The Stolen (2008)
Page 24
with, probably known, John Fredrickson. A few years
back, I defended two people Fredrickson was beating to
death, and in the struggle the man’s gun went off, killing
him. I didn’t know he was a cop, and his death was the
result of choices made long before I came along. Yet perception was reality, and the feeling was if I hadn’t stuck
my nose in, he’d still be alive.
“Just this way,” Curt said. We followed him down the
hall into a row of cubicles, each one set up with large,
likely obsolete computers. We entered a larger cubicle
which was set up in a U-shape, two computers at either
end. The walls were covered with crime-scene photos,
mug shots, business cards. Curt pulled up a pair of chairs,
then sat in a larger one. He shifted around a few times, then
leaned forward and scratched his ass.
“That’s lovely,” Amanda said.
“Hey, if you can convince Chief Carruthers to spend an
extra nickel on chairs that don’t make your ass feel like
it’s the wrong side of a Velcro strip, you’d be spared seeing
illicit activities such as these.”
“Is it really that bad?” I asked.
“Man, come around here during lunchtime when the
detectives are all eating at their desks. You’d think a family
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of porcupines must have made a nest in every seat. Like a
messed-up orchestra, all scratching at the time same.”
I said, “Think I’ll file that under ‘visual imagery I hope
to file away and never see again.’ So what is this here?”
“Here is where we find out about the criminal record
for this guy Benjamin, the dude listed on the property
deed on Huntley Terrace. You’re sure this Ray Benjamin
is the same cat who hung you out to dry in that tinderbox out on Huntley?”
“I can’t be sure, but that’s what we’re here to find out.”
“Now, you said this guy made a comment about serving
time up at Attica, right?”
“That’s right.”
“Then our boy’s damn sure got a record. Which means
he’s just a mouse click away from being ours.”
Curt logged in to a database, then proceeded to enter
first name “Raymond,” last name “Benjamin,” into the
fields. He plugged the years 1968 and 1972 into another
field marked “date range.” He clicked a box marked “Caucasian” and pressed the search key. One of those helpful
little hourglass icons appeared on the screen. On my
computer, the sand fell through the hourglass at roughly
the same speed as cars cruising Fifth Avenue during the
Puerto Rican Day parade.
A few minutes and ass scratches later, the hourglass disappeared and a file appeared on the screen. A mug shot
appeared in the top-right corner of the page. I recognized
the man in the image at once.
“That’s him,” I said, pointing to the screen like I was
picking him out of a lineup. “Holy shit, that’s the guy.”
“From the other night?” Curt said. “This is Raymond
Benjamin.”
I nodded. “No doubt.”
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Despite the picture being at least twenty years old, it was
easy to tell this was the same man. The man in this photo
had a fuller head of hair, fewer lines cutting across his face,
but the look in his eye was the same. Defiance. Anger.
“There’s no scar,” I said. “When I saw Benjamin that
night, there was a faint scar on his right cheek. There’s
nothing like that in this picture.”
“Let’s see here,” Curt said. He clicked a button, then the
photo enlarged. Curt highlighted a line below the photo.
“Mug shot, dated 1969.”
“Probably the last shot taken before he was sent to
Attica,” I said.
Amanda traced her finger down the man’s cheek on the
screen. “So if this photo was taken before he went to
prison, there’s certainly a chance he either got that scar in
jail or afterward.”
“Yeah, the scar actually did zigzag a little bit, like it had
been stitched up by someone who got their medical license
at the local butcher shop.” I looked at Curt. “This is the
only photo on record for this guy?”
“Afraid so,” he said. “So what I want to know is how
a dude who got busted for armed robbery in the sixties
ended up buying a house that got burned down over thirty
years later?”
“After he almost barbecued my balls,” I added. “And if
the house is owned by a three-time loser, why did the
inside look fit for the Huxtables?”
“Obviously the house was in his name, but that was to
hide whoever actually lived there,” Amanda said.
“What I think happened,” I said, “is that this guy
Benjamin bought the house as a front. I’m not quite sure what
the catalyst was, but a husband and wife named Robert and
Elaine Reed have actually been the ones living on Huntley.”
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“They weren’t in the fire though,” Amanda said.
“No, no bodies found. Not that Russian doctor or
anyone else,” Curt said.
“So the papers are in this guy Benjamin’s name, but he
sublets it to the Reeds. Only there’s no paperwork or documentation. The Reeds have a young son, Patrick, but
according to receipts from a local toy store they’d been
purchasing gifts for a young girl within the past month. I
think very recently, the Reeds added a young girl to their
family. Only I don’t think they did it through conception
or adoption.”
“In vitro?” Curt said.
“No.”
“Adopted a kid from Zaire?”
“Uh-uh. I think they kidnapped a child, and until that
house burned down they’d been holding the girl just like
whoever took Daniel Linwood and Michelle Oliveira had
done. Amanda, you saw all the toys in the room you were
held in. This wasn’t some medieval torture chamber, this
was a home. A place for a family to live.”
Amanda reluctantly nodded. “Actually reminded me a
little of my room when I went to live with Lawrence and
Harriet Stein,” she said. She turned to Curt. “I was
adopted. My parents died when I was young, then I went
from orphanage to orphanage until the Steins took me
home. I remember my room feeling not really like an
actual room a young girl would live in, but the kind of
room parents thought a girl would want to live in. Too
many floral patterns, too many dolls. Just overkill to the
extreme.”
“That’s why the Reeds racked up a hefty bill at Toyz 4
Fun,” I said. “They were pampering this kid like she was
their own.”
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Curt said, “So why kidnap a kid if you’re not holding
her for a ransom? What, you just pamper her for a few
years and then let her go? I mean, you’re comparing this
Girl X to Danny Linwood and Michelle Oliveira. Both
those kids wound up returning home unharm
ed. If what
you’re saying is true, the Reeds planned to eventually let
this kid go. Why go through all that trouble?”
“So she’d feel like a part of their family,” I said. “When
I interviewed Danny Linwood, he made a brief reference
to his ‘brothers.’ I didn’t think much of it at first, but
combined with this, I think all three of these kids were
taken with the intent of ingratiating them into their ‘new’
families.”
“But why?” Amanda said. “If the kidnappers knew they
were going to let them go, why bother?”
“I’m not sure,” I said. “But what scares me is that the
Reeds somehow knew Raymond Benjamin. He owned the
house they used. So how did a supposedly regular family,
a loving father and mother with a young son, wind up in
bed with a career criminal, and end up stealing someone
else’s child?”
None of us had the answer.
“So what else can I do?” Curt said.
“We need to confirm that the Reeds did in fact kidnap
another child. And if we do that, and we can find out who
that child is, hopefully we can find the Reeds and they can
answer all these questions.”
“It’ll be tough,” Curt said. “I can submit a request for
a breakdown of all children reported missing within the
past two weeks, but unless we can narrow down where the
child was from we’re basically looking in every town in
every city in the country.”
I thought for a moment. Then I said to Curt, “Cross- The Stolen
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check your records with Yardley Medical Center, the pediatrics unit. I have a feeling whatever child was taken was
born in Hobbs County, and was a patient of Dr. Petrovsky’s, just like Daniel Linwood and Michelle Oliveira.”
“How can you be sure?” Amanda said.
“Thiamine levels,” I said. “I spoke to Jack’s doctor at
Bellevue and asked what might cause a child to go through
what Daniel and Michelle did. According to him, it’s likely
they both suffered from a severe case of anterograde
amnesia, exacerbated by depleted thiamine levels. He said
that it was technically a form of short-term brain damage,
but when thiamine and vitamin B1 levels dropped in
patients whose thiamine levels were low to begin with, it
could cause exactly what afflicted Daniel and Michelle. I
think whoever has been kidnapped was born with low
thiamine levels, and Dr. Petrovsky supervised it all.”
Amanda said, “That would have to mean the kids were
preselected based on their medical histories. Which means
Petrovsky knew which kids to look out for.”
“I think there’s a strong chance he did just that. So this
new Girl X was chosen for the same reasons Dan and
Michelle were years ago—they were susceptible to having
their thiamine levels tampered with to a far greater degree
than a normal child. With the right—or wrong—nutrition
and care, you could almost literally give a child short-term
brain damage and harm their memory receptors.”
“Which would explain why Daniel and Michelle didn’t
remember a thing about their time missing,” Amanda said.
“And it means the Reeds are expecting the same thing
from this kid. Girl X.”
“Find her,” I said to Curt. “I’m tired of this bullshit, like
one lost kid doesn’t matter. What, because Hobbs County
and Meriden got a few extra bucks, a few of the houses
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got a nice coat of paint, this is all swept under the carpet?
These kids are giving their lives for some awful cause I
don’t understand.”
“I hear you, man. Give me some time,” Curt said. “I’ll
need to get medical records from Petrovsky’s office, which
won’t be easy, especially since the dude’s disappeared.”
“He’s dead,” I said. “There’s just no body to bury.”
“Either way, the guy won’t be answering his phone.
Give me a day. I’ll get an answer.”
“Thanks, Curt, every second counts. Benjamin wasn’t
expecting us to follow Petrovsky, and who knows if the
Reeds are even still alive. There’s a chance that, like
Petrovsky, they ‘disappeared’ the Reeds so nobody could
ask questions. We need to see if we can find the Reeds
before Benjamin takes desperate measures. And this is a
guy who seems to be redefining the term.”
32
Raymond Benjamin dialed the number of the motel. He’d
made the reservation for the Reeds just before he’d told them
what was going to happen to their home. He’d broken it to
them matter-of-factly. He’d told them they might have to
leave at a moment’s notice, but didn’t really believe himself
it would ever come to that. Elaine seemed pretty unnerved
but agreed to cooperate. Like always. Bob stayed silent,
nodded at his wife’s approval. But now it was Ray who was
unnerved.
When the receptionist picked up, he said, “Yes, can
you connect me to the room of Robert and Elaine Reed?”
“Hold a moment, sir.” Ray heard typing in the background. “Sir, we don’t have any record of anyone by that
name checking in.”
“But you do have a reservation, right?”
“Yes, sir, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Reed, weekly rates,
supposed to have checked in yesterday, but according to
this they haven’t.”
“Fuck me,” Ray said.
“Excuse me, sir?”
“Nothing. You’re sure about that?”
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“Yes, sir. Would you like me to have a message waiting
for them when they do check in?”
Ray slammed the phone down on the cradle so hard the
plastic receiver broke in half. It took him far too long to
jimmy open the door to the pay phone booth, and finally
he cracked the glass when he kicked it inward with his
foot. Vince was leaning up against the car, an errant toothpick sticking out of his mouth. Either it was lodged
between two teeth or the man had simply forgotten it was
there. Ray had a sudden desire to smack the thing out of
his mouth. But he restrained himself.
This wasn’t going as he’d hoped. Things had taken a
drastic turn once Parker and the girl had arrived at the
house on Huntley, and that necessitated burning the place
down. Of course, doing that meant relocating the Reed
family, which was an ordeal in and of itself.
He’d begun to worry about Bob and Elaine from nearly
the moment they took the girl home. There was something
in their eyes that was different from the other families, a
sense of sorrow that worried him from the start. He’d told
them from the first time he met them that they’d have to
be strong. Keep everything in perspective. Look at this as
short-term pain for a long-term solution. They were doing
it for the right reasons, and years from now they’d be
happy they did it.
Now he wasn’t so sure.
Bob and Elaine had a motive
. There was a reason they
were chosen. The same way there was a reason Ray was
good at his job, he expected the Reeds to live up to their
end of the deal. Looking back on that one week that shaped
Raymond Benjamin into what he’d become, he knew how
fast one moment could change everything.
Few people knew the truth about Raymond Benjamin.
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That all of the violence, everything that had occurred
during the horrific, bloody days from September 9 to September 13 was because of him. While the riots started
because the Attica prisoners were tired of being treated like
animals, there was one spark that started the explosion.
The week of September 2, 1971, a small metal bucket
was placed inside Ray’s cell. It contained about a gallon
of water. The guard told him it was his weekly supply of
water to shower with. On September 8, during mess hall,
Ray mouthed off about the food. He didn’t remember his
exact words, but it boiled down to the meat loaf tasting like
it had been some poor guy’s meat. That got him one cigarette burn behind his knee.
The next morning, on September 9, Raymond Benjamin
thought he was in for the worst day of his life. The previous
night, one of the guards came by, dropping a single roll of
toilet paper into Ray’s cell. Hope you got a clean ass, ’cause
this is the last one you’re getting until the end of the month.
Frustrated, Ray threw the roll back at the officer, hitting
him in the head. It barely stunned him, but soon all of 5
Company was laughing their ass off. The guard turned red,
told Ray he’d see him in the morning and walked off.
While his fellow inmates hooted and hollered at the newly
christened “Officer Shithead,” Ray sat in his cell, shivering as if death itself was waiting for him. And for all he
assumed, it was.
The next morning, September 9, all of 5 Company’s
cells opened, the sign for morning roll call. All cells except
for Ray Benjamin’s. As his friends walked past, they saw
him still in the cell, sitting on the edge of his bed, knees
quaking. Ray had never been so scared in his life. He
could hear the footsteps of the guards as they did morning
rounds, could hear the clomps as his friends walked past,
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knowing their buddy was about to face the worst beating
of his life. Perhaps the last beating of his life.
Ray sat there and prayed. He apologized to the Lord for