Darkness peering (31 page)

The woman offered Rachel a plump, limp, moist hand for her to squeeze
and said, "I thought maybe you were one of them reporters." Her breath
smelled yeasty. "They come crawling' up the hill to harass us, talkin'
about how my boy run off with Nicole Castillo."

"Can we talk for a minute?"

"Sure. C'mon in."

The air inside the trailer was moist and eucalyptus-smelling. Two more
children were curled up on the sofa, tattered outfits revealing their
bony frames. The older boy seemed more vulnerable than the other two
children despite his flattop haircut and paste-on tattoos. He sat on
the plaid sofa with his knees drawn to his chest, and beside him, like
a frightened bird, was a little girl who cradled the sofa's musty
arm.

"Would you like some Lipton tea?" Mrs. Tedesco offered, and

Rachel declined, but then changed her mind. Mrs. Tedesco disappeared
into the tiny kitchenette. "My mother used to buy those pinwheel
cookies, remember? I love them cookies, but you can't find 'em
anywhere."

Rachel took a seat in a damp-smelling armchair beside the TV set and
became the sole focus of the children's attention. There were pictures
of the family on the walls in neat simple frames. Back issues of TV
Guide and People were stacked on the slender coffee table. Tall
plastic cups decorated with football figures littered every surface.
The potted geraniums in the window were mottled with fungus.

"My ex-husband does carpentry work," Mrs. Tedesco said, a clatter of
teakettle and china cups emanating from the kitchenette. "Case you
need a fix-it man. Here's his card." She dug inside the pocket of her
tent dress. "Oops. Had one somewhere. He's real good with his hands.
Made me a computer stand with a paper tray I'm studying computers at
the community college."

"You and your ex ... are you still closer" Rachel asked.

"Oh my, yes. He's good with yard work, all kindsa stuff. I'm his
manager. I get a percentage of whatever business I can dig up." She
let out a death-rattle cough. "Roger and Dinger have such a strong
bond. Dinger sure loves his dad."

"Where's Roger live?"

"Over there on Carpenter Street. Funny, huh? A carpenter who lives on
Carpenter Street."

Rachel took down Roger's address and phone number, then asked, "He
doesn't know the Castillos by any chance, does he?"

"Oh yeah. Did some yard work for them over the summer. Worked on
their pool."

"And you say you and Roger get along?"

"Like bread and butter." Mrs. Tedesco came out carrying two cups of
tea. She set Rachel's down on the coffee table in front of her, then
squeezed in between the pale, dirty children on the sofa. "So what can
I do for you, Detective?"

"I need to ask you about the day Dinger disappeared."

"Well, he went to school, then he went to work."

"Around four-thirty?"

She shrugged. "He's got, watchacallit... flexible hours."

"School lets out at two-thirty, doesn't it? Where was he between
two-thirty and four-thirty?"

"Over Chris's house. Chris lives with his stepdad four blocks that
away Those two together are three stooges short of a load."

"And he borrowed your car?"

"I let him use it, long as he gasses up."

"What time were you expecting him home that night?"

"Dinger can stay out until eleven o'clock on weeknights."

"How's he doing academically?"

"Okay, I guess. He's good at math and science, but he's lousy at
history, and he's failing English and social studies. He's a big kid,
but he ain't interested in sports. Go figure."

"Does he own a chemistry set?"

"What?"

"A chemistry set?"

"He used to have one when he was little."

"Have you ever known him to take drugs?"

Mrs. Tedesco let out an indignant grunt. "My kids don't do drugs.
Dinger can't even stomach secondhand smoke. He made me quit."

Rachel nodded and flipped through the pages of her notebook. "He took
off on his bicycle that night. Why didn't he take the car?"

"I was using it. Had to go to the clinic to have a DDT or ... you
know, that thing that scrapes your insides? An IUD or something? Kind
of like Roto-Rooter?"

"You mean, a DC?"

"Yeah, sucks your insides out." Mrs. Tedesco made a sour face and
rubbed her stomach. "You want a cookie? I got YumYums."

"No, thanks." Rachel smiled. "Mrs. Tedesco, can you think of

anyplace Dinger might have gone to be alone? Someplace private?"

"Oh gee. Lemme think. Him and Chris used to hang out in the barn that
got torn down last year ..." Her voice trailed off.

Now that her eyes had adjusted to the dark, Rachel could make out the
girl more clearly--she looked twelve or thirteen, with dirty-blond
hair, hazel eyes and the beginnings of acne on her cheeks.

"Do you think Dinger might've confided in one of your other
children?"

"Gee whiz." Mrs. Tedesco looked at her brood. "Holy cow, kids.
Who's holdin'out?"

"What are their names?"

"Sheba ... Duncan ... Franklin."

Rachel smiled at the girl. "Hello, Sheba."

"Hello." A mere whisper.

"Speak up, mouse fart," Duncan, the younger brother, sneered.

"Sheba," Rachel said, leaning forward, "did Dinger say where he was
going last Wednesday night? The night he and Nicole disappeared?"

Sheba's eyes went wide like her mother's. "Well, um--"

"We can't hear you, goose poop!"

"Mom," Sheba whined, "make him stop."

Mrs. Tedesco pinched Duncan's thigh. "Quit teasing your sister."

"Owl"

"Sheba," Rachel said, trying to remain focused, "your brother's missing
and I'm trying to find him. Nobody's going to get into trouble here,
isn't that right, Mrs. Tedesco?"

"Absolutely not."

"I need you to tell me the truth."

Sheba had a sweet smile. She drew her knees up to her chest like her
brothers were doing and her clothes made a rustling sound. "Dinger
said he and Nicole were gonna get married."

"Really?"

"Yeah, he said they were gonna have a baby."

A surprised Mrs. Tedesco shifted her bulk on the couch and her three
children bobbed like buoys in her wake.

"It's okay, Sheba," Rachel said as coolly as she could. "No one's
going to get into trouble. Your brother needs your help. Trust me, I
won't get mad at anything you say."

Sheba chewed thoughtfully on her lower lip, then continued: "He said if
it was a boy, he was gonna name it Brother, and if it was a girl, he
was gonna call it Mercedes."

Rachel smiled her encouragement. "Interesting choices."

"When I have a baby, I'm gonna call it Portia like in Julius Caesar, if
it's a girl. And if it's a boy, I'll call him Fabio."

Duncan made farting sounds. "Fabio! Oh Fabio! Sounds like something
you'd spit up in the morning."

"Trust me," Mrs. Tedesco interrupted, "I don't know nothin' about any
baby."

"That's perfectly all right," Rachel said. "Sheba, what else did he
tell you? I need you to think real hard."

Sheba thought for a moment, then glanced at her mother. "Just that I
wasn't supposed to tell."

"Don't worry, you're not in any trouble."

"And that if Nicole's parents found out, they'd kill him."

"Nobody's gonna kill anybody," Mrs. Tedesco said uneasily.

"And that Dinger and Nicole were gonna run away together and get
married."

"Did he say where they were going?"

Sheba stared mutely at her and shook her head.

"I heard him talkin' on the phone," Franklin piped up. "He was talk in
to some guy named Billy."

"Billy?" The hairs prickled the back of Rachel's neck.

"Or maybe it was Bobby." Franklin frowned. "Yeah, I think it was
Bobby."

"When was this?"

"Last week."

"Last week, before he disappeared?"

"I can't remember."

" "I can't remember," " his younger brother sneered, pressing his palm
to his mouth and making a farting sound.

"Cut it out." Mrs. Tedesco twisted Duncan's nose, Duncan screamed in
exaggerated pain, and his brother and sister giggled.

Rachel stood up. "Thanks, you've been very helpful."

"But you haven't finished your tea." Mrs. Tedesco followed her to the
door. "D'you think they ran away?" she asked in an urgent, hopeful
whisper. "D'you think they ran off to get married or something?"

"I don't know," Rachel said. "We're doing everything we can to locate
them."

As she turned to leave, the children on the couch cried out in unison,
"Savonara!"

RACHEL DRONE TO THE BLIND SCHOOL WITH THE INTENTION

of talking to Billy, but instead found herself parked behind Knoxwood
Hall, the department for head injuries. She was feeling achy and had
taken some cold medicine and now her head was groggy. It was a
typically frigid November afternoon, the temperature in the thirties.

The building's furnace pumped pockets of hot, dusty air into the drafty
lobby. A silver balloon floated at the far end of the receptionist's
desk. Anchored to a pencil sharpener, it delicately drifted with the
fickle air currents. Rachel glanced at the flowers on the countertop,
a sensual yellow bouquet that aggressively greeted people as they
walked in the door.

"Excuse me," she said, approaching the receptionist, "I'd like to
speak to Russell Crenshaw. I'm from the police department."

The elderly woman seemed slightly out of breath. "There's a flu going
around," she said, shoving the nozzle of a Vicks inhaler up her nose
and squeezing. She picked up the phone and dialed. "Hi, it's me.
Russell's got a visitor." She listened a beat, then cradled the
receiver. "He'll be here in a minute, have a seat."

Rachel picked up a brochure and took it to the sagging lobby sofa.
"Adult Services: Comprehensive Rehabilitation Programs for Head-Injured
Persons 18 Years & Older." According to the brochure, there were
approximately 700,000 head injuries in the United States each year.
The most frequent reason for visits to the emergency room was head
injury. Every year, more than 140,000 Americans died as a result, with
2,000 cases in a persistent vegetative state. The typical survivor of
severe head injury required five to ten years of intensive
rehabilitation, resulting in a cost of $8 million over a lifetime.

The sound of a rattling trash cart reached her ears before Porter
Powell came into view. She identified him by his nametag. He had a
babyish face and startled, sandy blond hair, and was taller than the
man accompanying him by several inches. He hummed to himself, a
tuneless groan, and shook his head so forcefully, his hearing aid fell
out and began to whistle, high pitched and insistent. The
man--Russell, she assumed--followed him at a short distance.

"Hide your food," Russell said. "Porter's coming."

"Spare me," the receptionist said. "I'm going for a cigarette."

She ducked into the ladies' room just as Porter Powell stopped short of
the silver helium balloon rising up from her desk. He ran his hands
through his thick, stand-up hair, then poked at the balloon, which
bobbed above the pencil sharpener.

"Ung!" he grunted, and clapped his hands.

"You wanted to see me?" Russell said.

Rachel stood up and they shook hands. "Detective Storrow."

"Billy's sister?"

"Yes. I have a few questions about the night Claire Castillo
disappeared."

"Porter, no," Russell said firmly. He was a thin, middle aged man in a
Star Trek T-shirt. "Porter's on a mission," he explained. "It's his
job. Tuesdays and Thursdays, he empties all the wastebaskets."

As if on cue, Porter rounded the receptionist's desk and found the
wastebasket. He grasped the sides of the metal barrel and scanned the
desk for stray scraps, his eyes as wide and blank as puddles after a
hard rain.

"That's fine, Porter," Russell said, tilting back on his heels.

Porter spotted a dust ball on the rug and stooped to retrieve it, his
back expanding as he bent over until it was as broad as a billboard.
He upended the wastebasket, shook it viciously into the trash cart and
fished around for stuck pieces of tape. He returned the wastebasket to
its place beneath the receptionist's desk, all the while making
breathy, guttural sounds at the back of his throat.

"Thank you, Mr. Powell. Good job."

Porter didn't respond. Instead he fingered the balloon's string, and
the balloon hopped anxiously up and down.

"Porter," Russell warned.

Obediently, he returned to the cart where he throttled the full trash
bag, then secured it with a twistie.

"His big thing is neatness," Russell explained. "I have to stop him
from carrying too many half-filled trash bags out to the sidewalk in
front of the building. He's very thorough, I'll give you that."

"So I see," Rachel said with a smile.

"His one big vice is running water. He likes to go upstairs and play
with the bathroom faucets. He'd run water all day long if we let him.
Isn't that right, Mr. Powell? So you wanted to know ... ?"

"Was there anything unusual about Billy's appearance the night Claire
disappeared, when he brought Porter back?"

"Hm." Russell frowned. If he thought there was anything odd about her
line of questioning, he didn't let on. "As far as I remember, no.
Billy brought him back around nine, just like always."

"Did you two speak?"

'"Hey, man, how's it going?" Stuff like that. "Cold out?" I probably
asked him how Porter was, you know... what'd he get himself into this
time?"

"Was there anything unusual about Porter's behavior that night?"

He squinted at her. "What d'you mean?"

"Was he more agitated than usual?"

"Porter's always agitated. A year ago, he was a normal teenage boy,
headed for college on a football scholarship; then one night, he and
his buddies decide to go drinking and driving, right? Big mistake.
Porter's the lucky one, if you can believe it. Head trauma impact.
He's lost a lot of cognitive abilities--attention, memory, reaction
time, higher-level reasoning. He's got a constellation of behavior
problems. Hyperactivity, irritability, impulsivity ..."