Andi Unexpected (12 page)

How could the journal be gone?
I saw it just that morning.

Colin pulled his head out from under my bed and sneezed. He wasn’t wearing his surgical mask, and his eyes were red and puffy. Even with all of the junk now removed to the garage, an army of dust bunnies still camped out in the attic. “Are you sure that’s where you put it? Remember, I thought I lost the casebook yesterday. But it was just in a different place.”

“We’ve looked everywhere a thousand times. It’s not here!”

“You didn’t take it out of the house?” he asked me for the four-hundredth time.

“I already told you I didn’t.” I sat on my desk chair. “I can’t believe it’s gone.” I felt sick to my stomach remembering how Miss Addy had trusted me with her
precious journal, a journal that had survived for eighty years until I’d gotten a hold of it. “We have to tell Mr. Finnigan,” I said. “We should go right now.”

“Andi, you’re grounded. I had to sneak in the house just to help you look for it,” Colin argued.

“I know. But it’s Miss Addy’s journal. We’ll be back before Amelie even knows we’re gone.”

Colin’s bangs fell over his glasses and he pushed them aside. “Okay. Mr. Finnigan knows Miss Addy better than we do. He’ll know how to tell her.”

Thankfully, when Colin and I went to collect our bikes, Amelie was distracted by a buyer who was interested in buying that old dress form. As they haggled over the price, Colin and I made a clean getaway.

We parked our bikes outside the museum door, which was unlocked. Although the building was open for visitors, Mr. Finnigan was nowhere in sight.

Colin coughed. “Well, I guess you lucked out. He isn’t here.”

I picked up a brochure sitting on Mr. Finnigan’s desk. “The door’s unlocked. He has to be here.” I glanced around the reception area and saw that Mr. Finnigan had placed a coffee urn and some paper cups on a small card table in one corner. A little sign beside the urn read, W
ELCOME
, G
UESTS
!

I glanced in the trash can beside the table. Empty. Poor Mr. Finnigan. He hadn’t had any visitors.

“Let’s look for him.” I wanted to get my confession over with as soon as possible. I thought it best to treat
this situation like ripping off a Band-Aid: Do it fast. “He’s probably in the archives.”

Our footsteps echoed on the stone floor as we walked past the gallery of photographs depicting Michael Pike Ginger Ale executives sitting behind their wide cherry desks, and employees polishing bottles on the factory floor.

We were still a ways down the hall from the archives, when I paused in front of the four portraits of the Pike family—all of the Michael Pikes and Margaret. I stared at Margaret’s portrait and noticed again how she looked nothing like her dark-haired, olive-skinned relatives. And then my brain clicked.

“Andi,” Colin whispered.

I waved him away as I thought about this some more. Dr. Girard’s book proposal claimed that Andora didn’t die as a baby. Miss Addy wrote that Patterson had asked Number Three if Emily could see “her” because Emily was sad. What if Margaret was Andora? What if my great-grandfather had given Andora to the Pikes so he could attend college? I felt sick to my stomach. Could I be right?

I didn’t have time to tell Colin my theory because shouts erupted from further down the hall. I pressed my finger to my lips as Colin and I silently slid along the wall toward the open door.

After a few moments, I determined that the shouts were actually yelps of joy. “This is it! My golden ticket! This book is going to change everything!”

I stood as close to the doorframe as I dared, and instantly recognized a second voice: Mr. Finnigan.
“And you will give credit to the historical society and the museum?”

“Yes, yes,” the first voice snapped.

Colin gasped beside me as we both recognized the first voice.

“Dr. Girard,” Colin whispered.

I clamped my hand over his mouth and we froze.

“I still think we should tell the family and explain to them—”

“I’m not going to waste my time on that family,” Dr. Girard said. “I have an agent and now an editor breathing down my neck. They wanted this book a year ago. Now I have all the evidence I need to make it happen.”

“But what about Miss Addy?”

“What about her? That crazy old bat probably doesn’t even remember giving the journal to the girl.”

I balled my hands into fists at my sides, and I felt my face grow hot. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if my ears released some steam. I looked at Colin in the dim light of the hallway. Shock and disappointment washed across his face. And even though we’d only known each other for a short while, I knew his shock wasn’t due to the history professor’s words.

I had known I couldn’t trust Dr. Girard the moment I first met him. I had a gut feeling about him. But my gut feeling about Mr. Finnigan had turned out to be wrong. By the look on Colin’s face, I knew he felt the same betrayal I did. I thought Mr. Finnigan was our friend and Miss Addy’s friend. I thought he cared about Andora and what had happened to her.

Furious, I stomped right into the archive room. Colin trailed behind me. The two men’s eyes widened. Both of their mouths formed small Os just like those Honey Nut Cheerios Amelie had given to me on my first morning in Killdeer. Their facial expressions might have made me laugh out loud if I hadn’t been so steaming mad.

Dr. Girard held Miss Addy’s journal in his hand. My eyes trained on it. He gathered himself up like a proud peacock, ready for anything. “Andi! How nice to see you. Are you here to do more research?”

“I’m here for that journal,” I said through clenched teeth, holding out my hand. “Give it to me. Now.” I didn’t really think he would respond to a direct order, but it was worth a shot.

Dr. Girard laughed, wrapped the journal in its brown paper cover, and slipped it into an open briefcase on the desk.

“Missy Addy trusted me with it. Give it back.” I didn’t drop my hand but continued to hold it out, palm up, expectant and stubborn.

He closed and latched the briefcase, and then stood it up on the desk beside him. He rolled his eyes. “Nice try, kid, but I need this journal much more than you do.”

“Andi, I … Dr. Girard asked to see the journal. To borrow it. He has every intention of returning it to Miss Addy someday,” Mr. Finnigan stammered.

“Of course I do,” Dr. Girard said smoothly.

I whipped my head around to face Mr. Finnigan. “You stole it from my house.”

“I … I …”

“You asked me where I kept the journal. I thought you were concerned about it for Miss Addy’s sake. But you stole it!” I cried, feeling the full impact of his betrayal for the first time. “If I’d known you wanted to steal it for
him
, I never would have told you where it was.”

“Come, come,” Dr. Girard said. “You’re getting yourself all worked up over nothing.”

“Miss Addy trusted
me
with it, not you.”

“That journal isn’t the only source of information. Look around you.” He waved his arms around the room.

Colin slowly stepped out from behind me and inched his way toward the briefcase while the two men were focused on me.
Distract them
, I thought to myself.

The history professor smirked. “I suspected for years that something wasn’t quite right about the Michael Pike family tree. And now I know what it was: Boggs genes.”

“I already know that Margaret Pike is Andora.”

Colin gaped at me, but I concentrated on Dr. Girard.

The history professor’s lips curved into a smile. “Ahh, so you’re really as smart as everyone claims. Bravo! But do you know the whole story?” He waited for me to answer. When I said nothing, he said, “I didn’t think so. Well, let me tell you a little story then.” He was thoroughly enjoying his own performance. “It’s a story about a little girl who was sold to the highest bidder.”

A sinking feeling settled over me.

“Mrs. Emily Boggs, a healthy country girl, and Mrs. Beatrice Pike, wife of Michael Pike III, were pregnant at the same time. Emily had her baby in mid-December of 1929. This was shortly after the terrible Stock Market Crash, so little Andora was born into a chaotic world and to a poor family. Her father, Patterson, worked at the bottling company just like every other man living in Killdeer at that time. He worked on the floor as a mechanic, but he dreamed of something bigger. He and Emily had moved to Killdeer from the mountains of West Virginia because Patterson had dreams of attending Michael Pike College. After the Crash, it looked like those dreams were over. Every day another coworker was laid off, and long lines of men looking for work formed outside the bottling company every morning. Patterson was replaceable, and he knew it.”

My heartbeat quickened. “But my great-grandfather
did
go to Michael Pike College. He graduated and then became a professor. He taught there for years. He even has a building named after him. It’s a small one, but how many people can say that?”

A malicious grin slid across Dr. Girard’s face as he continued his story. “Beatrice didn’t have a strong constitution like Emily did. From the beginning, her pregnancy was troubled. The doctor put her on bed rest for the last three months. And even though her baby wasn’t due until late February, the local paper announced the birth of Margaret “Peggy” Pike on February second. Beatrice’s baby was born premature.

“Late in March, Andora Boggs died of a mysterious
illness, and no one knew what caused it. The casket remained closed at the funeral. And you would have known all of that by now if you’d thought to check the records at College Church. Churches record all kinds of helpful information: baptisms, confirmations, and funerals,” he smirked.

“But back to my story. A month after Andora’s death, Beatrice and her daughter, whom everyone thought would die in infancy, made their first public appearance. Coincidental, don’t you think? The girl was a beautiful child with fair skin and a full head of
red
hair. Strange that neither of her parents had red hair, wouldn’t you say?

“Sadly, Emily never recovered from her daughter’s death, and she died after giving birth to her son Brighton in November 1933. Those are the facts that are known. And your little adventure these last few days confirmed the rest of my suspicions. Thank you for that.” He gave me an oily smile, and I fought the urge to slap him.

“Although most of the employees at the factory were laid off or replaced for lower-paid workers, Patterson never lost his job. In fact, he was given a raise after the death of his daughter. And then in the fall of 1930, he enrolled in classes at Michael Pike College. I made some inquiries in the university archives, and you’d never guess who paid for your great-grandfather’s education.”

He waited for my answer, but I refused to give him the satisfaction.

“Michael Pike III. Now
that
piqued my interest,
so I started digging further. After all, nobody ever praised Michael Pike III for his generosity toward his employees.

“The conversation that Miss Addy overheard as a child is just the evidence I need to make my suspicions public. Your great-grandfather sold Andora to the Pike family for job security and a college education.”

It’s what I’d already suspected, what I already knew, but that didn’t make it any easier to hear—to know that someone I was related to could sell their own child. “What about Beatrice’s daughter—the baby that was born premature?”

“It was common knowledge that Beatrice had suffered a miscarriage before. I suspect that’s what happened to the real Peggy.”

“But …”

“The Pikes were desperate for a child—an heir to the family fortune,” Dr. Girard said smugly. Then he walked over to Mr. Finnigan and clamped a hand on his shoulder, carelessly abandoning the briefcase on the desk. “I shared my suspicions with Patrick here, and he helped me with the research.”

I turned on Mr. Finnigan then. “You knew! When Colin and I came here asking about Andora that first time, you already knew about her.”

“I’m sorry, Andi. But can’t you see that the museum isn’t doing well?” He waved his arms around the room. “There are hundreds of people in town today for the festival, and not one of them has stopped by the museum. They’d rather go to your neighborhood garage sale than come here. If we had the notoriety …” Mr. Finnigan trailed off.

I glared at him. I was so angry that I couldn’t speak.

Colin moved faster than I imagined possible as he grabbed the briefcase off the desk. “Run!” Colin yelled, slipping through the doorway and running down the hall. I was right behind him.

I heard Dr. Girard yelling behind us, “We have to stop them! That briefcase has all of my research in it!”

I didn’t look back.

“Outside to the bikes!”
I shouted to Colin as we thundered down the hallway, the pounding feet of a furious Dr. Girard hot on our heels.

Without responding, Colin ran. When we entered the lobby, I knew we were home free. We were going to make it! A grin spread across my face. I looked at Colin, and he was grinning too.

Suddenly a dark shadow slid out from the side hall and skidded across the floor in front of us. My grin disappeared. Colin stopped dead in his tracks, and I ran into his back with a thump. Dr. Girard. How could he have gotten in front of us?

Seeing the shocked looks on our faces, Dr. Girard grinned. “There are lots of things you kids don’t know about this old factory.”

The sound of pounding feet stopped behind us. I
turned and saw Mr. Finnigan blocking the hallway to the offices and archives. We were trapped. Unless … I looked out onto the crowded factory floor filled with old bottling machines and shadows. The same floor where my Great-Grandfather Patterson had worked every day because he’d sold his only daughter to his boss.

Dr. Girard grinned. “Hand over the briefcase, and you can go home.”

“No way!” Colin fired back.

“Forget it,” I added. I lightly tapped Colin on the shoulder and whispered, “Follow me.”

Dr. Girard slowly approached us from the front and Mr. Finnigan from the back.

“Kids, this is all a big misunderstanding,” Mr. Finnigan said. “I’m sure we can work something out—a compromise that will satisfy us all.”

“You could have had a compromise a long time ago.” I grabbed the back of Colin’s shirt and pulled him and the briefcase onto the factory floor.

We ran among the mammoth-sized machines, assembly lines, and bottle washers. I heard Dr. Girard shout in rage as we disappeared.

Colin and I crouched low as we wove in and out of the machines. “We have to find somewhere to hide until we can make a clean break and run for our bikes,” I whispered.

Colin wheezed back, unable to speak. I grabbed his hand and pulled him deeper into the labyrinth of metal. Even after all these decades of disuse, the floor smelled faintly of gasoline and maybe a hint of spilt ginger ale.

I found the perfect spot under one of the conveyor belts. It went all the way down to the floor but had an opening just big enough for the two of us to crawl underneath. “Here, you go first.”

Colin stared back at me, his eyes as wide as saucers. His chest heaved up and down as he gasped for air. “Do you have your inhaler?” I asked.

He shook his head.

This wasn’t good. He began wheezing more loudly.

I heard footsteps approaching. “You can’t hide in here forever!” Dr. Girard cried. “Just give me the briefcase and then you can leave.”

Colin started to tremble, his wheezing worsened by the second.

“In and out,” I said to him. “Slowly, in and out.”

The footsteps were right beside us on the closed side of the conveyor belt.

Colin clutched his hand to his chest. I couldn’t hear Dr. Girard any longer. But then his voice boomed from right above us. “I know you’re under there. I can hear Colin breathing.”

The dim light seeping through the cracks in the assembly line illuminated Colin’s face. I grimaced as it slowly turned an ugly shade of purple. Andora wouldn’t want this to happen.

I heard a scraping noise on the cement floor, and then the small hole of light that Colin and I had crawled through disappeared. I released Colin’s hand and crawled over to the space. A piece of sheet metal was now covering the opening. Dr. Girard must have moved it there to block our only way out. I tried to
move it, but the sharp edge cut my hand. I felt a thin trail of blood flow down my wrist and onto my arm. I pounded against the metal. “Let us out! Colin is sick! He needs a doctor!”

“The briefcase first,” Dr. Girard said, his voice muffled.

My eyes finally adjusted to the lack of light, and I looked back at Colin. He shook his head back and forth. His body was shaking, fighting for air.

“We have to.”

Colin shook his head again.

I crawled back over to him. “Colin, please.” He clutched the briefcase even tighter in his arms. “Do it for Andora. She wouldn’t want you to die this way. Just think: if you die, who’s going to go with me to meet her and tell her who she really is? You don’t want her to find out about this when Dr. Girard’s book is published, do you?”

Slowly, Colin loosened his grip on the case, and I pried the handle from his fingers. I crawled back to the opening. “I have it!” I shouted. Sweat poured down my face and into my eyes. This was all my fault. Why had I ever thought we could hide on the factory floor? After all of those hours of research, Dr. Girard knew every nook and cranny of the museum.

“Excellent. I’ll slide the panel open, and you push the briefcase out to me.”

“Okay.”

Slowly, the light moved in. The opening was just big enough for the briefcase, and I pushed it through. But as soon as the briefcase went out, the panel slipped
back into place. I pounded on the sharp metal, “Hey! Let us out!”

Dr. Girard’s voice sounded close, as if he were kneeling right beside me. And his tone made my skin crawl. “What you need is discipline, young lady. And since I doubt that nutty aunt of yours is going to deliver it, I’ll let you two stew for a little while longer.”

“Let us out! You got what you wanted. Colin needs a doctor.”

“Nice acting.”

“Mr. Finnigan!” I cried, pounding on the metal. “Mr. Finnigan! Please help us! Colin is having an asthma attack. Please!”

I looked back at Colin whose whole body now heaved up and down, up and down. I heard Dr. Girard stand up and walk away. I crawled back to Colin and held his hand. He clasped mine with all his strength.

“It will be okay. It will be okay.”

And then I prayed with all my might. It was the first prayer I’d offered since my parents died. “Please, God, not again. Please don’t do this to me again. Help Colin. Please.”

A loud bang followed by some scuffling sounds came from the other side of the metal panel. I crawled back over to it, and in a moment the panel slid out of view and the light streamed in. I rushed back to Colin and pulled him toward the opening. “Come on!”

We crawled outside.

Mr. Finnigan, tousled and red-faced, stood on the other side. “Bring him out.” He had a cell phone in one hand, and in the other hand he held a steaming cup of
coffee. “We have a boy here at the museum who’s having an asthma attack. Hurry!” he said into the phone, and then he knelt down and handed me the paper coffee cup. “Give this to him; it will clear his airway.”

“But …”

“Just do it!”

I put the coffee to Colin’s mouth, and without hesitation he drank a big gulp of it. He coughed and sputtered. After a few more gulps, he was still wheezing, but he wasn’t shaking as badly. I leaned him against a nearby machine.

I heard the sound of sirens getting closer. Mr. Finnigan left the factory floor to go meet the paramedics. I stood up and saw Dr. Girard lying on the floor. He was rubbing the top of his head, looking dazed. I grabbed an old monkey wrench off the floor nearby and walked over to Dr. Girard. The wrench was part of the new tool display that Mr. Finnigan had been planning.

“Don’t move,” I said.

“I don’t intend to,” Dr. Girard muttered.