Boys Life

you have an umbrella I might borrow?”
    “I believe so, Inez. Look in that closet over there.”
    She opened a closet and rummaged around in it. “Should be one in the corner,” Mayor Swope told her. “Smells awfully musty in here!” Mrs. Axford said. “I believe somethin’s mildewed!”
    “Yeah, gotta clean it out one of these days,” he said.
    Mrs. Axford came out of the closet clutching an umbrella. But her nose was wrinkled, and in her other hand she was clutching two articles of clothing that were white with mildew. “Look at these!” she said. “I believe mushrooms are growin’ in here!”
    My heart seized up.
    Mrs. Axford was holding a mildew-blotched overcoat and a hat that appeared to have been run through a washer and wringer.
    And in the band of that battered hat was a silver disc and a crumpled green feather.
    “Whew! Just smell it!” Mrs. Axford made a face that might’ve stopped a clock. “What’re you keepin’ this stuff for?”
    “That’s my favorite hat. Was, at least. It got ruined the night of the flood, but I thought I could get it fixed. And I’ve had that raincoat for fifteen years.”
    “No wonder you won’t let me clean out your closet! What else is in here?”
    “Never you mind! Run on, now! Leroy’s waitin’ at home for you!”
    “You want me to throw these in the garbage on my way out?”
    “No, Lord no!” Mayor Swope said. “Just put ’em back in there and close the door!”
    “I swear,” Mrs. Axford said as she returned the items to the closet, “you men are worse about hangin’ on to old clothes than little babies with their blankets.” She closed the door with a firm thunk. “There. I can still smell that mildew, though.”
    “It’s all right, Inez. You go on home, and be careful on the road.”
    “I will.” She gave me a quick glance, and then she walked out of the office with the umbrella.
    I don’t think I had drawn a breath during that entire exchange. Now I pulled one in, and I shivered as the air burned my lungs.
    “Now, Cory,” Mayor Swope said, “where were we? Oh yes: the man across the road. How’d you come up with that?”
    “I… I…” The green-feathered hat was in a closet ten feet from me. Mayor Swope was the man who’d worn it that night when the floodwaters had raged in the streets of Bruton. “I… never said it was a man,” I answered. “I just said… it was somebody standin’ there.”
    “Well, that was a nice touch. I’ll bet that was an excitin’ mornin’ for you, wasn’t it?” He reached into another pocket, and when his hand came into view there was a small silver blade in it.
    It was the knife I’d seen in his hand, that night when I was afraid he was going to sneak up behind my dad and stab him in the back for what he’d seen at Saxon’s Lake.
    “I wish I could write,” Mayor Swope said. He turned the blade around. On its other end was a blunt little piece of metal, which he used to tamp the burning tobacco down in his pipe. “I’ve always liked mysteries.”
    “Me too,” I managed to rasp.
    He stood up, rain pelting the windows behind him. Lightning zigzagged over Zephyr, and the lights suddenly flickered. Thunder crashed. “Oh my,” Mayor Swope said. “That was a little too close, wasn’t it?”
    “Yes sir.” My hands were about to break the armrests of my chair.
    “I want you,” he said, “to wait right here for a minute. There’s somethin’ I want to show you, and I think it’ll explain things.” He crossed the room, the pipe clenched between his teeth and a scrawl of smoke behind him, and he went out into the area where Mrs. Axford’s desk was. He left the door ajar, and I could hear him opening the drawer of a filing cabinet.
    My gaze went to the closet.
    The green feather was in there. So close. What if I was to pluck it from its hat and compare it to the green feather I’d found on the sole of my shoe? If the feathers matched, what then?
    I had to move fast if I was going to move at all.
    The filing cabinet’s drawer closed. Another opened. “Just a minute!” Mayor Swope called to me. “It’s not where it’s supposed to be!”
    I had to go. Right now.
    I got up on rubbery legs and opened the closet. The reek of mildewed cloth hit me in the face like a damp slap. But the coat and the hat were there on the floor, nudged up into a corner. I heard the drawer slide shut. I grasped the feather and tugged at it. It wouldn’t come loose.
    Mayor Swope was coming back