Wicked Business

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

I peered out the window that was next to the Shakespeare quote, and I looked down on Joy Street. Diesel walked over and stood next to me.

“Boston looks nice from up here,” he said. “This is my favorite American city.”

“I’m surprised you don’t live here. Why did you choose to live in Marblehead?”

“I had to be near you.”

It was the second time in the last two minutes I went breathless. When I get up in the morning, I try not to focus on the possibility that I’m one of two people on this earth with the ability to recognize an object that might make everyone’s life a misery. Truth is, a lot of the time when I’m tagging along with Diesel I’m feeling like Alice when she fell down the rabbit hole-that I’m in an insanely weird dream, and I’ll wake up at any moment and everything will be normal again.

And then there are times like this, when I’m reminded that I’ve been assigned a protector, and the magnitude of my responsibility sinks in.

“I found the clue,” I said to Diesel. “It’s painted into this mural.”

He draped an arm around me and read the quote attributed to Shakespeare. “Good job. There’s a sun in it, too. The hot eye of heaven. And it’s shining down on the farmer’s fields.”

“This mural is a mosaic,” Marty said, leaning close to the mural, examining the surface. “Inside the sun is a piece of tile shaped like a key.”

Diesel took the Lovey key out of his pocket and placed it over the mosaic key. It was a perfect fit, and a number appeared in the farmhouse. The number was followed by a capital J.

“This could all be a colossal nineteenth-century joke,” I said. “An endless scavenger hunt that goes nowhere.”

I heard the elevator doors open, and a security guard walked our way.

“No one is supposed to be in this part of the building,” he said.

“Sorry,” I said. “We didn’t realize. We had a free moment and I guess we got carried away. We’ve never been in the State House before, and it’s really interesting.”

“If you come back during the week, you can take a tour,” the guard said. “I’m going to have to ask you to go back to the Great Hall now.”

“We should be getting back anyway,” I said. “Our break time is over.”

Diesel pocketed the key. We took the elevator to the second floor and went back to the reception. The guests were still seated. Chamber music could faintly be heard over the crush of conversation.

“Watch this,” Morty said. “I could do it with my eyes closed.”

A cheer went up from across the room.

“I got one!” someone yelled.

“Am I good or what?” Morty said.

We went down to the employee locker room, changed back into our own clothes, and left through a door that led to Hancock Street. We walked Hancock to Mt. Vernon, and Mt. Vernon to Joy. The house number that appeared on the mosaic was on the first block between Beacon and Mt. Vernon. We stood on the sidewalk and stared at the redbrick town house. Four floors, plus a garden level. Not in terrible condition, but not newly renovated, either.

There weren’t any lights on in the house. Either no one was home, or else someone went to bed early. It was too dark to read the bronze plaque by the door.

“It must be a historic house,” Morty said. “They always have plaques on them like that.”

Curiosity got the better of me, and I crept up the steps to the small front stoop to better see the writing on the plaque.

“It says this is a historic house designed by William Butterfield in 1880,” I whispered. “Its name is The Key House, after its first occupant, Malcom Key.”

I touched the plaque with my fingertip and felt the trapped energy. “It’s the plaque,” I said, motioning Diesel to come take a look. “I can feel the energy.”

Diesel examined the plaque and felt around the edges. “I can’t just remove it,” he said. “It’s cemented into the brick.”

“I’m hungry,” Morty said. “I had some of them hors d’oeuvres, but I never got my baloney sandwich.”

Diesel looked at his watch. “I’m supposed to hand you over to your son in a half hour. Let’s go back to the car, and I’ll figure this out later.”

We walked to the car, and Diesel drove to Beacon and double-parked in front of a small grocery store. I ran in and got Morty a loaf of worthless white bread, half a pound of baloney, and a bag of chips, and I was back before the police spotted our illegally parked car.

Diesel skirted the Public Garden and pulled in behind the Four Seasons Hotel. Morty’s son was already there.

“He’s not so bad,” Morty said. “I’m sort of looking forward to going home. I got a nice television in my room, and I got my baloney.”

We handed Morty off, and Diesel got back into the stream of traffic, driving away from Beacon Hill.

“Where are we going?” I asked him.

“As long as we’re here, I thought I’d check on Deirdre Early. There are a few things I’d like to talk to her about.”

“Such as?”

“Hitting people in the head, threatening you, Anarchy.”

“All good topics of conversation,” I said. “Maybe you want to take five or six Advil before knocking on her door.”

Diesel turned onto Commonwealth Avenue, and we immediately saw the fire trucks a block away, parked in front of Early’s house. He pulled in behind one of the trucks, and we sat there for a moment looking at the disaster in front of us. Early’s house appeared to be gutted. Windows were blown out. The exterior was soot-stained. The roof was partially collapsed.

“I warned her she was going to self-combust,” I said to Diesel.

His smile was grim. “That would be the hoped-for scenario.”

We left the car and joined two of the firefighters, relaxing by their truck, sipping coffee.

“What happened?” Diesel asked.

“Not sure,” one of the guys said. “Probably some accelerant involved, since it went through the house like lightning. Impossible to know for sure, but it doesn’t look like anyone was home. Lucky we got here fast and kept it from spreading.”

I was thinking probably when the roof went it released all the evil spirits into the air, like the scene in Ghostbusters when the spook containment facility exploded.

Twenty minutes later, we were standing in front of The Key House again, and Diesel had a big screwdriver in his hand.

“So you think that screwdriver is going to do the job?” I asked him.

“I shouldn’t have a problem if it’s just cemented in at the corners.”

“And if the whole thing is cemented?”

“I’ll have a problem. Keep your eye out for company.”

He rammed the screwdriver into the brick and mortar, chipping away chunks of brick.

“You’re making a mess,” I said.

He stopped work and looked at me. “Do you want to try this?”

“No.”

Thunk, thunk, thunk.

“Jeez,” I said. “That’s awfully loud.”

“I’m starting to think I’d be better off with Hatchet,” Diesel said. “At least I could beat him.”

“Just trying to be helpful,” I said. “I thought you’d want to know you were loud.”

Second-floor lights went on in The Key House.

“Uh-oh,” I said. “Can you hurry it up?”

Diesel rammed the screwdriver in one last time, wrenched it back, and the plaque popped off. He scooped it up and stepped off the stoop just as the front door opened and a man wearing boxers and a striped pajama top looked out at us.

“What the devil?” the man said.

We turned and ran, and I heard the man whistle and yell for Bruno. Seconds later, Bruno bounded out of The Key House and took off after us.

“Dog,” I said, gasping for air. “BIG DOG!”

The dog was doing a lot better on four legs than I was doing on my two. We were still a block from the car, and Bruno was gaining. Diesel stopped in front of a house with a six-foot privacy fence, grabbed me, and threw me over.

One minute, I was running for all I was worth, and next thing, I was flying through the air, and then-wump-I was flat on my back in someone’s backyard. Diesel followed me over, landing on his feet.

He bent down and looked at me. “Are you okay?”

“Unh.”

Bruno was barking and scratching at the fence.

“He’s going to bring people,” Diesel said, pulling me to my feet. “We have to go.”

We looked around. No place to go. Six-foot fence on all sides. No gates.

“I’m going to alley-oop you into the next yard,” Diesel said.

“No!”

Too late. I was over the fence. Diesel came next. Same deal. No way out.

“This is ridiculous,” Diesel said.

He opened the back door to the house and the alarm went off. We raced through, found the front door, and walked out of the house.

“That was easy,” he said.

Diesel took the 1A all the way into Salem and drove to the bakery. I’d called to check on Clara and found she was at her sister’s house for the night. Glo was off on a date with the bellringer, and no one knew if Deirdre Early was still in the parking lot.

“What are we going to do if she’s still there?” I asked Diesel.

“We’re going to ignore her, break into the bakery, and get something to eat. I’m starving.”

He turned the corner, his headlights flashed on the lot, and the lot appeared to be empty, with the exception of a grotesque, twisted, large black piece of metal.

“What is that?” I asked.

“I think it’s your car,” Diesel said.

“It can’t possibly be my car.”

Diesel parked, we got out, and looked at the charred mess.

“I’m pretty sure it’s your car,” Diesel said. “I can see part of the license plate.”

“I loved that car!”

“No you didn’t,” Diesel said. “It was one step away from scrap metal.”

“Yes, but now I have no scrap metal.”

“Let’s think about what we have here,” Diesel said. “Someone torched your car and Early’s town house. Probably the same person. Possibly Early, although I don’t know why she’d burn down her own house.”

“Because she’s insane?”

“Yeah, that could be one possibility.”

“And then we also have a missing Early. Which could be that either the spell didn’t stick or else someone stole her.”

“I’m going with the spell didn’t stick. I can’t imagine anyone wanting Deirdre Early.”

“Bottom line is I have no idea what the hell’s going on,” Diesel said. “Are we raiding the bakery or do you have something better to eat at your house?”

“I doubt there’s anything left here. We mostly do doughnuts and cookies on Sunday, and Clara isn’t opening for business tomorrow.”