A Child Is Missing (3 page)

Fran sat in the dark, his engine still going, as he stared into the oasis of light his high beams dug out of the blackness. He could feel his heart beating faster. The thirst was rising up in his throat. Our Father, who art in heaven.

He switched his lights onto low beam and drove slowly along the narrow driveway. When he reached the end of the building, he saw that the driveway turned sharply, forming a small parking lot at the rear.

Fran Spicer pulled behind the rear of the building, turned off the lights, cut the engine. He was alone in pitch-darkness. It was good that he was out of sight from the road. For God's sake, if he did decide to have something before he got to Long Creek, he had to be out of sight of any cop.

Oh, Jesus. Our Father, who art in heaven.

Fran reached for the bag that held the schnapps and the six-pack. His fingers clawed at the paper, found the schnapps bottle. Could he still change his mind? Our Father…

Four

“No!” The boy's outburst came from pure anguish.

The man with him chuckled sadistically.

“No, don't!” the boy pleaded.

Another chuckle, softened only a little by compassion.

“No, no, no!” The boy was getting worse by the second.

His father only laughed. “What did I tell you, Brendan. Every time he tries to scramble, he gets sacked.”

Will Shafer sipped his beer and nibbled at his second slice of mincemeat pie. The neighbors who had come for dinner were gone. Will was thoroughly enjoying himself, eating leftovers and watching a football game on the big-screen TV in the basement rec room.

“No!”

“Easy, son. You almost knocked your sandwich on the floor.” Will was pleased: His son, soon to be twelve, wasn't much of an athlete, especially compared with his youngster sister, Cass, but at least the boy was learning to enjoy some sports.

“Third and fifteen,” the boy complained. “Oh, man.…”

“Brendan, they need a quarterback with a couple of good legs. What's his name's too old.”

“He's not
that
old. Is he? There! Run! See!”

“Fourth and nine. Thirty-three is old for a quarterback.”

“That's not as old as you.”

“Not by a long shot. But it's old for a quarterback. His future is behind him.”

“What's that mean?”

“It means I feel like another beer.”

The rec room phone rang but stopped after one ring. That meant Karen had answered it upstairs.

“Will!” Karen shouted.

Will Shafer turned down the TV and picked up the phone. Please, God, don't let it be Lyle Glanford. He had managed to forget all about the paper today. Shafer's relationship with the
Bessemer Gazette
's publisher had been tense lately.

“Will, it's Tom Ryan. Look, I'm sorry to bother you at home. It's about Fran Spicer.”

Damn, Will thought. Fran must have fallen off the wagon again, with a crash. “What is it, Ry?”

“He's hurt real bad, Will. He's in the hospital.”

“What happened?”

“Auto accident, Will.” Nervous pause. “He was on assignment.”

“On assignment? I thought he was taking a long Thanksgiving weekend.”

“He was, originally. But I needed, I mean, Mr. Glanford came up to me and…”

“Just tell me what happened, Ry. What's Fran's condition?”

“Critical, Will. He's in intensive care, so he's automatically listed as critical. But it sounds really serious.”

“Damn. He's in Bessemer General?”

“Uh, no. He's over in Hill County, actually.”

“Hill County? On assignment?” Now Will was flabbergasted. “Fill me in, Ry.”

Will stuck a finger into one ear to blot out his son's groans and cushion poundings, and pressed the receiver hard to the other ear. Patiently, Will listened to Tom Ryan's account, which was heavy on what the publisher had decreed, or what Tom Ryan thought he had decreed. Ryan even used one of the publisher's favorite verbs,
down-hold.

“Jeez, Will. I had to send him. There was no one else.”

“Okay, Ry. Okay. We'll just have to make sure he's treated okay.”

“He's in Long Creek Regional, Will.”

“All right. Someone will have to…” Will paused, shook his head. “I mean, I'll make a call and see that he has what he needs. Do we know anything about what happened?”

“Took a curve too fast, Will. Sideswiped another car. The driver, a young woman, she was banged up a little. Fran, uh, it seems he was drinking, Will. They found booze in the car.”

Will felt very sad. “Okay, Ry. Thanks for calling. I'll get in touch with the hospital to see that Fran has what he needs.”

“Uh, Will. One more thing. Should we send flowers?”

Will smiled, but ruefully. “Sure, Ry. I'll approve the bill myself.”

Shafer hung up, slumped in his chair. He was all but oblivious to the sounds of the game. He was sad over Fran Spicer and angry at Tom Ryan for sending him to Hill County. The sad truth was that Fran Spicer was the worst-possible choice for such an assignment. A major crime story, especially one that was still developing, required a reporter of resourcefulness and energy and good judgment. Fran had had all those qualities, once.

“But that was a lot of drinks ago,” Will said softly.

“What?”

“Nothing, son. Just talking to myself.”

The phone rang again. Will went to the foot of the stairs and hollered up. “Karen, can you please get that? I'm not here, okay? I don't feel like talking to anyone right now.”

After a few minutes, Karen called down and said she needed to talk to him. Will went up to the kitchen.

“That was Lyle Glanford,” she said. “Something about Fran Spicer being hurt real bad?”

“Yes, that's what the first call was about. He was in a wreck over near Long Creek. A bad one.”

“Oh, I'm sorry. The publisher wanted to be sure you knew about it. He said you should call him if you had any questions about what he wanted you to do.”

“Damn.” Will knew what that meant, and what he had to do. He dialed the publisher's home number.

“Will?” the publisher said.

“Lyle, I just heard about Fran. Terrible.”

“Yes, it is. What the hell did Ry have in mind, sending him over there?”

A voice in Will wanted to say, Why don't you ask him? He got his job by kissing your ass.

“Will?”

“I'm sure Ry had to make a spur-of-the-moment decision, Lyle.”

“Hmph. Well, it's done. Will, we need someone over there to look after him.”

Ah yes, Will thought. The paternalistic publisher. And who might that “someone” be?

“Will, we just have to.…”

“I understand, Lyle.” Will said good-bye and hung up.

Will's job had not been secure lately (at least that was the feeling he had been getting), partly for reasons beyond his control. He knew he might have to leave Bessemer someday, and he knew in his heart that he could cut it in a bigger city, but he wasn't ready to do it now. And he certainly wasn't ready to quit the
Gazette.
There were a lot of reasons; two of the simplest were the new furnace and the braces on his daughter's teeth. Damn, he wouldn't get to say good-bye to her, because she was at a friend's house.

Will went upstairs and packed an overnight bag. An hour later, he was on the highway, heading toward Long Creek. He was on edge, probably from the coffee Karen had made him just before he left. She insisted that he needed a jolt to minimize the danger of falling asleep at the wheel after too much to eat and two or three beers.

His wife was right, Will realized as he drove into the night. Ruefully, he thought that Long Creek had caused him plenty of trouble even before this latest, unexpected event. Long Creek had been a target of several on-again, off-again circulation drives by Will's paper.

Will had long argued that the
Bessemer Gazette
could make real gains in and around Long Creek. The cities nearest to Long Creek were Binghamton and Elmira, and neither paper in those communities had done much to court Long Creek readers. Perhaps that was because both Elmira and Binghamton looked down on Long Creek. Elmira and Binghamton were relatively prosperous, having more or less made the change from economies based on heavy industry to ones founded on services and high-tech products.

Long Creek had never made that adjustment. Some of it was due to a lack of political leadership, and some of it may have had to do with Long Creek's location: stuck in a rocky valley, with not that many good roads in or out in any direction (decades before, the city fathers had staked Long Creek's future on rail transport), and those roads apt to be snowed in from December through March.

In any event, New York State's other major papers had done precious little in Long Creek, whose own community paper was parochial and pathetically boosterish. Time and again, Will had argued with the
Gazette
's publisher that the paper might as well try to win some Long Creek readers; after all, the Albany papers weren't, and neither were the Rochester papers.

Besides, Will had argued, a dying city like Long Creek, with aging politicians and labor leaders (often, they were the same) and probably more than a little corruption, was a wonderful opportunity for three or four aggressive reporters. The
Gazette
might win some prizes as well as readers.

Depending on his mood and the latest balance sheet, the
Gazette
's publisher, Lyle Glanford, was more or less persuaded by Will's arguments. Unfortunately, building circulation in an area required patience and commitment, not a stop-and-start effort, and the
Gazette
had never stationed any reporters in Long Creek full-time.

When the
Bessemer Gazette
showed signs of doing well in Long Creek, the publisher seemed to think the circulation had been his idea. “And when things go lousy, it was all my idea,” Will said aloud. “What could be fairer than that?”

Five

He paused on the hill to look back at the tracks left by his snowshoes and the sled bearing the Christmas tree. His legs were pleasantly warm from the uphill trek, and the air tasted cold and pure. All around him, it was still, and the sun was setting through a gap in the pines over the ridge that lay ahead of him.

Usually, the sunset at this time of year was a faded peach; this evening, there was more orange in it, and he wondered why. He would tell Jo about it. Maybe she was watching the sunset right now. He hoped so; it would be almost gone by the time he got to the cabin.

Happiness filled his chest when he thought of the cabin. Jo would have the fire going just right (she built better fires than he did), and she had been baking bread when he left to find a tree. He had been gone longer than he'd expected, and the bread would be done by now. Just the thought of it made him smile so broadly that the frost on his beard and mustache crinkled. Could there be a better night to eat warm bread by a warm fire? He would sip whiskey (standing in the cold, he could almost smell it, feel it in his throat), would cut some of Jo's bread into pieces to dip in the beef stew that had been simmering all day. Later, he would gently rub Jo's belly, where the baby was growing. They would name it Jason; it would be a boy. He knew it.

He walked again, down a hill through thicker woods. There was a small stream at the bottom, and he would have to find a narrow place to cross before starting up the last rise, to the top of the ridge. From there, he would be able to see the cabin.

It was darker next to the stream, and colder. He held his breath for a moment, listening to the low gurgle of the water over stones beneath the snow and ice. He breathed again, deeply and slowly.

Time to start up the rise. He had promised Jo he would be back while there was still daylight. He looked toward the top of the rise, squinting through the trees.

Flashes of orange along the top of the rise. The orange shimmered and danced. Not the sunset, not the sunset.

Terror filled his heart. He splashed through the stream, one snowshoe breaking through the crust, knife-cold water at his ankle. He scrambled up the rise as fast as he could. The footing was worse in the cold dark of the trees, the snow brittle, cracking under him. He looked toward the top; the orange still flashed. He had to get to where he could see.

A snowshoe caught on a buried branch, and he pitched forward into the snow. He let go of the sled with the Christmas tree, and it slid back down the hill. He got up, stumbled again, and scrambled through the trees. Up, up toward the top of the rise, praying that he wouldn't fall. Got to get to the top, to see, to see.

And then he was standing on the top of the rise, looking across the gently sloping meadow, his eyes telling him what he had known. The orange was from the cabin burning. The color glistened on the snow, brighter now than the dying sun.

Where was Jo? Where was their dog? Through tears, he stared at the flames and smoke. Smoke, there was so much smoke. She must be safe where he couldn't see, behind the smoke. He screamed as loudly as he could, tried to make a sound like Jo's name, but all that came out of his throat was a scream. But she must be able to hear him, must know he was watching. Where was she?

God, don't let this be. Could he still bargain with God? Please, don't take Jo and the dog both. Please.

He ran again, his snowshoes bursting through the crust as he went down the slope toward the flames. He screamed as he tripped and fell. He had to get up, had to get up so he could see. If he kept watching, Jo would appear, waving to him. The dog would be with her. She and the dog could not be in the flames, could not be.

He screamed as loudly as he could, trying to say Jo's name.

In the dark, the big dog snarled, barked, then growled in bewilderment. The hermit sat up in bed, eyes wide, until he could make out the blue-black rectangle of the window against the darkness. The dog snorted, perhaps annoyed with him for disturbing its sleep again.