Forget Me Not

by Lee Boschen

  "Now, Richard, I may be sending you on a wild goose chase, but Lafayette Square has the only red brick wall that either George or I know about near any Camera Store. And that is the Camera Store somebody set fire to. George thinks you may be right, maybe the whole point of the fire was to destroy a single roll of film.” She shrugged. “Anyway, to see the wall for yourself—” She tore the page out of her pad and slid it across her desk. “Go out the back door of the store, and there you are."

  * * * *

  "But this is my store, damn it,” Richard shouted. “Was my store, anyway, before it was burned out. I want to see what's going on in there."

  They were standing in front of the boarded up Lafayette Square store, arguing with the security guard. In vain.

  "You can't go in there until the fire marshal gives the all clear."

  "Actually,” Leslie said, “what we want to see is the back door."

  "The back door?” The guard peered suspiciously at her. “Won't do you any good. You can't get in the back door either."

  "We only want to see the area around the back door."

  "That's the service area. Why do you want to see around there?"

  "Why not?” Richard said.

  The security man stared narrow-eyed at him, considering. “All right,” he said finally, “I'll show you.” He marched them out of the building, around the wall screening the service area and up to a fire-blackened door with a shiny new padlock. “There,” he said triumphantly, pointing to the lock, “you can't get in here."

  Receiving no response, he turned around to see Leslie standing against the red brick wall some forty feet away. “Hey,” he said, “I thought you wanted to see the back door."

  "Around the back door,” Richard said. “Thanks for your help."

  The security man threw up his hands, and went grumbling past the two of them to disappear around the curtain wall. Richard started pacing back and forth a few feet in front of the wall, glancing from where Leslie stood to the picture he held in his hand. “The pattern of the bricks, even the bits of missing mortar, everything matches exactly,” he said finally. “This is the place where the picture was taken. This is where I had to be standing to see what I remember. Come and stand beside me, will you? Just look around, at everything, and tell me why I would have seen this before, except with the Kimberlys standing where you are."

  Standing beside Richard, Leslie carefully examined the area. At last she shook her head. “You know, maybe this isn't what you saw. Your fingerprints are on those pictures, so it's pretty obvious that you've seen them before, and maybe that's what you remember. After all, it's the same view."

  Richard was unhappy with that, even though he couldn't find any fault in what she had said. “It seems incomplete,” he said finally, “like I was here. But what the hell would I be doing here? Watching someone take their picture? According to Jan, I was out delivering the payroll checks and making a strictly routine pre-weekend inspection. What would I be doing out here in back of the store?"

  "Walking out to your car?” Leslie pointed to the parking lot, visible through the entrance to the service area. “Just as someone was taking a picture? Come on, Richard, these things happen. Simple coincidence."

  "Then how did my fingerprints get on the pictures?” His voice grew sarcastic. “Oh, pardon me, I wasn't supposed to ask you that again, was I, because you wouldn't know."

  "I don't know,” she blazed. “And I don't see that there's any necessary connection between your being here in this spot and your having touched those pictures."

  He looked at the picture in his hand, and Leslie saw the muscles bunching in his jaws. “Why was I here?” he muttered. “Could I really just have been walking past here when this picture was taken? But if that's so, what could possibly be in the negatives that was so important someone would kill for it, and me not know about it?"

  After a long silence, Leslie heaved a deep sigh. “I don't know,” she said. “It doesn't make any better sense to me than it does to you.” She took Richard's hand. “Come on, let's get home. I want to be there when Coleen gets off the school bus."

  * * * *

  Alex Wright stared out of the barred windows of the Boone County jail. How long had it been? he wondered. A week? Surely longer. Only a week ... of pain, of shock at the sight of his face in a mirror.

  But everything was arranged. He went over the plan in his mind: the escape plans were laid, the money paid. He'd been given a key, and a crude knife smuggled into his cell. All that remained was to be ready to act during the distraction that was to be provided any time now. Today? he'd asked. Tomorrow? Soon, he'd been told.

  Richard Webb. Hatred simmered in Alex's mind. It's his fault that my face is a horror that makes people look away when they see me. Leslie Carson. His stomach burned acid at the thought of her. It's her fault I'm locked in here like a caged animal.

  He almost choked on his fury, drawing little, short breaths through his open mouth.

  But I'll get even. Oh, yes. I'll see them beg before they die. Then, after a few years, while my attorneys tie up the courts in knots, I'll walk. But they'll be dead.

  Plastic surgery will work a miracle and everything will be back to normal. But not for them. They'll be dead forever.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The drive back to Leslie's house was a silent one for much of the way. Richard had been alternating between staring blankly at Highway 52 unwinding ahead and gazing at the Kimberlys’ Christmas card he still held in his hand. Finally, Leslie said, “Whether you remember it or not, there has to be something on the negative for that picture that those guys think is worth killing people to hide."

  "Not this picture,” Richard said. “The killers didn't want this picture. They threw them all away, remember? But I know what you mean. They wanted the others. The ‘others,’ they said. Those are the ones they don't want anyone to see. The Kimberlys died because they didn't have them.” His face grew glum. “But we knew that when we were in the police station. We haven't come an inch since then."

  "We have too,” Leslie protested. “We know the spot where you remembered seeing the Kimberlys having their picture taken—behind your store. That's the connection we were looking for."

  "Okay, but it's a dead end. Why did those guys come after me? Me? The only picture I know anything about is this one, and it's the one they don't want. What possible connection could there be between me and some other picture on that roll of film? It's pretty obvious that it's some other picture that they want."

  "Where do you suppose the other pictures are?” Leslie asked. “The Kimberlys didn't have them. They weren't at your house."

  Richard pressed his hands to his eyes for a long moment, then nodded. “Exactly. You've put your finger on it. Where are they? It's a cinch those guys don't know, but they think I do."

  "Wait a minute,” she said. “Why do you say that? They weren't trying to get something out of you, they were trying to kill you. Why? To keep something you know a secret. Like where the film is."

  "That damned film. We've got to find it, Leslie.” He remembered the service entrance door, the paint blistered from the heat of the fire. “And it may have been destroyed in the store fire."

  "Judging from the way they searched your house, the killers certainly don't think so."

  "They could be wrong, though. The negatives could be ashes.” Richard stared unseeingly at the road stretching ahead. “But if not, where are they? Who would know where they should be?” He shook his head. “That's crazy. The film should have been at Lafayette Square, in the same package as the pictures.” He looked at Leslie, his eyes narrowing. “But they weren't, because if they had been, the killers would have gotten them from the Kimberlys. Yet I know that film and prints are always kept together."

  "How do you know that?” Leslie asked. “I mean, if you can't remember the details of your business...?"

  Richard stared at her. “Uh ... I guess I don't know that it's so. It's just—my mind says
that's the way it is.” He threw up his hands. “Except this time. Why? What's so special about this time?” He returned to staring at the road ahead, musing aloud. “We need to find someone who'd know where the negatives should be. It'll have to be someone familiar with the way the Camera Stores do their processing."

  "What about the people who were working in the Lafayette Square store, would their jobs have ended when the store burned?"

  A smile grew slowly on his face. “The people who were working there that Friday. Oh, yes, they'll know. There's that sharp legal mind at work. Yes, they'll remember what I can't."

  "How will you reach them? They may have gotten other jobs by now. They could be working anywhere."

  "We'll call Jan Waters when we get home. She'll have their home addresses. We'll go see every single one of them until we find what happened to those negatives."

  * * * *

  "The employees were placed temporarily in other stores,” Jan said. “It's a matter of policy. Your policy, in fact. We've had other emergencies, you know, like that sprinkler failure at the Speedway—no, you wouldn't remember that, would you? You've always preached—um, insisted, ‘take care of the people we have, and they'll take care of us.’ And I guess you're right. When Lafayette Square is rebuilt, we can pull the crew together from the other stores and have them waiting there at the door, fully trained on opening day."

  "Yeah, swell. Jan, do you know where each one is now?"

  Jan laughed. “Does the sun come up in the east? Have you a pencil and something to write on..."

  * * * *

  It was at the eighth store, the one in Castleton Square, that they had their breakthrough. Richard was talking to one of the salesmen from the Lafayette Square store who had been transferred temporarily. Showing him the Kimberly Christmas card, he asked, “Did you take these people out the back door to take a picture of them?"

  The salesman seemed surprised at the question. “No."

  Richard's shoulders sagged. “Hell, I'm beginning to wonder if I'll ever find out who shot that picture."

  "It was you, Mister Webb."

  "What?” Startled, Richard glanced at Leslie, then back at the salesman. “Me?"

  "The people in that picture—I remember them because they wanted us to take their picture to use on their Christmas cards. I was trying to explain that we didn't that in our stores when you came along. You stopped to listen, and when you found out what they wanted, you said that while the Camera Stores didn't do photography—"

  "Excuse me,” Richard interrupted. “Do we get a lot of requests for photography from people in the stores?"

  The salesman nodded. “Sure. All the time, people wanting us to take their picture. Get a lot of requests for passport photos, too."

  "Maybe we ought to start doing pictures,” Richard mused aloud. He glanced at Leslie. “Will you make a note for me to mention that to George, please?"

  "Yes, sir,” Leslie said. This is Richard in action. The real Richard. This is how he does things. She grinned. Now I'm his secretary. Obediently, she wrote a note to George Nelson about taking pictures in Camera Stores.

  "I'd write my own notes, except I don't have a pen or anything to write on."

  She smiled. “It's all right. I don't mind."

  Richard's look said more than thanks, adding something that made her feel warm clear inside.

  "Sorry for the interruption,” Richard told the salesman, “you were telling me that I was talking to the people, and..."

  "You told them that you'd be glad to take their picture with their own camera, but not in the store. You said you knew just the right place, and you took them out the service entrance—"

  "Ah-h,” Richard breathed, “the service entrance. That puts me out there with the Kimberlys in the service area.” His look told Leslie that he'd just had a big question answered.

  "You were gone maybe five, ten minutes, and when you banged on the door I let you in,” the salesman said. “You gave me the film from their camera and told me to have it processed. ‘One-hour processing,’ you said, and you said to use the last shot on the roll for their Christmas cards, and not to worry about printing any of the others. ‘Duplicate the last exposure twenty-five times on Christmas card stock,’ you said. I wrote up the order just like that."

  Richard glanced at Leslie. “Remember what Fahrquar told us? The ambulance medic reported that Mrs. Kimberly said, ‘There weren't any others.'” He sighed deeply. “And that's why. We didn't make any. We only printed the last negative."

  "How do you happen to remember all this in so much detail?” Leslie asked the salesman.

  "It's not something I'd have expected the boss to do,” he told her. “I mean, take Christmas pictures for walk-in customers?"

  Leslie nodded. Why am I not surprised at whatever he does?

  "So what happened to the roll of film I gave you?” Richard asked.

  "Our film processor was down that day, so we—"

  "That's what happened to the film. The processor was down, so you sent it out. Away from Lafayette Square.” Richard clapped his hands together. “Safe,” he shouted. “Which store did you send it to?"

  Taken aback by Richard's reaction, the salesman stammered. “You ... you took it downtown. You took all of them downtown."

  Richard touched his finger to his chest. “I did?"

  The salesman nodded. “You said you were going back there, so we gave you the whole bag and you put it in your car. And everything worked out just fine. Except—"

  The hairs on the back of Leslie's neck stirred. She leaned toward the salesman. “Yes?

  Except—"

  The salesman looked nervously at Richard. “There were some films that got separated from the prints. A sheet of sticky labels—they ... didn't stick. The guys downtown had a hard time finding out who the negatives belonged to. But people called in when they found their negatives missing. Took a lot of phoning, but we were able to get everybody's film back to them.” He paused, recalling. “At least, all but one. We were all expecting someone to call about that set of negatives, but no one ever did."

  Leslie's throat grew tight with tension. “One set of negatives was never claimed?"

  "That's right. Maybe they didn't want their film once they had their pictures."

  Richard's gaze was sad as it met Leslie's. “The Kimberlys.” He sighed. “So what happened to that roll of film?"

  "By the time all this was settled, there wasn't any place to bring it back to. There'd been the fire at Lafayette Square, you see."

  "Where the film should have been if the processor hadn't gone down,” Richard said. He nodded slowly. “So the film is—"

  "Yes, sir,” the salesman said. “It's still downtown."

  Chapter Nineteen

  "Downtown,” Richard breathed. “At last.” His eyes gleaming with suppressed excitement, he grabbed Leslie's hand and hurried her toward the store exit. “Thanks for your help,” he shouted back over his shoulder.

  He held the car door open for Leslie. “Get us downtown as fast as you can,” he told her. “I'll pay the tickets."

  "I'll hurry,” she promised. “But as keyed up as you are, you'll think your grandmother is driving."

  A few hectic minutes later, at the downtown Camera Store, Richard jumped from the car and ran around to open her door. “Come on,” he urged. “We're in the home stretch."

  One finger at a time, Leslie peeled her fingers from the steering wheel and, round eyed, looked up at him. The memory of his urging her on as she shaded lights and careened past near misses and blaring horns still loomed vivid in her mind. “Richard Webb,” she announced shakily, “I will never, ever, let you talk me into doing that again."

  "You did fine,” he said soothingly. “You're a very good driver. Come on now, let's go find that film."

  He helped her out of her car and together they looked up the film processor operator. “A couple of weeks ago I brought a bag of film from Lafayette Square to be developed here,”
Richard said. “Do you remember that?"

  The technician nodded, grinning. “Yeah, that was something different, the man himself being delivery boy."

  "And there was some trouble with the labels put on the films?"

  The grin slipped away. “They didn't stick. But, hey, it wasn't my—"

  "I know.” Richard waved away the protest. “It happens. No problem. What I want is—there was one set of negatives that was never returned to the customer because they never called to say theirs were missing. I want that set of negatives."

  * * * *

  Upstairs in his office, Richard weighed the envelope containing the negatives. “How many people have died because of these?” he said. “I'm almost afraid to look. What if there isn't anything on them? No matter how sure the guys are who killed the Kimberlys, there may not be anything incriminating on the film. Nothing to see, nothing that gives away who they are. But they'll never believe that."

  "And they'll keep after you,” Leslie said.

  Richard held the negatives up to the light. “Mm-m, nothing but pictures of two people and that brick wall.” He squinted. “At least the wall is in most of them. I must have shot the whole roll to get one they'd really like. Looking at these, I'd say I tried lots of different angles, some against the wall, some away, some high, some low. And the one I remembered was the last one, the best one—the one I had printed twenty-five times on Christmas card stock."

  "How can you tell anything from looking at color negatives?” Leslie asked. “They always seem such a blur of crazy colors."