Gumshoe Ghost Mystery: Dying for the Past Part 2

"Okay, good idea," I said, following. "Let's go back inside."

On the way to the ballroom, he checked with the deputies in each of the rooms. Everyone had the same story-after the shots, no one was in the halls and all the guests stayed put in the rooms. The house was locked down.

"Dammit." Bear stood in the ballroom entrance. His face was tight with frustration; his eyes darted everywhere, searching for an answer evading us both. "There's nowhere left to hide."

"Ah, Bear," I said as the strange, cold tingling started up my spine again. "Come with me. I think I know where the shooter is. Back to the bas.e.m.e.nt."

He blinked a few times and looked around. Then, without a word to the deputies standing in the hall watching him, he returned to the bas.e.m.e.nt door. He probably thought it was his idea, but I was three steps ahead of him.

I led him around the cavernous bas.e.m.e.nt into the far corner room where there were old wine shelves and storage racks cluttered with junk. The junk was cobwebbed and gritty and the few bottles of wine were long ago forgotten. The small room was sectioned off from the rest of the bas.e.m.e.nt and lit by only two overhead lights.

"He's here, Bear. Somewhere." Something pulled me to the wine rack closest to the corner of the room. It took hold of me-what, I don't know-and pulled me into the rack. I knew not to resist and stepped through the wine racks, pa.s.sing into darkness ...

_____.

The darkness consumed me. No, it didn't scare me or leave me feeling alone. I mean it consumed me. The stone floor fell away beneath my feet. The brick walls and wine racks withered into nothing, leaving a dull, black void. Darkness enveloped me and I was lost-nowhere-gone from the bas.e.m.e.nt and standing helpless and abandoned in empty, inky nothing.

Except for the 1932 Packard barreling toward me down the street.

I dodged the old four-door-old was wrong, this one looked brand-new-and jumped onto the sidewalk. I stood in front of a soda shop where a mother and two children emerged. They were eating ice cream. The children-two chattering girls in bright, frilly sundresses-were giggling over their sweets as the mom shooed them to a nearby bench. The mother wore a dark, below-the-knee skirt, long-sleeved blouse, and a wide-brimmed hat perched on her head.

A hat? A Packard? Ice cream shop?

1930-something was everywhere. Round-fender Chevys and Fords drove past. Businessmen in their pinstriped, double-breasted suits and fedoras stood smoking on the street corners and reading newspapers. A paperboy hawked his news across the street. Somewhere a radio blared swing music.

Everywhere was an era long gone in some Das.h.i.+ell Hammett novel. And I was its newest character.

Across the street at a storefront-my eyes were pulled there like steel to a magnet-was a strange building lost between a clothing store and stationery shop. The front windows were papered over with posters and billboards chiding some politician and calling for interested people to join a meeting inside on American patriotism. The gla.s.s-paned front door opened, and a short man with dark features and thick, slicked-back black hair emerged. He was in a business suit of the day-double-breasted, wide lapels, wingtips, and a hat in one hand. He stopped at the sidewalk and looked around as though expecting someone. No pa.s.sersby greeted him.

He tightened his hat on his head and walked with brisk determination down the street and around the corner out of sight.

Before I knew why, my feet were carrying me in his wake.

I followed him four blocks and after just two realized we were in Was.h.i.+ngton DC heading east toward the Mall. Three times, the man stopped and double-backed, crossed streets only to cross back a block farther down. He purchased a Was.h.i.+ngton Star from a young paperboy hustling folded papers to anyone with a nickel. When he reached the mall, he went to a row of park benches. He sat, unfolded his paper, and pretended to read.

I say pretended because his attention was above the paper-not the fold, mind you, the paper.

I tried to approach him but something kept me at bay. Each time I tried to move closer, my feet became mired and my legs refused to obey. An unseen force kept hold and refused to let me get closer than fifty yards. What, I have no idea, but it walled me to a patch of sidewalk opposite the Was.h.i.+ngton Monument where I stared across the gra.s.s at the dark-skinned man and his news-

paper.

There were perhaps twenty other people on the mall nearby. A mother with a carriage and child. Two lovers holding hands and strolling nowhere. Businessmen striding here and there on their way to important meetings. Even a uniformed beat cop ambled down the sidewalk, taking little notice of cars and pedestrians. And each of these people caused a ruffle in the man's newspaper and a peek over its edge. Twice, when someone neared him, he turned on the bench, re-crossed his legs, and continued "reading."

Just as I tired from boredom, he did a curious thing.

After the cop pa.s.sed him and headed north along 15th Street and the Ellipse, the man slipped something from his inside suit coat pocket and tucked it into his newspaper. Then he stood, folded the paper with care, and walked back to Independence Avenue. At the corner of 15th, he jammed the newspaper down into a trash can and hastened across the street. He continued farther down Independence, hailed a pa.s.sing cab, and disappeared before I could make chase.

And it was a good thing I did not.

Whatever restrained me before held tight-a force telling me my visit to 1935 was not over. The fun was just beginning.

A tall, thin woman beneath a floppy hat and wearing a matronly, long-hemmed dress appeared down Independence. She ambled toward me and crossed the street at 15th, stopping at the corner. She went to the trash can, dug around inside, and retrieved the folded newspaper. Then she recrossed Independence and waited.

A city bus approached.

My legs were free and movement restored. I ran across Independence and made the bus just as the door closed. The thin woman was aboard, sitting one seat behind the rear side door. I made it three seats down the aisle before the invisible hand seized me and trapped me in the aisle-I could get no closer to her.

Several blocks later, somewhere in Northwest DC, the woman left the bus and walked a circuitous route several blocks north to a small family restaurant-Quixote's Windmill. At the front door, I peered inside the window to see what became of the mysterious woman and her newspaper.

She was gone-nowhere inside. In fact, the restaurant was empty and closed.

A tornado of darkness whirled around me, scooped me up, and returned me, not to Kansas, but to the here and now of Winchester in 2014. The sidewalk vanished and the bas.e.m.e.nt floor returned beneath me again. The dark, empty bas.e.m.e.nt surrounded me.

When the swirling stopped, I looked around. The dark-skinned man, his newspaper, and the curious thin woman were gone. And with them, 1935 was back in history.

_____.

Bear stood at the foot of the bas.e.m.e.nt steps, looking up.

I said, "Bear, this isn't gonna make sense, but Grecco's killing is connected to 1935."

"Hmmph."

"No, really."

Bear called up the stairs to a deputy in the kitchen. "Ski, recheck the house and search the other houses on the property-everything. Something's going on here; I can feel it. And it's not going to make sense."

Didn't I just say that?

five.

"Partners?" Bear said to the pet.i.te, dark-haired woman giving orders at the crime scene team scurrying around. "You want me to partner with Spence? No way."

"Save it, Bear." Captain Helen Sutter's laser eyes made her order clear. "Clemens will be out for a few weeks. You haven't had a partner since Tuck was killed, and Spence needs one, too. Enough. What did the ME give us?"

Bear leered at Spence standing opposite Grecco's body from him. He snorted and gave his report. "Clemens and Grecco were hit with a .22 caliber slug-more after the autopsy. Grecco's shot came from a down angle based on the entry and exit wounds. We think the shooter was on the second floor in one of the rooms at the top of the stairs. He shot over the balcony railing and through the open ballroom doors."

Captain Sutter c.o.c.ked her head. "Is it possible ?"

"I went upstairs and checked it out," Bear said. "The ballroom entrance is two stories tall and wide enough. There's enough visual from the second floor above the main hall to see into the ballroom where the dancing was. I stood just inside the doorway of both bedrooms-out of sight of anyone below-and I could take a shot into the ballroom. A little patience and skill and boom."

"What a mess." Captain Sutter stood below the grand archway between the ballroom and hall and peered up to the second floor railing. "Find anything in the rooms?"

"Not yet. Now, Cap, about Spence-"

"No." Captain Sutter held up her hand. "Spence, finish in here and double-check the neighborhood canva.s.s. Bear, make sure the guests are interviewed before they go. And play nice, boys, or else."

"I always play nice, Cap," Spence said. "Bear has the att.i.tude."

"You tried to frame me for Tuck's murder."

"No I didn't." Spence held up his hands. "I was trying to-"

"Enough!" Captain Sutter yelled. "Will you two get over it already? Tuck's was a rough case-for all of us. Let him go."

Both men fell silent.

Looking around the ballroom, the donation table was still on the far wall with the crystal punchbowl on it. "Bear, what about all the charity donations? Whose got those?"

He looked over at the punchbowl. "Cap, whose got the foundation's money?"

"I'm sure Angela Tucker does. Check with her."

"Okay, soon as-"

"Holy c.r.a.p, Cap." Spence stood up. "This guy's loaded. He has ten g's in cash in his wallet."

Bear forced a laugh. "Bull, Spence. Ten grand won't fit in a wallet. What are you talking about?"

Spence pulled several bills from Grecco's black leather wallet and fanned them out.

"Holy twenty-second president," I said.

Spence held ten bills-each a U.S. Treasury, Uncle-Sam approved, Gold Certificate, one-thousand-dollar bill. The bills were in immaculate condition and except for a little fading on Grover Cleveland's mug, they looked like they'd just rolled off the Treasury press.

"Are they real?" Bear slipped on a plastic crime-scene glove and took one of the bills. "Can't be."

"I don't know," Spence said. "I've never seen one before. I didn't know they were still around."

"Neither did I." Captain Sutter already had gloves on and took the bills from Spence. "They look and feel real. We'll have to get the Secret Service to examine them. They're evidence one way or the other."

"Cap," Bear said, looking at the guests in the lounge across the hall. "Who carries this much old currency? Or this kind of currency? Angel told me Grecco stroked her foundation a check for one hundred thousand. Why all the cash? And why-"

"Thousand-dollar notes?" Captain Sutter pointed her chin toward the hall. "Spence, seize the donations right away. We don't want anyone undonating. And I want a list of all donations tonight."

"Sure, Cap."

"Bear," she said, "make sure we check everyone's personal effects for any more dead presidents when we interview them. I want to know if anyone has any more Clevelands."

"Right." He started for the lounge but stopped and turned around. "Cap, about Spence and me partnering-"

"Zip it, Braddock." Captain Sutter walked over to him and drove

a .50-caliber finger into his chest. She did, of course, have to get on her tiptoes to aim. "The friggin' sheriff and county supervisor are sitting in one of these rooms-right now, right here-waiting for answers. I gotta tell them Winchester's newest resident and biggest philanthropist got capped and we got diddly s.h.i.+t. I don't have time for this with you two. Got it?"

He nodded and walked off.

While I was alive, Captain Sutter and I got along just great-as long as I jumped when she yelled and didn't confuse her femininity with her rank. She was a fire-breathing dragon at work. None of us knew her off-duty. Rumor had it she had a calm, soft side hidden somewhere.

Rumors can be wrong.

"Go easy on Bear, Cap," I said as he walked away. "He's still in mourning for me."

She laughed and turned to Spence behind her. "Clever, Spence."

"Huh, Cap? I didn't say anything."

I started after Bear when the lights flickered off and on a few times-just as they had seconds before Stephanos Grecco's murder. When I looked up at the crystal chandelier, the raspy sound of Louie Armstrong croaked out Ain't Misbehavin.' In the hall, Louie's gravelly baritone introduced his old friend to me.

"Oh, no. Here we go again."

Standing in the hall was the stout, striking mobster in his s.h.i.+ny wingtips and fedora. He beckoned me to follow him into the lounge with a big smile and a wave.

I did.

My host had a drink in one hand and a big Cuban in the other. Bear, Spence, and Captain Sutter were gone. Instead, the bar was set up with bottles of expensive booze and the room smelled of good tobacco and dank night air. Even Angel's party and all her guests were gone-vanished to somewhere else-somewhere not here and not now.

Now wasn't 2014.

The mob boss lifted his drink in salute as I walked in. His broad smile consumed his puffy, dark face as he downed his drink. "Come in, Oliver. I've been waiting for you."

Oliver? The only two people who ever called me Oliver were dead. One of them turned out to be my guardian angel, Doc, and the other was Ernie Stuart. This gangster was neither.

He walked around behind the bar and took down a dark bottle from the top shelf. He put a second gla.s.s beside his on the bar and filled them both-one he slid over to me when I stepped closer.

"Hope you like bourbon, Oliver." He lifted his gla.s.s with a wink. "You look like a bourbon fella to me. Bottoms up."