When they reached the bottom of the stairs, they paused briefly as Betty and JR waited for Barnaby to decide where they should start in their investigation.
The elder Jones stood quietly for several moments, his gaze slowly making its way around the common room and the reception desk, the only areas of the resort, other than their rooms, that they had even viewed. �I think maybe we should take a look around the building,� he suggested.
Betty and J.R. exchanged apprehensive glances again, wondering exactly what they would find in the other rooms of the large resort building.
�I sure wish the phones were working,� Betty said. �If you want my opinion, I�d much rather the police had a look around the building than us.�
�Unfortunately, even if the phones were working, they still couldn�t get up here through the storm,� J.R. reminded her.
She shrugged, reluctantly conceding that he was right.
Turning to his right, Barnaby looked down the long corridor ran parallel to the staircase leading away from the reception area. Several doors designated other rooms, and at the far end of the corridor was a large picture window. Intersecting the east-west corridor at the window was another corridor running north-south, so they started down it to see what other items of interest the large building contained.
The first door they came to was on the right. Barnaby turned the knob and pushed it open to reveal a large banquet style room with white decorations. White flowers adorned a speaker�s podium, and white and baby blue streamers adorned the long banquet tables. The silver serving trays and warmers were empty, as was the crystal punch bowl. A large stone fireplace backed up to the one in the common room, and over the mantle was a large banner which read, Mr. and Mrs. Glenn Taylor.
Betty smiled. �I think they have either just had a wedding reception here, or they�re in preparation for one.� Noticing the reception book on the table by the door, she lifted the silver cover with her forefinger. It was empty of the names of the guests. �Looks like they�re in preparation. No signatures.�
They backed out of the room and proceeded down the hallway again. Farther down the corridor on their left was a large double door that was propped open with wedge-shaped rubber door stoppers. It was a large spacious area filled with square tables, most sitting individually, but others were pushed together to accommodate larger occupancy. Each one was draped with a white table cloth and bundles of silverware wrapped in a white cloth napkin.
�I think we�ve found the dining hall,� Betty said.
J.R. felt his stomach grumble with eager anticipation, and he placed his hand over his abdomen as if to sooth it. �You know, we skipped lunch because of the snow,� he reminded them.
�I�m kind of hungry, too,� Barnaby agreed. �I vote we have an early supper before we continue this investigation.�
�Well, I�m starting to think this investigation isn�t going to turn up anything useful,� J.R. told him. �There is simply no sign of another living being anywhere in this building.�
Barnaby nodded. �I�m in agreement with that, but I think we need to explore the building, anyway. In the meantime, why don�t we see if we can find anything in the kitchen that we can make a meal on?�
Again, Betty hesitated. Asking her to invade the receptionist�s workspace was one thing, something she was familiar with and could do with respect for the position, but encroaching on the cook�s terrain was another matter entirely. She had heard that some chef�s were extremely territorial.
As if reading the thoughts behind her eyes, Barnaby stated the obvious, �Unless we want to go to bed hungry tonight, we�re going to have to find something, even if it�s simply opening a can of soup or making sandwiches.�
Betty nodded. �You�re right. I just feel like a trespasser or something.�
�If we�re asked, we�ll explain the situation when we have an opportunity to do so. Under the circumstances, I don�t see how anyone could object. Besides, meals are included in the price of our reservation, and since no one is here, it�s up to us.�
Betty turned toward the swinging double doors leading into the kitchen, and placed her hand on it as if to push it open. Then, she paused to glance over her shoulder at her companions, her face vividly expressing the concern that they might find more than just a meal in the pantry. �Maybe one of you guys should go first,� she said, reluctant to take the lead in entering the kitchen.
�Betty, we�ve found no evidence to suggest that foul play was involved here,� Barnaby said, logically.
�We haven�t found anything to suggest otherwise, either,� J.R. added.
�We all agree that something is going on here,� Betty reminded them. �We just don�t know what it is.� She stepped away from the door, determined that one of the men would have to go first.
J.R. placed his hand against one of the doors and slowly pushed it open, peering through the crack between the two of them. The angle was not sufficient to see very well, so he pushed it a bit wider and inserted his head inside the room.
The kitchen was huge and well equipped for the preparation of large meals to accommodate their large clientele. Several large preparation tables stood in the room, and there was a great deal of counter space equipped with restaurant sized toasters, blenders, and other appliances. Also included were a large grill, range tops, and ovens.
His eyes dropped to the floor. It was covered in smooth linoleum for easy cleaning, and he was relieved to see that there were no dead bodies piled in the corner.
�What do you see?� Barnaby asked.
J.R.�s body jumped in response to the abrupt inquiry, and he glanced quickly over his shoulder at Barnaby, who grinned broadly.
�Jedediah, you�re as jumpy as a frog with the hiccups!�
Embarrassed by his edginess, J.R. did not respond. He pushed the door open fully and stepped inside, followed by Betty and Barnaby.
�Nice,� Betty said, admiringly. �Very clean, just as I would expect a kitchen to be.�
They spread out, looking around the kitchen. Barnaby placed his hand over the grill, spreading his fingers about an inch above the smooth surface to test the warmth. �It�s cold. Hasn�t been used in a while,� he told them.
Betty opened the pantry door and found it well stocked with a variety of goods that could be used in preparing meals while they were there.
A narrow alcove lead off the kitchen, and J.R. followed it, inquisitively. He was greeted by two closed doors, one of them at the far end of the corridor, the other built into the wall on his left. He approached the far door first and placed his hand on the doorknob. The metal knob was very cold, indicating that it was probably an outside door. Curious to see what was beyond it, he turned it and pulled it open. Totally unprepared for the sudden blast of icy cold wind and snow, he stumbled backward several steps, driven by the force of it. Quickly, he threw his weight against the door and pushed it closed again. Definitely an outside door!
Brushing the snow from his sweater with his hands, he turned to the other door, and realized that this one was a walk-in freezer. He reached for the door handle, but stopped just as his hand touched it, again consumed by the fear of what he would find inside it. He had heard of several instances where restaurants were held up by criminals who herded the employees into the freezer and either murdered them outright or left them there to freeze. He hoped that was not the case here.
Bracing himself against what might be revealed, his thumb pressed the handle, and he pulled the door open.
Again, he was assaulted by cold air, but this time there was no wind or snow. Labeled boxes of various kinds of meat were stacked on the shelves in the freezer, as well as frozen vegetables and boxes of ice cream desserts. He exhaled an audible sigh of relief at the absence of physical evidence of foul play.
Closing the freezer door again, he returned to the kitchen.
Betty was still looking through the large stock of food items in the pantry. �What sounds good?� she asked.
�Don�t go to too much trouble,� Barnaby told her.
�If you can find some buns, there are some hamburger patties and fries in the freezer back there,� J.R. suggested, hooking his thumb over his shoulder.
�Good. Bring me some, and I�ll see if I can get this fryer going.� She handed him the wire basket used for deep frying and a plate to hold the patties. �Here. Put them in this.�
J.R. returned to the freezer and filled the fryer basket with frozen ripple cut fries, and opened one of the boxes and removed three hamburger patties, and carried them back to the kitchen. Betty had turned on the fryer and the grill, and was waiting for them to heat up.
When they were ready, she inserted the wire basket in the grease and plopped the hamburger patties down on the grill.
When they were done, they carried their plates of hamburgers and fries into the dining room and selected a table in the center of the room.
�This is excellent, Betty,� J.R. said.
�Yes, not bad for an impromptu meal,� she agreed.
The windows rattled and shuddered against a particularly strong gust of wind, and they glanced at it, even though nothing could be seen through it except the swirling whiteness and an occasional gray shadow that marked the location of a nearby tree.
�That is some storm,� J.R. said. �I opened the back door off the kitchen and the wind nearly knocked me over backwards! I saw a lot of snowstorms back in Chicago, but nothing like this. I bet you can�t see more than ten feet out there. And listen to that wind! It sounds almost like a wild animal, trying to get inside.�
Betty shuddered at his description. �As if I wasn�t spooked enough, he has to throw wild animals into the equation!�
�It�s just a storm,� Barnaby reminded them, patiently. �And it doesn�t appear that it�s going to let up any time soon, so it looks like we�re going to be spending the night here by ourselves.�
The other two had already assumed that, but hearing it spoken aloud sobered them slightly. The only thing that might have been worse would have been to spend the night in a haunted house.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After supper, the trio of detectives lingered at the table for a while before cleaning the table and placing the dishes in the huge dishwasher. The atmosphere was growing dusky as they left the dining room.
Turning toward the rear of the building, they walked down the long corridor and stopped at the large picture window at the end, shadowy gray from the late hour and the swirling snow. On either side of them, the adjacent corridor led to other parts of the building. Barnaby gestured to their right, and they passed a series of meeting rooms and offices, but their search failed to turn up anything to explain why the resort had been abandoned.
The lengthy corridor terminated in a closed door, which Barnaby opened without hesitation. Behind it was a well equipped nursery to entertain the children while their parents were on the slopes. A variety of age-appropriate books lined the low bookshelves, and round tables provided plenty of reading space. A television stood in the far corner, with small chairs forming a semi-circle around it, and on the shelf beneath it was a VHS player. Video was a relatively new media, but a variety of children�s movies and cartoons stocked the cabinet beneath the player. Boxes of games were neatly stacked on the wide window sills.
�They thought of everything!� Betty marveled, examining the books. �Looks like they have books for every age level.�
�Why would they bring their kids to a resort and then leave them in a nursery?� Barnaby wondered.
�Lots of kids start skiing when they�re very young, but they tire out before the adults do, so this is a great idea,� Betty said. �Gives them something to do. I bet they have a licensed day-care operator to watch them.�
Growing both physically and mentally weary of the search right on the heels of the long drive, Barnaby glanced at his watch. �It�s after seven. I think maybe we should save the rest of the building for tomorrow and concentrate on the reception area tonight.�
They returned to the reception area, where J.R. hopped onto the countertop again, and swung his legs over to the other side. A moment later, he opened the door from the inside, but this time, Barnaby placed a heavy chair against the door, holding it open so that they could move freely about the reception area without becoming locked out again.
Barnaby stepped into the check-in office, his eyes taking in everything with the skill of an experienced investigator. A second office, presumably that of the general manager, was just off the reception area, and he wandered into it to have a look around. J.R. sat down in the receptionist�s chair and placed the trash can between his feet and began pawing through the discarded envelopes and spreading out wadded up sheets of paper to view their contents. Betty went through the items on the check-in counter, looking through the ledgers and documents.
Finally, giving up on the trash can, J.R. returned it to its original position beside the desk, and grasped the handle on one of the desk drawers and pulled. Locked. He looked up at Betty, who had turned around to face him.
�They probably keep petty cash and receipts inside the desk, so they would naturally keep it locked when no one was around,� she told him.
Rising from the desk, he went to a file cabinet and opened it. When it failed to turn up anything useful, he followed Betty into the alcove while she checked the switchboard again.
�Still out of order,� she responded to the inquiring expression on his face before he asked the question.
Barnaby emerged from the manager�s office. �Find anything?� he asked.
�Nothing to explain this situation,� Betty replied. �You?�
�No, nothing.�
Betty yawned, meaningfully. �I�m getting sleepy,� she said.
Barnaby smiled. �Maybe we should turn in early tonight, and get a fresh start tomorrow.�
�I�m all for that,� she agreed.
J.R. glanced at his watch, and groaned. �I haven�t gone to bed at eight since I was a kid!�
�You can stay down here and keep looking, if you want,� Barnaby told him. �There are some file cabinets you can go through. For myself, it�s been a long, stressful day, and a nice warm bed is sounding very inviting right now.�
J.R. swept the room with his eyes. �Well, I guess you�re right. I�m rather tired, myself.�
The decision made, all three climbed the stairs and returned to their rooms. They paused at their doors to bid the others goodnight, then went inside and closed their doors.
J.R. flipped on the television. The storm was still interfering with the video reception, but he could still hear the audio reasonably well, so he left it on while he undressed for bed. The Love Boat came on at nine o�clock, and he listened to it for a while, catching brief shadows of activity on the screen, before he finally gave up and turned off the set. With nothing else to do, no books or magazines to read, he pulled back the covers and got into bed. Listening to the storm howling outside, he turned out the lights and closed his eyes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
J.R. awakened with a sudden jolt. The room was engulfed in near total darkness, and for several disconcerting moments he experienced the alarming sensation of not knowing where he was. Cognizance returned quickly, and he remembered the resort and the mystery of the missing guests and staff.
He felt chilled, even though he could feel the weight of the bedcovers pressing down on him. Sometime during the night, he had pulled them up to his chin, but they did not seem to be holding back the chill. His feet and hands were icy cold.
Turning his head on the pillow, he withdrew his hand from under the covers and reached through the frosty air for his wristwatch on the bedside table, and glanced at the illuminated face. It was 11:30. He returned the watch to the table, and snuggled under the covers again, trying to get warm.
Lying perfectly still, he listened, wondering what had awakened him. There was no sound except for the howling wind of the blizzard outside, and he lifted his head to peer into the darkness, totally alert. Then it dawned on him: The heating unit was not blowing.
Sitting up, he tossed back the covers and felt the gooseflesh rise on his skin as the cold air surrounded him. Rubbing his hands up and down his arms to warm them, he quickly stepped into the slippers he had placed beside the bed in case he had to get up during the night, and then hurried to the closet to retrieve his bathrobe. He shivered into it quickly, and tied the belt securely around his waist.
Then he felt his way along the wall until he reached the light switch, and flipped it on, squinting his eyes in preparation for the illumination that he expected to flood the room. He heard the click of the switch, but nothing happened. He flipped it a couple more times, but the light did not come on. The power was off.
Remembering the penlight in his coat pocket, placed there in case of emergencies, he made his way back to the closet and felt around for the coat. When he found it, his hand slipped into the pocket and withdrew the thin flashlight. He flipped it on, and a narrow beam of light pushed back the darkness in the room.
Even after assuring himself that there was nothing out of order in the room, that everything was exactly as he had left it when he had retired, he knew he would be unable to go back to sleep if he returned to bed, so after some consideration, he decided to go downstairs. Making a bed on the sofa in front of a roaring fire was sounding pretty good at that moment. Snatching up his room key, he dropped it into the pocket of his robe. Then he pulled a blanket from the top shelf in the closet, and wrapped it around himself.
Quietly, he opened his door and slipped into the hallway. He glanced at the closed doors of Betty�s and Barnaby�s room, marveling that they were managing to sleep in spite of the freezing air, and then he gently eased the door closed, flinching when he heard the latch click a little louder than he had hoped. He glanced quickly across the hall at the two closed doors belonging to his two relatives, assuring himself that he had not awakened them, and then walked toward the stairs and went down.
The resort was eerie in its quietness, and J.R. felt the gooseflesh rise on his arms again when he reached the bottom of the stairs and observed the common room with his penlight. The little flashlight did not had a long reach, but it was sufficient to see where he was going, so he turned toward the fireplace and pulled back the large screen that shielded the guests from popping embers. The wood box was full, so he placed the penlight on the coffee table, its beam aimed at the hearth, and began transferring a sufficient amount of wood from the box to the grate.
Stepping back, he admired his work. �That outta do it,� he said, approvingly. �Now, for kindling.�
A day old newspaper was lying on one of the sofa cushions, so he took one of the sections, wadded it up, and tucked it under the grate.
Wondering where the matches were kept, he picked up the penlight again, and searched the mantle and the fireside tables, but failed to turn up a box of matches. If the stove in the kitchen was gas, it made sense that there would be matches there, so he made his way down the corridor and through the dining room, and then pushed open the swinging door that led into the kitchen. Going to the first drawer, he pulled it open and rummaged around. Nothing. He shoved it closed, and moved to the next one.
Just as his hand closed around the handle, he suddenly froze, listening intently, certain that he had heard something. Quickly, he turned off the penlight and waited. Then he heard it again, the creak of a floorboard under the weight of someone�s foot.
He felt his heart begin to hammer loudly with the realization that someone was in the dining room, just beyond the swinging door. Barnaby had not brought his pistol to the resort, but even if he had, there was no way that J.R. could get upstairs to Barnaby�s room without alerting the intruder of his presence. There were likely to be knives in the kitchen, but in the pitch dark of the windowless kitchen, he knew he could never find one in time.
Through the darkness, he saw a narrow, vertical strip of gray as the swinging door was pushed open from the dining room.
As quietly as he could, J.R. moved toward the door, intending to hide behind it until the intruder was inside, so that he could overwhelm him from behind.
The door, open partway, suddenly stopped, and J.R. realized that the prowler had heard the rustling of his bathrobe and the blanket as he had moved. The door was released, and it swung back to the closed position. Apparently, the intruder had not wanted to confront him in the dark, and had withdrawn.
Feeling a little more confident now at the intruder�s apparent retreat, J.R. pressed his ear against the door and listened. Again, the tell-tale creak of a floorboard reached his alert ears, and he knew that the person, whoever he was, was leaving the dining room rather quickly.
Pushing open the swinging door a crack, he peered into the dining room. The large picture windows, intended to provide the diners with a spectacular view of the scenery, provided a dusky gray atmosphere, enough for him to see the shadow of a figure going around the corner into the corridor. Moving quietly on the balls of his feet, J.R. jogged to the doorway and pressed his back against the wall, pausing for a few moments to muster the courage to continue.
J.R. was no coward, but he certainly had a well-developed sense of self-preservation, and confronting an armed intruder was not a particularly pleasant proposition. Betty and Barnaby were asleep and defenseless upstairs, and he knew it was up to him to determine what this person was after, so he cautiously leaned around the door jamb.
The corridor was empty, as far as he could tell without turning on the flashlight. Slowly, he felt his way along the wall toward the stairs.
Abruptly, his hand touched something soft, and he knew it was an article of clothing that was at that moment being worn by a human being.
He and the intruder uttered simultaneous shouts of alarm, and he jumped back against the wall and flipped on the penlight directly into the face of Betty Jones, who had jumped back against the opposite wall.
�J.R.! What is the matter with you? You scared me half to death!�
�I scared you? What do you think you did to me?�
�What are you doing down here?� she asked.
�The power went out, so I was going to bunk down here on the sofa in front of the fireplace, but first I wanted to build a fire.�
�I thought I heard someone prowling around down here, so I decided to investigate. I guess it was you. Was that you in the kitchen?�
�Yeah, I was looking for some matches to light the fire. I thought you were a prowler, maybe the guy who ---�
She raised her hand to stop him. �Don�t say it!�
�Okay. Do you have any idea where they might keep the matches?�
�J.R., did you think to look on the coffee table? There�s a ton of promotional matchbooks there.�
To verify her words, he returned to the fireplace and directed his flashlight beam at the coffee table. Sure enough, a bowl full of matchbooks was sitting in the middle of it.
Betty laughed out loud at his surprised expression. �Some detective you are!� she teased. �I saw them there last night.�
�Okay, okay. Don�t rub it in.�
He picked up one of the matchbooks, peeled back the cover, and struck one of the matches on the strip. The tiny flame danced and flickered as he lowered it toward the fireplace, and he carefully applied it to the wadded up newspapers. The newsprint curled and blackened as the flames slowly ignited the logs on the grate. Within minutes, they had a nice warming fire.
J.R. replaced the barrier and lay down on one of the sofas. After a moment, deciding that it was preferable to the cold bedroom upstairs, Betty curled up on the other sofa.
Go to Act IV