by Dan Padavona
“It must take up quite a bit of your time.”
“It's not as bad now. I made a decision to scale back operations. We don't produce nearly as much as my parents did. I wanted to specialize in several things, rather than try to be everything to everyone. So the cow pasture became General's playground, and we took half the field and converted it to a cover crop. We'll go back and forth year to year, planting in one half and covering the other. Speaking of which, did you get your garden topped off?”
“Yes, I did thanks to you.”
“I can't take the credit, for General on that one.”
“That's very reassuring,” she laughed. “You sure do seem to love that horse.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
“Some people have a dog. I have a horse. By the way, we're being watched.”
When Renee started to turn her head, Evan signaled her with his eyes not to look. A couple, probably in their early 50s, watched them from two tables away. Sharply regarding Evan, the woman leaned toward her husband and whispered. She had a hawk nose and jet-black hair pulled tightly into a bun. The man was fair-haired and tall. As the man’s eyes focused on his plate, as though he were embarrassed, Evan could feel the coldness drift off of the woman like air off of north facing snowbanks at winter’s end.
Renee didn't need to look, for she had seen them earlier.
“Bill and Janet Barrister.”
“You know them?”
“She know us.”
“I don't follow.”
“We're outsiders, and we aren't good Christians. And to be a good Christian, you need to be born in Storberry and to stay in Storberry. That's all she needs to know about anyone.”
“I see. And what makes you think I'm not a good Christian?”
“When's the last time you were in church?”
He thought for a moment, then thought some more.
“Exactly,” she said.
“But I'm from here.”
Mary returned with their order and greeted a young couple at a neighboring table.
“You left. Probably came back with the taint of a big Yankee city all over you.”
“I lived outside of Syracuse, New York, not Manhattan.”
“To some people, it's all the same. Anyway, I shouldn't speak poorly of the husband. He keeps to himself. Seems to mean well. Why he has stayed with her all of these years is one of the great mysteries of the universe.”
As Evan lifted the cup to his lips, steam drifted past his eyes, temporarily obscuring Renee in a transient fog. The polite clink of cup and plate rippled through the room like a wave.
Then a hard-looking man peered through the window of the café, his hands cupped above his forehead so he could see inside the darker interior. His short brown hair was a ruffled mess. Searching with a hint of desperation, the man’s eyes followed over the guests.
“Isn't that Dell Lawrence?”
“The one and only,” she said with a roll of her eyes.
“What on earth is he doing?”
“Probably looking for his daughter again. Katy. Pretty little thing. She goes missing a few times each year.”
“Is she missing now?”
“She has been running away since her tenth birthday. It's not news anymore when she goes missing. And nobody can blame her, given her home life.”
“That's terrible. Hasn't the school stepped in?”
“I'm sure they did at one point. She hasn't attended school in a long, long time.”
“I take it the parents don't exactly push her toward academic achievement.”
“Her mother took off when she was young. Left them both. Since Dell is three sheets to the wind most of the time, she barely has a father. In a lot of ways, I don't blame her for leaving.”
“I remember that he was a big drinker even before I moved away. We used to see him stumbling out of the Red Lion on Friday nights after the football games let out.”
“Not anymore. He sticks to The Watering Hole. I'm pretty sure Chuck Kingsley tossed him out of the Lion for good after he started a brawl there a few years ago.”
Dell Lawrence pounded the glass with his fist, a blast that caused the startled patrons to look up. Mary Giovanni left the counter to shoo him off, but Dell had stormed away before she reached the door.
“That's not a man you want to get on the wrong side of,” said Evan.
“Too late for that. He hates everyone in Storberry.”
The hum of conversation rebuilt as quickly as it had ceased.
As Janet Barrister stalked out of the café with her husband in tow, the tops of the buildings across Main Street turned golden, and shadows spread eastward like spilled ink.
“I guess you know my story. What brought you to running the public library in Storberry?”
“There were other options; all of which would have paid more, but none were anything I could envision myself doing for more than a few years. At the end of the day, if you aren’t happy in your work, no amount of compensation will ever be enough.”
“Words to live by.”
“I chose the library because it reminded of me of my own town’s library. I figured I would stay a few years and wait for something better to come along,” Renee said.
“But you ended up falling in love with the town?” he said, with his inflection suggesting it was a familiar story.
“A little too predictable, isn’t it? But I really did. I like the people here, the countryside is gorgeous, and I could not be more content with my work.”
“I saw the new addition when I first came back to Storberry.”
“The young reader's wing?”
“Yeah. How on earth did you get the town to cough up funds for new construction?”
“When I came to Storberry, I wanted the library to have closer ties to the town. Every town loves their school. So I established a scholarship fund for high school seniors. I also made it a point to donate extra copies of popular books to the school on a regular basis to keep the library fresh in the community's mind. That, and lots of volunteer work added up to a lot of brownie points.”
“That's all it took?”
“A little honey goes a long way toward attracting the worker bees.”
As he sipped his coffee and nodded in understanding, Mary Giovanni put the final touches on a strawberry cheesecake for the display case, which she placed next to a lemon meringue pie. Two more patrons exited, and the peripheral murmuring diminished. The young couple at the next table held hands and discussed an upcoming vacation in Florida. Holding a shopping bag from Jo’s Dress Shop, a woman hustled past the window. There was no sign of Dell Lawrence or his daughter on Main Street.
“Your tea is getting cold.”
“You're right,” she said, taking a long sip. “We should finish our drinks before Mary convinces us to try the cheesecake.”
“It looks good.”
“It is good. Which is why you don't want to order it. You'll be back for more tomorrow, the next night, and the night after that. Pretty soon you'll be shopping for clothes in the plus section.”
They laughed, and he noticed how comfortable he felt with her. A soft warmth emanated from her, like a woodstove on a winter’s eve. For the first time in the several months since he had returned to Storberry, he felt at home.
They talked for another ten minutes and finished their drinks. Mary brought them their bill and invited them to come back more often, and Evan thanked her and left a generous tip on the table.
“We should do this again,” he said.
“I'd like that.”
“Can I walk you to your car?”
“Sure. Just avert your eyes from the cheesecake on the way out the door.”
The sun descended toward the horizon in carmine fire. Shadows blanketed Main Street as the warm glow faded.
He recognized her hatchback half a block down the street. Two cars crawled past like army ants, Doppler shifting as they buzzed through the green light at the intersection of
Main and Blakely. The sidewalks were empty, save for a few last minute shoppers who hustled between storefronts.
He walked Renee to her car and glanced southwestward. In the space between the buildings, he could see the hill forest cloaked in growing murk. As its shadow stretched charcoal gray down the hill to just short of Becks Pond, he shivered involuntarily.
“Are you looking at Liberty Cemetery?”
“No...actually I was looking at the forest.”
“Ah. You mean the haunted forest.”
“The kids in town still think it is haunted?”
“They do. Every town has a haunted something or other. A house, a cemetery, a hospital. In Storberry the kids think the forest is haunted.”
“They may be right.”
She looked at him with one eyebrow raised.
“Don't tell me you are afraid of boogeymen too?”
“We all have them, do we not?”
“We do. Is the haunted forest your boogeyman?”
He shrugged his shoulders, his eyes never leaving the hill forest. He sensed something was about to happen, as though the air was alive with energy like it was before lightning struck.
After a few seconds the smile returned to his face.
“I enjoyed myself tonight.”
“Me, too,” she said, one eyebrow lifted as she contemplated his reaction to the forest. She rummaged through her purse and found a pen and a small piece of paper. “Let me give you my phone number.”
She jotted the number quickly and legibly, as only a person who spends a good amount of time writing can. He produced a business card with his home number on it.
“And here is mine.”
“Very professional!” she said. “Good thing you had one of these. I was going to have to write your number on my hand.”
“Like in high school?”
She kissed him on the cheek before she could decide if it was a good idea or not and thanked him for the tea.
Shopkeepers flipped their signs over from YES, WE’RE OPEN to SORRY, WE’RE CLOSED. The final shoppers drove off, leaving the traffic signal at the corner of Main and Blakely to cycle between its three options above an empty street.
She climbed into her car, and he closed the door for her. As the engine purred, she gave a final wave and backed across the abandoned blacktop. He waited until she was safely on her way.
Then he gazed up at the forest again. The sun had fallen to the horizon, and only the tips of its tallest trees flared with oranges and reds. The forest’s entrance was utterly black and forbidding.
As he stood amid the growing silence, an unwanted memory resurfaced, and his eyes grew haunted. He prayed that he would not dream tonight.
Two
The Storberry police department sat in a single-story brick building on Court Street near Jensen Road, a block east of Main. From its sidewalk you could see the public library to the north, where Renee Tennant had returned on her way home to shut off the lights and lock its doors.
Two small, seldom-occupied jail cells resided in the back of the building. The cold reality of their iron bars were somewhat offset by the humor of the WRONG WAY road signs screwed to the cell doors.
Just as the sun dropped below the horizon, a bell jingled, and the door to the Storberry police department closed. A portly, graying man behind the front desk shook his head and sighed. Art Stults had more paperwork to do, thanks to the now departed Dell Lawrence.
A small RCA television behind the counter displayed a spring training baseball game between the Atlanta Braves and the San Francisco Giants. As Dale Murphy began rounding the bases after a home run, Art hoped against hope that the Braves might be decent this year.
The missing persons report stated that Katy Lawrence, age 17, had not been seen in five days. A decade's observance of Lawrence disappearances informed Art that she would return home in two to nine days, about as long as it took her to run out of new beds to sleep in. She had never been gone longer than two weeks, and this time would be no different. But there was protocol to follow, and what little manpower Storberry had at its disposal had to be allocated to her safe recovery.
The bell jingled again, and Art looked up to see Greg Madsen pulling his bike through the front door. Madsen's shift had finished an hour ago, but the chief never ended his day until his rounds were completed.
“Evening, Chief.”
Wheeling his bike behind the counter, Greg asked, “Anything exciting happen while I was gone?”
“I thwarted a couple murders. Solved the energy crisis. Should I start on Middle East peace?”
“Another night in the life of the great Art Stults,” Greg said with a laugh.
“I was paid a visit by Dell Lawrence. I’m surprised you didn’t bump into him on your way in.”
“Thankfully I didn’t. Let me guess. Reported his daughter missing?”
“Your deductive abilities are what make you a fine chief. Sir.”
“Elementary, dear Stults. Elementary. It won't take long to find her.”
“No, sir, it never does.”
“Especially this time. I saw her a few hours ago walking into the Red Lion.”
“The Lion? No doubt frequenting the places her father isn't allowed in.”
“Shit, that’s what I’d do.”
“I'll call Chuck to see if she is still there. If she isn't, he probably saw who she left with.”
“You want me to hang out awhile in case we need to make a house call?”
“Nah. You head home, Chief. I can cover this one.”
“Okay, Art.”
Greg Madsen pushed his bike to his desk near the back of the office. As he grabbed his car keys and headed out the door, Art opened the phone book and punched in the number for the Red Lion Tavern. Producing a buzz of white noise amid the television clamor, fluorescent strip lighting cast the office in cool white tones.
Chuck Kingsley answered after two rings.
“Lion.”
The clink of glasses and loud chatter nearly overwhelmed Chuck's voice. It sounded as though half of Storberry was inside the tavern.
“Chuck? Art Stults here.”
“Hey, Art, what can I do for you?” said Chuck, struggling to hear Stults over the racket.
“We seem to have misplaced someone. Did the Lawrence girl come through your place today?”
“Yeah. About two or three hours ago. I didn't serve her if that is what you are asking.”
“No, I know you wouldn't, Chuck. Apparently, she hasn't been home in five days, so Dell came in huffing and puffing that we need to find her. Had to file a missing persons report on her.”
“I wish I had known. I woulda called you right away. She didn't stay long, though.”
“You happen to see who she left with?”
“Nobody. She talked to a few guys at the bar, but that's it. I don’t think the fish were biting today. She left alone.”
“Gotcha. Say, Chuck, if she comes back can you give us a call, and try to keep her around until we can get someone over there?”
“Will do.”
“Thanks, Chuck.”
After Art jotted a note about his call with Chuck Kingsley, he radioed the only patrol car making night rounds to keep an eye out for the Lawrence girl. On the television, a young pitcher named Glavine was shutting down the Giants.
Darkness butted up against the glass door to the parking lot.
Art Stults settled into his chair and threw his feet upon his desk. He hoped it would be a quiet night.
Three
Standing far enough back into the darkened living room so as not to be seen, Donna Kingsley peered through the split in the curtains. The sidewalk along Maple Street slept in shadow under the deepening blue of twilight.
She had long since covered dinner with a sheet of plastic wrap and stuffed it into the refrigerator. It was fifteen minutes after dark when her son approached the front steps.
It wasn’t unusual for Tom to arrive late on a Friday evening. Some
times he spent hours at the library lost in a book or writing a term paper on one of the library’s new word processors. Other times he worked with the school technology club or ran the scoreboard at school athletic events. But that wasn’t the case this time. She knew he had been with the Barrows girl this evening.
As Tom Kingsley opened the front door and placed his fishing rod in the closet, Donna materialized out of the gloom. Tension slithered through the air like a live wire, and he knew instantly that his best bet was to keep the conversation short and disappear to his bedroom as soon as possible.
“Hey, Mom,” he said, moving for the stairs.
“You’re quite late,” she said, and he stopped at the bannister. “Dinner is in the refrigerator if you intend on eating tonight.”
“Sorry. I lost track of time.”
“There isn’t much point to asking what you have been doing all afternoon, is there?”
“I was at Becks Pond.”
“With that girl again?”
“Jen and I have been friends since we were kids.”
“That’s my point,” she said, hands on hips. “I’d hoped you would have grown out of it by now.”
“Grown out of what? Being friends?”
“She’s hardly just a friend Thomas.”
He bristled. She only called him Thomas when she disapproved of his actions.
“Don’t tell me you spend time with her because you want her friendship.”
“What does it matter to you if she is more than a friend?”
“What matters to me is that you are a smart boy. Next year you are going to have your choice of any university in the country. A girl like Jen Barrows is never going to leave Storberry. Is that the sort of girl you wish to associate with?”
“We aren’t even dating.”
“But you aren’t content with just a friendship. You wish there was more. Isn’t that correct?”
“I’m old enough to choose my own girlfriends, Mom.”
“You are old enough to make good decisions too.”
Her words stabbed at him like tiny daggers. She could be so condescending when she argued.