The following Saturday morning found Brad, Janet, Ralph, and Betty on the grounds where the castle had once stood. It was now just a vacant, overgrown field.
"With all the weeds, I don't think we're going to find much, except maybe a snake or two," Brad grumbled.
"Do be careful, honey," Janet urged him.
They spent most of the morning and a good part of the afternoon searching the grounds carefully, searching for any evidence that had been left behind by the strange individuals who had lived there three years previously.
"Hey, look at this!" Betty shouted. The other three looked up with interest.
"It's someone's driver's license. A woman named Cornelia Quinn. Wonder who in the world she is. Anyway, she's not from Denton."
Ralph took the card from his wife. "That town's not too far away. We could look up her phone number in the library." The public library contained telephone directories for the areas surrounding Denton.
Brad and Janet got back in their car and drove to the library. The phone number to match Cornelia Quinn's address was located with little difficulty, and Janet made the long distance call as soon as they returned home.
"Oh, I'm so glad you found my driver's license!" Cornelia Quinn told Janet. "It must have fallen out of my purse when I was looking for clues as to what had happened to my daughter. She disappeared three years ago, and I haven't heard a word from her since then."
"What was your daughter's name?"
"Columbia. She got involved with a biker named Eddie, and both of them got mixed up with some group of weirdos who called themselves Transsexuals. They all lived together in a...I guess you'd call it a castle...that was right at the location where you found my license. One day the whole bunch of them simply disappeared, even the building they were living in."
Janet was taken aback. She didn't know what to say. How did one tell a complete stranger that her daughter was dead?
"Do you know anything more about that?" Cornelia went on. "I've been searching for answers ever since they disappeared, but everyone I ask just looks at me like they think I'm crazy."
"Ma'am, I'm...I'm very sorry to have to tell you this, but your daughter was killed in an accident. I saw her die." Janet felt worse than she had ever felt before.
"Oh, no!" Cornelia began to sob. "How did it happen?"
"Their leader, Dr. Franken Furter, had a handyman named Riff Raff whom he abused. One day Riff shot and killed Frankie in revenge. Columbia and a guy named Rocky were also killed. She didn't suffer any pain at all. She died instantaneously."
"What about Eddie?"
"He had already been killed earlier by Frankie." Janet didn't want to go into any of the gruesome details.
"Oh dear God," Cornelia moaned. "How will I ever tell Roger?"
"Roger?"
"Columbia and Eddie's son. He's only five years old. How will I ever tell him his parents are dead?"
"Columbia and Eddie have a son?" Janet was shocked.
"He's lived with me since he was a few months old. Columbia asked if I would raise him. She said she knew the environment she was living in was no good to bring a child up in." Cornelia sighed. "How I wish Columbia had stayed with me too! But she was determined to be with Eddie, and totally hung up on that evil Dr. Franken Furter fellow. I tried so hard to get her not to go back, but all my pleas fell on deaf ears."
"I'm so sorry, Mrs. Quinn."
"Please, call me Cornelia."
"I just wish there was something I could say to make you feel better."
"Did you know Columbia well?"
"No, I had just met her the night she died."
"I wish you could have known her better. She was such a bright and cheerful person, so full of life...could you please give me directions to where you are so that I can come pick up my license?"
"Oh, that's okay. Brad and I will take it to you. It's no trouble at all."
"Are you sure you wouldn't mind? I'd be ever so grateful."
"Oh no, we'd be happy to."
"Thank you, and good-bye."
Janet couldn't wait to tell Brad the incredible news.
