فصل 09 - بخش 04

9

Yune called at quarter past nine that evening, while Jeannie was in the shower. Ralph wrote everything down. It wasn’t much, but enough to be interesting. He went to bed an hour later, and fell into real sleep for the first time since Terry had been shot at the foot of the courthouse steps. He awoke at four on Friday morning from a dream of the teenage girl sitting on her boyfriend’s shoulders and pumping her fists at the sky. He sat bolt upright in bed, still more asleep than awake, and unaware he was shouting until his frightened wife sat up beside him and grabbed him by the shoulders.

‘What? Ralph, what?’

‘Not the strap! The color of the strap!’

‘What are you talking about?’ She shook him. ‘Was it a dream, honey? A bad dream?’

I believe there’s another dozen thoughts in my head lined up behind each one I’m aware of. That was what she had said. And that was what the dream – already dissolving, as dreams do – had been. One of those thoughts.

‘I had it,’ he said. ‘In the dream I had it.’

‘Had what, honey? Something about Terry?’

‘About the girl. Her bra strap was bright yellow. Only something else was, too. I knew what it was in the dream, but now …’ He swung his feet out of bed and sat with his hands grasping his knees below the baggy boxers he slept in. ‘It’s gone.’

‘It will come back. Lie down. You scared the hell out of me.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Ralph lay down again.

‘Can you go back to sleep?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘What did Lieutenant Sablo say when he called?’

‘I didn’t tell you?’ Knowing he hadn’t.

‘No, and I didn’t want to push. You had your think-face on.’

‘I’ll tell you in the morning.’

‘Since you scared me wide awake, might as well do it now.’

‘Not much to tell. Yune tracked the boy down through the officer who arrested him – the cop liked the kid, kind of took an interest, has been keeping track. For the time being, young Mr Cassidy is in the foster care system down there in El Paso. He’s got to face some kind of hearing in juvenile court for car theft, but nobody knows exactly where that will be yet. Dutchess County in New York seems the most likely, but they’re not exactly champing at the bit to get him, and he’s not champing at the bit to go back. So for the time being, he’s in a kind of legal limbo, and according to Yune, he likes that fine. Stepfather tuned up on him pretty frequently, is the kid’s story. While Mom pretended it wasn’t happening. Pretty standard cycle of abuse.’

‘Poor kid, no wonder he ran away. What will happen to him?’

‘Oh, eventually he’ll be sent back. The wheels of justice grind slow, but exceedingly fine. He’ll get a suspended sentence, or maybe they’ll work out something about time served while in foster care. The cops in his town will be alerted to his home situation, but eventually the whole thing will start up again. Kid beaters sometimes hit pause, but they rarely hit stop.’

He put his hands behind his head and thought of Terry, who had shown no previous signs of violence, not so much as bumping an umpire.

‘The kid was in Dayton, all right,’ Ralph said, ‘and by then he was getting nervous about the van. He parked in a public lot because it was free, because there was no attendant, and because he saw the Golden Arches a few blocks up. He doesn’t remember passing the Tommy and Tuppence café, but he does remember a young guy in a shirt that said Tommy something-or-other on the back. The guy had a stack of blue papers that he was putting under the windshield wipers of cars parked at the curb. He noticed the kid – Merlin – and offered him two bucks to put menus under the wipers of the vehicles in the parking lot. The kid said no thanks and went on up to Mickey D’s to get his lunch. When he came back, the leaflet guy was gone, but there were menus on every car and truck in the lot. The kid was skittish, took it as a bad omen for some reason, God knows why. Anyway, he decided the time had come to switch rides.’

‘If he hadn’t been skittish, he probably would have been caught a lot sooner,’ Jeannie observed.

‘You’re right. Anyway, he strolled around the lot, checking for cars that were unlocked. He told Yune he was surprised at how many were.’

‘I bet you weren’t.’

Ralph smiled. ‘People are careless. Fifth or sixth one he found unlocked, there was a spare key tucked behind the sun visor. It was perfect for him – a plain black Toyota, thousands of them on the road every day. Before our boy Merlin headed out in it, though, he put the van’s key back in the ignition. He told Yune he hoped someone else would steal it because, and I quote, “It might throw the po-po off my trail.” You know, like he was wanted for murder in six states instead of just being a runaway kid who never forgot to use his turn-signal.’

‘He said that?’ She sounded amused.

‘Yes. And by the way, he had to go back to the van for something else. A stack of smashed-down cartons he was sitting on to make him look taller behind the wheel.’

‘I kind of like this kid. Derek never would have thought of that.’

We’ve never given him reason to, Ralph thought.

‘Do you know if he left the menu under the van’s windshield wiper?’

‘Yune asked, and the kid said sure he did, why would he take it?’

‘So the person who tore it off – and left the scrap which ended up inside – was the person who stole it from the parking lot in Dayton.’

‘Almost had to be. Now here’s what had me wearing my think-face. The kid said he thought it was in April. I take that with a grain of salt, because I doubt if keeping track of dates was very important to him, but he told Yune it was spring, with all the leaves pretty much out on the trees, and not real hot yet. So it probably was. And April is when Terry was in Dayton, visiting his father.’

‘Only he was with his family, and they flew round-trip.’

‘I know that. You could call it a coincidence. Only then the same van ends up here in Flint City, and it’s hard for me to believe in two coincidences involving the same Ford Econoline van. Yune floated the idea that maybe Terry had an accomplice.’

‘One who looked exactly like him?’ Jeannie hoisted an eyebrow. ‘A twin brother named William Wilson, maybe?’

‘I know, the idea is ridiculous. But you see how weird it is, don’t you? Terry is in Dayton, the van is in Dayton. Terry comes home to Flint City, and the van turns up in Flint City. There’s a word for that, but I can’t remember what it is.’

‘Confluence might be the one you’re looking for.’

‘I want to talk to Marcy,’ he said. ‘I want to ask her about the trip the Maitlands made to Dayton. Everything she remembers. Only she won’t want to talk to me, and I have absolutely no way of compelling her.’

‘Will you try?’

‘Oh yes, I’ll try.’

‘Can you sleep now?’

‘I think so. Love you.’

‘Love you, too.’

He was drifting away when she spoke into his ear, firm and almost harsh, trying to shock it out of him. ‘If it wasn’t the bra strap, what was it?’

For a moment, clearly, Ralph saw the word CANT. Only the letters were bluey-green, not yellow. Something was there. He grasped for it, but it slipped away.

‘Can’t,’ he said.

‘Not yet,’ Jeannie replied, ‘but you will. I know you.’

They went to sleep. When Ralph woke up, it was eight o’clock and all the birds were singing.