Santa Sleuth (17 page)

“I think we found it,” Eve said. “‘LIV’ stands for the roman numeral 54.” Eve held up an old newspaper clipping. “This article is entitled ‘
A TRIBUTE TO THE 54
.
’
The article is from the
Chronicle
, and it’s dated October 12, 1910. There’s a photo of a bunch of men and a couple of women standing in front of the clinic. The article states:

“‘A year ago today fifty-four men from the small mining camp of Devil’s Den pooled their meager resources to bring a doctor from our local hospital to their small village to save the life of a prostitute who had developed complications from a late-term pregnancy. Dr. Owen Ozwald, a recently hired resident at the hospital, was chosen for the task. Upon his arrival at the camp, the doctor found admiration and affection for a community that had come together to save the life of one of their own. Dr. Ozwald was so moved by the commitment of the community to save a single life that he handed in his resignation and announced plans to move his family to Devil’s Den in order to open a clinic for those who live in the area. The highly anticipated Devil’s Den Medical Clinic opened today and the entire town came out for the celebration. Lilly England, the local madame, who acts as a mother of sorts to the girls, attributes the close-knit community and the willingness of its members to make sacrifices for one another with its isolation from the outside world.’”

“So Mr. Ozwald’s grandfather was the local doctor,” I realized.

“The thing is, I still don’t know how this relates to the next clue,” Alex said.

Hazel frowned. “When we got to this point in the original treasure hunt Zoe looked at the photo and made a huge leap as to where she thought the treasure might be hidden, but now that I think about it, we never did actually find the next clue. It seems there must have been one.”

I was confused and I could tell by the look on the girls’ faces they were as well.

“If you notice in the photo,” Hazel elaborated, “the doctor has his arm around the woman on his right. Based on the way she’s dressed, Zoe speculated that she was the Lilly England mentioned in the article. She also speculated that the woman on the left with the baby was the prostitute the doctor must have saved. Somehow she made a giant leap from that assumption to deciding that Dr. Ozwald must have given the treasure to Lilly for safekeeping. The next thing I knew, we were heading to the abandoned house Lilly used to live in to look for the treasure.”

“Did you find it?” Eve asked.

“We did. The thing is, it never occurred to me at the time that if Owen Ozwald set up a treasure hunt for his son, he would have provided another riddle or clue relating to the seal. I doubt he would assume someone like Zoe would be the one to embark on the hunt for the treasure he left. Very few people could make the leap Zoe did and solve the riddles.”

“So we might actually be able to find a clue that has never been found before if we can figure this out,” Alex asserted.

“Did you bring the riddles with you?” I asked Eve.

“Yeah.” She pulled a piece of paper out of her pocket.

“The first riddle led to a second one, so it makes sense that the second riddle would lead to a third.”

I looked at the second riddle again.

To find what’s next

You must reveal

The hidden text

In the medic’s seal.

“What hidden text?” I asked. “The words
legatum sit amet
,
as well as the numeral LIV, are clearly shown on the seal. They were difficult to see from the grainy photo, but at the time Dr. Ozwald planned the treasure hunt, the seal was on the building and clearly visible. There must be a hidden message somewhere on the seal that Ethan and Zoe didn’t take into consideration the first time around.”

“You make a good point,” Hazel agreed. “Let’s scan the photo of the seal into the computer; then we can enlarge it on the screen. Maybe there are words hidden somewhere else in the design.”

Hazel, the girls, and I looked until we were cross-eyed, but we couldn’t find any hidden letters.

“What if the hidden message is within the letters we have?” Alex suggested.

“Like a word scramble?” Hazel asked.

Alex shrugged. “It’s just a thought.”

“I guess it couldn’t hurt to put the clue through the unscramble program I have on the computer,” Hazel offered. She pulled the program up on her computer. “If you take the letters from
legatum sit amet
in their entirety, we have quite a few choices, although we don’t come up with a single fourteen-letter word. There are several ten-letter words, including
stalagmite
, which fits because Devil’s Den was a mining town, and a clue could very well have been left in one of the mines.”

“Yeah, but which one?” Alex asked.

“What letters are left?” I wondered.

“U-M-E-T,” Hazel answered.

“Mute?” Eve guessed.

“That doesn’t ring a bell,” I admitted. “Besides, there was no such thing as a computer or an unscramble program back then. It had to be something simpler. Maybe something to do with the translated text.”

“Life is love’s legacy,” Eve repeated.

“Dr. Ozwald wanted to leave his son a legacy or inheritance,” Hazel pointed out.

“Maybe Zoe was right all along. Maybe Dr. Ozwald simply arranged for Lilly to hide the gold and then give it to his son when he arrived. Maybe there really isn’t another clue,” Alex suggested.

“I don’t know,” Eve said. “The clue leading to the seal clearly states that we’re looking for hidden text. Is there another seal?”

“Zoe got the photo we have from Dr. Westlake,” Hazel informed us. “She did say he had a whole box of old documents.”

“I guess it couldn’t hurt to ask him if we can take a look,” I suggested.

“Yes, let’s.” Alex jumped up.

“Maybe we should call Dr. Carlton to fill him in on our plan,” I said. “If there is another clue I’m sure he would want to be in on the finding.”

Both girls agreed immediately.

I called Ethan, who was, as I suspected, intrigued by our line of thinking. He agreed to meet us at the hospital. Once I’d arranged a place for us to meet, the girls and I thanked Hazel and then headed to the hospital. Luckily, Dr. Westlake was in and agreed to our looking through the boxes of old records and photographs from the clinic at the mining camp.

It turned out there was quite a lot of material to go through, so it was a good two hours before anyone found anything of relevance.

“Look at this.” Alex held up an unopened letter that had been closed with a wax seal.

“Who’s it made out to?” I asked.

“No one. The envelope is blank. What I found interesting is the seal on the back.”

I took the envelope from Alex. The wax seal had the letter
O
in the middle, but what was really interesting was the small words that were so tiny as to be unnoticeable around the outside edge.

“I’m afraid my old eyes can’t make out such small type.” I handed the envelope back to Alex.

“It says, ‘Seek to know for whom the bell tolls,’” Alex informed me.

“The
O
on the seal could stand for Ozwald,” Eve said, excitement in her voice. “Maybe this is the seal that was referred to in the letter. Maybe Dr. Ozwald wanted his son to go to a place in town with a bell. Do we have any idea where that might be?”

“The schoolhouse,” I suggested.

“Is the schoolhouse still here?” Alex asked.

“I’m afraid not,” I answered.

“Phyllis is correct; the old school building has been gone for years,” Ethan confirmed. “But the bell that hung in the tower is still around. It’s hanging in the bell tower of the church.”

“Do you think that bell somehow holds the missing clue?” Eve asked.

“There’s only one way to find out,” Ethan answered.

We packed everything up and returned it to Dr. Westlake, then headed to the Ashton Falls Community Church. Pastor Dan was fine with our climbing up into the tower to look at the old bell. Engraved on the side of the bell was one word:
Lilly
. It appeared we’d found the missing clue at last.

Publishes 1/1/2016

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Recipes for
Santa Sleuth

Baked Rice—submitted by Vivian Shane

Sweet Potato Soufflé—submitted by Teresa Kander

Crock-Pot Turkey Breast Roast—submitted by Marie Rice

Punch Bowl Cake—submitted by Wanda Downs

Peanut Butter Cookies—submitted by Elaine Robinson

Mexican Wedding Bells—submitted by Pam Curran

Santa Whiskers—submitted by Nancy Farris

Almond Banket—submitted by Joanne Kocourek

Festive Fudge—submitted by Kathleen Kaminski

Peanut Brittle—submitted by Vivian Shane

Divinity—submitted by Pam Curran

Yorkshire Pudding—submitted by Janel Flynn

Baked Rice

Submitted by Vivian Shane

This recipe has been passed down through the generations in my family. I’ve submitted it in its original form, with the so-very-specific instructions on how my grandmother cooked the rice—too funny!

Cook 1 cup rice until tender (1 cup to 1½ cup water—bring to a boil uncovered at medium, turn to low, and put lid on partway; when holes appear in rice mixture, turn to simmer and put cover on and cook for 15 minutes).

Mix together 3 beaten eggs, ½ cup sugar, ½ cup cream, ½ cup raisins, and 1 tsp. vanilla. 

Sprinkle with cinnamon. 

Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until custard is set. Great with baked ham or even as dessert!

Sweet Potato Soufflé

Submitted by Teresa Kander

This is a recipe I started making for the holidays from the time I was living on my own, about thirty years ago. It was requested by extended family members at my grandmother’s every year, and I continue to make it for nuclear family holiday dinners.

4 cups mashed sweet potatoes 
1 cup sugar 
2 eggs 
½ cup milk 
½ tsp. salt 
⅓ stick butter or margarine (melted) 
1 tsp. vanilla

Mix well. Pour into buttered pan.

Crumble topping evenly over potato mixture. Bake at 350 degrees for 35–45 minutes uncovered.

Crock-Pot Turkey Breast Roast

Submitted by Marie Rice

It was a happy accident that I discovered this recipe. The first Thanksgiving when none of our children would be in town, it was just the two of us for Thanksgiving dinner. Hubby loves turkey at the holidays, but I didn’t want to do the traditional big bird in the oven. I picked up a couple of three-pound turkey breast roasts at the grocery store. I’d seen quick mentions on several blogs about cooking them in a Crock-Pot. To my surprise, the Butterball brand of turkey roast I bought had instructions on the side. True to my nature, I had to “improve” those instructions to come up with my own version.

Set a 4-quart Crock-Pot near the sink. Not plugged in yet, you just need the Crock right by the sink at this point. Remove the plastic wrapper from a 3-pound turkey breast roast (Butterball is great, but any brand should work). Leave the string “net” over the roast intact. Put the breast roast into the Crock with the fatty portion side up.

Rinse all juices out of the plastic wrappings and toss in garbage can without scattering raw chicken juice all over the floor or counters. Using soap, vigorously wash hands; also wash gravy packet if one was included in the roast package.

With clean, dry hands, pour approx. 1½ cups of apple juice into the Crock. I tend to use unsweetened apple juice, but regular apple juice would be good. Apple cider will kick the taste up another little bit, too. Sprinkle black pepper over turkey and a little down into the juice. A little dash or two of cayenne pepper will kick the taste a bit for those who like it spicy.

Place Crock back into the pot and cover; situate near an electrical outlet. Cook on low in Crock for at least 7 hours. It can easily take another 1–2 hours of low cooking if you’ve got one of those superlong days.

Once it has finished cooking, remove turkey roast from Crock and let sit on a plate for about 20 minutes to cool off before attempting to cut the string net off the meat. Caution: the meat is superhot at this stage. I’ve about burned off a few areas of my fingerprints because I don’t like waiting long enough for it to cool.

While the roast is cooling, pour all the liquid and scrapings from the bottom of the Crock into a saucepan to make gravy. If your turkey had a gravy packet with it, add that packet to the liquid and scrapings in the saucepan. I do have to add some thickener (I use arrowroot powder) to get the gravy to thicken once it has warmed up, mostly because my back gets tired quickly when I’m standing at the stove for that long.