(2001) The Girls Are Missing

by Caroline Crane

  Gail did not know why they shouldn’t, but in a way it seemed right. It was sort of a secret thing, there under the leaves. Something, or someone, had carefully covered it, and they were not supposed to find it.

  But the cave-rock was gone. She would never be able to go back to the cave-rock, knowing that thing was there. She would have no place to escape to after Mary Ellen came.

  “I don’t like it.” She kicked at a tree trunk. “I wish it wasn’t there.”

  “Well, it is. What do you want to do now, Gail?” “I think—” Gail looked at the ground, avoiding the hill where the flies were. “I think I’d better go home now.”

  “Me, too,” Anita decided. “I’m going to your house. And I’m going to stay for a while, and then I’ll walk around home by the road.”

  3

  Joyce woke from her nap as voices sounded on the stairs. She recognized Anita’s. It was good that Gail had someone to play with during the summer.

  Rousing herself, she assembled a load of laundry. On her way to the basement she stopped and looked into the sun-porch, where they were playing. Dolls and doll clothes littered the floor. Anita did not notice her, but Gail glanced up with a faint smile.

  They really were different, those two. Gail, always thin, still had the matchstick legs and wispy blondness of a child, while Anita, without seeming older, gave an unconscious hint of womanhood to come. It showed in her mannerisms, some probably spontaneous, some acquired, such as the habit of flinging back her hair and then preening it with a long, slow stroke of the hand.

  It showed in her easy way of handling adults, and it showed, rather surprisingly, in her legs. From the red shorts to the sockless sneakers, they were long, tanned, and shapely.

  Upstairs, Adam woke and demanded to be fed. She sat on her bed to nurse him and paged through a magazine with her free hand.

  “How to Cope With Your Child’s Fears.” It was an article she ought to read sometime. Gail had had some terrible

  fears after her father’s death. Most were gone now, but a few remained. Her questions about those missing girls, for instance.

  Gradually Adam dozed off. She returned him to his crib and went downstairs to start dinner.

  Anita was seated at the kitchen table, whining into the telephone. “Why can’t you come and get me?… Then will you tell Daddy to pick me up? . .. No, I don’t want to, I’m scared of Mr. Lattimer. … So much for you, I’ll stay here all night.”

  Joyce unwrapped a freshly thawed beef fillet and began to slice it. “Why are you scared of Mr. Lattimer?”

  “Because he’s a pervert and he’s ugly. And besides,” Anita tossed back her hair, “he’s in love with me.” She flounced away, immensely pleased with herself.

  Joyce was shocked. What if he really had made advances to the girls?

  Moments later came the sound of Gail’s voice. “No, I know what you’ll do. You’ll make me walk you all the way, and then I’ll have to come home by myself.”

  “So much for you!” Anita burst back into the kitchen. With a sly smile at Joyce, she called over her shoulder, “I guess you’re not my friend anymore.”

  Gail crept into the kitchen and stood close to her mother.

  Anita slammed out through the back door. “Good-bye, Mrs. Gilwood. Your daughter’s mean and selfish.”

  “Good-bye, Anita.” Joyce watched the black hair swinging down the driveway. “Now what’s the matter with her?”

  “I don’t know.” Gail stared at the floor.

  “I heard her asking for a ride home. Did she hurt herself?”

  “No … Mommy, what does it mean when there are a lot of flies around something?”

  “It means something’s spoiling, I guess. You know how flies are attracted to garbage.”

  Of course Gail knew. What a silly question.

  “What’s the matter, Gail? Where did you see these flies?”

  “In the woods.”

  “It might be a dead animal. A rabbit, or a deer.” There were occasionally wild deer, even in Cedarville.

  “I couldn’t see it. It was covered with leaves.”

  Mixing her teriyaki sauce, Joyce thought vaguely of dead animals, of how rarely one saw a dead wild animal.

  Perhaps Mr. Lattimer had died. But how would he have gotten covered with leaves?

  And then she realized that nothing could have gotten covered with leaves unless it had died last autumn before the leaves fell, and by now it would be well beyond the stage of attracting flies.

  “Where in the woods?”

  Gail said, “You know that place we found when we took a walk, and you said it was a fairy palace?”

  “That’s what my grandmother would have called it. You mean it was there, in my grandmother’s fairy palace?”

  “No, the next hill. It was in some rocks, in a crack in the rocks. There was just a pile of leaves and all the flies. And it smelled bad. It made me sick.”

  “I should think so, when it’s this hot.”

  Maybe a dead dog. Maybe someone buried a dog, but didn’t really bury it, with a shovel It’s very rocky there.

  “Mommy, will you come and see it?”

  “No, honey, I can’t go out and leave Adam. Why do you want me to see it?”

  “Because maybe—” Gail ground her toe into the floor, then fled the kitchen.

  Joyce peeled and sliced two cucumbers to marinate in sweetened vinegar. A real Japanese dinner.

  The telephone rang. It was Sheila Farand, wondering if her daughter had started home.

  “She left a while ago,” Joyce said, “by the road. There was something in the woods that bothered them. Gail was just telling me about it.”

  “What sort of something? Don’t tell me that Lattimer’s been pestering them again.”

  Then it was true, what Anita had said about Mr. Lattimer. Or was it simply that Sheila believed her daughter’s tales?

  “No, it was something in the rocks. They said it was covered with leaves, and had a lot of flies around it, and it smelled bad.”

  “Did they see what it was?”

  “No. Probably a dead animal. Or maybe Mr. Lattimer’s been dumping garbage.” She grasped the phone with her shoulder and grated a sprinkle of fresh ginger over the cucumber.

  “Probably,” Sheila agreed. “Okay, thanks, Joyce.”

  Gail came back into the kitchen. “Who was that on the phone?”

  “Anita’s mother. What were you starting to tell me?”

  “Nothing.”

  “It was about that thing you saw in the woods. Just tell me why it bothers you so much.”

  “I’m afraid of it.”

  She could pretty well guess what Gail thought it was, her phobias being what they were. But there must have been something she noticed, perhaps even subliminally, that made this seem beyond the realm of normal experience.

  Joyce looked at the clock. In forty-five minutes, Carl would be home. She could not broil the teriyaki until he arrived. There was rice to cook, but Gail could mind that as well as Adam. She must do this for Gail, to help her exorcise those ghosts of fear. To let her know that she still mattered.

  “Okay, where is it?” She could not help a little sigh of annoyance, despite her good intentions.

  “Are you going?” Gail’s look of gratitude made it almost worthwhile.

  Joyce received instructions as to where to find the “thing,” and Gail on when to cover the rice.

  “Come back soon,” Gail called as she left, and Joyce wondered if she was right in leaving her and Adam alone for even half an hour.

  But she had promised. Resolutely she stepped through the stone wall into the bright, hot meadow. Far in the distance she could see the roof of Mr. Lattimer’s shack. Would he have gone all that way to dump his garbage? Not likely. He kept very much to himself and that included his trash. Most of it he burned. The rest littered his own property but extended not an inch beyond.

  She descended to the denseness of the brook and an army of mosq
uitoes. She had not been this way since April. It was almost eerily dark, with the trees in leaf and the sun past its zenith.

  And then she was out in the woods. For a moment she could not remember where the fairy palace was. That first small hill. She climbed up to see it and was amazed at what Gail had done. A little garden with pebbles and moss and even a pool, all neatly arranged. What a creative child she had.

  Love and admiration for Gail surged within her. She must get back to her quickly. Scrambling down the side of the hill, she continued along the path. And there, just as Gail had said, was another rocky hill.

  She could not see any flies. Perhaps she was in the wrong place, or they had retired for the evening. The rocks seemed full of crevices. Some had trees growing out of them. Others were filled with moss, and leaves, and—

  Yes, leaves. In one place the leaves and twigs were piled up to form a mound. She moved closer. And suddenly she was assaulted by all of it, the flies, the droning, the smell. She backed away, fighting waves of nausea.

  After several deep breaths she tried again. Closer this time. She picked up a stick. For a moment she stood contemplating the leaves, then dropped the stick.

  Still holding her breath, she hurried back along the path, across the brook and up into the sunny meadow, where she collapsed into the grass.

  4

  Gail greeted her with astonishment. “Did you go there already?”

  “I went,” said Joyce. “I just love what you did with that fairy palace. It’s probably supposed to be a secret, but I couldn’t help looking. Gail, why don’t you run upstairs and take a bath now, before dinner?”

  “Why? It’s still daytime.”

  “Lots of people take baths in the daytime. It’ll cool you off, you’re all hot and sticky. And look at your knees.”

  Gail inched toward the stairs. “A bubble bath?”

  “Of course. But not too long, Carl will be home. Do you want me to start it for you?”

  Then she would know when Gail was in the tub.

  “Why does Carl take so many showers?” Gail asked, following her up the stairs.

  “Because he gets hot and sticky, too.”

  In the muggy summer weather, Carl always seemed to melt. But then, it wasn’t easy, that daily trek into New York and back.

  When Gail’s tub was running, and Gail sitting happily among the bubbles, Joyce went downstairs to the telephone in the kitchen. She looked in the directory, first under “P,” then realized she hadn’t been thinking. Cedarville, Village of.

  She dialed the number. It rang twice. A voice answered, “Cedarville police. Chief D’Amico.”

  “I don’t know if this is anything at all,” she began. “My daughter and her friend—they were playing in the woods near here—”

  “Take your time, ma’am. Where is ‘here’?”

  “Shadowbrook Road. They were playing in the woods, and they found—something.”

  She thought she heard a change in his breathing, some alertness. He said nothing.

  “They couldn’t see what it was,” she went on, “but it upset them. I went over there—”

  She described the mound of leaves, the flies, the smell. “It must have been an animal. I shouldn’t have bothered you.”

  “Where did you say this was?”

  “The woods. Up near the Lattimer place, near Shadow-brook Road. But the more I think about it—”

  “We’ll check it out, Mrs.—”

  “Gilwood. No, really, I’m starting to feel like an idiot.”

  “Don’t worry about that, Mrs. Gilwood. You did right to call us. Can you tell me the exact place?”

  “You start from the end of Shadowbrook Road, right near Mr. Lattimer. There’s this brook …”

  She directed him along the brook and onto the path. She did not know what those dead plants were, but he couldn’t miss them, the bone-white stalks. She described the hill, the second one, the crevice of leaves and sticks. He asked for her full name, her address, and said, “Thanks a lot, Mrs. Gilwood. We’ll check it out.”

  Probably just an animal, she thought again. A dead animal that somebody covered with leaves.

  Her ears caught the sound of a car in the driveway. She got up from her chair and lit the broiler.

  Carl came into the kitchen utterly wilted, his tie loosened, jacket over his arm. He was a big man, broad-shouldered, with golden brown hair that looked blond in the light. His face was strong and his jaw square. She liked that jaw. Although nature had not endowed him with the outrageous beauty of Larry, her first husband, Carl had an air of calm strength, as though he could cope with anything. And he certainly managed better than Larry ever had at living in the real world.

  She kissed his cheek. “Hi, honey. Gail’s in the tub, I’ll get her out. I bet you’ll be glad to see the end of summer.”

  “Don’t talk about the end,” he groaned. “This is only the beginning.”

  “Oh, well, it won’t last forever.” She ran upstairs and banged on the bathroom door.

  “Time’s up, luv, there’s a line forming.”

  Gail said something indistinct and petulant. She knew the “line” meant Carl.

  While he showered, Joyce quick-broiled the meat. When he came down ten minutes later, she was putting the finishing touches on the table.

  He said, “I thought Gail was supposed to do that.”

  “I made her take a bath,” Joyce explained. “I guess she’s still dressing. They were playing out in the woods, she and Anita. Got kind of grubby.”

  “Who?” he asked absently. “Oh, that little sexpot.”

  “Carl, for God’s sake! The kid’s only nine years old.”

  He shrugged and went into the kitchen, where she heard him breaking open a tray of ice cubes.

  Sexpot. How could he? And yet she understood what he meant. She had seen it herself that afternoon. A few more years and Anita would be leaving Gail far behind.

  Carl came into the living room, an old-fashioned glass tinkling in his hand. He settled back on the sofa. “What sort of day did you have?”

  “Hot,” she answered.

  “Restful? Peaceful?”

  “Well—Barbara called. Mary Ellen’s coming tomorrow.”

  He set his glass on the floor. “No kidding. Why tomorrow?”

  “I suppose so Barbara won’t have to see you. And vice versa.”

  A mirthless chuckle. “That Barbara. Poor girl.”

  “She strikes me as more of a woman than a girl,” Joyce said. “But I suppose you knew her when she was younger.” She went to the foot of the stairs and called Gail.

  Carl brought his drink to the table. “So except for Barbara, it was a pretty good day.”

  “Pretty good, as days go.” It was not only Gail’s approach down the stairs that stopped her from telling him about the mound of leaves and her phone call to the police. By now, the whole thing seemed too trivial for words.

  “How about your day?” she asked as she passed him his plate. She enjoyed hearing about the office. It was where they had met, when she changed jobs after Larry’s death. Carl had been a young executive, charming and personable. And pursued. Joyce, so recently widowed, had paid little attention to him, which was probably what piqued his interest.

  He grinned, giving a small laugh. “Well, now, you know that place. Does anything ever happen? Same old accounts, same old people, same grind.”

  “So tell me about the people. Who’s doing what? Who got fired, retired, married?”

  He pondered the question. “Nobody.”

  She was hardly surprised, not by the lack of activity, but by Carl’s lack of interest. He had never been really people-oriented, and did not much care about any of his colleagues on a personal basis.

  “I guess I’ll just have to go and visit sometime,” she said.

  “Why don’t you? We can have lunch.”

  “I was thinking of bringing Adam, to show him off. How would he behave in a restaurant?”

  �
�Don’t bring Adam. They’ve all seen babies before.”

  She was stung, but had to admit he was probably right.

  Long after dinner, when Gail had finished clearing the table and taken her accustomed place before the television set, and Joyce was wiping the last of the kitchen counters, the telephone rang.

  A male voice asked, “Is this Mrs. Gilwood? Police Chief D’Amico. You called us a couple of hours ago.”

  “Yes. Right.”

  “We checked the place you told us about. I thought you’d want to know.”

  She listened vainly for a note of humor. A report on Mr. Lattimer’s garbage, perhaps. But he was saying, “You were right to call us, ma’am. It’s bad news. We can’t establish identity yet, but there have been a couple of missing persons—”

  “No!”

  “I’m afraid so. You say your daughter was upset by it. How much did she actually see?”

  “I don’t know. Nothing. I don’t know what bothered her.”

  “Does she go out there often?”

  “Pretty often.” Oh, God.

  “Did she ever mention seeing anybody?”

  “Nobody except—Mr. Lattimer.”

  “Okay. Thanks, ma’am.”

  She hung up the phone and discovered Carl in the kitchen doorway.

  “What was that all about?” he asked.

  “Oh, Carl, I—” She sat down weakly in one of the dinette chairs. “This afternoon, they—Gail and Anita—they were playing in the woods.”

  “You told me. And?”

  “They saw—I just don’t believe it.”

  “A UFO,” he suggested.

  “It’s not funny. I went over, too. It looked like—a pile of leaves. There were a lot of flies around. I don’t know how the girls knew. It frightened them. I called the police.”

  “Because of a pile of leaves?”

  “But, Carl, it was”

  “Was what? You’re a very poor storyteller. You leave out the best part.”

  “Not the best. It’s not a story, it’s real. Somebody was killed and buried, practically in our back yard.”

  At last she saw the twinkle disappear from his face.