Hard to Find: A Tillgiven Romantic Mystery

by Traci Tyne Hilton

  I followed him, as usual, but this time instead of sitting within comfortable gazing distance, I joined him at the overstuffed couches. “Did you call the police?”

  Sioeli, a mission kid from Tonga, tilted his chin up at me. “The police? This sounds interesting.” He tossed his shaggy hair out of his eyes. He looked almost interested in the conversation, for the first time in at least a week.

  “Yeah, I did.” Professor Daniels scratched his bristly chin and glanced from me to Si, who happened to be a benchwarmer on the school soccer team, which Professor coached. No offense to school sports, but the soccer team had enough of Professor’s time. I needed his full attention right now.

  “What did they say?” I perched on the edge of the brown corduroy ottoman. “What are they going to do?”

  “Is this about Drew?” Sioeli leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “She still not back?”

  “No, she’s not.”

  “They’ll find her. You don’t have to worry about a thing.” The professor gave me one of those fatherly smiles that adults use when they don’t actually know what is going on.

  “How?”

  “They know how to handle these things.” Professor looked me straight in the eye. I don’t deny I almost fainted. “They have it under control. Plus, Stina said this happens all the time. Students come back late from travel weekend on a regular basis.”

  “Didn’t that climber run away a couple of years ago?” Si asked. “The guy from Liverpool?”

  “Someone escaped?” Si’s roommate Garret leaned away from his poker game. “I wish them luck.”

  The yahoos in the student lounge were going to make it hard for the professor and me to make a plan. I needed to get him away. The library was usually empty. I rubbed my hands together and looked toward the hall. No couples were “praying” quietly together in the long, dark space, so we should be able to get to the library without interruption. “So, Professor, could we talk somewhere quieter?” I nodded toward the hall—for the sake of the library, obviously.

  “Heh heh.” Si waggled his eyebrows at me, insinuating exactly what I had been hoping no one would insinuate.

  I snarled at him.

  It wasn’t my prettiest moment.

  “To talk about Drew, right?” The professor lifted his eyebrow.

  “Please?” I chewed my lip and looked from the hall back to the professor. I needed him to be cool with taking me on a long train ride. Drew might think hitting the Continent all by herself was perfectly safe, but I had fond hopes of living through the year. A tall, muscly, deep-voiced, scruffy-cheeked chaperone was a necessity.

  “Sure, no problem.” Professor cleared his throat. That wasn’t a good sign, but I was going to have to take what I could get and hope I could win him over.

  “The library?”

  “Yeah, okay.” He tripped over Si’s big foot as he got up.

  I shot Si a look of death, but he just made a kissy face at me. Sometimes I hated the other students here.

  As I walked into the hall, I heard Garret say “the library” like it was a dirty word.

  Cadence, the girls’ resident assistant, was in the middle of the library reading aloud to a set of triplets from Upstate New York. The girls turned fifteen shades of red when we walked in, and Cadence tucked the book under her knee. “Yes?” She lifted her eyebrow, but her own color was pretty bright. I tried to catch a glimpse of the book they were reading, but she had the spine side toward her bum so I couldn’t read it.

  Professor narrowed his eyes and looked from Cadence to the girls. “Is all well here?”

  The girls giggled. I mean, really, they couldn’t have looked guiltier if they tried. If Cadence wasn’t hiding a dirty book, I was a monkey’s uncle.

  “It’s fine. But, can we have some privacy?” She winked. She winked? Was that a signal that the professor knew what was going on?

  The professor blushed and stepped back. “Of course, sorry to bother you all.” He led me back to his office again, which, while cozy, was a bit awkward.

  I like to talk with my hands, and he had a lot of stuff on his shelves I might knock over. He flipped a switch and the bare bulb that hung from the ceiling flickered slowly to life.

  “Professor Daniels, we need to go find my sister. When do the Hoffens get back from Gothenburg?”

  “They’ll be back in a couple of days.” He shoved a plastic chair toward me. “Sit down, relax. I spoke with the police. They’ll handle it.”

  “But I think we could handle it faster.”

  Professor shook his head. “I’m not sure I understand what you mean.”

  “It’s pretty simple, actually.” My feet were bouncing on the floor, so I pressed my hands down on my knees to try and get myself together. “I can track her debit card, and we can just hit the road and catch her en route.”

  Professor chuckled.

  I sniffled. But not on purpose. I was not going to cry.

  I tried to make my face do that aloof thing Stina in the office did so well, but I don’t think it worked, because he chuckled again.

  “You want to find out what town she last used her debit card in and just go down and pick her up? I don’t think it really works that way.”

  “The bank should be able to tell me exactly what machine was used, address and everything. We can take a train.”

  He lowered his eyebrows and looked at me like I had a bird sitting on my head. “I think Europe is maybe bigger than you’re giving it credit for.”

  I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “The size of Europe is not a problem if we’re able to pinpoint her exact location. Sure, it might take us a few tries to catch up to her, since she’s probably on the move, but I’ve got a three-month EuroRail pass, and we can get you one for the week, if you don’t already have one. There’s really nothing to lose if we go together.”

  “Only my job.” He rested his chin on his fist. “This isn’t going to happen, Dani. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be dramatic.” I glanced at the clock on his tiny desk. Possibly he had a point on the job thing, but why wouldn’t the school want him to help me, or help Drew for that matter? Frankly, I thought it would be more than silly not to let him run down to…wherever she was…with me.

  I mean, what did the school want? Me running all over Europe by myself?

  The professor cleared his throat. “If Drew doesn’t stumble into the school sometime tonight, I’ll call the police again in the morning. I can see you’re worried, so go ahead and call the bank and find out what you can, but there’s no reason for you to go running after her, with or without me, okay?”

  He was giving me the condescending smile again.

  I turned away.

  And then I left, without saying anything else. I would have kept talking, but it had occurred to me that my Bible teacher hadn’t recommended I pray about the problem. I might not have any traditional school experience under my belt, but I knew enough to know that your Bible teacher ought to encourage you to seek God’s guidance. At least if he was a serious Christian.

  Isaac Daniels 2

  I watched her leave my office, with a sense of dread. She was going to be trouble, that one. And not in the “I’ll get in trouble for dating her” sense.

  I happen to be fairly good at predicting student behavior. Pretty impressive for a homeschool kid, I know, but there it is. It makes me a good teacher, I think. I can anticipate the various learning needs…who will be drunk all weekend, who will actually do their homework. Who will cheat. Who will be working endless hours to pay for their school and then be too tired to stay awake during class. It’s a skill that comes in handy at these smaller schools, where you can know all the students by name. It was a little harder at the university in Montreal, but then, everything was.

  Not that anyone had a job or partied while at Tillgiven. The strict curfew, language barrier in the community, difficulty getting, say, work visas, and lack of transportation—unless you count hitchhiking as reliable
transportation—kept the kids on campus, and no little bit frustrated. But it was good for them. Focus is fairly hard to come by in the modern world, and they had no option but to focus while here.

  But Dani, she was trouble, because I honestly had no idea what she was going to do next. I could tell you exactly what any of the boys on my soccer team would have done. I could make a fair guess as to what half of the rest of the kids would do in this situation, but Dani…I didn’t know.

  She wasn’t like the other kids somehow. Both less impressed by the whole living-in-Scandinavia thing and less frustrated by the curfews. And by less frustrated, I really mean she was less bound by them.

  Some kids toss rocks from the gravel path at their windows to let their roommates know they need to get back into the dorm every night, and some kids never stay out too late. Dani did both, for no apparent reason. And with no sneaky looks about it the next morning.

  Once, when her roommates hadn’t woken up, she had tossed a rock at my window so I could let her back in the dorm. Without even blushing about it.

  Dani also did all her classwork, which no other kid in the school did. But sometimes she emailed the assignments to Stina in the office, and sometimes she did them in colored markers on the back of someone else’s assignment from the week before. And there was no rhyme or reason to when she would decide to do her best work and when she would phone it in. Which she had literally done before. I took the call myself.

  I couldn’t pin her down. And so I didn’t know if she had left my office to hitch a ride to the train station at Malmo or to find a quiet place to pray.

  There was just no telling.

  I really wished the Hoffens were there to take care of the situation, but barring that, I had done what I could do.

  My mind was restless, however, and I couldn’t take myself back to my apartment above the kitchen with any kind of equanimity. Instead, I took the back door and headed to the woods.

  The woods around the school reminded me of home. It was somewhat like hiking through the foothills of Mount Hood. But there was a difference. The land behind the school was swampier, with a lot of really bright green moss, and less underbrush. It had the look of a movie set, and I could see why the Swedes had a tradition of elves in their folklore.

  I hadn’t been at the school long, but I already knew the students preferred to hike into the hills or follow the train tracks down to the store rather than haunt this section of woods. That was more than half the reason I liked this hike so much. The air was full of the earthy smell of wet, fallen leaves. I inhaled, and let the clean, wholesome world fill me up.

  I hadn’t expected to see Dani sitting on the fallen tree in my favorite spot when I rounded the corner. Nothing that girl did should have surprised me, but I was surprised and irritated and I let it show. I gave her a brief nod and kept walking. There was another good stump for sitting a quarter mile or so into the woods.

  Of course she looked up at me with those big eyes of hers and batted her eyelashes, so I stopped.

  “What?”

  “I just…” She picked at the bark on the stump.

  “You look like you could use some alone time.” I glanced toward the trail, willing myself to keep on walking.

  She shook her head no, and exhaled. “I still can’t reach my parents I think they are off the grid.”

  “Oh.” It had occurred to me that the school should probably call her parents, but I, well, I wanted the Hoffens to do it, obviously.

  Dani chewed her bottom lip. “But I think they would want me to do something.”

  “They would want you to stay put and stay safe.” I stepped forward to sit on the log but stopped. Couldn’t get sucked into student drama. It wouldn’t end well.

  She shook her head. “Drew and I spent some time backpacking Europe before school started. They wouldn’t be too worried.”

  “They would let you go alone?” I didn’t like the sound of her parents, and really didn’t want to be the one to have this conversation with them.

  “Drew took money out in Calais.”

  “France?”

  She nodded.

  “You can’t go to France alone. That wouldn’t be smart.”

  “I don’t want to go alone.”

  I took a deep breath. “Do you think your parents would come out and look for her?”

  “They would want someone from the school to help me.”

  I laughed. How could I help it? “Not likely.”

  She shrugged. “Well, they certainly wouldn’t want me to go alone.”

  “And neither do I.” I paced, hands clasped behind my back.

  “You should come with me.” She sighed.

  “Number one, that would not be appropriate. Number two, I’m in charge of the school until Dr. Hoffen and his family return. Ergo number three: if I just left, I’d get fired.”

  “I don’t think it’s inappropriate.” She batted her eyes again. I was beginning to think I would hate that before Drew came home.

  “I need air, Dani. You head back to the school. You don’t want to miss dinner.”

  Dani Honeywell 2

  I ignored Professor’s request that I head back to the school, and picked up a small branch that had fallen from a maple tree. I ran my hand the length of it. Then I jammed it as far into the swampy mud as I could. “There.”

  Professor looked unimpressed.

  “You are like this stick.” Not subtle, but the professor needed to be shaken up a little. Most people did.

  He frowned.

  “You. In the mud.” My heart raced. I had to walk the fine line between waking up his sense of adventure and insulting him into hating me. At least, I thought it might be a fine line. Time would tell.

  “A stick in the mud.” His stiff shoulders were indicating I was on the wrong side of the line.

  I yanked the stick out and tossed it. “It’s not that you are a bad guy or anything. You are pretty cool. The students all agree, you’re almost one of us. But you seem to lack vision. Unwilling to think outside of the box. What are you protecting yourself from?”

  He lifted one eyebrow, but at least he was looking at me.

  “My best guess,” I swallowed, hard. “is heartbreak. You’ve had your heart broken, haven’t you? I find it hard to believe, to be honest, but it’s the only thing that makes sense.”

  “Fine.” He turned slightly away from me. All signs pointed to my losing this battle. Shoot. I couldn’t lose. Hunting Drew with Troy, the boy’s RA would not be nearly as much fun.

  Something in the back of those dark eyes of his told me that he wanted to come with me. “Oh, stop it” I laughed. “You’re not really a stick in the mud. It’s just that I had a stick, see? So it seemed like a decent illustration.” I looked down at the muddy ground. “As little sense as it makes, the only thing that could account for a nice guy like you being so unhelpful is a broken heart. You’ve been burned, and recently, if my guess is right, and aren’t willing to risk getting invested again. So I say, forget the cowgirl. She’s not worth ruining your life over.”

  “The cowgirl?” He frowned. “Oh, Tanya. She’s forgotten.” He squinted into the distance, pretending to ignore me, I guessed.

  “So the cowgirl was your rebound? I see. Then the French one. Forget her. Accent and all, she can’t be worth building such a big wall around yourself. Especially since that was, like, a year ago.”

  “It wasn’t even close to a year ago.” He was staring over my head. I didn’t like that. He seemed so much more responsive when I could get him to make eye contact.

  “So she broke your heart. I think it’s time to pick yourself up and make yourself useful.” I picked up another stick, but couldn’t think of a way to make a point with it, so I just held it, letting it tap my knee while I talked. I was on thin ice here. I wanted Professor. That is to say, I hoped for Professor…no, the first way was right. I wanted Professor. Like, bad.

  Plus, I needed him to help me find Drew.

 
; “Noemie didn’t break my heart.” He sat down next to me on the moss-covered log and leaned forward on his elbows. “And how do you know about them?”

  I felt my face warm up. “Um…girls talk.” I paused. “But if it wasn’t the Frenchy or the cowgirl, it was someone else. Someone a long time ago.”

  “That just shows how young you are.”

  “So? Are young people always wrong?” I didn’t give him a chance to answer. “As a matter of fact, we are not always wrong. So, some mystery girl broke your heart.” I almost rested my hand on his knee, but stopped myself just in time. “Are you going to let this vintage injury ruin everything else good God might be throwing your way?”

  He shrugged.

  He shrugged? How dismissive. I straightened up. He couldn’t shrug away all the great stuff I was saying.

  But…what if he wasn’t just shrugging off my brilliant words of wisdom? This was the same teacher who claimed the born-again movement was some kind of modern construct—just, like, a postwar thingy—and who hadn’t yet mentioned I should pray for my lost sister. He could quite possibly be shrugging off the idea that God had good things planned for him. This wasn’t good at all.

  My saved-dar had never failed me. I could spot a real, true born-again boy from a yard away. This one… I a cold finger of doubt shivered up my spine. This one was giving me mixed signals. Why teach at a Bible school meant to train up the next generation of church leaders if God was merely an intellectual nut for you to crack? I didn’t like that at all. But, mixed signals, right? I could be wrong. There was a first time for everything. “Professor, can I change the subject?” I laid the stick down at his feet.

  “Please do.”

  “Can you tell me your testimony? I mean, when you got saved?” My heart was about to beat right out of my T-shirt. I shouldn’t have lain in wait for the professor and I knew it, but now that I had him alone, I had to find out if he was really saved. No use building castles in the sky for a man who was only into God intellectually.

  And no use expecting someone who wouldn’t personally rely on God to know how to solve my problems.