The Adventures of Young Elizabeth and Rollo, the Wondercat* (*Who thought he was a dog?)

by Les Cohen

Episode 10:

  Not Quite As Dead As We Thought

  Eleanor stayed over, but called her sister to be on standby with the car the next morning, just in case we figured out someplace to go. Missing cat or not, we were both out before our heads hit our pillows, but not before I opened my dormer window in case Rollo made his way back to the roof during the night. But he didn’t.

  “I’m guessing he stayed with the old man to take care of him.” Eleanor, up earlier than I would have expected, was trying to make me feel better, but it wasn’t working.

  “Sure,” I agreed half-heartedly. “Let’s get dressed before the guys show up for breakfast. You shower first.”

  “Hey, Mrs. Coleman.”

  “Good morning, Eleanor. When Elizabeth comes down...”

  “I’m right here, Mom.” I’d stepped into my closet to pick out something to wear.

  “Good. Your father and I are going out to get some bagels and a paper. Go ahead and make breakfast for your friends, if you like, or you can wait for us to get back. We won’t be long. Just don’t go anywhere without us.”

  “Right, Mom. See you guys later.”

  As it turned out, Bobby and MR were walking across the yard together just as my parents were driving out.”

  “Hey,” I opened the door for them even before they got there. “We’re having scrambled eggs with bacon pieces, toast, juice and then we’re out of here.”

  “Where we going?” Bobby was the first to ask.

  “MR, you make the best eggs. Do it. You’re a way better cook than I am. ..Bobby, you help him. Eleanor, you call your sister. Tell her to get over here and then get juice for everybody...”

  “I want some chocolate milk. ..And didn’t your mother just tell you not to..” Eleanor was right, but I ignored her. I was finding Rollo today or.. or.. I don’t know. I finding him today, period.

  “And make MR some chocolate milk while I set the table. Use the skim milk. It’ll be better for him.”

  “So... ?” It was Bobby again.

  “Harness Creek.” They all stopped for a moment, but no one was surprised. “We’re going back to that shack and see what we can find. I think the old man was living there.”

  “Your parents said to wait.”

  “I know, but...”

  “Let’s just eat, guys,” Eleanor interrupted. “Mr. and Mrs. Coleman will probably be back before we’re ready to leave anyway.” And that’s what we did, talking to each other about this and that, nothing particularly important, but it was just the change of pace we needed.

  “Hey,” Bobby was pushing the curtains aside over the sink, “you’ve got a police car pulling up out front. One guy in uniform, the other in a suit.”

  “Short blonde hair?” I was thinking about the detective that had interviewed us before.

  “Yeah, it’s the same guy. He’s got a file with him. Looks like the one from your father’s desk.”

  So I got up from the table and opened the door. “Hi.”

  “Hello, Elizabeth. Can we talk to you and your parents?”

  “Sure, Detective. Come on in. My parents should be back in few minutes.”

  Just as the door was closing behind them, Eleanor’s sister Connie pushed it back open. “Hi, everyone,” and then, seeing that I was starting to clear the table, “thanks for waiting.”

  “Don’t worry,” I told her, pointing to the plate, glass and silverware neatly arranged on the kitchen island, “we saved you some. Go ahead, while we get ready. Make yourself some toast. There’s English muffins in the cupboard if you want one.”

  “Thanks.”

  “While we’re waiting for your parents, would you mind taking a look at some pictures, in case you and your friends recognize anyone? Okay if I lay them out here on the table?”

  “Sure,” I gave him permission and he did, putting down some head shots that he must have had in his police files, and the picture of the two men we’d found among the papers in the safe.

  “If you could gather around, those of you who were at the your father’s office building last night, just make a mental note of anyone who looks familiar, but don’t point or say anything until I ask you.”

  “Doesn’t want us influencing each other’s opinion,” MR mumbled under his breath to Eleanor, tapping with his fingers on the checkered tablecloth.

  “That’s it exactly,” the detective smiled as MR looked up.

  No more than two minutes later, we were just standing there, pretty obviously all done.

  “Okay, let’s start with you, Bobby. Tell me if you see anyone familiar looking, and no body changes his or her mind, no matter what he says, or doesn’t say. ...How about it, Bobby?”

  One at a time, Bobby, Eleanor, MR and I told the detective what we saw. MR and Eleanor thought they recognized one of the men with the Russian accents, although he had a beard now. His eyes looked right, but I couldn’t be sure. None of us could find the shorter man, the one with the red hair, although a couple of faces looked familiar. It would have helped if the pictures had been in color, instead of black and white. But all of us recognized the old man from the picture that came from the safe. Especially Eleanor and me, from the night before and from when I saw him on the boat in Harness Creek.

  “Officer.. Detective, I’m sorry, if we’re done, my friends and I...”

  “Of course, Elizabeth, but I really need to talk to your parents.”

  “Look, they’ll be back in a minute. Eleanor,” I wasn’t about to hang out at the house waiting for my parents while Rollo was lost in space, “you stay here with MR until my parents get back, tell them what’s up and then ask them to drive you to the creek to meet us.”

  “What?!”

  “Eleanor, please. I’ve got to get out there.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Before they tell you not to..” she said quietly, out of earshot from the detective and policeman who were talking to each other about something. (Wait. Of course they were talking about ‘something.’ Why else would they be talking to each other? If I want to be a writer, I need to be more careful about things like that. Back to the story..) “Okay. I get it.”

  “Elizabeth?”

  “Yes, Detective.”

  “Our people haven’t been back out there. How about if you just wait and we’ll all go together.”

  “Thanks, Detective, but you’ll be right behind us,” I told him, turning to look out the window toward the familiar sound of our car’s engine. That’s my parents pulling up now. We’ll be okay. ..Bobby. Let’s go, Connie.”

  “Wait,” Connie gulped down half a glass of orange juice, wiped her mouth on a folded paper napkin, and we were off.

  “Hey, Mom. We’re out of here. Eleanor will bring you up to date.”

  “Wait a minute,” my mother turned, always desperate to get in that last question or say something while I was walking out the door.

  “Talk to Eleanor, and the detective,” I shouted back to her as Bobby opened the door to Connie’s car for me. (He’s so, polite. Sure, I could have opened the door for myself, of course, but somehow it seemed nicer this way, like he wanted to make sure nothing happened to me. ..Maybe I should occasionally open the door for him.)

  “Hi, Mrs. Coleman.” I could always count on Eleanor to cover for me.

  My parents didn’t recognize the other men. Why should they? Rollo and I, and now Bobby and MR, but only for a second when the elevator door opened in the third floor hallway, were the only ones who had seen them. Obviously, the police wouldn’t have had the picture of that one guy if he didn’t have some criminal record. “And all four of them,” the detective, talking to my parents, held up the picture of my grandfather and his partner, “recognized the old man.”

  My father nodded.

  “Apparently,” the detective continued, “he hasn’t changed all that much over the years. This picture’s got to be 30 years, maybe older.”

  “Well, Detective, I’
ve only met the man once, I think, when I was kid and he was visiting my father.” Extending his hand, my father pointed to the man in the photo on the left. “I really don’t know much about him. His name is ‘Manny,’ Manuel... something,” he paused, trying to remember a last name he hadn’t heard in years. “It’s been a long time. I can remember my father meeting with him at our old house on...” And then he got it, “Spe-dar-i-kov, I think. Something like that. I’m not sure about the spelling. Besides, I’m pretty sure they both changed their names. My father’s, from ‘Zuretsky’ to ‘Coleman,’ but I don’t know about Manny. He was my father’s partner. They came over together from Russia, a long time ago.”

  “You got to be kidding, Mr. Coleman, that guy on the left is your father’s partner?” MR had hardly been paying attention, but he was now, and Eleanor knew why.

  “That’s right, MR. I only met him once or twice when I was kid. He and my father didn’t...”

  “That’s not the point, Mr. Coleman,” Eleanor took over where MR left off, “the guy we saw is the man on the right!”

  “That can’t be. ...That’s my father, Elizabeth’s grandfather. She probably can’t remember what he looked like. He’s been dead for almost ten years. Died in a boating accident on South River...”

  “Not far from Harness Creek?” This guy wasn’t a detective for nothing. “Never found the body, did they?”

  “Well, he used to own that shack. Kept his boat there, the one that sunk the other day.”

  “Your name isn’t ‘Coleman’?” MR had just figured that out.

  “It is now.” My father didn’t want to take the time to talk about it now, but didn’t want to blow MR off either. “Look, I’ll explain later. Right now we’..”

  “Let’s go. Mr. and Mrs. Coleman, you follow me in your car with Ralph and Eleanor. ...Ray,” he was talking to the uniformed Officer while he, the detective, shuffled up his pictures from the table, “you call for another car to meet us there.” And they were out the door in a second, fifteen, maybe twenty minutes tops behind Connie, Bobby and me.

  “Let’s park here, on the shoulder across from the entrance.” Connie was right. The dirt and rock covered road to the creek was barely big enough for one car. Getting back out in a hurry might not be easy. Better to leave the car here and walk, or run if we had to, back to it. Besides, if there was somebody at the shack, they would more likely hear us coming by car than on foot.

  Out of the car, we crossed the road and began walking toward the water, staying near the trees and brush on our right, instead of down the middle, thinking our approach would be a little less obvious that way. It was, I’m guessing, twenty, maybe thirty yards or so before we came into the open area where we could see the shack ahead of us, and the water behind it. The dirt road made a right, past some trees, and then came into the clearing where not one, but two cars were parked. From there, the road continued around in front of the porch, between it and the rusty chain link fence at the top of the small hill that led down to the water. The driveway, barely wide enough for a small car, then completed its circle on the other side of the house before heading back out again to the main road, where we were parked.

  “Get down,” I motioned to Bobby and Connie as soon as we saw the cars, and we ducked behind a couple of small bushes and a tree, peering through the leaves while we figured out our next move. At that point we were only fifty feet from the cars, and another twenty or so from the house.

  “We need to get closer,” Bobby was whispering, but sounded remarkably cool. I was nervous and looked over at Connie. She was older, but had the same intense look on her face that I was feeling in my chest. From where we were, if there was anyone on the screened porch, it wasn’t likely they would have seen us coming. “We’ve got to get up against the side there where we can get a look through those windows.”

  “There,” I pointed into the woods behind us. “We’ll go straight back into the trees, work our way toward the water and come up the hill on the other side of the cars. The only exposure we’ll have will be between that one car,” the one that was parked closest to where we were hiding, “if we use it for cover, and the house.”

  “And if we stay low,” Connie had been following my plan with her eyes on the terrain, “there’s not much chance they’ll see us out the windows, even if they’re looking.”

  “Okay,” Bobby started to go first, “Let’s do it, but take it slow and avoid stepping on dry brush, if you can. The faster we go, the more noise we’ll make, and the more likely they are to hear us.”

  “Wow,” I was so impressed, honestly. “When did you become a Boy Scout?”

  “You’ve obviously never seen me in my uniform,” Bobby took the time to smile back at me. He wasn’t a Boy Scout. Just playing with me, which, under the circumstances, was exactly what I needed. “And I prefer ‘Man Scout,’ if you don’t mind.” (My gosh, he’s so cute. Remind me to have that smile licensed with the state Department of Wow. It was just the distraction I needed to keep my mind off what might really happen if we were discovered.)

  “Stay low,” Connie warned us, making a downward motion with her open hand.

  Saying nothing, the three of us did exactly what we had planned. Although it seemed pretty noisy to us, it had rained a bit the day before and the leaves didn’t crackle under our feet all that much. Slow and steady, chances were we weren’t noticeable what with the sound from the light breeze coming in off South River, and the other noises the woods always make on their own.

  “Eleanor,” it was my father asking as he drove faster to stay up with the police car he was following on their way to the creek, “did the detective tell you how he happened to have a picture of that one guy, one of the two who kidnapped Elizabeth and were threatening you last night?”

  “Yeah, he said he was a ‘hired hand,’ with a minor criminal record.”

  “That’s right, Mr. Coleman,” MR leaned forward, grabbing onto the side of my father’s bucket seat. “He made the point that someone was probably paying that guy to take care of business for him.”

  “Did he say who?”

  “No, Mrs. Coleman,” Eleanor finished up. “Could have been the other man that was there, but he wasn’t sure.”

  From the one of the cars that was closest to the shack, the three of us crunched down almost onto our hands and knees to cover the last few feet to the windows on that side of the house. Carefully, we stood up, our backs just barely rubbing up against the siding around this one particular window. Bobby was on one side. Connie and me, on the other. He looked at us, and we at him, and then ever so slowly we rolled our faces to look inside. Connie went high, with me below her, just a few inches above the sill.

  While the light wasn’t all that good, we could still see well enough to make out what was important. Either the place had been trashed, or whoever had been living there pretty much stunk as a housekeeper. My guess is, someone was looking for something, and hadn’t found it yet. (I’ve always wondered why people in the movies seem to mess a room up so much when they’re searching it. You’d think making the mess would make it harder to find anything. “I need to remember that,” I made a mental note, “if I ever write about all this.”) For a moment, I thought we could hear the voices of the two men who’d kidnapped me, talking in Russian to each other, but from somewhere else in the room where we couldn’t see them.

  And there, in the dimly lit middle of the floor, as much of it as we could see, was the old man from last night sitting in a chair, his white hair mussed and fallen down over his forehead, a small trickle of dried blood coming from his nose, as if he’d been in a fight. To my surprise, far from being scared, I was relieved and felt my confidence returning. There, sitting beside the old man was the only one in the room who turned to look at me. The slow motion of his head almost indiscernible, not even his eyes shifted their direction toward the window for long enough that anyone would have noticed. And then
his head did move, once, then again to his right, and back again, all the way left. What was he trying to tell me? Were there two, even three other men in the room? It was Rollo, his unusually large frame bringing his head even with the old man’s thighs. Any other cat or dog would have made a move in our direction, running over to the window, giving us a way. Not this cat. He looked at me, the dim gold glow of his eyes hard to miss, but only for a moment for fear of giving their captors a clue.

  “Mmmmmmm.” I could hear his deep-throated rumbling from the outside, through the screen window. The windows were open on the other side of the house. A quick turn, and easy leap onto one of the window sills, he could have been outside and safe in a flash, before whoever was keeping them had time to react. Instead, he was holding his position. But why? What was it about the old man that Rollo had figured out, but my friends and I couldn’t fathom?

  “Care to join us?”

  To be continued…

  “Who said that?!” Have Young Elizabeth and her friends been discovered? If so, to what end?! ..Well, you’ll just have to wait until I get back from class to find out. ..Right Rollo? ..Rollo? Man, when you take a nap, you don’t fool around, do you?