Finders Keepers (26 page)

“OK, OK.” Chuckling, the old man bent over and began rearranging the muffins for the umpteenth time. “I tell you what, Elizabeth. I think that Phil Fox is going to try to take Grace’s house away from Zachary. This, I believe, is his plan.”

“I know he’s up to something sneaky. Zachary and I—” She thought of the man who seemed to have vanished from her life almost as quickly as he had appeared. It had been a week and a half since the eventful night at the police station. “It’s really none of my business.”

“Not your business? And when is the future of Ambleside not the business of everybody who lives here?”

“The mansion belongs to Zachary. He’ll have to iron things out with Phil himself.”

Boompah was silent as she arranged a collection of fine old crocheted linen pieces in the trunk. She wasn’t going to insert herself back into Zachary’s life. Clearly they were incompatible. Clearly they had few values in common. Clearly he couldn’t be bothered with a woman so rigid … so moralistic … so “porch swing.”

“You better tell Zachary about the city council meeting next week, Elizabeth,” Boompah said. “He needs to go there and see what Phil Fox will do.”

“You can tell him, Boompah.” She smoothed out a set of monogrammed napkins.

“What, you don’t talk to Zachary now?”

“Not for a while, really. He’s busy and so am I.”

“Busy.”

“Boompah, Zachary needs a more interesting, more modern sort of woman in his life. I’m just too … boring.”

“You?” The old man crumpled the paper bag in which he’d brought the stale muffins. “You are not boring! You are smart, beautiful, clever, kind—ach, if I am not such an old man, I try to marry you myself. I better talk to that boy. He can’t make a big mistake and be unlucky in love like I was. Certainly not!”

“Boompah, wait.” Elizabeth caught his arm as he shuffled toward the door. “Please don’t say anything to Zachary about me. He and I have talked things over already. We’re very different from each other, OK?”

“No, is not OK.” His face darkened. “I don’t believe that. To keep away from true love for the reason of being ‘different’ is stupid! Sometimes different can be very good. Interesting, you know. But you and Zachary are not so different. You are both good people, Christian people, nice people. And you love each other.”

“No, Boompah, we don’t love each other.”

“Don’t try to fool this old Gypsy, Elizabeth.” He tapped his temple with a fingertip. “I see how you look at Zachary. I watch how he looks at you. I listen to you talk about each other. I know the truth of this thing, and it is called love.” He turned to the door. “I go now.”

Great. Just great,
Elizabeth thought. How could she explain to Boompah all the intricacies of her relationship with Zachary? They held such different moral standards. She had a son he didn’t want to bother with. He designed modern churches she could hardly bear to look at. He wanted to tear down antiquities. She wanted to preserve them. They were too different.

“And you better come to that city council meeting, too, Elizabeth,” Boompah said over the jingle of brass bells as he stuck his head back through the door. “Zachary needs you.”

“Can Nick come over for supper, Miss Hayes?” Montgomery asked. “Daddy’s grilling hot dogs tonight.”

“Hot dogs?” Nick poked his head between his mother’s hip and the door frame. “I love hot dogs! Can I have two? Or maybe three? I like them with mustard and ketchup.”

Elizabeth regarded her son and his bright, eager eyes. “Nick, you know you’re still grounded.”

“Oh, bother.” He thought for a moment. “But I have not played with Magunnery for a long time, Mommy. All we do every day is eat donuts with Miss Viola and read books with Mrs. McCann. We never get to play together.”

“Eat donuts and read books?” She looked back and forth between the two children. “You’re supposed to be
working
at the donut shop and the library.”

“After we work, we eat the donuts.”

Elizabeth sighed. Whatever had made her believe the citizens of Ambleside would be firm with the two wayward children? She should have guessed that Nick and Montgomery would be taken into their wardens’ hearts, quickly forgiven their trespasses, and then coddled like a pair of hothouse flowers.

“I have never eaten hot dogs in all my life,” Nick said solemnly.

“We eat hot dogs at least once a week, Nikolai Hayes, you little con artist.”

“But not with Magunnery. Not hot dogs from the barbecue grill at Magunnery’s house.”

Elizabeth considered for a moment. Nearly a month had passed since Ellie Easton’s death. According to local observation, Luke had been doing better lately. Pearlene had told Elizabeth that Luke was working hard on his construction project at the new McCann subdivision on the outskirts of town. And Ruby had mentioned that Luke and his daughter were seen attending a movie together and walking in the park. Maybe this hot-dog dinner would be a good step toward normalcy for everyone concerned.

“All right,” she said. “I’ll let you eat supper with Montgomery just this time. But I’ll come by to pick you up at eight.”

“Yesss!”

Montgomery did a little twirl across the porch, her red braids flying out to the sides. Hand in hand, the two children skipped down the steps and headed across the backyard pathway that had been worn between their houses.

Elizabeth sat down on the porch swing and lifted her hair from the back of her neck. Another hot day. To tell the truth, she was grateful to Luke for offering her a break from the constant care of her son. Nick was always a handful, but his confinement following the window-breaking incident had made him more restless than usual.

She shut her eyes and pictured the sleepy little town around her as it basked in the humid heat of midsummer. The aroma of barbecue grills drifted through the air to mingle with the scent of new-mown grass. In the distance, Elizabeth could hear the low buzz of a weed cutter, the murmur of someone’s radio tuned to a country music station, and the metallic thump of car doors shutting. People were parking around the square for the city council meeting.

She wouldn’t go, of course.

Turning her thoughts to her latest project, Elizabeth drifted in a sweltery daze. An old walnut sideboard would have to be stripped of its offending 1970s harvest-gold paint. She would remove the hardware … check the joints … pull on her rubber gloves … spread the refinisher … wipe and wipe … steel wool …

“Elizabeth!” Someone shook her shoulder. “It is almost time for the meeting.”

She opened her eyes to find Boompah staring down at her. She must have fallen asleep and lost track of time.

“Why you are sleeping on the porch, Elizabeth? Phil Fox has put Grace’s mansion into the subject of the ‘new business.’ The councillors are almost ready to discuss it. There sits Zachary Chalmers all by himself, and you do not stand beside him?”

“Boompah, the mansion is Zachary’s heritage. I told you before, it’s not my business.”

“Bah! Is your business. In Germany we give the town hall the name of
Rathaus.
Means the house of counsel and advice. But in English, is a good name for what happens here in Ambleside tonight. Elizabeth, I think if you will not go and help Zachary, those rats across the street are going to steal his mansion from him!”

“Boompah, one small voice like mine isn’t going to make a difference.”

“No? Then the biggest rat of them all will gnaw away the heart of Ambleside. You mark my words!”

Still muttering, Boompah turned on his heel and stomped off the porch. Elizabeth leaned back in the swing. She knew what an effort it was for the old man to walk across the street to her house without assistance. Never had she seen him so worked up.

She swung her feet back and forth the way Nick often did. Then she checked her watch. She couldn’t make any difference over at the meeting, could she? And if she spoke up for Zachary, what would the town think? What would Zachary think?

Jumping to her feet, she tucked in her blouse and headed across the porch. Why should she care what anyone thought? She wanted to save Grace’s home as much as Boompah did. And if she didn’t speak out, it might go under the wrecking ball in a matter of days.

Jogging across the street, she tried to calm her heart. She didn’t need to pick up Nick from Montgomery’s house for at least another half hour. She could slip into the back of the council room and listen to the proceedings. Maybe no one would notice her.

“Now a lot of you know,” Phil Fox was saying as Elizabeth opened the door to the basement chambers, “that Ambleside lost a prominent citizen this spring when Grace Chalmers passed away.”

An overworked air conditioner pushed the dank smell of rusted pipes into the crowded room as Elizabeth took a chair in the back row near the wall. The council had cancelled its meeting in June due to Ellie’s death. Somehow no one in the close-knit community—except maybe Phil Fox—had felt like going ahead with business as usual. And besides, city business in a town as small as Ambleside was rarely a pressing matter. But looking around at the crowd gathered for tonight’s meeting, Elizabeth wondered about that.

The room was filled to capacity with townspeople, and all of the city councillors were present. She scanned the fluorescent-lit hall with its ceiling of white plastic tiles and its rows of gray folding chairs. Near the front of the room, Zachary Chalmers leaned forward in his chair, his broad shoulders outlined by the crisp tailoring of his dark suit.

“There’s been a lot of talk and speculation as to what ought to be done with Grace’s mansion,” Phil was saying. “Most folks know Chalmers House has been a part of the history of Ambleside since its founding. But there’s not a soul who’d deny that the mansion has fallen on hard times. From the outside, a person can see how the ivy’s taken over the walls, a good many of the windows are cracked, and the chimneys are missing some bricks.”

He pulled a pair of half-moon spectacles from his shirt pocket and set them on the end of his nose. “Now I’ve got here an official inspection report that says the heating system is dangerous, the roof leaks, the lower floor’s got termites real bad, the stairs are so worn that a body could twist an ankle or maybe even fall right through. The renovation of that building is going to cost a pretty penny, and I’d like to know who’s willing to go to such an expense for an old eyesore like that?”

“Eyesore?” Boompah came to his feet, his fist raised. “The building is beautiful.”

“Mr. Jungemeyer, I appreciate your comment, but the floor is not yet open for discussion,” Phil said.

“And I am not the floor! I am a citizen of the United States of America, and I have the right to give my own opinion.”

“In a minute, Jacob,” the town’s mayor, Cleo Mueller, spoke up. “Let Phil have his say, and then you’ll get your turn.”

“Thank you, Mr. Mayor.” Phil adjusted his spectacles. “Now, in her last will and testament, Grace Chalmers left the mansion to her nephew, Zachary Chalmers. Over the past few weeks, I have spoken at length with Mr. Chalmers, and I believe him to be a fine young man and an outstanding architect. On a number of occasions, Mr. Chalmers and I have discussed the future of the mansion as well as the future of Ambleside itself. Isn’t that right, Mr. Chalmers?”

From his chair, Zachary nodded. Elizabeth wondered how he was feeling. Was Phil boxing him into a trap? Or was Zachary a co-player in this unfolding drama?

“From the day he moved to Ambleside, Mr. Chalmers has made no secret of his desire to raze Chalmers House,” Phil stated. A murmur rippled through the crowd, and heads turned in Zachary’s direction. “He would like to build offices for his architectural firm on that land. And in a move that could only be beneficial to the city of Ambleside, he plans to rent offices within the complex to other businessmen—most of them from Jefferson City.”

“How do you know the plans of Zachary Chalmers?” Boompah demanded, again rising from his seat. “He has told you these things? Or you have searched his office and listened to his telephone?”

“I have done nothing of the sort!” Phil retorted.

“Now, Jacob,” Cleo Mueller put in. “You’ve got to stay quiet until Phil gets to the point here. And we’re all hoping that will be soon.”