Page 67 of A Thin Line

They were all locked.

But I was positive I knew where the keys were: on the keyring in Sinclair’s desk drawer in his office.

So back down the stairs I went once I was sure no one was looking. When I got to the rear east hallway, I glanced all directions again—and then went straight to Sinclair’s office door.

I almost just walked in but then felt a rush of panic. What if he was in there? I took a deep breath to steady myself and then rapped on it three times. If he was there, I would make up some dumb excuse, like I accidentally locked the trunk again.

When I was positive there was no one in there, I slowly turned the knob. Then, once I had it open enough to fit my head in, I did so, looking throughout the entire office. Seeing no one, I entered.

It wasn’t until I noticed my hands were shaking that I realized how nervous I was. Really, though, what would be the consequences if I were caught? Was snooping in a place where you lived considered illegal?

Surely not. I wasn’t breaking other rules of the contract, like stealing or vandalizing. I simply wanted to see what was in that wing.

The top drawer on the side of Sinclair’s desk was locked, and my heart dropped into my stomach as I believed all this had been for nothing. But I tried the second drawer just the same and my heart leapt back into the space where it belonged.

In the second drawer was that black ring of keys—and nothing else.

When I picked them up, the metal keys clinked against one another, sounding like an explosion in my ears. So I held them tightly together in my fist to keep the noise to a minimum. Glancing around like a mouse hoping not to attract attention of the cat, I then moved quickly back to the stairs and into the east wing on the second floor.

The air there seemed cooler, as if I were entering a dark cave—but I knew that was all my imagination, even though there wasn’t any light in that hallway except what came from the antechamber. I stopped at the first door to my left and examined the lock. When I looked at the keys, I had no clue if any of them would fit—so I decided to simply do trial and error. I found the most unusual key to start with and tried it in the lock.

It didn’t fit.

I wasn’t surprised because the odds were against any key fitting. I just had to be patient and try all of them, hoping one of them was on the ring. None of the next five fit, nor the five after. I tried another and another and another, and I was beginning to believe the key I wanted wasn’t on this ring, even though I had several to go.

But then a key fit—and it turned.

And I was twisting the doorknob open.

It was an ordinary bedroom. Well, maybe not ordinary. It was far more extravagant than my bedroom had ever been, present accommodations excluded. The room I used here didn’t count, because it wasn’t actually mine. My bedroom was in Winchester in the house I shared with my father.

This room felt bright, with its light curtains and plentiful windows, especially after coming in from the dark hallway.

I wandered around, trying to figure out why a room like this was locked away and forbidden to be entered. As I took in details, I realized this was a teenage boy’s room. It wasn’t just that the room was decorated in hues of blue and browns. There was a baseball on a shelf but it was the books that confirmed my suspicions: Holes by Louis Sachar was a giveaway and, I suspected, so was the Unwind Dystology, although I’d never read those books—not to mention the décor of navy blue and browns. But I couldn’t see a thing that would make me want to lock this room away.

Maybe it wasn’t this room in particular that made Sinclair shut off this wing—unless it was his childhood bedroom filled with bad memories.

So I kept digging, curious as hell about what secrets that man was hiding. Closing the door to the hallway in case anyone walked by or could even see it from another floor, considering it was nearest the stairs, I then began opening drawers and even looked under the bed. This room had its own bathroom like so many of the rooms in the mansion and I even peeked in there. As I was ready to give up, I headed for the door, noticing another book on the highest shelf—but it was laying flat. I was barely able to reach the shelf, but I managed to pull the book down. The back, facing up, had a thin layer of dust on it and I wiped it on my jeans as I turned it over.

It was a yearbook from Colorado Rocky Mountain School. I’d never heard of it. But I went straight to the back of the book for the index, looking for the name Whittier. And there it was—except it wasn’t Sinclair. It was Augustus III.

His oldest brother.

So this had to be Augustus’s childhood bedroom. Again, I didn’t see the reason to lock it away but that simply meant I had to keep exploring.

Fortunately, I was able to lock it on the inside knob and, after I was back in the hallway, I pulled the door shut, testing it to make sure it was secure. As I glanced out toward the open space of the mansion, I chided myself for not checking for noise or movement before I opened the door all the way. I had to be careful.

After finding the key to the door across from Augustus’s room, I unlocked it. This, too, felt like a boy’s room—only the color scheme was hunter green and dark brown. There was an unmistakable feel of money but there were no books. Was this Sinclair’s old bedroom? On a shelf in the walk-in closet, I found not one but three yearbooks. One was from the same school as Augustus but the other two were from a school called Phillips Exeter Academy. When I checked the index, I found that it was Warren, the middle Whittier brother, who had attended that school. As I rifled through the pages, I realized these weren’t colleges—they were high schools…what I’d heard described as prep schools, a luxury people of my class couldn’t afford.

But I wouldn’t have wanted to attend school away from home anyway. My teenage years had been rough and I couldn’t have handled them as well without my father’s support.

Then again…maybe if I’d been able to get away from the people who lived in Winchester…

But there was no sense dwelling on something that couldn’t have happened. Besides, that was all past. There was nothing I could do about it now.

My mind was swirling with this new knowledge. It wasn’t much, but it was beginning to paint a picture. The Whittier boys—the oldest two, at least—had been shipped off away from home for school, and I wondered if it was something they’d wanted or if it had been at their father’s insistence. Maybe even rich kids didn’t always have it so well, just in different ways.

I was distracted as I locked that door behind me and ventured across the hall to open the next door, curious if I would finally find Sinclair’s old bedroom. And, as I tested the keys, I wondered again why this wing was off limits. It made no sense.

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