“Anyway, I have to do a walk-through and speak to any other members of your family… Thanks for your cooperation, Drew,” she said, then walked toward a glowering O’Brien. “He cleared you if that’s what you’re concerned about.”
But somehow Em had to ensure that the after-school practices stopped. An idea came to her. “Drew, promise me, no horsing around tonight, no rough stuff with your friends, and that goes for the next few days too. The last thing any of us want is for you to be injured. Josh says he’s heard from several scouts who’ll be attending the championship game.”
By the time Em got home, it was almost seven. She wanted to take Gus for a quick walk before she headed to the All Hallows’ Eve party, and while she trusted Izzy, she wanted to take a look around Seaton House. She attached Gus’s leash to his collar and grabbed a flashlight.
It was a beautiful autumn night. The stars and quarter moon shone bright in the black velvet sky. The air was cool and smelled like woodsmoke, fall flowers, and decaying leaves.
Gus nosed around a bush, and Em gave the leash a light tug. “We’re not taking a nature walk tonight, buddy. Do your business, and then we’ll check out Seaton House.”
His ears perked up at the mention of the house, and he quickly got his business out of the way. Em pushed open the gate and shined her light along the path and around the front yard. There was no sign of anything out of the ordinary. She hadn’t really expected there to be—not this early. If Josh agreed to go out with her, maybe they could have their first real date here tonight at midnight. If she were a teenager, that’s when she’d come.
Gus barked, straining at the leash as he pulled her after him. “What’s up, boy?” She looked around as he dragged her up the stairs to the front door. And that’s when she heard it, someone calling “Help.”
She tried the door. It was unlocked. As she walked inside, she heard Mike and Charlie’s voices coming from the kitchen. They were pounding on a door, yelling for help.
“We’re coming!” she called out, shutting the door behind her. There was a loud blowing noise, and she looked up the stairs. A large commercial propane blower sat on the landing. Izzy was right. It would be dangerous for anyone to come here tonight. Em and Charlie and Mike were going to have a serious chat.
When she reached the kitchen, Gus was sitting at the basement door, barking. She reached for the knob but she couldn’t get it to turn. “Guys, back up in case the door swings into you. I might have to give it a shove.”
Eventually she got the door to open, and the boys raced to her, throwing their arms around her. “We didn’t think anyone would ever come,” Charlie said.
She patted their backs. “What were you two doing here? Or more to the point, what were you doing in the basement?”
“Trust me, we didn’t want to go in the basement,” Mike said. “But we think Willy was trying to tell us something. Maybe about the box?”
Em’s pulse kicked up at the thought she might finally solve the case. “Why do you think Willy was trying to communicate with you?”
Charlie took the red ball out of his pocket. “It rolled down the stairs, and then it kept rolling right to the basement door. So we opened the door, and it rolled down the stairs and stopped near a shelf kind of thing, maybe a workbench? We couldn’t see anything. We didn’t have a flashlight, and we’d left our phones upstairs. But you have one, Em. We should check it out.”
She was going to tell them to stay in the kitchen but she needed to know the exact location the red ball had rolled to. “Okay, but as soon as you show me where the ball stopped rolling, you come back and wait for me here.”
They shared a look and nodded. “To be honest, we don’t like it down there. It’s creepy.”
“Gus will stay with you,” she said and then started down the stairs with the boys and Gus following close behind. When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she raised her flashlight. There were signs that the basement had been home to rats and raccoons, and spiders, a lot of spiders going by the number of cobwebs on the shelves that held dust-coated cans and jars.
“Where abouts did the ball stop?” she asked the boys.
“Here,” they said, pointing to the right of Em’s foot. She was standing beside a workbench that looked like it hadn’t been used in decades. The tools were buried under a thick layer of dust and cobwebs. “We’ll help you look, Em.”
She glanced around the workstation. It would take her less time to search the area if the boys helped, and she’d have a chance of making it to the party on time. Ten minutes later, they’d searched every nook and cranny, underneath the workbench and in every drawer, and still they came up empty.
Em heard a whoosh and turned. The basement door slammed shut, and the doorknob fell off and rolled down the stairs. The boys sent her panicked looks.
“Don’t worry. We won’t be locked down here all night.” She didn’t scare easily but this place was even creeping her out. She checked her phone. No cell service. “Okay. You guys have been working with Neil for a while now so you probably know a thing or two about tools.” She picked up the doorknob and walked over to the workbench. “There must be something here we can use to reattach the knob.”
Above them, something crashed and banged several times. Em couldn’t be sure but it sounded as if something was rolling down the stairs. Something heavy, something metal, something like the propane blower, she thought with a touch of alarm.
She hurried up the stairs and pressed her ear to the door. Whatever had rolled down the stairs crashed at what she suspected was the base of the staircase. She heard running feet and then the front door slammed, the wood shuddering beneath her ear. She wondered if O’Brien had followed her to Seaton House. The thought had barely crossed her mind when she smelled something. Something familiar… Burning wood.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Here you go, buddy. Nice costume,” Josh said to the little girl dressed up as a firefighter. A couple of guys had called in sick at the last minute, and he’d volunteered to give out the Halloween treats for HFFD. He didn’t mind. All he had to do was stand at the end of the parade route, handing out treats to the kids.
He looked up Main Street. There were a couple stragglers making their way to him as one by one the store’s lights blinked out. He glanced at his phone. It was five after seven.
He waved the stragglers on, directing a couple of people to the community center for the party. He planned to head there himself. He was hoping to see Em so they could finish the conversation they’d started on his birthday. He’d gone to her house a couple times to talk to her but she hadn’t been home.
With the uptick in Halloween pranks, it was a busy time for HFPD. He’d just missed her when he’d gone to help clean up at Silver Creek. Then he’d gotten busy himself and it wasn’t something he wanted to talk about over the phone.
“Okay, it’s your lucky day, guys,” he said, emptying the boxes of mini chocolate bars into their pillowcases. They were dressed like the kids from Stranger Things. A couple of them looked older than thirteen, but he didn’t call them on it. He figured if a kid put the effort into dressing up, they deserved a treat.