The Ghost and the Dead Man's Library

JACK’S DREAM, WHICH ended more like a nightmare, should have prepared me for what was coming the next day. It didn’t.

Tuesday morning began like any other, apart from my postdream disorientation. I crawled out of bed as soon as the alarm went off, not sure if I was in Jack’s century or mine. But after a cup of coffee, I managed to shower, dress, dry my hair, and stop wondering what Jack was going to do next to find his missing person, and whether he felt guilty about Mindy’s fate.

All the while I was thinking about this stuff, I expected Jack to break into my thoughts and answer me. But he never did.

Anticipating my meeting with Mrs. McConnell, Spencer’s principal, I chose a suitably matronly, nonthreatening outfit from my closet—a long, gray wool skirt, black low-heeled boots, and an oversized black turtleneck. Vaguely aware that my outfit would have raised absolutely no eyebrows in the 1940s, as well as today, I went to wake my son.

To my surprise, Spencer’s bedroom was empty, save for our snoozing marmalade-striped cat, Bookmark, which Sadie had given to Spencer as a kitten on the day we’d moved in.

The bathroom all three of us shared was also vacant, so I hunted through the apartment. The television was quiet, but I checked the living room anyway. Empty. The dining room was empty, too. I finally found Spencer in the kitchen. He was standing at the sink, washing out his cereal bowl, his back turned to me. It was more than a half hour before the school bus arrived, but he was already dressed and ready for class.

“Up early, aren’t you?”

Spencer jumped, startled, then reddened with guilt. I spied his backpack on the counter, his bicycle helmet sitting next to it. I tumbled onto his scheme immediately. He’d almost made it, too. If Spencer had skipped breakfast, he would have outfoxed me.

“You are not riding your bike to school,” I said.

“Why not?”

“Because avoiding the bus is not the way to solve this problem.”

The bowl clattered—too loudly—in the drying tray. Spencer tossed his still-damp spoon into the silverware bin.

“Get ready to go. I’m driving you.”

Spencer rolled his eyes and yanked his backpack off the counter. I could tell by his expression that he was sorry I hadn’t changed my mind about seeing Mrs. McConnell to discuss what had happened on the bus the day before.

My son continued his sullen silence in the car. While I never condoned pouting, I understood his reasons. It was bad enough that he was bullied and humiliated in front of his classmates. Now his mother was going to have a talk with the principal about the matter.

Poor Spence probably feels trapped and embarrassed, I thought, with more humiliation to come.

No, baby, more than anything, your son’s pissed off.

“Back off, Jack.”

Why? You can handle the truth once in a while, can’t you?

“Of course Spencer is angry. You know very well a bigger boy at school gave him a hard time. But I’m going to have a talk with the principal and see that a matron is put on the bus from now on—”

A matron! Baby, your son’s not going to have a matron with him every minute of every day. He’s got to learn how to handle punks and Brunos.

“How?”

Jack Shepard offered a variety of tactics he himself had used in the past. I shook my head.

What’s your beef?

“Things are a lot different from when you were a kid, Jack. If Spencer took your advice, I’m fairly sure he’d end up in juvenile hall or I’d end up being sued for everything—or both.”

I tried to explain the wonderful world of modern middle-class public education.

What do you mean “Zero Tolerance”? Are you telling me a red-blooded American boy can’t bring a switchblade or a pair of brass knuckles to school these days?

“Sorry, Jack. The future’s pretty complicated.”

Jack went silent.

“What?” I asked. “Don’t you have any more parental advice to dispense?”

Listen up. Forget the brass knuckles. I’ll make it simple because, when you’re dealing with the human animal, some things will never change. Bullies look for weakness and fear. Your son has to learn how to overcome his fear and fight for his dignity. He has to learn how to stand up for himself.

I drove by the entrance to the Finch Inn, past the sign for the restaurant, and swerved onto Crowley Road. We crested the hill, went through the traffic light, and began rolling down the other side when a flurry of white particles blew across the roadway.

“Mom, look! It’s snowing.”

The particles swirled right into the path of my Saturn. Then a wind funnel swept them onto the shoulder of the road, where they collected like snowflakes. But they weren’t snowflakes.

The white torrent was formed by thousands of pellets of foam peanuts, the finer grain we used at the store to protect books during shipping. It was about that time that my stomach clenched with an ominous premonition.

“An accident,” Spencer said. He leaned forward and peered through the windshield.

Crowley Road ended at the bottom of a steep hill, where it hit Seneca. Drivers could make a right or left turn on Seneca. Going straight wasn’t an option unless you wanted to crash through a wooden fence and slam into a tree. It was clear from our vantage near the top of the hill that someone in a maroon sedan had chosen the third option.

Debris from the shattered fencepost littered the grassy field now sprinkled with foam. The sedan had left tracks in the soft dirt, leading right to a tall oak. The vehicle’s front end was crumpled into a U around its stout trunk. The hood was bent like an accordion and the front windshield was shattered. The sedan’s doors were open, and a thin stream of foam continued to pour out of the vehicle. The trunk had popped, too. On the ground next to the wreckage lay a stretcher bearing a shrouded body.

Emergency vehicles were parked all over the place: Quindicott Police cars, ambulances, and fire trucks. I braked as I approached the scene.

A young officer I didn’t recognize waved me around the bend, but as I swung onto Seneca and negotiated my way through the vehicle barrier, a bearlike figure stepped into the path of my Saturn. I say “bearlike” in the literal sense, for Chief Ciders of the Quindicott Police was indeed built like a bear, and not the cuddly kind. He had the disposition of a bear, too, though debate raged about whether he acted more like a hibernating bear or an angry one.

(If you want my two cents, given our little town’s low crime rate, he acted like the former most of the time—until something set him off, in which case he acted more like the latter.)

The chief recognized me. I know because I saw him scowl just before he waved me into a space between two fire trucks.

“Park!” Ciders called tersely (even though, what he really cried was “Pahwk!” because his accent was particularly thick).

I had no choice but to pull over. I parked, rolled down the window, and cut the engine. The chief approached the car. Tucking his hat back on his head, he leaned his face into my window and leveled his watery gaze on me.

“Why is it, if there’s trouble in this town, you and Fiona are always in it?”

I blinked innocently. “Whatever do you mean, Chief?”

“I’m talking about the dead fellow we just pulled out of this car. I just talked to Fiona and she told me he was staying at her inn last night. She claims he never checked out, never slept in his bed.”

“And?”

“And apparently he got into his car at around nine o’clock last night, drove away, and never came back. Fiona said she didn’t know where this guy went, but she said that you might know.”

“Me?”

Ciders looked at me squarely. “Fiona said you had business with this man. That your aunt Sadie sent him over to her inn yesterday.”

You’ve been fingered, baby. Your pal the Bird Lady has been singing like a canary.

“Huh?”

Your friend ratted you out.

Jack was, of course, referring to Fiona Finch. He called the innkeeper the Bird Lady because, in addition to her married surname, Fiona regularly wore one of a huge collection of brooches fashioned in the images of birds.

“Was his name Montour?” I asked. “Rene Montour?”

Ciders nodded. “That’s him. Canadian citizen—French-Canadian. He was a solicitor, according to his passport. He’s over there on the stretcher, deader than a monger’s mackerel.” Suddenly the chief remembered that Spencer was in the front seat next to me. “Er…Sorry, Mrs. McClure.”

I was too busy staring at the accident scene to voice any motherly indignation. “What did you find inside the car?” I asked.

Ciders shrugged. “A bunch of old books and a cloud of packing plastic. The box broke open from the force of the crash. There are books scattered all over.”

“I need to see them,” I said.

“Mom!” Spencer cried.

“Stay here, I’ll be right back.”

I climbed out of the car and walked toward the accident scene. I didn’t get five steps before Ciders grabbed my arm.

“That’s a restricted area, Mrs. McClure.”

“I have to see the books,” I repeated. “All of them.”

Ciders cupped his beefy hands around his mouth. “Hey, Womack,” he bellowed.

Near the smashed car, an officer looked up.

“Bring those books over here,” Ciders commanded. “All of them.”

Officer Womack picked up a large box emblazoned with the logo for Tide laundry detergent. He carried the crate across the field, avoiding the rutted tire tracks. Finally he reached the shoulder of the road and plopped the box down on the hood of a police car.

“Go ahead, Mrs. McClure. Take a look. Then tell me what you’re looking for.”

I hurried over and quickly rummaged through the books. The box contained eight volumes—all Raymond Chandler first editions. All were damaged—dents and scrapes, mostly. One had a broken spine, another edition’s dust cover was in tatters. All the books were damp from the morning dew, their pages curled.

“There’s nothing else?” I asked. “I’m looking for a smaller box, with a single volume inside?”

Womack shrugged. “None we can find. But we ain’t looking too hard.”

“This box is smaller. It might not have broken open. The box might be in the trunk, or still in the back seat.”

“The trunk’s empty,” said Officer Womack. “There was only one box in the back seat, ripped open from the crash.” Womack shrugged. “I can look again, but—”

“Please,” I said. “Look again. Or I will.”

Officer Womack stared at me, then faced Ciders. To the man’s surprise, the chief nodded and sent him on his way. The officer returned to the crash scene, grumbling. Ciders redirected his gaze toward me.

“If you just tell me what this is about, we—”

“Is this an accident or a crime-scene investigation, Chief Ciders?”

The man blinked, then his eyes narrowed. “What are you getting at, Mrs. McClure?”

“My aunt and I sold Mr. Montour a very valuable book yesterday, worth many thousands of dollars. If it’s gone, then someone might have stolen it—”

“Nothing, Chief,” Womack called from the crash site. “Just a lot of that packing foam.”

“Thanks, Tom,” Ciders replied. Then he faced me again. “What were you saying?”

“I was saying that if this book is missing, then there may have been a crime committed—”

Ciders raised his hand. “I don’t know about any theft, Mrs. McClure, but it’s clear what happened here. Mr. Montour went to dinner, had a few drinks. Unwisely, he chose to take a drive. On Crowley Road, at the top of the hill, he got the red light. He braked, but while he was waiting for the light to turn green, he passed out. His foot slipped off the brake and his car rolled down the hill, out of control.”

“You’ve completely ruled out foul play?” I asked.

“This was an accident,” Ciders replied, growing increasingly cranky. “You can still smell the booze in the guy’s car, Mrs. McClure. This guy Montour was soused—to the gills.”

“But—”

Ciders cut me off. “Look at the tire marks. The man never braked, not even when his car careened through the fence and hit the grass.”

I looked at the marks—on the road and in the dirt. There were no skid marks on the pavement, no swerving curves in the grass, just a pair of straight lines right into the tree. Chief Ciders was correct: Montour never braked.

“And by the way, Mrs. McClure. I was out here last year, same place, same kind of accident. Only that time it was the high school quarterback, Tyler Scott. The kid went to an illegal drinking party, passed out at the wheel. The punk survived the crash. Can’t say the same for the team. They lost the regional playoffs.”

Ciders looked over his shoulder, at the shrouded form on the stretcher. “That Scott kid got away with two broken legs. Frenchy there wasn’t so lucky.”