Free The Pea Soup Poisonings by Nancy Means Wright Page B

know if they get you?” asked Alice, biting her lip.
    “Just watch the house. You can see it from your window, can’t you? And if your mother wants you for something or other, listen for the car and then run to a window. Tell her you’ve just seen a bluebird! I mean, it might not be a blue car. Cedric might have rented a different one. If I don’t come over to your house when they’ve gone, you’ll know they’ve got me.”
    “Oh-h-h,” said Alice, wringing her hands together. Her eyes were the size of coconuts.
    “Can I count on you?” Zoe grabbed Alice’s hands.
    “Yes, yes you can. You can count on me,” said Alice, sounding breathless. “But don’t let them get you.” She hugged Zoe fiercely, and raced out the back door.
     
     
    Chapter Nineteen
     
    Hiding in the Dust
     
    At the rear of the bedroom closet was a small rectangular door, leading into a dusty, cobwebby space under the eaves. The kidnappers would never think to look in here, would they? For one thing, they were too big to get through. Zoe herself had to squeeze her way in. She didn’t dare leave the tape recorder in the closet; it made a soft whirring sound. But she would leave the small door open when the couple was not in the bedroom. Miss Gertie was her back-up: the phone would ring as soon as Gertie saw the pair go out to the car, Zoe would jump in Gertie’s car, and off they’d go in pursuit.
    She crouched there for at least thirty suffocating minutes. It was already twelve-twenty. Had the gas attendant made up Cedric’s words? And yet they made sense. How else would the boy have known about an “old lady’s house?”
    She was just changing position on the grimy floor when she heard a car door slam, and the front door crack open. Then a voice: Cedric’s voice. Then Chloe’s. She couldn’t make out the words – they were still in the hall, but she could hear footsteps moving in her direction.
    “Go through those bureau drawers,” Cedric ordered.
    Chloe said, “But we already looked in those.”
    “You could have m-missed it,” Cedric said in his gravelly voice. “Do it again. Then look in the c-closet there. I’ll take the hall c-closet.”
    Zoe crouched in a ball, her ear against the little door, the recorder whirring. She heard bureau drawers open and shut, objects bang and thump.  She heard Chloe mutter to herself, “It’s a waste of time.”
    Finally Chloe entered the closet. A dozen dresses and coats were hanging from a wooden rack; they would hide the little door. The floor was cluttered with boots and shoes: there were hats and sweaters, Zoe recalled, folded up on a shelf.
    Zoe’s eyes and nose were running. She was allergic to dust, all right. It was thick on the floor. Her pants and shirt were already filthy.
    “Nothing here. No key,” Chloe called back to Cedric. He answered, but Zoe couldn’t make out the words.
    Chloe sighed loudly, and then sneezed. “The old bag needs a housecleaner,” she said. “Boy, these hats must date back to the nineteen- thirties!” Zoe heard her giggle, and then back out of the closet. When the footsteps clicked out of the bedroom, Zoe pushed open the little door again and folded herself up into a long yellow robe that hung on one side of the closet. She could hear everything they said from here. And so could the tape recorder.
    The search went on in the kitchen. Pots and pans rattled, the oven door clanged.
    “What’s in that drawer?” Cedric asked.
    “Just a bunch of kitchen stuff,” Chloe said. “Look, I told you it was a waste of time. There’s no key here. The old lady must have it in her purse. I told you to look through it when we took her up to that place.”
    “And let her know what we were up to? Did I know she was gonna disappear like that? Those m-miserable k-kids...”
    “We got one of them, anyway. But he won’t talk. Says he knows nothing about a key. And I believe him, Cedric. Ced, we gotta let him go. We can’t keep him in the attic any longer.