Search for the Shadowman

Praise for
Search for the Shadowman

An IRA Teachers’ Choice

Books by Joan Lowery Nixon

FICTION
A Candidate for Murder
The Dark and Deadly Pool
Don’t Scream
The Ghosts of Now
Ghost Town: Seven Ghostly Stories
The Haunting
In the Face of Danger
The Island of Dangerous Dreams
The Kidnapping of Christina Lattimore
Laugh Till You Cry
Murdered, My Sweet
The Name of the Game Was Murder
Nightmare
Nobody’s There
The Other Side of Dark
Playing for Keeps
Search for the Shadowman
Secret, Silent Screams
Shadowmaker
The Specter
Spirit Seeker
The Stalker
The Trap
The Weekend Was Murder!
Whispers from the Dead
Who Are You?

NONFICTION
The Making of a Writer

“W
hy’d Mr. Hammergren give us such a dumb assignment?” Andy Thomas complained to his best friend, J.J. Andy impatiently kicked at a small rock. It skittered across the street, dust swirls rising in its wake. “Why can’t we study something important? Like outer space? What if a comet comes smashing toward Earth while we’re busy asking our relatives about what life was like when they were kids? Who cares?”

As J.J. brushed a strand of light brown hair from his eyes, he tried to be patient with his friend. “We’re studying Texas
history
, noodle brain. History means what happened in the past, not the future.”

“Texas history! It’s just a bunch of wars, cattle drives, and outlaws.”
Outlaws?
“Hey, that’s good! What if our
relatives weren’t just ordinary? What if they were bandits and train robbers?”

J.J. didn’t answer.

“I mean it,” Andy said, beginning to enjoy his own idea of being related to a Western desperado who rode with a holster low on his hips.

“Sure,” J.J. finally answered. “I can just see my great-grandma Minna on a horse, waving smoking six-shooters. Or your great-aunt Winnie.”

Both Andy and J.J. bent over, shouting with laughter at the thought of their very proper relatives—elderly ladies of more than ninety—hooting and hollering down the main street of Hermosa.

When Andy was finally able to talk, he said, “You’ve got it easy, J.J. Your great-grandma’s done all that genealogy stuff. Your family has been naming their kids after the first James Jonathan Gasper forever. I forget, what are you, J.J., the fifth or sixth?”

“Seventh.”

As they reached the driveway to the Gasper family’s imposing white brick house with its impressive row of Ionic columns across the long front veranda, Andy teased, “Maybe I should interview Miz Minna, too. She’s been around so long she could tell us almost everything there is to know about every family in Hermosa.”

Instead of laughing, J.J. looked uncomfortable. “I know what people say about her gossiping, and they’re
right. She wouldn’t be any help with your family’s stories.”

“I was just kidding,” Andy said, worried that he had hurt his friend. “Miss Winnie’s stories are going to be all I can handle. I’ve heard over and over about how it was before electricity came to West Texas, and about one-room schools and spelling bees and taffy pulls instead of television and video games. Now, because of Mr. Hammergren, the king of seventh-grade history, I’ve got to listen to it all over again.”

“Not just listen, write it down and get a grade!” J.J. reminded him. He laughed and ran toward his porch.

Write it down. Sure
, thought Andy.
As if I haven’t got anything better to do.

He headed toward home—a comfortable one-story brick house on a street two blocks from the Gaspers’. His family lived next door to his dad’s parents and Miss Winnie. She had left the family ranch and had come to live next door when Andy was only seven years old.

Andy pictured Miss Winnie and Miz Minna again and chuckled—not at the notion of the two elegant old ladies as part of the Wild West, but at the stuck-up, snippy rivalry that existed between them.

Neither Miss Winnie Bell Bonner nor Miz Minna Gasper would miss a party, the opening night of a play at the Hermosa Community Theater, or the visiting symphony orchestra that performed in the high-school auditorium each fall and spring. They were often in the
same group. But their words to each other were as brittle and cold as ice splinters.

Once when Andy had asked his mother what caused Miss Winnie and Miz Minna to be like that, she’d answered, “Some old feud, I suppose. It’s gone on for so long, I wouldn’t be surprised if neither of them remembers what started it. I certainly don’t!”

When he’d asked J.J. if he knew, J.J.’s glance had slid to one side, and his face had turned red with embarrassment. “Miz Minna’s kind of stuck-up,” he’d said, “and my mom says she’s too quick to say what she thinks. Whatever happened between them was probably Miz Minna’s fault.”

Five years ago, when J.J. and Andy had become best friends, J.J. had introduced Andy to Miz Minna, a short, plump woman with a face like a soft, pink-tinted marshmallow.

In her high, sugary voice, Miz Minna had settled herself into a high-backed, overstuffed chair and said, “So you’re Andrew Thomas. Turn around, child. Let me get a good look at you.”

Awkward and uncomfortable, Andy felt as if he had to follow her order.

When he had faced her again, Miz Minna had pursed her lips, continued to study him, and said, “Hmmm. Dark, curly hair, blue eyes, a little on the stocky side. You do look like a Thomas.”

Andy had laughed. “I
am
a Thomas.”

Her eyes opened wide, she blinked twice, and the sweetness slid from her voice like syrup down the drain. “Don’t get uppity. Unfortunately, I can see some of the Bonner blood in you too, young man.”

Puzzled, Andy began, “Miss Winnie is a Bonner, and my grandma Dorothy, so my dad—”

Miz Minna interrupted. She reached out to ruffle J.J.’s hair and said quickly, “Run along, y’all. Don’t make too much noise, don’t break anything, and don’t get into trouble.”

As soon as they’d left the room, J.J. had grinned and said, “Don’t mind Miz Minna. She orders me around like that all the time.”

Andy was glad that J.J. wasn’t as stuck-up as his great-grandmother. He guessed if anybody had a right to be conceited, it was J.J. The library, the bank, the high school, Hermosa’s largest department store, and even the fountain in the park were named after the original James Jonathan Gasper, one of the men who had helped build the town of Hermosa. Gasper’s bronze statue stood tall and dignified in front of the court-house. Even under a crown of pigeon droppings it looked impressive.

As Andy ran up the driveway to his back door, he wished once more that his class could have left the past behind and written instead about the future. The future was exciting, especially outer space, but the past?

He sighed, knowing he didn’t have a choice. He
wanted a good grade, so he’d better interview Miss Winnie and get his paper written.

Andy gulped down a glass of milk and two chocolate brownies before he left a note for his mom on the refrigerator. He wanted her to find it as soon as she got home from her job at the bank. He grabbed a notebook and pencil and ran next door to visit his great-aunt, crunching through the dried cottonwood and elm leaves that dusted the lawn.