Page 34 of The House That Held Her

“Hi there, I’m Marty. What can I do for you ladies?”

My heart pounds. I remind myself to breathe. “Hi, Marty, I’m Margot, and this is Shannon. We’re hoping you may be willing to chat with us for a few minutes. My husband and I just recently moved to Florida from Maryland. We, uh–we bought Hawthorn Manor in Mount Dora.”

Marty’s friendly expression crumbles the moment I say “Hawthorn Manor.” His shoulders go rigid, eyes darting around like he’s worried someone might overhear. “Listen, I don’t know you,” he says in a tense whisper. “And I don’t want anything to do with Mount Dora or that house. You need to leave.”

I feel Shannon stiffen at my side. I take a tentative step forward, making my voice as gentle as possible. “Please, Marty… if you know something, anything, please. We’re not here to cause trouble.”

He shakes his head firmly. “No. I’ve been done with that place for years. I want nothing to do with it. I’m sorry, but you need to go.”

He steps out from behind the counter, guiding us toward the doors. My heart sinks, but desperation flares up inside me. Just before reaching the exit, I whirl around and pull out the old newspaper clipping Shannon found—the one with Amelia, George, Chief Miller, and Marty as kids, labeled “The Bugs.”

“Marty, please.” My voice trembles. “I know you were one of them. We don’t know who else to trust, but we do know something’s horribly wrong in Mount Dora.”

Marty’s eyes lock on the yellowed photograph. The color drains from his face, and his gaze turns glassy with tears. Slowly, he takes it from me, his hand shaking. “It’s been years since I’ve seen these faces,” he murmurs. He brushes a fingertip over the grainy images. I catch a glimpse of a wistful smile, quickly replaced by haunted worry.

Shannon edges closer. “We’re just looking for answers. We don’t want to drag you into any danger.”

Marty looks up, scanning the store once more. After a shaky breath, he mutters, “Follow me.”

He leads us down aisles of office chairs, folders, and printers. Eventually, he unlocks a door marked “Manager’s Office.” We slip inside, leaving the store’s bustle behind. The room is cramped, stacked with paperwork and cardboard boxes. Photos on the desk show a smiling family—a woman with warm eyes, two college-aged daughters, and a teen boy standing in front of a sailboat.

A flicker of pride and sadness passes over Marty’s face. “That’s my wife, Josie. My kids: Emma, Rachel, and Tyler. Emma’s at Florida State, Rachel’s at UF, and Tyler’s in med school at UCF. Everything I do– it’s for them.”

He glances at Shannon and me, his posture stiffening. “Which is why I’m telling you now: if I share anything with you, you keep my name out of it. My wife’s battling breast cancer, and my kids need me. I can’t afford to get pulled back into… whatever happens there.”

I nod, my voice hushed. “We understand. We won’t bring trouble to your door. I promise. Please, we need to know what’s really happening in Mount Dora.”

Marty seems to sag as if the weight on his shoulders is too heavy to carry. He lowers himself into the chair behind the desk and drags a hand over his face. Taking a deep breath, he begins to speak, his voice low and filled with a heavy sadness. "What you have to understand is, everything the Bugs did back then, it was all because of Dorothy Hawthorn.”

21

The air in Marty’s cramped back-office feels thick and stale. I can’t shake the sensation that everything is about to change in this room—that the final pieces of this puzzle are about to click together. Shannon sits beside me, and I feel her tension prickling the air. Across the small desk, Marty exhales, looking like he’s bracing for a storm.

“George’s favorite book,” he begins, “was Poe’sThe Gold-Bug—he was obsessed with it. Everything we did as kids tied back to that story somehow.”

I exchange a quick glance with Shannon. She looks as puzzled as I am.

“The Gold-Bug,” Marty explains, “is a classic treasure hunt story that incorporates cryptography and hidden messages—one of the first popular stories to really showcase how coded clues can lead to buried treasure. That concept fascinated George. He saw it as proof that sometimes, what’s hidden can change the world. William Friedman—founder of the NSA—creditedThe Gold-Bugfor inspiring him to become a cryptographer.”

Shannon leans forward, arms resting on her knees. “So, George wanted to make an impact on the world… using cryptography?”

Marty nods, a faint, sad smile tugging at his mouth. “Yes. In his own way, that was George’s dream. He was forever crafting puzzles, building secret contraptions. Anything he could do to challenge the rest of us. Andrew Miller—yes, your very own Chief Miller—Cecilia Doyle, Amelia Hawthorn, and me… we were inseparable back then. Called ourselves ‘the Bugs’ because of Poe’s story. George made it up, said we were just like William Legrand, the main character in the book. Amelia was George’s kid sister, so she tagged along. He grumbled about it sometimes, but because Cecilia doted on Amelia, that was enough for him to put up with it.”

I notice Marty’s voice soften when he says Amelia’s name, and for a brief moment, an almost wistful expression warms his face. But it fades just as quickly, replaced by a shadow.

“We grew up the way most kids did in the seventies,” he says, running a hand through his graying hair. “Riding bikes, exploring, solving silly mysteries around town—like who kept stealing candy from McMyers, or why Farmer Jackson’s cows kept breaking loose at night. We were known around Mount Dora as a rowdy group of junior detectives.” He glances away, eyes flickering with memories. “Those days felt magical. But, like everything else, they came to an end.”

Silence settles for a moment. Shannon shifts in her seat, clearly sensing there’s more—something darker. I sit very still, my heart hammering in my chest.

Marty sighs. “Cecilia was originally from Ocala. Her parents, Margie and Thomas Doyle, moved to Mount Dora when she was a baby. Margie taught at our school, took a special liking to George from the start. And Cecilia, well, she was big into history, loved the architecture of old churches. Hawthorn Manor was built in that gothic style mostly because she wanted it that way.”

He rubs his hands together, the skin dry and pale. “George was different. Born here in ’62, he had deep roots in Mount Dora—especially through his father, Normand, who ran a large citrus grove business. It made the family well-off, and the town respected him.” Marty’s voice wavers. “Normand was hardly ever home, and when he was, he seemed more invested in refining the town’s image of him, rather than being a father to his own kids. That left George and Amelia in the care of their mother, Dorothy— ‘Dot’ to most.”

Marty pauses, running his tongue over his lips as though his mouth has gone dry. “Dot gave birth to Amelia in 1970, and after that… she went to a dark place. Postpartum depression, we’d call it now, but back then no one talked about it much. She started drinking heavily. Everyone knew, but nobody intervened. Normand’s influence, small-town silence… it was easier to look the other way.”

A chill skitters up my spine. Shannon inhales sharply, and I reach over to gently squeeze her arm.

Marty closes his eyes for a second before continuing, voice low. “One day, George and Amelia started turning up with bruises. We Bugs saw it, but we were just kids ourselves. We had no idea how to help. By winter of ’75, things escalated. Dot passed out drunk one night holding a lit cigarette, and she nearly burned down half the house. Destroyed their Christmas tree and the gifts underneath it. I still remember seeing George afterward—he looked hollow. The curiosity and joy in him just… vanished.”

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