The Hayloft: a 1950s Mystery Read online

  It took us five minutes to drive to the farm. I pulled into the driveway, turned around, and parked on the street, since I would be driving Sylvia home later. Aunt Dorothy was teaching at Atherton High today and wasn’t home yet. I wanted to introduce Sylvia to her.

  I led the way to the barn. We walked through the ground floor to the old metal ladder that led to the hayloft. I went up first, pushed the heavy trapdoor to its vertical position, and secured it to the hook on the wall. I turned on the floodlight and helped Sylvia exit from the ladder as she clambered up.

  “Hey, this place is all right,” Sylvia said, looking around. “Can we shoot some baskets?”

  I was surprised at her request, but I grabbed a basketball and passed it to her. I was even more surprised to see that she had a good two-hand set shot. We played a couple of games of HORSE.

  When she beat me in the second game, I said, “Don’t you know you’re always supposed to let boys win?”

  “Sorry,” she said, giving me an impish grin. “I guess I’m just too competitive.”

  I pointed out the other forms of recreation available in the hayloft. To my increasing surprise, she wanted to slide down the haystack. We did this several times. I was the one who suggested that we go down in tandem. Since I had done it with Kate, somehow it didn’t seem fair that I not do it with Sylvia.

  She enjoyed this, yelling on the way down. I found myself enjoying it, also. I felt a spark between us, but without the guilt. That was good news. I took her up on the hay bales on the other side of the hayloft and pointed out the fort that Kate and I had made, although I didn’t mention Kate.

  She crawled inside, so I crawled in after her. We snuggled together in the dark and it seemed the right thing to do. Then Sylvia started to talk.

  “I don’t know how I would have gotten through the last ten days without you. Most of my so-called friends seem to have been fair-weather versions.”

  I thought of Natalie but didn’t say anything.

  She talked more about her feelings. Feelings of betrayal and feelings that she must have done something wrong. I could see tears glistening in her eyes in the dark of the fort, even though she was trying to hold them back. She looked so sweet that I kissed her. It felt good, and she was a whole-hearted participant, so we continued to kiss.

  When we paused for a moment, she said, “I hope you’re not just taking pity on me.”

  “I hope you’re not just taking pity on me.”

  We both laughed.

  I needed to say something more. “All seriousness aside, you’ve shown a lot of…courage standing up to everybody.”

  “Thank-you,” she said, softly. Then her tone changed as she said, “You don’t have a girlfriend stashed away back in Atherton, by any chance, do you?”

  I could truthfully reply that I didn’t. We kissed some more. I found myself mentally comparing Sylvia to Kate. They were both good looking, but Sylvia was more mature, a more fully formed person. And she had guts. Kate was a cuddler and a clinger. I had made the right choice.

  After a while, we came out of the fort. I walked over to the northwest corner of the barn to see if there were any gaps in the hay bales.

  I said, “Are you aware that Ed is also my cousin?”

  “No. You’re always keeping secrets from me.”

  That made us laugh. Everything was amusing now.

  “Well, I think he’s my fourth cousin, so he’s not that close, but there’s a legend that involves both of our families. I can’t tell you the details, but I may need assistance from somebody who isn’t a relative.”

  “Does this have some connection to Ralph?”

  “Yes, it does. Anyway, it’s the old story of buried treasure. The treasure is supposed to be in this hayloft, buried underneath these bales. I want to see if there’s a way to get to the bottom.”

  I moved several bales away from the corner. There was a small gap between the next level of bales and the wall. I figured it was over fifteen feet to the floor of the hayloft from there. I went to where the end of the rope that came across the length of the barn, under the peak of the roof, was coiled on top of the bales and dragged a section over to the corner.

  “Gary, are you about to do something dangerous?” Sylvia asked.

  “I just want to see if I can lower myself to the floor. I can use the rope to help me.”

  I snaked the rope down into the crack between the bales and the wall.

  “This is not a good idea,” Sylvia said. “I didn’t sign on with you to watch you kill yourself.”

  “I heard a car drive up a while ago. That means Aunt Dorothy’s home. If I get into trouble, you can go and get her.”

  “Great. That makes me the messenger. And you know what they do to messengers who bring bad news.”

  “Okay, I’ll only go down a little way. I just want to see what it’s like.”

  I took hold of the rope and carefully lowered myself a few feet into the crack. I could see already that it was going to be a tight fit. The roof of the barn slanted, so I wasn’t going straight down, but each layer of bales was offset to utilize the extra space.

  “How are you going to die?” Sylvia said. “Let me count the ways. One, you might suffocate. Two, the bales might shift and crush you. Three, you might get stuck and not be able to get out. How many others do you want?”

  I lowered myself a few more feet until my head was about even with the top of the bales. I started to sweat. I didn’t think of myself as being claustrophobic, but the fear of being trapped almost overwhelmed me. I edged sideways a few inches, with difficulty, to where there appeared to be more room, clinging tightly to the rope. There wasn’t any more room.

  “I’m coming out in just a minute,” I said. “I just want to check one thing.”

  I didn’t want to admit that Sylvia was right. I had placed a small flashlight from the car in my pocket before coming up here. I had been thinking about doing something like this. I needed a better foothold, so that most of my weight wouldn’t be held by my arms. I found a small crack in the boards supporting the roof shingles and wedged a shoe into it.

  I let go of the rope with one hand and fished the flashlight out of my pocket. I turned it on and shone it downward. I tried to see all the way to the floor of the loft, but the slant of the roof and the offsetting bales prevented me from doing that. I ducked my head to see better.

  “Gary, what are you doing?” Sylvia’s voice showed panic as I disappeared from view.

  “All right; I’m coming up.”

  I was defeated for the moment. As I raised the hand holding it, the flashlight knocked against the roof and fell out of my grasp. We could hear it bounce off the wall several times on its way to the floor. Sylvia screamed an almost silent scream.

  “That could have been you,” she said.

  That was an exaggeration, of course, but I was sufficiently chastised. I was ready to come up. I grabbed the rope with both hands and pulled, while pushing with my foot. I didn’t budge. The sweat was streaming down my face.

  Sylvia lay on a bale, reached down, and tried to wrap her arms around my upper body. She couldn’t get a good grip, it was an awkward angle, and besides, her hundred pounds weren’t enough to offset my greater weight. When she pulled on me, she started sliding down the crack. I made her stop.

  My arms were getting tired of supporting my weight. If I let go of the rope, I would slide down out of sight. Then Sylvia’s fears might come true.

  “Go get Aunt Dorothy,” I said.

  “I’m not going to leave you. If I could move this bale,” she said, indicating the one next to the one I was wedged against, “then we could move that one away from you.”

  “There should be a hay hook on a rung of the ladder that leads up to the window,” I said.

  The rungs were actually pieces of wood nailed to the studs on the side of the barn. I hoped that’s where I had placed the metal hook after Kate and I finished building the fort.

  Sylvia scrambled over t
o the ladder and found the hay hook. The problem was that I didn’t think she had the strength to lift a bale vertically that weighed as much as she did. Especially since it was surrounded by other bales. She dug the point of the hook into the bale and pulled upward.

  At first, the bale didn’t move. Sylvia placed one foot on each bale adjacent to the offending bale and, using all her weight, gave a superhuman pull. The bale came slowly to a vertical position. With another show of strength, she shoved it out of the way.

  Now I pushed against the bale that held me in place. I didn’t have good leverage. Sylvia grabbed the wires holding the bale together and pulled at the same time I pushed. It rolled out of the way, and I was able to get my elbows on top of the bale below it and with a supreme effort scramble out of the crack.

  We both lay panting. We looked at each other. Her face was red, and, of course, she was covered with hay.

  “Wonder Woman,” I said. “You must eat rivets for breakfast.”

  “Yeah, and it’s a good thing I do. Promise me you won’t try anything stupid when I’m not here.”

  “That was a good flashlight.”

  “I hope I don’t look as bad as you do.”

  “You look worse than I do.”

  She attacked me but ended up brushing me off. I brushed her off. We brushed each other off. And then we kissed.

  “I’d like you to meet Aunt Dorothy,” I said when we had finished the job.

  “Do you think that’s a good idea?”

  “I want her to meet you. And see what a nice girl you are.” And, hopefully, pass that information along to my father before he heard about Sylvia from Dr. Graves.

  ***

  I introduced Sylvia to Aunt Dorothy as the person who had shown me around when I arrived at Carter High and made me feel at home. I also mentioned that I had been driving her to school. Better to hear it from me than somebody else.

  Aunt Dorothy was very cordial. She asked Sylvia questions about school and didn’t say anything about communists. I was hopeful that she would give a good report to my father.

  I looked out the kitchen window and saw the Drucquers’ old car sitting in the driveway. I pointed to it and asked Aunt Dorothy, “What’s that doing here?”

  “Oh, Edward is here. He asked if he could walk down the lane. I told him I didn’t know where you were, but to go ahead.”

  “Did he say why he wanted to walk down the lane?”

  “He said something about looking for the bubbles in the creek. I’m not sure why this sudden interest in bubbles.”

  “When do you have to be home?” I asked Sylvia.

  “Not for a while. Let’s take a walk down the lane.”

  Once outside, Sylvia asked me, “Why is Ed looking for bubbles?”

  “You tell me, and we’ll both know.”

  We walked hand in hand. It felt natural. There was a cool breeze, but, still hot from our recent exertions, we weren’t bothered by it. It was usually windy in this part of the country. The windy city, Chicago, had nothing on Buffalo.

  Fences made of crisscrossing wires ran along both sides of the lane, held in place by wooden posts. In the field on one side of us, green shoots from a crop of winter wheat showed above the ground. On the other side was the stubble from cornstalks that had been cut up for silage. An oak tree down the lane still had colorful leaves, although many of them were on the ground.

  I stopped Sylvia and pointed to a bare patch of earth in one of the fields. A movement had caught my eye. I directed her gaze to the furry, brown woodchuck that was sitting beside his hole, fat and sassy in preparation for winter.

  “If I had Ralph’s .22 I’d take care of him,” I said. “He eats the crops.”

  “Oh, let him alone. This is his farm, too.”

  The woodchuck sensed our presence and scurried into his hole. We walked on toward where the lane crossed the creek on a concrete bridge. I knew the path the creek took through the fields and was the first to spot Ed, about thirty yards from the lane. We turned into a bare field through an opening in the fence and walked toward him. He was intent on watching something in the water and hadn’t seen us yet.

  As we approached, he took a cigarette lighter and held it to what looked like a small branch of a tree wrapped in a page of a newspaper. The newspaper flared up and Ed held it over the water. There was a whoosh of flame that seemed to come from the water. Ed jumped backwards onto the bank of the creek, and the flame went out. He landed on his back. As he recovered himself, he saw us and looked sheepish.

  “Hi, Gary. Hi, Sylvia. What are you two doing here?”

  “That’s just what we were going to ask you,” I said. “Are you trying to prove that water burns?”

  “Not quite. Look at this.”

  He pointed into the creek. As we came close to the bank, I could see bubbles coming up out of the meandering stream.

  “Is there a fish down there?” Sylvia asked.

  “Naw, it’s too shallow for a big fish,” I said. “And a small one wouldn’t make bubbles that size.”

  “It’s natural gas,” Ed said. “You saw how it burned.”

  “How did you know about it?” I asked.

  “From the letters your great grandfather wrote to my great grandfather. My dad has a box full of them. They make interesting reading. He told about the bubbles coming from the stream on the farm. I read something recently about how natural gas is being used for heating homes. A description of how one person found it under a creek convinced me that these bubbles must be natural gas. And now I know they are.”

  “You almost burned yourself up to prove it,” Sylvia said. “You and Ben Franklin flying a kite in a thunderstorm. You’re either mad or you’re a genius.”

  “I lean toward the latter appraisal,” Ed said, grinning.

  “So, is this gas worth anything?” I asked.

  Ed shrugged his shoulders. “Who knows? But I suspect that your aunt and your dad don’t want to tear up the farm to find out. And they still own it together, don’t they?”

  I nodded. Not wanting to get into that discussion, I said, “Are you ready to go back?”

  “Sure. I’ve proved my point.”

  As we walked down the lane toward the house, Sylvia and I continued to hold hands.

  Ed said, “You guys look good together. Like Mutt and Jeff.”

  “I love you, too,” Sylvia said, “but I’ve got a dog at home.”

  ***

  At dinner, Aunt Dorothy was the one who brought up Sylvia. She said, “Does Sylvia talk about her father?”

  That sounded like a loaded question. I said, “Not much. I believe he’s doing some freelance writing.”

  “You have to be very careful. When you associate with the devil, you’re going to get burned.”

  I kept quiet. Although I had never been loathe to argue with my father, my aunt was a different story. Especially since she was giving me a place to stay.

  Uncle Jeff said, “I take it you like Sylvia.”

  “She showed me around the school and made me feel at home.”

  He smiled. “That’s probably more of an answer than I would have gotten from Ralph. I understand she’s president of the student council.”

  “Yes.”

  “How are the students treating her?”

  “Many of them won’t talk to her.”

  “But you do. I think that’s admirable.”

  “Your father isn’t going to like it,” Aunt Dorothy said.

  “Does he have to know?”

  “He’s your father.”

  That seemed to end that discussion, and I didn’t dare say anything more. To talk about something more comfortable, I told them about the natural gas Ed had discovered.

  “Yes, we know about that,” Uncle Jeff said. “It’s sort of a tourist attraction. We take visitors down the lane and show them the bubbles.”

  “I understand that natural gas is being used to heat homes,” I said. “Is there any money in it?”

  “Y
ou mean, is it the next oil? Possibly so. It’s too soon to tell.”

  “I don’t want people coming and drilling holes all over the farm,” Aunt Dorothy said.

  “Even if it would make you a millionaire?” Uncle Jeff asked, teasingly.

  “Well…we could travel more.”

  I liked the idea of having money, especially since my father owned half the farm. I would have to talk to him about it.

  CHAPTER 19

  I figured the best time to talk to Willie was at cross-country practice. The team usually had a meet on Friday afternoons, but there had been a meet against several other teams yesterday, so they just had a light workout scheduled.

  Sylvia had agreed to ride the bus home. She no longer cared what the other students thought. Or so she said. I took my sneakers to the practice, thinking that I might run alongside Willie and talk to him then. I was a basketball player, and he was a smoker, so I shouldn’t have any trouble keeping up with him. The coach was a volunteer from the community, and I doubted that he would mind if I participated in the practice.

  I joined a dozen or so boys behind the school. I wore long pants, because I thought it was too cold to run in shorts, but there they were with their legs hanging out, although most of them were wearing sweatshirts. I went up to Willie and said hi.

  He looked surprised and said, “It’s too late to join the team.”

  “I know, but I’d like to get in shape for basketball.”

  “I’m too short to play basketball.”

  “Can I run along with you?”

  “Be my guest.”

  The coach was also wearing running clothes. He often ran with the boys. I introduced myself to him and asked if I could run with them. He said sure and joked that if I was good enough, I could join the team next year. I told him I was a senior.

  We started out at an easy lope, taking a path around the Carter playing fields. First we went around the football field where the team was practicing for a big game on Saturday. I also saw the cheerleaders doing their thing, led by Natalie. I’d lost my desire for cheerleaders recently.