010 Buried Secrets (12 page)

T
HE ONLY THING
to do, Nancy thought, is to stand behind the door and rush out when it’s opened. She flattened herself against the wall, her eyes still darting around the room. That was when she saw the button for the dumbwaiter.

In a second Nancy was across the room—jabbing at the button, listening to the footsteps on the stairs, and praying.

Outside the door, the footsteps slowed to a cautious walk. That was all the time Nancy needed. The dumbwaiter arrived, and she scrambled inside, jabbing the button just as the office door swung open.

As the dumbwaiter started to creak its way
down, Nancy heard the office door slam. Quick footsteps moved straight for the exposed tape recorder. Soon Mayor Abbott would figure out exactly how John Harrington had discovered what he was up to. But that won’t help him any, Nancy thought, holding tightly to the crucial tape. He’ll never get his hands on
this.

It was dark and stuffy inside the dumbwaiter, but even in there Nancy could hear the thunder outside. The storm was getting worse. Driving down the cliff road in the middle of an electrical storm was not going to be fun, but Nancy knew she’d have to do it—and she’d have to do it quickly.

Finally, with a jerk and a thump, the dumbwaiter landed and Nancy slid the panel open. She got out and found herself in the biggest kitchen she’d ever seen. Two massive stoves were against one wall, and two refrigerators loomed against another. In the middle of the black- and white-tiled floor was a big wooden counter with copper pots and pans hanging over it.

The kitchen was dim, and the refrigerators and pans threw long shadows across the walls and floor. Tucking the tape into the waistband of her running pants, Nancy headed for a door. She’d almost reached it when she saw another shadow—the shadow of a man, hiding just beyond the door.

Nancy stopped. Mayor Abbott must really be worried, she thought. He’d sent two men after her. Looking around, she spotted another door, one she guessed that probably led up to the rest of the house. She turned quickly and started for it.

When she was halfway across the kitchen, the tape fell out, hitting the floor with a slap. Nancy bent to pick it up. As she straightened, she looked back and saw that the shadow outside had moved. Standing in the doorway was Mayor Abbott’s skinny “caretaker,” one hand on the door and the other wrapped around his shotgun.

Before the man could get to her, Nancy climbed back inside the dumbwaiter, sending it up to the tower office. She knew Abbott had someone waiting for her there, too, but she hoped the upstairs guy didn’t have a gun.

Now she wasn’t in a hurry at all, and the dumbwaiter’s ascent seemed horribly fast. Just before she reached the top, Nancy stuck the tape in a corner. Whoever was up there had probably guessed about the tape. But if he didn’t see it on her, maybe she could pretend not to know anything about it. It’s worth a try, she told herself, taking a deep breath as the dumbwaiter came to a stop.

“Well, Miss Drew,” Mayor Abbott said as she climbed out. “We meet again.”

Nancy kept quiet, wondering how much he’d guessed.

“I see you’ve been very busy since our interview,” the mayor commented, pointing to the tape recorder. “Tell me, does your job always involve stripping down walls?”

“If that’s what it takes,” Nancy told him.

The mayor nodded. “Clever. John Harrington was clever, too. But I guess you already know that.”

Nancy didn’t answer.

“Come on, Miss Drew, I know you must have discovered a tape on this machine.”

A tape that exposes you as a murderer, Nancy thought.

“I didn’t plan to kill Harrington,” Mayor Abbott told her as if he’d read her mind. “I didn’t even plan to hit him. But when he told me that I was finished, that I’d never get a chance to run for office myself, I lost control. I hit him, and when he fell, his head hit an iron doorstop. It was an accident, but I couldn’t let anyone know about it. So I dumped the body out the window.”

“What about Charles Ogden?” Nancy asked. “How did you get him to go along with your story?”

“Money,” the mayor said. “Ogden wanted money. I had plenty to give him, so he agreed to
tell the police exactly what I told him. Of course, I knew I couldn’t trust him,” he said, shaking his head. “He would always have known the truth. So I had to get rid of him. I’m afraid that right after he left town, Ogden met with a fatal accident.”

Nancy closed her eyes. She felt sorry and glad for Hannah at the same time. It was going to be awful for Hannah to know that the man she’d thought of marrying had actually taken money to cover up Harrington’s murder. But maybe learning that Ogden wasn’t much of a person would help her get over the fact that he’d been murdered.

“Miss Drew.” Mayor Abbott broke into her thoughts. “I want that tape.”

“I don’t have any tape,” Nancy lied. “I didn’t know about any of this until just now, when you told me.” Forget the tape, she was thinking. If he just doesn’t find it, then you can tell the police where it is after you get out of here.
If
you get out of here.

“Somehow, I find that hard to believe,” the mayor said. “But it doesn’t really matter. Tape or no tape, I’m afraid that what happened to Ogden is going to happen to you, too.”

Behind him, in the open doorway, the man with the shotgun appeared.

“There’s someone downstairs, you know,”
Nancy said. “And a gun like that makes a really loud noise. How are you going to explain it?”

“I’m surprised at you, Miss Drew,” the mayor said. “Did you really think you’d have that ‘accident’ here? You must think I’m stupid. No, you’ll be found some distance from the mansion, and by that time, I’ll be safely back in my office. No one saw me come in here, and no one’s going to see me leave.”

No one saw
me
, either, Nancy thought. The best she could do was scream and hope that Barry heard her over the thunder.

“Please, Miss Drew,” the mayor said, holding out his hand as if he were her dance partner. “I have a very important meeting in an hour. Let’s not waste any more time.”

Taking a deep breath, Nancy opened her mouth and gave the most piercing scream she could manage. A clap of thunder drowned it out, but in the split-second that the startled mayor and his henchman paused, Nancy pushed the button and jumped into the dumbwaiter.

She heard a shout followed by a slap. Someone had just hit the panel in frustration.

Good, Nancy thought. Let’s just hope this crate makes it to the bottom before they do. If it didn’t, she’d be a sitting duck the second the dumbwaiter stopped.

For a few moments Nancy tried to decide if she could get past the two men. The mayor looked out of shape—one good, unexpected push would probably send him sprawling. But his sidekick? The man was skinny, but he looked strong. Besides, he had a gun.

Still, Nancy knew she’d have to fight. Go after the sidekick first, she told herself. If you can get him, the mayor’ll be a piece of cake.

Moving as deeply into the dumbwaiter as possible, Nancy braced her foot against the back wall. She was planning to push out the minute the door opened. If she came out fighting, she might catch them off guard.

Suddenly the dumbwaiter stopped. It was so abrupt that Nancy fell over, landing awkwardly on her side. Quickly she tried to get back into position before she opened the door, but then she realized that it didn’t matter. The dumbwaiter had stopped, but not in the kitchen.

The power must have gone off. Either the storm had knocked it out or one of those guys had done it. But however it had happened, the dumbwaiter was suspended somewhere between the floors of Harrington House. And Nancy was trapped inside.

N
ANCY FOUGHT TO
keep from panicking. It was one thing to be in that cramped box while it was moving, but to be stuck in it, not knowing how or when she’d get out, was a completely different story.

Nancy took a couple of slow, deep breaths and told herself to calm down. The power couldn’t stay off forever. If the storm had done it, it might take hours, but it would still come back on. In the meantime, she knew she wouldn’t suffocate.

What if the mayor had remembered where the circuit breaker was and shut the power off? But what reason could he possibly have to do it? To get
her so scared she’d fall apart and actually be glad to see him when he let her out?

Fat chance, she thought, sitting up straighter. What other reason could he have? If it weren’t for the storm raging outside, all Nancy would have to do would be to scream and kick hard enough, and eventually somebody would hear her. In fact, she wondered, what was she waiting for? It wasn’t thundering every second. If she made enough noise, maybe Barry would hear her.

With a piercing shriek, Nancy kicked her heels against the floor of the dumbwaiter and banged the walls with her fists, making so much noise her ears started ringing. Then she stopped and listened.

Nothing but thunder and wind. She started yelling again, and again.

The third time, the heel of her running shoe stuck. Looking down, she saw that she’d kicked so hard, she’d splintered the floor.

Pulling hard, Nancy pried her foot loose. A small section of the floor came up with it. She expected to see nothing but air where the wood had been. Instead, she saw what looked like a white box.

Quickly Nancy reached down and pried loose another piece of wood. She was right—it
was
a
box. Four boxes, in fact, each one the perfect size for a reel of tape.

Lifting the boxes out, Nancy had to smile. John Harrington had found the perfect hiding place for his blackmail tapes—a false bottom in the floor of the dumbwaiter, where no one would ever discover them. No one, that is, except a person who happened to get trapped in there during an electrical storm.

But was she still trapped? After all, if she’d been able to break the false bottom so easily, maybe she could break through the real bottom. It would be a long haul down the cable, but anything was better than sitting and waiting for something to happen.

On her hands and knees, Nancy began prying up more of the false bottom until she had an opening she thought she could squeeze through. Then, she kicked at the floor beneath. It gave a little. She kicked harder, wishing she could stand up and give it all her strength.

Finally the wood gave. By kicking again and again, Nancy eventually gouged out a second hole. It was rough and ragged around the edges, but she didn’t care how many splinters she got or how much skin she left behind. Nothing mattered but getting out of there.

Nancy reached for the tape she’d found on the recorder and tucked it securely into her waistband. She’d have to leave the other tapes behind, but not this one. This one was leaving Harrington House with her.

On her knees again, Nancy reached through the hole until she could feel the cable. It’s probably seventy-five years old at least, she thought. I hope it doesn’t pick tonight to break.

Turning around, Nancy began to lower herself feet first into the darkness of the dumbwaiter shaft. She wrapped her legs around the cable, then lowered the rest of her body inch by inch.

Finally Nancy let go of the floor and put all her weight on the cable. Her hands were slick, and she slid a few inches before she managed to stop. Above her the dumbwaiter swayed slightly, and she had to force herself not to climb back into it. It was an awful place to be stuck in, but at least it was more solid than the empty darkness below her. Just keep going, she ordered herself and began to inch her way down the cable.

After a few minutes the muscles in Nancy’s arms were shaking badly and her hands felt raw. What she really wanted to do was let go of the cable and drop the rest of the way—anything to stop the ache in her arms. But she had no idea how far she’d come and how much farther she had
to go. It can’t be too much longer, she kept telling herself. But she knew that if she dropped too soon, the drop might as well be as far as that from a skyscraper.

Nancy tightened her legs around the cable and tried to relax her arms for a second. Then, gritting her teeth, she lowered herself a few more feet.

Suddenly the dumbwaiter swayed hard, bumping against the shaft. Beneath it, Nancy clung to the cable—and felt a nail scrape across her back. The cable slipped from her feet, and for a moment she was hanging by her hands. What’s going on? she wondered. Isn’t a storm bad enough? Do we have to have an earthquake, too?

Then, above her, Nancy heard Mayor Abbott’s voice.

“Miss Drew?” the mayor called. “Can you hear me?”

“Yes,” Nancy gasped. “I hear you.”

“You sound frightened, Miss Drew.”

Terrified is more like it, Nancy thought.

“And I don’t blame you for feeling that way,” he went on as if she’d answered. “So I propose that we make a deal.”

“A deal? What kind of deal?”

“Very simple. You forget what you’ve discovered about me, and I’ll see to it that your bank account suddenly starts growing.”

“That’s the kind of deal you made with Charles Ogden,” Nancy said. “And look what happened to him.”