Читать книгу 15 Minutes of Flame - Christin Brecher - Страница 9

Chapter 2

“Is that a real skeleton?” said Peter.

“Looks like it,” I said, staring at a skull that seemed to look right back at me.

Peter switched on his phone’s flashlight and joined me. I wouldn’t say I was afraid of my discovery, but it’s not every day you plan to carve a pumpkin and end up finding a skeleton. It was nice to have his warm body beside me at that moment.

“Are you sure the scouts didn’t pull a prank on you?” he said, lowering the phone under his chin for a spooky effect.

“Not a chance,” I said. “This is the real deal.”

I explained how I’d found the body behind the mantel’s large stones, which had been covered by the heavy, wooden sign.

We both shuddered.

“I wonder how long it’s been here,” he said.

I’d been wondering the same thing. I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply, deconstructing the odors in the room as I did so. I smelled the autumn leaves, the dirt, the rusted wheel, gate, and spade. I also picked up the scent of turkey and swiss, with a dash of mustard, that wafted from Peter’s knapsack, and a little of his Old Spice. I did not, however, smell any rotting flesh. Granted, my experience with the smell of body decomposition was limited to a squirrel that had died in my wall last year, but that odor was filed away in my highly sensitive olfactory files, honed after years of mixing and matching candle scents for customers.

“I think this guy’s been here a long while,” I said, opening my eyes.

“I can’t believe you found a skeleton,” he said, absently touching a pencil he keeps behind his ear, ready for any story. “You’re like a tomb raider.”

I had to agree I’d stumbled on an unbelievable find. I picked up my phone, which I’d left lying on the floor, and turned its flashlight toward my skeleton. Moving another stone aside with my free hand, I realized the body was clothed.

My beam of light joined Peter’s on a pair of boots with two bones extending from them. They were black leather, with decent soles and tightly bound laces, still tied into a bow. The shoes were sturdy, but the stitching looked as if it had been made by hand and not by a machine.

“They’re so tiny,” Peter said.

Tracing the light up the body, we realized that the skeleton was enrobed in a dress and matching bonnet, both in a somber gray and black.

This was no guy.

“She looks like a Quaker,” I said. “When I worked at the Whaling Museum in high school, I sometimes gave tours of the decorative arts rooms. I remember this kind of attire was from around the early to mid-eighteen hundreds.”

“I didn’t know you were a museum docent,” said Peter with a smile. Even in front of a dead body, I was suddenly very aware of his dirty-blond hair, which always flops over his left eye when he’s excited, and the blue plaid shirt he was wearing today. I love that one. It brightens his baby blues to an irresistible shade.

“The teen docent program didn’t last long,” I said. “Some of us had too much fun making up stories.”

“Too bad you didn’t have this one to tell.” Peter’s light hovered over the woman’s bodice and stopped at the hands, which were folded over what had probably once been her heart.

“Check out her shirt,” said Peter. He pointed to a pattern on the woman’s blouse.

I peered more closely. I’d never been up close to a skeleton, and I felt like I was intruding and also like she might reach out and grab me at the same time.

“That’s not a design,” I said. “It’s a bloodstain.”

“Maybe she died in an accident,” he said.

“And they buried her in the same bloody clothes? Above the mantel?”

I couldn’t believe that the cantilevered mantel had been chosen as a grave, but someone had gone to great lengths to remove pieces of the hearth’s thick wall to bury the blood-soaked woman there. I looked around the room in search of the stones that had originally been removed to make space for the small corpse. There was no sign of them. All I saw were the ones that had fallen when I’d moved the sign and those I’d cleared away. Given the condition of the corpse and the way the grave had been boarded up, it was clear to me that the woman had been hidden there.

There was only one conclusion to make.

“I think she was murdered,” I said.

“This is definitely an eerie set up, but murder?” said Peter. He pulled a small notepad from the pocket of his pants. “Either way, your find is a great local interest story, especially leading up to Halloween.”

I ignored the doubt in his voice about my murder theory. I had no misgiving that the woman I was looking at had been murdered, and not because I had some experience in the matter. I didn’t have evidence, but I had common sense. For one, although I knew it was a custom for Quakers to be buried in unmarked tombs, I’d never heard of home burials like this one. Otherwise, dozens of historic houses on the island would have produced a cemetery’s worth of remains over the decades.

Also, I had been the one to discover the body. I had seen the building’s stones fall from the wall. They hadn’t been carefully sealed into place, as one would have done in a thoughtful, premeditated burial. Instead, they had practically sprung from the wall after years of compression behind the large and heavy sign that had covered the body.

It felt as if we were far from civilization, but outside The Shack, I heard the back door to the Morton house open, along with the sound of young girls. I wasn’t exactly standing in a crime scene, given that the murder had probably been committed over a hundred years ago, but I knew enough to keep the girls at bay. I wasn’t sure whom to call about a century-old skeleton, so I hit Officer Andy Southerland’s number on speed dial before I was halfway out the door, waving my hands like an air-traffic controller to stop the girls from approaching.

Shelly came up behind them and gave me a look that said, Where have you been? and What’s inside that I don’t want to know about? (aka, better you than me), and I was hoping to let the girls run around back here for a few minutes. Three emotions rolled into one piercing stare, which ended with a mutual nod of sympathy from each of us.

As the girls headed back into the house, equally disappointed that their free play had been canceled, Tinker joined them. His ears twitched with excitement at the prospect of a dozen scouts lavishing affection on him. I hoped he could provide enough entertainment so that Shelly could have her break. While I explained to Andy our need for his services, I heard the girls already making up stories about what was inside The Shack. In this instance, I suspected that even their wildest imaginings would not match my find.

After the back door shut behind them, the reality of my discovery hit me. Outside, the sun was still shining, the clouds were still rolling, but in the building behind me lay the bones of mystery. An irresistible puzzle. I wanted to know who the woman buried behind the Cooper’s Candles sign had been. I also wanted to know who had killed her and why. The combination of the dead woman’s carefully crossed arms over her bloodstained shirt in an old candle shop made me curious. What had happened?

There was no electricity in the building, but I wanted a better view of everything inside. Fortunately, I’m the kind of person who always has at least one box of candles stashed in the back of her car, which I now retrieved. While Peter phoned the Inky Mirror, the islanders’ nickname for the newspaper, to tell them he had a breaking story, I went back into the old chandlery and placed my candles around the perimeter of the room. When Peter finished his call, I handed him a pack of matches, and we lit the wicks.

“I can’t decide if this is romantic or the beginning of a horror movie,” he said when we’d finished and found ourselves surrounded by candlelight in the small, historic room.

“It’s authentic,” I said.

No disrespect to the dead, but I would have done anything to set up a Wick & Flame holiday-themed pop-up shop right there. I felt like my candles had brought Cooper’s Candles back to life.

“I wonder if the murder weapon is still here,” I said.

“Assuming she was murdered,” said Peter. “My editor is excited about the discovery, either way, so thank you for handing me an exclusive. I’ll be cooking up my cheese spaghetti to celebrate. I’m sending in a story on my way to Crab City. Can I get a quote from you?”

“Here’s my quote: I’m sure there’s more to this story. Aren’t you?”

“Maybe,” Peter said, “but I like to print facts, not speculation.”

“Ok,” I said.

I knew a weapon could have been tossed into the ocean over a hundred years ago, but it was worth a look around. I started with the item I knew best, the sign.

“Hold this, please,” I said to Peter, handing him my phone and kneeling on the ground before the sign.

There were no traces of blood on the front or back of the heavy wood plank, so I studied the nails that had secured the sign to the wall. There were eight of them, and none of the nail heads were the same size, nor were the shafts of equal length. I lifted one that had fallen free, and I could feel the iron pin’s irregularities. I decided they were handmade. Old. That meant that the woman had been there a long time too. Based on the absence of dried blood, I decided that the sign had not been used as a murder weapon. Its function was to seal the tomb with the aid of a few hammered nails.

My eyes wandered up to the oversized hearth. I wondered if the murderer had hidden incriminating evidence there.

“Excuse me,” I said to Peter. I slid around him, still on my hands and knees, and began to explore the stones inside the hearth, which were thankfully free of mice. Before I knew it, my head and shoulders were entombed in the lowest part of the wide-based chimney. I was impressed with how well the structure had stood the test of time. A few of the stones were wobbly, but they were all still in place.

“Who was the guy who owned the house? I wonder if he buried the woman here,” said Peter as I felt around the dark, enclosed space.

“John Pierre’s great uncle, Fritz Hepenheimer,” I said to him as I continued to feel around. “He was a captain for the US Coast Guard. He died two years ago at one hundred years old.”

I wiped my hand on my leggings as my hand had touched something slimy and entirely gross.

“John Pierre told me that Uncle Fritz served in the nineteen forties at the island’s Coast Guard base. He bought the house in hopes of marrying a Nantucket girl, but she turned him down, so he hightailed it off the island and rarely returned.”

“Maybe she didn’t turn him down,” said Peter. “Maybe they married, and she died, and he had some fetish about Quaker garb, and he buried her here.”

“Nope,” I said. “You have a twisted imagination, but legend has it that he left after she dumped him. Between the Quaker dress on our skeleton and the period nails from the sign, I think it’s safe to assume that John Pierre’s uncle wasn’t a murderer. One suspect down, who knows how many more to go.”

At that moment, I heard the front door budge against the warped floor. I looked down from my post in the chimney and saw Andy’s black, police-issue shoes arrive at the edge of the hearth and face mine.

“So you found a human skeleton,” said Andy.

“Yup,” said Peter.

“I found her,” I said, ducking out of the chimney and into the room. “She was hidden behind this sign.”

Andy gave me a smile, one of the warm “hey how’re ya doing?” smiles he’s known for, but he also folded his arms and studied my excavation. I was about to return his greeting, but he held up his hand.

“I hate to break it to you, but according to sections five and six of Title Six, chapter thirty-eight of the Massachusetts General Laws, the medical examiner or, subsequently, an archaeologist if the body is more than one hundred years old, are the only individuals who can be touching the body right now,” he said.

As he spoke, he led us outside of The Shack before we quite realized what he was doing. I turned to reenter the building, but Andy stood between me and the door, his solid frame blocking my path.

“Slow down, Stella,” he said to me. “You will be happy to know that I called the medical examiner on my way here. He was leaving for his Saturday round of golf, but he’s on his way. Meanwhile, I have a job for you.”

Good thinking on his part. He had to follow protocol, but since I’d found the body, I wasn’t going anywhere, and he knew it.

“Bring it on,” I said, folding my arms in the same way he had only moments ago.

Peter nodded supportively, but Andy laughed as if he still couldn’t believe I had a newfound interest in tackling a good mystery. It really is sort of crazy that we’ve known each other all our lives but had only recently realized we shared a similar tenacity when faced with solving a good puzzle.

“You’re friends with the guy who owns the house, right?” said Andy.

I nodded.

“Can you call him?” he said.

“I can,” I said, dialing John Pierre, but sure we could come up with something more for me to do.

“Find any more candle artifacts?” John Pierre said to me after a couple of rings. I heard the sound of a bird in the background, on his end of the line. John Pierre owns a Christmas tree farm, so I imagined he was reviewing the stock for his upcoming season.

I put him on speaker, thanked him again for the sign, and let Andy give him the details of my discovery while I watched the ME arrive with a bag of tools and gadgets I’d have loved to explore.

“This is an incredible find,” said John Pierre when Andy finished.

“We’ll have to figure out what to do with her, but I can keep you updated on our options by phone,” said Andy

“Was there ever any sort of legend in your family, or clue that there might be a body on the premises?” I said to John Pierre after Andy handed me the phone.

The tiniest little shift in Andy’s jaw let me know that he was trying to decide a few things: how the case would need to be handled, how interested I was going to be in the case, and which of those two issues would be harder to manage.

“I never heard about a body,” said John Pierre. “But my great uncle kept to himself.”

“When you were visiting the island, did you spend time at the house?” said Andy.

I was happy to see that although he was following protocol, his natural curiosity was as high as mine.

“I didn’t spend much time out back,” said John Pierre. “I meant to peek in The Shack, but it wasn’t high on my list.”

“Southerland!” With that exclamation, the chief of police now made his appearance and crossed the yard.

“Sir,” said Andy, his attention shifting to his boss.

“What do we have?” said the chief.

The chief directed his question to Andy, but the medical examiner must have heard him from inside the building because he emerged too. As he exited, he pushed a pair of goggles to his forehead and peeled off a pair of latex gloves.

“I’ve given the skeletal remains and clothing a preliminary look. Judging from the bone structure, it’s a woman,” said the ME. “From her attire and the level of decay, I’d say she’s been deceased for over one hundred years. The body has suffered trauma. Cause of death could have been foul play, could have been an accident. This is more of an archaeological and historical site than a police matter. Maybe historians can ascertain more about her identity, or at least develop a composite description of who she might have been.”

Behind me, I now heard cars pulling up to the Morton house. From the moment Andy had arrived, my discovery of the hidden world of Cooper’s Candles had begun to feel like a three-ring circus. As the scouts began to open and close the car doors for their rides home, I picked up the chatter of parents calling out to each other from one vehicle to another. Their conversations focused on their concerns about what was happening in The Shack and were underscored by excited but also frightened chatter of the girls.

“Samantha is too afraid to come back,” said a mom’s voice.

“I think we should cancel,” said a worried dad. “This isn’t worth Cindy having nightmares.”

“And who knows what sort of toxins they’ve just let loose?” said another voice. “I googled it. Decomposing bodies emit chemicals that are harmful to the girls’ health. And there will be guests coming on Friday night too. We don’t need a lawsuit.”

“We’ll see what we can do,” I heard Shelly say.

“I think Jane will have to bow out moving forward,” said a dad.

I waited for an argument from Jane, the most boisterous of the scouts. I’d be willing to bet she was one of the imps who’d thought to take a peek at The Shack. To my surprise, I heard no protest.

Andy had his list of concerns; I now had my own. The first was the medical examiner’s suggestion that this was at most a project for historians. I had a vision of well-meaning professor types, taking their time to brush off dirt and catalog bones over months and months of tedious work, only to conclude what we already knew: that our skeleton had been a Quaker woman who had suffered trauma and had been mysteriously buried in an unmarked and unusual grave. The house would become a tourist attraction, and ridiculous stories would abound. I knew that even by the end of today, rumors and fantastically tall tales would begin to make the rounds. But I, for one, wanted the real scoop on what had happened in this small candle workshop.

I was also entirely disappointed that the Girl Scouts had fallen for their own propaganda about ghosts and goblins. I didn’t mind a few scary stories floating around, but fear of a skeleton, an historic discovery no less, was unacceptable. We were not going to let a few old bones keep us from raising money for the island’s neediest, and having a great event in the process. We needed a dose of girl power to show everyone that there was nothing to fear.

I was still holding up my phone, and John Pierre was still on the line.

“John Pierre? It’s Stella,” I said. “What would you think about letting me stay in the main house? I’d like to show the girls that there’s nothing here to be afraid of.”

Andy, ever on alert for my extracurricular interests, raised an eyebrow, but I was prepared for that.

“As it turns out, my kitchen window broke this morning, and I’d love a place to stay while it’s being fixed.”

It was Peter’s turn to look surprised. And a little concerned.

“What happened to your window? Also, this place is really old and drafty,” he said. “You should stay with me.”

“I love the house,” I said, truthfully. “When else will I be able to enjoy it? Tinker’s already made himself at home inside.”

We looked at the back window, where Tinker, in fact, could be seen happily curled in a ball and taking a nap on the sill. Peter shoved his hands into his pockets, knowing not to fight me.

“You know we’ll lock up the door at night and keep everyone—that means you—away from the skeleton until an archaeologist takes a look,” said Andy.

I nodded, seriously. As if a lock would stop me.

“Sure, you can stay,” said John Pierre. “It would give me some peace of mind, actually.”

With that much decided, John Pierre and I worked out the details of my stay while the officers considered the next step of calling in an anthropologist.

“If you don’t need us,” Peter said to the group when I hung up, “we’re heading out to Crab City for low tide.”

Andy smiled with something of a victorious look.

“I’m working on a seaside scent,” I said.

Did I sound defensive? Perhaps. Nonetheless, Peter and I left the action and walked to the sidewalk in front of the Morton house.

“You want to work on the skeleton, don’t you?” Peter said when we reached my car door.

“Do you blame me?”

“Nope,” he said with a kiss on my forehead for good measure.

“Say hi to the crabs for me?”

He pulled out his pad and untucked his pencil.

“Say-hi-to-crabs,” he said, writing in his pad. Then he gave me a smile and headed to his car.

I followed behind Peter’s car for a couple of streets, knowing exactly where to start. Nantucket is a small town with a big history. Fortunately, it’s been well documented. The Research Library on Fair Street holds thousands of pictures, periodicals, and documents related to the island’s history, many from the time that the Coopers had run their chandlery. If there was any information to be found about my skeleton, the library would have it.

I liked the plan, but it came with one immediate problem. Extended periods of time amid the quiet, peaceful air of a library have resulted time and again with me falling into a cozy nap, my head on a table or against a chair, until my arm drops or my foot falls asleep. It’s a curse. In high school, Andy and my best friend, Emily Gardner, even drew a mustache on me once while I soundly slept. And I’d been working on college applications at the time. Skeleton or not, I knew myself, so when I reached the road to Main Street, I decided to make a pit stop at my favorite coffee place in town, The Bean.