Secrets and Revelations (Bellingwood #4) (25 page)

"Yep. The trombone would be cool."

Henry stepped back in, taking possession of her waist again. "Do you boys want to walk over to the carnival with us? I'm taking my girl for a trip on the Ferris wheel."

A chorus of "Oooohhh, his girlfriend!" came from the boys and he grinned at them. "Don't knock it until you try it."

The next chorus sounded a little different with more of an emphasis on "ewwww."

When they arrived at the gate, Henry purchased a large number of ride tickets and then glanced around the small group of boys, counting off fifteen for each of them. "This should get you all started on the evening, don't you think?"

"Really?" Andrew said. "Our moms gave us some money."

"Moms never give you enough for a place like this. Have a good time."

They took off running for the nearest ride and Polly smiled up at him. "You're a sweetheart."

"Not really," he laughed. "If I didn't get rid of them, they were going to follow us around all evening. Now, how about we start with a corndog and something to drink."

"The corndog sounds great and honestly, I just want a bottle of water to start. I'm parched."

"Blew it all out during the concert, did you?"

"Whatever." They stopped in front of a corn dog vendor and he ordered two and two bottles of water.

"Ketchup? Mustard?" he asked.

She looked at her hands and tried to imagine how she was going to manage one more thing. "Okay
, ketchup."

He squirted some on top of her corndog and her eyes grew big.

"Enough! You just put it right on there!"

"I sure did. Enjoy." He winked at her and with his shoulder nudged her out of the way.

"What do you want to ride first?"

"Ride? I will ride the Ferris wheel with you, but are you going to make me ride any of those other vomit machines?"

"Oh Polly, I love you. No, you don't have to ride any of those. You've had enough excitement and terror for one night. Let's get in line."

The Ferris wheel was turning when they arrived and there were ten or twelve people in front of them, waiting. A few kids, but mostly couples. The sun was
going down in the west and Polly snickered.

"What?" Henry asked.

"They think it will be romantic," she laughed.

"It will be and don't you forget it. Eat your corndog. I don't want you getting all romantic at the top and then dropping it on someone's head."

She pointed to a sign that read "No food or drink on rides."

"Like I said, eat your corndog."

Polly took another bite. She didn't think she'd eaten one of these since she left Iowa to go to college. It was heavenly.

"Can I have another one of these?" as she wadded up the paper wrapper.

"Of course. You don't want to try anything else?"

"I want another one of these. They're awesome."

"We'll do it. Just a second, I'll be right back." He took her paper and bottle of water and walked over to the ride operator.

"Hey Polly!" she heard and turned around.

"Hi!" She'd already forgotten the woman's name who delivered her mail and felt awful. "Did you enjoy playing tonight?"

"I did. How about you? Will you play for the Labor Day concert?"

"Of course. Jeff would have my head if I quit now. I was scared out of my mind, but once we got going, it was a lot of fun."

"Are you going up
in that?" the woman pointed to the Ferris wheel, which was beginning to slow down.

"It's the only ride I'll let Henry get me on tonight, so I suspect we'll be here a couple of times," Polly laughed.

"Have fun! I'll see you Sunday." The woman walked off with her arm linked through her husband's and Polly shook her head.

"I'm a terrible person," she muttered. "Terrible!"

"Why?" Henry asked.

"Because I can't remember her name."

"Oh, that's Lisa and Paul Bradford. He runs the hardware store downtown."

"Right! She delivers my mail. I had to ask her name last week and feel terrible that I can never remember things like that."

"You'll get there, stop worrying." He kissed her on the forehead. "You're cute when you beat yourself up."

It was their turn to get on the ride. Henry politely helped her into the car, sat down beside her and waited as the operator checked the bar in front of them."

"Are you ready for this?" he asked.

She snuggled into him until he put his arm around her shoulders. "I am now. It's a pretty night, isn't it?"

"Not as pretty as my girl."

They went up and around and she looked out over Bellingwood. The streets downtown were filled with cars and the lights at Sycamore House were coming up. This was a perfect way to enjoy the evening. They went down and then up again.

"Look, there's Andrew and his friends," she pointed. They were buying candy at one of the stands. "He's going to be so sick."

"It's what boys do," Henry said. "A couple of years ago …"

"I know, I know, they told me all about it. I don't want to think about it," she interrupted.

He chuckled and squeezed her shoulder. "This is kind of romantic."

Polly kissed his cheek. "I love you, Henry Sturtz."

The ride lurched and came to a stop. Polly's heart felt like it stopped too, but then she looked at Henry and saw a wicked grin on his face. "How much did you pay him?" she asked.

"I'm not telling, but it is part of the deal. Now look around and enjoy yourself. You don't get to see this side of Bellingwood very often."

Polly looked out and leaned a little bit to see different parts of town. Then, something caught her eye.

"Henry, look." she said, pointing down toward the parking lot just north of Sycamore House.

"What is it?"

"It's Jaleel and Mickey. It has to be."

"What makes you think that?"

"I've seen the other boys here and they’re with their host families. Those two are on their own."

They watched as the two boys darted in and out around the buildings and then r
un across the road to her home.

"What are they doing?" she asked.

"I don't know." He checked his watch. "We've got a little more time up here. Just keep watching."

The boys ran around the back of Sycamore House and disappeared on the other side of the building.

"You don't think they are living in my barn, do you?"

"No, that doesn't make sense. There's been too much activity down there and they couldn't keep your horses quiet like Eliseo did when he moved in."

"Do you think they're camping out in the woods back there?"

"I don't know. Do you think you should call Aaron?"

Polly pulled her phone out and laughed. All four bars were present on her phone. "I like the signal up here."

The Ferris wheel lurched again and they began to move. She decided to wait until they were on the ground to make the call.

"We might have to leave, but I still want popcorn and another corn dog."

They walked past the operator, who handed Henry the two bottles of water.

"You saved those? Thanks!"

"For the money I gave him, he should have kept them on ice. I thought we'd have time to ride again. I was going to kiss you in the stars, but it looks like that will have to wait."

Polly stepped to the side of the traffic flow and dialed her phone.

"Polly Giller, tell me it's not so."

"It's not so, but I'm pretty sure I just saw those two boys from Chicago at Sycamore House. Henry and I are headed over there now." She saw that Henry was talking on his phone. "I think he's reaching out to Roy Dunston, so I suspect he'll be there with us."

"I'm on my way."

Polly waited for Henry to end his call. "Aaron's going to meet us there. Were you talking to Roy?"

"He's coming over to the corn dog stand." Henry shoved a twenty dollar bill in her hand.

"What's this for?"

"Get us three corn dogs and some popcorn for yourself. I'll bring the truck up and the three of us can ride back to Sycamore House. Meet me at the front when you've found Roy and got your food."

He kissed her cheek and threaded his way through the crowd. Polly got her bearings and found the corn dogs. She ordered eight of them and asked him for a bag. If those boys were like any normal boy, they would like this as much as she did. The popcorn stand was a few feet away and she put four bags of popcorn into the sack she'd received.

"Polly?"

"Hi Roy. You're here. Henry will meet us at the entrance with his truck."

"I can't believe you saw them."

"Henry can't either. He was trying to be romantic and sweet and I was finding lost boys."

Roy chuckled. "I hope they're okay. I'm so worried about them."

"From up high, they looked just fine. They were both moving around normally and didn't look hurt. We'll know in just a bit. How are the rest of your boys doing?"

"I'm a little worried that they're going to keep their host families up all night. Your friend, Sylvie, served us a terrific supper and I know they're eating too much junk food here at the carnival. But, none of them has ever experienced anything like this and they are going to ride every ride they can and play every carnival game they can play.
They're having a great week."

"Even with Jaleel and Mickey gone? Has that upset them?"

She opened the back passenger door of Henry's truck to get in. "Can you hold this?" she asked.

He realized that she was going to have to pull herself up and into the truck and offered her a hand after taking the bag. She held her hand out to take the bag back and waited while he got in the front seat.

"The kids have heard rumors about Jaleel and Mickey and they don't know what to think, but I believe they trust I will do everything I can to help them out."

"And none of them have heard anything at all?"

"Nothing. I think if they had, I would have heard by now. We're leaving on Tuesday and they'd want the boys to have a ride back to Chicago if nothing else."

Henry pulled
into Polly’s driveway.

"We're going to walk through the trees around the creek, Polly. We'll let you know if we find them. Why don't you go on upstairs?" Henry said.

She pursed her lips. "Am I lame? Have I suddenly become an invalid? These are my woods and I probably know them better than either of you. I will, however, get Obiwan. He knows them better than me."

Roy bit his upper lip to keep from laughing. "Should we wait for her?" he asked Henry.

"I think so. I was being gentlemanly and I guess that meant I was being stupid."

Polly had the garage door open and ran inside. She set the bag of food on Andrew's desk and opened the door to her apartment. Obiwan was waiting at the top of the steps and she called him down. Snapping the leash on his collar, they went back out.
The sun was getting lower on the horizon and there wasn't much natural light left.

"Come on, Obiwan. We're going for a walk. Let's see what you sniff up out here by the creek."

Roy and Henry followed her down to the creek and they split up. Roy and Henry went north to the road and Polly and Obiwan walked south toward the pasture.

Standing
at the northwest corner of the pasture, they were frustrated because the kids were nowhere to be found.

"I know I saw them run behind the building," Polly said. "I know it was them!"

Roy sighed, "There probably aren't many pairs of young African-American boys in Bellingwood this evening and the rest of my kids were all accounted for. If you saw them, I'm sure it was Jaleel and Mickey. It doesn’t surprise me at all that they might return here."

"Henry, tell me I'm not crazy," she begged.

"No, I saw them too, but I can't imagine where they've gone."

"I suppose they could have crossed the road and followed the creek on down back there when they heard us coming." Polly shook her head. "I'm sorry, Roy. I don't know what else to do."

"We know they're in the area. Let's talk to the Sheriff when he gets here and find out how far he wants to search."

They walked around to the front of Sycamore House and went in the front door. Polly sat down on the first bench, pushing Obiwan's bottom to the floor in front of her.

"That's a good boy," she said.

Henry sat beside her and Roy sat down on a bench across from them.

"Why do you suppose they came back here?" Henry asked.

"They're in completely unfamiliar surroundings. This is a big enough facility they can probably find places to hide
. Even though they only spent a little bit of time here, it's connected to me and the other boys. They're good kids. I wouldn't doubt that they want us to find them."

He stood up, "Should we check the barn?"

Polly shook her head. "If they were in the barn, the horses would have let us know. They don't like strangers in their space. We can check it, but I can almost guarantee they aren't there."

"It's a perfect place to hide, though."

"You're right, it is. People have tried to hide there before. But, even when I didn't realize that was what the horses were telling me, they tried to alert me to the presence of strangers."

He sat back down.

"Roy, when Sheriff Merritt gets here, I'll go down with Henry. If they're in the barn, we'll find them."

"Thanks, Polly."

She heard tires crunching on the gravel and watched until Aaron Merritt came in the front door.

"I thought you'd have them by now," he said.

"We searched the trees by the creek and there was no sign of them," Henry told Aaron. "No sign at all."

"I can bring some of my guys in and go through back there."

"You can, but we'd have seen some sign of them if they were staying back there, don't you think?"

"Can we take a look through the barn, Polly?"

"Sure. I told Roy we'd check that after you got here."

"What about your basement here. The place was open today, wasn't it?"

"I didn't think about that," Polly said. She pressed some buttons on her phone and the lights leading down into the basement came on. "Henry and I will take the barn. We'll be right back."

They left the house by the side door and walked through the covered walkway, then down to the barn. Polly opened the door and turned the lights on. Obiwan pulled her in, sniffing at the stall doors.

"Is everyone in good shape tonight?" she asked. "I didn't get a chance to tell you how great you were this morning."

All four horses put their heads over their stall doors to see what was going on at this hour. None of them acted as if there were anything out of the ordinary.

"I'm going to check the haymow. Can you turn the lights on for me?"

Polly flipped them on from her phone and he went up the ladder. She checked the empty stalls and the tack and feed room and found nothing.

When Henry came back down, he said, "This place is buttoned up pretty tight at night, isn't it? Those kids wouldn't be able to come in without someone raising a ruckus."

"What did you say?" Polly asked.

"They couldn't come in without a horse making noise?"

"No, you used the words buttoned up. That's what you said the other day about the addition. That's where those boys are hiding. No one has been in there since Wednesday night!"

She made sure the lights were all off and shut the door, then ran for Sycamore House with Obiwan chasing after her. Henry followed and stopped when they got to the side door. The doors leading into the addition weren't locked.

Henry said, "You go get the Sheriff and Roy. I'll stay here."

She flung the side door open and called out, "Aaron? Roy?"

They came around the corner.

"What's up, Polly? Did you find something? They weren't downstairs."

"They have to be in the addition. It's been empty since Wednesday night when Henry shut down construction for the festivities.
There aren't any locks on the interior doors yet, so they'd have access to all of the rooms and bathrooms and for that matter, at night they'd have access to the main kitchen."

"Let's check it out," Aaron said.

Henry opened the door into the addition and Aaron flicked on his flashlight. They hadn't turned on any electricity to the rooms out here yet, so it was pitch black, except for the street lights shining through the windows.

"Jaleel? Mickey? Are you boys in here?" Roy called. "It's cool. You just need to come out and talk to us. I've been worried sick about you."

They heard nothing and moved down the hallway. "Jaleel? Mickey? Please come out and talk to me. I need to know that you are okay."

There was scuffling and Polly heard feet running down the steps. They attempted to get through the doors to the walkway, but Henry was still standing there and stopped them, "Whoa, boys. It's over. You can stop running now."

Roy dashed to their sides and pulled both boys into an embrace.

"I'm so glad to know that you are alive. I thought something awful had happened to you."

Jaleel burst into tears and buried his face in Roy's shoulder. It didn't take long for Mickey to follow suit. He held them for several moments.

"Oh boys," he said. "I don't know what's been going on, but we have to work this out. You're with me now and you're safe."

Sheriff Merritt finally stepped forward and said, "Let's take this inside to the conference room. I assume you will act as their guardian and lawyer if it becomes necessary?"

"Of course I will," Roy said. "Of course I will. Come on boys. Have you had anything to eat tonight?"

Jaleel rubbed his eyes and shook his head no.

Mickey said, "We had some food, but it run out and we didn't have no more money."

"Any more money," Roy corrected and then chuckled to himself. "Sorry. Habit."

"I've got corn dogs and popcorn in the back room, but let me see if I can scare something up that would be better for empty stomachs than that," Polly said. "Henry, would you help me in the kitchen?"

"Could we use your conference room, Polly?"

"Use any room you like," she responded. She swiped her phone. "All the rooms down here are unlocked now. We'll make up some supper and be back in a bit."

She heard him say to Roy, "I'm not going to place these boys under arrest or anything until we have the full story. I'd like you to find out what you can before we go any further. Is that okay with you?"

"Thanks, Sheriff. I appreciate it."

"But, unless you tell me you want me to leave, which will make it official, I would like to sit in on your conversation."

Polly and Henry turned the corner toward the kitchen.

"Oh, damn, Henry. Those poor boys couldn't have killed that woman, could they?"

"I hope not. I think if they'd done something that stupid, they wouldn't have come back here."

"I don't know what to think."

"I feel awful for Roy. He completely missed his reunion in Des Moines this week and has been spending every day with the rest of the boys. I think he's terrified that someone else will bolt and run."

"Open the refrigerator and see if Sylvie packed up leftovers from dinner. She's usually pretty good about that. I'm going to take Obiwan upstairs and then grab the bag of corndogs and popcorn."

She opened the door that led upstairs to her apartment and unsnapped Obiwan's leash. He bounded up the steps and then stood at the top waiting for her.

"I'll be back later. You go sleep."

Polly shut the door, snagged the bag from Andrew's desk and went back into the kitchen. She found Henry staring at a stack of containers.

"There's a lot of food. How much should we fix?"

She took a breath, ripped the bag open and took out a corn dog. "I'm having this while I think," she laughed. "Is there a bottle of ketchup in there?"

"You're a strange woman, Polly." He opened the refrigerator again and shifted some items and pulled a ketchup container from the back.

"That's why you love me and don't you forget it."

She squeezed ketchup on a corner of the ripped paper bag, swirled the corn dog in it and jammed it in her mouth while she pulled dishes out of the pantry cupboards.

"Pr prcn hr," she said.

"What did you say?"

She spun around and he took the corn dog out of her mouth.

"Pour the popcorn in here," as she pointed to a large bowl, then grabbed the corn dog, smeared it in the ketchup again and stuck it back in her mouth. She flipped open a couple of the containers and mumbled something else. When Henry didn't respond, she took the corn dog back out and said, "Would you hand me two of the plates?"

"Uh huh. That's exactly what I heard you say."

"Bite me."

He leaned in to kiss her and nibbled her bottom lip. "I obey, ma'am."

"Oh stop it, you nut. Plates, please."

He held out two plates while she filled them with mashed potatoes and corn Sylvie had sliced off the cob from Jason's party. It didn't seem possible that was only last night. She scooped out some macaroni and cheese and then added two pieces of chicken to each plate. First one, then the other went into the microwave until Polly determined they were finished.

Sylvie always had some napkin wrapped silverware in the drawer, so Polly grabbed two sets, lay them on top of the popcorn bowl, put two of the corn dogs on each plate and said, "That should feed them, don't you think?"

"They aren't going to be able to eat
all of that," he laughed.

She picked up the two plates and said, "Could you get the popcorn and the ketchup and I'll bet you five dollars at least one of them completely clears his plate. Ten if they both do."

"You're on," he said. "Neither of them will be able to eat all of this."

"Whatever, loser," she taunted and sashayed into the hall in front of him.

When they got to the office, she peered into the open door of the conference room. "Can we come in?"

Roy took a deep breath and said, "Come on in, guys. I suspect the boys are very hungry by now. They've been telling us a pretty amazing story."

Polly looked at his face to see if she could read anything, yet he was stoic.

"A story?" she asked. "As in, fiction?"

Roy stood up. "I need something to drink. Sheriff?"

"I could use some water myself."

The two of them got up and walked out, leaving Polly and Henry alone with the two boys. There had been more tears, as evidenced by the used tissues on the table in front of the boys.

"Well, boys, it looks like you get a reprieve. Ho
w about some supper? My friend’s son had a birthday yesterday and she cooked up all sorts of wonderful food. Those corn dogs, though? They came from the carnival and are about my favorite fair food in the world."

She put a plate down in front of each of them and then handed them each a set of silverware from the popcorn bowl.

"Henry tells me he doesn't think you guys can eat all of that food. I told him he was nuts. Now here's the deal, he bet me five dollars each that you couldn't. If you both clean your plates, I'll give you the five dollars. Can you make a liar out of him?"