The Seekers, page 22
Was Spencer Atkins playing the same game?
“Easy enough to find out if it was Atkins’s suggestion,” Dallas said. “What does Carl say? We know that Atkins gave him the information about the caterers, but how could he explain that he knew about the Truth Seekers?”
“The internet. That’s where Brad is famous,” Joe said.
“What about Billings? Just a disgruntled cop? Or is there something about her being such a witch—no offense to the Pennsylvania Dutch intended there—that has to do with all this?”
“Hard to tell.”
Keri, her bag slung over her shoulder, was heading toward them along with Carl.
“Hey, Dallas, they’re going off again,” Carl said. “I’m going to be hanging with you again, I guess. I hope I’m not driving you crazy.”
“Only a little,” Dallas told him. He grinned. “All I have to say is that I’m getting married soon. If Kristin and I have little ones, and you continue being a rising star, you’d better give me plenty of signed autographs for my kids.”
Carl laughed. “You got it.” He grinned at Joe and Keri. “Dallas and I go way back.”
“Yeah, just about three months,” Joe said. “Like you and I go way back, right?”
Carl shrugged.
“Okay, we’ll be back. Brad and Serena are crawling around the graveyard now,” Joe said. “You can see them.” He turned to Carl. “When you called in the Truth Seekers, was there a reason you called them specifically?”
“Yeah. I checked out all kinds of groups before I asked them to come,” Carl said. “I didn’t want anyone who just wanted sensationalism. I wanted them to really investigate.”
“Spencer Atkins gave you the names of the caterers, right? Did he suggest the Truth Seekers, too?”
Carl frowned. “Well, he knew that I intended to bring in a group of paranormal investigators. He said he didn’t believe in any of that rot, but when I mentioned them, he did say that they were better than others because they didn’t scream every second the wind blew.”
“He did know you were bringing them in, though.”
“Of course. He was here that day when they came in.”
Joe nodded. “Thanks. Dallas—”
“You’ll be back. I have my eye on Brad and Serena. I will know where they are at all times,” Dallas promised.
Joe waved, setting his hand on the small of Keri’s back as he led her out to the car. He opened the passenger door for her and she looked back.
“Carl makes me feel like I’m locking my puppy in when I leave the house for a long day,” Keri said.
“He likes you.”
“I care about him, but like he said, he and Dallas go way back.”
Joe slid into the driver’s seat and switched on the ignition. He knew the way to the old house where Spencer Atkins was living, and it was a short drive.
“It’s too bad,” Keri said.
“What’s too bad?”
She turned and smiled at him. He glanced her way, loving that light in her green-gold eyes and the way her dark hair fell around her face. Loving the curl of her lips...
“Too bad we can’t just drive back to Philadelphia.” She smiled wickedly. “Anyway. What does Dallas think of our theory?”
“I think we’re all in line with believing that there is a group or a club—whatever you want to call their weird sect. I don’t think it’s any kind of worship that they’re into, not even Satanism. Though they may carry out certain rites, and maybe one or two of the adherents do believe that honoring the devil is the only way to go. Let’s see what Atkins has to say.”
“Are you going to accuse him of murder?”
“I don’t know. We’ll see when we get there.”
* * *
Atkins came to the door almost before Joe knocked, as if he’d been expecting company.
“Hello there, Joe Dunhill, right? And, Keri, a delight to see you again. How are you doing? And what can I do for you?” he asked. “Come in, come in. Coffee? A soft drink? Something stronger?”
“I’m fine,” Joe said. “Keri?”
“No, nothing, thank you,” Keri said.
“Come in and sit down. Welcome into my parlor,” Atkins said and laughed softly.
“Said the spider to the fly,” Keri mumbled, then followed into the parlor, where Atkins indicated they should sit.
“What can I do for you?” he asked. Before they could answer, he looked at Keri and added, “And how are you doing with all the material in the museum? Did Hank Bergen do it? Or are you now convinced that he was innocent?”
“I’m convinced that he was innocent. I believe that the real killer instigated the lynch mob.”
“Wow! I wish I’d had the patience to go through the junk in that museum. I had years to do it, but I admit, sometimes, too much research bores me,” Atkins said.
“We think that there’s a sect or a cult here, near the Miller Inn and Tavern,” Joe said flatly. “We believe that there’s a conspiracy involved with the murder of Julie Castro.”
“A conspiracy? Here? We’re not that big. I mean, of course, there’s more of a population these days, and people travel more easily, but...here?”
“If one existed in the 1920s, I’d say there is a damned good chance that one exists today,” Joe said.
“You think there’s a cult out here today?” Atkins asked. He sounded incredulous. Was he really?
“It’s scary. Yes, lots of cults do exist. And I think that there might be one out here today.”
“And that I know about it?” he still sounded incredulous.
“Perhaps you know something. Something you don’t even know you know.”
Atkins stared back at him. “Nope... I think you’re just asking questions. I see where you’re going with this. John Newby, proprietor, was head of your supposed conspiracy sect years ago. I was an innkeeper—that means I had to be the grand chief or high priest of some kind of an evil society—right?”
“Were you? Are you?” Joe asked.
“Oh, come on, please.”
“Okay. But there’s an aspect of Julie’s murder that made it seem as though it was staged specifically for the Truth Seekers, and you suggested Brad Holden and his team to Carl Brentwood.”
“I hate crap like that,” Atkins said, snorting. “But hey, Carl came in, bought the place, and he intends to do the right thing with it. I believed in Carl—I do believe in Carl. When he told me that he was planning to hire the Truth Seekers, I said that from what I’d seen and heard from ghost-hunter types through the years, Brad Holden and his crew were probably the best of the lot. Please don’t forget that I was in the city that day. I did not murder Special Agent Julie Castro, or anyone else for that matter, nor was I in on any conspiracy to do so.”
Joe listened to his impassioned words. Was the man telling the truth?
“You’re a local, Mr. Atkins,” Keri said to him. “You did own the inn, and you knew all the stories, and you know this place. If something has been going on around here, you’d have heard rumors.”
Atkins looked at her and sighed. “There have always been rumors. There is a major forest just behind the inn. For years, this place was remote and it’s still basically isolated. Any time you have a deep, dark forest and nights that come in with a sweeping mist, you have stories.”
“All well and good,” Joe said. “And avoiding the issue. What specifically have you heard?”
Atkins waved a hand in the air dismissively. Then he sighed again, deeply this time. “I had a housekeeper once who said that she was waiting out back, smoking a cigarette, when she heard some kind of chanting from the graveyard. She was sure that ghosts were rising in the mist. I was more certain that it was teenagers, drinking, trying to pick up girls, whatever. But I owned that place for over twenty years, and I never had a body in the basement, and even at Halloween, I never had anything bad or ridiculous happen. Who knows, maybe Brad and his Truth Seekers did waken some kind of evil instead of ghosts, but...” He paused.
“What is it?” Joe asked.
“Nothing. I mean, people disappear all the time. And I didn’t think...”
“What are you talking about?” Joe asked him.
Atkins looked as if he was being tortured. He grimaced. “Once, about three or four years ago, a man came out to the inn. He was looking for his wife. But I didn’t know his wife, and I’d never seen her. I don’t even know if he ever found her. She had headed to Philadelphia, but she had told him about the inn, and he thought that she might have come this way. I never thought anything of it. I figured that even though he appeared to be a good guy, he might have been a wife-beater, and she had just tried to escape him. Or, maybe he’d been okay, and she’d just run off with the deliveryman or something.”
Joe pulled out his phone and brought up the photo of the insignia that Dr. Sam Jeffries had first shown him and that Keri had found among the papers in the museum desk.
“Have you ever seen this before?” he asked.
Atkins stared at the paper. “No,” he said, but there was something husky in his voice, something tight in the way he was sitting.
“You’re sure?”
“Positive,” Atkins said.
Joe flicked through his phone and produced the photo of Barbara that had been created by computer artists. “This is Barbara Chrome, the kidnapped teenager Special Agent Castro was seeking when she was murdered here.”
Atkins shook his head, frowning, studying the image intently. “No, I haven’t see her. I’d know if I had. Pretty kid. The kind you remember.”
He was telling the truth.
But he’d lied about the insignia.
“Thanks,” Joe told him. “And thanks for talking with us.” He looked at Keri and she stood, knowing he was ready to leave.
“You haven’t any real leads?” Atkins asked, rising to walk them out.
“We have leads, and we’re following them, and they will take us where we need to go,” Joe told him.
“I hope so. That poor woman.”
“Yes, that poor woman, who had family and friends and a life in service to others,” Joe said. “Anyway, thanks again.”
“Anytime,” Atkins said.
Joe paused at the door. “We believe that someone involved in Barbara’s kidnapping was ready to sell out. It was one hell of a big reward being offered for her. Maybe someone wanted to collect and get the hell out of Pennsylvania.”
Atkins lowered his head. “Was that supposed to draw some kind of big confession out of me?”
“No. If I believed you were guilty, I’d have figured out enough of a charge to get you down to the police station. That was just in case you know anything, say, suspect that a friend might be involved. Whoever it is, they need to turn themselves in. They are in extreme danger,” Joe told him.
“Noted. If I knew who to tell, I would.”
“Okay, thanks.”
Atkins bid them a chilly farewell and they left. When they were in the car, Keri said, “How strange. I believe that he hadn’t seen Barbara before, but he was lying about the insignia. Why?”
“Because he does know something. He’s seen that insignia somewhere,” Joe told her. “If he isn’t involved, he might have an idea of who is.”
“Yes, I figured you were thinking that.”
“Damn. I wish to hell we knew who was going to turn Barbara in. Barbara’s out here somewhere.”
“Okay. But where? I really don’t believe that Atkins has her stashed in his house.”
“We’re getting close. There’s an APB out on the van that mowed down Ed and possibly picked up Barbara, but I’m sure it’s in a lake somewhere. Here’s another question that bothers me. The cops were told to check out restaurants, not grocery stores. I still think that Detective Billings might have thought of Greta’s. How could you live out here and not know about such a unique store not so far away?”
“You really think that a detective might be involved? That’s so...”
“Bad. And I hate it.” Joe took a deep breath. “Most cops are great. But with all this going on, it’s possible.”
“Well, she’s not the person who was going to betray the group,” Keri said.
“Why do you say that?”
“Because she’s still alive,” Keri said. “But we haven’t found any other bodies, either, so maybe the group is still trying to figure out who betrayed them. Of course, once they do, whoever that person is, they’re definitely dead.”
14
When they returned to the Miller Inn and Tavern, the police on guard were changing shifts. Keri was delighted to see that Officer Belinda Emory and her partner, Jamie Hawkins, were back on, along with the officers they’d served with two nights before, Milo Roser and Henry Schultz.
Joe and Keri parked and walked over, greeting them.
“We’ll get dinner going soon. I hope you’ll come in, two by two,” Keri told them.
“You don’t have to cook for us, Keri,” Belinda told her.
“She’s not going to cook tonight. I am,” Joe told them. He grinned at Belinda. “I’ll do all the hard work, then I get to sit around for the cleanup.”
Belinda laughed. “Share and share alike,” she said.
“Have you seen Dallas and the others out here?” Joe asked.
“Earlier. He told me they were all going down in the basement. Brad wanted to investigate there, and apparently Dallas was willing to go along with it,” Jamie said. He rolled his eyes, apparently not much of a believer in the occult.
“This has got to be hard on Dallas. He’s looking for a flesh-and-blood murderer. Brad and his people want to raise the dead,” Belinda said.
“Maybe they’ll go hand in hand,” Joe said lightly. “Okay, you know where to find us. And I’ll give a holler as soon as we have dinner going.”
He caught Keri’s hand and they headed into the inn. He went straight for the basement stairs and then turned back to Keri, “Are you okay to go down there?”
She smiled. “Places aren’t bad. It’s what people do in them that can be cruel and evil.”
He nodded, smiling, and they descended together.
Dallas was leaning against the wall by the hatch door, watching, his arms crossed over his chest. Carl was near Dallas, close enough to jump into his arms, if need be. Brad and Serena were at the head of the stone altar, their hands set upon it.
They heard Joe and Keri enter, and Brad turned to stare at them.
“We were just about to contact Julie Castro,” he said.
“Don’t mind us,” Joe told him and took up a position against a basement wall.
They watched. Brad had his recorder on the altar, talking to the dead.
“Julie, we want to help you. You weren’t killed here, but others were before you, and you were brought here, to be found doused in your own blood. We want to help you, and we think that you were good at your job. Really good. You don’t have to be embarrassed that you were tricked. The best of us can be. We’re all so sorry, and we want to help you move on. We want to find your killer and let you find eternal reward. You were a good person, Julie. I didn’t know you, but I know people who did know you and love you. We want to help you.”
Nothing moved; nothing stirred. Then the arrow on one of Brad’s little gadgets bounced along its dial.
Brad gasped. “Julie, you’re here.”
Julie wasn’t there at all. Keri squeezed Joe’s hand and she knew that he saw what she saw. The woman in white was in the basement again. Beatrice Bergen. She was staring at Brad as if wondering if he could possibly be for real.
She looked over at Keri and Joe and almost smiled. Then, she was gone.
As she disappeared, Brad was going on and on with Serena about the reading they had taken. “If only we could get more. When the others are back in, we’ll try again,” Brad was saying. “Maybe we’ll get recorders out everywhere and get something. That’s happened before.”
“I think I’ll get dinner started,” Joe said. “Keri, want to give me a hand?”
“Hell yes,” Carl said.
Joe laughed. “I said Keri.”
“But I’d just love to help,” Carl said.
“Sure,” Joe said, glancing over at Dallas.
Keri had to wonder if Dallas’s patience was fading, but he just grinned and shrugged.
“Dallas,” Brad began, “I know you’re not changing rooms, but could we hang out in 207 for a while? You’ve said that nothing has happened there, but you’re not receptive—we are.”
“All right,” Dallas said. “I have to make a few phone calls. I’ll hang in the hallway. You have to keep the door open.”
“Will do,” Brad promised.
Keri headed up the stairs first and then straight for the kitchen. Joe and Carl were behind her.
“We’re ready to serve, oh, great chef,” she told Joe. “What are we creating?”
“Whatever we can throw in the oven,” he told her, grinning and digging into one of the big refrigerators. “Hey, we’ve got sausages, sauerkraut, red cabbage...ah, wow, German potato salad. Looks great. Carl, see if you can find mustard up there in the cabinets. Oh, and paper plates. We’ll keep the cleanup as easy as possible.”
They set to work, Joe going through the sausages, choosing one to chop up finely for the sauerkraut and some to cook. Keri found plates and napkins and asked Carl to help her put together a salad; they were done soon, and Joe called Dallas to have him let the cops know to come in when they could.
They decided to eat in the kitchen. Milo Roser and Henry Schultz came in first, and Brad questioned them about ghosts. Milo, who was local, said that they would tell all kinds of wild stories about the place when they were in school.
Joe asked him about local beliefs.
