Chapter 8

An hour had passed since the teens discovered oral sex. Satisfied for the moment and cleaned up, Robby and Debbie entered the doors of the Howard County Public Library, where Penny Martin, Head Librarian, proudly waited to serve the few customers who came her way.

Penny had only graduated from college with her cherished library science degree about six months earlier. The placement service at the college had found her a job offer before she even graduated. That she'd landed a job as "head librarian" almost immediately had impressed her parents. What she hadn't told them was that it was in a hick town in a remote county that couldn't pay for more than one staff member. So while she was the "head" librarian, she was also the only librarian. Still, it was a job, and the cost of living in Nettleton was workable, and she was basically thrilled.

Some of the thrill wore off when she realized there might actually be days when the only patron she served might be old Mr. Breckenridge, who was retired and had nothing better to do than sit in the library and sleep with a book open in his lap. He did that pretty much every day, especially since the pretty young librarian had been hired. He was there today, in fact. Or perhaps the hospital would call and ask her to bring around a selection of books for the patients to read while they were laid up. It being summer time, no students came to do any research. They all had better things to do.

So, when Debbie and Robby walked in, they got good service.

Well, they got good service until Penny found out what they wanted. She could recite Dewey Decimal System numbers in her sleep, including history, but she quickly found that the history section of her library was a bit sparse when it came to history concerning the town, county and even state. There was a really nice selection of books on World War II which, she noticed, were actually in the wrong section, but she had nothing on the old house the town was named for.

All three of them were so intent on searching for a book on the shelves that they were startled when old Mr. Breckenridge shuffled up the aisle.

"Couldn't help but hear what these young'uns wanted." he said, his voice a little too loud. "Ain't a goin' tuh find it here." he added.

"Oh?" inquired Penny.

"Yup" said Breckenridge. "All that's down in tha basement." he slurred. "Madge packed it all away 'cause nobody ever wanted it."

Madge was the previous head librarian, who had retired herself and never ever came to the library after she locked the doors the final time.

"Ah kin show ya" he grinned. "Ah helped her put it down there."

The Howard County Public Library was, in reality, a house built in the twenties, that had been taken over by the county for taxes during the Great Depression. Walls had been knocked down and replaced with pillars, making it into two rooms, one quite large and the other quite small. A bathroom had been added when inside plumbing came into vogue and the narrow steep wooden staircase still lurked behind a warped door in the wall that had been a kitchen wall in years past. The tiny kitchen now acted as an office.

Penny had descended those stairs a couple of times since being hired, but she didn't go down there often. The books she had found down there weren't suitable for display, being musty, thick with absorbed moisture, and falling apart for the most part. There were boxes and boxes of records of who had checked out what over the years. Basically it was all junk, but the cobwebs kept Penny at bay. She hated spiders. Her original plans to clean it all out had been put on hold.

Now, as she led the way down the stairs, and pulled the string that lit the bare bulb that hung by a cord from the floor joists above, she shivered. She made room for the kids, who came next, and Mr. Breckenridge, who eased his aching joints down the stairs entirely too slowly to suit Penny.

"Ain't as spry as I used to be." he mumbled, peering into the semi-darkness of the basement. "Should be over that-a-way." he pointed with a skinny finger, on which rested a discolored and too-long fingernail.

"That-a-way" turned out to be a far corner, which very little light penetrated into. Penny looked at the kids, who looked perfectly at home, as if they prowled around in dusty, damp and cobwebbed environs on a regular basis. She shuddered again.

"I don't want to get my clothes all dirty." she complained.

"That's OK." said Robby. "I'll move anything that needs moving."

Truth be told, they'd never have found anything if he hadn't been for Homer Breckenridge, who had a memory better than his appearance might have suggested. He shuffled unerringly to the far corner and pointed again.

"Look behind them boxes there." he said.

Robby had to move several boxes overflowing with old cards that had names scrawled on them, with dates after them. Why someone had kept them was a mystery, but had they been studied, they would have provided a remarkable history of what the townspeople of years gone by had read. Clouds of dust billowed into the air as Robby restacked boxes on top of other boxes. Finally he uncovered one battered wooden crate that was neatly packed with ledgers, a few books, and a number of yellowed newspapers.

Penny directed them to take the crate upstairs, trying to get out of the basement as quickly as she could. Once upstairs again, they unpacked the crate on a table. Homer lifted several of the folded newspapers and opened them with a surprisingly gentle touch. They all appeared to be editions of "The Nettleton Crier". There were no pictures, to speak of, but huge printed headlines were scattered all over the front, as well as some drawings that depicted various things, including advertisements for various medicines and other items for sale by merchants of the town. Debbie's eyes were drawn to a hand drawing of a woman wearing a hat and a dress just like Debbie had put on during dress-up play many times. It looked much more full below the waist than it did when Debbie wore hers.

The ledgers turned out to contain information about the mines. One thin book, in surprisingly good condition was titled "The Nettleton Empire". It was a handwritten history of the Nettleton mining operation. The last entry said only "Company sold in probate after the tragic incident."

Penny, her curiosity whetted by actually having something to do, began leafing through the book, while Homer pointed out various newspaper articles.

"I 'member some of that now." he wheezed. "Sad times they were. Those poor little babies."

"What babies?" asked Debbie.

Homer's eyes went out of focus. "They wuz two little 'uns left after the momma and daddy wuz killed. They caught them two what dun it and 'lectrocuted 'em. 'Lectrocuted the feller what hired 'em too. Bunch of us drove up to the pen'tentiary and stood outside to watch the lights dim. I wuz there when they fried. Saw the whole thing."

"What?" asked Robby shocked. "What are you talking about?"

"Killers ... hired killers" said Homer explosively. "Snuck in thar and kilt the parents one night. They wuz a little boy and a little gurl in there when it happened. Found 'em hidin' somewhere in that old place. Them killers said they'd have dun fer the kids too if'n they'd a bin able tuh find 'em." He sighed. "Them kids found thar kin all slaughtered and raised the cry."

Debbie gasped. She had been leafing through newspapers and pointed at one.

"Here it is!" she said.

Everyone peered at the huge type on the front page.

"PILLARS OF COMMUNITY SLAIN IN VILE MURDER!" screamed the headline, which looked to be three inches tall and took up the top quarter of the page. The story went on to describe, in gruesome detail, what the town constable had found when he was summoned to the Nettleton Mansion by a hysterical woman employed as a cook by the Nettletons. The cook was in her room in the carriage house when Robert E. Nettleton, age six and his sister Elizabeth R. Nettleton, age four, burst into the room crying and covered in blood. She had fearfully gone with them to find their parents slaughtered in the master bedroom. The children had been hugging their dead parents, trying to get them to get up, and when that failed, had gone to get the cook. The investigation had revealed the house had been ransacked and a number of items appeared to be missing. All other staff members in the mansion had been gone that night, to a dance in town.

There was another article on the same page in one corner that reminded readers of the death of an unidentified Nettleton boy at the hands of would-be kidnappers and, later, the murder of Constance Nettleton in the very same room that this crime had taken place in, some forty years earlier. It was suggested that a demonic presence inhabited the house, and that this demon required history to repeat itself.

The newspapers had been stacked in date order, and the next day's edition also had a banner headline.

"MURDERERS CAUGHT RED HANDED!" That story told how a posse had been formed and had fanned out across the county using the technology of the day, the internal combustion automobile to speed them to points where a cordon had been established. When two blood spattered men carrying a gunny sack were observed, they were taken into custody and found to have the Nettleton silver in the bag, as well as other items identified by servants as property of the slain Nettletons.

Another slightly smaller headline at the right lower corner of the front page said:

"NETTLETON ORPHANS REMOVED FROM SAD STRUCTURE."

That story was about how there were no relatives to be found, and the children had been removed to a boarding house where they would be cared for until their murdered father's will could be located. That such an instrument existed was clear, since Mr. Wilfred Tower, an attorney in the town, swore before the circuit judge that he had executed such a document within the last year. The will had not yet been found.

In another paper with a later date, there was another front page story with a drawing of a man, strapped in a large wooden chair, his head hooded, with wires going from the chair to a wall. The story told of the swift trial and execution of the murderers, and the man who hired them to perform their grisly task. It also verified Homer's assertion that the henchmen had admitted they'd have killed the children too if they'd been able to find them in the house.

The next paper in line was dated five months later, with much smaller headlines, but still on the front page. That story told of the finding of the will. Details of what was in the will were sketchy, but the disposition of the two orphans was discussed, identifying one Margaret Swales as having been identified in the will as the guardian of the children.

The next paper didn't appear to have anything in it at first glance, but, on the inside they found a small article that had the headline:

"Orphaned waifs' ordeal continues" That story told of Mrs. Swales inability to care for the Nettleton children due to her confinement to a sanitarium, and of their assignment of a new guardian. The entire article was no more than seven lines long.

There were additional articles, quite small on average, that mentioned this or that milestone in a Nettleton child's life. There was one that spoke of their entry into the public school system, using only "the Nettleton children" as identifying data, and another one later that heralded Robert Nettleton's graduation from school and his impending assignment as a missionary in "blackest Africa".

By the time they were finished going through the main documents it was clear that, what had riveted the townspeople in the beginning, took on less and less significance as time went on. The last newspaper article they could find was about the house itself, and how two young men had been apprehended trying to sneak into it on a dare. The article said it had been shuttered up until the return of "the present owner", who was not identified by name.

Debbie looked at her Bulova wristwatch. They had been reading for two hours, and there was a lot of materials in the crate no one had examined yet.

"Miss Martin, can you keep this somewhere for us until we can come back?" she asked.

Penny looked askance at the crate. "As far as I'm concerned you can take it all with you." She dusted her hands by clapping them together. "That doesn't really belong in the library." she pronounced. "If anything it should be in the museum or someplace like that ... if anybody wants it at all." She had, after all, only been in town for six months, and had no curiosity about the Nettleton Mansion. In truth, she had never even been by the place.

Debbie began repacking the crate immediately. She planned on taking it home and going through it more carefully. They had learned a lot, but she knew there was more information in there and she wanted to know that too. Robby carried the crate on his shoulder as they walked back to the house.

Homer Breckenridge tried to accompany them, giving them unasked for advice.