The Train (7 page)

    Going back to sleep was easier said than done. Thoughts of Frog, unbidden, crawled furtively into her mind… first on the edges of it and then, when she was unable to resist, into the middle of it, taking up every inch of her thinking space. Because…

    Because where was he? If he'd been in his coffin where he belonged, there wouldn't have been room for her.

    The idea that someone might actually have moved Frog's remains made her physically ill.

    What kind of person would do such a ghastly, disgusting, horrific thing?

    Well, then, where was he?

    Hannah was reminded of her mother's standard comment whenever Hannah misplaced something: a sneaker, her locker key, a favorite sweater… "Well," her mother always said, "it couldn't get up and walk away."

    Neither could Frog. Not now. Not ever again.

    Unless…

    The thought came into Hannah's mind like a snake slithering through deep grass, arching its narrow head to snap, sending its venom coursing through her veins. The stunning, incredible thought stabbed her, venom-like, with a sharp and wicked pain.

    No - impossible! How could she even think such a thing?

    But…

    Frog had burned to death. How many times on television had someone supposedly burned to death in a car or plane crash and then turned up alive later? Happened all the time, didn't it? It always turned out that someone else had died in the character's place and no one suspected.

    Could someone other than Frog have died in that crash?

    Who? A hitchhiker? Had Frog stopped to pick up someone that night - some innocent person wandering the highways - just before the car crashed? Had Frog himself escaped a split second before the wreck burst into flames? No one would have checked the identity of the driver. No dental records would have been examined. The police would have assumed that, of course, it was Frog driving the car. They had no reason to think anything else.

    Hannah bit her lower lip. No. It couldn't be. It was too bizarre. It was Frog's car that had crashed and burned. Frog would have been driving it, so Frog would have died… no question about it.

    But if that were true… Frog would have been in the coffin. And he wasn't. Hannah was.

    He's here, she thought clearly, her head snappingup so suddenly she smacked it against the upper berth. He's here. Somewhere. And he's… he's angry.

    We shouldn't have been so mean to him, she thought, her heart slamming so wildly against her chest she expected Kerry to lean over the upper bunk and cry, "What's that horrible noise?"

    But Kerry slept on.

    Frog is out to punish us, Hannah thought with sickening conviction. Those stories we all told in the Cafe… they were awful. Cruel. He's not going to let us get away with that.

    But Hannah, the nasty little voice reminded her slyly, You didn't tell a story. You were the only one who made no confession. So why would Frog be out to punish you?

    For that matter, an even bigger question was, Why would he want to hurt Lolly? Lolly wasn't part of Hannah's group. She was Frog's own girlfriend.

    I know what we all did to Frog, Hannah thought. But what was it that Lolly did to make him angry enough to hurt her?

    A sharp rap on the door interrupted Hannah's thoughts.

    "Time to get up, girls!" Ms. Quick's voice called. "Denver in an hour." Then, "Hannah? Are you awake? How are you feeling?"

    "I'm okay," Hannah answered, forcing a casual tone of voice. Why worry Ms. Quick? She was frantic enough already.

    Besides, Hannah could just imagine the look on the teacher's face if she knew Hannah thought Frogwas alive. The woman would have a stroke and the whole trip would be cancelled.

    Maybe that wouldn't be such a bad idea.

    Hannah didn't say anything about Frog being alive to Kerry, either. What if Kerry thought Hannah had freaked out completely because of last night? She couldn't stand the thought of Kerry looking at her as if she had left her mind behind in that coffin.

    Besides, saying it aloud would make it so.. _ real. And now that it was daylight, now that she was washing her face and combing her hair and slipping into a pair of jeans and a red long-sleeved sweatshirt, now that Kerry was up and chattering about how "totally starving" she was, thoughts of Frog being alive seemed Twilight Zone-ish.

    An hour later, she had convinced herself that her morbid thoughts about Frog had been irrational. Because she felt safe with Ma. Quick at her side as they waited at the doctor's office in downtown Denver, she insisted that Mack go with the others to eat breakfast in a nearby restaurant.

    "You'd be bored waiting here for ma," she told him, "and I'm not the least bit hungry. I couldn't eat anything. Go ahead."

    "I don't want to go until I'm sure you're okay," he argued, lingering by her side.

    "Mack," she said with a wan grin, "Go eat! I'll wait for you here when I'm done with the doctor."

    Mack finally agreed, and left with Kerry, Lewis, and Jean Marie. Hannah's expression was wistful as she watched them troop off down the street. If it hadn't been for last night, she'd be going with them on this crisp, clean morning in Colorado, having the time of her life instead of waiting to see a doctor.

    The doctor gave Hannah a clean bill of health and some aspirin for her headache.

    As they left his office, Ms. Quick said, "You know, Hannah, if you want to return home, we can put you on a train to Chicago this morning. If that's what you want."

    "No," Hannah said, recalling her resolution from the night before not to let some crazy person force her off the trip. "I'll stay."

    "All right," Ms. Quick said, as she and Hannah waited outside in the sunshine for Hannah's friends to appear.

    Other students, checking out Colorado's capital city, passed them. Several threw curious glances Hannah's way and she realized the word was out. News of the attack on her had been making the rounds. She hated that. It was humiliating.

    Dale Sutterworth and Eugene Bryer, looking odd without Lolly walking between them, passed by.

    Eugene looks mad, Hannah thought as his eyes briefly met hers and then quickly moved elsewhere. Was he still angry about the attack on Lolly? Having no one but gloomy Dale as a traveling companion couldn't be much fun.

    A little while later, Kerry and Lewis came sauntering up the street with Jean Marie tagging along behind, studying the storefront windows.But there was no Mack with them.

    He's late because he's ordering take-out coffee for me, she told herself even as her heart began pounding in her chest.

    "Where's Mack?" she asked and to her surprise, the words sounded perfectly normal.

    "Not here yet?" Lewis asked, surprise on his face. "That's weird. When we came out of the restaurant, we started to head this way and all of a sudden, Mack yelled something and took off down the street. We figured he'd decided to jog or run back here, maybe for the exercise. Then," he added with a grin, "we figured, he'd been away from you for more than five minutes, and was feeling Hannah-withdrawal pains, so he decided to race back here to relieve his symptoms." The grin disappeared as Lewis frowned. "But he's not here. That's weird. Where could he be?"

    Hannah sucked in her breath. When she spoke, her voice was little more than a whisper. "I don't know," she said. "I don't know where he is."

    

    

    

    "Perhaps Mack misunderstood," Ms. Quick told Hannah. "He might have thought he was supposed to meet you back at the train. Why don't we go back there?"

    "He promised to meet me here. And that's what he'll do," Hannah insisted. "I'm waiting."

    Realizing that there was no changing Hannah's mind, and anxious to return to her other duties, Ma. Quick volunteered to return to the train station to see if Mack had arrived there. "Don't wait too long," she warned before she left. "The train will be leaving as soon as that detective arrives."

    Hannah knew the train would never depart without all of its Parker passengers. Ms. Quick would lie down on the tracks, if necessary, to prevent that.

    And it didn't matter, anyway. Hannah was far more worried about Mack than she was about being stranded in Denver.

    She turned to Lewis. "Why did you let Mack leave like that?"

    "Like I could stop him," Lewis replied dryly. But his gray eyes searched the avenue for any sign of his best friend. "I told you, he just took off. He acted like a man on a mission. If we had a clue about what that mission was, we'd know where to look for him."

    Hannah began pacing back and forth in front of the doctor's red brick office. She didn't know what to think. What had gotten into Mack? Splitting from Kerry and Lewis like that, making them all worry - after everything that had happened.

    It was mean of Mack, that's what it was!

    But Mack wasn't a mean person. He was smart and funny and kind.

    Ah, but he was mean to Frog, a voice inside her head taunted.

    "Hannah," Kerry said, "we have to get back to the station. Mack must already be back there."

    "He couldn't have gone back without us seeing him," Hannah argued.

    "Probably found a shortcut," Lewis said with one final glance up the street. There was no sign of Mack. "We can't wait here forever, or we'll have to hitchhike to California."

    "I'm not leaving without Mack," Hannah said stubbornly.

    Lewis was patient with her. "Let's just go back to the station and check, okay? If Mack's there, no problem. If he isn't, we'll tell the conductor and the detective and they'll hold the train until he shows up. And they'll help us look for him. We can't search this town by ourselves."Hannah knew he was right. It would be stupid to separate and search for Mack in an unfamiliar city. If he wasn't at the station and they did have to look for him, they'd need help.

    She nodded slowly, and they began walking. But she kept glancing back over her shoulder with anxious eyes. "He could be hurt," she murmured as they hurried along the street toward the station. "Something terrible could have happened to him." Like something terrible happened to Lolly and me, she added silently.

    Lewis patted her shoulder sympathetically. "Listen, Hannah, if anyone can take care of himself, it's Mack. Quit worrying. He'll be at the station, I know he will."

    But he wasn't.

    The platform was crowded with noisy Parker High students, many of whom fell silent as she approached. Embarrassment washed over her. She hated everyone knowing how helpless she had been.

    But she had more important worries now. Not one of the students staring at her was wearing a light blue shirt and a grin that curled her toes.

    Dale was leaning against the railing opposite her. He was alone. She couldn't remember ever seeing him alone before. He'd always been with Frog or Lolly or Eugene, or, most often, all three.

    Where was Eugene? Hadn't the two of them passed her only five or ten minutes ago? Maybe he'd stopped to buy gum or candy or mints in the terminal.

    If only Mack had, too. But Lewis had checked, and there was no sign of Mack inside the building. Where was he?

    Her face crumpled. "Oh, God, Lewis, he's not here!" she whispered, clutching at Lewis's sleeve. "He's not here!"

    Frog's got him, came the voice in her head. Frog's got your precious Mack and it serves him right. Serves you right, too. You're as bad as he Is.

    "Don't panic," Lewis said, but his thin face was as anxious as Hannah's. "We'd better tell Ma. Quick. She'll freak, but she needs to know. And she'll have to tell the conductor to hold the train for Mack."

    How long was a train allowed to wait before someone high up in the company gave the order to move it? she wondered.

    "If Mack isn't on the train when it leaves," she announced, "I won't be, either."

    "I heard Ms. Quick tell the conductor we weren't leaving without him, schedule or no schedule," Jean Marie said. "That should make you feel better."

    Frog's got him, Frog's got him… the voice hissed in Hannah's ear. He's doing something terrible to your precious Mack while you stand around doing nothing. Some friend you are.

    Hannah couldn't stand the thought of Mack in pain. She closed her eyes and leaned against the platform railing for support. Mack… _ "Here he comes!" Lewis cried jubilantly. "And he's okay, Hannah, look!"

    Hannah's eyes flew open. They fastened on a red-faced, breathless Mack as he ran up the platformsteps. His hair hung, wet with sweat, on his forehead, and his face was flushed with exertion. But he didn't look bruised or bloody.

    Hannah was the first to cry, "Where have you been?" as she ran to him and dove into his chest, wrapping her grateful arms around him. "We thought something horrible had happened to you!"

    "I got lost," he said quickly. "You okay? Did the doctor find anything wrong?"

    "Never mind me, tell me where you were! You got lost?" Her relief was rapidly becoming overshadowed by annoyance. He had scared her half to death and now he didn't want to talk about it? Maybe - maybe because it was so awful, he couldn't talk about it? Or so bizarre that he was afraid no one would believe him?

    "We were so worried," she said, backing away from Mack and waiting for his explanation. "Lewis sand you yelled something and ran off. Why?"

    Mack shrugged. "I feel like a fool - " he began.

    But he was interrupted by Ms. Quick calling out to the conductor, who wanted on the train steps, "Everyone present and accounted for!"

    The conductor nodded and called, "All aboard!" adding, "C'mon, folks, we're behind schedule. Let's get a move on."