CHAPTER 24 — THE SEVENTH
The name Samuel Cross appeared in a document so ordinary that George almost overlooked it.
He was reviewing the Kant family's old employment records when he noticed a reference to a young man who had worked for Daniel and Helen during the final years they lived at Blackwood House.
Samuel had been listed as a driver, caretaker, and occasional assistant, but his name appeared nowhere in the police reports concerning the Kant family's disappearance.
Mara searched through the remaining documents and found only a handful of references to him.
He had been in his twenties and had apparently been trusted by Daniel, receiving access to parts of the property that ordinary employees would never have entered.
Most disturbing of all, his employment ended abruptly in October 1998.
There was no resignation letter, no forwarding address, and no explanation for what happened to him afterward.
George placed the employment record beside the photograph of the six people.
“This is him,” he said quietly. “The seventh.”
Mara compared Samuel's description with the damaged photograph they had discovered earlier.
One of the figures whose face had been scratched away appeared to be a young man standing slightly apart from the others.
His posture was different from the remaining people.
He wasn't looking directly at the camera.
Instead, he seemed to be watching someone outside the frame.
George enlarged the photograph and studied the figure carefully.
The resemblance wasn't enough to establish certainty, but it was strong enough to make the possibility impossible to dismiss.
Arthur had claimed that the seventh person had never been photographed, yet perhaps that wasn't exactly true.
Perhaps Samuel had been present when the photograph was taken and someone had deliberately removed his identity afterward.
Mara remembered the words written on the back: “We all agreed never to speak about what happened.”
If Samuel had witnessed something but refused to become part of the agreement, his face being erased suddenly made sense.
Someone had wanted to remove the evidence that he had been there.
The records revealed that Samuel's relationship with the Kant family had been much closer than his job title suggested.
Daniel trusted him with private errands and allowed him access to the basement, the locked areas of the house, and possibly the second property.
One document suggested that Daniel had even asked Samuel to investigate unusual activity around the underground passage.
That meant Samuel could have known about the secret meetings and the people moving between the properties long before the Kant family's disappearance.
George found a handwritten note from Daniel dated several weeks before October 17, 1998.
It contained only one sentence: “Samuel says he saw them again.”
Mara stared at the words. “Them?” she asked.
George shook his head. There was no explanation.
But if Samuel had repeatedly witnessed people entering the second house, he may have been one of the few people who understood what was happening beneath Blackwood Road.
The more they investigated, the more completely Samuel seemed to have vanished.
His name appeared in a payroll record dated October 1998, but afterward there were no employment records, no new address, and no confirmed activity.
His bank account showed no transactions beyond that period.
A vehicle registered to him was later discovered abandoned several miles from Blackwood Road, yet the police report treated it as an unrelated incident.
There was no missing-person investigation, no newspaper article, and no official explanation.
It was almost as though Samuel had simply ceased to exist.
Mara stared at the records. “They erased him too.”
George nodded, but then found something that made the disappearance more significant.
It was a handwritten note from Detective Thomas Reed: “Cross disappeared before Kant case was closed. Find him.”
Beneath it Reed had written another sentence: “If Cross is alive, he knows what happened.”
They eventually discovered Samuel's last known statement, contained in a letter addressed to Daniel Kant only days before the family's disappearance.
Samuel warned Daniel that people had been using the second house at night.
He had seen them entering through the underground passage and had recognized at least two of them.
But the final portion of the letter was far more disturbing.
“There is someone else. I never see him arrive. I only know he is there because everyone changes when he enters the room.”
Mara read the sentence twice. Samuel wasn't describing someone hiding in the shadows.
He was describing a person whose presence immediately changed the behavior of everyone around him.
Someone powerful enough that people became afraid simply because he entered the room.
George looked at Mara. “The seventh person.”
She nodded. But the letter contained one final warning: “If anything happens to me, don't look for me at Blackwood.”
Samuel seemed to understand that whatever was happening around the Kant family could eventually come for him as well.
George returned to the photograph of the six and examined the erased face again.
If Samuel had witnessed the events of October 17, he might have known exactly what happened at 2:17.
He could have seen who entered Blackwood House, who moved through the underground passage, and what happened to Daniel and Helen.
More importantly, he might have known the identity of the person standing behind the entire operation.
Mara remembered the mysterious note discovered in the metal box: “One died. Three disappeared. One survived.”
She wondered whether Samuel could have been the survivor.
If so, his disappearance might have been deliberately staged.
Perhaps he escaped. Perhaps someone helped him disappear.
Or perhaps, like David Vale, he had been taken somewhere beyond the reach of the authorities.
George couldn't determine which possibility was true, but one fact remained undeniable: Samuel's disappearance occurred at exactly the moment when his knowledge would have become dangerous.
Then Mara discovered one final photograph hidden inside the metal box.
It showed Samuel standing beside Rebecca.
She was much younger than she appeared in the 2003 photograph, and Samuel was smiling toward the camera while Rebecca looked past it with an expression that suggested fear or distraction.
On the back, someone had written: “He promised her he would come back.”
Beneath the sentence was a date: October 18, 1998.
Mara stared at it. Samuel hadn't merely witnessed what happened to Rebecca.
He had apparently promised her that he would return.
George immediately understood the significance.
If Samuel had survived the night of October 17, he may have tried to follow the people who took Rebecca through the underground passage.
He may have discovered where she had been taken.
And if he vanished immediately afterward, perhaps someone had stopped him before he could tell anyone what he had seen.
George placed the photograph beside the original image of the six.
The scratched-out face now had a name. Samuel Cross.
George looked at Mara. “The erased face may not be the person we're hunting,” he said.
Mara looked at the photograph of Samuel and shook her head slowly.
“No. He may be the person who can finally tell us who we're hunting.”
For the first time, the mystery seemed to have a human link that connected the Kant family, Rebecca, the underground passage, Detective Reed, and David Vale.
Samuel had been close enough to the Kant family to know their secrets, close enough to witness their final night, and important enough for someone to erase his existence afterward.
But before they could decide what to do next, a car slowly passed Blackwood Road outside the house.
George moved toward the window, but the vehicle disappeared behind the trees before he could see the driver.
Mara remained beside the table, staring at Samuel's photograph.
Then George noticed something on the dashboard as the car vanished from view.
A photograph. It was a photograph of Samuel Cross.
And whoever was driving had just wanted them to know that they were being watched.