The Missing Girl

by Shirley Jackson

  The woman smiled. ‘He got to the station ahead of me,’ she said.

  The conductor gave her her change, and went on down the car. ‘That was funny, when he thought you were my little boy,’ the woman said.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Joe.

  ‘What’re you reading?’

  Wearily, Joe put his comic book down.

  ‘Comic,’ he said.

  ‘Interesting?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Joe.

  ‘Say, look at the policeman,’ the woman said.

  Joe looked where she was pointing and saw – he would not have believed this, since he knew perfectly well that most women cannot tell the difference between a policeman and a mailman – that it was undeniably a policeman, and that he was regarding the occupants of the car very much as though there might be a murderer or an international jewel thief riding calmly along on the train. Then, after surveying the car for a moment, he came a few steps forward to the last seat, where Joe and the woman were sitting.

  ‘Name?’ he said sternly to the woman.

  ‘Mrs John Aldridge, Officer,’ said the woman promptly. ‘And this is my little boy, Joseph.’

  ‘Hi, Joe,’ said the policeman.

  Joe, speechless, stared at the policeman and nodded dumbly.

  ‘Where’d you get on?’ the policeman asked the woman.

  ‘Ashville,’ she said.

  ‘See anything of a woman about your height and build, wearing a fur jacket, getting on the train at Ashville?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said the woman. ‘Why?’

  ‘Wanted,’ said the policeman tersely.

  ‘Keep your eyes open,’ he told Joe. ‘Might get a reward.’

  He passed on down the car, and stopped occasionally to speak to women who seemed to be alone. Then the door at the far end of the car closed behind him and Joe turned and took a deep look at the woman sitting beside him. ‘What’d you do?’ he asked.

  ‘Stole some money,’ said the woman, and grinned.

  Joe grinned back. If he had been sorely pressed, he might in all his experience until now have been able to identify only his mother as a woman both pretty and lovable; in this case, however – and perhaps it was enhanced by a sort of outlaw glory – he found the woman sitting next to him much more attractive than he had before supposed. She looked nice, she had soft hair, she had a pleasant smile and not a lot of lipstick and stuff on, and her fur jacket was rich and soft against Joe’s hand. Moreover, Joe knew absolutely when she grinned at him that there were not going to be any more questions about nonsense like people’s ages and whether they liked school, and he found himself grinning back at her in quite a friendly manner.

  ‘They gonna catch you?’ he asked.

  ‘Sure,’ said the woman. ‘Pretty soon now. But it was worth it.’

  ‘Why?’ Joe asked; crime, he well knew, did not pay.

  ‘See,’ said the woman, ‘I wanted to spend about two weeks having a good time there in Ashville. I wanted this coat, see? And I wanted just to buy a lot of clothes and things.’

  ‘So?’ said Joe.

  ‘So I took the money from the old tightwad I worked for and I went off to Ashville and bought some clothes and went to a lot of movies and things and had a fine time.’

  ‘Sort of a vacation,’ Joe said.

  ‘Sure,’ the woman said. ‘Knew all the time they’d catch me, of course. For one thing, I always knew I had to come home again. But it was worth it!’

  ‘How much?’ said Joe.

  ‘Two thousand dollars,’ said the woman.

  ‘Boy!’ said Joe.

  They settled back comfortably. Joe, without more than a moment’s pause to think, offered the woman his comic book about the African headhunters, and when the policeman came back through the car, eyeing them sharply, they were leaning back shoulder to shoulder, the woman apparently deep in African adventure, Joe engrossed in the adventures of a flying newspaper reporter who solved vicious gang murders.

  ‘How is your book, Ma?’ Joe said loudly as the policeman passed, and the woman laughed and said, ‘Fine, fine.’

  As the door closed behind the policeman the woman said softly, ‘You know, I like to see how long I can keep out of their way.’

  ‘Can’t keep it up forever,’ Joe pointed out.

  ‘No,’ said the woman, ‘but I’d like to go back by myself and just give them what’s left of the money. I had my good time.’

  ‘Seems to me,’ Joe said, ‘that if it’s the first time you did anything like this they probably wouldn’t punish you so much.’

  ‘I’m not ever going to do it again,’ the woman said. ‘I mean, you sort of build up all your life for one real good time like this, and then you can take your punishment and not mind it so much.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Joe said reluctantly, various small sins of his own with regard to matches and his father’s cigars and other people’s lunch boxes crossing his mind; ‘seems to me that even if you do think now that you’ll never do it again, sometimes – well, sometimes, you do it anyway.’ He thought. ‘I always say I’ll never do it again, though.’

  ‘Well, if you do it again,’ the woman pointed out, ‘you get punished twice as bad the next time.’

  Joe grinned. ‘I took a dime out of my mother’s pocketbook once,’ he said. ‘But I’ll never do that again.’

  ‘Same thing I did,’ said the woman.

  Joe shook his head. ‘If the policemen plan to spank you the way my father spanked me …’ he said.

  They were companionably silent for a while, and then the woman said, ‘Say, Joe, you hungry? Let’s go into the dining car.’

  ‘I’m supposed to stay here,’ Joe said.

  ‘But I can’t go without you,’ the woman said. ‘They think I’m all right because the woman they want wouldn’t be traveling with her little boy.’

  ‘Stop calling me your little boy,’ Joe said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Call me your son or something,’ Joe said. ‘No more little-boy stuff.’

  ‘Right,’ said the woman. ‘Anyway, I’m sure your mother wouldn’t mind if you went into the dining car with me.’

  ‘I bet,’ Joe said, but he got up and followed the woman out of the car and down through the next car; people glanced up at them as they passed and then away again, and Joe thought triumphantly that they would sure stare harder if they knew that this innocent-looking woman and her son were outsmarting the cops every step they took.

  They found a table in the dining car and sat down. The woman took up the menu and said, ‘What’ll you have, Joe?’

  Blissfully, Joe regarded the woman, the waiters moving quickly back and forth, the shining silverware, the white tablecloth and napkins. ‘Hard to say right off,’ he said.

  ‘Hamburger?’ said the woman. ‘Spaghetti? Or would you rather just have two or three desserts?’

  Joe stared. ‘You mean, like, just blueberry pie with ice cream and a hot fudge sundae?’ he asked. ‘Like that?’

  ‘Sure,’ said the woman. ‘Might as well celebrate one last time.’

  ‘When I took that dime out of my mother’s pocketbook,’ Joe told her, ‘I spent a nickel on gum and a nickel on candy.’

  ‘Tell me,’ said the woman, leaning forward earnestly, ‘the candy and gum – was it all right? I mean, the same as usual?’

  Joe shook his head. ‘I was so afraid someone would see me,’ he said, ‘I ate all the candy in two mouthfuls standing on the street and I was scared to open the gum at all.’

  The woman nodded. ‘That’s why I’m going back so soon, I guess,’ she said, and sighed.

  ‘Well,’ said Joe practically, ‘might as well have blueberry pie first, anyway.’

  They ate their lunch peacefully, discussing baseball and television and what Joe wanted to be when he grew up; once the policeman passed through the car and nodded to them cheerfully, and the waiter opened his eyes wide and laughed when Joe decided to polish off his lunch with a piece of watermelon
. When they had finished and the woman had paid the check, they found that they were due in Merrytown in fifteen minutes, and they hurried back to their seat to gather together Joe’s comic books and suitcase.

  ‘Thank you very much for the nice lunch,’ Joe said to the woman as they sat down again, and congratulated himself upon remembering to say it.

  ‘Nothing at all,’ the woman said. ‘Aren’t you my little boy?’

  ‘Watch that little-boy stuff,’ Joe said warningly, and she said, ‘I mean, aren’t you my son?’

  The porter who had been delegated to keep an eye on Joe opened the car door and put his head in. He smiled reassuringly at Joe and said, ‘Five minutes to your station, boy.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Joe. He turned to the woman. ‘Maybe,’ he said urgently, ‘if you tell them you’re really sorry –’

  ‘Wouldn’t do at all,’ said the woman. ‘I really had a fine time.’

  ‘I guess so,’ Joe said. ‘But you won’t do it again.’

  ‘Well, I knew when I started I’d be punished sooner or later,’ the woman said.

  ‘Yeah,’ Joe said. ‘Can’t get out of it now.’

  The train pulled slowly to a stop and Joe leaned toward the window to see if his grandfather was waiting.

  ‘We better not get off together,’ the woman said; ‘might worry your grandpa to see you with a stranger.’

  ‘Guess so,’ said Joe. He stood up, and took hold of his suitcase. ‘Goodbye, then,’ he said reluctantly.

  ‘Goodbye, Joe,’ said the woman. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Right,’ said Joe, and as the train stopped he opened the door and went out onto the steps. The porter helped him to get down with his suitcase and Joe turned to see his grandfather coming down the platform.

  ‘Hello, fellow,’ said his grandfather. ‘So you made it.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Joe. ‘No trick at all.’

  ‘Never thought you wouldn’t,’ said his grandfather. ‘Your mother wants you to –’

  ‘Telephone as soon as I get here,’ Joe said. ‘I know.’

  ‘Come along, then,’ his grandfather said. ‘Grandma’s waiting at home.’

  He led Joe to the parking lot and helped him and his suitcase into the car. As his grandfather got into the front seat beside him, Joe turned and looked back at the train and saw the woman walking down the platform with the policeman holding her arm. Joe leaned out of the car and waved violently. ‘So long,’ he called.

  ‘So long, Joe,’ the woman called back, waving.

  ‘It’s a shame the cops had to get her after all,’ Joe remarked to his grandfather.

  His grandfather laughed. ‘You read too many comic books, fellow,’ he said. ‘Everyone with a policeman isn’t being arrested – he’s probably her brother or something.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Joe.

  ‘Have a good trip?’ his grandfather asked. ‘Anything happen?’

  Joe thought. ‘Saw a boy sitting on a fence,’ he said. ‘I didn’t wave to him, though.’

  Nightmare

  It was one of those spring mornings in March; the sky between the buildings was bright and blue and the city air, warmed by motors and a million breaths, had a freshness and a sense of excitement that can come only from a breeze starting somewhere in the country, far away, and moving into the city while everyone is asleep, to freshen the air for morning. Miss Toni Morgan, going from the subway to her office, settled a soft, sweet smile on her face and let it stay there while her sharp tapping feet went swiftly along the pavement. She was wearing a royal blue hat with a waggish red feather in it, and her suit was blue and her topcoat a red and gray tweed, and her shoes were thin and pointed and ungraceful when she walked; they were dark blue, with the faintest line of red edging the sole. She carried a blue pocketbook with her initials in gold, and she wore dark blue gloves with red buttons. Her topcoat swirled around her as she turned in through the door of the tall office building, and when she entered her office sixty floors above, she took her topcoat off lovingly and hung it precisely in the closet, with her hat and gloves on the shelf above; she was precise about everything, so that it was exactly nine o’clock when she sat down at her desk, consulted her memorandum pad, tore the top leaf from the calendar, straightened her shoulders, and adjusted her smile. When her employer arrived at nine-thirty, he found her typing busily, so that she was able to look up and smile and say, ‘Good morning, Mr Lang,’ and smile again.

  At nine-forty Miss Fishman, the young lady who worked at the desk corresponding to Miss Morgan’s, on the other side of the room, phoned in to say that she was ill and would not be in to work that day. At twelve-thirty Miss Morgan went out to lunch alone, because Miss Fishman was not there. She had a bacon, tomato, and lettuce sandwich and a cup of tea in the drugstore downstairs, and came back early because there was a letter she wanted to finish. During her lunch hour she noticed nothing unusual, nothing that had not happened every day of the six years she had been working for Mr Lang.

  At two-twenty by the office clock Mr Lang came back from lunch; he said, ‘Any calls, Miss Morgan?’ as he came through the door, and Miss Morgan smiled at him and said, ‘No calls, Mr Lang.’ Mr Lang went into his private office, and there were no calls until three-oh-five, when Mr Lang came out of his office carrying a large package wrapped in brown paper and tied with an ordinary strong cord.

  ‘Miss Fishman here?’ he asked.

  ‘She’s ill,’ Miss Morgan said, smiling. ‘She won’t be in today.’

  ‘Damn,’ Mr Lang said. He looked around hopefully. Miss Fishman’s desk was neatly empty; everything was in perfect order and Miss Morgan sat smiling at him. ‘I’ve got to get this package delivered,’ he said. ‘Very important.’ He looked at Miss Morgan as though he had never seen her before. ‘Would it be asking too much?’ he asked.

  Miss Morgan looked at him courteously for a minute before she understood. Then she said, ‘Not at all,’ with an extremely clear inflection, and stirred to rise from her desk.

  ‘Good,’ Mr Lang said heartily. ‘The address is on the label. Way over on the other side of town. Downtown. You won’t have any trouble. Take you about’ – he consulted his watch – ‘about an hour, I’d say, all told, there and back. Give the package directly to Mr Shax. No secretaries. If he’s out, wait. If he’s not there, go to his home. Call me if you’re going to be more than an hour. Damn Miss Fishman,’ he added, and went back into his office.

  All up and down the hall, in offices directed and controlled by Mr Lang, there were people alert and eager to run errands for him. Miss Morgan and Miss Fishman were only the receptionists, the outer bulwark of Mr Lang’s defence. Miss Morgan looked apprehensively at the closed door of Mr Lang’s office as she went to the closet to get her coat. Mr Lang was being left defenceless, but it was spring outside, she had her red topcoat, and Miss Fishman had probably run off under cover of illness to the wide green fields and buttercups of the country. Miss Morgan settled her blue hat by the mirror on the inside of the closet door, slid luxuriously into her red topcoat, and picked up her pocketbook and gloves, and put her hand through the string of the package. It was unexpectedly light. Going toward the elevator, she found that she could carry it easily with the same hand that held her pocketbook, although its bulk would be awkward on the bus. She glanced at the address: ‘Mr Ray Shax’, and a street she had never heard of.

  Once in the street in the spring afternoon, she decided to ask at the newspaper stand for the street; the little men in newspaper stands seem to know everything. This one was particularly nice to her, probably because it was spring. He took out a little red book that was a guide to New York, and searched through its columns until he found the street.

  ‘You ought to take the bus on the corner,’ he said. ‘Going across town. Then get a bus going downtown until you get to the street. Then you’ll have to walk, most likely. Probably a warehouse.’

  ‘Probably,’ Miss Morgan agreed absently. She was staring behind him, at a poster on the inside
of the newspaper stand. ‘Find Miss X,’ the poster said in screaming red letters, ‘Find Miss X. Find Miss X. Find Miss X.’ The words were repeated over and over, each line smaller and in a different color; the bottom line was barely visible. ‘What’s that Miss X thing?’ Miss Morgan asked the newspaperman. He turned and looked over his shoulder and shrugged. ‘One of them contest things,’ he said.

  Miss Morgan started for the bus. Probably because the poster had caught her eye, she was quicker to hear the sound truck; a voice was blaring from it: ‘Find Miss X! Win a mink coat valued at twelve thousand dollars, a trip to Tahiti; find Miss X.’

  Tahiti, Miss Morgan thought, on a day like this. She went swiftly down the sidewalk, and the sound truck progressed along the street, shouting, ‘Miss X, find Miss X. She is walking in the city, she is walking alone; find Miss X. Step up to the girl who is Miss X, and say “You are Miss X,” and win a complete repainting and decorating job on your house, win these fabulous prizes.’

  There was no bus in sight and Miss Morgan waited on the corner for a minute before thinking, I have time to walk a ways in this lovely weather. Her topcoat swinging around her, she began to walk across town to catch a bus at the next corner.

  The sound truck turned the corner in back of her; it was going very slowly, and she outdistanced it in a minute or so. She could hear, far away, the announcer’s voice saying, ‘… and all your cosmetics for a year.’

  Now that she was aware of it, she noticed that there were ‘Find Miss X’ posters on every lamppost; they were all like the one in the newsstand, with the words running smaller and smaller and in different colors. She was walking along a busy street, and she lingered past the shopwindows, looking at jewelry and custom-made shoes. She saw a hat something like her own, in a window of a store so expensive that only the hat lay in the window, soft against a fold of orange silk. Mine is almost the same, she thought as she turned away, and it cost only four ninety-eight. Because she lingered, the sound truck caught up with her; she heard it from a distance, forcing its way through the taxis and trucks in the street, its loudspeaker blaring music, something military. Then the announcer’s voice began again: ‘Find Miss X, find Miss X. Win fifty thousand dollars in cash; Miss X is walking the streets of the city today, alone. She is wearing a blue hat with a red feather, a reddish tweed topcoat, and blue shoes. She is carrying a blue pocketbook and a large package. Listen carefully. Miss X is carrying a large package. Find Miss X, find Miss X. Walk right up to her and say “You are Miss X,” and win a new home in any city in the world, with a town car and chauffeur, win all these magnificent prizes.’