Spyglass Mysteries: #1 Death At The Merryworth Manor

Chapter 18: The Case Closed

Saturday, May 24th

4:00 pm. Afternoon

The car stopped at the bottom of the hill once again. We all walk up to the house and knocked. The previous officers had left during the funeral. The whole house was empty. Detective Shayne pushed open the door and led us all into the back hallway. The doors line both sides of the hallway. One door in particular was left open ajar. Detective Shayne tapped open the door and glazed over the entrance way. I trip over Detective Shayne's shoe and flung the door open. Papers flew into the air as I collapsed onto the floor. We all look over the room. From the layout of the furniture, It seemed to be the family staff. It was small, barely enough room to maneuver. Detective Shayne nodded for us to enter.

"This is it!" said Detective Shayne.

"Whose' room is this?" asked Jeremy.

"Arthur Nobb's room," spoke Detective Shayne.

We all spread out and checked over the room. I saw a booklet opened on the desk by the window. The pages were lamented letters, hand written. Each saying the same thing, $300,000 by tonight. I placed the booklet back down. The bed sat neatly in the center of the room even for being tight as the room was. I peeked out the window by the desk, it was raised high off the ground, close to the ceiling as sort of a vent in the summer. I lifted myself up to look out. The backyard was set before me, especially the work shed and the stream. I hopped back down and bumped the metal trash bin over, knocking over a crumbled piece of paper. It had in bold letters "GOT YOU". I smoothed the paper out the best I could. I was holding a letter sent to a Blackmailer.

"GOT YOU!"

And to think you were trying to get away with this for years and years. Lying all this time about shady meeting and dealing money to keep that old fool in this mansion. So with him leaving, maybe I could be the one who breaks the chain. Not another Grace shall be your puppet anymore. Meet me behind the shed by the creek bed and well settle this...

-Anonymous

"What you got there, Mike?" Jeremy asked.

"It's a Letter to the Blackmailer... seems someone figured it out before us," I said.

"Lemme see that," said Detective Shayne, grabbing the letter from my hands, "Well, what do you know... This would explain Stephen asking for the officer assigned to the manors front door. He wanted protection. Shame... he could have stopped this."

"Not like he enjoyed having a mansion given to him in an old will, who knows what he has now," Logan bragged, walking over to the closet.

Logan opened the closet, packets of letters sat on the bottom of the floor. As far as anyone was concerned, we had found everything we needed to bust this guy.

"So Arthur did it? How did you find out?" asked Jeremy.

"When he lied about visiting his mother yesterday. Shes' been dead for years. Also an anonymous tip," said Detective Shayne.

"So what was he doing?" I continued.

"Making an alibi. Hes' been in the family for years, I'm sure he put the crime together, but instead he wanted money," said Detective Shayne.

"He wrote the first letter, its' in this booklet," I said, holding up the booklet from the desk.

"Lemme see that!" said Logan, paging through it, "He wanted to keep taps on Mr. Wills. I wonder if he didn't get payed, what he would have done to Mr. Grace's family."

"Maybe Mr. Wills found out one day, he tried to do something," said Jeremy.

"Like removing him from the real will," said Logan.