The Vanishing Game (26 page)

He only gave a curt nod, but it was enough to make me feel relieved I'd set things right. I picked up the knife and turned it over. Examining every centimeter, I found nothing but a high-quality blade with the brand name
Cold Steel
etched into the handle. Putting it back in the case, I picked up the clue with Roman numerals on it and counted how many English numbers they represented.

XX-XV-XVI-XIX-V-VIII-XX-
XIX-XI-XVIII-I-XIII-XXIV

Soon we reached the Jefferson County Courthouse, parked, and got out. We entered the main lobby, and Noah found the appropriate line. I went down a hallway in search of a drinking fountain. On my way back I was surprised to see Zachary Saulto, the guy from ISI who had talked to us
at the library. He had the same confident strut as last time. Smiling at me, his Silly Putty face looked even creepier in the fluorescent light. “How are you, Jaclyn?”

“Jocelyn, you mean. What are you doing here?”

“My boss, Sam Marvin, asked me to check in with you. We heard about the fire. Are you okay?”

“Look, you can talk to Noah if you want. But I don't have anything to say.” I headed to the lobby and he started walking beside me.

“Hey, we're just trying to look out for Jack's sister. We owe him that. We're concerned and want to make sure you're all right.”

“I got that part already. Anything else?”

He smiled again, pretending to be friendly—but he was also blocking my path. “We think it's important to give you a heads-up about one of our past employees. His name is Paul Gerard.” Saulto studied my expression, which I tried to keep neutral.

“What about him?”

“Seems he and Jack had a run-in a couple of days before the car crash.”

“What do you mean?”

“It's a long story.” He moved a step closer and leaned in, as if what he was about to say was confidential. “Basically, Paul Gerard took something that belonged to our company. Jack went to get it back for us.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Your brother was very loyal to ISI.”

“What was it he went after?”

“I can't discuss that. We have a security policy.” He returned to his former stance. “We wouldn't have let Jack go meet with Gerard if we thought there might be a problem.”

“Was there a problem?”

Saulto shrugged.

I really disliked the way he was dangling bits of half-information in front of me. “So did Jack get what you sent him for?”

“We're not sure. Because of the car crash, there was no way to find out.”

I didn't say anything and he added, “Gerard is an interesting guy. He used to be one of our best security specialists. Then he started stealing from us and went to work for himself.”

“If he stole from you, then why didn't ISI involve the police instead of my brother? Wait, let me guess. You didn't want to go public with the fact that you couldn't protect your own assets.”

Saulto ignored my sarcasm. “Sometimes it just happens that we hire a bad apple, regardless of all the background security we run. Gerard hasn't tried to contact you, has he?”

I shook my head.

“Just so you know, the guy has always been a sucker for tall, pretty blondes. But then so have I.”

“You're not going to start flirting with me, are you?”

“I'm past starting,” he grinned, and I wondered if that
phony smile hurt his cheeks. “Tell me something, what do you see in a computer geek like Noah?”

I studied Saulto's shaved pink head. “His hair. I'm totally into guys with hair.”

The smile disappeared and I moved around him. Under my breath I added, “And brains.”

He hurried to keep pace with me as I entered the main lobby. Noah was just leaving the traffic ticket counter, stuffing a receipt in his wallet. He looked up and his expression darkened. “What are you doing here?” he said to Saulto.

“Sorry to hear about your place. Do you know how the fire started?”

“I don't like being followed by you, Zach. In fact, I just don't like you. So stay out of my way.”

They glared at each other until Saulto shrugged and turned back to me. He held out a business card. “Again, if you need anything, just call.”

I didn't take it. “There is something I want.”

“What's that?”

“The truth. If you guys are so concerned about me, then be honest. Tell me what it was Gerard stole and my brother tried to get back.”

“I'm really sorry, I can't.”

I looked at Noah. “Let's go.”

We turned away and I felt Saulto's eyes on us as we left the courthouse.

During the next few minutes, Noah kept an eye on the rearview mirror while he drove. I told him everything Saulto said, and wondered aloud what Paul Gerard had stolen from ISI and how my brother had managed to get it back. Noah and I agreed on one thing: Jack had most definitely gotten it, which was the reason he'd faked his death. It was also the reason Gerard attacked me and later set fire to Noah's house.

The more we talked, the more sober Noah's face grew, and I knew what he must be thinking. Saulto's story explained a lot, it just didn't explain enough. We both felt frustrated at getting closer but still being in the dark.

Remembering the livid sound of Paul Gerard's voice and how he'd choked me, I experienced a new wave of fear. He must be certain that Jack had passed on the stolen item to me, and the fact that we didn't have it made our situation really risky. If he cornered us, there was nothing for Noah or me to bargain with. Zachary Saulto was being
a stubborn jerk by not telling us what Gerard had stolen. Noah and I would have to finish this crazy scavenger hunt soon to figure out what was going on.

Noticing I was unconsciously chewing on a fingernail, I dropped my hand to my lap. Worrying was getting me nowhere, so I told myself not to think about Gerard. Finally I tossed Noah a mischievous grin.

“Isn't Saulto the biggest sack of Erv you've ever met?”

He chuckled. “Yeah, he really is.”

“I hate it when big-headed guys like that come on to me.”

“You mean he was hitting on you?”

I secretly enjoyed his jealous glare. It was great to be more to Noah than just his best friend's sister. “Don't worry. I made it clear he's not my type.”

We left the downtown area and I turned back to the clues. On one of the strips I converted the Roman numerals to regular numbers.

20 15 16 19 5 8 20 19 11 18 1 13 24

Noah glanced over at what I was doing. “Since none of them are higher than twenty-six, they must represent letters.”

I nodded in agreement. Scribbling an alphabet list, I assigned a number to each letter. I started with 1 for A through 26 for Z:

T O P S E H T S K R A M X

“I must've done something wrong.”

When we stopped at a light, Noah looked at the letters. “Maybe they're an anagram. Try switching them around.”

“Hang on. I see what it is.”

The light turned green and we started moving again. I reversed the letters and wrote out the words. “Okay, got it.”

I showed the clue to Noah.

X MARKS THE SPOT

“You're joking.”

I stared at the words, equally unsure.

“I know. It doesn't make sense. Jack's favorite phrase from the third Indiana Jones movie was: ‘
X
never, ever marks the spot.' He wrote that more than once in his Jason December notes. Why would he contradict himself with this clue?”

I remembered the many times we'd watched those “Indy” movies. Hazel didn't allow cable or any rentals, but she did own about twenty DVDs that we viewed repeatedly, including the old
Star Wars
trilogy.

Noah shrugged. “I don't know. The joke of the movie was that
X
really did mark the spot, remember?”

After thinking about this for a few more seconds, I decided to move on. Focusing on the other message that we'd decided was a substitution cipher, I started swapping out the letters in the puzzle. This one was harder and I kept scratching out wrong letter choices until it was finally decrypted. I stared down at two sentences,
thinking this new clue was about as bad as being told to find Hazel.

K n i v e s a n d n e e d l e s
   w i l l l e a d t o d e a t h.
T r u s t l e a s t t r u s t
   m o s t o u r A n g r y B e t h.

I read it to Noah. “What do you think that means: ‘trust least, trust most'?”

“No clue.”

“Very funny,” I said, and he smiled. “Do you know where Beth ended up?”

“No, but it's not surprising the puzzle is about her. He left us a knife, didn't he? And she's in the logic problem, too. We should've known it would involve Beth. What about that last clue?”

I picked up the blank strip of paper, tilting it to catch the light, though I couldn't quite make out the impressions. With my pencil I rubbed the tip back and forth across my scrap paper until there was a dark spot, then ran my finger over the graphite. Just the way I'd done all those years ago on my thirteenth birthday, I smeared it across the indented paper until I could read a reverse template of the writing.

J u s t w h a t h a s J a s o n
   D e c e m b e r d o n e?
C a n y o u f i n d h i s o b i t
   i n t h e E v e n i n g S u n?

I read this aloud to Noah and tried to squelch my concern about what it might mean. “Do you know what the ‘Evening Sun' is?”

“Probably a newspaper, because ‘obit' means obituary. But I've never heard of it. Anyway, this is the clue we need to follow. The one about Beth doesn't tell us where to find her. And the other one could mean anything.”

“We should check the Internet.”

He drove onto a side road and pulled over. Reaching into the backseat he grabbed his laptop, handed it to me, and turned it on. Then he pulled back onto the road as the laptop scanned for wireless service.

“I'll head over by a couple of the larger hotels and see if we can pick up their wireless signal. They don't usually require a password.”

About ten minutes later we made the connection and Noah drove into the parking lot of a motel. He turned off the engine and we got on the Internet. “Start with New York newspapers,” he suggested.

After some searching we found
The Evening Sun
, which was in Norwich. I said, “There wouldn't be an obituary about Jack in that newspaper. Norwich is down toward the bottom of the state. The car accident happened on his way back home from Albany, after a work assignment.”

“Let's check it out anyway. Go into their archive section and search by date.”

I did, and typed in March sixteenth, the date of Jack's car crash. We scanned the front page. Scrolling down,
I paused at an article: “Elderly Couple in Fatal Crash.” We stared at the picture of a totaled car being towed from a river. Scanning the names and circumstances, none of it was familiar to me—except that their car had gone off into the river the way my brother's had.

“This doesn't really have anything to do with Jack.”

I was ready to click on the next page but Noah stopped me. “Yes it does. You know the report about his accident that ISI e-mailed to me? That's the picture they sent of his totaled car.”

“You're sure?”

“Positive. I spent a lot of time studying that photo.”

“Well, I can tell you one thing, that's not Jack's car. He drives a Civic like me. Only his is a newer model and it's blue.”

“Did you see any photos from his accident?”

I shook my head. “I couldn't face them. No one in the family wanted to.”

I didn't add that the thought of reviewing the details of my brother's death made me afraid I'd go off the edge. “This is a picture of a car crash from the same day he was supposed to have died, and I feel sure it's tied to ISI.”

“Either Jack wanted them to believe he was gone, or they're the ones faking his death.”

A small gasp of fear escaped me. “What if they have him somewhere? What if they're hurting him?”

“I don't think so, because he left all these clues for
us. He couldn't do that if he was locked up somewhere. But one thing we do know: something happened on March sixteenth. And it put him in such serious danger that either he or ISI faked his death.”

I exited the Internet, turned off the laptop, and put it in the back. I slumped in the seat as Noah started the engine. He said, “Until we figure out the clues, we need to stop guessing.”

“I can't help it. And I can't stop worrying.”

“Worry isn't productive.”

In the past he used to say the same thing to me, though it never seemed helpful. I sighed. “Okay then, what should we do now?”

“That's a hard one. Jack gave us three clues with the knife, but none of them has enough information. The newspaper told us something important, but what do we do with it? As for the other two, we don't know where the
X
is that marks the spot, and we don't know where Beth is, either.”

“Beth! Why her? Even though she and I were roommates, it wasn't like we were friends. No one could be friends with her. She was too messed up.”

We drove through the outskirts of town, both of us somber, neither wanting to share our thoughts. Several miles later, we ended up on a road lined on either side with birch trees, silver maples, and willows. Cattails grew in marshy spots and wild primrose edged the road, while orange daylilies were just starting to bloom. At any other time I would have enjoyed how pretty it was. Not now.

Eventually we passed through the tiny town of
Alexandria Bay and headed toward the St. Lawrence River. Noah stopped the car at a grassy park and we got out. In the distance there was a vendor selling food items from a cart near the bike path. Its yellow-and-purple-striped awning flapped in the breeze.