The Hayloft. A 1950s Mystery

joking. Sure, there was some work involved, but if things went according to my plan, we would have time for necking later. Aunt Dorothy had a League of Women Voters meeting after she finished teaching school. It involved some sort of dinner, and she wouldn’t be home until nine. It was an ideal day to bring Sylvia back to the hayloft.
    My ulterior motive was that I wanted to see if the necklace was actually in the southwest corner of the loft, as Ralph’s map indicated, or whether the whole thing was a hoax. And I wanted Sylvia with me because I had been shaken up by my previous experience trying to get to the necklace, even with Sylvia present. She was levelheaded and a good person to have looking out for me.
    Without giving her the details of how I knew, I told her that I had reason to believe the necklace was not where I had been looking, in the northwest corner of the barn, but in the southwest corner instead. I even told her that it was a necklace we were looking for. Then I told her my plan.
    “I want to remove the topmost bales from this corner, until we get below the crossbeam. I think there may be a gap between the bales and the wall below that.” I pointed out the solid wooden beam, part of a series that extended around the perimeter of the barn at the point where the roof and the wall came together. By shining my new flashlight down from the corner of the loft, I could see that the bales abutted the beam.
    I took two hay hooks and started moving bales around. I could do it faster by myself than with Sylvia’s help.
    “What do you want me to do?” she asked. “I feel about as useful as an appendix.”
    “Make sure I don’t kill myself. You did a good job of that before.”
    The bales weren’t stacked as high on this side as they had been initially on the other side. I hadn’t gotten down to the crossbeam on the other side, even after I had spent some time moving bales.
    I went to work. In twenty minutes, I had cleared enough bales so that I was below the beam. I stopped and panted for a bit and then shone my flashlight down the crack in the corner.
    “There’s more space here than on the other side,” I told Sylvia. “And I’m starting lower. Come and look.”
    She peered down the hole for a few seconds and then said, “I don’t think it’s safe to go down there, Gary. You’ll get stuck again.” She looked some more. “What’s that? It looks like another beam.”
    It was another beam. This beam and others went around the wall, midway between the floor and the roof. Although I hadn’t completely forgotten about it, I had hoped it wouldn’t constitute a problem. However, there didn’t appear to be any space between the bales and this beam. And it was far enough down that it would take forever for me to dig out all the intervening bales.
    “I’m going to lower myself to that beam and investigate,” I said, bringing over the end of the rope that hung from the rafters. “There’s room enough so that I won’t get stuck. I can always pull myself up with the rope.”
    Sylvia wasn’t as convinced of that as I was. But she wasn’t going to let me do it without her there, either. And she was clearly afraid that I would do something dangerous later if she didn’t allow me to try it now.
    I placed the flashlight in my pocket and, holding onto the rope, lowered myself until I was standing on the lower beam. There was a little more room between the bales and the wall than there had been on the other side of the loft where I had gotten stuck. I took out the flashlight and knelt on the beam on one knee, placing the foot of my other leg awkwardly in front of that knee. I wouldn’t be able to maintain this position long. I shone the light along the beam, looking for cracks.
    Right at the corner of the barn there appeared to be a gap in the bales. That’s where I wanted to be, anyway. I edged myself along the beam the few feet to the corner and felt the area around the beam with one hand. I also used the flashlight. I thought there was enough room for me to slide between the beam and the bales and get down to the floor of the loft. Although I couldn’t use the rope for this maneuver, I kept it nearby so that I could help pull myself back up, if necessary.
    I worked my way around the beam and reached down with one leg. I was gratified to feel the floor under my feet. Then I lowered my other leg to the floor. I had made it, but I couldn’t stand in this position, because the beam wasn’t