by Rick Mofina
“Let’s go over it all one more time so I’m clear.” He shuffled papers. “Your job is to monitor all the cameras. Tell me again—what’re you looking out for?”
“The guests. We don’t want anyone freaking out, or having a heart attack, or harming other guests. We don’t want people falling or getting hurt, that sort of thing.”
“That it?”
“No, we also want to be sure guests don’t hurt the staff, or the actors, or damage the sets. Sometimes when people are scared they react by punching or kicking the actors. We watch for that, too.”
“So, did you see Gage Hudson leave the Chambers of Dread?”
“No.”
“One more time, walk us through events surrounding his disappearance.”
“Sid called me on the radio saying we had a straggler in the spinner and described him to me—a nine-year-old boy with a Cubs T-shirt, ball cap and shorts. I searched all the cameras in the Chambers but never saw him. Then Sid called a Code 99 and Mr. King took over and we shut it down and everyone searched. Mr. King even took the parents through the Chambers to help search.”
“What about the emergency exits? Could Gage have gone out one of the emergency exits?”
“An alarm sounds if the doors are opened and no alarm sounded.”
“Is it possible that the alarms may have malfunctioned?”
“Maybe, but they’re on a separate system. If someone went through the door, we would’ve known.”
“Okay, but the cameras didn’t record everything, right?” Malko asked.
“No, they’re on a different system and were spotty after Milwaukee.”
“Let’s go back to the alarms for the doors. Can they be disarmed? Switched off?”
“Yes, at the door with a key.”
“What about at the control panel where you work? Can they be switched off manually there?”
“Yes. That usually happens when we break down a ride after a fair, or for maintenance.”
Malko leaned forward and steepled his fingers before his chin.
“Did you at any point surrounding the time frame Gage Hudson disappeared switch off the alarm system, even accidentally for a brief moment?”
Seconds ticked by before Alma answered. “No, I did not.”
Malko read her face for deception. “Alma, would you agree to come back and submit to a polygraph examination, to help us?”
All the saliva dried in her throat as she swallowed, her mind reaching back for Sid’s advice on the lie detector. Just keep changing your answers, make sure they’re all over the map because you’re scared and worried about that boy.
“Alma?” Malko said. “Would you agree to a polygraph?”
“Yes. I want to help.”
“Good. Thank you. We’re almost done here. Let’s switch gears.” He opened a folder and slid a photo toward her. It showed a laptop with a photo of Gage Hudson displayed on the screen.
“Why do you have this on your laptop, Alma?”
Was this a trick? She shrugged as if it were obvious. “That’s what police sent out when it all happened and I’ve been praying for him.”
“Praying for him?”
“Yes, like everyone, hoping that you find him and return him to his mom and dad.”
“Prior to his disappearance, did you have any contact with Gage Hudson?”
“No.”
“Online?”
“No.”
“With his family?”
“No.”
“Do you have any information about anyone who may have ill will toward the Hudson family?”
“No, I don’t. I don’t know the family.”
Malko then slid a physical color photo, five inches by seven inches in size, to her. It was a head-and-shoulder image of another boy about the same age as Gage Hudson.
“We found this among your belongings in your RV.”
Alma leaned over and looked at it, her face softening.
“Is this your son, Kyle?”
Her face creased as she nodded.
“Tell us what happened to him.”
“You know. You have my file there. Please don’t make me.”
“We’d like you to tell us in your words.”
Fighting her tears she stared at the ceiling.
“Kyle was seven. His father was out of the picture. I was raising him alone, struggling to make ends meet. It was hard. One day Kyle was watching a kids’ show and got rope from our storage and learned how to make a lasso. He was twirling it, playing cowboy in the living room. I told him to stop. He didn’t. The rope hooked our TV and brought it down, smashing it to pieces on the floor. I’d just bought it and I lost my temper. I yelled at him, grabbed his arm and twisted it hard. Something cracked, he screamed and I took him to the hospital.”
She looked down at the photo.
“I can’t. Please don’t make me go through this.”
“You’d broken his arm,” Malko said. “Hospital staff said you’d been drinking. Social services were called and they took Kyle away. They determined you weren’t fit to be Kyle’s mother and placed him in a foster home, isn’t that correct?”
Alma nodded. “They were wrong,” she said. “It was an accident, a flash of anger.”
“Then what happened?”
“There was a fire in the foster parents’ home. Smoking in bed, they said, and the parents and Kyle they were...they were...”
“No one in the house survived the fire.”
Alma’s tears fell on the photo.
“But something happened before the fire,” Malko said, passing tissues to Alma as he continued. “You’d gone to the foster home and tried to kidnap Kyle, to steal him back, but the foster father stopped you, didn’t he?”
“I needed Kyle back with me. He was my son! I needed to tell him how sorry I was.”
“Do you feel somehow responsible for his death?”
Alma stared at Malko, knowing it was in the reports.
“If I hadn’t hurt him—” Alma’s voice grew small “—he wouldn’t have been in that house and he wouldn’t have been in the fire. He’d be alive.”
Malko looked at her as she struggled to compose herself.
“You’d give anything to have him back, wouldn’t you?”
Alma nodded.
“You ache to have your child in your life, don’t you?”
She nodded again.
“You know you weren’t an unfit mother, that people make mistakes. And each day you see happy families, like the Hudson family, go by in your cameras and you die a little more and you want to take back what the system took from you.”
Alma blinked as if awakening. “What? No, nothing like that.”
Malko stood.
“And your pain’s been building over the years, hasn’t it?”
“No, stop!”
“Maybe you’re thinking you deserve a ‘do-over’ with another boy?”
“No.”
“You’ve admitted you control the alarm system. You can switch it off.”
“Yes, but I didn’t.”
“And your boyfriend, Sid Griner, knows all there is to know about the Chambers. Did you two do it together?”
“Stop this, it’s crazy.”
“Are you involved in Gage Hudson’s disappearance?”
“No.”
“You’re not telling us everything, Alma!”
“I am!”
Malko slapped his palm on the table.
“You did something, Alma! What did you do?”
“Why’re you so cruel?” she cried. “I don’t want to talk to you anymore. I want a lawyer.”
She thrust her face into her hands and sobbed.
36
In River Ridge police headquarters, Malko spla
shed water on his face.
It had already been a long day and it was not over.
Reaching for paper towels, he couldn’t help his gut feeling that Griner and McCain were hiding something.
Malko knew they were lying and was confident the polygraphs, which were being arranged through Ultra-Fun’s attorneys, would show that.
They needed to look hard at all the carnies and guard against falling victim to one approach. There were a lot of elements in play.
Back at his desk, Malko resumed work and saw a message that pleased him. A warrant was obtained to ensure the Chambers of Dread attraction remained at the fairgrounds and intact so investigators, with help from experts, could continue working on the entire structure, including its faulty security camera system, for potential evidence.
On other fronts, the Illinois state police were helping review the statewide sex offender database to identify persons convicted of certain crimes against children. They’d started with those residing near the fairgrounds, then went out by a ten-mile radius, knowing that an individual could come from anywhere. Many disturbing people had surfaced but so far in the ongoing search, all those questioned were alibied.
Investigators were still poring through the canvass reports, and they were beginning to examine security footage collected from businesses and residences between the fairgrounds and Emerson Plaza.
The forensic team was processing physical material collected from the Hudsons’ home and vehicles. Agents were looking at bank and credit card records. They were studying information contained on their phones and computers.
Malko knew they were looking closely at Gage’s chat history on the earLoadzone and they’d interviewed his friends Ethan Clark, Colton Huppkey and Marshall Thompson.
“What we mostly talked about on ELZ lately was the Chambers of Dread,” Marshall had told agents. “That it was supposed to be the scariest thing ever.”
Ethan Clark had said, “People on ELZ were talking about the insane butcher, the burning witch queen and the guy who chased you with a chain saw.”
“We talked about it at school, too,” Colton had told the FBI. “We knew it was coming to town and we were daring each other on who would be brave enough to go in and who would be first.” Colton then blinked quickly at the agents. “You’re going to find him, right? Gage is going to be okay?”
The agents promised Colton they’d do all they could to find his friend.
Some of the cyber experts had suggested adults posing as children could’ve accessed the site. But it was challenging to nail down. Some visitors had the skill to erase their trail on ELZ, perhaps the work of protective tech-savvy parents.
Other investigators were beginning interviews with Cal and Faith’s friends, coworkers, neighbors, as well as Gage’s teachers, coaches, his friends and classmates. And people who’d claimed to be in the Chambers of Dread, or at the fair, when Gage vanished were coming forward.
The list of people to speak to was growing. Malko glanced at the time again. Pamela Huppkey, a close friend of Faith Hudson’s, was coming in for an interview shortly.
He opened another file. A small team of agents was studying all the major crime stories Cal had produced for the Chicago Star-News. Starting with the most recent and going back, they were looking at cold-blooded criminals, their families and associates, who may have taken Gage as an act of vengeance. The agents made notes, intending to consult Cal.
Malko’s shoulders and neck had knotted with tension.
What were they missing? Was there something he wasn’t covering? How does a little boy disappear from an enclosed area? Did he wander off? Was he taken? He hadn’t yet eliminated the parents as suspects, so which way should he point the investigation?
A shadow fell over Malko and he raised his head to FBI agent Larson Ward, the polygraphist who’d administered Faith and Cal Hudson’s exams, standing before him with his computer.
“I’ve concluded examining the Hudsons’ results. Is now a good time?”
“Yes.”
Ward set up his laptop and began rolling through and pointing at the peaks and valleys of the graphs.
“We still have a lot of people to process, Tibor.”
“I know.”
“We’ve made the parents a priority as you requested.”
“Yes, thanks. Can we get on with it, Larson?”
“First, it’s important to note that we have to take in a spectrum of emotions and reactions, from the innocent parent suffering from guilt for what’s happened, to the offender who knows who is responsible for the crime.”
“Ward, I’m familiar with the cautions.”
“Given the high profile and the emotional atmosphere of this type of case there are a lot of potential factors to bear in mind when evaluating the responses and readings. Individuals could be responding as part of a diversionary tactic to protect someone, or deflect suspicion. It could be a matter of misperception, such as an honest error, or there could be mental health issues, or other stressors at play.”
“Ward, yes, I’ve been through this many times. What do you have?”
“Based on my readings of the results, I conclude that both Cal and Faith Hudson were untruthful in their responses. They’re concealing something.”
37
Pam Huppkey twisted the straps of her bag while taking stock of the small, barren room where she waited.
With its four cinder-block walls, plain veneer table, hard chairs and stained ceiling tiles, it seemed clinical, cold and smelled of floor cleaner.
Pam had never been in a police station in her life but when the FBI requested an interview regarding Gage Hudson’s disappearance she drove to River Ridge police headquarters as soon as she could.
She wanted to help, but deep down she was nervous and jumped a little when the door opened.
“Thank you for coming, Mrs. Huppkey,” said the man who’d entered the room with a woman. His tie was loosened and his shirtsleeves were rolled up to his elbows. The woman was wearing a conservative business suit. She had short hair cut in a layered bob.
They were unsmiling as the man closed the door behind them. They set file folders on the table and took the two chairs opposite Pam.
“I’m Tibor Malko with the FBI. This is Agent Sue Marsh. Can we get you anything—coffee, tea, water?”
“No, thank you.”
Malko and Marsh opened their folders.
“As you know,” he began, “this is a large investigation and part of our job is to talk to everyone in Gage Hudson’s circles to help us with any information that could lead to us finding him. We don’t want to miss anything.”
Pam saw that they were looking at pages that resembled the questionnaire form that she and Dean had completed. She saw penned asterisks in the margins. Her nervousness bordered on fear, for she was uncertain what she should say, given the secret that had been gnawing at her.
“You, your husband and son are good friends with the family,” Marsh said.
“Yes, our son, Colton, and Gage go to Saint Bartholomew’s together. I work part-time as a volunteer in the admin office there.”
“And you’re quite involved with various activities?”
“Yes, I volunteer with school and church groups. Our boys play on the ball team. Dean helps coach.”
Malko and Marsh continued with seemingly routine questions about the length of the Huppkeys’ friendship with the Hudsons, the frequency of interaction, before moving to specifics about Gage’s disappearance.
They pressed Pam to identify anyone in Gage’s circle who may have been recently exhibiting unusual behavior. They asked her to detail anything out of the ordinary concerning the Hudsons in the forty-eight hours before Gage vanished. Then they wanted her to characterize Cal and Faith’s reaction to Gage’s disappearance, their demeanor, what they said, what they did.
&nb
sp; “Every iota of information is relevant,” Malko said.
As they continued, Pam grew increasingly anxious, twisting the tiny cross on the chain around her neck—a reaction that was not lost on Malko and he saved it in his mind the way a skilled card player keeps an ace in reserve. He held on to it until their interview with Pam neared its conclusion.
“I think we’re done, Mrs. Huppkey,” he said. “But before we wrap up, let me ask you—is there anything else you think we should know? It could be crucial, no matter how trivial, or embarrassing, or unrelated it may appear.”
Malko casually stroked the stubble of his bald head while his eyes, like black ball bearings, drilled into Pam’s as if he knew a truth was hidden there.
“Anything at all that might be weighing on you, Pam?” Malko asked, using her first name for the first time.
She twisted her cross, grappling with whether she should reveal her most disturbing and secret observations about Faith Hudson. Pam’s desire to be a good friend, to mind her own business, became entangled with the acrimony she’d buried for years about her friendship with Faith.
Faith had always had a prickly side to her and could be a bit of a bitch. Pam could not help but feel that at times the pretty and high-octane businesswoman, working in a downtown skyscraper, looked down at her, the plain-looking, religious, suburban school mom.
Above all, what had happened to Gage had chilled Pam to her core and in her heart she knew that if it had happened to Colton she’d want everyone to do all they could to find him—no matter what it was.
“There’s one thing,” Pam said.
Malko’s expression was stone-cold. He said nothing.
“A few months ago—” Pam cleared her throat “—I saw Faith do something that troubled me and I’ve never told anyone about it.”
“What did you see?” Malko said.
Pam related the shopping lunch with her friend Marcia at a mall about ten miles away in Oak Brook, and how she’d spotted Faith in the food court with a man.
“He was a rather handsome man. I have no idea who he was,” Pam said, recounting how Faith had never seen her, and how she thought the man was a client, possibly. But that their conversation seemed so intense.