by Vivien Sparx
Stone took the can of Coke back outside and sat at the sidewalk table. Stretched out, drank slowly. Watched the traffic passing by, not really looking for anything, but noticing everything.
Gradually the town seemed to be coming alive. He saw shop doors opening one by one, and a couple of cars pulled over and parked as townsfolk went about their daily business. The sun crept over the roofline of the buildings and blasted down on the sidewalk.
By 9.30am he had seen everything he needed to see of Windswept, Arizona.
Stone finished his Coke and went back to the town library.
Thirteen.
Stone was the only customer at the library. He stood patiently at the counter until a young woman with mousy brown hair and glasses came from a back room wheeling a steel-framed trolley of plastic colored bins filled with books. The woman looked like she was in her early twenties. She had a serious expression on her face, wore no make-up – but probably should have. She looked plain in every way, right down to the straight grey skirt and the white blouse that had ruffles of lace around the buttoned-high neckline.
She glanced up from where she was trying to steer the trolley, saw the imposing figure of Jack Stone, and looked surprised, like maybe she wasn’t accustomed to people visiting the library.
Stone smiled at her. In the background he could hear the hum of an air conditioner unit. The woman must have just turned it on because the air was warm and still.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hello,” the woman smiled like it was an expression she was unfamiliar with. It looked to Stone more like a grimace – and maybe it was. “Can I help you?”
“I hope so,” Stone smiled again, forcing the friendliness into his voice. “I’d like to look at your newspaper records.”
“Newspaper records?”
“Yes. Please.”
“Records of what, exactly?” the woman asked.
“The last few weeks of newspapers,” Stone explained. “I was hoping to find more information about the two young girls who went missing from around here last week.”
The woman nodded, still a little unsure. She went behind the counter taking brisk little scissor-like steps and hoisted a file of old newspapers onto the counter-top. The pile was about six inches thick, and held about forty newspapers. The top couple of editions were ragged around the edges, the pages curled. All the papers were strung together with two long pieces of leather tied through a long flat piece of timber. Stone turned the papers around so he could read them, and then glanced up at the woman.
“These papers – the ‘Rapture Regional News’. Isn’t there a local newspaper?”
“That is the local newspaper for these parts,” the woman explained. “The only one. Windswept doesn’t have its own paper. We get the ‘Rapture Regional’. It covers all the local news from around here and other outlying parts.”
Stone nodded, processing. “Where is Rapture?”
“About ten miles north,” the woman said. “It’s the next town along.”
“And it’s bigger than Windswept?”
“Much,” the woman nodded. “It’s like the main center around these parts. Windswept and some of the other towns around here all get the ‘Rapture Regional’ as their local newspaper.”
Stone nodded slowly, and changed the angle of his questions.
“Did you know either of the girls?”
The woman hesitated. She looked down at the top edition of the newspaper like the answer might be there. Then she pushed her glasses up high onto the bridge of her nose with one finger and said softly, “Yes, of course. Everyone in town knew them.”
Stone nodded. “Did you know them well? I mean were you friendly with either of them?”
“Why do you want to know? Who are you?”
“A friend,” Stone smiled again. His jaw was beginning to ache. “I’m just trying to help.”
The woman frowned. She folded her arms across her chest. She had small breasts, and a thin, bony figure. Her skin was pale and her brown hair hung lank to her shoulders. Dowdy.
“I knew Margie Bevan,” the woman said. “She came in here on Thursdays after school to help out. Just as a volunteer.”
“Oh,” Stone said, showing just enough interest, but not so much that the woman would become suspicious. “Was she a good worker?”
“Sure.”
“And what did she do to help?”
The woman shrugged. “Just re-sorting the shelves. Things like that. No one takes a book off the shelf and puts it back in the same place. Margie would help keep everything in order.”
Stone nodded. He pointed down at the newspaper. Under the headline were black and white photos of the two missing girls. “It’s a shame about these photos,” he said. “I was trying to find a color photograph.”
The woman looked up at him, and hesitated like she was trying to think faster than her brain had the capacity to handle. “I have one if you would like it,” she said eventually, but not with any enthusiasm. More a statement than an offer.
“Sure,” Stone smiled again. Now the pain of smiling so much seemed suddenly worth it.
The woman disappeared into a small back room and returned a few minutes later with a 6x4” color photo. She handed it to Stone. It was a snapshot of the librarian and a younger girl, probably about seventeen. The young girl has honey-brown tanned skin, a wide smiling mouth and long blonde hair that had been platted into ponytails. The women were sitting side by side on upended plastic colored crates, with picture books open in their laps. In the foreground of the photo, Stone saw the backs of children’s heads.
“That was taken at the recent read-a-thon,” the woman said. “Margie and I were reading Dr Zeus to some local children.”
Stone guessed the photo had been pinned to a lunchroom noticeboard. There were a couple of thumbtack holes in the top corner of the photo. He held the image closer to the light streaming through the windows and studied the missing girl’s face closely.
“Thank you,” Stone said to the woman. “I really appreciate this.”
The woman shrugged. “Anything to help,” she said.
Stone slipped the image into the back pocket of his jeans. “Have you heard anything about either girl?” Stone asked. “I mean I know the police are investigating, but I wonder if there are any rumors about what might have happened.”
The woman relaxed a little now. Gossip was something she seemed more comfortable sharing. She leaned across the counter, closer to Stone, and lowered her voice, like she was worried about being overheard.
“Stella Hinton – that’s the other girl who is missing – she has a reputation,” the librarian said, and raised her eyebrow to give the words added meaning. “Margie and her were friends, but Stella was considered a bit of a wild child…”
Stone said nothing. Just kept his eyes on the librarian’s face, listening carefully, committing everything to memory.
“Last time they were seen was along the turnoff road, back towards the highway. That was last Wednesday afternoon. Hank Dodd saw them both, walking on the roadside.”
“Really?” Stone did a thing with his face to show he was merely curious, but behind the expression he was becoming intrigued. “Who is Hank Dodd? Is he a local?”
“He owns a bar on Main Street called ‘Stan’s’.”
Stone nodded, but gave nothing more away from his expression. “Where were the girls heading?”
The woman shrugged. “No one knows, but Hank Dodd told the deputy that Margie was carrying a suitcase.”
The woman leaned back, the news delivered. Stone frowned. “Really? I didn’t read any of that in this newspaper report,” he said.
The woman puffed out her cheeks and nodded her head, like she was one of the privileged few with access to information. “The police decided to leave that information out of the report. They didn’t want anyone knowing any more than the basic facts while they complete their investigations.”
Stone stood back, looking thoughtful. “
So the police aren’t investigating this as a kidnapping?”
The librarian shook her head, looked just a little smug. “No. Not from what I’ve heard around town. They think the girls have run away to Phoenix.”
Stone rubbed his chin slowly. “Are you sure about this?” he frowned. “Are you sure this Hank Dodd told the police Margie was carrying a suitcase.”
“Of course,” the librarian said, and then she peeled off her glasses and changed her stance so one of her hips was thrust forward. She glanced at Stone from beneath hooded eyes. “I got it straight from my boyfriend, Deputy Larry Peyton.”
Stone blinked. He had a vague recollection of the young orange-haired cop with the rash around his neck who had leveled a shotgun on him back at the diner. He said nothing for several moments.
“Do Margie’s folks live nearby?” Stone asked.
The librarian nodded. “Corner of West and Richmond Street.”
Fourteen.
Jack Stone knew plenty about grieving parents. After mustering out of the military he had worked for a Seattle-based firm doing hostage rescue work. As a hostage rescue expert he had dealt with mothers, fathers – even brothers and sisters who were suffering the terrible trauma of not knowing the fate of a missing loved one.
And he had his own personal experience that haunted him with the same terrible uncertainty ever day. So when he knocked lightly on the door at the corner of West and Richmond Street, he knew what to expect.
He stood back, well away from the door. He knew he wouldn’t have to wait for long.
He heard the creak of floorboards from inside the house followed by fingers scrabbling impatiently at a chain, latches being turned. Then the door was flung open just a few seconds later and a hopeful, tearful woman’s face appeared. The woman looked to be in her forties. She had curly blonde hair, unkempt, and pale skin that seemed puffy and blurred, like it had lost its elasticity. Like it just hung from her skull. Her eyes were red-rimmed and watery.
Stone stood with his hands clasped before him, quiet and respectful.
“Mrs. Bevan?”
“Yes.”
“Ma’am, my name is Jack Stone. I’m investigating Margie’s disappearance.” He reached into his back pocket, flipped open his wallet to show his drivers license. He was too far away from the door for the woman to see his identification clearly, but he knew that wouldn’t matter. In Stone’s experience, the only people who asked for identification were those who weren’t freely offered identification.
The woman looked Stone up and down, and her eyes narrowed. “You’re with the police?”
“I’m conducting a parallel investigation,” Stone said. “And I just wanted to ask you one question if I may.” He kept his wallet open, held it up beside his face, like he had nothing to hide.
The woman paused, and then a grey-haired man appeared behind her, peering over her shoulder at the stranger on their porch, crowding the doorway. The woman turned, spoke quickly to the man. “He’s an investigator helping the police,” the woman explained, and Stone did not correct her. The man pulled the door wider open and stood watching Stone with vacant sad eyes.
“Do you have news about our daughter?” the man asked. His voice was weak and tremulous. He had been weeping. Stone knew their pain.
“No, sir. Not yet,” Stone said. “I just have a question.”
“What is it?”
“I wanted to know if Margie owned a suitcase.”
The couple in the doorway didn’t move, didn’t exchange questioning puzzled glances, and didn’t hesitate for a moment.
“No,” they said together.
Fifteen.
Stone stood on the intersection of Main Street and looked up at the sun. It was mid-morning, and the temperature was still rising. He could feel the heat, baked into the concrete path, rising back up through the soles of his boots. Then he looked over his shoulder at the shop fronts, and then along the ribbon of road that led back to the Highway and Lilley’s diner. There was a hot breeze on his face, coming in gusts that flattened his shirt against his chest and whipped up the dust on the sidewalk. He stood for a few minutes and watched the sky. Clouds were beginning to stack up across the distant horizon, like a dark angry scar.
Stone sighed, set his jaw, and just started walking.
It was three miles to the turnoff – not a long walk. Not a walk that bothered him, even in this heat. He strode out, keeping his eyes on the verge.
He didn’t know what he was looking for. If the two missing girls had been walking this way, then maybe they would have left footprints. It hadn’t rained for months in these parts – but Windswept wasn’t called Windswept without good reason, he guessed. So the chances of finding footprints, or tire tracks in the dirt were practically zero. But he walked the road anyhow, because it was a lead, and because he was accustomed to following dead-end leads.
On foot, the desert wasn’t anywhere near as flat or featureless as Stone had thought. Speeding past at sixty miles an hour from a car’s window, the wide pan of red earth looked bland and smooth, but now he was at ground level, he saw the way the desert undulated in rolling ridges and hollows, and how peppered the ground was with twisted scraggly brown shrubs and thorns and cactus. This wasn’t a wasteland, Stone realized – it was the kind of place that people could get lost in – or buried in.
Never to be seen again.
Sixteen.
Stone reached the junction where the road from Windswept met the highway without seeing anything that might be a clue to the disappearance of the two local girls. Then walked the extra distance to Lilley’s diner, and came through the door with red dust on his jeans and over his boots.
There were three customers in the diner; a young couple sitting at a table by the windows, holding hands and staring into each other’s eyes like maybe they were on their honeymoon, and a middle-aged man wearing denim overalls. He was at a table on his own, with farming brochures spread out across the counter-top. Lilley was leaning over the man’s shoulder, pouring him a coffee refill from a stainless steel pot.
She looked up, saw Stone in the doorway, and her face went through a whole rush of emotions, from delight, to embarrassment, to concern, and finally back to delight again. Self-consciously, she tucked a loose tendril of hair behind her ear, set the coffee pot on the table and wiped her hands on her apron.
“What are you doing here?” she came to him, drew him to one side of the counter.
“I went for a walk,” he said. “Have you got a Coke?”
She frowned. “You walked all the way here for a Coke?”
“No. I walked all the way here looking for leads on the roadside that might be connected to the disappearance of your two local girls. As a separate issue, have you got a Coke?”
She handed him a can from a low refrigerator that was concealed behind the serving counter.
“Did you find anything?”
Stone opened the can and drank thirstily. “Not a thing,” he admitted. “Not yet.”
“That sounds ominous, Jack Stone.”
Stone shrugged. “The last man to see the girls alive was the guy who owns the bar. I think I’m going to pay him a visit.”
“Hank Dodd?”
Stone nodded. “You know him?”
Lilley shook her head. “Not personally, but I know of him. He’s one of the town’s most influential men. He has connections, Stone.”
“Connections? You mean with the police?”
“I mean with his brother-in-law, the sheriff.”
Seventeen.
Stone borrowed Lilley’s Chevy on the promise he returned to pick her up at 6pm.
He drove back along the turnoff road doing a steady fifty, getting accustomed to the big car’s spongy brakes and vague steering. It wasn’t a great car. It had seen better days – but it was a lot better than walking. He cracked the window down, and didn’t pass a single car all the way to Windswept’s outer limits.
He slowed speed through the town, taking
elaborate care because it wasn’t his car, and when he went through the intersection of West and Main Street, he kept on going. ‘Stan’s Bar’ disappeared into his rear-view mirror. So did the police station opposite. Stone blew through Windswept’s outer limits and kept on driving north.
Outside the town limits, maybe a mile down the road, he saw a sign on a pole by the roadside.
‘Rapture Arizona. Population 13,886. 11 miles.’
Stone checked the fuel gauge. He had three-quarters of a tank. He put his foot down, and the Chevy gave a growl as the speedometer crept up to sixty.
The road was the same two-lane blacktop. But there was more traffic as he drove further north. Stone passed a couple of trucks, and a couple of cars – enough to be considered peak-hour chaos back in Windswept.
Dotted in the distance on either side of the road, Stone could see occasional buildings. He wasn’t sure if they were farms, homesteads or storage sheds, but each building seemed to be marked with a battered old mailbox, and a dusty rutted trail that branched off the road at right angles.
He kept driving.
The town of Rapture appeared gradually, first as intermittent roadside houses, vacant lots of dry brown grass, telegraph poles and trees – but gradually filling in as he drew closer. The houses became suburban streets that intersected the two-lane. Then he hit his first traffic light, and a couple of semi-trailers appeared from a road on his right, joining the steady flow further north.
Drab green and grey industrial sheds and motor home parks became neat residential areas – until finally he hit the town’s business district. Here the traffic was more constant. Shop fronts and bright advertising signs on high poles announced the next motel, the next fast food outlet and the next discount department store. Stone slowed, eyes working left and right as he edged into Rapture.
Stone parked up and spent several hours in the town, walking the business district, and quartering the streets looking for motels and overnight accommodation, watchful for a blue SUV. He found nothing, and by 4.30pm he’d felt he had discovered everything he could. He slid back behind the wheel of the Chevy. The seat was hot, the air stuffy from being too long under the direct baking sun. He turned the car around and headed back towards Windswept.