“Where did you go?” Lexie asked on their way out of the dining room.
“The point wasn’t that he kills birds,” James answered. “It’s the dog, Lexie.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about. Which is nothing new, I might add.”
“Ouch!” James said.
They reached outside and a summer evening, warm, no breeze, and the cry of small insects filling their ears. Both of them caught by the perfection of the moment, other students streamed past them as if they were two sticks poking up out of a stream.
Lexie sighed. She reached out tentatively, hooking her pinkie into his. The two remained unmoving, wholly uncomfortable and yet thrilled, not wishing to be anywhere else.
“You’re going to explain what you mean,” she said softly, “when you’re ready.”
“Of course.”
“I don’t like to be left hanging.”
“Understood.”
“Tuck Shop later?” It was the closest thing to a student lounge. Located in the gymnasium, the Tuck Shop, part food bar, part mini-market, offered a pool table, Ping-Pong, foosball, and a big-screen TV. It opened evenings after study hall and afternoons after athletics.
“Definitely,” he said.
She released their fingers and walked away, somehow knowing James needed time to himself.
He congratulated her silently for understanding that, for giving him the time.
He headed away from the other students, in the direction of the school chapel.
CHAPTER 8
SOMEONE HID WITHIN THE BLACKENED SHADOWS and the tangled ivy on the far side of the school chapel.
“Come,” James instructed.
A man appeared, dressed in a groundskeeper’s coveralls and heavy work boots; his buzz-cut black hair revealed a tattoo on his scalp. It being so dark, James couldn’t make out the design.
“Espiranzo! Good to see you.”
“And you, Governor.”
James wasn’t comfortable with his title as head of the Directory. “The Scowerers?”
“’Tis a busy time, James,” said Espiranzo.
“It is. Did you hear the news—a member of the Directory?”
“Slain. Yes.”
“Was it us? Did the Scowerers kill him?”
The man cursed boldly. “Mr. Lowry’s a member of the Directory. That would never happen. Besides, we are not in the business of ending lives. Least not at present.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Difficult times, James. You read about the killing, or you heard about it?” Espiranzo asked.
“The article’s full of errors.”
“Errors hardly matter when one’s met his maker.”
“He was killed here.”
Espiranzo was unmoving. “Where?”
“Here. In the woods. Down the hill.”
“Don’t be believing every rumor you hear, Governor. ’Twas Boston.”
“I saw him. I was with him. He’d been shot.”
“Be careful, boy.” Espiranzo adopted a paternal, unfavorable tone with James that he did not appreciate.
“Injured badly. Bleeding. I came across him in the woods. I’m not here to get your approval of what I saw with my own eyes. I’m here to ask you, if it wasn’t us, if it wasn’t the Scowerers, then who would kill him and move his body?”
Espiranzo grabbed James by the arm and pulled him into the darkness with him. A grown-up walked past, following the path to the gap between the stone wall and then across the two-lane road toward the faculty houses beyond.
“How did you know?” James asked in a whisper.
“Heard the man coming.”
“Impossible. I was right here. Didn’t hear a thing.”
“Your senses improve as a matter of course and need,” said Espiranzo. “Not to worry, sir. You have much to learn.”
They remained in the dark, their backs against the cool, scratchy ivy leaves.
“From here to Boston, and good enough to fool the police,” James said.
Espiranzo didn’t answer.
“Can’t be easy. But more important, what was Lowry up to that someone would kill him or have him killed?”
Still, no answer.
“If you don’t know, just say so.”
“I don’t know,” the man said softly. It gave James a shiver.
“I don’t want you asking around.”
“If what you say is true, it needs explaining.”
“One man’s dead. That’s enough. I didn’t like Mr. Lowry, but my father did. Trusted him with so much. With me. With Moria. For all we know, he asked the wrong question. Look, I couldn’t bear to lose you too, Espiranzo.”
“I don’t like the thought much myself.”
“The Directory must be told. The Directory only.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Immediately.” James let the silence that followed speak for him.
“If it’s murder, and it happened here as you said— You understand the urgency that creates. Someone’s killing our leaders.”
“I understand.”
“Like it or not, I must stay close to you, sir,” said Espiranzo. “’Tis my job. In times such as this, more so than ever.”
“You cannot be seen. It would cause too many questions.”
“The girl. Is that wise? Do you value her safety?”
James shuddered. The man knew too much. Saw too much. “If there’s trouble, you’re ordered to protect Lexie first.”
“I am not.”
“You are now.”
“Might be that you and I could do the same work as you and her. Keeping her out of this would be the best protection of all, you don’t mind me saying.”
“I do . . . mind you saying. She’s smart. Very smart. She knows about . . . She was there. Lowry. I need her.”
More silence.
“I’m going to the Tuck Shop. Into the woods after that. I suppose I’ll feel safer knowing you’ll be nearby.”
Espiranzo warned, “I’ll have another Scowerer with me. Do not mistake him for the enemy.”
“Who are the enemy, Espiranzo? Who would have shot Lowry?”
“A good deal of thinking must be done, Governor. By you and the Directory. It’s not for me. It starts with you and the headmaster and them others. Same as always.”
“I’ll let Headmaster Crudgeon know that the Directory needs to meet.”
“Indeed.” Espiranzo exhaled dramatically.
“Now. I have to do this tonight,” said James.
In fact, he had other ideas.
CHAPTER 9
ON THE WAY TO MEET LEXIE, JAMES STOPPED beneath a tree to place a phone call. Use of cell phones on campus was prohibited for all students but James and me. Even though the Headmaster allowed us to have them (for our security), it didn’t mean we could show off. James kept his eyes open and his voice low.
“Detective Colander?”
“Speaking.”
James reintroduced himself to the detective superintendent with Interpol, the global law enforcement agency. He remembered the man as tall, his black hair graying, his teeth stained like a smoker’s. Colander’s raspy voice confirmed his bad habit. The detective had questioned us at the Interpol offices. He’d put us under surveillance. He’d made a nuisance of himself. But he was a global cop. He knew things and had connections.
“There’s a case that should interest you,” James continued. “A death.”
“Is that so?”
“Lower part of the Metro section. First page. The Herald. Today. Hairs and fibers? I don’t know what you guys call it. You’re going to find leaves and dirt and sticks and stuff like that. If it’s a mugging, a shooting, there should be a lot of blood, right? You should check it out.”
“Why would I do that, James?”
James hung up the call without saying good-bye. Rude? Yes. But lately James didn’t seem to notice the lines between what he wanted and what offended others. Including his sister.
He could be a real pain—surprise.
Later, he met up with Lexie in the Tuck Shop. Most nights there was either nut mix, popcorn, Rice Krispie bars, or fruit snacks to take, but it was always gone quickly.
“You promised to explain whatever it was that turned you into a space-out at dinner.” Lexie didn’t forget much.
“The dog, Lexie. Hinchman’s dog is a hunting dog. A scent dog. Do the math.”
“Don’t be mean.”
“Mean? I’m here, aren’t I?”
“And don’t be so patronizing,” Lexie chided.
“Pardon me if I don’t want to wait around for others to figure out what I already know! You’re boring me, Lexie.”
“And you’re being a real ashtray.”
“Hunting dogs go after the hunter’s dead bird, or dead deer, or—”
“Dead body,” she whispered, her face suddenly pale. “You can’t possibly be thinking what I think you are thinking.”
“Of course I’m thinking what you think I’m thinking,” James said. “The truth is like a seed stuck in your teeth. Sometimes it just falls out all on its own. Sometimes it hides or it sticks and you have to pick it out. You have to grab a toothpick, dig in there, and pry it loose.”
“Diego’s your toothpick,” Alexandria said.
“Who’s Diego?” James said.
“Do you ever pay any attention to anyone other than yourself?”
“Rough.”
“Mr. Hinchman’s dog, James. Diego.”
James nodded. “Oh, right. Got it.”
“When?”
“Tonight.”
“No way.”
“Way.”
“All black.”
“What?” James said.
“We wear all black,” Lexie said. “I’ll bring red theatrical gel to cover the two flashlights you will provide. Red is much harder to be seen from a distance. What else?”
“Bulletproof vests?”
“Not funny,” she said.
“Whistles for if things go bad.”
“Badly.”
“What?” James asked.
“Never mind.”
“The gym,” James said. “There are whistles right here in the gym.”
“Two, please,” she said.
“Got it.”
“A camera. Not our phones, but a camera that can shoot in almost no light. In case we find something.”
“Of course we’re going to find something,” James said.
“Natalie has a nice camera. I’ll borrow hers.”
“Don’t tell her anything.”
“Yeah, right. ‘Hey everybody, I’m going to steal Hinchman’s dog with James and go looking for the trail of a dead man who ended up in Boston.’”
“Actually, you could probably get away with saying that. They’d just think you’d lost it.”
“We could be expelled, James. Or worse.”
“Two a.m.,” he said. “Back by four.”
“And if whoever did this is still out there?” she asked.
“Then I suppose we’re not back by four.” They met eyes. Neither blinked for a long time, and when it happened, it was James first.
“That . . . is . . . not . . . funny,” Lexie said, fighting back her grin.
James looked smugly proud of himself.
Summer air after midnight held different qualities than daytime air. Summer scents held flowers, cut grass, and loamy earth. Even the hint of barbecue somewhere within it all. Like charcoal and chlorine. Low tide and high mountain pine.
At night, crickets chirped. Frogs croaked. Leaves rustled. And then, there were moments of absolute stillness that could be terrifying.
Lexie was not one to allow herself to be led, so she and James walked side by side. Dressed as ninjas. James with a red-occluded headlamp, courtesy of Lexie’s red theatrical gel. Lexie feeling self-conscious about her tight-fitting top and wishing she’d gone with the T-shirt. James feeling stupid for having spread the football team’s eye black onto his cheeks as camo. Both feeling awkward while trying to project confidence.
They’d agreed on a few primitive hand signals to avoid speaking. The gag rule was supposed to last until they got Diego back in his cage. An hour or two of silence. Neither believed it would hold.
James brought beef jerky to attract Hinchman’s dog to the cage door. It worked. The only sound the dog made was the pounding of his tail against the wire mesh cage. James got the gate open and the dog out as Lexie watched the house for a light coming on, or movement in any of its windows.
They avoided the road down to the hockey rink just in case, staying inside a strip of woods that dropped from behind faculty housing to the varsity football field and joined the hundred acres or more of rolling forest. They walked carefully, eyes on the ground, trying to avoid snapping sticks or tearing through brambles. Diego heeled to James without being instructed.
Once well into the forest, James opened his backpack and removed Lowry’s lone shoe, inserting the dog’s snout a good way inside. The dog huffed and grew excited. James, who’d internet-searched hunting dog commands, lifted the dog’s flapping ear and whispered, “Find it!” The only words spoken over the past thirty minutes.
Diego was all business, putting his nose to the ground and dragging James along by the leash. James and Lexie followed the dog lower on the hill, reaching the top border of the capture-the-flag boundary. Minutes later they passed through no-man’s-land, each consumed by different memories of the same night.
Lexie reached over and took James’s hand. He didn’t try to let go. He didn’t look over at her either. They continued as a connected trio—James with the leash, Lexie with James.
James switched on his red headlamp and waved his hand, signaling: unsure.
Lexie pointed to the right and then made the same unsure motion. James tugged the leash. The dog led them in that direction. Their progress continued a few yards at a time, both Lexie and James looking for anything that might jar their recollection of how they’d come across the opening where Lowry had appeared.
After another twenty minutes of slow going, Lexie steered them back uphill. James didn’t protest. They came into the clearing from a different spot, but there was no mistaking it, in no small part because Diego was pulling so hard he was about to break the leash. They reached the ruffled leaves that were black in places and looking as if ink had been spilled. But it wasn’t ink.
James used the shoe again. Lexie cupped some of the leaves and held the dried blood to the dog. Diego practically pulled out of his own fur.
Showtime! It was as if the dog were following a cable hidden beneath the leaves. He tacked this way and that, but never far off a center line that carefully dodged bushes and shrubs—just as Lowry had. At the occasional tree trunk the dog went berserk, sniffing and huffing, snorting and coughing. It became clear to both Lexie and James that Lowry had paused at these locations, not only because of Diego, but also the discovery of similarly black-splattered leaves at the tree’s base. And, in one instance, a perfect impression of a human handprint on the bark of a birch tree.
It was the handprint that caused Lexie to vomit. Kneeling off by herself, she retched and puked and dry-heaved as tears flowed from her eyes. Too soon to the death of her father, James supposed. Too real when intertwined with the idea of a hunting dog and men having pursued Lowry in much the same way. James dragged Diego over to Lexie and she came into his arms and they hugged. And the dog wrapped the leash around them. And their chests moved as if laughing. James kissed a tear from her cheek. She leaned back and glared at him. Maybe she hadn’t liked it. Maybe she didn’t know how to react. James felt much older.
“Thank you,” Lexie said.
“No problem.”
“Don’t do that again. Don’t confuse things.”
“Understood,” James said.
“I mean . . . not unless you ask me.”
“OK.”
“But you can ask me.”
“OK,” Jame
s said.
“Are you mad? You look mad. I didn’t mean to make you mad. It . . . I liked it. I appreciate it, James.”
“I’m not mad.” Confused, James wanted to say. Girls were confusing.
Moving once again, the dog followed Lowry’s climb up the hill. James signaled a stop. He and Lexie caught their breath as James ad-libbed swinging a stick—a hockey stick—and pointed north to indicate the rink.
Diego’s frantic behavior infected them both. The dog reared up on his hind legs, straining the leash. He wanted to get on with the hunt.
James took Lexie’s hand this time. He gave it a slight squeeze. The pace was hurried, the climb difficult. James pulled them to stop, resisting Diego’s uphill charge. He cupped his ear, imploring Lexie to listen along with him. Wings—probably bats; Lexie didn’t want to look up. Insects sang loudly. And what was that? Lexie wondered. A door? A window? A car? She pointed behind. She wanted to turn around and head back.
James shook his head. He motioned they should hunch over and continue more carefully, his fingers making like walking legs. She nodded, though reluctantly. Taking James by the shoulder, she pointed to herself and then away, suggesting they split up. James shook his head. Retook her hand.
All for one and one for all, he seemed to be saying. She shrugged. Waited. Nodded. Joined him and the dog, her legs heavier, her feet less willing.
James sensed progress, complimented himself on using Diego. Slipped the dog some more jerky. They weren’t following a rabbit or a deer. They were following Lowry’s death march back to the source. Back to where he’d been shot?
The first time I heard anything about any of this was when I was awakened by a text.
A text from James.
If I’m not at school tomorrow, start looking for me here
Attached was an internet-mapped pin with a GPS coordinate.
It took me a second to zoom the map so I could see the pin’s location. I searched for a landmark I knew.
I gasped so loud I woke up my roommate, Natalie.
My brother was out of his mind. I had to stop him.
The Final Step Page 3