by John Saul
He snapped the phone shut and was about to drop it back in his pack when the boys’ restroom door suddenly slammed open and two of Frankie Alito’s best buddies—Bennie Locke and Stan Wojniak—burst out and grabbed him, jerking him off balance and shoving him through the restroom door before he even had time to react. His cell phone flew out of his hand and shattered on the hard tile floor, then the door slammed shut and Ryan himself followed the ruined cell phone, his elbow smashing on the filthy floor beneath the sinks.
As pain from his elbow shot through Ryan’s body, Bennie Locke grabbed him by the leg and jerked him out from under the sinks. Ryan grabbed onto one of the drainpipes and lashed out at him with his left foot, but the kick went wild as Wojniak’s own shoe crashed into Ryan’s jaw.
Ryan felt his hands go slack and blackness swirled around him.
“Maybe this’ll teach you to do what you’re told,” Wojniak snarled, drawing his boot back to kick Ryan in the side.
Ryan felt his ribs crack—thought he could hear them pop. White-hot pain erupted on his left side, and for a second he thought he might pass out. “Don’t,” he whispered, instinctively curling up to protect himself from whatever might come next.
“Listen to him,” Bennie mocked. “Beggin’ like a little girl.” His lips twisted into a vicious sneer. “Freakin’ loser!”
Another kick landed squarely, this time on Ryan’s hamstring, and another kind of agony shot through his body.
He tried to scream, but his cracked ribs prevented him from drawing a deep breath, and all that emerged from his throat was a faint whimper.
The kicks came faster after that, and all Ryan could do was close his eyes, wrap his arms around his head, and wait for it to be over. Again and again he felt the hard toes of their shoes crash into him. But then the pain began to fade, as did their taunting voices, and when the darkness surrounded him again, Ryan didn’t fight it.
He embraced it.
And finally the kicks ended.
CHAPTER 4
WITH A FLASHLIGHT in one hand and the big key ring Sister Margaret had given him in his other, Brother Francis pushed open the stairwell door behind the dining room and searched the wall for the light switch.
Nothing.
No switch. Not even an overhead bulb with a string. Not that Sister Margaret hadn’t warned him. “The Holy Grail itself could be down there, and no one would ever find it,” she’d said when she handed him the heavy key ring and flashlight. “And if you should run across Sister Agnes Leopold, tell her she’s twenty-seven years too late for her final vows.” Rolling her eyes at the blank look on Brother Francis’s face, she told him she was only kidding, then abruptly left him to begin his search of the basement.
Now, faced with the impenetrable blackness below, Brother Francis was suddenly transported back to the day years ago when his own brother had locked him in the basement and turned out the lights. He’d been five then, and terrified. But I’m an adult now, he reminded himself, and there’s nothing to be frightened of. Swallowing hard, he turned on the flashlight and started down the darkened steps, telling himself that even if he didn’t find Kip Adamson, it was time he familiarized himself with the interconnecting labyrinth of tunnels that connected all the buildings that St. Isaac’s had spread through over the last century. The students, he was already well aware, used basements and subbasements like their own private freeway system, even starting to call it the Big Dig, after the decades long project that had finally buried Boston’s freeway system underground. Though he knew the subterranean maze let the students maneuver around campus quickly—and undetected—this was the first time he had ventured below the ground floor, and even as he came to the bottom of the stairs he was wondering if maybe he shouldn’t just turn around and go back up into the late afternoon light. Still, before he sounded the alarm about Kip Adamson’s disappearance, he needed to search the whole campus, and that certainly included the tunnels.
At the bottom of the stairs there was a large and empty chamber, with three passageways leading in as many directions. Brother Francis took the one to the left, and almost missed another short flight of stairs, stumbling before catching himself against the clammy concrete wall. He moved slowly, trying every door he came to, but all of them were locked. Then he came to another intersection, and slowly the enormity of the underground campus began to dawn on him.
There must be miles of tunnels under these buildings.
The beam of his flashlight caught a glint of brass, and a moment later he found himself looking at an ancient accordion-doored elevator, barely large enough to hold two people.
Behind another door was a storeroom where his flashlight played over two ornately carved wooden confessionals, both of them covered with cobwebs. Something glowed inside one of them, and a moment later a large rat darted out and disappeared into the shadows beyond the reach of the flashlight’s beam.
He moved on through the tunnels, feeling the musty darkness closing in around him, trying to keep track of every turn he made, but knowing deep in his heart that he had no idea where he was.
The beam of his flashlight grew weaker.
Then, from down a corridor to his right, a faint glow of light!
He shined his flashlight toward it and saw a single door, heavily carved, with a small panel of stained glass set into it.
A panel in the shape of a heart.
He moved closer to the door and flicked off his light.
The heart embedded in the door seemed to throb.
He reached out to the door, tentatively at first, and as his fingers touched the wood something inside him told him to turn away.
Instead, he pushed the door open.
Beyond the door was a tiny chapel that held a confessional, two short pews, and an altar.
A single candle stood burning on the altar.
Above the altar hung an enormous crucifix—large enough to dominate a chamber ten times this size.
A bloodied Christ hung from the cross, seeming to stare Brother Francis squarely in the eye.
His own heart throbbing now, Brother Francis backed out of the chapel, reflexively crossing himself as he pulled the door closed.
Turning away, he hurried back down the corridor.
But a dozen steps later, he was no longer certain he was going in the right direction. He shone the flashlight both ways, but its rapidly yellowing beam quickly faded into darkness.
Then the flashlight faltered and faded away.
He slapped it on his palm, and for a brief moment the light flickered back on, but then went out for good.
The throbbing of his heart grew into an audible pounding and the familiar heaviness of panic began to grip his chest.
His skin began to crawl as, unbidden, his mind began to conjure what might be lurking in the corridor, creeping toward him.
The chapel! If he could find his way back to the chapel, he could take the candle from the altar!
But as quickly as the thought came, he knew it was hopeless—he had no idea which way the chapel was, and he could wander in the dark for hours without finding it.
His heart began to race, and the panic that had begun in his chest spread through his body. Despite the stale chill of the air around him, a trickle of perspiration oozed down the side of his face.
Then, from out of the darkness, a sound.
Faint, barely audible, but a sound.
“H-Hello?” Brother Francis said, his voice echoing oddly. Steeling himself, he spoke again: “Who is it? Is someone there?”
No answer.
He took a single step farther down the tunnel, but froze when the keys in his left hand jangled loudly.
You’re not a child any longer, he told himself, but the words did nothing to assuage the fear of the surrounding darkness that his brother had inculcated in his mind so many years ago.
His rising panic suddenly threatening to overwhelm him, he instinctively reached for one of the walls to steady himself, and his fingers closed on a
large padlock.
Again he froze, listening.
Silence.
His fingers explored the lock, finding an enormous keyhole that felt like it would need an old skeleton key. Releasing the lock, he fumbled with the key ring until he found the largest of the keys, then tried to fit it to the lock.
Too big.
He tried a second key, then a third.
The fourth one slid into the slot, turned, and the lock fell open. Brother Francis slipped the lock from its hasp, pushed the door open and groped the wall inside, silently uttering a prayer to whatever saint might watch out for things like light switches.
A moment later his prayer was answered: he found a switch, flipped it, and a dim yellow bulb illuminated a small storeroom filled with slumping cardboard boxes.
But no sign of Kip Adamson.
He stood in the doorway to the storeroom, looking both ways into the endless darkness of the tunnel. Though his heart was no longer pounding as it had been a moment ago, Brother Francis was still loath to turn off the light. He had no real idea of where he was, and just the thought of trying to find his way out in pitch darkness made him shudder.
Yet what choice was there? If he left the single dim bulb in the storeroom burning, its light would carry no farther than the end of the corridor in which he stood, and that was no more than twenty feet—thirty at the most.
Then, from somewhere off to the right, he heard a sound.
Voices.
Distinct voices.
The tendrils of panic falling away from him like leaves from a tree in the last days of fall, he reminded himself to tell Sister Margaret to have every burned-out bulb in the basements replaced, then called out into the darkness. “Hello? Who is that?”
“Brother Francis?” a familiar voice replied. “What are you doing down here?”
A moment later Clay Matthews and Darren Bender emerged out of the darkness into the faint glow spilling from the open storeroom door.
“I might ask you the same question,” Brother Francis replied, hoping they couldn’t read the relief in his voice.
“We’re looking for Kip,” Clay said.
“Shouldn’t you be studying?” Brother Francis countered, glancing at his watch. “It’s still an hour until dinner.”
“We couldn’t study,” Clay told him. “We kept thinking about Kip, and I remembered him saying he’d come down here to make his confession in some kind of chapel I’d never heard of before and…”
As his voice trailed off, Darren Bender shook his head. “I keep telling Clay he’s gone, but he wants to keep looking.”
“How many of the basements have you searched?”
Darren shrugged. “Most of them. We started under the library, and went around the long way under the gym and the rectory. We figured we’d go under the auditorium on our way back to the dorm and check the rest on the way to dinner.”
“He’s not under the dining room,” Brother Francis sighed. “I already looked there. We might as well head back to the dorm.”
Fifteen minutes later, Brother Francis brushed dust and cobwebs from the shoulders of his cassock, then rapped quietly on Father Laughlin’s door.
The old priest looked up from the book he was reading, and when he saw Brother Francis, a smile spread across his soft, wrinkled face. “Come in, Francis,” he said. “Sit down.”
Brother Francis entered the office and closed the door behind him. “Bad news, I’m afraid,” he said, then perched nervously on the edge of one of a pair of carved wooden chairs with a worn velvet seat.
The old headmaster’s brows rose. “Oh?”
“One of our boys—Kip Adamson—is missing. He doesn’t seem to be anywhere in the school at all, and I’m afraid—” He hesitated, then decided there was no easy way of putting it. “I’m afraid he’s run away.”
“Kip Adamson,” Father Laughlin repeated.
Brother Francis nodded. “He’s one of our at-risk students. Nothing too bad—a little shoplifting—that sort of thing. But the odd thing is that he’s been here two and a half years, and according to the records he’s been one of our best successes. No disciplinary problems, and better than average grades. Far better, actually.”
“And he’s missing, you say?” Father Laughlin asked, taking off his wire-rimmed glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose.
Something in the old priest’s tone made Brother Francis wonder if Laughlin was truly grasping what he was saying, and he found himself wondering, not for the first time, if perhaps Father Laughlin was a little too old and a little too out of touch with today’s youth to be running a school like St. Isaac’s. The old priest seemed like a relic from a kinder and far gentler era. “He’s the second one this year,” Brother Francis sighed. “And I have to say, I’m feeling like I must be responsible. I feel like I must have failed these boys in some way.” He paused, then finished his thought. “I’m wondering if you made a mistake bringing me here. Perhaps I’m just not cut out for this kind of school.”
Father Laughlin shook his head. “This isn’t your fault, Francis. It’s just—”
“No child has gone missing from this school in the last five years,” Brother Francis cut in. “Then I arrive, and lose two in my first year.”
Brother Francis sighed heavily again. “And I’m having a very hard time trying to figure out what I’m going to say to Kip’s parents.”
Father Laughlin didn’t respond right away, but finally put his glasses back on and looked up at the young cleric. “There’s more than one reason the Cardinal sent us Father Sebastian Sloane at the same time he sent you,” Laughlin said. “And one of those reasons is that Father Sebastian not only has a great deal of experience with troubled students, but with their parents as well. Let’s wait until after dinner, and if the Adamson boy still hasn’t turned up, you can explain the situation to Father Sebastian. Then—if it becomes necessary to talk to the boy’s family, he can do it. I’m sure Father Sebastian will know exactly what to say.” Laughlin reached out and gave Brother Francis’s arm a reassuring squeeze. “And in the meantime, we’ll all pray for Kip’s safe return.”
As he left the headmaster’s office a few moments later, Brother Francis tried to tell himself that everything was going to turn out all right, that Kip Adamson was going to turn up. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t make himself believe his own words.
No, something was wrong.
Something was very wrong.
CHAPTER 5
TERI MCINTYRE ADJUSTED the belt on her skirt and checked her watch again. 5:50. She’d been annoyed when Ryan hadn’t shown up as promised by 5:30, but already annoyance was dissolving into worry. Ryan, even when he was small, had been the kind of boy every mother dreams of. When he said he’d do something, he did it, even if he didn’t want to, and Teri knew that even though Ryan didn’t particularly want to go to dinner tonight, he had said he would. And according to his message, he’d left the school around four. So what had happened?
Why wasn’t he home?
She picked up the phone and dialed Ryan’s cell one more time, but clicked off when she heard his voice mail; she’d already left him two messages to call home, and a third wasn’t going to accomplish a thing. She went downstairs to wait for him.
Beyond the front window the street was empty, and a bus was just pulling away from the stop at the corner. Teri perched on the arm of the sofa where she had a view of the driveway and front walk, and gnawed at a cuticle as she thought about what to do.
And what might have happened.
As if to escape her own thoughts, she left the sofa and went to the kitchen, where she dug the address book out of the catch-all drawer. Less than a minute later she dialed the school, but everyone in the office had gone home for the day, and all she got was a recorded message. She clicked off, then dialed Josh Singer’s house. Maybe Ryan had stopped over there on his way home, got involved in a video game or something, and simply lost track of time.
“Hi, Melinda,�
�� she said when Josh’s mother answered. “It’s Teri McIntyre. Is Ryan there by any chance?”
“Hey, Teri. No, I haven’t seen him. Hold on a minute. I’ll get Josh.”
Teri unconsciously tapped her fingernails on the Formica counter-top while she waited.
“Mrs. McIntyre?”
“Hi, Josh. I’m looking for Ryan.”
“He was going to make up a history test after school. He—”
“I know about the test,” Teri cut in. “I thought he’d be home by now. If you see him, have him call me right away, okay?”
“Sure.”
Teri hung up just as she heard a car door slam outside. Phone in hand, she hurried to the front door, thinking maybe someone had given Ryan a lift, but instead of Ryan, it was Tom Kelly coming up the walk. She glanced at the clock even though she already knew exactly what time it was. Sure enough: 6:00 on the dot.
Tom Kelly was nothing if not punctual.
She opened the door to be greeted with a smile and a kiss, but instead of returning his hug, she pulled away, her eyes going to the bus stop at the corner where two people were getting off the last bus of the afternoon.
Neither of them was Ryan.
Tom, feeling the tension in Teri’s body, dropped his arms to his sides. “Something’s wrong,” he said.
Teri nodded. “Ryan promised to be home a half hour ago and he’s not here yet.”
Tom visibly relaxed and pulled her close again. “So he’s late—he’s sixteen. He’ll get here.”
“But he was going to go to dinner with us, and we’ll be late for the reservation.”
“Then leave him a note and some money for a pizza. He’ll go with us another time.” He was already reaching for his wallet.
Teri shook her head and moved back into the house. “This isn’t like him. Call the restaurant and see if you can push the reservation back fifteen minutes. I’m going to call some more of his friends.”
Tom smiled wryly. “Why don’t you call the police department and all the hospitals while you’re at it?” When Teri glared at him, he took her hand, sat on the sofa, and pulled her down next to him. “He’s sixteen, Teri,” he repeated. “Almost seventeen. He’s allowed to assert his independence.”