In the Passageway

Isn’t this a cute picture? Janelle is thinking about cats today, so I thought I’d share this photo with you. And now, to continue our story with…

Chapter Fifty-two

Janelle sneezed. This passageway was certainly dusty.

         She pulled another box into the middle of the floor and opened it. More old girdles—so old they even had garters on the ends. Had these boxes been setting back here for fifty years?

         Walking down the passageway, she passed box after box lined up against the wall. Four to five boxes in every stack. Why was all this old merchandise back here? Maybe Janelle should go through these boxes when she had nothing to do—which was too often—and clean this place up.

         A door at the end closed off the passageway. Where did it lead?

         But just as Janelle made her way to the door, she noticed a break in the boxes. She knelt beside them. The dust had been disturbed here. And what was that against the baseboard?

         She gathered some dust between her fingers. Cat fur stuck out from the dust.

Cat fur? She sat back. That was odd in an office building. Someone must have been here recently. Someone perhaps who owned a cat?

“Janelle, you might disturb the evidence.” That’s what Ben had told her, and he was right. These boxes should be dusted for fingerprints. That meant the sheriff would have to get involved.

Janelle sighed. Her sleuthing for this case might be at an end.

After lunch, as Janelle sat at her desk sorting the mail, Helga walked in with a cardboard animal carrier.

“I brought my Spiffy to show you, Yanelle.” She set the carrier on Janelle’s desk. 

         “The Sphynx?”

         “Ja. She is shy, but sweet kitty.” Helga opened the box and picked up a hairless cat.

Janelle’s eyes widened. That was the ugliest cat she’d ever seen. “So, she…doesn’t have any fur?”

“No.” Helga laughed. “That is why I wanted Sphynx. No shedding.”

“I see.”

It didn’t look like Helga was a suspect in the murder case. At the very least, Spiffy wasn’t a culprit in the secret passageway cat fur situation.

Janelle opened her mouth, ready to tell Helga about the passageway. That would put Helga’s mind at ease about ghosts in the walls. But if the bookkeeper wanted to see the passageway for herself, she might also disturb the evidence.

Janelle would inform Helga later.

But the cat fur bothered Janelle. Who could have been back there and left cat fur behind? Surely the murderer didn’t bring a pet cat to the scene of the crime. Could it be Howard or… Aunt Ida?

No, not Ida. It must be Howard. Dad thought so. Maybe Howard knew about the secret passageway, and that’s the way he left the room.

Janelle sighed. She still wasn’t sure about the murderer’s identity.

* * *

Until Monday, may the Lord bless your weekend!