A Crossworder's Delight (5 page)

“How awful,” Belle whispered. The image in her mind was not only ghoulish and gruesome, it was also horribly sad. A woman no one had missed. Hadn't she had family or friends who'd noticed she'd gone? Or could foul play have been involved?

But the questions were to remain unanswered, because a trio of customers walked into the shop at that moment, all scraping snow from their shoes and dusting off their coats as they stood in the doorway. “Looks like we're in for a heavier fall than they forecasted,” one of them said with a good-natured groan. “Over a foot, maybe, they're saying now. The first snow of the year, and it's gotta be a doozy. I predict, folks, that we don't see the ground till springtime.”

Old Mr. Liebig and his son both shook their heads in rueful acceptance of this hypothesis. Then Young Karl turned back to Belle. “I'll see if I can find Dad's old records.… What are those dates you wanted?”

“Nineteen forty-four to '46.” As she supplied the information, Belle couldn't help but frown. The war years, she thought, when a woman had drowned in melting chocolate.

Five

W
HILE
Belle was in the midst of her unlikely quest at Legendary Chocolates, twelve-year-old E.T. Whitman was zipping up his parka, squashing his fleece-lined hat down on his head, and tugging on his boots and waterproof mittens. He considered even the fiercest blizzard to be an absolutely terrific part of life. Not because he enjoyed playing outside, although he most certainly loved sledding, building weird and scary alien snow creatures, ambushing unwary passersby with snowballs from behind a “fort” of hedges just like any other boy his age. No, the real reason E.T. was so crazy about the white stuff was because of his job shoveling the pathways at the Paul Revere Inn. And it wasn't just the money the Marz brothers paid him—although that was really, really nice—it was his sense of power and pride, which were two commodities in short supply in his home. At least, for him they were.

So as soon as the snow began to stick in earnest, accumulating in the crooks of the trees and coating the neighbors' fancy gardens, E.T. was dressed, out the front door, on his bike, and peddling down the hill. His agility with this two-wheeled vehicle would have been the envy of any downhill skier. As he caromed along on his mission, he often imagined that his home was still part of the large farm that had spread into the western wilderness back when Newcastle was still a whaling port—instead of what the house really was: a funny old clapboard building with a lot of fancier, newer homes nearby.

E.T.'s “response time” (he liked to set records for himself) was usually under fourteen minutes: what he referred to as “observation of snow accumulation to delivery of services.” Zooming down the road, he considered how fortunate he was that it was a Saturday morning so he could spend all day at the inn, shoveling and reshoveling, putting out rock salt, deicing the steps. “Saturday
A.M.
,” he corrected himself in an officious tone. “
Ante meridiem
, which is Latin for ‘before noon.'
P.M.
is
post meridiem
. Who doesn't know that!”

He'd memorized a lot of similar facts, as well as other lesser-known but equally compelling expressions he found in the dictionary. The reference book was one of his all-time favorite reads (although this wasn't information he shared with anyone), and he perused it as avidly as he did tales of pirates or space monsters or people who could travel back and forth through time. The words he gleaned from a section entitled “Foreign Words and Phrases” came in handy when the other kids at school ganged up on him.

“
Furor loquendi!”
he'd yell at them, which translated to “rage for speaking,” although he never revealed the truth. Or, “
Furor scribendi!”
which was “rage for writing.” The kids who teased him guessed that the
furor
part had to do with fury, so they believed he was cursing them out or putting weird hexes on them. What dopes. But then they also made fun of his curly red hair. One particularly stupid classmate had even likened him to a troll. E.T. hadn't bothered to explain that the Vikings had the same wild red hair, and everyone knew you didn't mess with a Viking warrior. At least everyone living in the British Isles and Western Europe during the ninth and tenth centuries. After all, where did the word
berserk
come from if not from the Norse
berserksgangr?
But, again, that was information E.T. Whitman kept to himself. If his classmates had no desire to be illuminated, why bother?

He now squealed to a halt beside the inn's carriage, house that had been converted into a garage with an apartment above it for the chef. E.T.'s tires didn't actually make any sound in the new blanket of snow, but he supplied the noise himself: a sudden application of brakes, an out-of-control skidding across gravelly pavement, and a final, thudding crash. Sometimes he added a scream of alarm, or yelled, “Watch out below!” Today he had too much on his mind to create a big disaster.

Instead, he opened a side garage door that led into a square room that had once held the inn's saddles, horse blankets, bridles, and reins. Then he stepped around the mini-tractor used to cut the lawn, grabbed a snow shovel, and hurried toward the service entry to report for duty. The shovel was slung rifle-style over his shoulder, and he swaggered as he walked. He was small for a twelve-year-old, so the swagger took a certain amount of work.

The “M and M's”—E.T.'s private name for Morgan and Mitchell Marz—were not in the kitchen or pantry where he expected them to be. He wanted to check in with one of the twins personally, rather than simply telling the sometimes grouchy breakfast waitress, Joy Allman, that he was shoveling the walks, so he “parked his gear”—again his term—and hustled through the service doors into the guest area.

The age of the building never failed to stop E.T. in his tracks: the stone hearths where he imagined Revolutionary War soldiers filling their clay pipes and recounting that day's battle, the creak of the oak doorsills, the rattle of the ripply glass panes in the windows, the slanting stairs that certainly had ghosts still lingering on them.

“Mr. Mitchell,” E.T. called out. “Mr. Morgan, I'm here to clear the paths.” Curiously, no one was about. Although at 8:56 on a snowy Saturday morning in a place visitors chose because of its relaxing ambience, maybe only a twelve-year-old would find the lack of people strange.

“Mr. Mitchell? Mr. Morgan?” E.T. crossed the foyer and moved toward the front parlor where the famous poem sat enthroned in its big, elaborate frame. E.T. was certain he'd find one of the brothers there; it was where the morning newspapers were set out for the overnight guests.

“
Then he said ‘Good night!'
,” E.T. recited softly but dramatically. “
And with muffled oar, / Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore
…” He loved the “muffled oar” part, and he made hand and arm gestures indicating he was pulling hard on two invisible oar handles. “
A phantom ship, with each mast and spar, / Across the moon like a prison bar
…” Those lines always gave him goosebumps, which, of course, was the entire purpose in saying the poem aloud. Needless to say, E.T. had all thirteen verses of Longfellow's famous work memorized.

“
Till in the silence around him he hears

The muster of men at the barrack door
,

The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet
,

And the measured march of the Grenadiers
…”

E.T. entered the parlor. “Mr.—?” The words stopped in his throat as he looked at the desk and the wall above it. The poem was no longer proudly hanging there, and he could tell from the shattered glass ornaments that spread across the desktop and the greenery that lay trampled on the floor, that the picture frame had been grabbed a hurry. And there wasn't a newspaper in sight.

Six

R
OSCO
had just settled into his office chair and opened a hefty file folder to begin toiling away at his wrap-up of this latest insurance fraud case of his when the telephone rang—a welcome diversion, if truth be told. Anything that put paperwork on the back burner was just fine with Rosco. The call was from a near-frantic Mitchell Marz, informing him that someone had run off with the famous autographed Longfellow. Rosco knew the Marz brothers, of course; besides the Solstice Dinner and the awarding of the Holiday Decoration Competition prize, there were many pleasant meals he and his culinarily challenged wife had shared at the Revere Inn. But Mitchell spoke as if Rosco were not only a close family member, but as though the vanished poem had also been a cherished relative.

Naturally, Rosco's first bit of advice was to call the police. Mitchell told him that he and Morgan had already done so; someone from Robbery had arrived at the inn fifteen minutes earlier.

“Who'd they send?” Rosco asked. Out of habit he reached for a pad of paper and pen. Although he seldom read the directions for new electronics gadgets, and rarely relied on maps when driving to unknown locales, he did believe in writing down everything that pertained to business. The human brain had an uncanny facility for remembering misleading details.

“A Sergeant Fuller,” the obviously shaken Mitch answered.

“Ohhh, boy,” was Rosco's knowing response. Fuller had been with the Newcastle Police Department for nearly twenty-five years. When Rosco had worked for the NPD as a homicide detective, his path had crossed the Robbery Division, and Sergeant Fuller in particular, many times. Within the department, he was almost renowned for his slipshod work; and unless an honest pawn broker actually called to report a suspicious “fence” trying to unload something “hot,” it was rare that the man ever solved a robbery or recovered anyone's lost property.

“I'll be right over,” Rosco added, returning the phone to its cradle.

It took him a little over twenty minutes to work his way across town to the inn. The slick roads had already contributed to a few minor fender-benders, but Rosco's trusty Jeep, with its four-wheel drive, sailed through the salted slush and icy patches easily. When he walked through the inn's front door Mitchell was there to greet him. Behind him, several guests and a few members of the decorating clubs looked on in stunned silence. Sergeant Fuller was nowhere in sight.

“Fuller already left, I take it?” Rosco asked. He couldn't keep the sound of relief from his voice. The sergeant, like NPD's medical examiner, Herb Carlyle, were touchy when it came to criticism—either overt or not.

“No. He's in the kitchen having some breakfast.”

Rosco instinctively glanced at his watch. “At ten thirty?”

Mitchell raised a single eyebrow. “I think it may be his second feeding—or third, judging by his girth. He doesn't seem to be taking much interest in the theft; that's why I decided to call you.”

At that point Morgan appeared. His expression also displayed his concern over the vanished artwork, but he made a point of greeting the overnight guests and the returning decorators who'd braved the snow with a warm—if slightly forced—smile. “Sorry for this unfortunate disturbance, everyone. But if you make your way into the dining room, I can guarantee some dynamite chocolate-filled croissants our pastry cook just whipped out of the oven.… You know what they say about New England winters: extra weight's what gets you through the cold.… And if you're not partial to chocolate, we've got fresh cranberry bread and cinnamon buns …”

When the group had moved away, he and Mitchell led Rosco into the front parlor. “I was warning Mitch about this type of problem just yesterday,” Morgan admitted with a beleaguered sigh. He stared at the wall where the Longfellow had been displayed. “This kind of situation isn't good for business. People worry about security when something like this happens—as well they should.” He shook his head and looked bleakly at his brother, but Mitchell avoided the appeal. “I'd be less than honest, Rosco, if I didn't say that I disagreed with Mitch's decision to call you. So far, the police department has been very subtle in their approach, and that's just how I'd like to keep things.… How
we'd
like to keep things. Our patrons are here to escape the real world … not to have their faces rubbed in it. And the same goes for the decorating gang. Crime's not a fun diversion if you run a hotel and a popular restaurant.”

“Oh, you can count on Sergeant Fuller on being subtle,” Rosco responded with a thin smile. “Fuller's investigative techniques can out-subtle the best of them.”

As if on cue, Fuller entered the room carrying a paper plate with six strips of bacon on it. He nibbled on a seventh, which he held in his right hand. After he finished it, he licked his fingers, wiped them on his trousers, and said, “Hey Polycrates … I thought you were out of business.”

Rosco shrugged, appreciating the fact that Fuller hadn't extended his still-damp hand in greeting. “As long as NPD's Robbery Division works with its calculated efficiency,” he said evenly, “there's no shortage of work for the private sector.… How's the bacon?”

“A little crispy for my liking.” Fuller folded the paper plate around the remaining bacon strips. “Well my work here is done. I just stopped in to tell you gents that I'm off. I'll keep you posted on what I turn up.”

“Aren't you planning to get someone in here to dust for fingerprints?” Rosco asked.

“This wasn't the
Mona Lisa
, Polycrates. Besides, it's my feeling that any prints walked right out the door with the picture frame.” Fuller then turned and left.

“What a piece of work,” Rosco muttered half under his breath.

“That's why I wanted to get you involved,” was Mitchell's anxious reply. “Besides monetary value, there's the sentimental significance. The poem has been in our family for years; our guests remember it—even their kids and grandkids. It's one of our main attractions.”