The Room Upstairs

Chapter Four

"So bye bye Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
And them good old boys were drinkin' whiskey and rye
Singin' 'This'll be the day that I die!
This'll be the day that I die!'"

Reid blinked open his eyes and frowned in the direction of his window. Stumbling out of bed, the agent stared down at the barnyard where an overall-clad Cassidy was laughing and singing with an old man. Buck frolicked with a Border Collie around their feet. The old man said something to them, and the dogs ran off towards the pasture. Reid yawned and pulled on some cloths before heading down the creaky steps to join them.

"Ah! Dr. Reid!" the old man smiled. "I'm Even Carter! Miss Sherwood's told me all about you!"
"I've heard quite a bit about you too," Reid nodded.
"Not much of a farm boy, eh?" Evan chuckled.
"I'll have him on Dolly before Monday," Cass snorted.
Reid looked alarmed.
"Dolly? W-Who's Dolly?" he stammered.
"Dolly is a horse," Cass grinned.
"Gentlest critter I ever seen!" Mr. Carter laughed.
"Oh," Reid squeaked.
"I think you'll like her," Cass said. "But you don't have to ride her if you don't want to."
"Uh, okay," Reid said skeptically. "Can I borrow your car? I want to swing by my apartment and check up on the painting."
"Sure," Cass nodded. "Keys are in the kitchen!"
"Okay, great! Thanks!" Reid called, hurrying off.
He grabbed the keys, his bag, and his gun, smuggling the latter out so Cass wouldn't get suspicious. He hopped into the driver's seat of her car and drove out to 147 West Run Road.

"Yes?" an irritable old man asked, opening the door a crack.
"Mr. Sherwood?" Reid checked.
"As far as I know."
"My name is Dr. Spencer Reid," Reid began, holding up his badge. "I'm from the FBI."
"FBI? What do you want?" Rick demanded.
"I'd like to speak with you about a pendant," Reid said.
"A pendant?"
Rick sounded mildly alarmed now.
"Yes, sir," Reid nodded. "May I come in?"
Rick grudgingly allowed Reid access to his house and pointed the agent to an old recliner.
"What do you want to know about a pendant?" he growled, sitting in a chair opposite of Reid.
"This particular pendant belonged to your sister-in-law," Reid said calmly.
"Victoria? She's been gone now twenty five years!"
"And I've heard that you took her pendant," Reid said. "Shouldn't your brother have kept that?"
"My wife bought that for Victoria's birthday," Rick dismissed. "Gordon felt it should go back to her."
"Mr. Sherwood, evidence that the pendant was a map has been uncovered. A map to the Hill family fortune?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Rick said stubbornly.
"Mr. Sherwood, have you spoken to your niece recently?" Reid asked, attempting a different approach.
"She and I haven't seen eye to eye since her daddy passed."
"Cassidy is a successful FBI agent," Reid said. "As a matter of fact, she's my friend."
"Cassidy doesn't have friends," Rick said shortly.
"Mr. Sherwood, why won't you take the farm?"
"I don't want that place!" Rick snapped. "I don't want anything to do with it!"
"Why won't you let her sell it then?"
Rick fell silent, and Reid let silence hang in the air for an uncomfortably long time.
"I'll ask again," Reid finally said. "Why did you want the pendant?"
Rick stared at him, hatred in his eyes.
"The Hill family was rich," he finally muttered. "Filthy rich for the longest time. The older generations suddenly didn't have all the money anymore. The last of them was little old Matilda Hill. Every Sunday Gordon and I would sit in church like good lads and talk to the lonely old woman after the service. She always wore that blasted pendant, and when she died, everything she owned was auctioned off. My wife, Ethel, bought her pendant after it'd been through several owners to give to Gordon's Victoria. When I saw it up close, I realized it was engraved with a map to the Hill family fortune. Once, their estate bordered the Sherwood farm. Matilda sold us most of their land, and their fortune is somewhere on our property now. Evidentially, Matilda had no idea. Neither did we until she was long dead."
"So you and Gordon planned to use the pendant to find the fortune, but Ethel had already given it to Victoria," Reid summarized.
"He tried to sneak the thing away from her, but she wore it constantly," Rick sighed. "When she disappeared she left it behind, but the map was harder to read than we thought. Then Gordon started drinking. He'd liked his alcohol before, mind you, but he wasn't sober from then till the day he died."
"Victoria Sherwood didn't disappear, did she?" Reid guessed.
"She- she ran off," Rick nodded.
"See, there's the flaw in your story," Reid yawned. "If Victoria valued the pendant as much as you said, then she wouldn't have left it behind. Furthermore, her appreciation of a gift from her sister-in-law tells me she valued family and never would have abandoned her children."
Rick looked strained now.
"What really happened to Victoria Sherwood?" Reid asked.
"He- he killed her," Rick whispered. "One night, he finally got so desperate to get the pendant that he hit her over the head with a frying pan and she fell dead."
"He took the pendant and hid her body where?"
"He put her on the back of the property under an old maple," Rick said. "He never told me exactly where."
"Did you ever find the fortune?" Reid asked.
"N-no," Rick said. "We couldn't decipher the map on the pendant. We knew which mark was Hill Manor, but not which way the map faced. Then Gordon got bad about his drinking and took ill. I couldn't search with Cassidy running the farm. If Alec hadn't been in jail..."
"Alec knew about the pendant?"
"Not about his mother's murder, but about the pendant," Rick sighed. "He caught us examining it one day and we were forced to tell him. He was old enough to know, I suppose."
"Thank you for your time," Reid said, standing to leave.
"Wait, Dr. Reid!" Rick worried. "I'm an old man. I won't survive jail!"
"I don't believe you'll get jail time," Reid said. "You did cover up a murder, but you didn't have a direct hand in it. Considering your age and cooperation, I believe the worse you'll get is a fine and maybe house arrest."
"Oh, thank you," Rick said in relief. "Wait a moment, I'll give you the pendant."
He hobbled into another room and returned with a engraved blue stone on a gold chain.
"Give it to Cassidy and tell her to do what she'd like with the farm," he requested. "And... if she's willing to speak to me, I'd like to make amends before I die."
Reid nodded and accepted the troublesome pendant, then showed himself out.

The agent didn't return to the farm right away. First he checked up on his apartment, pleased to discover the painters ahead of schedule, then swung by Garcia's place.
"Any luck?" the peppy agent asked.
"I got the truth out of Rick," Reid smiled. "And I got the pendant."
He proceeded to fill Garcia in completely, and she grew more and more curious.
"That went surprisingly well then!" Garcia beamed.
"I have a suspicion though," Reid said. "Can you check on Victoria Sherwood's ancestry?"

"Victoria Sherwood was born Victoria Lancing to Charles and Miriam Lancing," Garcia read off her screen.
"What about Miriam?" Reid asked.
"Born Miriam Hill to Xavier and Amanda Hill."
"Xavier's siblings?"
"Christopher."
"Spouse?"
"Matilda Vernon."
"Does the line go from her to an Ethel?"
"To Ethel Sherwood..."
"HA!" Reid said excitedly. "I knew it!"
"What are you talking about?" Garcia frowned.
"The last of the Hills was Matilda, who was married to Christopher, whose brother is Cassidy's great-grandfather!"
"So she's supposed to be the heiress of a huge estate?" Garcia frowned.
"Apparently," Reid shrugged. "But it explains Victoria's reluctance to hand over the pendant. She knew what it was, and she knew she didn't want her husband and brother-in-law to be in control of the estate. Ethel was her cousin and sister-in-law, so when Ethel stumbled upon the family heirloom, she gave it to Victoria."
"So what do we tell Cass?" Garcia asked.
"The truth," Reid replied.