Private Screening

by Richard North Patterson

  Parnell resolved to send his son to a boarding school in Maine.

  The idea seemed to frighten Alexis. “He’s just fifteen—it’s obvious that Robert needs us.”

  “At his age, my father shipped me off to Groton. We have to face that there’s something wrong here—at least wrong for him. It’s selfish to go on saying ‘one more year’ when every day now he gets stranger.”

  She turned on him. “You want him gone. That’s what this is.”

  For once he did not look away. “I don’t love Robert the way you do,” Parnell said softly. “And I never will.”

  Her face contorted. “You’re blaming me.”

  “No, Alexis. I’m just not blaming lack of love.”

  At dinner, Parnell told Robert of his decision.

  Standing, Robert leaned across the table toward his father, face distorted.

  Parnell stood. “Robert!” Alexis cried out.

  Her eyes were wet. Robert turned to his mother and, quite softly, said, “You bitch.”

  Tears ran down her face. Slowly Robert walked to his mother, resting his forehead against hers.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  In the candlelight, Parnell saw his son’s throat working. He closed his eyes.

  A week later Robert left for Maine.

  But things went no better there or at the next three schools. Robert started fights and would not stop until he’d broken someone’s nose or teeth. He was a loner who found drugs and lived at the edge of rules. There was to him, one poetic headmaster wrote Parnell, bright anger and a ruined sensitivity. At seventeen, the last expulsion brought him home.

  His rhythms changed abruptly. Robert showed no inclination to bait his father or do anything but watch him. Though his mother saw this as a sign of progress, Parnell felt his son taking stock of him: recalling that Robert’s bedroom window had an angle on their own, he began to draw their curtains. He sent Robert to a psychiatrist. Returning, Robert would closet himself with a film projector, studying old John Garfield movies as if his life depended on it. He made calls late at night, followed by strange absences. Parnell began waiting for something to happen.

  But Alexis seemed certain that she could make Robert whole. At first, he spurned her impulsive hugs and invitations to some film or play. Then, as though seized by childhood cravings or sure that he had punished her enough, Robert began to ask that she play sonatas for him, or come to his room to watch a musical they had enjoyed when he was younger. Encouraged, Alexis asked him to the opera. He spent more time with her, and showed no sign of leaving.

  “What’s he planning?” Parnell asked her.

  “In what sense?”

  “In the sense that he never finished prep school.”

  “Please, Colby—don’t push him away yet. We’re so close to where we were.”

  The following afternoon, for the first time since his son’s return, Parnell heard Paganini coming from the music room. That night, leaving with Alexis for the opera, Robert smiled at his father. The smile struck Parnell as so triumphant that he could not sleep.

  The next morning, as Alexis dressed, Parnell put on a robe and went to Robert’s room. Within an hour, Robert was gone.

  Six months later, Parnell shook hands with the FBI agent who met him at the cabin.

  Special Agent McCarry brought two others with him. They searched the area as he questioned Parnell, his red-veined face expressionless.

  “Do you know who’d want to do this?”

  Parnell shook his head. “No. But that my family owns a newspaper is no secret. Or that we own this cabin.”

  “Why was he living here?”

  “His school performance has been disappointing.” Parnell had rehearsed his answer carefully. “This cabin was a kind of retreat. To reflect.”

  “Who else knew he was here?”

  “His mother—perhaps a few of our friends. I don’t know Robert’s friends. He’s been East until recently.”

  “Any involvement with drugs, or sudden need for money?”

  “He’s smoked marijuana. About the other, his mother gave him money whenever he needed it.”

  “How about problems over girlfriends?”

  “No—nothing like that.” Parnell hesitated. “What are you after?”

  “Several things.” The agent’s gaze was steady. “Any unusual conflict, for one.”

  Parnell waited.

  “Was there?”

  “My son and I had the usual conflicts—lifestyle, and grades.”

  “Nothing deeper?”

  “He seemed troubled.…” Stopping, Parnell took off his glasses, and began to clean them.

  “How well did Robert get on with his mother?”

  Parnell looked away. “Quite well.”

  “Better than with you?”

  Parnell put on his glasses. “She was his mother.”

  Hands in his pocket, McCarry watched him. “You said he fought. Was there ever violence between you and Robert?”

  “It—it didn’t come to that.”

  “What about toward his mother?”

  Slowly, Parnell shook his head.

  “When was the last time you saw him?”

  “Six months ago.”

  “Or spoke to him?”

  “Then.”

  McCarry looked up sharply. “Was there some specific incident?”

  “You keep harping on that. Am I a suspect?”

  “Should you be?”

  Parnell felt tired. “No—of course not. I’m sorry.”

  “What about Robert?”

  “How do you mean?”

  McCarry seemed to choose his words.

  “When a teenaged child disappears, the reason often has less to do with money than with hatred—something within the family that makes the child want revenge.”

  Parnell turned to the cabin. A second agent walked toward them, holding a pair of hiking boots. “Are these your son’s?”

  Parnell nodded. “I believe so. Yes.”

  The man spoke to McCarry. “We’re lifting a boot print from near the window—a size and a half larger.”

  “Worn or new?”

  “We think worn. Also the typist wore gloves, and there don’t even seem to be prints for the boy. Of course, at his age he’s probably never been printed anyway.”

  Parnell looked back to McCarry. “If I follow that, there’s no doubt someone took him.”

  “Perhaps.” Parnell wondered if the agent’s voice seemed cooler. “Just how clever is he, Mr. Parnell?”

  “He’s an imaginative boy—I really don’t know how clever.”

  “You don’t seem to know Robert all that well.”

  “I wonder, Mr. McCarry, how many fathers really understand their sons?”

  McCarry did not seem to like the question. “Sooner or later, someone’s going to ask you for a million dollars. If it looks legitimate, you’ll have to decide whether to pay it.”

  “What should I be thinking about?”

  “Besides your son? Several things. A ransom drop’s usually our first clear shot at the kidnapper. But we can’t guarantee we’ll catch him or get back your million dollars. What would that kind of loss mean to you?”

  “I’d probably have to sell the newspaper. Do you ever use fake ransom?”

  “At times. But the danger is that the kidnapper will stay pissed off and free long enough to take revenge on the victim.”

  “What other choices do I have?”

  “If you announce up front you’re not going to pay it, at least they’ll have time to think about it rationally and release him. They also might have time to dispose of Robert where no one will ever find him.”

  Parnell rubbed his eyes. “I see.”

  McCarry’s tone softened. “Do you have other children?”

  “No—only Alexis.”

  “Still, there’s one more thing I should say. You’re a wealthy man, Mr. Parnell—a mark. Once you pay ransom for your son, there’s no guarantee that
this kidnapper or another won’t want more money for him next year.”

  “Or for Alexis?”

  “Her, too.”

  Parnell touched his ear. “I should call her. She doesn’t know yet.”

  “Say we’ll want to talk to her.”

  “Is that necessary? She doesn’t know anything more than I do.”

  “You understand that we can’t be sure.”

  “I’ll tell her, then.” Parnell began trudging toward the car.

  “Mr. Parnell.”

  “Yes?”

  “We’ll be receiving crank calls in the next few days. We’ll need a question that can only be answered by Robert, if he’s still alive. Then you can decide.”

  Parnell felt sick to his stomach. “Ask him—ask them what his mother called him when Robert was a little boy.”

  On the telephone, Alexis seemed unready to accept it. But he returned home to find her in the music room, strangely calm. “They’ve already been here,” she told him. “Two agents. I couldn’t tell them what happened.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Unless he’s done this.”

  She began crying. As he knelt beside her, she shook her head, almost angrily. “He loved me.…”

  Alexis ran upstairs, near hysteria. The doctor gave her sedatives.

  Parnell called Danziger to ask advice. But he did not explain to the lawyer the reason that Alexis would not speak to him.

  For the next five days, their life became the focus of a drama, from which Alexis withdrew. Their front grounds were the scene of press conferences; strangers tapped their phones to screen the flood of hoax calls; Parnell and Danziger made contingency plans to borrow cash in large denominations. But until the evening of the fifth day, Parnell did not know if Robert lived, or what he would decide when the demands were made.

  He was in the library when McCarry phoned. “The kidnapper called me, by surprise—he must have caught my name on television. They want a light airplane to drop the parcel at 11:30 tomorrow evening in a meadow near your cabin. It was too short to trace the call, but the voice was like you described—a wheeze.”

  Parnell hesitated. “Did you ask the question?”

  “Yes. He said he’d call your house in half an hour. I’m on my way.”

  Hanging up, Parnell turned to watch Alexis.

  She sat in the music room; Parnell could not bring himself to enter.

  Through the window of the library, he saw two headlights. A moment later, a policeman let McCarry in.

  Shaking his hand, Parnell asked, “What if they know the answer?”

  “Then he’s alive.”

  The telephone rang.

  McCarry went to answer it. As Parnell turned, he saw that Alexis had looked up at the sound.

  Putting down the telephone, McCarry gazed at Alexis, and then Parnell. In the semidark, his eyes seemed clear and comprehending.

  “Lexie-love,” he said.

  For a last moment, Parnell looked back at his wife. Sitting at the piano, her profile seemed like china.

  “I’ll pay no ransom,” he answered softly.

  “Colby?”

  Parnell realized that he had closed his eyes. Standing, he shook hands with Danziger, somewhat formally.

  “Sorry to be late,” the lawyer said. “Quite a crowd coming out of Chinatown. Are you in a rush?”

  “A bit. Alexis is rather nervous over this Kilcannon party, and I feel I should be there. Personally, I don’t like his politics but …” He shrugged, helpless. “The man taps something in her.”

  Danziger smiled in sympathy. “Charisma.”

  They ordered drinks. Sipping his manhattan, Parnell mused, “I suppose it’s good for her, in a sense. An emergence …”

  “Of course.”

  Parnell snapped from his reverie. “Now,” he said. “Young Mr. Lord.”

  “I spoke to him.” Danziger’s tone was one of distaste. “He asks too much.”

  Their eyes met. “He did well this morning,” Parnell answered quietly.

  “It was cheap. Lord’s a hired gun looking for headlines.”

  “What does he want, John? Cole’s job back?”

  “And retroactive pay. There’s some complex custody matter involving Cole’s daughter, and I’m sure Lord means to use you to finance his client’s efforts.”

  “I see.”

  “You don’t have to pay it.” Danziger’s voice sharpened. “There’s no justification for that.”

  Parnell finished his drink. “Settle with him.”

  “Don’t be a fool, Colby. The jury won’t …”

  “Pay him, dammit. Just pay Lord the money.” Standing, Parnell excused himself without ordering lunch.

  6

  DAMONE had moved so quickly, Stacy remembered, that nine years later it still scared her.

  She’d been singing at a crummy club in Oakland; the floor smelled like stale beer, and the bathroom had an acrid stench from kids throwing up drugs—Stacy could hear them vomit during breaks. Damone stuck with her, hustling deejays and club owners in to hear her sing. But the last night her only audience was some lesbian bikers; Stacy won them over with “My Funny Valentine.”

  Afterward she waited in the back room for Damone to settle with the owner. Then Damone rushed in, taking her arm.

  “Did we get paid?”

  “That’s next. Something’s funny—I don’t want you in here any longer.”

  The owner lived in a trailer behind the club. A light was on; the bouncer who should have been guarding Stacy stood at the door. In the dark, she saw his shadow shift slightly, arms loose at his side. He was taller than Damone.

  “Where’s Naxos?” Damone asked.

  “Sleeping.”

  “Wake him up. We haven’t been paid yet.”

  “Then chalk it up to experience, asshole.”

  As Damone moved past him, the man pulled a revolver and swung at his head. Stacy started to scream; suddenly the bouncer lay at Damone’s feet, hand clapped over his ruined mouth. Damone picked up the revolver, took three long strides, and kicked in the door to the trailer. Her scream died.

  A soft voice came from the trailer, Damone’s. The bouncer moaned in the dirt.

  Damone came through the door clutching a wad of money. Reaching the bouncer, he murmured, “Chalk it up to experience, asshole,” and stuffed one bill in his mouth. Then he put an arm around Stacy and walked her to his rusted-out Ford.

  They were on the freeway before either spoke. “I scared you,” he said.

  “It’s just that it happened so fast.”

  Damone lit a cigarette. “Vietnam.”

  “You never talk about that.”

  The tip of his cigarette had glowed orange. “I never will,” he said at last.

  Now, reflecting on their silent ride from Chinatown, the memory made her hesitate. “You could have been saving Jamie’s life,” she finally told him.

  They were in the tuning room, following Stacy’s sound check. The band’s guitars were in metal racks; Damone had dragged in a garbage can filled with ice and beer. They sat on the rug, backs against the wall, drinking beer from cans. The ritual reminded them of how far they’d come; the others left them alone.

  “I embarrassed him,” Damone replied. “He was afraid of how he’d look on television.”

  Stacy felt his chagrin. “It wasn’t that. Really.”

  “Whatever, tell him to be careful.”

  “I have.” Stacy turned to him. “It’s like he’s trying to prove he’s real, John. It scares me.”

  Damone nodded. After a time, he asked, “Is that what was wrong just now?”

  “It was a rehearsal. I’ll be okay tonight.”

  Shrugging, Damone let it drop. “What will you wear?” he asked.

  “Don’t know.” Stacy sipped her beer. “When I opened the suitcase, my silk blouse looked like the Elephant Man.”

  “The romance of the road.” Damone gave a one-sided smile. “You didn’t have to do this, Stacy.”
<
br />   “Just like you didn’t have to play road manager.”

  “And miss your first case of stage fright in a year? Besides, driving the truck’s nostalgic.”

  She touched his hand.

  The roadie, Carson, drifted in. Quickly, Stacy smiled at him. “Thanks, Harry—the sound’s great.”

  “No problem,” Carson answered in a monotone, and continued his trancelike amble toward the garbage can. To Stacy, Carson had the inbred look of a typical roadie: lean-muscled, with spectral eyes, sharp features, a wispy blond mustache. But there was something else inside him, remote and a little scary. Reaching into the ice, he pulled out a chilled fifth of tequila, took one long swallow, and wiped his mouth.

  “Find your kid?” Damone asked him.

  Carson’s gaze was glassy, as if the question was taking detours in his brain. “Not yet,” he finally answered, and walked off with the bottle.

  “Is he all right, John?”

  Damone pulled his knees up to prop both elbows, and stared at the beer. “Harry does his work, and he hasn’t crashed his cycle lately.” He took another sip. “He drinks sometimes.”

  “He was in Vietnam with you, wasn’t he?”

  Damone gave her a sideways look. “Harry didn’t quite get back,” he said, and resumed drinking the beer.

  Stacy finished hers. “Off to the hotel,” she said. “I’m writing a new song.”

  “You are jumpy.”

  “It’s good, I think.” She stood. “Coming to the Parnells’?”

  “Swine city?” Damone tossed his can in a wastebasket. “I’d better count the gate. Rock ‘n’ roll’s a cash business, remember—like politics.” Turning, he gave her a keen, upward glance. “Isn’t Kilcannon worried that being with Parnell will piss off gays?”

  Stacy felt defensive. “He’ll be all right.”

  “The idea is to win.” His half-smile returned. “If he does, I guess you’ll keep on doing this.”