by JoAnna Carl
Today Hershey is a city, but also a giant fun park. There’s Hersheypark, with sixty-five rides and attractions, including eleven roller coasters. There are shows at theaters and outdoor arenas. There’s the Hershey Bears hockey team, plus the Hershey Gardens, Dutch Wonderland for children, a special area on falconry, and ZooAmerica. Then there are two museums: Hershey’s Chocolate World, which explores how chocolate is made, and the Hershey Story, which tells of Milton Hershey’s life. “All-American” is an understatement. But the once-famous tours of the Hershey chocolate factory are no longer offered.
Hershey’s Web site is www.hersheypa.com.
Chapter 13
It must have been disbelief that kept me from screaming.
It just wasn’t possible that there was actually somebody in my car. For a split second I thought it was a joke. Then my nerves caught up with me, and I jumped all over and dropped my car keys.
That turned out to be a good thing. The keys rattled and clunked as they hit the pavement. “Darn!” I said.
I leaned over, used the tiny flashlight on my “no-harm charm” chain, and began to look for them. I found them almost immediately, picked them up, and pocketed them. But I didn’t stand up. I kept creeping along beside the van, my head down, pretending to look for those keys.
When I got to the back of the van I split for the back door of the shop. In a hurry.
I admit that I had to punch in the numbers on the keypad twice. It’s hard to look at numbers when you’re keeping your back turned toward the keypad so you can see the van and make sure no one is getting out of it to come after you.
When the door clicked open, that click was the most beautiful sound I had ever heard. I jumped inside like a kangaroo. The sound of the door slamming and locking behind me was even more beautiful than the sound of it opening.
I was in our break room, standing with my back to the locked door and panting with the adrenaline rush.
I had pulled out my cell phone as I moved toward the door, and now I wanted to call 9-1-1. Actually, I wanted to stand inside that door, keeping it open a crack, and watch the van while I called the police. But that wasn’t going to work. In ten seconds the fancy alarm system we had installed a few months earlier was going to sound off and blast the whole neighborhood. And if it did, the guy in the van was going to jump out and take off down the alley.
And I realized that I didn’t want him to do that. I wanted him to stay where he was until the police got there.
Besides, leaving the door ajar while I called the cops seemed pretty stupid. Something like yelling, “Come on in, sex maniac.”
So I made double sure the heavy steel door had locked behind me, flipped on the break room lights, and ran into the storage room to punch in the magic numbers that kept the alarm from blasting.
With that done, I was finally able to call 9-1-1. Because it was after five o’clock, when our local police department shuts down its office, I got an operator thirty miles away in the county seat. First she made sure I was in a safe place. Then she told me she’d have the Warner Pier patrolman there as quickly as possible.
“He’s clear down by the south city limits,” she said. “Some car slid into the ditch.”
I knew that was a ten-minute drive, even if the patrolman left the other people sitting in the ditch.
“Stay on the line,” the operator said.
She didn’t say that I couldn’t look out the back door while I waited for the patrolman.
Luckily, that door opened in, I guess to keep people from swinging it out and hitting passing trucks. So I’d have to open it only a crack to see what was going on.
I still tried to be careful. First I shoved one of the two family dining room–sized tables up against it, leaving a small amount of leeway. If the guy in my backseat ran at the door when I unlatched it, he’d have to move not only the door but also the heavy table before he could get in. Then I jammed a strong rubber doorstop in position to hold the door if anyone tried to open it more than a tiny bit. Next I turned out the kitchen light.
Finally, I opened the door about half an inch and peeked out.
The section of the alley I could see was deserted. The outdoor light was still on.
So were the van’s interior lights.
I think that scared me more than anything else had. Maybe I’d been trying to convince myself that I’d just seen an old blanket or some other innocuous item in the floor of my backseat. I’d still harbored a hope that I had imagined the whole thing, that there had been nobody there.
Those interior lights told me differently. They meant that at least one of the van’s doors was open, and I’d left all of them closed and locked.
And I could see which one was open. It was the back door on the driver’s side, on the opposite side of the van from where I was now standing. It opened like a regular car door, instead of sliding back and forth as some van doors do, and it was completely agape.
And as I realized that, I heard footsteps. Thud-thud-thud-thud. Fast and heavy.
Someone was running down the alley, headed toward Pear Street.
I reported all this to the 9-1-1 operator, and at the same time I began to remove my barricade.
“He’s getting away!” I said. I shoved the table, and it made a scraping sound.
“What’s that noise?” she said.
“I’m moving the table I put in front of the door.”
“Why?”
“So I can get out.”
“Why?”
“Maybe I can get a look at him.”
“No! No! Mrs. Woodyard, stay where you are!”
“I’m not going to run after him! I just want to get a look at him.”
By then I had the door open far enough that I could slip through. I ran around the van and stared down the alley, still clutching the cell phone.
“Darn! He just turned onto Pear Street! Toward the lake.”
“Get back inside!”
“I’ll get in the van.”
“No!” She didn’t like my ideas, but I pretended not to hear. My purse was hanging on my shoulder, and my car keys were attached to its side pocket. I yanked them out. I slammed the backseat door—yes, first I looked to make sure there was no one in there or in the cargo area—and I got into the driver’s seat. I started the motor, and I headed down the alley. The 9-1-1 operator was still objecting to everything I did, but I gave her a running account anyway.
“I just turned onto Pear Street.”
“Go back! Wait for the patrolman!”
“Nobody’s moving on the street. I’ll cruise on down to Dock Street.”
“No! He may be armed!”
“I can’t just let him get away!”
“I have two cars on the way. The state police and the Warner Pier officer. He won’t get away.”
I tossed the phone into the passenger seat then, though I didn’t break the connection. I drove slowly toward Dock Street, looking into every doorway.
Then I saw something move. A human figure. I picked up the phone.
“He’s turned into the alley between Fourth and Fifth streets.”
The operator’s voice got really firm. “Don’t follow him! Mrs. Woodyard! Go back to the shop!”
I turned into the entrance to the alley.
“I just want to see which way he goes.”
“He may be armed. Mrs. Woodyard, go back! He may have a gun.”
A gun. She could be right.
She didn’t yell, because 9-1-1 operators are trained always to sound calm. But she spoke like she meant what she said. “Don’t follow him!”
“Okay! Okay!” I backed out of the alley and turned toward Dock Street. I gunned the motor and sped to the end of the block. Then I drove a block down Dock Street, going as fast as I dared. I swung around that corner in a wide left turn. I pulled into the darkest parking place on the block, turned off my headlights, and sat there, wishing my van wasn’t a light color. I waited to see if anyone came out of the other end o
f that alley.
There wasn’t a single car parked on that block. Downtown Warner Pier was deserted. I waited. And waited.
After three long minutes, I knew my plan hadn’t worked. The person I’d been chasing had beaten me to the street and had gotten away. Or else he was hiding in the alley. And I wasn’t going in after him.
I waited another minute—still no cops, and still no crook. Just me, alone in Warner Pier’s quaint business district.
I had the phone to my ear, and the operator was telling me to go back to the shop.
“The cars are coming,” she said. “Jerry Cherry was out by the interstate working that wreck, and the state police car was nearly to South Haven. But they’ll be there any minute. I told them you were safe inside the building.”
“I’ll go back,” I said.
I did. But I admit I took the long way. I flipped a U-turn and went back to Dock Street. I went left. And I came to Herrera’s parking lot.
“Herrera’s parking lot has a half dozen cars in it.” I said. “Anybody could be there.”
“Go back to your office,” the operator said. She sounded angry. “Go to the front. Park there. Lock the car door. Do not get out of the car.”
I laid the phone down again. I had to turn around somewhere, so I drove into Herrera’s lot.
Herrera’s is Warner Pier’s nicest restaurant, the one Aunt Nettie had selected to entertain the Pier-O-Ettes at lunch. Because it’s a white-tablecloth place, its dinner crowd comes in late-ish. At the moment, just before six o’clock, the parking lot was just beginning to fill up. None of the cars looked unusual. None had a bumper sticker that read MOLESTERS UNITE or anything else that singled it out as likely to belong to the person who had tried to waylay me.
As I drove I noticed something. My van was becoming very hard to steer. And it was leaning to the left.
Did I have a flat?
I toyed with the idea of parking at Herrera’s and running inside, but I decided against it. Flat or no flat, I wasn’t stopping. I was getting back to the shop to meet the cops.
I drove out of the parking lot slowly—still searching the sidewalks and alleys—and I went back to the shop. I had to fight the steering wheel every foot of the way, but I managed. I turned into a parking place at the curb, and I threw on the brakes.
As the van came to a halt, I heard a chugging sound. It was a motorcycle, or maybe a motor scooter. And it wasn’t far away.
“He’s on a motor scooter or something!” I yelled the words at the 9-1-1 operator.
The idea of a motor scooter was reassuring. If the guy was armed, he’d have to be an acrobat to fire a gun while riding a motor scooter.
Maybe I could still get a look at him. I was out of my parking space and back on the chase in a flash. Ignoring the van’s desire to pull to the left and to tip over, I drove around the corner and poked the nose of the van into the alley—the one behind TenHuis Chocolade. It was dark in there. I flashed my headlights to high, and I saw movement at the other end of the block.
It was beyond the reach of my headlights, but it was movement. I headed down the alley as fast as I dared. If I had to buy new tires, okay. I wasn’t going to give up my try at getting a look at this guy.
Of course, going down a narrow alley, dodging Dumpsters and piles of boxes and the other stuff people tend to stack in alleys, made me feel as if I was speeding madly. In reality, I was probably going thirty miles an hour, bouncing along with the right side of my van higher than the left.
I hadn’t had a clear view of the motor scooter, but I had an impression that it had turned left. When I came out at the other end of the block, I spun the wheel and went in that direction. This brought me back to Fifth Street. And Fifth had streetlights—the type that shed pools of light every thirty feet or so up and down the block. I should be able to see the fleeing motor scooter.
But no. The street was completely empty. Not a pedestrian, a car, a truck, a bicycle, a rickshaw, or a motor scooter in sight. I lowered my side window a few inches and listened. No noise. No motor scooter. No nothing.
I growled into the cell phone. “He must have gone toward Dock Street.”
“I don’t care where he went. You go back to your shop. Now!”
I decided it was time for me to obey.
“Yes, ma’am.” I tried to sound meek. I went to the front of the shop, and I parked. This time I was directly under a streetlight, just two doors down from the corner of Peach Street.
I turned off the motor. This, of course, unlocked my doors, so I hit the magic button and relocked them.
I sat there, listening. There was no sound of a motor scooter. There was no sound of a siren. I was completely alone. I debated getting out of the van to look at my flat, but I decided it was pointless. I couldn’t tell what caused it in the dim light. I’d probably picked up a nail in my travels through Warner Pier’s alleys. Getting out of the car wasn’t a good idea.
I’d wait for the cops.
As soon as that decision had been made, I heard a noise.
It was a footstep. Normally, that’s not a very frightening noise, but it made my heart leap into my throat. I stared frantically around, trying to tell the direction the sound had come from.
The first footstep was followed by more, but still no one was in sight. I picked up the phone, still connected to the 9-1-1 operator, and started to tell her someone was approaching. I assured myself that I was safe from unknown pedestrians ; after all, I was locked in my van.
Then, startlingly fast, a man in a ski mask ran around the corner and headed straight toward me.
I screamed. I hit the horn. And I turned the key in the ignition.
I’m locked in, I told myself. I’m locked in.
The man ran up to the van and reached out his hand. I saw he was wearing gloves.
And in his gloved hand was a key.
He used it to unlock the door of my van.
Chapter 14
I daily thank heaven for three things.
First, I had the car window down a few inches.
Second, the person who unlocked my door had on a ski mask, which has eyeholes, rather than a motorcycle helmet of the type that covers the whole head.
Third, one of the useful items on my “no-harm charm” chain was—ta-da!—pepper spray.
I yanked the chain out of its pocket, found the pepper spray, flipped its top open, and made a direct hit on the left eyehole of the guy’s mask just as the door lock clicked open.
He grabbed at his left eye, and I aimed for the right one.
I’ve never known if I hit it or not. The van’s motor had caught, and I took off. I might be tipped sideways and traveling on the rim of my left front tire, but I was getting out of there.
As soon as I had a free hand, I began honking madly. The door the guy had unlocked automatically relocked, and I closed the window. I headed toward Herrera’s. There were people there. I should have stayed there in the first place.
As far as I could tell, nobody was following me. I thumped into Herrera’s parking lot, pulled into a handicapped parking place—it was closest to the front door—and jumped out clutching my keys in one hand and my phone and “no-harm charms” in the other.
The van was no longer my sanctuary, my fort on wheels. I ran up the front steps of the restaurant and banged in through the front door.
Now I realized that the 9-1-1 operator was talking on my phone. “What’s going on? Mrs. Woodyard!”
“I’m okay! I’m inside Herrera’s. He didn’t follow me.”
I leaned against the wall and panted. Then I realized that my old friend Lindy Herrera, night manager of the restaurant, was standing near the door. She looked scared to death. “Lee! What’s wrong!”
I shushed her. She listened while I told the operator what had happened. “I’m waiting here,” I said. “What’s taking the cars so long?”
Her reply sounded petulant. “I told you it would be ten minutes.”
Ten minutes? It se
emed as if I’d been chasing around Warner Pier’s downtown streets and alleys for an hour. But when I looked at my watch, I realized it had been just over five minutes.
Lindy brought me a chair and a glass of water, and I sat down. And I sat. And sat. Since I was safe, finally, the Warner Pier patrolman and the state police car checked out every crack in the pavement in downtown Warner Pier before they came to check on me. It was a third car that arrived at Herrera’s. A woman officer in a state police uniform came in to interview me.
Just after she came in I heard steps running up to the front door, and Joe rushed in.
We fell in each other’s arms with lots of “How did you know what happened?” and “Why didn’t you call me?” remarks. Lindy took us into a private dining room that wasn’t in use, and Joe and the state police officer listened to my story.
I didn’t get a whole lot of sympathy.
When I came to the part where I cracked the back door so I could look out into the alley, Joe gave a loud, “What!” And when I told about running back out to try to get a look at the guy who’d been in the van, he got up and stomped all around the room, shaking his head. After that he didn’t look at me.
When I’d finished talking, I looked at him. “I don’t know what’s wrong with the tires, Joe.”
He got to his feet. “Neither do I, Lee, but it sounds as if the guy you were chasing slashed them.”
“Slashed them?”
“Yes.” Joe’s voice was angry. “He was trying to keep you from chasing him. But what he got was something even better. He was able to trap you out in the open, with no one to help you. You are damn lucky to be alive.”
I glanced at the state police officer. She didn’t say anything, but she didn’t tell me I’d been brave either. It was obvious she agreed with Joe.