It took several tries before I got the key to work. It was old. Probably as old as the house itself, being passed down from Mr. Whitman, the original builder, to Dr. Hunt, then to Rob’s brother Randall, whose estate turned it over to Rob. I assume Barbara as tenant had used it for the fifty-plus years she operated her bed-and-breakfast.
Once inside, I flipped on three light switches to my right. The grand foyer came alive, as brilliant as an exploding star. The chandelier contained dozens of uniquely shaped bulbs. It was like each had a specific job: to highlight a particular section of the walls and ceiling. I was glad Marshall-Dekalb Electric Coop had not yet disconnected the power. If it had, I’d be dependent solely on my iPhone’s flashlight.
Everything I saw was oak: the floor, the walls, the ceiling, and the staircase. The only difference was the stair treads were stained a darker color. As I headed to the second floor, I expected some creaking and groaning. None. I don’t know why I’d imagined the Hunt House was falling apart.
My knowledge of the house came mainly from Rosa. During mine and Rachel’s marriage, we’d see Rosa and Rob once a year, unless they were still serving as missionaries in China. During those rare visits, I’d always quizzed my mother-in-law outside Rachel’s presence. She despised the place.
On the second floor, Randy’s room was to the left, Rachel’s to the right. What interested me was the narrow stairwell landing behind her bedroom that led two ways: down sixteen steps to the first floor beside a pantry, along the east side of the giant kitchen, and up eight steps to a low-ceiling attic transformed into a reading and pondering room, as Rosa described it. This cozy room had one double window facing Julia Street Methodist Church and was Rachel’s favorite spot.
I entered Rachel’s old bedroom and immediately saw the door that led to the narrow stairs. Stepping inside, I turned, looked up, and reached above the door frame and felt the board that lay horizontally above the stairwell’s entrance. The light from Rachel’s bedroom sufficed to descend the stairs to the kitchen, but it barely reflected upwards where I needed. I removed my iPhone and clicked on its flashlight. Four nails secured the board I had felt. Two nails per side. But, higher, above the ten-to-twelve-inch first board, looked like a hollow cavity. My problem was I couldn’t reach it.
After descending the stairs to the kitchen, I exited the back door and walked to the detached garage. It was locked, but I found a half-rotten stepladder entangled along a vine-infested rear wall. Another problem. It seemed clear to me it was too long to do me any good. I probably could use the front stairwell to tote it to the second floor and inside Rachel’s bedroom, but even if I could stand it inside the closet-sized space, the ceiling of the narrow stairwell was such that I couldn’t climb the ladder. I needed something else, maybe a stepstool.
I had no choice but to return tomorrow better equipped for the task.
***
I hurried down the foyer stairs. It was a few minutes before 10:00. I wanted to be at Kyla’s before she got home.
I had already closed the door and was fiddling with the key when I looked upwards through the glass panels. The chandelier was still on. I turned the knob and reopened the door. When I reached to my right to flip the three switches, I heard a thud. Something had fallen. It was heavy. I left the lights on and returned to the porch. Two men were sitting in a swing twenty feet away. A shattered pot of red Mums lay inches from the feet of Mayor Ted King. Black soil lay across the wooden floor. At first, I didn’t recognize the other man, but then, like a computer, my brain searched for and retrieved decades-old memories and superimposed a fifty-year aging process. Voila. Ray Archer.
“I hope we didn’t startle you.” Ted had changed clothes. He was now wearing a pair of blue jeans, crimson red running shoes, and a dark brown cardigan sweater. His carefully combed dark hair looked like he’d pulled his sweater over his head and didn’t bother with his disheveled look.
Both men stood and walked towards me. I had no known reason to fear either of them, physically. Yet, I did. I now knew the fight-or-flight feeling I’d heard about my whole life. Ted was only slightly larger than me. I would describe both of us as scrawny. Ray was six or more inches taller and outweighed me by a hundred pounds. Although he had lost most of his high school physique, he could decimate me with one blow. I stayed quiet.
“You find what you’re looking for?” Ray’s attire was halfway between formal and informal. Unlike Ted who had been at the park, formal. But not as casual as Ted was now, informal. Ray’s pants were more elegant than your standard Khaki’s and his blue oxford cloth shirt looked like he’d just taken it from an ironing board. He wasn’t wearing a tie, coat, or sweater. His shoes were casual, tan-colored loafers. Ray’s gray hair made him look older than the image in my mind, a youthful Ray sporting a full mane of brown hair.
I wanted to lock the door and walk away, never saying a word to either of them. I decided that wasn’t a viable option. “Just looking, always wanted to see inside.” For a lawyer, that was an unneeded admission.
“But Rachel wouldn’t let you.” Ray said, now standing two feet away like a light-pole. His eyes were dark, like the inside of a cave. Outside of my one attempt to play junior high football, I’d never wanted to hit someone. That had changed.
“Let it go, Ray.” Ted stepped in. “Listen, Mr. Harding. We respect what you’re trying to do for your in-laws, but the law is on our side.”
“Whose side is that? The City’s or Mr. Archer’s?” I was saying too much. Ted reached his left arm out as though blocking Ray, like a traffic cop stopping someone from crossing the street.
Ted continued. “I admit this is a beautiful place, a landmark, but half-a-million dollars is a lot of money. A lot of help for Rob and Rosa. You should encourage them to take it.”
Ted could restrain Ray just so much. “Would help them forget their dead daughter.” What a complete asshole.
“Ray, go sit.” I was glad Ted had more control than his lumbering friend. “Lee, may I call you Lee?” Ray didn’t do as told but retreated to the brick and concrete porch railing. He leaned back and removed his cell phone.
“Okay, Ted.” I wouldn’t ask permission.
“I’ve read your motion and I must admit, it rings true if you look at history, what’s in the past. But let’s be practical. Barbara is gone. It’s unlikely there will be another bed-and-breakfast host to come along. And, you know Rob and Rosa will never return. The house is too big, I’d say awkward for such an old couple, and this ignores all the needed maintenance.”
I interrupted. “I haven’t seen problem issues.”
“Mold and mildew. Plus, the foundation is cracking. Again, the only reasonable way to look at this property is from a financial standpoint.”
“Rachel would vote for progress.” Ray couldn’t keep quiet.
I felt my blood pressure rising, but I bit my lip. “Ray, I’m warning you. Have some respect.” I must admit, I saw some decency in Mayor King. “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. Monday night, I’ll ask the council to approve another $50,000. That’s $550,000 for a property that two appraisers have said is worth, at most, $300,000.”
“How about three-quarters of a million?” I was pushing the envelope, wanting to see how high the mayor would go. I had no authority from my client to make an offer or settle on any terms.
Ray got riled. He stood straight and came at me, ignoring Ted’s arm. I didn’t back down as he stared down at me. He had been drinking. “You little shit-face. I’ll burn this fucking place to the ground.”
I’m not sure what would have happened if Ted hadn’t squeezed himself in between Ray and me. For sure, it wouldn’t have been good for me. “Okay guys let’s keep this civil. Ray, you agreed to come here to negotiate, not start a bar brawl.”
What Ray did and said next went beyond anything I could imagine, especially his words. He pointed his right finger in my face even though the mayor was trying to hold him back. The tip of his finger poked my forehead. “You’d think you wouldn’t be so damn interested in where your wife lost her virginity.”
How I kept from physically responding is beyond me. But this didn’t mean I wasn’t responding inside. It was like the proverbial fire hydrant exploded. Revenge was all I could think about. Thankfully, Mayor King persuaded Ray to retreat. The two walked down the stairs.
“Lee, I’m sorry about all this. Please know my offer stands.” I was still staring in disbelief when the two drove away in the Mayor’s Mercedes.
***
I forced myself to switch gears, away from Ray’s horrible words and toward the puzzle that presented itself. Once I focused, it didn’t take long to frame the most likely scenario.
After Kyla and I walked away from the refreshments table, Lillian had answered Ted’s question: “who was that guy?” Also, earlier, she may have seen and heard Rosa and Kyla exchanging the key. Later, Ted found Ray somewhere within the park and hatched the plot. Together, they agreed to pay me a brief visit at the Hunt House.
Without going back inside and turning off the lights, I locked the front door and semi-jogged to my Explorer. Ray’s statement, “I’ll burn the fucking house to the ground,” rang in my ears. I wondered if it had a hidden meaning.
I drove to Walmart and bought a three-foot stepstool, a claw-hammer, a screwdriver, a flashlight, and a box of vinyl gloves. During the return to the Hunt House, I mentally reviewed Rachel’s diaries. The 38 caliber should be right where she had hidden it. Unless she had lied. I truly believed I’d find the Smith & Wesson in that hollow space at the top of the narrow stairwell.
When I returned to the Hunt House, I exited my vehicle and did a full 360-degree scan of my surroundings. Once clear, I grabbed my purchases and climbed the front porch steps. Luckily, I was learning how to use the old key. The scene with Ted and Ray prompted me, after flipping on the chandelier, to lock the door from the inside.
I took it slow up the foyer stairs, not wanting to slip and fall. I didn’t know why I was now stepping so softly. Who was listening?
Inside Rachel’s bedroom, I laid aside the tools, gloves, and flashlight and expanded the stepstool. I placed one side on the stairwell landing and the other half about a foot inside the bedroom. I centered it below the door frame and provided the right amount of clearance to ease to the second step. Now, I could reach inside the hollow void above the board Rachel had said she removed.
Even though I felt something, maybe the spine of a book, I couldn’t reach down far enough to grab whatever was behind the board. This made me question why Rachel would need to remove the board. If she could access the opening, she wouldn’t need to do anything else. Just slip it over the board’s edge and let it go. She was right and often said I had the unpleasant habit of over-analyzing things.
I eased down from my perch and opened the vinyl gloves, sticking two in a front pocket. After tucking the screwdriver in a belt loop, I grabbed the hammer and flashlight, and re-climbed the steps. It didn’t take but a couple of minutes, holding the flashlight handle between my teeth, to pry the board away from the studs. It was maybe 30 to 32 inches long. Once removed, I lowered it to the floor and dropped it. Another thud, which rekindled my anger at the son-of-a-bitch Ray Archer.
By now, the flashlight was shining sideways, and I couldn’t make out what I’d uncovered. As I clutched it in my right hand and turned it toward Thomas Avenue and inside the now exposed hollow cavern, I saw the pistol. Rachel had sealed it in a zip-lock bag and laid it sideways against the boards that lined the wall inside Rachel’s bedroom. And there was more. To the right of the pistol were two books, both laying on their side with the spine reaching skyward. The one whose front faced me was another diary. I paused and put on my gloves. I removed the diary and couldn’t have been more shocked. The other book was The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the book Rosa had loaned Rachel.
The Pencil-Driven Life 