The Investigators, Inc. The Hotel Case. Chapter 2. Granger.

Katresa and the other girls are pretending to be a group of friends from Canada, traveling around Europe. They are hoping to see as many castles as possible, they had told the waitress. Midnight went over to visit with the girls while they talked with the waitress. Then he will report back to us with the information the girls can get from her. The owner doesn’t want any of the employees to talk about what they see or hear, apparently so as not to scare the tourists.

She could lose her job if she does talk, and that is even more scary, she told them. A friend of hers that had come with her to work at this castle hotel, and she was caught talking to some tourists. She was found dead outside the castle wall the next day. So our waitress, Nicole, is afraid to say anything to anyone now. She is actually from a small town about an hour away from our chateau. She and her friend had thought this job would be fun, especially living in an old castle, but now wishes she had stayed home and worked in the family bakery.

I then sent Ginger over to talk with Dawn. I would like Dawn to ask Nicole if she would like to leave, we would make sure she got away and safely returned home. But, apparently, if she did leave, her family would be hurt, though she didn’t know exactly what that meant. We knew what that meant, however, and it means that someone important is in charge of things around here. That makes staying here very dangerous, but I don’t want to leave Nicole here by herself either.

So, for now, we will stay and try to find out what is going on around here. Nicole warned the girls not to get involved or something might happen to them also. They told Nicole that they are not afraid of anything or anyone and if someone tried to hurt them, those people would be sorry they did so. Nicole gave us the same warning, telling us it was especially dangerous right now while a certain American was staying there. I asked her who this person was, that is so important.

She hesitated a bit, pretending to talk with the cats. She was putting on a good act, her boss did not suspect she was talking to us about anything other than normal tourist stuff. She even brought out castle maps which included the area around the castle where there were nice walking trails through the forest. Anyway, she told us his name was Granger Williams. Nicole then went back to get us some more coffee. While she was gone I got that odd sort of feeling again.

“I sense trouble Jennifer,” I told her. “Yes, so do I,” she said, “I also sense danger, and it is not far away either.” Just then Granger and 2 men came into the restaurant and sat on the other end of the room. Granger had his back to us, but his 2 men could see us plainly. We decided to wait here for the castle tour to begin, which was in another 20 minutes. The owner came out and talked with Granger for a few minutes, looking over at us a couple of times.

One of Granger’s men never took his eyes off of us the whole time they sat at their table. Finally they left, going outside and driving off somewhere. Then the owner came over to us and said the castle tour was canceled for today, because there was not enough people. According to the paper in our rooms there must be a minimum of 10 people for the tour to go ahead. Between the Bad Girls and us, there are 21, so I am going to talk with the owner about that later.

Obviously Granger had something to do with this cancelation. That means he knows who we are, and that is not a good thing. We could still go out and walk around, but the owner said we could not go beyond the fences as those areas were dangerous to walk around due to falling rock from the walls and other buildings. The Bad Girls went out to walk around, but my team went back to our room to talk for a while first.

I wanted a large room so we could all meet in it at times, however, they only had 2 large rooms and one was already booked, so I took this one. There is a large bed for Jennifer and I, plus bunk beds for the other 5 girls. Considering what we have learned so far, it is probably a good thing we are all in the same room. “We need to check the area behind those fences,” I said, “they are hiding something over there.” “I will check it out tonight,” agreed Jennifer.

“What do you mean ‘I will check it out tonight’?” I asked. “I didn’t say you would check it out,” she said, “I said that I would check it out.” “That’s what I just said,” I reminded her, “you said you would check it out.” “No, I didn’t say you would check it out,” she said, looking at me sternly, “I said quite clearly that I would check it out.” By now the girls and cats were having a good laugh. Sigh. “Okay, let’s stop with this, I’m getting confused,” I said, “but why can’t I come along? I can turn invisible now too.”

“Yes, but you can still be hurt, I can’t,” she reminded me. “How can anyone hurt me if they can’t see me?” I asked. She just looked at me. That ‘look’ means I have lost the argument. We all went out to look around the place during the day, but nothing of real interest was found. At least, not the kinds of things I wanted to find, which was evidence of some wrongdoing by Granger. Whatever he is doing, it must be underground, or hidden in the part of the castle that is off limits to us tourists.

I really don’t want Jennifer going alone, however, even if she is a ghost and can’t be hurt. She could protect me too but that would hinder her ability to look around so she wouldn’t be able to cover as much ground as she can alone. Still, something isn’t right and I don’t like it and I told her I sensed trouble, and she did too. However, after it was completely dark, she went on her way.

A couple of hours later I sensed danger, something new for me, so I communicated with Jennifer and asked her to come back. She did so right away and as she passed the front desk Granger was there with his two men. “You should not be outside after dark,” said Granger, “it is not safe, too many wild animals around here and they come within the castle walls.”

The owner of the castle said the same thing. Jennifer thanked them for their concern, but said she is not afraid of the local wild animals. Of course, there are none in this area that are dangerous anyway, we already checked that out. It is the wild people that are dangerous around here. Jennifer came into our room but she wasn’t ready for what she saw…

To Be Continued.

©2024 Steve McLeod.