Behind the Curtain

by Peter Abrahams

  What if you buried him right side up?

  I guess your house would never sell.

  Ingrid got up. She felt funny, not quite herself, more of a virtual self, a figure in a dream. Maybe her brain was doing some knitting after all. She took St. Joseph off the shelf, carried him downstairs, entered the garage.

  Gardening tools hung on wall hooks. Ingrid selected a little hand spade, six or seven inches long. She went out to the front yard.

  Where was the best spot for this? Maybe by the dogwood bush, her favorite landscape feature at 99 Maple Lane. Ingrid knelt, cut out a circle of grass, careful not to damage it—Dad was fussy about the lawn, sprinkled all kinds of stuff around every spring. Then she dug a hole, narrow and a little more than a foot deep. No frost yet, the earth still pretty soft—digging was fast and easy.

  Ingrid buried St. Joseph right side up in her front yard.

  Her mood lifted before she even got back inside, no longer tired or fuzzy. She switched on lights, sat at the kitchen table with a cold Fresca and a minibag of Fritos, a great combo. Yes, her mood was lifting, like something good was on the way. She thought of Grampy’s .357. Sherlock Holmes didn’t go in for a lot of gunplay—his favorite weapon was a hunting crop. Watson had a pistol. It appeared in “The Adventure of the Speckled Band,” for example, one of the scariest of the Holmes stories because of that swamp adder, deadliest snake in India. But in the climactic scene, the pistol plays no role; in fact, the snake doesn’t even get killed.

  For some reason, Ingrid’s mind wanted to stay with that last scene. By then, Holmes had figured out how Dr. Roylott killed Miss Stoner’s sister, but he had no proof. For proof, he had to be inside the mansion when Dr. Roylott went after Miss Stoner herself. Holmes kept Miss Stoner safe from the swamp adder, of course, secretly moving her to another room and hiding out with Watson in her bedroom while Dr. Roylott got that whole diabolical snake plan going. It was really a kind of…

  Sting.

  Bzzz.

  Ingrid felt an idea, a huge one, struggling to be born. The sting was one of the strongest weapons of law enforcement. How did it work, exactly? You set up the bad guy, made sure you were there when he committed the crime, caught him red-handed. For example, say you knew a guy was selling stolen cars. What do you do? Buy one from him, maybe saying at the same time, “This sure is a great price, buddy.”

  And he’d snicker, guilty as sin. Tucking the cash into his greasy pocket.

  “What’s that little laugh all about?” you’d say.

  And he’d say, “You don’t wanna know.”

  “Oh, but I do,” you’d say, as you snapped on the cuffs.

  The door opened and Mom came in from the garage. Ingrid looked up, startled. She hadn’t heard a thing.

  “Hi, Ingrid,” Mom said, giving her a close look. “How was school?”

  “School?” said Ingrid. “Oh, fine. You know.”

  “Much homework?” said Mom, kicking off her shoes and sliding on her sheepskin slippers.

  “Um,” said Ingrid.

  “What does that mean?” said Mom. “I know things may be…difficult now, but it won’t help to let your schoolwork slip.”

  “No chance of that,” Ingrid said.

  Mom did a quick double take. “You’re in a good mood today,” she said.

  “Pretty good.” True, and kind of amazing, what with everything she’d been going through. But Ingrid knew why: Now she had a plan. She was going to sting them like they’d never been stung.

  “I’m glad,” said Mom.

  All very well, Ingrid thought while Dad drove her to the high school for the Wizard of Oz rehearsal, to talk tough about stinging, but exactly how was a sting organized, anyway? It had to start with putting out the word that you were in the market for something—in this case, steroids. Putting the word out meant she’d have to have a target, someone on the receiving end of the word. Who was that going to—

  Dad’s cell phone rang. He answered it. “Hi, Tim.”

  Ingrid couldn’t hear what Mr. Ferrand was saying, but she caught the tone, not nice.

  “But that wasn’t what she—”

  Mr. Ferrand’s voice rose.

  “I’ll be there in a few minutes,” Dad said, and clicked off.

  Dad sped up, shifted gears, grinding them slightly, which never happened. He was a great driver and loved the TT, treating it like a baby.

  “Going back in to work, Dad?”

  He nodded. A passing streetlight turned his face into all bones and shadows. Had he lost some weight?

  “It’s kind of busy these days, huh?” Ingrid said.

  “Can’t be afraid of hard work, Ingrid. Haven’t we been through this?”

  “You mean all that globalization stuff?”

  Dad’s hands tightened on the wheel. “Try to express yourself a little more maturely,” he said.

  That hurt. Ingrid sat back in the seat. Had she been grating on him, grating on her own father? She folded her arms across her chest and didn’t utter another word.

  “It might help,” said Jill Monteiro, sitting on the auditorium stage at Echo Falls High, feet dangling over the edge, “if we shared an understanding of what this scene’s all about.”

  Silence from the cast—Stacy, Mia, Brucie, Joey, Ingrid—all of them sitting with their feet dangling too. Somehow Brucie’s sneaker fell off, landing with a loud smack. Brucie had big feet for his size.

  “Brucie?” said Ms. Monteiro.

  “Yeah?”

  “Any ideas?”

  “Sure,” said Brucie. “How about a car that washes itself?”

  Stacy jabbed him in the arm, hard.

  “Ow,” said Brucie.

  “Retard,” said Stacy.

  He batted his eyes at her, like he was in love.

  “Joey?” Jill said.

  Joey, sitting next to Ingrid, gazed down at his script. “Scene?” he said, like it was a foreign word or something.

  “This little episode,” said Jill. “When the four travelers finally meet the wizard they’ve been seeking. What ends up happening?”

  Joey’s eyes stayed on the script, but he couldn’t have been getting any help from that, because it was turned to the title page and just said Wizard. “Ends up happening,” he mumbled to himself.

  “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, dudes,” said Brucie.

  “Joey?” Jill said.

  Joey took a deep breath. “They find out he’s a con man.”

  Jill clapped her hands together. “Exactly.”

  Joey looked up, a surprised and slightly pleased expression on his face. A great expression, in Ingrid’s view.

  “The wizard is a con man, as Joey says,” said Jill. “This is where we get to see what’s behind the curtain, the way things really are. And when we do, there’s another surprise.”

  “What was the first one again?” said Brucie.

  They all ignored him, including Jill, a fast learner. “Anyone?” she said.

  Blank looks, except for Mia. “Even though the wizard’s a fake,” she said, “he ends up giving them what they want anyway.”

  Wow. Mia was so smart.

  Then Ingrid got a little idea of her own. “Except for Dorothy,” she said.

  Jill smiled. “Now we’re ready,” she said. “Let’s put on a play.”

  Was there anything like the theater? Not even close.

  “Can we pause right there for a sec?” said Jill, not long after. “In my script, Brucie, that line doesn’t read, ‘I am Oz, the great and terrible and oh so cool.’ It just says ‘the great and terrible.’”

  “That’s called ad-libbing,” said Brucie.

  “Let’s stick to the script for now,” said Jill.

  “Jawohl,” said Brucie.

  Stacy whacked him again, actually hard enough to hurt. Brucie didn’t bat his eyes this time. Things went smoothly after that.

  Just before the end of the rehearsal, Ingrid saw a little old man coming down one of the s
ide aisles. Hey, Mr. Samuels.

  “Ms. Monteiro?” he said.

  “Hi, Mr. Samuels,” said Jill.

  “I’m going to be doing a piece on The Xmas Revue this year,” he said. “Any chance I could snap a few rehearsal photos?”

  “Free ink?” said Jill. “Fire away.”

  “You showbiz types,” said Mr. Samuels, taking a camera from his coat pocket.

  He came close to the stage, took pictures as they rehearsed. Ingrid made sure to block out his presence completely, although she did allow a dazzling yet somehow mysterious smile to play across her face from time to time. Yes, she was a showbiz type.

  Only when Jill said, “That’s all for today,” did Ingrid remember the braces and clamp her mouth shut. Too late.

  They filed out to the lobby. Parents were parked outside, all except Ingrid’s. Jill and the kids drove off, leaving Ingrid plus Mr. Samuels, squinting into the viewer of his camera, checking his photos.

  “Got some good ones here, Ingrid,” he said. “Who’s the wizard?”

  “Brucie Berman.”

  “Is his father the rabbi?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh, boy,” said Mr. Samuels, putting the camera away. “How’s that grandfather of yours these days?”

  “Good.”

  “I ran into a few snags trying to nail down the owners of those cottages where the complaint got filed,” Mr. Samuels said.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Ingrid said. “The pig thing worked.”

  “Happy to hear it,” said Mr. Samuels. “But I’m going to keep digging anyway. This one’s got my curiosity up.”

  “How come?” said Ingrid.

  “Turns out that Delaware outfit, DRF Development, is just a shell.”

  “A shell?”

  “Like one of those Russian dolls,” said Mr. Samuels. “Eggs within eggs. The innermost one I can find so far is Black Coral Investments, based on one of those Caribbean islands. Which of course is why I got curious.”

  Ingrid wasn’t following this too closely. What did it matter, now that the pig thing had worked?

  “Those Caribbean islands,” Mr. Samuels went on, “where anonymous companies hide out when they don’t want scrutiny from Uncle Sam. This particular island’s one I hadn’t heard of. Anguilla, I think is how you say it.”

  Ong Willa. Hey. That rang a bell, but before Ingrid could figure out why, Mr. Samuels changed the subject.

  “Not particularly interesting to a civilian, I guess,” he said. He came a little closer. “And how are you yourself doing these days, Ingrid?”

  “Fine,” said Ingrid.

  He gazed down at her; not too far down, because Mr. Samuels was just a little guy. A curious little guy, with still and watchful eyes that didn’t miss much. He knew something. Oh my God. Could all this get in the paper? SCHOOLGIRL CAUGHT IN ELABORATE RUSE. Unbearable.

  “Sure about that?” said Mr. Samuels.

  “Yeah,” said Ingrid. “Very.”

  He backed off a step or two. “The press can be your friend,” he said. “I hope you know that.”

  He waited for her to say something. “Give us a good review,” she said.

  Mr. Samuels was silent for a moment. Then he said, “I call ’em like I see ’em. No integrity, otherwise.”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “No problem,” he said. He glanced outside. “Someone coming to get you?”

  “They’re just a little late.”

  “I could drop you off.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Samuels,” Ingrid said. “But I’ll be okay.”

  The door had barely closed behind him before Ingrid realized something very important: Time was a factor. There were going to be headlines, and soon, all about her. A permanent record and completely false. She couldn’t afford a lot of musing about the fine points of organizing a sting. That kind of dithering was what had got Hamlet in trouble. Ingrid had never actually read or seen Hamlet, but Jill had told everyone the whole story during a rehearsal break two or three productions ago. And, hey! What was that whole play-within-a-play scene if not a sting?

  She had to hurry.

  And…and here she was, alone in the deserted high school. The high school where Ty and Sean and God knew how many other steroid customers spent their day. Also the high school where Carl Kraken the third’s father, Carl Junior, worked out of that basement office. The observer who truly understands one link understands the whole chain.

  Ingrid looked outside. No headlights approaching, no Mom or Dad about to pull up to the front door. Ingrid headed back into the school, passed a big pep rally poster—Red Raiders Rule—and took the stairs leading down.

  twenty-one

  INGRID WALKED ALONG the basement corridor in Echo Falls High. This was the oldest part of the school, the walls stone, the brick floor worn smooth. Grampy had gone here long ago, maybe strolled right down this corridor when these bricks were new. She’d known about Grampy going to the high school but never really thought about it. Now it turned out that Grampy had played for the Red Raiders too, a ferocious hitter on the football field, probably a big star like Dad. She tried to picture a teenage Grampy and couldn’t. Hard enough to picture a teenage Dad.

  Those rows of unused rusted-out lockers went by. Somewhere nearby a furnace rumbled. The floor vibrated under Ingrid’s feet. She came to the door marked CUSTODIAN: MR. KRAKEN. Closed. Ingrid put her ear to it, heard nothing.

  No sound at all, except for the furnace. Getting late now, the school emptied out, Carl Junior probably long gone. Long gone, so he’d have locked the door behind him. Ingrid tried it. Unlocked. Were things starting to go her way? She opened the door—it squeaked on its hinges, the custodian’s own door, which had to say something about him—and stepped inside.

  No one there. The office was dark except for the desk lamp, spreading a narrow cone of light. Ingrid went over to the desk.

  A messy desk, all kinds of bills and memos scattered on it, a few glass jars filled with nuts and bolts, an ashtray overflowing with butts. But what caught Ingrid’s attention the most were some little waxy crescents: fingernail cuttings. Really gross. Of course, if you snuck into someone’s personal space, you were bound to—

  Whoa. Fingernail cuttings. Something Holmes had said was coming back to her, something about—yes, that was it: the suggestiveness of thumbnails. From “A Case of Identity,” right? One of her favorites, but she’d never really understood what the suggestiveness of thumbnails meant, beyond Holmes’s usual thing about observing closely. Now she wondered whether Holmes was somehow ahead of his time. When was DNA discovered, anyway? Ingrid didn’t know, but she was pretty sure it was after Holmes.

  She tore off the top page of Carl Junior’s desk calendar—the day was practically over anyway—and blew two fingernail cuttings onto it. No way was she going to actually touch them. Holmes wouldn’t have either. She folded the page into a square and pocketed it. Kraken DNA: might come in handy.

  On a roll now? Ingrid got the feeling she was. She pawed through all the papers on the desk, found a pen, kind of greasy. Now to compose a note. Why was putting something in writing, even a sentence or two, always so hard?

  Ingrid pulled the desk calendar closer and wrote on the new top page.

  Echo Falls athlete looking to get stronger. Meet me Sunday at noon at

  Ingrid paused. Where would be good? Maybe after you’d set up three or four stings you’d know the perfect location right off the top of your head, but this was her first one. She mulled over a few possibilities—the swings at Ferrand Middle, the parking lot at Blockbuster, the Punch Bowl pond in the town woods—saw pros and cons for each. She was still mulling, pen poised over Carl Kraken Junior’s desk calendar, when she heard hard footsteps coming down the corridor.

  Her heart pounded in her chest, going into a panic that spread instantly to the rest of her. What was her story going to be? Quick, quick, like now. But no story came. Ingrid whirled around, noticed a closet at the back of the room.
The hard footsteps got louder. She ran to the closet door, threw it open.

  A big closet, dark and shadowy. A glimpse of file cabinets, cardboard boxes, clothes hanging from a rail, junk all over the floor, and then she ducked inside, closing the door softly behind her. At the same moment, the office door opened with its little squeak.

  Almost total blackness inside the closet, just a band of dull yellow light, almost brown, leaking in at the bottom. Ingrid scrambled back into the closet till she could go no farther, wedging herself between two filing cabinets. Her heart—she could actually hear it.

  Footsteps sounded on the office floor. Ingrid heard a little hmmm, quiet and thoughtful. Made by a man, no doubt about it. Then came shuffling sounds—he was going through the papers on the desk. Too late, Ingrid remembered her Wizard script. She’d had it in her hand when she’d entered the office, and didn’t have it now. Could she have laid it on the desk, say when she was writing her sting note? Very possible. And had she written her name on the title page the day Jill had handed them out? Sure, that was one of Jill’s rules, and Ingrid, maybe not a great follower of rules in general, always followed Jill’s. Ingrid L-H—she could picture it, just below Wizard.

  A drawer opened and closed. Then another. Ingrid heard a clink of glass, remembered Carl Junior boozing at his desk. She didn’t hear any unscrewing or pouring sounds, though, just another clink, maybe a bottle going back in the drawer. She also remembered that Carl Junior had been counting money at his desk. Money: a link in the chain? Ingrid thought of the $1,649 in Sean’s baseball glove, $1,649 not there the second time she looked. Where had it gone? What was that expression? Follow the money. Good idea, if she ever got out of here.

  Silence. What was going on? Could he—

  Suddenly Ingrid heard voices. Faint voices, not in the office but from the corridor outside. The man in the office must have heard them too. The next moment, he was on the move, his footsteps almost silent now, very quick. And headed her way. Was he going to—