shit, though. One helluva headache… and my neck hurts like hell.” Half-grinning, he said, “You saved my life.”
“I wish there was something more that I could’ve done to prevent this.” With his hand in mine I said, “But tell me what happened.”
“Went for gas. Thought I saw a light on in the store. So I parked and checked it out. Don’t remember much else.” Max rubbed his neck and grimaced. “Ouch!”
“Basically all you did was enter? What’d you do, clunk your boots on the floor?” I massaged his forearm. “Who would have guessed you’d be the next victim.”
“Gee, what an honor,” Max said between clenched teeth. Looking at Aaron, he grumbled, “What in the hell is going on?”
“Good question,” Aaron replied, plopping into a chair. “We’re all mixed up.”
“That’s comforting.” Max turned his gaze on me. “Liv, what’s up?”
“Mary Lincoln is the focus. All those crazy clues that we’ve found must add up to something.” I almost melted from Max’s bloodshot eyes.
“Century and a half old mystery.” Max frowned. “Go on, let’s hear it.”
“The toy bear is ripped in shreds. Tad Lincoln’s bear…but they left his uniform alone. Go figure.” I cocked my head. “Last night we carefully searched for clues, but came up empty handed. There’s so much we don’t understand.”
“How many years has it been since the Civil War, and this speech was given how many years prior to his inauguration? It’s ridiculous.”
“It all seems to tie together.” I honestly didn’t know what to think myself. “Well, I’m tired of this nonsense.” I noticed that Max had raised his right foot under the blanket.
“Don’t come back unless you have something of importance to say. Geez. First it was Dolley Madison causing all sorts of shenanigans, now mysteries around Lincoln.” He yanked his blanket higher.
“We’ll keep you informed,” Aaron told him.
We used Aaron’s cell phone when we were back in the car to do a Google search to find out where the nearest Masonic Lodge was located. There was one only twenty minutes away.
The lodge was in the heart of Northeast Minneapolis, the section of town where mainly Polish, German, and Slovakian immigrants had settled. It was full of Catholic churches as well as plenty of wonderful ethnic restaurants and meat markets. Traffic rushed around us as we tried to find a parking space in a lot. Aaron finally gave up and parked on the street.
“Do you think we’ll be able to enter?” I asked. “The symbols are right there, on their building, and they’re just as Mary had drawn them. I feel in my bones that we’re nearing some kind of revelation, don’t you?”
“Yes, but what is it?” Aaron asked. “Let’s get out so we can take a look around.”
The large, square, red brick building looked even more ominous the closer we came to it. I hesitated in front of the door. “Should we knock?”
“Maybe it’s always open, sort of like a church.”
“Right.” I reached for the doorknob but happily stepped aside as Aaron tried opening it. It was locked. So much for that theory. With Aaron leading, we walked around the packed down, snow-covered sidewalk to the back door but found that locked.
Aaron knocked, but after a couple minutes with no response, we turned and walked toward the car.
Once inside the car, I asked, “Now what do we do?”
“There must be pictures online showing the interior of these lodges. They are bound to be similar, as they are all part of the same organization.” Aaron started the engine and began to drive away from the curb, still eyeing the building. “It’s got to be several stories high.”
“The staircase.” My eyebrows rose in puzzlement. “Mary deliberately drew it. If only we knew why.”
“Where to now?”
“Back to the store. It’s time to take another look at the stuffed bear and the desk.”
We drove onto Main Street and headed toward the store. Aaron spotted the frown that came to my face as we ar
rived in the parking lot behind the store.
“Don’t worry. The police have beefed up the patrol. It’s all safe.” After we parked, he offered, “I’ll go in first. How does that sound?”
“Good. Much better.” I opened the car door to step out and the fresh air felt good on my cheeks. “Too much has happened.” Aaron climbed from the car. “Thank you, baby.”
Aaron opened the door and entered with me following close behind.
“Any bad guys here?” Aaron called with a smile.
In the workroom, we removed our jackets and hung them on the clothes tree.
“Let’s take care of the house last.” When my gaze fell on the ruined little house, I said, “This hurts. It’s so unnecessary and hateful.”
“I know, Liv.” He placed his arm over my shoulder for a moment. “Let’s do it.”
“You first.”
“All right. Come along.”
We stood at the showroom entrance, and gazed around the room.
“Well, let’s start picking up this mess.”
“Right. Let’s get a bag to hold all the toy bear parts.” I walked over to the desk. “I want to take a closer inspection of this, too.”
“Me too. All we did before was glance at it, open the drawer, and that’s about it.” After grabbing a plastic bag, I went over to the desk and picked up each fragment of the fragile old fabric. Each seam and the filler appeared to be like any normal stuffed animal, except the rear, which had the long-john-like trapdoor.
“Why the oak tree?” I carried the pieces over to the counter and sat down in front of the computer. While the computer went through its start-up procedures, I held up the embroidered section to the light and studied it. In my mind’s eye, there was an image of Mary’s chubby, short fingers pushing the needle in and out. The points of the stitched leaves were impeccable. The brown looked like a trunk. One nut hung from a branch, which was barely visible. “There’s a nut on this tree.” I held it up. “Come here.”
Aaron got up from where he had been kneeling and came over to me. “Let me see.”
I pointed to it. “The nut might be important to the investigation. We need to keep it safe. We shouldn’t part with it or talk about it except between us.”
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