Page 45

“He could have,” O’Shea agreed. “But he told me he didn’t. He needs to explain the difference.”

She nodded, then sat quietly while he checked the next page. I let him finish instead of pressing for a conclusion the evidence didn’t support.

“Grant hasn’t changed his account either,” he added. “He says he wasn’t at Hollowfield Thursday night. I don’t have anything new that contradicts it.”

None of that gave us a clean answer. We had unexplained records, missing time, and a former supervisor whose account still needed to be checked against whatever the rest of the investigation produced.

O’Shea closed the folder.

“If the ticket appeal brings in something useful, I’ll call. Tell me if you find anything else changed in the attraction.”

“We’ll be in production,” Sybil said.

She stood and pushed the chair back beneath the table. I opened the office door, and she stepped out beside me into air cold enough to make her draw her jacket closer.

The public side of the farm was louder now. A cart bumped over gravel near the barn, and laughter carried from the pumpkin wagons. We walked toward production while Sybil watched the ground immediately ahead of her boots.

At the turn into the staff path, she slowed.

“The knife didn’t kill him,” she said. “Whatever else O’Shea finds, that part is different now.”

“It is.”

She stopped and faced me. “You think somebody put it there deliberately.”

“I think we need to find out who put it there and why. The medical findings make staging a stronger possibility.”

Sybil looked at me for a few seconds before a small smile appeared.

“You’re deeply irritating when you’re being reasonable.”

“I’ve been told.”

She started walking again, and I matched her pace. Her shoulder brushed my arm where the path narrowed beside the building, but she didn’t move farther away when it widened.

At production, Sybil unlocked the workroom and switched on the light. The room smelled of paper, paint, and cold fabric. Radios stood in their chargers along the shelf, their cords tucked behind boxes of replacement supplies. She put down her bag, unlocked the desk, and took out the thick black binder she’d left there after closing.

“I want to look at the figure set again before tonight,” she said.

“So do I. We can start with the plans.”

She set the binder on the worktable and opened it to the current route. Her changes from the night before marked the earlier bypass, keeping visitors away from both the damaged effect and the sealed final room.

For a moment she stayed bent over the page. Then she turned toward the low file cabinet.

“I want last year’s version too.”

I moved a box off the table to give her more room while she pulled out a broad folder. Its edges had softened with use, and laminated diagrams stuck out between staffing sheets and vendor paperwork. Sybil laid it beside the binder and began separating the route plans from the rest.

She spread the old and current versions side by side, turning them until the outlines of the enclosed structure faced the same way. I leaned over the table beside her. The outside shape was familiar; it was the paths through it that differed.

“This section changed more than it looks like when you’re standing inside,” she said. “Last year, groups came in from this side.”

She traced the old approach with her finger. It entered through the side opening where we’d found the displaced pumpkin lantern, several yards from its proper position on the shelf.

I looked from that point to the current plan.

“Where did you put the lantern last season?”