by ML Gardner
“Charles.”
“So, Charles, is this a man we all can see?”
Everyone around me laughed.
The old guy writhed uncomfortably and then pointed. “He’s outside.”
The hair went up on the back of my neck. I didn’t like the idea of being lured outside. I started to turn away.
“Here.” Charles placed something small and brown on the counter. “Cecile told me to give it to him once we got to the big town, but I forgot…I forgot. And now I’m here and he’s out there.” He clenched his fist and seemed frustrated with himself.
I eyed the wallet before picking it up.
With one eye on Charles, I pulled out the contents.
“There ain’t an ID. We looked.”
I held one card that felt too thick. I teased apart the dried wrinkled papers and found a smudged but readable name.
“Aryl Sullivan.” I thought for a moment, grabbed a quick reference roster from my office and flipped through it. Scanning the pages, I came up shaking my head.
“Nope. No one by that name has been reported missing.” I handed him back the wallet.
Charles looked distraught. “Cecile called him John. John Doe. He’s just outside. Please.” He made for the door, looking back several times. I rolled my eyes and followed, smelling a prank from the word go.
***
We stepped outside and I followed Charles to his farm truck that looked terribly out of place in the city. I was sure to glance over my shoulder frequently.
Charles opened the door and pointed to the empty front seat. I folded my arms.
“I don’t see your John Doe. You better not be wasting my time with some sort of prank. I’ve got better things to do.”
Charles looked frantically up and down the street.
“Looks like he figured it out and headed home.” I turned back inside.
Truth was, I was a little disappointed for purely selfish reasons. A case that cracked itself. Wouldn’t that be the best? But that wasn’t my kind of luck. Not this year.
I went back inside leaving Charles to wring his hands in the street and asked Helen if Harry was back from lunch yet. She bobbed her head and pointed.
***
After a quick knock I walked in and sat down. He was on the phone. From the sound of it, his wife was giving him the what for. He held his forehead and squeezed his eyes shut. Unlike my wife, Maggie, Harry’s wife called him constantly. I supposed having a woman who barely talked to you had its small advantages.
“Hey, Sloan,” he said as he slammed the phone down.
“What’d you do to get Ethel all riled up today?”
He rubbed his eyes and grimaced. “Don’t ask. How can I help you?”
“Got an alias I need to run by you. I think he has a young gal who ran away from home. Goes by Sal.”
Harry rocked back in his chair and smiled. “There must be a hundred guys in Boston who run by the name Sal.”
“Well, gimme what you got. I’ll track them all down if I have to. I gotta find this girl before the file gets transferred over to homicide.”
“Haven’t had much luck lately, have you, Sloan.” It wasn’t really a question.
“Not so much.” It was no secret. The whole precinct was yapping about how I was losing my edge.
“Don’t let the new guy get under your skin. He’s young and quick but he’s new and green. It’ll take a few years before he grows up enough to fill your shoes.”
“Who, Felix? I’m not worried about him,” I lied.
He was new, it’s true. But this kid was making strides breaking cold cases left and right. It would only be a few weeks before they moved him from his cramped metal desk in the middle of the main room, to his own office. Trouble was, there were no open offices right now. Not unless someone got the boot. I’d heard the whispers and rumors and knew everyone had their eyes on me. If I didn’t find someone alive, and soon, they’d hand me a card and a plant and a have a nice life, blaming it on budget cuts or something.
“Thanks, Harry. I appreciate that. Can I get that list?”
“Sure thing,” He scribbled a long list of names on a pad and tore off the top sheet. “Good luck.”
***
I gave the list to Helen at the front desk and asked her to gather all the latest addresses she could. She was swamped and she barked—literally barked like a dog—as she swiped the paper. I yanked my hand back and grinned. I’d have to get her something for her trouble. A scarf or some chocolates.
Of all of us here, Helen fit best in the overworked and underpaid category. Yeah, I’d pick something up tomorrow. The last thing I needed was for her to go barking her way out the door, never to return. A replacement would take months to train and would likely crack under the stress of working the front desk and being shared as personal secretary to a handful of detectives.
She pounded her palm on her desk and I looked back at her. She held out the wallet and tilted the phone away from her mouth.
“Crazy man with the invisible friend left this here.”
I took it, though I had no idea what to do with it. Sitting down at my desk, I dropped it in my lower left hand drawer where I kept all the other stuff I didn’t know what to do with but didn’t want to throw away.
***
Close to three in the afternoon, I was ready to call it a day. Nothing more to do here until I got the list of addresses from Helen. I stared at the stack of files on my desk, begging them to talk to me. They stared back; quiet, yellow and stubborn.
I was gathering my things when Helen popped her head in.
“Got someone here to see you, Sloan.” One of her finger waves was popping out of place and I tried not to smile. It had been a hell of a day for her.
“I hope it’s the old man so he can take that wallet.”
“Nope. Parents reporting another girl.”
My heart sunk. I hated those. The smooth talking grifter, the runaway wife and the hapless drunk who hopped onto a passing rail car were easier to deal with. I knew they were either where they wanted to be or better off where they were. But the young girls, those were always troublesome. And urgent. Getting a fresh one this late in the day without time to work the case at all would keep me from sleep tonight. And I really needed some sleep.
A man and a woman entered my office and sat down. They were frightened. He wrung his hat in his hand and the mother looked as if she’d been crying for hours.
“I’m Detective Sloan. How can I help you?”
“Our daughter. She never came home Friday. We wait two days and come here. You find her.”
German. The father had a heavy accent.
“What’s her name?”
“Helga. Helga Werner.”
“Do you have a picture?”
“No. No money.”
“No, do you have a picture of your daughter.”
“Picture takes money,” he pleaded. Of course. They didn’t look dirt poor, but they looked as if they struggled.
“Okay, describe her to me.”
“She has long blond hair. Short, maybe…” He stood and put his hand mid chest on his own tall frame. “To here, with blue eyes.”
I scribbled it all down and asked the usual questions.
“Did your daughter run with a bad crowd? Did she drink? Do dope?”
The mother looked confused and then puffed up. I could tell she wanted to hit me.
“Look, I ask everyone these questions. It’s nothing personal.”
“No. No dope. No bad friends. She was a good girl.”
Was. The father used past tense and it grabbed my attention. I studied him. He still wrung his hat in his hands. Nervous and scared sometimes looked similar and I had to tease apart the two while getting past the language barrier.
“When is the last time you saw her?”
“Two days ago. She left for school. She never come home.” The mother started crying again.
“Did the school report her absent?”
/> “Yes. Said she never show up,” the father said.
“Did she normally walk or take the street car?”
“Walk.”
I asked for their address and the address of her school.
“Give me the names of her closest friends and their addresses.”
“She…she was shy girl. No friends,” Mr. Werner said. I watched him for a moment.
“Where do you work, Mr. Werner?”
“The Hilton. I clean.”
“You clean the rooms?” He scoffed and looked as if he smelled something bad.
“No, that is for woman. I clean lobby, sidewalk, hallway.”
“You’re a janitor, then.”
He shrugged.
“And do you work, Mrs. Werner?”
“Nien.”
Having everything I needed to start a file, I told them I would be in touch if I had any more questions. The mother looked hesitant to leave. She rose and shuffled around the desk. With a grip on my jacket, she implored, “You find her, yes? You find her for me? Bring her home safe. Please.”
I could make no promises. I had made that mistake once with Maggie. Promised her everything would be okay. It wasn’t and she had never forgiven me.
“I’ll do my best, Mrs. Werner. I’ll be in touch.”
She started crying again as her husband pulled her out of the room.
I already had thoughts swirling around my head. He didn’t look like the type to put his daughter on the street, but it was possible if they needed money bad enough. I’d seen stranger things happen. Maybe he did and it went horribly wrong.
The mother got pretty upset when I asked if Helga ran with a bad crowd. They looked like decent people, but it was easy for a teenager to hide these kinds of things.
Of course there was the possibility that she had simply been grabbed on her way to school. That happened more times than I could count. With Helga Werner, anything was possible at this stage of the game. I grabbed my hat and closed my office door.
“Do you like being a missing persons detective?” Aryl asked.
“It’s all I know how to do,” Sloan said, holding his hands out, his smile seemed to surrender to his own words. “I think about leaving sometimes. But I have no idea what else I’d be good at. Are you finished eating?” Sloan asked, pointing to the plate where the food had been mostly moved around.
“Yes, thank you.”
Sloan gathered the plates and empty glasses.
“Are you sure you don’t want to continue our conversation up in the lounge? Or get some fresh air on the deck?”
He thought about it for a moment but felt compelled to stay right where he was. This spot by the window felt safe. And it had been so long since he’d felt safe.
“No, I’m fine here.” Aryl looked out the window again.
“Well, I’ll just have to bring back a bottle.” He put the glasses back on the table with a smile.
The sun was beginning to set. Aryl had always loved sunsets. He remembered seeing countless sunsets working on the boat with Jonathan and Caleb. Watched countless more with Claire. They were different here in this part of the world. More muted than the ones at home with their violent streaks of red and orange. Hues of green and black, if a storm were coming.
“Are you married, Sloan?”
He stopped with a hand on the door. “Yes. Her name is Maggie.”
“Will you tell me about her?”
“Sure. Sure I will. Soon as I get back.”
***
Sloan returned with a few pieces of fruit, a bottle tucked under his arm and a grin.
“I have never in my life spent that much on a bottle of whiskey.” He placed it on the table and admired it for a moment before he cracked it open.
“Is Prohibition still on in the states?” Aryl asked, holding out his glass and helping himself to another cigarette.
“Unfortunately it is.”
“I was hoping it might have been repealed while I was gone.”
“You weren’t able to keep up on the news?”
“I was. But I didn’t care. I mean, I didn’t know where to care about. Didn’t know where home was. So news from America didn’t mean anything any more than news from China.”
“How long have you known who you were, Aryl?” Sloan asked, becoming very still, watching him.
Aryl slugged his whiskey and put the glass down with a thud.
“You promised to tell me about your wife.”
“If I tell you about my wife, will you tell me how long you’ve known you were Aryl Sullivan?”
“I intend on telling you everything. And when I do, I’d appreciate it if you’d take notes because I don’t want to have to repeat it when we get to Boston,” Aryl said.
“I get the feeling that this isn’t going to be easy for you,” Sloan said, looking on him with pity, reaching for his notebook.
“Me and Claire…we’ve been through a lot, you know? A lot more than most couples. We’ve pulled back from the brink a few times. And to be honest, I don’t know if this is survivable. Forgivable. I don’t know if we’ll get past this if I get home.”
“Why do you say if? We’re full steam ahead to Boston now. You’ll be home in less than a week.”
“I’m not so sure about that. I haven’t told you anything, Sloan. That opinion might change after I do. All you know from my telegram is my name and that I needed to get home. I sent that telegram to New York. I never intended on anyone in Massachusetts to see it. Did you know that?”
“No, I didn’t. I wouldn’t have known about it if my friend in New York hadn’t routed it to me. Does this have anything to do with when you realized who you were?”
Aryl didn’t acknowledge or deny. He just stared ahead looking deeply worried.
“What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done to your wife? And how long did it take for her to forgive you for it?”
The question took Sloan off guard but he knew the answer without thought.
“That’s easy. I can’t seem to give her a baby. She’s lost a pregnancy for every year we’ve been married. Seven years last month.”
Aryl’s face softened and he looked down.
“The doctor says it’s her, but I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think the doctor knows best?”
“No. Not in this case. I think it’s me. And I think she has to forgive me on a daily basis for failing. I’ll tell you how bad it got there for awhile. Before we quit trying all together. She stopped telling me she was pregnant. She’d only tell me when it was over.”
Chapter Four
Lost Souls
I arrived home at five. I could smell the pot roast my wife was making and my stomach growled. Maggie smiled and gave me a passing kiss on the cheek. She could be my sister or my aunt, by the way she acted. But I was used to it. The first two were hard, but the third miscarriage changed her.
Third time’s a charm, she used to walk around saying, crossing both her fingers for luck. But the luck left her. Ran out with the blood that would have been a child.
She stopped outwardly hoping after the fourth. With each miscarriage that followed—the fifth, the sixth and the seventh—she became more distant. I didn’t even know about the rest. Just got a call at the precinct to head over to the hospital.
I’d take a few days off and sit with her while she stared blankly out the hospital room window. We didn’t talk. I had accepted the fact that part of her blamed me. Hated me. I had suggested that we stop trying after the fifth. Consider adopting. She slapped me. I didn’t mind. She’d been wound up tighter than a steel coil for weeks. That and crying the whole night long, she settled down into what was her normal despondent self. With casual farewells and brush of the lips hellos, this is what our marriage had been reduced to. Not what I had imagined, that’s for damn sure.
I looked her over. She’d been crying.
“Everything alright?” Stupid question.
Are there any urgent problems I might coul
d actually fix, should have been my question.
She gave a tight nod.
“Fine.” Nothing has been fine for years.
I did some math in my head. The last time we dared risk it was two months ago. If she had gotten pregnant then, she would be violently sick by this time, and losing it by the end of the month. That is why I hated sleeping with my wife. It wasn’t because I didn’t love her. It was because it came with worry and fear. It came with a price. Or rather, I did.
We ate dinner in silence. After dinner she poured coffee and creamed it perfectly. Maggie made great coffee. She handed it to me with a cordial smile and sipped her own.
I’m not pregnant. I’m drinking coffee.
“How was your day?” Talk to me.
“Fine. Yours?” I don’t want to. Tell me about yours.
“Average. The new guy is driving me crazy.” He wants my job. Thinks he’s better than me.
“Find anyone today?” Show me you’re not a complete failure.
“Got a few strong leads.” Don’t give up on me yet.
“Anyone we know?”
This was always her next question. She asked it every night. Did anyone we know turn up on my roster. What an oxymoron. Turn up missing. Her question used to bother me until I figured out why. After number three, I wasn’t the only one dealing in the business of lost souls.
“No. No one we know.” Everyone we know that has already made it into this world is accounted for.
“That’s good.” I can’t handle more loss.
She stared into her coffee and I knew all of her wasn’t there.
“Everything okay?” I’ve got a little room on my shoulders, if you need to talk.
“I’m just tired.” I can’t deal with anything heavy.
I nodded. “This humidity takes a lot out of a person.” The weather. Just talk about the weather.
She nodded. “It does. And we have the whole summer ahead of us.” Give me something to look forward to.
“Maybe we could take a trip?” Just a few days away and maybe we could start acting like we love each other again.