Chapter Three: "A Glimpse of Hope"


If I was going to be awake all night like Ami worried I'd be, the reason was that I ate too much food. My stomach was so full, I could hardly walk. If I didn't see another lobster for a month, that would be too early.

"Ohhhh," I groaned as we stepped outside.

"I can't believe you ate four lobsters!"

"The waiter kept bringing them to me at no extra charge!" I defended myself, although my eyes had definitely been bigger than my stomach.

"Not such a bargain after all then, huh? Perhaps a walk will help. The waiter said the police station was on the next street over."

"Let's take it slow to start with." I grabbed Ami's hand and took the outside path near the street just as the Sisters had taught me. They wouldn't have liked my gluttonous behavior, however, and would've charged me with washing the dishes more than likely.

"I've never seen a cleaner place. There isn't a single piece of litter to be seen. It's almost perfect except for one thing that's bothering me. Something's missing. Have you noticed? I can't put my finger on it."

I looked up and down the street and even up into the sky before I figured out what she was talking about.

"Electrical lines. Poles. Telephone wires."

"That must be it," Ami uttered, sounding just as perplexed as I was. "There aren't any!"

I'd managed to make it the corner, now I just had to get to the next street. It felt as if I was carrying a lead balloon in my belly.

"No wonder Mr. Quinn hasn't contacted us. There's no access to a phone here."

"How strange! I guess it's their choice to be cut off from the outside world, but how do they manage?"

Just when she asked the question, a delivery truck rattled by. It was from a bakery in a town we passed on the way here.

"They appear to be managing somehow."

"I suppose you can't miss something you've never possessed. I don't think I could get by without a phone. I don't watch much television, but I do like to talk on the phone. I call my parents and my sister at least once a week."

Her parents. She hadn't told me much about them and hadn't invited me to meet them. I tried not to read anything into that fact since our relationship was still fairly new. If that was still the case by the time I asked her to marry me, it would definitely become a problem.

I, on the other hand, didn't have much to say about family. I'd been left in the dropbox outside of St. Mary's on Third Street and raised in an orphanage by a gaggle of nuns. In that way, I actually had many mothers. Ami, however, wouldn't meet any of them. They were old, to begin with, and most of them had already died. The ones left had been transferred or dismissed from the orphanage completely; none of which was my fault. I didn't cause that much trouble as a child even though Sister Margaret had once reminded me that someday, I would pay for my raising.

"There," Ami said as soon as we advanced onto the next street. "Constable Tom Harris."

The title was inscribed on a sign that hung above the door and swung to and fro with the breeze. I was beginning to believe nothing about this town would surprise me, although I hadn't imagined a police station could look like this.

"It's a castle, isn't it?" I had asked Ami. I realized she was most likely smarter about these types of things. I had barely made it through high school.

"Any building with fortified walls, battlements, a watchtower, and sometimes a moat can be considered a castle. It looks to me like this meets the requirements of one."

"It's rather small for a castle," I debated.

"I'm not sure size matters. It's all about functionality."

"I hope it functions as any normal police station, or I'm not certain what we're going to do!"

I was halfway expecting knights on horseback to charge down the street and was almost disappointed there hadn't been any. Once we'd stepped inside, instead of knights, we were met by a pair of regular-looking police officers, although their uniforms were slightly out of date.

"What may I help you with?" the young one asked.

I stepped forward to do the talking for no reason other than the fact Ami had given me a little shove.

"Hi. Yes. We've driven down from the city to find a friend of ours, whom we believe to be in the vicinity. He called from a town close by four days ago and mentioned he was going to be spending some time here. We haven't heard from him since, however, and are starting to get a little worried."

The man had a thick mustache that curled in on itself at the end. He leaned back and stared at both of us, a finger and thumb twisting one end of his facial hair.

Ami stepped closer to me and whispered. "Ask him again, maybe he didn't hear you."

"Oh, I heard you all right. I was just thinking. Constable!"

The shout caught both Ami and me off guard and we jumped. In a few seconds, a tall, thin man, built much like Mr. Quinn stepped into the room.

"Constable, these two visitors claim to have a friend here in town. Uh, what's his name?"

"Mr. Matthew Quinn," Ami answered.

"Mr. Matthew Quinn," the officer repeated. "That name sound familiar to you?"

"Let's see." The constable crossed his arms as if he were in deep thought. "There was that one lad who came through from North Star a few days ago. Does your friend have red hair and drive a motorized bicycle?"

"No, that's not him. Mr. Quinn is tall; about six foot, four inches, is 45 years old, has blue eyes, brown hair, and wears a long dark brown trench coat most days."

The three men confided quietly amongst themselves before offering any kind of answer. When they were finished, the constable returned to his office, and the original one I had spoken with stepped back up to the counter.

"Nope. Sorry. Nobody here has seen anyone meeting that description. Are you sure you're in the right town?"

"Yes, we're positive," I confirmed. I was starting to get a little annoyed and when that happened, I had a bad habit of enunciating every syllable, especially if I was having to repeat myself. "He phoned the office. Several. Days. Ago. And. Mentioned. He. Was. Coming. Here!" I had just felt Ami poke me in the back. It was a warning. I took a deep breath and continued more calmly. "There's some business he needs to take care of. I have to speak with him."

The officer had been chewing on something and bent over to spit it out into a trash can. He then leaned onto the counter and glared at us through his lashes.

"Like I said. There's nobody here by that name or that description. My advice is for you two to get back in your tiny little car and return to the big, bad city where you belong. If you do, there won't be any trouble. If you don't and you keep nosing around here? You'll find yourself in a heap of it. Am I clear?"

Ami probably could see the hair raising on the back of my neck like a mad dog preparing to fight. I knew that because she grabbed my upper arm and began pulling me toward the door.

"I know he's here and I know you're lying!" I shouted as I was leaving. "I don't know why you're lying but I'm going to find out! I'm not leaving here without him!"

Once we had gotten outside she spun me around by grabbing the tender inner skin of my left bicep.

"Ow!" I complained.

"Ben! What do you think you're doing?"

"He's lying!" I argued, probably louder than I should've.

"Don't you think I know that? And what good is it going to do us for you to lose your temper and yell at him like that? The only thing that will do is land us in jail! And we won't be having much luck finding Mr. Quinn from inside there, will we?"

Dammit. She was right.

"You're right. I don't know what happened. I usually don't lose my temper like that." Which was true. I had interviewed hundreds of jerks in my investigative life and had always kept my cool until today.

"It's okay. You're probably just not used to working a case involving someone you care about."

"Is that it?" It was certainly a possibility. I didn't dare tell her what I would've done if it were her missing instead of Quinn. I imagine my gun would've come into play.

"More than likely. Just remember to stay calm until we find him. Once we do, then you can lose your mind and I won't say a thing."

"And that's why I love you so much. You allow me to occasionally lose my mind."

Ami smiled at me and I leaned forward to kiss her. Neither of us was all that comfortable with public displays of affection and shortened the touch much sooner than we wished.

"Now what do we do?"

What choice did we have? I looked around, and then up one side of the street and down the other. Across from us and three businesses down was something familiar.

"Look," I pointed to the sign that displayed the hind end of a kicking horse. "Horseshoe Inn."

"Isn't that the place Aggi suggested we spend the night?"

"I believe so," I answered. I looked at my watch. Most hotels I was familiar with didn't allow check-in until past eleven or twelve o'clock. It was now a quarter past one. "Come on. We can at least check in."

"After we go back and get our car and luggage."

"Oh yeah," I remembered, adding a groan for dramatic effect.

"I hope that taught you a lesson. At least you won't want to eat dinner."

I trudged back the way we came. Maybe an afternoon nap would help, although I couldn't justify taking one. We weren't here on vacation, we were here to find Quinn.

"Don't even mention food. I'm never eating again."

Ami laughed and called me ridiculous as we walked. It wasn't very far to the car, and we got in and drove around to the inn, finding an empty parking lot in the back. Once inside, we were greeted by a kind-looking older woman.

"Good afternoon. My name is Nancy. How many rooms would you care for?"

"One," Ami answered quickly. "Ben and Ami Noble," she added before reaching for my hand. "We're newlyweds."

I didn't know what to say, so I held my tongue. I was rather pleased with her claim. Surprised, but pleased.

"Oh, how sweet. Congratulations to you both. Why Mr. Peterson and I just celebrated our fiftieth wedding anniversary."

"That's wonderful!" we both told her in unison.

"I hope we make it to fifty."

"Oh you will," Mrs. Peterson told me. "There's no trick to it. Just love one another and listen to each other."

"Good advice," Ami replied.

"Henry here will carry up your bags. You'll be staying in room 249, the honeymoon suite."

"We don't need all that space," I argued with her. I wasn't concerned about the size of the room, just the cost.

"No worries at all, young man," Nancy told me. "The upgrade is free. You'll pay the regular room price. That'll be $3.99 for the night. A free breakfast will be served in the dining hall which is to your left promptly at 8:00. Enjoy your evening."

After we received the slight oversized room key, we followed Henry up a flight of stairs and down the hall. The suite was apparently at the end of the hallway. Henry asked for our key, unlocked the door, and motion for us to step inside. Then he carried in the luggage and smiled.

"Oh, yeah. Hang on." I dug into my wallet and pulled out a dollar bill to hand to him.

He took the cash and continued to look at Ami and then to me and back to Ami. He was nervous and apparently wanted to say something.

"Go ahead," Ami told him. "We're harmless. Is there something you want to tell us?"

Instead of speaking, the boy nodded his head and withdrew a piece of paper from his vest pocket. He slapped it into my hand and promptly left.

"What was that all about?"

I unfolded the piece of paper and read it out loud.

"If you want to find your friend, meet me behind the library at 9:00 p.m." Aggi