Violet hurried up the steps to the library. It was barely 9:00 a.m., and the library wasn’t slated to open until ten, but the lights were all on inside. She cradled Maggie in her sling as she jogged, heart and mind sprinting with concerns for what awaited her beyond the historic red door.
Mrs. Foster met them at the threshold, swinging the door wide and motioning Violet and Wyatt inside. “Thank you for coming.” She pressed the door shut behind them and slid the lock into place. “I’m sorry I behaved so strangely on the phone, but I was worried, and I didn’t know what else to do. Now that I’ve had a moment to relax, I wonder if I’ve wasted your time.”
“What worried you?” Wyatt asked. “And for the record, you can call anytime.”
“Yes,” Violet agreed. “It’s no trouble for us to be here. What happened?”
Mrs. Foster wet her thin white lips. “Sheriff Masterson was here this morning when I arrived at eight. I came early to tidy up and restock shelves. It’s too hard to get to it once we open. I won’t have any help here until afternoon.” She splayed thin fingers over her collarbone, a tremor playing on her narrow frame.
Violet inched closer. “You don’t look well,” she said, sliding a steady hand down the librarian’s arm, shoulder to elbow. “Can I get you some water? Would you like to sit down?”
Mrs. Foster nodded, then moved to the nearest table and took a seat. “I’ll be fine. Like I said, I’ve surely overreacted. After what’s happened to your grandma, and now Ruth, I can’t help feeling as if I’m living in an episode of The Twilight Zone.”
Violet took the seat across from Mrs. Foster, then set Maggie on the floor, keeping an eye on her as she crawled to the nearest chair and tried to pull herself up. She’d dressed her little princess in a red-and-white-checkered sundress, complete with lace-rimmed socks and ruffles across the little white bloomers beneath. All she needed was a pair of cowgirl boots to complete the outfit, but Violet had forgotten them, rushing through her routine to get to the library. It was okay, she assured herself. The pediatrician had said babies learning to stand and walk do better in bare feet than in soled shoes. Of course, Maggie wasn’t walking yet, but she tried getting onto her feet at every opportunity.
Wyatt crept along with Maggie staying a step behind as she moved chair to chair, grabbing hold and failing to get completely upright before moving on. “Why was Sheriff Masterson here?” he asked Mrs. Foster. “You say he was waiting for you when you arrived?”
“Yes,” she said, then frowned. “Well, no. I didn’t mean the current Sheriff Masterson. I meant the former one. Tom Sr. That man was sheriff so long I think I’ve gotten the title in my head like it’s part of his name.”
Violet glanced at Wyatt. “Mary Alice’s husband was the sheriff before her son, but I’ve never met the man.”
“Well, you haven’t missed out on anything,” Mrs. Foster said. “If you’ve met Tom Jr., then you’d know apples don’t fall far from their trees.” She folded her hands on one knee, crinkling the material of her simple brown-and-white print dress. “They’re both about as friendly as an alley cat, but Tom Sr. is harder. He’s always made me nervous, and he seems to have taken up drinking, which made it worse this morning. I imagine life’s been tough on him since Mary Alice was diagnosed with dementia, but it’s barely 9:00 a.m.” She fiddled with her skirt, looking suddenly sad. “It was rough on everyone when Mary Alice’s slow decline took a plummet last month. We all knew it was coming, of course. That’s the nature of the disease, but how do you prepare for something like that?” She shook her head sadly.
Violet’s heart broke for Mary Alice and all the folks who loved her. “What did Mr. Masterson want today?”
“He wanted to come inside and take a look at the computers, so I let him. I’m not even sure if I could have said no. He was the sheriff for years. Decades. When I smelled the gin on his breath, I got worried. Then I thought about how odd it was for him to come this morning asking about the same thing you did yesterday. Especially since your grandma and his wife are so close, and one is ill and the other is in the hospital. Maybe I read too much Agatha Christie. I don’t know, but the timing, and the way he showed up here for the first time ever, as far as I know, and two hours before we open, set off my internal alarm bells.” She scrunched her face. “That’s silly, right?”
“No,” Wyatt said. “It’s perceptive and smart.”
Violet scooted to the edge of her seat. “He asked about the same thing we did? Do you mean my grandma?”
“Yes.” She wrung her hands.
“Did he say what he was looking for, specifically?” Wyatt asked.
“No. He just wanted to know if Mrs. Ames had used the computers and if anyone else had come in asking about her. I said no to both.” Her cheeks darkened in humility. “I don’t normally lie.”
Violet offered a small smile. “It’s okay. You were scared and alone with a man who’d clearly been drinking. Anyone would have acted out of character in that situation.”
Mrs. Foster lowered her eyes. “Thank you for saying that.”
“It’s true,” Violet assured. “What else can you tell us?”
“Not much. I asked him how Mary Alice was doing. He said fine. When he asked if your grandma had been in to use the computers, I told him she’d fallen and was in the hospital. He didn’t respond to that. He just marched on past me and flopped onto a chair at one of the computers. That was when I called you.”
Wyatt took another small side step, following Maggie around the table. “Did you know Mary Alice and Tom before they were married?”
“Loosely,” she said. “I met Mary Alice at a bonfire in Potter’s Field. It was a big hangout in those days. We stayed friends for a little while after that. As long as we could, I mean.”
“Any reason it didn’t last?” Wyatt asked.
Mrs. Foster let her gaze fall briefly to the floor, clearly uncomfortable rehashing other folks’ personal stories, yet still visibly unnerved by her morning run-in with the former sheriff. She pulled her attention determinedly back to Wyatt. “Once she was married, things changed. She’d longed to be out of her parents’ home so she would be free to do what she wanted, but moving in with her new husband was worse. When they returned from their honeymoon, he practically isolated her. Once they had children, she barely left home. Most of her friends moved on. We still chatted when she came in for new books each week. I enjoyed that time very much, but it was always limited. He was always outside waiting in the car. Your grandmother hung on, though. She refused to let Mary Alice slip away into isolation. After the dementia diagnosis, your grandmother was practically the only person Tom would let in the door.”
Wyatt crossed his arms. “Sounds like the Mastersons have been in power a long time. Let’s hope neither man is behind all the lawbreaking.”
Maggie made it to Violet’s chair and grabbed her mom’s calves, trying and failing to pull herself upright. Violet lifted her onto her lap for a kiss.
Wyatt relaxed his stance and turned his full attention on Mrs. Foster. “May I take a look at the computers again? I’m not sure what there is to find, but I’m curious about what Mr. Masterson looked up while he was here.”
“Help yourself,” she said with a flip of one wrist. “I’m just glad he’s gone. His son came to pick him up a few minutes before you got here. I’m not sure how he knew where to find him, but he removed him through the back door service exit. I suppose it would’ve been embarrassing to be caught hauling your drunken father away from the library at eight thirty in the morning.”
Maggie wiggled, and Violet set her back onto the floor. She flipped immediately into a crawl and headed off in the direction Wyatt had gone.
“Mrs. Foster?” Violet asked, a new question popping into mind. “Does the name Henry Davis mean anything to you?”
Mrs. Foster paused. She frowned. “It sounds vaguely familiar. I’m not sure why.”
“He’s a military man from Grove County who went missing in 1968. He was twenty-three at the time.”
“Oh my. That would make him my age now.” She cupped one palm over her jawline. “No. I can’t place the name. I’m the wrong person to ask. I didn’t get out of River Gorge often as a young woman. Is he still missing?”
“I’m not sure.”
Wyatt’s head appeared to bob over the aisles of books as he strode back into view. Brown eyes deep in thought. He’d dressed in low-slung jeans and a fitted gray T-shirt that accentuated his body in knee-buckling ways. The set to his jaw made Violet want to run her finger along it, maybe also her lips. “There were no recent searches on any of the computers,” he said. “Makes me wonder if he might’ve come in just to check the search history like we did.”
Mrs. Foster looked ill. She let her hands fall onto the table. “I didn’t watch. I wanted to put some distance between us, so I went to the desk and called you. It just didn’t feel right, him being here like that.”
Violet leaned across the table and squeezed Mrs. Foster’s fingers. She understood the unsettling feeling, the uncertainty and fear, not knowing if there was real danger or if she couldn’t trust her instincts anymore.
“What do you think he wanted?” the librarian asked. “What’s all this about? First you, then Tom. It isn’t about buying your grandma a cat.”
“No.” Violet offered a sad smile, though she was unwilling to tell Mrs. Foster any more than she absolutely had to. There was no reason to drag her into Grandma’s mess any further than they already had. She lifted her gaze to Wyatt’s grim expression. Was it too late?
“Where’s Maggie?” Wyatt asked. He twisted at the waist, examining the immediate area. “Can you see her?”
“No.” Violet slid her chair away from the table, nearly toppling it in her haste. Her heart lodged instantly, painfully, in her throat. “She went after you.”
Wyatt spun on his boots and launched into a sprint, heading back in the direction he’d come. “I don’t see her,” he called. “She’s not here.”
“Maggie!” His voice boomed over the rows of book-laden shelves.
“Oh dear.” Mrs. Foster went toward the front door. “I’ll check behind the reference desk.”
Violet forced her leaden feet into action. She ran the length of the long room at half speed, ducking to peep under tables and slowing to peer down each empty aisle. “Maggie?”
Wyatt fell into step at her side a moment later. “She’s not in the back. Not near the computers, in the bathrooms or activity space.”
“Maggie!” Violet hollered, more loudly, more desperately. She raked shaky fingers through her hair, gripping her skull and trying to think. “She’s a baby. She can’t have walked away.”
“Right,” Wyatt agreed. “She’s not tall enough to reach doorknobs, and there are no more open doors. The library isn’t open yet, so there are no patrons to take her, and there’s nothing to get hurt on.” Wyatt ticked off perfectly good reasons for Violet to remain calm. “So let’s split up and start again.”
“She’s not here,” Violet said, rubbing the heavy ache in her chest. “We’ve already looked. Something’s happened to her. She’s in trouble. I feel it. I know it! Maggie!” She turned in a slow contemplative circle. The back door stood silently before her. “Mrs. Foster said the sheriff took his dad out this way.”
“She can’t open that,” Wyatt said. “Even if it’s unlocked.”
“Yeah?” Violet sprinted for the door. “And what if someone took her?” She thrust her weight against the heavy door, and it burst open. Unlocked.
No, Maggie definitely couldn’t have opened the door, Violet thought as she squinted against the sun in search of the sheriff or maybe the blue-and-white derby car, but an adult could have.
A red-and-white-checked sundress scuttled swiftly through the distant grass.
“No!” Violet flew from the door, hitting the parched earth at a run. “Maggie! No!”
Her baby was closing the distance to the sidewalk and headed for a very busy street.