by J. S. Volpe
“Now, we’re not gonna officially charge you,” Krezchek said. “Your parents”—he nodded at Cynthia and Donovan—“they’re going through enough as it is without you two winding up in juvie. And trust me, we’ve got more than enough on all of you guys to put you in orange jumpsuits for a very long time. But instead, you’re going to apologize to Mr. Grey, and you’re gonna pay to fix the damage to his window.”
“What?” Cynthia’s voice was shrill with outrage.
“Is there a problem?” Agent Rowan said.
She wanted to reply that, yeah, there was one hell of a problem: There was no chance in hell she was going to apologize to Roger Grey, and if she saw him on fire she’d hide the nearest fire extinguisher. But saying any of those things wouldn’t be terribly productive.
“It’s just, he’s involved somehow,” she said. “I know it.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Because everything points to him.”
“Like what?”
“For one thing, he works at the bank, which is right near the park, and he spends some of his free time in the park, so he has to have seen Emily there. He was definitely in the park at the time she met her abductor. Plus he was on vacation last week and this week, which seems a little too perfectly coincidental, you know?”
“Is that all?” Agent Rowan said. He sounded somehow both amused and disappointed.
“My dad said he was acting funny right before his vacation,” Calvin said.
Agent Rowan cocked an eyebrow. “Funny how?”
“Distracted. Spacey.”
“That doesn’t mean much,” Agent Schmidt said.
“Well, I know for a fact it was him,” Violet said.
“How?”
She shrugged. “Just by talking to him. I can tell these things.”
“That’s a lovely talent,” Agent Rowan said dryly. “We should sign you up for the Bureau.”
She snorted. “Forget it. I ain’t workin’ for the pig system.”
Agent Schmidt looked at his partner with feigned amazement.
“Golly, I didn’t realize I was part of the pig system.”
“That must be why I like truffles so much,” Agent Rowan said.
“Hey, make fun of me all you want,” Violet said. “But I’m right about Grey. You’ll see.”
Agent Rowan’s good humor faded, and he eyed Violet in silence for a moment. Then he swept his gaze over the whole group.
“Do any of you have any actual hard evidence to support your suspicions about Mr. Grey?” he asked.
No one spoke. Calvin and Cynthia glanced at each other, both of them realizing the same thing at the same time: They didn’t have any solid proof. Even the circumstantial evidence, which had seemed so convincing when they set out from Mr. May’s house, now felt weak in the face of cold law-enforcement logic. Was Grey innocent after all? And what about Mr. May? Was he really not the ace investigator he had led them to believe?
Then a thought struck Calvin.
“Did he call you guys?” he asked.
“Who?” Chief Krezchek said.
“Roger Grey. Did he call you?”
“Yeah. He called to report intruders in his house.”
Cynthia stiffened, seeing where Calvin was going with this. “But we couldn’t have been in his house at that point,” she said. “He must have called you before we even approached the house! Because Violet went to the front door before any of the rest of us did anything, and he didn’t make any phone calls after that.”
“Well, he probably just saw you lurking about and, you know…” Agent Schmidt shrugged. He had sounded sure of what he was saying when he started to say it, but at the end the words trailed off uncertainly.
“He knew what we were going to do?” Calvin said.
Agent Rowan gave a derisive laugh. “When you see folks in black ski masks lurking in the bushes next to your house, it’s not hard to divine their intent. Besides, I don’t recall the precise phrasing of the phone call. He probably just said there were suspicious characters lurking about, or something like that. I think you’re making too big a deal out of this.”
“Did you search his house?” Cynthia asked.
“Why would we? He hasn’t given us cause to. He’s not the guilty party here, don’t forget. You are.”
“Besides,” Agent Schmidt said, “didn’t you guys already search it pretty thoroughly?”
“Not everything,” Cynthia said. “We didn’t really check his garage. And I didn’t get a chance to finish looking through his basement.” She wanted to mention her feeling that there was something important about the chest freezer she had seen, that it meant something. But she still wasn’t sure what, so she held her tongue.
“And he might own property somewhere else,” Donovan said. “I mean, he might have a cabin or—”
Chief Krezchek shook his head. “Just drop it, kids, okay? We’re letting you go. Mr. Grey has been kind enough not to press charges—he understands how freaked out you all are about Emily going missing—but like I said, you’ll still have to pay for his new window and give him your personal apologies. In fact, he’s waiting in the lobby for those apologies right now.”
“Oh, fuck you!” Violet said.
Chief Krezchek’s cheeks went bright red. He scowled at Violet.
“Unless you want to spend the next week in the city jail,” he said. “Do you?”
Violet regarded him with narrow eyes. It seemed like she was about to say yes, but then Donovan gave her hand a small squeeze under the table. She glanced at him, then rolled her eyes and looked away at a framed photo of the May police force from 1985.
“Fine,” she said. “We can make with the kissy-face shit.”
“Good.” Krezchek settled back in his chair and hooked his thumbs into his belt. “I’d say we’re about done here, then. We’ve notified your parents to come pick you up. They’re waiting for you outside.”
A collective groan rose up.
“Before you go,” Agent Rowan said, “is there anything else any of you guys have to say? Any questions?”
Heads shook. Shoulders rose in distracted shrugs. Everyone was too busy fretting over their parents’ impending outrage to think of much else.
But as the three men started to rise from their seats, Calvin remembered something.
“Yeah,” he said. “I have a question, actually.”
The men glanced at each other in surprise, then sat back down.
“What is it?” Chief Krezchek said.
“Did you ever figure out how the clearing got burned?”
The men glanced at each other again.
“We can’t speak about the details of an ongoing investigation,” Agent Schmidt said.
Calvin nodded. He didn’t need them to speak. He could tell from their reaction the answer was no.
2
Five minutes later the four teens stood before Roger Grey, who was regarding them with a small, smug smile.
“I’m sorry,” Calvin told him, hating the words, hating the man.
Roger’s smiled widened and he gave a crisp nod. He turned to Cynthia, the next in line, eyebrows raised expectantly. He was clearly enjoying their humiliation.
“I’m sorry,” Cynthia said tersely, her narrow eyes fixed on Grey’s in hopes of conveying the message: I know you’re behind this, and you won’t get away with it.
If he got the message, he didn’t seem to care. He just nodded again like a king receiving tribute. He turned next to Donovan.
“I’m sorry,” Donovan mumbled, the words barely audible.
Grey nodded again. He turned last to Violet.
Violet grinned at him, her teeth white and gleaming, her eyes glinting evilly.
“I am so, so sorry,” she said. Despite the words, it didn’t sound anything even remotely like an apology. Instead the message conveyed by her tone and expression was, “I am going to ass-rape you with a rusty chainsaw and cackle while you scream.”
Grey’s smile flickered. H
e glanced at Chief Krezchek as if about to protest this violation of protocol, but then apparently thought the better of it. He swept his eyes over the foursome.
“I accept your apologies,” he said. “And I hope we have put any misunderstandings behind us.”
“All right, then,” Krezchek said. “Let’s return you kids to your parents.” He hustled them toward the door. He was clearly in a hurry to finish this up. In his view, the police had more important things to deal with.
3
“I don’t believe this,” Mark Beckerman said as he pulled out of the May Civic Administration Building’s parking lot. “This is…” He shook his head and heaved an angry sigh, as if his outrage with his son were too great for words.
In the passenger seat Calvin’s mom Mary Beckerman glanced at her husband, then turned and looked at Calvin, who sat meek and quiet in the back seat.
“You were just trying to help that little girl, right?” she asked.
Calvin nodded. “Yeah. She’s my…my friend’s sister. We were just—”
“You were breaking the law, is what you were doing!” Mark growled. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. The back of his neck was bright pink. “You were humiliating me in front of the whole damn community. A community I have to deal with on a daily basis. But you didn’t give a thought to that, did you?”
“Mark—” Mary began.
“Don’t!” He swatted away the consoling hand she had stretched out toward him. “Just don’t. There is nothing you can say that will make this acceptable.” Calvin watched his father’s head shake atop its thick pink neck.
The houses rolled by outside in silence. Most of the houses were dark. Calvin peered at the clock on the dashboard. It was nearly eleven p.m.
Calvin thought that the dressing down was pretty much done, but after they pulled into the driveway, his dad turned off the engine, then twisted around in his seat to look at Calvin, the imitation leather upholstery creaking loudly in the closed and freshly silenced car. Mark didn’t look angry anymore. He didn’t look anything. His face was blank, as if he had quashed any feelings he had for his son.
“You’re grounded for the next month,” he said.
“What? But—”
“Mark—” Mary began.
“No debate,” Mark said. He opened the driver’s side door. Cool night air spilled in, diluting the warm, tense atmosphere that had built up in the car during the drive home. He looked back at Calvin. “Now go to your room and don’t come out till it’s time for school tomorrow.”
4
Calvin waited until his parents went to bed, then called Mr. May.
Mr. May answered midway through the first ring.
“Yes?” he said. “What happened? Is everyone all right?” His voice was tight with worry. Calvin wondered if this kind of excitement was healthy for a guy his age.
Calvin told him everything that had happened at Grey’s and at the police station.
“I’m sorry,” he said in conclusion.
“For what?” Mr. May sounded baffled.
“For…I mean, we kinda messed this up, didn’t we?”
To Calvin’s surprise, Mr. May laughed. “Hardly. You successfully searched most of his house and got away with having only to give an unfelt apology and pay for a window. Which all seems quite onerous, I’m sure, but trust me, it’s much better than spending time in jail. I know. I’ve been there.”
“You’ve been in jail?”
“In seven different countries, actually. When you’re investigating things that lie beyond society’s accepted boundaries, you find that you have to cross some of those boundaries yourself from time to time.”
“Wow.” Calvin smiled, buoyed up by the sense of acceptance and confirmation he was receiving from Mr. May. Calvin felt that he had done right and well and that everything was going to be okay. Which was exactly the opposite of what his dad had made him feel. Calvin found himself wishing Mr. May had been his father instead of bland, button-down Mark Beckerman.
“Well, we still have recourses,” Mr. May said.
“We do?”
“Certainly. I have a few more ideas about things we can do. But…”
“But what?”
“Will you and Cynthia be free to visit tomorrow afternoon? And I suppose we should consider her brother and his, um, interesting little friend to be part of the team at this point.”
Calvin grinned at the idea of being part of a team. It was like something out of a comic book or a TV show, only for real. Then his grin faded as he remembered other, less pleasant aspects of reality.
“I dunno,” he said. “I’m technically grounded. Cynthia probably is, too. I might be able to visit, though. After all, my dad was the one who grounded me, but he doesn’t get home from work till close to six, and I think my mom’ll cover for me. I’ll probably be okay as long as I’m back before my dad gets home from work.”
“Good.”
“What exactly would we do, though? Do you still think it’s Roger Grey, or should we investigate someone else now?”
“I am more certain than ever that Roger Grey is the culprit. As you said, he seemed to know the four of you were there before you made your appearance.”
“Well, it’s possible he spotted us in the bushes or something…”
“But why play along with Violet then? And why go back into the house if he knew there were mysterious masked intruders inside? He didn’t act as if he were worried about his safety. He didn’t act as if he saw you as any kind of a threat at all. He acted as if he were trying to entrap you.”
“Holy crap! That’s exactly right.” Calvin wished he had thought to frame the situation in those terms to Chief Krezchek and the FBI guys.
“So, no,” Mr. May said. “We’re not done with Roger Grey just yet…”
5
When Roger unlocked his front door and stepped into his house, his nose wrinkled. He could still smell strangers, unfamiliar bodies, the scent of leather cop belts. He hated it. It was a violation of his space, his selfhood.
He wasn’t entirely surprised to see Emily Faux sitting in her usual spot on the couch.
“Now do you see?” she said. “Now do you believe me? If I had wanted to hurt you, I wouldn’t have warned you about those children. I wouldn’t have helped you at all. Yet I did. And my help was flawless. My advice was correct in every respect. Everything occurred exactly as I said it would.”
“I guess,” he muttered. Much as he hated to admit it, she was right. All throughout the incident Roger had dreaded that something would go wrong, that Emily’s advice and assurances would prove incorrect either by error or on purpose, that one of the kids would find the body or one of the cops would decide to search the house. But everything had gone perfectly. The chest freezer had not been opened. The cops hadn’t even gone downstairs. They had been more interested in busting the kids than in looking around.
Roger’s eyes narrowed. “Then again, maybe you’re only helping me just long enough to reanimate Emily. Maybe you’ll find a way to dispose of me once you’re done with me. Maybe…”
He trailed off with a frown. He was talking about performing reality-altering magic as if it could be true. The trouble was, by this point he was more than half-convinced it was true.
“My word has been reliable so far,” Emily Faux said. “You have no evidence to believe it will ever be otherwise. As I told you before, my task is only to correct an error. That’s all. You’re being needlessly paranoid.” She smiled reassuringly. It looked like a real smile.
But then, she looked like the real Emily.
“Whatever you decide, you must do it soon,” she added. “Think hard. Think well. The next time you see me, you must give me your answer.”
Roger opened his mouth to ask how long he had. But by then she had already vanished.
Part Four:
The Other Side of the Door
Chapter 25
See Emily Play (IV)
1
/> “No, I don’t think I’ll be able to meet up today,” Cynthia told Calvin on the phone the next day. He had called her during his lunch period at school to see if she could make it to Mr. May’s proposed meeting. She could hear the usual lunchroom din in the background. She was surprised to find herself missing school. She wondered how soon it would be before she and Donovan went back, before normal life resumed. If it ever did. “I’m kind of under house arrest for the foreseeable future.”
“You can’t get out at all?” He sounded heartbroken. She winced to hear it.
“I’d like to,” she said. “But it’s just not possible. My parents are watching Donovan and me like hawks. Besides…I don’t know, maybe this situation should be left to the police.”
“Are you serious?” His voice was high, almost outraged. “How can you say that after everything we’ve done, everything we’ve learned.”
“I said maybe. I don’t know.”
“But she’s your sister.”
“No shit, jackass!”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean…um…you know…”
“I know,” she said in a soft, conciliatory tone. “It’s just, I want to do what’s best for her, but I’m not quite sure what the best thing is anymore. After what happened last night, I can’t help wondering if maybe the cops were right: Maybe we’re just making things worse.”
“Yeah, but don’t forget: If Mr. May’s right, then there’s a lot more going on here than just a child abduction. There’s a whole history. The cops aren’t equipped to deal with that. Besides, at the moment they all seem to think Grey’s an upstanding citizen who can do no wrong.”
“I know, I know. I just—”
The school bell rang.
“I gotta go,” Calvin said. “I guess…well, I guess I won’t see you later, then.” The heartbroken tone was back. God, he had no ability to hide it, did he?
She decided it would be best to end the conversation on a light, humorous note.
“As much as I might want to go,” she said, “I don’t think I’ll be able to evade the guard dogs and the land mines my parents have set up around the house.”
She was relieved to hear him laugh.
“All right,” he said. “I’ll talk to you later.”