Emily, Gone

by Bette Lee Crosby

  He couldn’t let that happen.

  For a long while he sat watching Vicki, her face aglow, a sense of guileless joy surrounding her as she played with the baby.

  “Peekaboo,” she’d tease as she hid her face, then merrily popped out from behind the pillow. After peekaboo there was patty-cake, and as Vicki clapped the chubby little hands against her own, the baby shrieked with laughter. Here and there Murphy found moments when he could push back the apprehension and feel that they were indeed a family, but before that contentment could take root in his heart the fear came roaring back.

  AS THE NEWS SPREAD

  George Dixon’s hardware store did not open on Monday or Tuesday. Sometime late that afternoon a sign indicating the store would remain closed until further notice was taped to the inside of the glass door. No explanation was given, but by then most everyone in Hesterville knew about the kidnapping.

  When Sadie Jenkins got word of what had happened, her first thought was of Helen Dixon, George’s mama.

  Helen lived alone in a big house, three blocks west of Main Street. She had a sharp tongue, an intolerant nature, smoked Chesterfield cigarettes by the carton, and purposely kept to herself. Although there were some who labeled her an unpleasant person and moved on, there were others who knew she wasn’t always that way. At one time she’d been a good neighbor and considered a friend by half the women in town. But after she lost Henry, George’s daddy, to a heart attack that didn’t allow time for goodbyes, she’d grown resentful of life. Three years later, when George married Rachel and moved out, the bitterness inside her swelled to such a size it completely obliterated the loving nature she’d once had. With her now ready to snap the head off anyone who dared ring the doorbell, few people other than Sadie and the grocery store delivery boys came to the house. The windows that had been shuttered two years earlier remained so, and the wraparound porch sat devoid of furniture.

  Early Tuesday morning Sadie filled a basket with her fresh-baked blueberry muffins, pulled on her walking shoes, and headed over to Pecan Street. She knew Helen was going to need a shoulder to cry on.

  She rang the doorbell three times and, after standing there for almost ten minutes, began pounding on the door. Eventually she heard the shuffle of footsteps and Helen’s angry voice.

  “Hold your horses; I’m coming!”

  When the door finally swung open, Helen was in a clumsily tied bathrobe with one side of her hair spiked up and the other side smashed flat against her head. Sadie held out the basket of muffins and strode in without waiting for an invitation.

  “I rushed over the minute I got the news.”

  “News?” Helen echoed, her face as dark as a storm cloud. “It’s not yet eight o’clock! Have you not heard of calling before you come pounding on a person’s door?”

  “I thought it was more important for me to hurry up and get here.”

  Sadie closed the door behind her and moved toward the kitchen. The two women had been friends since grade school, and Sadie knew Helen’s kitchen almost as well as she knew her own. She filled the coffeepot, set it to brew, then dropped down in the chair across from Helen.

  Pulling a pack of cigarettes from her pocket, Helen shook one out and lit it. “Now, what is so damn important that you need to be banging on my door at the crack of dawn?”

  “Hasn’t George called?”

  A look of annoyance flickered in Helen’s eyes. “Not that it’s any of your business, but yes, he called yesterday evening. I was in the shower, and he left a message for me to call him at the house.”

  “Did you?”

  “No. Not yet. I’m not overly anxious to talk with that wife of his. I figured it best to call him at the store later today.”

  For a brief while, Sadie sat there saying nothing. As the percolator bubbled to a stop, she searched her mind for an easy way to tell of the kidnapping, but there was none. She finally stood, poured two cups of coffee, and set them on the table.

  “I know you’ve had your differences with Rachel, but right now she and George could use your support.”

  “I doubt that!” Helen took a long drag of the cigarette, then stubbed it out in the ashtray. “George doesn’t need me. Not since he married her.”

  Sadie stretched her arm across the table and took Helen’s hand in hers. “Actually he does need you, Helen. They both do. When Rachel woke up yesterday morning, Emmy’s crib was empty. They think the baby was kidnapped sometime during the night on Sunday.”

  The angry set of Helen’s face softened, and her lip began to quiver. “Kidnapped? Emmy? But how? Who would—”

  Sadie gave her friend’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “My understanding is that they don’t know much yet. Sheriff Wilson is working on it, and he’s got a team out there searching the woods.”

  Helen’s eyes filled with water. “Lord God. They should never have been living way out there. I told George they ought to move in here with me, but Rachel wouldn’t hear of it! She’s the one to blame! A thing like this never would have—”

  “Stop it!” Sadie snapped and withdrew her hand. “Rachel’s already crazy with worry. The last thing she needs is for you to be blaming her.”

  “Well, it’s true.”

  Sadie pushed back her chair and stood. “I don’t want to hear it! If you were any kind of a mama you’d be out there comforting your family instead of sitting here on your righteous high horse!”

  Leaving the full cup of coffee on the table, she turned toward the living room. Halfway to the door she stopped and looked back.

  “I’m making a casserole for them, and I’ll be bringing it out there later this afternoon. If you want to come along, you’re welcome to do so.”

  As she reached for the doorknob, she heard a rather contrite voice say, “Pick me up on the way.”

  That afternoon Sadie not only baked a casserole, she also started a fund-raising campaign. She went through the directory and called every friend who lived within fifty miles of town. Once she’d given them a rundown of what happened, she said, “Right now there’s not a speck of information on who the kidnapper might be, but if we were to offer a sizable reward for information . . .”

  By late that afternoon, she had commitments for $7,850, and $500 of that came from Harold Baker. Although he’d told Sheriff Wilson he was absolutely certain the music festival had nothing to do with the disappearance of the Dixon baby, he had suspicions otherwise. The thought of that possibility needled him. He’d gotten a look at the people camped out in the field—most of them stoned out of their minds or rolling around in the mud half-naked—and although you couldn’t tell one from the other, he wouldn’t put it past any of them.

  It was near five o’clock when Sadie pulled into the driveway of Helen’s house and beeped the horn. Seconds later the front door opened, and Helen hurried down the walk lugging an overnight bag.

  “I thought I’d best bring a few things in case they need me to stay,” she said and climbed into the car.

  When they arrived at the Dixon house George was standing on the front porch, his hands jammed into his pockets and his face tilted toward the sky. Startled by the sight of him, Helen felt her heart drop into her stomach. Never had she seen him looking so forlorn, not even five years earlier when his daddy died.

  He looked at her and gave a barely perceptible nod. “Thanks for coming, Mama.”

  “Well, of course I’d come. I’m your mama.”

  He stepped down from the porch and came toward her. Although she had benevolence in her heart, Helen’s sharp tongue got the best of her.

  “Your message just said to call as soon as possible; you should have left word that it was an emergency and explained what happened! I’m Emmy’s grandmother! I deserve to know when—”

  She stopped midsentence when she caught sight of Sadie’s pinched-up frown.

  “No matter,” she said and kissed his cheek.

  Thinking this might be a good time for a mother-son talk, Sadie lifted the casserole fro
m the back seat of the car and started toward the house. “Is Rachel inside?”

  George nodded.

  “I’ll see if she wants this in the fridge or the oven.” She hurried by and disappeared through the front door.

  Sadie expected to find Rachel sitting on the living room sofa or trying to keep busy in the kitchen, but she was nowhere to be seen.

  “Rachel?” she called out.

  A small childlike voice came from the far end of the hall. “What?”

  She set the casserole on the counter and followed the sound of the voice.

  “It’s me, Sadie Jenkins,” she called out. “I’ve brought a casserole so you won’t have to worry about cooking.”

  No answer.

  Sadie slowly started down the hallway. The first doorway opened into the master bedroom where George and Rachel slept. The drapes were drawn and the bed unmade.

  “Rachel?”

  Again, no answer.

  At the end of the hall she spied a room with the door pulled shut. She tapped lightly and said, “Rachel, are you in here?”

  No answer, but Sadie heard the creak of a rocking chair swaying back and forth against the wooden floor. A feeling of apprehension gripped her as she eased the door open and looked into the room. She gasped.

  “Dear God!”

  Rachel was sitting in the chair with the rag doll she’d made for Emmy in her lap. She was wearing the same white nightgown and robe she’d had on Monday morning. Her face was whiter than the robe and drawn so tight you could see the skeletal structure of her bones.

  Sadie crossed over and kneeled beside the chair. “Rachel, honey, what in the world are you doing?”

  Rachel turned with a blank expression. “Doing?”

  Sadie took the limp hand in hers. “You look like a dead woman. You’re making yourself sick. I know how terrible this is, but you’ve got—”

  Rachel blinked, and for a brief moment her eyes seemed to focus on Sadie’s face. Then she turned away.

  “No, you don’t know how terrible this is,” she said in a voice that was as flat and heavy as an iron skillet. “You can’t possibly know, because you’ve never had your baby taken away.”

  “That’s true. But just because someone else hasn’t experienced the pain of what you and George are going through doesn’t mean they can’t understand it.”

  Rachel creaked back and forth in the chair, her eyes focused on the far wall and her lips pressed tightly together.

  “When someone you love hurts, you hurt for them. That’s how love is.” Sadie reached in and wrapped her arms around Rachel. “Honey, there’re a lot of people in this town who love you and George both, and as long as you’re hurting, we’re gonna be hurting with you.”

  Without saying a word Rachel leaned forward, lowered her face into the thick folds of Sadie’s bosom, and sobbed as though her heart was broken—which it was.

  Sadie and Helen stayed until late in the evening. They scurried about washing sheets, making the bed, and running a rag mop across floors that were already spotless. The sky was dark when Sadie heated the casserole and called everyone to the kitchen table.

  George brought Rachel from the back room, keeping hold of her arm as he eased her into the chair. Like an obedient child she sat silently, her eyes as lifeless as an abandoned house. For several minutes, there was only the sound of a utensil scraping the bottom of the pan as Sadie spooned out the casserole.

  Feeling this silence was more painful than that of her own house, Helen finally spoke. “I can help out in the store if you want,” she said, looking to George. “Maybe wait on customers or tend the cash register?”

  He looked into his mama’s eyes for half a second, then shook his head and stuck a forkful of the chicken in his mouth.

  Rachel just sat there, barely touching the little bit of food on her plate. Twice she moved a piece of carrot from one side of her plate to the other, then she left it there and set the fork aside.

  At the end of the evening, Helen took George aside. “I know I haven’t always acted real kindly toward Rachel,” she said, “and I’m sorry about that.”

  “There’s no need, Mama—”

  “It’s been a difficult time for me, but I want you to know I’m willing to help her out. I brought my overnight case, and I’m prepared to stay if you think she has need of me.”

  George shook his head. “Not tonight, Mama. Maybe when Rachel gets to feeling better.”

  Helen glanced across the room and eyed Rachel curled into a ball at the end of the sofa. A gut-wrenching feeling settled into her stomach as she came to fear Rachel was not going to get better, at least not anytime soon.

  THE INVESTIGATION

  The Primrose Post was a weekly newspaper distributed free of charge every Wednesday; that week they ran a headline declaring Infant Taken As Family Sleeps. The paper included a squint-eyed photo of Emily taken at the hospital just after she was born. Her eyes were almost closed and her hair still dark. Beneath the photo was a description saying the infant was wearing a pink nightgown; weighed approximately sixteen pounds; and had blue eyes, blonde hair, and a butterfly-shaped birthmark on her back.

  Alongside Emily’s photo was one taken of the music festival. That article estimated the crowd to be fifteen thousand and told of the featured bands. At the bottom of the column it said Continued on page 6.

  When the newspaper arrived, Sheriff Wilson was in his office thumbing through the scraps of evidence he’d gathered over the past two days. Most of it amounted to nothing: fingerprints the FBI couldn’t identify, a partial footprint of a girl’s sandal, and statements from neighbors who had neither seen nor heard anything. Given the number of people at the music festival and the downpour that flooded the field, there was not a scrap of evidence to be salvaged.

  The newspaper sat on his desk for almost two hours before he glanced over and spotted the picture. It wasn’t the photo of Emily that piqued his interest; it was the one of the music festival. There were at least a dozen faces that might be identifiable. He studied the picture, then flipped over to page six. No names but more pictures. He checked the byline on the article: Joy Dancer.

  As it turned out, Joy was a part-time reporter whose real name was Alice Montgomery. She worked special events and came into the office only on Fridays. With a bit of persuasion, Wilson got her address and phone number. That same afternoon he drove out to her house and met with her. Alice said she’d read the story of the missing baby and couldn’t imagine what the Dixons were going through.

  “It must be hell,” she said sympathetically. “If there’s anything I can do—”

  “There just might be.” Wilson went on to ask if she was there on Sunday and if she had any other shots of the crowd.

  “I worked the festival all weekend. Did ten rolls of film, more than three hundred shots,” she said. “If you think there’s something . . .”

  They spent the next two hours going over the proof sheets. Several shots were of the performers, and a large number were crowd shots taken from behind, but there were twenty-one shots with a clear view of the faces in the crowd. As the angle of the camera changed, so did the faces.

  “Any of these people strike you as different? Maybe a bit out of the ordinary?”

  She gave a wry smile. “They all like to think they are, but the truth is they look pretty much the same. Long hair, beards, and clothes that could use a washing.”

  Wilson nodded. It was the same story he’d gotten from everyone else.

  He waited while she went into her darkroom and printed enlargements of all twenty-one photos. Once the photos were dry, she slid them into an envelope.

  “Good luck,” she said as she handed it to him.

  He’d counted 103 individual faces; hopefully one of them would ignite a spark of recognition.

  For nearly a week Sheriff Wilson went from place to place showing the pictures and asking if any of the faces looked familiar. He visited every house on Yellowwood Road and then went nearly
five miles beyond the Baker farm showing the pictures and asking questions. Time after time he got the same answer from people. They’d heard the noise of the music festival but hadn’t seen a thing.

  “I’m not one to go looking for trouble,” the widow Scoggins said. “I kept my blinds drawn and doors locked until those rowdies left town.”

  After he’d tried every house, he began canvassing the merchants in town. He went from one end of Main Street to the other asking if perhaps one of the faces looked familiar, possibly someone who’d shopped in the store using a credit card that could be traced. Abner Vanhouten, owner of Vanhouten’s Drugstore, pointed out a lanky fella standing off to one side and said he looked vaguely familiar. The sheriff called Alice and asked if she knew anything about the man in question. She enlarged her copy of the photo, then said he was the lead guitarist with the Blue Bandits Band, so that also turned out to be a dead end.

  When the reward fund grew to more than $10,000, Sadie turned it over to the sheriff, and he printed up posters with a grainy black-and-white picture of Emily in the center. At the top in bold red ink it read “$10,000 reward for information leading to the return of this child.” Underneath was the same description that appeared in the newspaper—pink nightgown, blue eyes, blonde hair, and a butterfly-shaped birthmark. At the very bottom was a phone number for the sheriff’s office.

  A team of volunteers—mostly friends of Rachel and merchants who worked alongside George—went from town to town pinning posters on bulletin boards, placing them in store windows, and tacking them onto telephone poles. They went as far north as Ellijay and as far south as Needmore.