By the time the two men were ready to leave, Mr. Perkins had several pages of notes, some of them on the history of the village itself. “I think I’ll get a statement from the Seaway Authority, too,” Brown said as he slid into the driver’s seat. He had an impish smile on his face. “That will really put them on the spot! They know how the people around here feel about the village, and if there’s a way to save it, they’ll have a hard time explaining why not!”
After the car had driven off, Mr. Caldwell left to work on the notes he had gathered in the Glassworks during the morning. Ronnie, Phil, and Bill walked back toward their office. Ronnie had cooled off considerably, and now he felt more like working again. There wasn’t time before lunch for hunting for clues or cleaning out a building, but he had an idea in mind for a sign to hang outside the office door. It would read: “Tours from 9–12 and 1–5. OFFICE.”
He had found a suitable piece of wood the day before and now he set to work sandpapering it down smooth. Bill sat opposite him, tipping back in his chair again. Phil seemed restless, and a few minutes later announced that he was going back to the house.
“You know,” Bill said thoughtfully as he watched Ronnie rubbing vigorously with the sandpaper, “you know, Ronnie, there are two things that bother me. Two questions I can’t answer.”
“Yes?” Ronnie asked looking up for a moment. “What are they?”
“Well, the first one is this: How is this fellow we’ve seen around here getting in and out of the padlocked building?”
“That’s a question maybe we can answer this afternoon when I get the key and we get a chance to look inside,” Ronnie said.
“Maybe. But I don’t see what we can see from the inside that we can’t see from the outside.”
Ronnie ran his hand over the wood to see how smooth it was. “Oh, I don’t know about that. Supposing he’s dug a tunnel? We couldn’t see that from the outside. Anyway, what’s the other question?”
“This question’s a real stickler,” Bill said. “Remember what Mr. Caldwell said before—that he has a pair of candlesticks like your grandfather’s?”