Chapter 13. The mermaid comes back
When I came home, dad was in the kitchen, cooking dinner. I sat down at the table in front of him and told him what we'd found out in the museum. When he heard that one part of the lost triptych worth several million dollars, had been hanging in our local library for many years, his eyebrows shot up. The spoon he had been holding in his hand fell down to the floor with a clunk.
"I can't believe. I can't believe it!" he kept muttering, running his fingers through his hair. "It's a sensation! Elmo, you and your friends mustn't tell anyone about it. Oh, why is it Thursday today!?"
"Dad, we must tell Greta Vortek about it," I objected. "You understand that we can't keep it a secret from the police, don't you?"
"Yes, of course," he sighed. "I just hope their investigation won't be finished till the next Thursday."
After dinner dad went to his room. I tried to watch TV in the living room, but I couldn't concentrate. My thoughts kept returning to the picture. Finally I stood up, intending to go to my room to read something, when the phone rang.
"Elmo," I heard Nick's voice as I answered. "Ross Adaskey has come to himself. He remembers everything."
"What?" I gasped. "How did you know?"
Nick told me that when he came home, his parents were leaving for the Terzises to a party. Nick decided to go with them. At the party there were a lot of noble and rich people of Raven Hill: Mr Hampson, Mrs Drisk-Haskell and some people from Raven Hill administration.
After a little while Mr Palmer senior, his wife and son arrived. They brought news. The doctor had phoned Mr Palmer and informed him that Mr Adaskey had come to himself and could tell what had happened to him. But he said nothing about it yet. Even the police would be allowed to speak to him only tomorrow.
"Nick, I'm worrying," I said slowly. "I just can't help myself. Listen, if he remembers everything, maybe we'd better see him today?"
"Are you kidding? It's eleven o'clock. We can't go there now, can we?" Nick objected. "We'll go to see him tomorrow."
"Tomorrow might be too late. Tomorrow he'll tell the police everything," I attempted to convince him. "I don't think that they will let us speak to him after that. He's their witness after all. The police even can carry him out of Raven Hill. Especially if he's tangled with this robbery."
"If he's tangled with this robbery, he won't tell us anything," Nick objected again.
"But we at least will know what happened to him and maybe we'll be able to make some conclusions," I insisted.
"When do you want to go to see him?" Nick asked.
"At night."
"Very funny," Nick muttered. "I can't imagine how I'll go out at night after the yesterday's row."
I weighed my chances. I knew I had to persuade him. I tried to press on his weakest points – curiosity and money. "I'll go alone then," I pretended that I made up my mind. "Or with Sunny and Tom. Maybe they'll be able to go out tonight."
As I expected, Nick immediately objected. "No way," he said firmly. "I'll go too." I smiled to myself. I was right, his curiosity was stronger than his fear to get into troubles and be punished again. "We'll all go," he went on. "But later."
"What do you mean "later"?"
"At half past one or at two a.m.," Nick explained. "I won't be able to go out earlier."
"Okay," I agreed. "I'll call the others. Let's meet in the Glen at 2:00 a.m."
"Okay," Nick replied and hung up.
I phoned the others. Sunny said that she would go, though she didn't see any sense in this visit. Tom also promised to come. Now he has got a separate room and can go out without waking up anyone in the house. Richelle, on the contrary, said that she wasn't going to get into troubles again and that she won't go anywhere at night. Liz also wanted to go, but she wasn't sure that she would be able to go out.
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At two o'clock in the morning I struggled through the bushes into our clearing in the Glen. Sunny was there. She was calmly sitting on a rock, wrapping in her jacket. In a few minutes Tom and Nick joined us. We waited for 15 minutes for Liz, but she didn't turn up. In the end we decided that she wouldn't come and stood up to go without her.
As quiet as possible we crept down the path and onto the street. It was dark and empty.
"All normal people are sleeping at this time of night," Nick muttered to himself.
"Shut up!" Tom snapped.
Quickly we strode down the street, trying to keep ourselves in the shadow of trees. The night was cold, but windless. A half moon hung high in the clear sky. Stars were blossoming in the darkness.
We turned from Craigend Road into a little street and stopped in hesitation. Someone was going in front of us. His dark figure was looming far ahead.
"Listen," I whispered to the others. "We'd better be more cautious. We can't come across someone who'll tell our parents that we were seen to walk around at night."
"Oh, what would happen then…" Nick drawled.
"The last thing I need now is to be caught walking around Raven Hill at night," Tom muttered.
The stranger was going far ahead, so even if he knew us, he was unlikely to recognize us in this darkness, but all the same, we slowed down and tried to keep in the shadow of the trees.
We walked and walked, but the stranger was still ahead.
"I wonder how long he's going to hang in front of us," Tom grumbled. "I feel uneasy when he's so close."
"He's probably going home. Soon he'll turn away," Sunny whispered.
But to our astonishment the man didn't turn anywhere. We were walking after him, keeping far back. Several minutes later we were surprised even more when he turned into a street that led to the hospital.
"Maybe he feels bad?" Sunny suggested.
"When people feel bad, they don't go to the hospital at nights," Tom objected.
The next moment we all gasped, flabbergasted. The stranger walked through the gate of the hospital yard, but didn't go towards the main entrance. Instead, he ducked into the bushes.
"I don't like it," Sunny said anxiously. "Let's follow him. Quick! But be careful!"
We also slipped through the bushes and found ourselves in front of the back part of the hospital. There was no one there, but we heard the gravel crunch under someone's feet from behind the corner.
"Ross's room is there!" I gasped.
We glanced at each other in dismay and dashed towards the corner. Just in time to notice that the stranger jumped, grabbed the window frame and slipped into the dark room.
Without thinking twice Sunny hauled herself up and also disappeared in the window. Nick immediately did the same. Tom and I glanced at each other. We could hear sounds of a scuffle and muffled screams, coming from the window. I grabbed the window frame and with Tom's help climbed into the room. What I saw there was a mess. Ross was lying on the bed, his eyes popping. He seemed to be in a new shock. Although, it wasn't surprising, because practically straight on top of him there was a severe struggle. Sunny and the stranger, whose face was covered with balaclava, were rolling on the bed, fighting. Nick, jumping beside the table, was trying to kick the stranger, but it seemed to me that it didn't help Sunny at all.
"Psst! Elmo?! Help me to climb in!" I heard Tom's voice from the outside.
I hung out of the window and stretched my hand to him. Hardly had Tom clambered inside, when "the nearly-drowned man" slipped like a snake from under Sunny and the stranger, and with a wild roar crashed down onto them.
"Sunny!" Tom shouted. "Sunny's there!"
"And Nick," I added.
The next moment we flung ourselves at Mr Adaskey. He was fighting furiously, without ceasing to roar. All of a sudden the lights came on. The doctor and three men in white uniforms rushed over to the bed.
One of them grabbed Ross. The other two men seized Sunny and Nick, who were pressing the stranger to the bed and started to haul them to their feet.
"Don't be stupid! Let go of us and hold him!" Nick growled.
For some reason the guys obeyed him. They dashed to the man and in no time tied him, using the bed sheets as a rope.
Mr Adaskey seemed to be coming to himself. He was sitting on the bedside table, looking around with wild eyes. Tom bent down and carefully picked up a big knife from the floor.
"Do you have a plastic bag?" he turned to the doctor. "We need to save the fingerprints on this thing."
"Egyptian? You again?" the doctor stared at him. "You know, I've had enough! I'm calling the police."
"I'm not an Egyptian," Tom grinned at him. "But you're right, you should call the police. By the way, if it hadn't been for us, Mr Adaskey would have been dead by now."
The man in balaclava jerked and snarled something, but he was tightly tied. A nurse's aide brought a small plastic zip-lock bag. Tom cautiously put the knife into it.
The doctor, meanwhile, had called the police. Then he hung up and turned to us.
"Speak," he ordered. "I'm listening to you."
"No, first let's see who this man is," Nick was dying to know the name of the killer.
He squatted by the tied man and pulled the balaclava off his face. For a while Nick was staring at the man, then he slowly stood up. Tom, Sunny and I gasped with astonishment when we saw the man's face. I guess we just couldn't believe our eyes. It was the nicest and very impolite John Hampson. His face was twisted with rage and desperation.
"Young idiots!" he snarled through the gritted teeth. At that moment Mr Adaskey let out his favourite "I'll kill you!", dashed to Mr Hampson and grabbed his neck. Two guys in white uniform for the hundredth time dragged him away. Though this time Mr Adaskey let go of Mr Hampson's neck quite easily.
"It was he who tried to drown me," he said clearly.
"What?" the doctor exclaimed. It was obvious that he had a lack of information. He demanded again that we tell him what was going on.
Tom opened his mouth to tell him, but right at that moment Constable Vortek and three policemen stormed into the room. "What's happened," Miss Vortek demanded. Then she saw us. "You? Again?" she exclaimed.
"Hello, Miss Vortek," we greeted her.
"We've found the criminal," Tom added gleefully. "Here he is," he pointed at Mr Hampson.
"Mr Hampson?" Greta's eyes rounded.
"He was trying to kill Mr Adaskey with this knife," Tom held out the plastic packet to Miss Vortek.
"We're sure that it is he who stole the painting from the library," Sunny said calmly.
We told Miss Vortek that the stolen picture turned out to be an extremely valuable part of a famous triptych, which included three parts: "The guileful mermaid", "The crying mermaid" and "The dead mermaid". But two parts of this triptych were considered to be lost.
"Damned puppies!" Mr Hampson snarled through gritted teeth. "I should have strangled you earlier. If only I knew that you'd poke your noses into…"
"You won't strangle anyone now," Greta sharply interrupted him. Then she turned to us. "I wonder how such a priceless work of art could appear in our little local library."
"Mr Palmer told us that this picture belonged to a rich family," I explained. "Then relatives of this family inherited paintings and sold most of them, including this one. The previous librarian must have bought it and hung it on the wall in the library."
"Maybe," Greta agreed. "So you found it out, didn't you?" she looked at Mr Hampson.
"He's a famous fine art expert," Nick said in a low voice. He seemed to be shocked. It wasn't surprising though. After all Mr Hampson was a good friend of his family.
"Can anyone explain to me what's going on!?" the doctor demanded. "What are you talking about? What mermaids, works of art and everything?"
"Haven't we explained yet?" Tom asked impatiently.
"I didn't understand," the doctor spread his arms.
Tom opened his mouth to repeat, but Greta interrupted him. "You four go home right now," she ordered.
"But they promised to tell me…" the doctor objected.
"I'll tell you everything. You four go straight home, understand?" Miss Vortek gravely looked at us. "No," she changed her mind. "I'll have someone to drive you home. I want to be sure that you won't sneak anywhere else again."
She pulled out her mobile phone and asked someone to drive us home. While we got into the car we saw two policemen escorted Mr Hampson into the police car.
We managed to convince the young policeman to drop us off at the gates, so the rest of that night was quiet. But the next day Miss Vortek fanned the flame when she came to speak with our parents and congratulate us.
She told that the police had searched Mr Hampson's house. The picture was there. It was sent to the city for examination. When Mrs Terzis learnt about "terrible doubleness" of their good friend and workmate, she ranted and raved, telling everyone about "meanness of this villainous man". We all felt even worse when we learnt that Mr Hampson's friendship with Mrs Terzis wasn't disinterested. Agreeing with her in everything and escorting her everywhere, he hoped to make her trust him and get access to the Terzises' paintings.
As well as other people in Raven Hill, Mr Hampson didn't know what a treasure had been hanging in the library till this month. He learnt about the triptych and its lost parts only when the Fine Arts Museum had exhibited the "Crying mermaid". When he realised that an extremely expensive and rare painting had been hanging in front of his nose, he decided to steal it. He understood that he had to hurry, because someone from Raven Hill also could visit that Museum and the picture certainly would have slipped away from his hands.
So he decided not to waste time and act immediately. The main thing was to make the police look for anything but the painting itself. Luckily for him there was a small, hidden cavity in one part of the frame. Mr Hampson inspected it and found a little, silver locket with a strand of golden hair inside it. The locket was cheap and small, and was valuable only for its owner. But it was Mr Hampson's chance to turn the investigation away from the painting.
He had broken the frame and threw it into the bay. But while he was doing it, an unexpected witness appeared on the beach. Mr Adaskey had gone out for a little walk that night and accidently saw what Mr Hampson was doing. Mr Hampson couldn't afford to leave witnesses, it could ruin his plan. He hit Mr Adaskey on the head and tried to drown him.
Except for this unfortunate event, Mr Hampson's plan had been going quite well. Talking to people and listening to gossips, Mr Hampson realised that the police and Raven Hill citizens were looking for a treasure from the hiding place and suspected anyone but him.
But Mr Adaskey had survived. Mr Hampson knew that when Ross's memory returned, he'd tell who had tried to drown him. So there was no choice, except for killing him. Thank to us, the first effort failed.
Mr Hampson wanted to wait for a while before the next effort, but Mr Adaskey unexpectedly remembered everything. It happened that Mr Hampson was at the Tersises' party when Mr Palmer brought this news. It made Mr Hampson act immediately. But again we crossed his path. If it hadn't been for us, Mr Adaskey certainly would have been killed.
The painting had been examined for a long time. Finally experts finished the examination and gave the verdict: "The guileful mermaid" is an original painting, created by famous artist Jack Troffe. There was a meeting in the library, where Raven Hill's citizens decided to present the painting to the Fine Art museum so as to reunite two parts of the triptych. Mr Palmer was especially glad about it.
"I told you! I knew that this mermaid was special!" he repeated all the time.
We managed to convince Miss Vortek to give the two paintings to us for a few days so that Tom could make copies of them. He copied them really well, even Nick admitted it. Plus Tom found the third part of the triptych in a book, and copied it too. Soon three pictures were hanging on the wall in the library instead of one.
Samuel Palmer didn't forget his promise and paid us the reward, which made Nick happy. Miss Vortek also received her part of the reward.
"People have been afraid of mermaids since ancient times," I thought as we sat in the Black Cat café, celebrating the end of this case. "They're right. This one, even painted, managed to make such a mess and nearly killed a man."