Out on a Limb

by Joan Hess

  “Well, yes,” I said. “Why don’t you tell us?”

  “Skyler and I went out for a stroll after his morning nap. Sally Fromberger was lurking in the parking lot across from the Book Depot, but I saw her before she saw me and I took a detour. We went past the Azalea Inn, over the railroad bridge, and back past the bicycle shop and the new sushi restaurant across from the—”

  “This is not the time for a travelogue,” I said.

  “I know.” She took several gulps of air. “I guess I’m trying to stall. When we got back, I parked Skyler behind the counter and went into the back room to warm up a bottle of formula. No one could see him from the street. I came out three or four minutes later and he was gone, as was the diaper bag.”

  “Someone must have been watching,” I said. “He or she saw you return from your stroll and then loitered in front of the store until you went to the back room. The door was unlocked, wasn’t it?”

  She nodded. “I even flipped over the sign in the window so customers would know I was open.”

  Caron draped herself over the seat. “Would you have recognized Daphne if she was standing across the street?”

  “It’s Saturday afternoon,” said Luanne. “Even with the threat of rain, there are lots of pedestrians out and about. I might have recognized Daphne had I been watching for her, but the only time I’ve seen her was on a very short news clip, less than half a minute. I was thinking more about a fresh diaper and a warm bottle of formula.”

  “Let’s go back to your store,” I said.

  “Where’s your car?”

  Caron poked my shoulder. “I’d like to know, too. Did you give Daphne the key or something screwy like that?”

  “No, I did not.” I told her and Luanne everything that had happened since our arrival at the Armstrong villa. “I heard Daphne drive away from Oakland Heights, and my car was parked near the catering vans when I returned. As much as I’d like to discuss various forms of retaliation against Peter, we need to figure out where Skyler is.”

  Luanne began to snuffle. “I never should have left him alone, not even for a minute. All I had to do was take him in the back room with me.”

  “And I should have stayed with you,” said Caron. “Inez wanted to, too, but she was afraid her parents would get annoyed if she didn’t go to that totally twisted concert.”

  “No,” I said, “what we should have done was call social services that first evening. Now let’s think where Skyler might be and do something about it.”

  Luanne parked behind Secondhand Rose and we hurried inside, each of us no doubt envisioning Skyler asleep in his stroller behind the counter. He was not. “Okay,” I said, “I find it hard to believe Joey would be involved. He showed little interest in Daphne and none whatsoever in Skyler. Bocaraton did not strike me as a thwarted madonna. He couldn’t have thought Adrienne or Sheila would pay a ransom.”

  “I agree.” Luanne went to the front of the store and stared through the window. “Someone must have been in the vacant lot over there and saw me come back with the stroller. All this person had to do was wait until I went into the back room, sneak inside, get the stroller and the diaper bag, and then take off. There’s a maze of side streets and alleys around here.”

  “But who?” Caron demanded.

  I mentally crossed Joey’s name off my fist. “Probably not Sheila, either. She wouldn’t have any reason to think Skyler was here—and she wasn’t doing much thinking when I last saw her. And she has no particular motive.”

  “Which leaves us with Daphne,” said Luanne. “She saw me pushing the stroller at the press conference. She lived on the streets for several months, so she might have recognized me. When I receive clothes that aren’t vintage, I take them to the shelter. Maybe someone there told her who I was.”

  I sank down on a steamer trunk. “Let’s work on that assumption. For starters, she has access to a vehicle. It’s not Joey’s, and it’s not Sheila’s. Whose is it?”

  “Arnie’s cab?” suggested Caron.

  I considered it. “I don’t think so. She was driving something four nights ago, when her father was killed. Randy Scarpo saw her drive away.”

  “Him?” Caron said with a derisive laugh. “He’s a weasel.”

  “Why do you say that?” I asked her. “Did he attempt to get too cozy over the cocktail napkins?”

  “I am most definitely Not His Type. He was fawning all over the rich women, practically licking their hands when he made them drinks. What’s worse, just when we got really busy, he told me he had to take a break and went into the house. Am I supposed to know how to make a manhattan and a vodka collins? I’m in high school, for pity’s sake!"

  “Let’s go back to Daphne. She’s been driving somebody’s car since Tuesday evening. If she had any friends, she wouldn’t have lived on the streets.”

  “That’s what’s so awful.” Caron wrapped her arms around her shoulders. “Her father dumped her, her mother dumped her, and Joey dumped her. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have a single person to turn to.”

  Luanne looked at me. “She does have one other friend besides Arnie.”

  “Yes, she does,” I acknowledged unhappily. “And this friend has a house and a car, neither of which she’s used since Monday.”

  “Who are you talking about?” said Caron. “Surely not Miss Parchester…”

  I stood up and held out my hand. “Luanne, I need to borrow your car. You call the police department and convince them to give you Peter’s cell phone number, then call him and tell him where I’m going. Caron, you need to stay here.”

  “While you storm Miss Parchester’s house by yourself?” she said. “I don’t think so.”

  Luanne snatched up her purse. “I’m going with you.”

  It seemed I lacked the leadership skills to command a battalion, or even a platoon of two. “Someone has to stay here and try to get through to Peter,” I said, sensing the futility even as I spoke.

  “Then you stay here,” said Caron. “Daphne’s never seen me. I’ll just knock on the door and say I’m Miss Parchester’s niece. If I have to, I can cry so she’ll let me inside. At least that way we can make sure Skyler’s okay, and I can stay until the police arrive.”

  “Or until she gets suspicious and shoots you,” I said.

  “I don’t much want her to shoot you, which she’s more likely to do.”

  “No one is going to shoot anyone,” Luanne said firmly. “As for calling Peter, that may be premature. Daphne and Skyler could be driving across the Missouri state line as we speak.”

  I shook my head. “She may have a car, but she doesn’t have any money.”

  “Unless she stole some Tuesday night when she was prowling upstairs at her father’s house,” said Caron. “I agree with Luanne that we shouldn’t call the police until we see if Daphne’s really at Miss Parchester’s house. Besides, she’s not pissed at us. She’ll know we took good care of Skyler.”

  “All right,” I said, “we’ll go to Miss Parchester’s house and peek in a window. If Daphne’s there, we have to call the police. We are not going to face charges of aiding and abetting a fugitive.”

  We went outside and climbed into Luanne’s car, this time more decorously. Once we neared Willow Street, I told Luanne to park at the library in case the nondescript officers were still keeping Sheila’s house under surveillance. We hurried up die alley, then stopped to catch our breath and assess Miss Parchester’s backyard. Luckily, her basset hounds were on vacation in the country, and therefore unavailable to alert every other homeowner along the alley of the proximity of burglars.

  “We need to stay behind the forsythias until we get to the porch,” I said.

  Caron ignored me and continued on to the garage. “The car’s here,” she called, “and the hood’s warm. We know Miss Parchester hasn’t been driving it.”

  “Then let’s get out of here and call the police,” I said.

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” Caron went through the g
arage and into the yard. “Stay out of sight. You look like a couple of freshmen planning to toilet paper the trees.” Before I could respond, she walked up the steps to the back door and knocked. “Hello? Is anybody home?”

  “Oh, my god,” said Luanne as she pulled me down. “How did Daphne seem earlier?”

  “Very tense,” I muttered, struggling to free myself from Luanne’s grip on the back of my shirt. “Miss Parchester doesn’t seem to think Daphne has a gun, but she could be wrong, you know.”

  Caron knocked again, then cupped her hands and peered through the glass pane. “Aunt Emily? It’s your niece from Boise. Remember how you invited me to stay for a week and help you plant your vegetable garden? When you didn’t meet me at the bus station, I had to walk. I was on the bus for more than twenty-two hours, and I sure would like to use your bathroom.”

  “Your child is a master of improvisation,” said Luanne. “She may have a career in it.”

  “I just hope she lives to have a career in something.” I was going to add more when the door opened and Luanne jerked me into a honeysuckle vine.

  “Miss Parchester’s not here,” said Daphne.

  “Drat.” Caron began to squirm rather convincingly. “Do you know when she’ll get back? I’m so tired and grubby and hungry that I could just stretch out here on the porch and cry.”

  Daphne stepped back. “You can come in for a minute, but you’ll have to find somewhere else to stay.”

  “Thanks so much,” Caron said as she disappeared into the house.

  I finally managed to free myself. “Go to the library and call the police.”

  “Shall I mention that there’s a potential hostage inside?”

  I leaned against the fence and rubbed my face. “I solemnly swear I’m going to send that girl to band camp every summer until she’s twenty-one.”

  “You’re making no sense whatsoever.”

  “And this situation is?” I let my head fall back into the vine. “What do you suggest we do—just sit here and wait until a garbage truck rolls over us on Monday morning?”

  “All we can do is wait,” said Luanne. She flicked dried leaves off her jeans and sat down next to me. “Caron knows we’ll call the police if she stays in there too long.”

  “How long is that?” I said, nearly whimpering.

  “We have to trust her.”

  I tried to smile. “Did I tell you about the cheese sauce?”

  Luanne and I had run out of diversionary topics and were reduced to listening to spouses bickering in nearby yards when the back door opened. I rolled over to my knees and peeked through the vine.

  “Thanks again,” Caron said as she came out to the porch. “It’s kind of you to house-sit for Aunt Emily while she’s protesting. She’s always been one to sacrifice her personal comfort for a just cause.”

  Once the back door was closed, she came back through the garage to the alley and stared at us with a disapproving frown. “You both look as if you’ve been wrestling with a leaf blower. I hope you’ll tidy yourselves before we get to the library. Mrs. McLair lives just up the street and insists on telling us how she spends every Saturday afternoon at the library doing genealogy research. I would be so humiliated if she saw you like this. She might wonder just how long ago my ancestors came down from the trees and learned to use tools—like combs, for instance.”

  “Is Skyler in there?” Luanne asked before I could react in a manner unequivocally discouraged by Dr. Spock.

  “No,” she said. “I looked in all the rooms, and there’s not so much as a diaper or a bootie. I don’t think Daphne had anything to do with abducting him.”

  “What did you two talk about?” I said as we walked toward the library.

  “School, mostly. She hated that place her father sent her, and she may have hated her stepmother even more. According to her, the first thing Adrienne did after she moved in was to fire the housekeeper, who’d been there fifteen years. A cleaning service came in once a week, and the rest of the time Daphne had to keep the house in impeccable shape so her parents could entertain on the weekends. And clean up afterwards, on top of that.”

  “What did Cinderella’s father have to say about it?” asked Luanne.

  “That it wouldn’t hurt her to develop a work ethic. Her allowance was ten dollars a week, and she had to take her lunch to school every day because she couldn’t afford the cafeteria.”

  I put my arm around her shoulder. “You do realize I have to call the police, don’t you? Peter’s going to do a lot more than have my car towed if he ever finds out I knew where Daphne was and didn’t tell him.”

  “Yeah, I know, and it’s probably for her own good. She’s pretty jittery. The whole time I was there she kept prowling around the living room, pulling back the drapes to look at the street, and scratching herself like she has poison ivy. Tell Peter that she needs to go to the psych ward, not the jail. When she went into the bathroom, I looked in the refrigerator. It’s emptier than ours, which is saying a lot. I guess Miss Parchester cleaned it out in preparation for a prolonged protest. We’re talking mustard, mayonnaise, a stick of margarine, and a bottie of vitamins.”

  I stopped her. “Do you think she has a gun?” “I don’t know. She didn’t say or do anything remotely threatening.”

  “And she bought this niece-from-Boise business?” asked Luanne, who’d been trailing us with uncharacteristic silence.

  “She just wanted to talk to someone who wasn’t accusing her of anything. We agreed that dissecting frogs was disgusting and that cheerleaders will never rule the world—after graduation, anyway. I was going to tell her about Rhonda’s locker, but I was afraid I might inadvertently allude to Skyler. She acted like she wanted me to hang around, but I figured the two of you would lose what little you have left of your moldy, middle-aged brain cells if you had to wait much longer.” She looked at me. “And I didn’t like lying to her. I tried not to once I got inside, but I had to stick with the Boise nonsense. Now I’m going to betray what little faith she has left. Why did all this have to happen?”

  I wanted to tell her that it was all Daphne’s father’s fault, but I wasn’t at all sure she’d resolved her problems with her own father. “It just escalated until it was out of control, dear. I’ll stress the need for an immediate psych evaluation. At least she can have some decent meals and a chance to rest.”

  “What about Skyler?”

  “I wish I knew,” I admitted.

  Luanne nudged us back into motion. “We agreed that Joey and Sheila wouldn’t have taken him. Is it possible Arnie might have?”

  “I don’t see how,” I said. “He’s never even met you, and he has no reason to think Skyler would be anywhere except in my possession—and he approves of that.”

  “What if Daphne begged him to retrieve Skyler so she could run away?”

  “It’s hard to predict how he’d respond, but he most certainly wouldn’t have been sniffing around outside Secondhand Rose. Besides, he supposedly drove Sheila to the cemetery for a private sacrament involving expensive vodka.”

  Caron sighed. “Could Chantilly have something to do with this? I mean, she’s disappeared, and now so has Skyler.”

  “I can’t find any logical connection,” I said. “Neither Adrienne nor Chantilly displayed the slightest solicitude for Daphne or Skyler. Babies are not welcome at social events unless high-priced clowns and ponies are involved.”

  “Then where’s Chantilly?” asked Caron, who was keeping a not-so-subtle lookout for Mrs. McLair as we went across the library parking lot.

  I shrugged. “I’m going to use a pay phone inside the library to try to get in touch with Peter.” I left them sitting on a bench and went into the lobby. I fed the appropriate coins into the phone and dialed the number of the police station, which I happened to know all too well. “Lieutenant Rosen, please,” I said when my call was answered.

  “He’s out of the office. If you tell me what this is about, I’ll connect you with someone who can as
sist you.”

  To tell her what this was about would require a couple of hundred manuscript pages of a convoluted mystery novel. “I really need to speak to Lieutenant Rosen. Can you give me his cell phone number?”

  “I’m not allowed to do that, ma’am. If you tell me what this is—”

  “What about Sergeant Jorgeson?”

  “He hasn’t been in today.”

  “Can you share his home telephone number?” I asked without optimism.

  “I’m not allowed to do that, ma’am. Are you in danger?”

  Only of having my derriere towed to jail. “Okay, contact Lieutenant Rosen right now and tell him that Claire called and has information concerning Daphne’s whereabouts. He has three minutes to call me back.” I gave her the number on the pay phone, hung up, and sat down on a stool. Patrons were coming and going, their arms laden with books. I’d met Mrs. McLair at the fall open house, but I wasn’t sure we’d recognize each other. For Caron’s sake, I hoped not, since my blouse had lost a button and my knees were caked with dirt.

  The pay phone rang less than a minute later. I grabbed the receiver, but before I could say anything, Peter said, “This had better not be a hoax, Claire. What’s more, if you’ve known all along where Daphne’s been since yesterday morning, you’re in big trouble. Once the chief is done with you, he’ll throw your scraps to the prosecuting attorney and assign me to lunchroom duty at the police academy.”

  “Are you finished?” I said politely.

  “Where is she?”

  “At Miss Parchester’s house, and close to snapping. Have one of those pimply adolescent officers put on jeans and a sweatshirt, and ease her out. She needs a full psychiatric evaluation. Caron doesn’t think she has the gun.”

  “Caron dropped by for cookies and tea?”

  “Mustard and mayonnaise, anyway. There is one other little problem.”

  “Yes?” he growled.

  “Well, Skyler’s been kidnapped. We thought Daphne might have him, but she doesn’t. I don’t see how Arnie could have—”

  “Skyler?” he growled much more loudly. “Who’s Skyler?”