5 The Murders at Astaire Castle Page 5

  Speechless with awe, Mac turned around in a full circle to take in the sight. He had never expected there to be anything like this on the other side of the brush that he and David had been traveling in the day before. Imagining what the castle would have been like in its heyday, he could see that Reginald Astaire had created a whole world separate from the rest of Deep Creek Lake.

  “Well, we’re here.” Hector produced a key ring filled with keys from his jacket pocket. “Do you want to go inside to meet the Wolf Man?” he asked with a mockingly evil laugh that reminded Mac of Vincent Price, a popular horror movie actor from back in the 1940s and 50s. Certain of Mac’s answer, he climbed the steps to the main door.

  “That’s not funny, Hector.” David had his arms folded tightly across his chest.

  “I don’t believe in ghosts,” Mac said. “In over twenty-five years of police work, I never encountered a murder that had been committed by a ghost or vampire or wolf man. I want to see inside.” He added to David, “You don’t need to babysit me. If you’re afraid to go in—”

  “I’m going where you’re going.”

  Gnarly leapt out of Hector’s jeep, ran up the steps, and beat them to the front door.

  “Hey, are you guys coming?” Hector unlocked the door. “I don’t have all day.” When David and Mac came up the steps, he chuckled at Gnarly racing in ahead of all of them. “Gnarly ain’t ‘fraid of no ghosts.”

  “He takes after his master,” David said.

  After turning on his high-powered flashlight, Hector stepped inside. “We had a couple rent out this place for a weekend. Their sheltie never came out from under the bed.”

  Mac had thought the foyer of the Spencer Manor was huge. The foyer for the castle stretched up three floors to reveal an oak ceiling and log beams that stretched across the width of the entrance hall. A suit of armor stood guard next to the double doors.

  Gnarly quickly lifted his leg to mark the suit of armor as his.

  To Mac’s surprise, the foyer was furnished with dust-covered solid wood chairs, paintings, and tables complete with brass and crystal bowls.

  “Robin didn’t allow us to take the time to remove it,” Hector said. “She wanted as few people coming in here as possible. As soon as the crime scene was released for the Wagner murders, she ordered the place locked up.”

  His hackles up, Gnarly uttered a low growl while sniffing his way around the foyer. Periodically, he would stop to mark tables or corners.

  “Gnarly, stop it,” Mac said.

  Instead of being horrified, Hector snickered. “The Wolf Man isn’t going to be happy about you marking his territory, Gnarly.”

  “Cut it out, Hector,” David ordered.

  “There’s no such thing as a Wolf Man.” Mac lifted the face piece for the suit of armor and peered inside.

  “People down in the valley have claimed hearing him howl from up this way,” Hector said.

  “I thought you said that was Nigel’s ghost.” Mac let the metal face piece drop in place, which produced a puff of dust.

  “A couple of years before you moved out here,” David told Mac, “a couple claimed to have seen Bigfoot up here, too.” He turned to Hector. “But that doesn’t mean he’s living here in the castle.”

  Gesturing at Gnarly who was marking the bottom step of the stairs leading up to the second floor, Mac said, “Before Gnarly has time to petition for homesteading here in the castle, can we move on?”

  Directing them with the beam of his flashlight, Hector led the way through the entrance hall and the game room in the back. They stepped off the granite floors onto what had to be an Oriental rug. The layers of filth made it difficult to determine the design. A pool table rested in the middle of the rug. A bar was at one end of the room. A dart board was at the other. Hunting trophies filled the walls and display cases.

  “Reginald Astaire considered himself a hunter,” Hector said.

  “Bar,” Mac said. “Wasn’t this castle built during the Prohibition?”

  “They drank iced tea,” the security manager said with a smile.

  Mac noticed David staring at a display of what was supposed to be two battle axes on the wall. The outline of the two axes, one crossing the other, was still evident, even though both were missing.

  Hector led them through a cut-glass door to a verandah. Outside, the wind whipping up from the valley below tore at their jackets with chilling fingers. As soon as the wind hit Gnarly in the face, he backed up to return inside and went over to the pool table to mark one of the legs.

  The patio below was made up of granite plates out to the edge of the cliff, which was blocked off with a stone wall. “That was where Reginald and Gwen Astaire leapt to their deaths,” Hector told them.

  In the center of the patio was a huge fire pit.

  Seeming to sense Mac’s thoughts, David said in a low tone, “That’s where Wagner’s daughter and editor were burned up after being hacked to death.” He turned to Hector. “Let’s go inside.”

  “Want to see Damian Wagner’s study?” Hector offered to Mac. “Since you’re a fan.”

  Inside, Hector led the way up the circular stairs lining the inside of one of the turrets to the top floor. At the top of the stairs, he handed his flashlight to Mac to hold while he lifted a wooden plank from where it rested in brackets on either side of the door to hold it shut. Then, grasping a huge brass ring, he pulled the door open to reveal a grand room with windows providing a bird’s eye view of the valley below. The room was furnished with bookcases, paintings, and artwork. Mac noticed a hole in the layout at the end of the room where a desk seemed to have once rested. “Someone stole his desk.”

  “Robin had—I mean you have—the desk,” Hector said. “The day before Wagner killed his daughter and editor, he gave it to Robin. It was his. A big fancy heavy thing. He had brought it from his place in Washington State.”

  Shivering, David stomped his feet. Mac couldn’t tell if it was anxiety for them to leave or cold. He felt a chill in the stone lined room himself. He envied Gnarly’s fur coat. The German shepherd was sniffing along the bottom shelf of the bookcase at the end of the room.

  “Okay, Mac, you’ve seen the place,” David said. “Let’s go.” As if he expected them to follow his order, David turned to the door leading into the turret only to have the heavy wooden door swing shut. A split second after the slam of the door, they heard the wooden plank fall into place on the other side of the door.

  “No!” David raced to slam his shoulder into the door to force it open. “Don’t just stand there looking like a couple of doofuses. Help me!”

  The three men lined up and pressed against the door until David gave up with a sigh. “It’s useless. The bar came down on the other side.”

  “No problem.” With a shrug of his shoulders, Mac took his cell phone off his belt. “All we have to do is call the Inn to have one of the security personnel come to let us out.” He frowned when he read the screen on the phone: No Service. Seeing that he had no bars to indicate a signal, he held up the phone closer to the window.

  Hector did likewise with no success. “That’s weird,” he said. “The tower is right over on the next mountain.”

  “I’ll use my radio.” David took his radio out of his utility belt and turned it on. “Dispatch, this is Police Chief O’Callaghan. Can you read me?” The only answer he received was static. “Dispatch,” he said into the radio. “Come in, Dispatch.”

  They all strained to hear any sign of someone responding to the call.

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Mac said. “Even with the stone walls, that radio should be able to pick up and project a signal.” He gestured at the sky outside the window. “And we’re on top of a mountain. There’s nothing to block either signal. We should have the strongest cell phone signal in the area.”

  W
ith a devilish grin, Hector laughed. “Unless it’s because we’re in a real and authentic dead zone.”

  Chapter Four

  David slid down from where they were peering out the window to the valley and freedom to the granite floor of Damian Wagner’s study. “Mac,” he said, “there’s something you need to know … in case we die.”

  “What?” Mac asked him in a soft voice. He suspected it had to do with their father or a great family secret.

  “If we die here, it’s your fault.” David pointed his finger directly at Mac.

  As if to signal that he was taking David’s side, Gnarly trotted over to paw at the police chief. After receiving a pat on the head, Gnarly returned to the last section of the bookcase to sniff along the bottom shelf.

  “I didn’t ask you to come here with me,” Mac argued with David.

  “I wouldn’t have had to come if you had listened to me yesterday and forgot about this whole side of the mountain.”

  “Archie will notice when we don’t come back,” Hector said. “She’ll call someone and come looking for us.”

  “If she cools off before we freeze or starve to death.” David wrapped his arms around himself and shivered.

  “Is Gnarly dark meat or white meat?” Mac joked.

  “Don’t even talk like that,” Hector said. “We’re going to get out of here.”

  “David’s right,” Mac said. “It’s cold in here.” Standing at the far end of the room, in the corner where the windows and the last bookcase met, he looked around the long grand room. With fifteen-foot high ceilings, he estimated that it was one of the biggest rooms he had ever been in. Maybe that’s why it’s so cold. “It could be the stone walls, but we’re inside. That should block the wind.”

  “Cold spots,” Hector said from where he was peering out the window. “Another complaint we got from renters. Here and down in the pantry.” He pointed to Mac. “They used to say it was in that corner where you’re standing. Folks speculated that it was the ghost of Nathan Hindman, standing there watching Giselle playing tennis with the pro. Notice that you can see the tennis court perfectly from there.”

  Mac shivered when a cold chill hit him in the back of the neck and traveled down his spine. This is not a cold spot. It’s a draft. He noticed that Gnarly was now trying to dig through the granite with his paws.

  “I have a plan,” Hector said. “We break one of these windows and throw Gnarly out. He’ll go for help.”

  “What if he dies from hitting the cement patio three stories below?” David asked.

  “He’ll land on his feet,” Hector said. “Dogs always land on their feet.”

  “That’s cats that land on their feet,” David said.

  “Dogs, too. Everyone knows that.” Hector continued, “Gnarly will run all the way back to the Inn, go inside. Jeff will throw a fit upon seeing Gnarly in the Inn. He’ll call Archie to bitch. Archie will realize that we’re in trouble and call Bogie, who will bring the cavalry to the rescue.”

  “That’s the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard,” David said.

  “Do you have a better idea?” Hector asked.

  “We throw Mac out the window and, if he survives, he can go get help,” David said. “If he doesn’t survive …” With a wicked grin, he shrugged.

  “How about if we go out the other way?” His back to them, Mac was studying the bookcase in the corner that had captured Gnarly’s attention. It was set at a slight angle off from the other bookcases.

  “What other way?” Hector asked.

  Mac ran his fingers along the edge of the case. “There’s a draft blowing in from behind this bookcase. That’s why Gnarly keeps digging at it.” He pointed to the other end of the room. “This castle has four turrets. This room is the length of the castle. There’s a turret on the other side of this bookcase.”

  They looked out the windows and along the building.

  David displayed the most excitement he had shown since entering the castle. “There’s probably another staircase behind that bookcase. It’s a secret entrance.”

  They yanked the books from the shelves.

  “There has to be a way to open it,” Mac said, “like a secret lever. In the movies, it’s usually a book.”

  After yanking all of the books off the shelves, they studied the edges and shelves for any sign that it was more than wood. They had made their way to the last shelf when David noticed hinges connecting the bottom shelf to the case. He stood up and pressed his foot against the shelf. They heard a click before the case popped back a couple of inches. All three men pressed their full weight against the book case to push the door back into the dark room on the other side. As they pressed, it gave way to allow them entrance.

  Uncertain of what was inside, they stood in silence. Hector and David shone their flashlights around the dark room. As they had concluded, the opposing turret was circular like the one they had climbed up on the other side of the study. However, this turret appeared to have not been used in nearly a century. Sealed up, they could smell the mold and dank walls. The wind whipped the cobwebs that hung from the walls.

  In contrast to the scary atmosphere, Mac chortled. When Hector and David glanced at him as if he had lost his mind, he pointed up to the ceiling at the top of the turret. One quarter of the top was missing. “There’s your cold spot. The wind has been coming in from up there and blowing down through this turret. How much do you want to bet this turret has another secret entrance down in the pantry, which is where people have complained about another cold spot?”

  “I never said I believed in these ghosts,” Hector claimed. “I’m just saying what others say.”

  Noting that Mac didn’t have a flashlight, David ordered for him to follow him. “Keep Gnarly close.” Hector was to bring up the rear while they made their way down the stairs to the bottom. Even with their flashlights, they had to feel their way along the wall to the stairs leading down. They had only just entered the turret when David stumbled. The only thing to prevent him from tumbling down the stone steps was Mac grabbing the back of his belt to pull him back up to his feet.

  “What happened?” Hector asked.

  “I tripped over something—something big.” David shone his light to the floor to reveal a human skull with an ax embedded in the back of its head.

  “Make that five murders associated with this place,” Hector said.

  Chapter Five

  “Damian Wagner,” Hector said in a low voice.

  “Let’s not make any assumptions.” Mac knelt down to study the skeleton. “It could be David’s friend Riley.”

  Gnarly sniffed at the body and its clothes.

  In the dark, Mac could not see David and Hector both shaking their heads. “That ax disappeared when Damian’s daughter and editor were killed,” David said. “Both Dad and Robin were fixated on what happened because only one of those two axes was found in the fire pit.”

  “He’s wearing a blue cardigan.” Hector shone the light on the torso of the skeleton. “Damian Wagner always wore a blue cardigan when he was writing. It was his lucky charm. I used to see him wearing it when he’d come to the Inn for lunch.”

  His curiosity about the dead body satisfied, Gnarly turned his attention to the stairs leading down to freedom. Once again, his hackles were up. He shifted from growls to low barks and back to growls.

  Checking to see if there was any signal yet on his cell phone, Mac rose to his feet. It still read No Service. “We can’t do anything about this body until we get someplace to call it in.”

  Mac grabbed hold of Gnarly’s collar to keep him from tumbling down the stone steps. Hugging the wall, they inched their way down the stairs lining the inside wall of the turret. Each of the men put on a brave mask when the cobwebs blowing in the wind tickled their faces or necks or a rat would scurry across their path when a
flashlight beam would frighten it.

  Mac found it increasingly difficult to hold onto Gnarly as they neared the bottom. The German shepherd lunged to break free of his hold on the collar. Mac wondered what prey he had picked up. At the bottom, they found a door not unlike the one at the top of the stairs in the opposing turret, only there was no wooden beam to block the entrance. But it did have a giant brass ring which Hector grasped and pulled out to open.

  As soon as it was open enough, Gnarly charged through the opening into the light.

  “Gnarly! No!” Mac ran after him.

  Barking his alarm to announce his presence, Gnarly stood in the middle of an abandoned kitchen pantry littered with rusted and rotten cans that had been opened. The room smelled of decayed food and feces. They gingerly watched their steps while Gnarly sniffed the garbage.

  “Looks like raccoons hit the mother load,” Hector said.

  Finding that it was not good enough even for him, Gnarly followed the scent he had picked up out of the pantry.

  Mac examined one of the cans. “I’ve seen some smart raccoons, but never one intelligent enough operate a can opener.” He picked up an old hand crank can opener.

  David grabbed the can opener from him. “It’s not animal—”

  Gnarly’s barks cut him off. His bark was joined by the bark and growl of another. The three men were still piecing the noises together when Gnarly’s snarling bark was cut off by a yelp.

  Mac was the first out the door. In the two years that he had Gnarly, Mac had never seen the dog cry out for help. Later, he would struggle to recall if he had ever heard Gnarly yelp. He was certain of the fact that this was the first time he had seen Gnarly downed by another animal.

  At first glance, he thought Gnarly was being attacked by a giant white dog that was more than twice his size. The animal had Gnarly pinned down on his back by his throat. Gnarly was yelping in terror while the thing tried to shake him to snap his neck.

  Mac drew his gun, took aim, and was firing a shot when David slapped his arm down to send the bullet into the floor. Before Mac could object or take aim again, David charged forward with his baton and swung it at the thing to make him let go of Gnarly.