Secrets of Shakespeare's Grave Read online

  “We will talk again tomorrow,” said the deep voice. “I suggest that you accept the situation.”

  Colophon braved a peek around the corner and saw a tall, thin bald man in a dark suit striding toward the front door of the house. The door to her father’s office shut quickly.

  Chapter Four

  The Ill Wind Which Blows

  The female voice rang from the kitchen into the hallway: “If I catch you in this kitchen one more time, young lady, you will become close and personal friends with my spatula. You will eat when the whole family eats and not a minute sooner. Do I make myself clear?”

  Audrey Letterford handed her niece Colophon a plate of cookies and said in a hushed tone, “Do you think your mother heard me?”

  “I think everyone in the house heard you,” replied Colophon with a grin.

  Audrey Letterford chuckled. “Well, they are used to that. Anyway, it’s a holiday, for goodness’ sake, and I’ve been in this kitchen cooking all day. If your favorite aunt wants to give you some cookies, what is my little brother going to do about it? Nothing, that’s what. Now get out of here, and don’t let anyone see you.”

  “Thanks, Aunt Audrey. You’re the best,” said Colophon as she scooted out the back door.

  Colophon made her way through the garden and headed toward the lake. At the edge of the lake and shielded from the house by a large, slightly overgrown hedgerow was a small metal bench. She sat down on the bench, unwrapped the plate, and started in on the large pumpkin spice cookie on top.

  As she sat eating her cookie, a shadow passed over her head and out over the lake. She looked up and spied a large silver hawk circling lazily in the sky. Hawks were common around the family’s home and could frequently be spied circling the hay fields as they hunted for mice, snakes, and rabbits. It occurred to her, however, that she had never seen a hawk above the lake. She nibbled on her cookie and watched as the large bird drifted on the breeze that constantly blew down from the mountain and across the water. The hawk’s wings rarely moved as it dipped and turned with the air currents. Its reflection shimmered in the water as it passed over the far side of the lake.

  It was mesmerizing.

  Dreamlike.

  As Colophon watched, the hawk turned in a long slow arc and headed back across the lake in her direction. Just as it reached her side of the lake, the large bird tucked its wings and went into a steep dive. Colophon froze.

  The hawk was heading straight for her.

  The bird came closer and closer. At the last second, it adjusted its dive ever so slightly and splashed into the lake just a few feet from where she sat. There was a small explosion of water, then the hawk took flight back across the lake, tucked low against the surface. As it flew away, Colophon could see a large snake writhing to get free of the hawk’s claws.

  Colophon’s heart beat rapidly as the hawk disappeared into the stand of hardwoods on the far side of the lake. For the moment, the cookies were completely forgotten, as was her brother.

  The moment, however, did not last long. Footsteps crunched to her left on the pea gravel path.

  Case! Why couldn’t he leave her alone?

  She grabbed the cookies and scooted into an opening in the hedgerow. She sat still and listened. The footsteps stopped. A moment later the smell of cigarette smoke drifted into and through the thick foliage. To her knowledge, no member of her immediate family smoked. She did not move.

  A deep voice—the same deep voice that she had heard in her father’s office—broke the silence.

  “He responded as I expected he would.”

  Silence again.

  Colophon sat frozen.

  “No. I did not think that he would simply turn the company over to me.”

  Another pause.

  The deep voice: “You’ve done well—as I expected. It’s only a matter of time now. Needless to say, the resources are not and will not be available to him to solve this problem. Now I have to get back to the house. We will speak again tomorrow evening. I expect everything to be resolved by that time.”

  Colophon could hear a faint beep signaling the end of the call.

  And then there was silence again.

  She knew the deep-voiced man remained on the other side of the hedge. Finally, she saw a cigarette butt hit the edge of the lake and fizzle slightly. And then silence, except for the wind rustling through the woods near the lake.

  She sat absolutely still and listened intently. After a minute or so, having heard nothing, she stuck her head out from the small opening to look around. She did not see anything and ventured farther out.

  Looking back up the path to the house, she saw no one.

  Colophon turned to pick up her cookies—and there standing directly in front of her was the man from her father’s office. He was tall, bald, and thin, as she remembered. His piercing black eyes peered down at her over dark, thick-rimmed glasses. And, she noticed, he had no eyebrows, which she found very unsettling.

  “I assume,” he said in his deep voice, “that your parents taught you that it is impolite to listen to other people’s conversations?”

  “I didn’t . . . I just came down here to have some cookies.”

  The man looked down at the cookies in Colophon’s hand. “Of course you did,” he said. “What was I thinking? My apologies.”

  The tall man’s tone was less than warm.

  He bent down and looked Colophon directly in the eyes. She couldn’t move. She could smell the cigarettes on his breath. His black eyes bored into her. He slowly raised his hand. She watched as the man’s long index finger approached her face.

  His placed his finger on the side of her face and then lightly flicked the side of her mouth.

  “You missed a crumb,” he said.

  Colophon turned and ran as fast as she could back to the house.

  Chapter Five

  Under Thy Own Life’s Key

  Colophon pushed open the door to her father’s office and stuck her head inside. Mull Letterford was on the phone but motioned for her to enter. Her heart was still racing from the encounter by the lake, but she focused on trying to calm herself. She looked around the small room. The walls were covered with a dizzying array of black-and-white photos of her family. None of the frames seemed to match, and there was no particular pattern in the arrangement. Immediately behind her father’s desk was a small photo of her grandfather holding a young Mull Letterford on his knee. Colophon missed her grandfather. This had once been his office, and she could still smell the smoke from his pipe. She was glad her father had left the office in essentially the same condition as her grandfather had kept it.

  On her father’s desk and under a small glass cover was a brass key that had once belonged to Miles Letterford. It had been passed down from her grandfather to her father as a symbol of the ownership of the company.

  Colophon scooted her chair quietly up to the desk and leaned in to look at the key. It was a passkey, no more than three inches long, with the name Letterford inscribed down the shank. The tooth of the key was a simple square. The bow of the key—the end that is turned—was oval-shaped with the Greek letter sigma—∑—engraved in the middle. Colophon moved closer to the key, her breath lightly fogging the glass.

  It was hard to believe that the key would one day be passed down to her obnoxious brother.

  The phone clicked down into the receiver, and she looked up. “Are you busy?” she asked her father.

  “Never too busy for you. So what brings you to the office?”

  Mull Letterford appeared tired. He was sitting in a large rocking chair. On his desk were stacks of manuscripts for his review. She could tell, however, that he had not been reading them, and that his mind was on something else altogether.

  “Dad, may I ask you a question?”

  “Certainly. You know you can ask me anything.”

  “You do own Letterford and Sons, don’t you? I mean, it’s your business, isn’t it?”

  His response was measured.
“It is my business, but it is also the family’s business.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Colophon.

  “I own the majority interest in the business. That means I have total control over the operations of the publishing house. However, and this is very important, I also have an obligation to the family. It is an obligation passed down from generation to generation. When your grandfather turned ownership of the business over to me, I assumed a responsibility that has been required of every owner of Letterford and Sons.”

  “What responsibility?”

  “We operate the business for the family. I may own the majority interest in Letterford and Sons—just as your grandfather did and his father before him and so on and so on—but we have employed generations of the family in a variety of jobs. Miles Letterford had four sons. He could have left the business to all of them. But that would’ve been a mess. He understood—as too few do, I might add—that passing ownership to all of his children would ultimately have proven a disaster and resulted in the destruction of the company and the family. He had to choose some way of deciding who would run the company. Ownership had to pass according to some rule. He elected to pass the business to his eldest son and to obligate all future owners to do the same. Miles’s three other sons were each granted a small ownership interest in the company, which they in turn have passed down over the generations. Control of the company, however, was vested in Miles’s oldest son. This was a harsh and an arbitrary decision. I am not suggesting otherwise. Rules such as this are always arbitrary. However, they are also necessary.”

  Mull paused, took a sip of coffee, and stared out the window at the field outside.

  “I have no misconceptions as to how I became owner of the family business. It wasn’t by merit. I didn’t earn it. It was simply by virtue of when I was born. That, I believe, places an even greater obligation on me. I am responsible to the other members of the family for the operations of the business. Their livelihoods depend on me doing my job and doing it well. It can be a heavy burden at times.”

  Colophon walked over and stood beside her father. “Could the business ever be taken from you?”

  He looked at his daughter. “Why do you ask?”

  “I heard that man talking to you—the tall man in your office earlier today. I wasn’t eavesdropping, I promise. Are you mad at me?”

  He smiled. “No. I suspect half the household heard that conversation.”

  “Who was he?”

  He paused and took another sip of his coffee. “That was someone I have known for a long time.”

  “A friend?”

  “No.” Her father’s voice was firm.

  “Then who—” she started.

  Mull Letterford placed his hand on his daughter’s shoulder. “That, my dear, is all you need to know for right now. Besides, it’s almost time for dinner, and I am absolutely sure”—he added with a slight wink—“that you haven’t done anything to spoil your dinner. Correct?” And with that, Colophon understood their conversation had ended.

  Chapter Six

  Be Bounteous at Our Meal

  Thanksgiving Dinner

  Thursday, November 27

  For the first time in her life, Colophon was allowed to sit at the adult table for Thanksgiving dinner. Unfortunately, her brother was not making this an easy transition.

  Tradition in the Letterford family dictated that children younger than twelve years ate together at a table in a room adjacent to the dining room. Since Colophon had now reached the age of twelve, she was permitted to join the adult table. Seating here was not random; rather, it was assigned according to a strict family hierarchy. Mull, as the owner of Letterford & Sons, sat at the head of the table. Mrs. Letterford sat to his right. Immediately to their right and left sat Mull’s two brothers and their spouses, and then aunts, uncles, cousins, and so on. At the far end of the table and almost immediately opposite her father sat Colophon. Next to her sat her cousin Jules, who had turned twelve the preceding year and was therefore enjoying his second year at the adult table. Next to Jules sat his older brother Patrick, and next to Patrick was Colophon’s brother, Case.

  Colophon remembered the years she had watched and envied her brother as he sat at the table with the adults. Although Case took no particular pleasure in being in the presence of the adults, he relished the idea that his mere presence at the adult table drove his sister absolutely crazy. He would often find an excuse to stop by the children’s room during the course of dinner just to remind Colophon that he was at the adult table and she sat among the toddlers. Colophon had hoped things would improve once she reached the adult table. She was wrong. Her brother was merciless in his quips and comments about her. Jules and Patrick snickered at each of Case’s insults. Colophon tried to ignore the insults and her cousins’ reactions, but it was not easy.

  Dinner, per family tradition, began with a prayer from the youngest member at the main table. As such, the duty today fell upon Colophon. The previous year Jules had made it halfway through his prayer before vomiting on the table from nervousness. The cleanup had delayed dinner by half an hour. That was the only year that Colophon had been happy to be seated in the children’s dining room. Now, although nervous, she took her duty seriously. In a precise and dignified manner, she managed to say grace over the food they were about to receive—without vomiting. A round of congratulations on a job well done quickly followed. He father looked at her and silently mouthed the word “outstanding.” Her mother gave a thumbs-up.

  The moment, however, did not last long. “At least Jules didn’t put me to sleep when he threw up last year,” Case whispered in Colophon’s direction. “I thought the nap was supposed to come after dinner, not during the prayer.”

  Jules and Patrick busted out laughing. A disapproving glance from the far end of the table brought an end to the laughter, but the damage was done. Colophon stared straight ahead, furious at her brother and her cousins.

  It took several minutes for the food to be served, and just as those gathered had started to eat, a tall, thin, unshaven man with glasses and long stringy hair burst into the room. He was dressed in a threadbare sweater, which at one time might have been some shade of light yellow. His pants were bright blue corduroy and equally worn, with patches on both knees. On top of his head was a black wool beanie, and under his arms he carried an assortment of rolled-up documents. He looked as if he hadn’t slept (or bathed) for days.

  After surveying the family gathered at the table, the oddly dressed man exclaimed in a loud voice, “Mull, I must see you immediately!”

  Without looking up from his food, Mull Letterford replied: “Cousin Julian, it is so nice that you have finally arrived. You realize, I assume, that it is Thanksgiving and that we are gathered here for Thanksgiving dinner?”

  The odd man looked around the room. “Is it Thanksgiving already?” said Julian with apparent confusion.

  “Yes, Julian, it is Thanksgiving already,” Mull said calmly as he gestured to the family and then to the turkey that sat in the middle of the table.

  “Well, I . . . but . . . I must—” protested the new arrival.

  Mull Letterford held up his hand. “What you must do is wait until we finish dinner before we discuss anything. Please, have a seat and join us. I insist. There is an open chair at the end of the table.” Mull gestured to the empty seat next to Colophon.

  For several moments Julian considered his options with a look of uncertainty. He ran his hand across the thick stubble on his face as if he were contemplating some great and significant point. The entire family stared at him, with knives, forks, and spoons frozen in place.

  The room was quiet, as if someone had pushed a pause button on some grand remote control. Finally, realizing that everyone was looking at him, and apparently facing the reality that nothing would be done until after dinner, the unkempt man dropped everything that he had been holding and sat down in the empty seat next to Colophon. The sounds of the meal immediately started up again.<
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  Under his breath, Julian muttered: “Thanksgiving dinner? I can’t believe I barged in on Thanksgiving dinner. Smooth. Real smooth. Nice going, Julian.”

  “Hello,” Colophon interrupted.

  The unshaven man turned and peered down at her over the top of his glasses, then turned his gaze to the empty plate in front of him.

  Colophon prickled at the man’s rude reaction. It was bad enough that she had to put up with her brother’s insults and her cousins’ laughter, but who was this so-called cousin? He looked like he hadn’t shaved in days! And to burst in on Thanksgiving dinner—that took some nerve.

  Colophon, however, took a deep breath. She knew her mother and father expected more from her. Perhaps the gentleman had simply not heard her. She would try again. “Hello,” she repeated, in a friendly voice.

  Again, the disheveled man turned to Colophon and peered down at her. “Hello,” he grunted.

  She stuck out her right hand. “My name is Colophon Letterford.”

  “I thought this was the adult table,” Julian replied. He ignored her outstretched hand.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Excuse what?”

  “What did you mean that you thought this was the adult table?” Colophon asked.

  “I said I thought this was the adult table. At least that used to be the rule.”

  “I am twelve years old,” Colophon responded. “I am allowed at this table.”

  With an impatient shake of his head, Julian bent over to Colophon, stared directly into her eyes, and said: “No disrespect, and I sincerely mean that, but I am really not in the mood for this conversation.” He then turned back to his plate.

  Colophon stared straight ahead.

  How rude!

  For years she had sat at the children’s table and waited patiently for her chance to sit at the adult table. It was her time to sit at the adult table, and no one was going to treat her like a toddler—least of all this obnoxious man.