“It's my one passion,” he said, staring down at me in a way that made me hope he had room for more than one in his life. “I've been working on it for years. Restoring the animals one by one. It's a slow process, but I was lucky to find a carousel that hadn't disintegrated too badly. Want to see my workshop?”
I nodded and followed him to the back of the barn. I moved slowly, afraid of stumbling on something, because the only light in the vast space came from the carousel itself. There wasn't even any daylight coming through the windows. “Why don't you put in some lights?” I asked. “You've got electricity. Or at least open some windows.”
“They're boarded up. I don't want anybody to see inside. Obviously you have no idea what a carousel like this is worth. Besides, I like it this way.”
We stepped inside a large room, made bright by the fluorescent lights hanging from the ceiling. We were surrounded by carousel animals in various degrees of disrepair. Darious stroked the carved mane of a statuesque horse. “One more coat of varnish on this beauty, and he'll be ready to join his friends on the carousel.”
“What do these letters stand for?” I asked, pointing to the monogram on the figure's saddle.
“PTC stood for the Philadelphia Toboggan Company. It was founded in 1903 and was one of the most important of the carousel manufacturing companies. This particular carousel is an early one, probably most of the carving was done in 1904.”
“Aren't carousels hard to come by? Where did you find this one?”
“That, dear Tori, is my secret.”
“There can't be many as complete as this.”
“I'm afraid you're right. In the golden age of carousels, 1905 to 1925, there were thousands of them. Only about three percent have survived.”
“What happened to the others?”
“Fire, mostly. Neglect. Natural disasters. But I'd say there are probably still a few more carousels rotting away in barns, waiting to be discovered.”
He moved over to a bench where a creature lay on its side. Even my untrained eye could see it had been sloppily painted. “I'm going to start stripping this baby next. It looks like it's got a dozen layers of paint over the original.”
“Do you use chemicals?”
Darious shuddered. “No. I use a heat gun to melt the enamel. It gives me more control, and I don't have to worry about damaging the wood.”
For the next hour he proudly showed me animals in various stages of restoration. Some had been badly rotted in places, and he'd had to carve replacement pieces. With others, he'd blended oil paints to fill in worn areas. He showed me where he had applied real gold leaf to a horse's mane. The nearly finished figures didn't look new, they still showed signs of imperfections, but he assured me that he did that on purpose so they would retain their antique appearance.
It was all so fascinating, I would have stayed hours longer listening to him describe his work. But he put an end to it by saying, “I'm sorry, Tori, but I've got an appointment I have to keep.”
“I need to get going anyway.”
He walked me to the door. While I stood blinking in the sunlight, he asked, “Will you come back for another ride?”
“Just try to keep me away!”
I drove back to town, humming, “In the good old summertime, in the good old summertime…” It wasn't until I turned into Moon Lake that I realized that while I had learned a lot about carousel restoration, I had not asked Darious DeShong any of the questions I'd gone there to ask!
CHAPTER 8
IT WAS SUCH A GLORIOUS FALL DAY THAT I DECIDED to walk the half a dozen blocks to the office. Three blocks later, I was sorry. Twice, I'd stumbled over rough places in the sidewalk where tree roots had heaved the pavement up. And it was hot, much hotter than an October day should be.
I passed a church with a bulletin board out front that said REPENT IT'S HOT IN HELL. Not much hotter than this, I bet. Under my gold corduroy blazer, my beige T-shirt was already sticking to my back.
At the corner of Maple and Elm, which was the beginning of the downtown commercial district, all three blocks, I came to the Lucy Lock-it Shoppe. Through the plate-glass window I saw the owner, Lucy, talking to a single customer. This would be a good opportunity for me to ask her some questions about the locks at the college and the key that didn't open what it was supposed to.
The shop was barely big enough for the three of us, but thankfully the paying customer soon left with his new key.
“Have a safe day,” Lucy called to his departing back. “Hi, Tori,” she said with a cheerful smile. “Do you have some more keys need made?”
“As a matter of fact, I found the missing ones, so now I have two sets.” The day after I'd started work at the Chronicle, I'd lost my entire key ring, including the keys to Garnet's house and P. J.’s car, and the office key that Cassie had given me with obvious reluctance. In response to my panicky call, Lucy had visited the Gochenauer residence and the office and made me a set of new keys. The next morning, I'd found the original ring under the bed, along with a small wedge of cheese, Garnet's favorite tie tack, two of Greta's scarves, and a lot of dust bunnies. Fred lay next to his hoard, looking smug. “Some hunter you are,” I'd said, scooping the things out. “I wonder how brave you'd be if they could fight back.”
From the back room came the whine of a machine. “I have a lot of work to do,” Lucy said.
I took the hint and got right to the point. “It's about the Lickin Creek College for Women. I understand you have a contract to do all its locksmithing.”
“Right. Not too unusual, considering I'm the only locksmith in town.”
“Do you recall putting a lock on a basement storeroom for the PR department?”
“Storeroom-is that what they call it? More like a closet if you ask me. Yes, I did. About three months ago. Why do you ask?”
“I was wondering about the keys. I was over there yesterday and one of the two keys didn't work in the lock.”
“Then you used the wrong key,” Lucy said.
“But I couldn't have. They were the only keys on the ring labeled storeroom. I just wondered if you might have made a little mistake and given Janet Margolies the wrong key when you put the lock on.”
She bristled, and I realized I'd offended her professionalism. “Look, Tori. I don't make mistakes. The lock came packaged with two keys. I put the lock in the door. Made sure both keys worked. Handed them to Janet. End of my involvement. Got it?”
“Okay. Thanks.”
Without saying so much as “you're welcome,” Lucy spun around and disappeared through the beaded curtain that concealed her workshop area from the public part of the shop. Who recently said that I often left my tact at home?
I was so anxious to escape the heat of the street, I didn't even pause to take my ritual swipe at the smudges on the brass plaque next to the Chronicle's front door. When I hung my blazer on the hook behind the door, Cassie looked at my damp T-shirt and asked, “What did you do, swim over?” She, of course, looked terrific and cool in a cotton shirt of fall colors.
I collapsed into my chair and fanned myself with last Saturday's newspaper. It didn't help. “Wish we had air-conditioning.”
“We don't need it in Pennsylvania,” Cassie said.
“Save that propaganda for the tourists. I know better. What's on the agenda for today?”
Cassie opened the calendar that lay on her desk. “A ribbon cutting at the new pizza shop on Main Street at eleven-thirty-you might be interested in covering that event, they're offering all the free pizza you can eat. A pro-life rally at Saint FX School-students in grades five through eight will hold up signs on the steps of the school during their lunch break. And there's an icecream social and craft show at the Sigafoos Retirement Home this afternoon.”