The Lure

by S. W. Hubbard

Joe accepted the card with all the eagerness of a man being handed a live tarantula. He pushed his glasses up to get the bifocals aligned for close scrutiny. “I can’t make out the name, can you? But that writing looks familiar to me, like I seen it somewhere before.”

  “Where? Another card that was mailed to the house?”

  Joe shrugged.

  Frank tried to keep his tone casual. “Have you ever been to the Cascade Clinic?”

  Joe wrinkled his brow at the sudden change in topic. “Yeah, once last year when I had pink-eye. That young doctor prescribed some drops and it went away. Why?”

  Now there was no mistaking Frank’s interest. “So, you had a prescription filled. Could that be where you saw that writing?”

  “You mean you think that young doctor, the short fella, was the guy who…”

  “There’s some link there, but I don’t have any solid evidence that Galloway is the father. It may be that he helped deliver the baby.” Frank told Joe about the antibiotics he’d found with the card, and about his visit with Dr. Galloway. “Did Mary Pat ever mention him, say that he came into the store?”

  Joe shook his head.

  “What about Ann? Can I ask her?”

  Joe, who had been cooperative if reluctant, now bristled. “You leave Ann out of this. She don’t want you prying into Mary Pat’s business.”

  Why did the Sheehans treat him like some busybody from the Store? “For God’s sake, Joe, your daughter’s death wasn’t an accident, it was a crime. Whoever wrote that prescription knew Mary Pat was sick, knew that the birth hadn’t gone well. She should’ve been taken to the hospital. Instead, he tried to patch her up himself, and she died. That’s reckless endangerment, and it’s a felony. Don’t you think Mary Pat deserves some justice for what was done to her?”

  If he expected Mary Pat’s father to be grateful for his concern, he was wrong. Tears streamed down Joe’s face. He put his hand on the doorknob and backed away from Frank. “You can’t give her justice, only God can. She’s in heaven now. Just leave us alone.”

  Frank got back in the patrol car and massaged his temples. Might as well make the afternoon complete by visiting another relative who’d be unhappy at the news he had to deliver: Fred Jacobson.

  Dean Jacobson’s grandfather answered the door after a protracted period of shuffling and muffled shouts of “I’m coming, I’m coming.” Frank followed him into the cramped and shabby living room. Amazing how similar old people’s houses all smelled—the place exuded that trademark scent of mothballs, musty magazines and burnt toast. There was no sign of a young person’s presence here.

  Frank broke the news of the coroner’s autopsy results and the old man bore it stoically.

  “Drugs. I thought that might be it, but I didn’t know what to do.” He raised his hands, then let them fall back in his lap. “I’m too old for this. I raised my kids the best I knew how, but I just didn’t know what to do about Dean.”

  “How did he come to be living here?” Frank asked.

  “Both his parents died within a few months of each other, his last year in high school. Dean was angry about his folks passin’, but it wasn’t anybody’s fault—heart attack, cancer, what can you do? He wasn’t prepared to live on his own, but he didn’t want to take no rules from me, neither. He worked some and gave me a little money, but it was like having a boarder here—he came and went on his own schedule.”

  “So you don’t know who his friends were?”

  “He never brought anyone here, and if fellows called when Dean wasn’t home, they never left a message.”

  “You said he’d been acting strange lately?”

  Fred nodded. “He came home one night and woke me up, he was talking so loud. I thought someone was here with him, but when I came out, it was just Dean alone, pacin’ around the house, talking up a storm and not making a lick of sense.”

  “When was this?”

  “About three weeks ago. After that, it seemed like he hardly slept. He was barely ever home, but when he was he was jumpy and nervous and always muttering to himself. I guess it was the drugs makin’ him like that, huh?”

  “I’m afraid so. Could I look around his room, Mr. Jacobson?”

  “Sure.” Fred led the way to a small bedroom in the back of the house. “It’s real messy. I couldn’t get him to clean it up.”

  If the rest of the house smelled of old age, Dean’s room reeked of youth: sweat, unwashed clothes, and half-eaten food, over-laid with spray deodorant. Frank lifted the gray-sheeted mattress and immediately found what remained of Dean’s drug stash. But an hour of sifting through the clutter of CDs, video games, magazines and clothes didn’t produce an address book, or even any scribbled phone numbers that would provide a link to his friends.

  Frank spent the rest of the day trying to come up with more evidence to support his suspicions of Dr. Galloway, but the facts just wouldn’t cooperate. Galloway had graduated near the top of his class, had volunteered at an inner city health program in Washington, and got sterling recommendations for his job at the Cascade clinic. No patients had ever complained about him to the state medical board. He had no outstanding traffic violations, a good credit report despite his high debt, and neighbors who insisted he never entertained anyone at his apartment.

  Frank hung up the phone after the last unproductive call and leaned back in his chair with his eyes closed. A vision of Mary Pat’s baby flickered through his mind’s eye: a little bundle wrapped in a blanket with only a shock of black hair and two dark eyes peeping out. He supposed he imagined her like that because the Finns had said the baby they were offered had been dark. Galloway had dark hair and eyes, but so did Doug Penniman and a thousand other guys.

  The Finns said they didn’t know who the father was, but he hadn’t really quizzed them on whether Mary Pat or Sheltering Arms had dropped some hint about him. Frank smiled at himself. He knew the hint he’d like to hear—something along the lines of, “The baby will be smart because the father’s a doctor.” Still, it couldn’t hurt to call the Finns and go over that again just to see if he’d missed anything.

  He found their number in his file and dialed. A few clicks on the line, then the familiar three-note tone followed by a recorded voice: The number you have dialed, 518-555-1247, has been disconnected. Click.

  Frank’s hand tightened on the receiver. Had they changed their number for some reason? He dialed directory assistance, and gave them the Finns’ name and address. No listing. He checked his file again for the name of the school where Brian Finn worked, and called the Buchanan Open Academy.

  “Mr. Finn no longer works here,” the secretary informed him.

  What the hell was going on? Did the Finns have the baby all along, and now had run off with her? Was the story about being scammed by Sheltering Arms a scam too? Or had Sheltering Arms come back to the Finns after his visit, because they had coughed up the extra money?

  Frank asked to speak to the principal, who became extremely chatty when he learned who Frank was. “It was the weirdest thing. He came into my office on Friday afternoon while I was out watching a field hockey game and left a letter of resignation. No explanation, no two weeks notice. Nothing. I called him up and the number was disconnected. I drove by his house and there’s a FOR SALE sign up and no one answered the door.

  “He’s always been very reliable, because I gave him a break. With that assault conviction he had, he couldn’t have taught at a public school. I don’t know what came over Brian—”

  Frank knew what had come over him: the lure of a healthy white infant. Never mind sex or drugs or money—a baby had driven Brian and Eileen Finn to abandon their safe suburban life and go on the lam.

  The principal sighed. “And I’m going to have a hell of a time replacing him.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “He taught social studies, computer science, and coached lacrosse. That’s a combination you don’t find every day.”

  “He taught computer science?”


  “Oh yes, Brian was quite a whiz with computers.”

  Frank increased the tempo of the pencil he was tapping on his desk. So, when Brian had told him Sheltering Arms had disappeared into cyberspace and couldn’t be traced, maybe he’d been lying. Maybe Brian had the computer skills to locate the group, even though he and Earl didn’t. He should’ve gotten the state police computer guys involved. But whom was he kidding? Meyerson would never have approved that request.

  But the Finns could be tracked down. After all, what did people like that know about creating a new identity for themselves? They’d want the money from the sale of their house; they’d want to teach again. All it would take to find them was a little time and some resources.

  Neither of which he had.

  Chapter 23

  The smell of stale beer and fresh cigarette smoke engulfed Frank as soon as he entered the Mountainside Tavern looking for the men Sean Nevins had accused of vandalizing the trailer at the Extrom place. The decor of the Mountainside was no decor at all. Bar stools covered in black Naugahyde, virtually every one marked with huge fissures oozing dingy beige stuffing, surrounded the big U-shaped bar. The linoleum floor had probably been new when Truman was in the White House. Lit solely by the glow of two color TVs suspended over the bar, and a large, red neon Budweiser sign, the bar required games of pool, pinball and darts to be played largely by feel.

  Frank groped his way to a seat at the bar, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. He ordered a hamburger and a beer, and asked the bartender if he had seen Dan, Pete or Richie recently.

  "They turn up most nights around seven, seven-thirty."

  Frank watched ESPN until, just as predicted, Dan Strohman sauntered in at 7:10. A few minutes later Pete and Richie plopped into bar stools beside their friend. Frank wasn’t sure if they hadn’t noticed him on the other side of the bar, or if they were avoiding eye contact. Soon, they wandered over to the pool table. Frank followed them.

  “Nice shot,” Frank said as Richie sank a ball in the corner pocket.

  Richie glanced up and smiled, but his next shot went wide of the mark.

  “You guys working much up at the Extrom place these days?”

  All three of them exchanged glances. Dan took elaborate care sizing up his shot. Richie and Pete looked down at their feet. Honestly, they were like three six-year-olds standing next to a broken vase.

  “They’re doing the roofing now. Isn’t that a specialty of yours, Pete?”

  “Uh, yeah, I like to roof. But I’m busy now with another job.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “Um…um…Schroon Lake.”

  “What about you two?”

  Dan and Pete eyed each other. Dan slammed his pool cue down on the table.

  “Just spit it out! That fag Sean Vinson sent you here, didn’t he?”

  “He reported some vandalism—graffiti spray-painted on the work trailer. A threat to do more damage. I came here to warn you that wouldn’t be a good idea,” Frank said.

  “This ain’t right! That prick accuses us and you automatically believe him because he works for that rich asshole, Extrom,” Richie complained.

  “The fact that Rollie Fister at the hardware store remembers selling Pete three cans of orange spray paint would tend to support Vinson’s theory,” Frank answered. “Let me give you a heads-up—experienced criminals tend to buy their materials where they’re not well-known.”

  Dan gave Pete a disgusted shove. “Nice work.”

  “We were pissed that day when he fired us.” Pete jammed his hands in his jeans pockets. “We wouldn’t really do nothin’ to the house.”

  “It was just unfair, is all,” Dan chimed in.

  “Why’s that?” Frank kept his face stern. He was interested in their side of the story, but he didn’t want them to think they were off the hook yet.

  “We couldn’t make heads or tails of the blue print for this section we were supposed to be framing. We went to look for Sean, but we couldn’t find him,” Richie explained. “Finally, we just said, screw this, and did it the way that made the most sense to us. Then Sean shows up and has a shit fit and fires us.”

  “But what really griped my ass,” Pete picked up the story, “is that Doug Penniman was there working with us the whole time and Sean didn’t fire him.”

  “Why not?”

  Pete shrugged. “Doug seems to know The Man himself. I saw him driving Extrom’s Land Cruiser one day.”

  “Did you ask Doug about it?”

  Pete shook his head. “I saw him at the lumberyard later that week. He caught sight of me and headed in the other direction. I figure he’s embarrassed he hung us out to dry. But I ain’t beggin’ to be taken back up there. I don’t need the work that bad.”

  “All right.” Frank looked long and hard at the three of them. “Just see that you all stay away from the Extrom place. I don’t want any more trouble.”

  Muttering and nodding, they returned to their game. Frank watched them for a moment longer. “Say, just out of curiosity, where did you see Doug driving Extrom’s SUV?”

  Pete leaned on his pool cue, watching his friend shoot. “He was coming out of the road right next to the sign for Beth Abercrombie’s shop.”

  Frank left the tavern and cruised slowly toward town. Might as well make one last patrol before heading home. He passed the Stop’n’Buy—all the lights were on, but it was empty except for the new girl hired to replace Mary Pat. The sign for Beth’s shop loomed in his headlights. He looked down the dark road that led to her home and wondered if Doug Penniman might be down there. He kept driving—he wouldn’t stoop to spying on the woman.

  The neon sign for Mountain Vista illuminated the next rise. The NO VACANCY part was lit—business must be good. A raccoon scrambled across the road in front of him, still fast enough to escape the wheels of the car despite being fattened up for winter. Frank glanced into the woods where the raccoon had disappeared. Were those headlights back there?

  He slowed the patrol car and turned around in the Mountain Vista parking lot for a closer look. A few years ago a developer had bought this land with the intention of building some homes back there. But he’d gotten only as far as clearing some of the trees and creating a rough track into the property before he ran out of funding. Now, couples drove back there to park and kids hung out and drank. Mr. Patel had complained more than once about noise and broken beer bottles thrown in the road. Frank positioned the patrol car so the headlights shone into the trees. He could see a car, sure enough.

  He got out and prepared to walk back there with his flashlight. He couldn’t see anyone in the car—either it was empty, or he was about to get an eyeful. A few steps closer and he could distinguish the color and make of the car. Beige, a small Ford. Another step. A Ford Escort. Good grief, it was Earl’s car! What was he…?

  Frank stopped and began to laugh. Earl was here with Melanie. Both of them lived with their parents, so there was precious little privacy at home. It was getting nippy out now, but he supposed the inside of the Escort was warm enough.

  Frank sat alone at the Formica table in front of the big plate glass window at the Store. The generically named emporium in the center of town carried just about everything but what you really needed. Dusty valentines and St. Patrick’s Day cards stayed on the rack year-round; there were toothbrushes but no toothpaste; baking powder but no flour; grated cheese but no spaghetti. Frank hated to buy milk there ever since he discovered the little Styrofoam deli containers on the same shelf in the fridge held nightcrawlers, not cole slaw. But, you couldn’t beat the Store’s coffee.

  A fruitless morning spent trying to track down the Finns, interspersed with nagging doubts about Beth Abercrombie, had driven Frank out of the office in search of a fresh cup and a sticky bun to clear his jumbled thoughts. Mercifully, the place was empty except for Rita cleaning up behind the deli counter.

  The sugar and caffeine weren’t helping him come up with a logical reason for why Doug Pennima
n should be driving Extrom’s car past Beth’s place. He could have been going somewhere else on the road, but the only other homes back there were vacation places. Still, he might have a carpentry project lined up with one of the homeowners. But why would he be driving Extrom’s expensive vehicle to a moonlighting job?

  Why did he care, anyway? Was he jealous that Doug and Beth might have something going on? Doug was good-looking, in a way, but he didn’t seem Beth’s type. Right. Not like me.

  Frank watched Augie Enright emerge from the side door of the church and head toward the Store. You could set your watch by that man: morning coffee break at 10:15, afternoon break at 2:45. Frank wasn’t in the mood to gulp his coffee so he resigned himself to the handyman’s company.

  Augie’s eyes lit up as he came in and saw Frank. He poured his coffee, tossed fifty cents in the cigar box on the counter and sat down next to him. “Hiya, Frank. What’s new? Green Tomorrow planning any more demonstrations?”

  “Nope.”

  “Any news on Mary Pat’s baby?”

  “Nope.”

  Augie would talk to a statue, so Frank’s taciturn mood didn’t discourage him. He chatted on about the weather, fishing, football, until a tall man and his little girl came in. But Augie’s face fell when he called out, “Nice afternoon, eh?” and they walked right past him without answering.

  The man was Rod Extrom and he’d committed the ultimate breech of Store etiquette—failure to greet all other customers, whether you knew them or not. Frank and Augie watched in silence as Extrom paid for a quart of orange juice and a candy bar. “Here, Alyssa,” he said and handed the candy to the child, who had shiny black hair and almond eyes. Those were the only words he spoke, and then they left.

  “Humpf,” said Augie, before the door had fully swung shut. “I guess some people think they’re too important to even say hello to folks.”

  “He’s always like that,” Rita said. “As many times as he’s been in here, he looks right through me like he’s never seen me before. And his daughter’s just as bad.”