I aimed the flashlight over to the far wall and…it was Diane! She was hanging from the ceiling! Then I felt a thump on my head which dropped me to my knees. I heard Lena scream briefly, then Thwock!, Thwock! The cats came running over as they had moved further away out of the light. Meow,meow?=Someone take Lena, we follow? “No Muffin,” I said slowly, “both of you stay here and watch until I can get up, then we go together.” Meow.=Okay, we watch good, no one hurt you more. It took a few minutes for the swirling in my head to settle down, then I stood up. I grabbed the flashlight and looked at Diane again, but, she was gone! How could that be? I went back to whoever hit me and…it was David! Well, he won’t be bothering us anymore. They are obviously working with John, or maybe I should say, they were.

Diane could still be alive, it wouldn’t surprise me if she is working with John. He always seems to find someone to help him. But if they only knew what will happen to them in the end. John does not like to share with anyone. But there is no money involved with just killing me, so why would someone help him? Hmm, I wonder if there might be something else involved, perhaps there is something valuable about this hotel. Maybe that’s why John hasn’t killed me yet, he wants me to find this “treasure”, whatever it is, and then kill me. But how can I find something when I don’t know what it is? “We better get out of here,” I said to the cats, “but don’t run ahead of me, we need to stay together.” Meow,meow.=No worry, we stay right with you. Meow.=Yep, all stay together.

We ran up those stairs, though I did have to stop and rest once, must be out of shape. Well, these stairs must be 5 or 6 stories high. We finally get all the way to the top, and a solid rock wall. But this time there is a lever like the one outside by the staircase. I pull it and the wall begins to move and the doorway appears. We go in to this small, round room with no door. But the room starts to turn back the opposite way closing the door behind us and opening another door. We go into the next room. This is the upstairs bedroom we searched before which had that odd round room off of it. Strange place, but interesting. We go back down to our bedroom and there is Lena lying on the bed. I checked and she had a large lump on the back of her head just like mine. Obviously she had been hit too, and the cats said someone large carried her away. They couldn’t tell who it was because the person was wearing a mask.

John is a large man and could easily carry Lena. She was holding an envelope again, with another note inside; “You won that round Steve, congratulations. Now I have a proposal for you. The old lady that owned this hotel 300 years ago hid some jewels before she died. Find them for me and I might consider letting you all go. If not, then you all die. Just call out your answer, yes or no, I’m listening. John.” I called out “YES”. There was no answer, but I’m sure he heard. Then we heard a clang in the kitchen. “Muffin, stay with Lena, Mr. Cat you come with me,” I said. We went to the kitchen and on the table was a note and a needle. The note read, “give this to the girl if you want her to wake up.” I took the needle and ran back to Lena. Meow?=You trust John? “Right now I do, he wants us to help him so he won’t harm Lena now,” I explained, “he knows I won’t help if anything happens to Lena or you two.” I gave her the needle and she started to wake up in a couple minutes.

To Be Continued.

©2020 Steve McLeod.