Nicholas Raven and the Wizards' Web - Volume 1 (5 page)

She again heard voices somewhere in the blackness of the field across the road. She sat up and remained still, noting distinct whispers and a flicker of light near the shed behind Nicholas’ cottage. She wondered if Nicholas or Maynard might be out, but the hour was so late. And since the farmhouse and the cottage windows were as black as pitch, she assumed both men were probably asleep by now. When Adelaide noticed the flicker of light a second time, she hurried inside to light an oil lamp, threw on a coat and went back outdoors, walking across River Road into the grass.

As she neared the shed, Adelaide could distinguish two separate voices within. Yellow light outlined the door frame of the low windowless building. Adelaide cautiously stepped closer to the entrance, pausing every few seconds to listen. There was movement inside, but little talking now. She couldn’t stand the suspense any longer and placed a hand on the knob, swinging the door open.

Shadows leaped on the walls as she held up the lamp in the cramped, dimly lit room. A man setting down a sack of flour spun around and faced Adelaide, his eyes wide like saucers.

“Dooley Kramer!” she whispered. “What are you doing here?” An oil lamp rested on the ground near his feet.

“Well, I’m...” He swallowed hard and looked to one corner of the shed.

Adelaide glanced in that direction as well, the lamp casting a sickly glow over a few bales of hay. Standing there was a tall man in a long leather coat, his stern face glaring at Dooley.

“Is that you, Zachary Farnsworth?” She shook her head. “I don’t understand. Why are you both here? I’d better wake Nicholas.”

“Don’t do that!” Farnsworth warned in a gruff whisper.

Adelaide took a step backward when she caught a glimpse of a steel blade that he slowly removed from his coat pocket. “
Oh dear
...” She saw Dooley glance at Farnsworth for silent advice, watching as both their faces tightened in sinister resolve. She accidentally dropped her oil lamp as she ran out of the shed and across the black grassy field toward her house, too terrified to scream. The pounding in her head drowned out the sound of heavy footfalls swiftly closing in.

CHAPTER 2

A Trap is Sprung

The Harvest Festival began two days later. Throughout the morning and early afternoon, people milled about in the streets and yards of Kanesbury, attending small parties and luncheons to kick off the three-day event. Residents from farms and small communities outside the village slowly trickled in during the day. By mid-afternoon, wandering musicians, magicians and acrobats had arrived to display their talents. Colorfully costumed stilt-walkers strolled through the streets like nimble giants pulled out of some fantastic dream. Musicians deftly played their fiddles, flutes and hand drums on street corners and under the park pavilion, drawing those who gathered to watch and listen into spontaneous dance. And up and down the busiest streets, magicians made stones and fruit and even a cawing crow disappear before applauding onlookers.

As twilight settled in under clear, crisp skies, one by one the oil lampposts in town were lit, casting a warm flickering glow over smiling faces and bony tree branches. But only when the festival torches planted around the village had been ignited did the celebration officially begin. Cheers and hollers echoed in the autumn air as the torches cast off colorful light and engulfing warmth, assuring all that somehow the brief days and long nights that lay in the winter months ahead would not be so bad.

Nicholas stepped out of his front door shortly after sunset on his way to meet some friends at the Water Barrel Inn. A brilliant crescent Fox Moon hung high in the west. As he walked past the farmhouse, Maynard stepped out onto the porch and called to him.

“Don’t mean to keep you from your fun, Nicholas, but have you seen Adelaide today?” Maynard gripped the railing. “I had promised to walk over to the park with her this evening, but I haven’t seen her today or yesterday. She’s not in her house either.”

Nicholas shrugged. “I last talked to her two nights ago. Maybe she’s helping the other ladies set up food tables at the pavilion.”

“Or Amanda Stewart is talking her ear off someplace.”

“Most likely,” Nicholas said, anxious to get going.

“Well, I’m sure I’ll find her. You go and have a good time.”

“Okay, Maynard. If I run into Adelaide, I’ll let her know you’re looking for her.”

“Thanks,” he said, waving him on his way.

Nicholas hurried down the road into the village, feeling alive and lighthearted. The brisk air and sweet smell of wood smoke filled him with an energy that made him believe he could conquer any obstacle that life threw in his path. After a dizzying week of work at the gristmill, he was especially eager to unwind at the inn with friends over a game of triple dice and some ale. With any luck, he hoped to run into Katherine at the Stewarts’ party later on and spend some time with her, too.

Ned Adams, Nicholas’ employer at the gristmill, swam frantically through the crowded streets with Constable Clay Brindle at his side. Ned was a thin man with thinning hair. His hands gesticulated wildly as he explained his predicament to the constable.

“It was Dooley Kramer who told me, Clay.
Dooley Kramer
, if you can believe that!” Ned tried to keep pace with Constable Brindle who walked at a furious clip despite having two stout legs that were forced to carry a paunchy upper body. “I never knew Dooley to be such a conscientious worker.”

Clay Brindle carried a torch in one hand. He removed a handkerchief from his coat pocket with the other and patted away beads of sweat dotting his forehead. “Now just take a breath, Ned, and settle down. Tell me the facts again–slowly this time.”

“All right, Clay. As I stated earlier, Dooley came to me and said he’d been walking along the river like he does most nights. When he passed the gristmill, he thought one of the side doors was slightly ajar and he examined it. Sure enough, the door was open. The wood was splintered around the lock as if somebody broke into the place.”

They turned onto the main business street in the village, now jammed with revelers and entertainers. Lively strains from a fiddle and the soft beats of a hand drum filled the night air. Several villagers weaved through the street carrying torches that blazed in various colors, the result of a whimsical magician’s trick. Flames of plum, silver, emerald green and scarlet cast gentle hues on the delighted expressions of passersby. Clay Brindle and Ned Adams maneuvered though the boisterous crowds until they began to thin out where the road to the gristmill curved northeast. From there it led directly to the mill situated on the banks of the Pine River, its waterwheel hidden in the darkness.

“What happened after Dooley spotted the open door, Ned?”

“He checked inside. Dooley said he lit one of the oil lamps and looked around the place. That’s when he discovered–”

“–the missing flour sacks?”

“Yes!” Ned replied bitterly. He kicked a small stone up the dark dirt road illuminated by the torch held aloft by Constable Brindle. Lethargic chirps of crickets in an adjacent farm field replaced the jovial voices back in the center of the village. “Dooley was inspecting the orders that were ready for shipping when he saw some spilled flour on the floor. When he looked closer, he discovered some of the original sacks had been replaced with ones filled with leaves and pinecones to make it look like a full order. Can you believe it? The thief must have accidentally ripped a sack when removing it.”

“That’s positively rotten,” the constable muttered.

“Dooley found parts of other shipments missing, too.”

Constable Brindle picked up his pace, his arms pumping back and forth in sync with his legs. The torch waved wildly in the air. “Is Dooley at the mill now?”

“Yes. He’s examining the books, trying to determine precisely what’s missing.” Ned scratched his brow and frowned. “These are the last shipments before winter. Who would do such a thing?”

When they entered the main storage building at the gristmill, Dooley Kramer was busily poring over the account books. Light from an oil lamp bathed his hunched figure and frazzled hair in an eerie yellow glow. He sat at Nicholas’ desk and glanced up when Ned and Constable Brindle walked into the room.

“Thanks again for all your help, Dooley. Find anything?” Ned asked.

Dooley tilted his head slightly, raising a single eye in Ned’s direction. “After counting what’s left in the orders that were disturbed, and comparing that to the numbers marked in the books here, I’ve figured there are twenty sacks of flour missing.”

“Twenty!”

“Yes. And I’m sad to say that I packed those very shipments just two days ago with Arthur Weeks.”

Constable Brindle waved the torch. “Show us.”

Dooley led them to a corner of the storage area. Flour sacks were piled chest high in several rows. He set his oil lamp down on one of them. “I saw flour spilled on the floorboards,” he said, pointing. “The thief must’ve torn one of the sacks. And notice the replacement sack filled with pinecones in this one order.”

The constable raised his torch, nosing his way between Ned and Dooley for a closer look. “This is the work of a clever one, that’s for certain. Deviously clever.”

“I want that scoundrel thrown in your lockup and left to rot!” Ned spastically waved a finger in front of Clay’s nose. “That’s just for starters!”

“Take a breath, Ned, and quit trying to poke my eye out!” The constable brushed past him. “Let me examine the area in peace.”

“You might want to look in your office,” Dooley suggested to Ned. “I noticed some items in there scattered all over the floor.”

Ned rushed to the office as Constable Brindle continued snooping around. “More light, Dooley.”

“Right away!” Dooley lit another oil lamp and hurried over to the constable.

“Thanks,” Clay said, hanging it from a nail in the wall, creating more flittering shadows in that area. He knelt down on a knee and swept his fingers through the pile of spilled flour, cold to the touch. He next examined the sack of pinecones and scowled when something caught his eye. The constable directed his gaze to a patch of floor just beyond the spill. He reached down and grabbed a tiny object laying there, rolled it through his fingers and then slipped it inside his vest pocket just as Ned stormed out of his office.

“That miscreant looted my private office, too! I had a leather pouch filled with silver half-pieces locked inside my strongbox. They’re gone! Someone pried the box open and stole the pouch.” Ned’s oil lamp shook like a storm-tossed ship at sea as he flailed his arms. “You find this hooligan at once, Clay! Deputize the entire village if you have to. I’ll be first in line to volunteer.”

Constable Brindle hung Ned’s oil lamp on another nail and motioned for him to sit down before addressing Dooley. “You said Arthur Weeks helped you fill these orders?”

“Yes, sir. We both put in extra hours this week. Arthur worked more than me, cleaning up the place at the end of the day. He likes earning the extra pay before things slow up for winter. He locked up a couple of times, being the last one here. Mr. Adams will attest to that.”

Ned nodded, rubbing his chin. “They both did some fine work this week. Our busy season, you know. Arthur worked well into dark on a couple of nights recently.”

“Did he say anything that might indicate he’d pull a stunt like this?” the constable asked Dooley.

“No, sir! Not in the least.” Dooley grinned. “You know Arthur. He minds his business pretty much. Does what he’s told. Doing extra clean-up work for pay is one thing, but a scheme like this, well... That would just be too much work to interest him.”

“Still, I’d like to have a word with him,” Constable Brindle said. “Know where I might find him?”

“Probably plopped down on a chair at the Iron Kettle right now, celebrating. That’s his usual haunt.”

Ned agreed that they should seek him out at once. “Yet I find it hard to imagine Arthur having anything to do with these matters,” he added. “Truth is, I find it difficult to believe that any of my workers would stoop to such treachery. Something’s rotten here, I tell you. Like a basket of forgotten fish, something’s very rotten!”

The Iron Kettle Tavern sat slumped on the south side of River Road like a tired, wet dog. Several layers of dried mossy growth blanketed its sagging roof. Firelight from within peeked through an assortment of cracked and dirty windows. Inside, pipe smoke drifted to the ceiling like gray and white snakes hovering over the chatter of drinkers, gamblers and braggarts. Oil lamps hung from low rafters over crowded pine tables as a roaring blaze in the corner fireplace viciously sputtered and snapped.

Constable Brindle and Ned Adams stepped inside and drifted through the packed room, soon spotting Arthur Weeks turning away from the bar with a freshly filled mug of ale. He wore a brown water-stained coat and quickly gulped from his drink when he saw the two men approach.

“Arthur, we need to talk to you,” the constable said, wiping his brow. “But it’s awfully warm in here. Step outside for a minute?”

“Sure,” Arthur said, suspiciously eyeing Ned Adams.

When they stood outside the front door, Arthur questioned them with a twitch of his pointed nose. “What’s going on? I come here to get away from the serious faces you two are wearing.” He attempted a laugh.

“Clay needs to ask you a few questions, Arthur, about some goings-on at the gristmill.”

“All right.” Arthur Weeks downed another mouthful of ale.

Constable Brindle explained about the robbery at the mill, noting the surprise etched on Arthur’s narrow face. “Since Dooley mentioned that you helped pack those orders, and that you also stayed late on a few nights recently to clean up, well, is there anything you might be able to tell us about the missing items?”

“Yesterday was the final workday of the week,” Ned added, “so the robbery probably happened last night after you locked up.”

“Whenever it happened, just know that I had nothing to do with it,” Arthur said. “I put flour sacks on those piles, not pinecones. Just because I was the last one to leave the mill on some nights doesn’t mean I was up to anything crooked.”

“No one’s accusing you, Arthur. We’re just trying to piece together events. Any information you can supply would be helpful,” the constable said reassuringly. “On those nights you worked late, did you see anything unusual or notice anyone hanging around the area? Perhaps someone walked by who you normally didn’t see near the mill.”

Arthur Weeks stared at the constable’s torch that had been set against a nearby rock. The flames sputtered in the cold night air. He shook his head before looking up to speak. “It’s usually pretty quiet up there after work hours. I didn’t see anyone in the area that– Well, I didn’t see any strangers hanging about. That’s the honest truth.”

“Whoever robbed me probably broke in during the dead of night,” Ned mumbled dejectedly. “I just can’t believe this could happen.” He stepped away from the others and looked up at the starry sky.

Clay Brindle patted Arthur on the shoulder and smiled a quick thank you. “Okay then. We’ll figure it out somehow,” he said, picking up the torch. “Let’s head back to the mill, Ned, and look around some more.”