Outside, the temperature had fallen into the teens, on its way to single digits. The two women had switched out their heels for boots and pulled on their wool coats, hats, and gloves, but still braced themselves as they ventured into the cold air. Their hands tightened on their scarves and collars, pulling them a little snugger, and they blew out their breaths, which misted around them as they hurried along. They crossed the street at the light and turned into Town Park, walking carefully on the salted yet still-slippery surfaces.
Despite the chilly weather, or perhaps because of it, the place looked as festive as Candy had ever seen it. She craned her head up and around, her eyes following the strings of lights, which curved around tree trunks and swooped from tree to light post to tree.
It would have been a magical night for a stroll here with Ben, she thought absently as they walked briskly along. But in the next moment she told herself that she couldn’t think about that right now. She had other concerns. Ben was at the police station, running down the story on Liam, and she was here, searching for something hidden in the ice.
“What are we searching for?” Maggie asked, breaking into her thoughts.
Candy pointed out in front of them, where spotlights attached to posts and trees illuminated the icy works of art, perfectly preserved in the bracing air. “An ice princess.”
“You think Preston left a clue for us?”
“That’s what it sounds like, doesn’t it? At the foot of the Ice Princess. That sounds like a definite invitation, and why would he invite us to look if he hadn’t put something there?”
“But why would he do that? Why not just call us or text us or tell us over coffee and Danish?”
“Because I think Preston’s playing a game with us,” Candy said, her face turning more angular as her jaw tightened, both against the cold and what might lie ahead. “Something’s been off about that guy from the beginning. It just didn’t stick out that much, since there are quite a few people around here who are a little quirky. So someone like Preston fit right in.”
“What do you think’s going on?” Maggie asked, an edge of concern slipping into her voice.
Candy let out a deep, tight breath. “That’s what we’re here to find out.” She nodded up ahead. “When I was out here yesterday afternoon, some of the sculptures were still unfinished. But if I remember correctly, Gina was working on something that might fit the bill.”
She angled off toward the large ice sculpture of the Maine wilderness, which depicted stately Mount Katahdin and the surrounding pine- and spruce-covered slopes, reflected in a mirror lake. Separate from the main display were individual sculptures of Maine animals, as well as specialties of the ice carvers.
As they walked along, Candy scanned the area. To their left, up the slope a ways, several teens were playfully throwing handfuls of snow at each other, shouting and laughing. Couples and groups strolled along the lighted pathways and lingered around the ice sculptures, impressed with the artistry on display. A few families with smaller children, tired yet excited, roamed the park as well, hand in hand.
She shifted her gaze right and focused on the single-block ice sculptures, carved for demonstrations earlier in the day: a mountain lion, an eagle with wings spread, a pair of seals, a bear and her cubs, caribou and coyote.
Beyond that, curving around the back of the main sculpture, were the specialties of the ice carvers—their more personal works. Each sculptor had carved one or two single-block pieces, on display here. It was a diverse collection that included a curling snail adorned with a realistic textured shell and eerily probing antennae, a Sphinx with a face that resembled a national politician, an elaborate depiction of a giant shoe turned into a home for anthropomorphic woodland creatures, a surprisingly detailed tall ship, and a windblown woman who appeared to emerge from the block of ice itself.
Candy could link up most of the sculptures with their creators. Liam had obviously done the tall ship. She’d seen his detail work, and she had to admit it was impeccable. Baxter had created the giant shoe with all the critters. He’d even added little Snowball, the family dog, to the icy tableau. She could attach Duncan to the politically oriented Sphinx, and Felicia to the exquisite rendering of the snail.
The final piece was Gina’s work.
It was just the woman’s head and torso; the rest of her body remained submerged in the ice. But it was her windblown hair that was most intriguing. It streamed out behind her in several thick, swirling strands of ice, only to merge again with the block itself.
It had a melancholy feeling about it. The way the face seemed to pull away from the ice gave it an element of action, yet her expression was one of both resolve and resignation, as if the woman was trying to break free from the ice but was being held back by some invisible force.
She’s trying to escape, but it won’t let her go, Candy thought, and she knows it.
It was not the most elegant piece in the park, and had some crude elements to it. And it looked unfinished. Gina hadn’t shown up today to complete her creation. But enough of it was there, evidence of Gina as an emerging artist. Perhaps, in some subconscious way, the ice princess expressed Gina’s own inner feelings.
Is she trying to break free of something too?
Leaving the question unanswered, Candy pointed. “I think that’s the one we’re looking for.”
“The ice princess.” Maggie let out a shivery breath as she gazed upon it.
“Let’s check it out.”
They circled it several times, studying it from all angles. Its ruggedness appealed to Candy, and she decided she liked it. Gina might still be developing as an artist, but she had a style all her own.
But was it hiding a clue?
Check at the foot of the Ice Princess. Your destiny awaits.
She stepped up close to the sculpture and looked at the ice down toward the bottom, near the snow-covered ground. It looked smooth and unblemished. She searched along the foundation on the second side, and the third. She ran her gloved hand over the ice, studying it in the bright light and shadows cast by the spotlights. Maggie searched as well.
They found what they were looking for on the sculpture’s back side, directly beneath the woman’s right ear, at the bottom near the ground.
There was something embedded in the ice.
Candy bent, and Maggie leaned forward with her hands on her knees. “What is it, and how the heck did it get in there?”
“Someone must have put it there for us to find.”
“It’s a bottle,” Maggie said, after studying it from several angles.
She was right, Candy realized.
It looked like a small plastic water bottle. Its transparent skin had made it difficult to identify at first.
“And I think there’s some sort of note inside,” Maggie added after further inspection.
Intrigued, Candy reached out a gloved hand toward it but came up against the hardened ice.
She brushed her hand over the ice several times, studying it and the bottle inside.
It finally dawned on her what she was looking at.
Maggie let out a little gasp as Candy pulled back her arm, folded her fingers into a fist, and jabbed quickly at the ice.
It cracked.
“It’s just a thin covering.”
The bottle wasn’t embedded in the ice; it was sitting in some kind of pocket. Candy jabbed at the thin covering a couple more times, finally breaking the ice. She cleared away the shards, reached in, and withdrew the bottle.
It had once held local spring water, she saw, but now, as Maggie had said, it contained a folded sheet of paper with writing upon it.
A message in a bottle.
Maggie gazed at it, trying to decipher the writing on the note. “What do you think it says?”
“There’s only one way to find out.”
The cap had frozen in place, but Candy finally managed to untwist it. She tipped the bottle upside down. The note was thin and tightly folded, making it easy to slip into the bottle’s small round hole. Still, she had some difficulty getting it back out, since it had unfolded during the time it had been inside. She slapped the bottom of the bottle several times, trying to get the note to pop down through the opening, but finally she had to slide her pinky far enough inside so she could compress the note down, coax it out, and snag its leading edge with her fingernails.
“Got it,” she said finally.
It was a three-by-five-inch piece of paper, folded lengthwise, and a color other than white, either blue or purple. Or possibly gray. She couldn’t quite tell in this light.
The message was short, written in a shaky, erratic hand, as if someone was purposely trying to disguise their handwriting style.
Hidden Valley, Cabin 9, it read.
“What’s it say?” Maggie asked, looking over Candy’s shoulder.
Candy read it to her.
“Hidden Valley? That’s that motel up on Route 1.”
“That’s right,” Candy said, thinking. She stooped and took another look at the pocket in the ice in which the bottle had been hidden. It looked neatly done, a hollowed-out area with smooth sides that had been professionally cut with an electric saw of some sort, not dug out from the ice with a hand pick or hatchet.
Candy studied it. Preston could have carved it out of there anytime over the past day or two. Gina hadn’t been in the park that day, so she wouldn’t have noticed the strange item embedded in her sculpture. And anyone who might have seen Preston creating the hollowed-out space would probably just have taken him for another sculptor. It would have been an easy task to accomplish.
But why the elaborate ruse?
Candy had the sudden, strange feeling that she was an unaware vole trying to hide under the snow, being pursued by a cunning, hungry fox.
She looked at the note in her hand again, reading the note’s terse wording. Finally, shaking her head, she looked up at her friend.
“I know it’s getting late, but are you up for a road trip?”