by Alex Grecian
Goodman stood back up and stared at the twisted paper plate in his hand. “I wish to God you’d just left Burden County when I asked you to.”
“Perhaps if you had been more polite about it.”
Goodman chuckled. “Well, soon’s as I finish processing your paperwork, I’ll let you go. I’m gonna ask you real polite to just head on back home. If there’s somebody here like you say, you leave him to me.” He nodded once, as if settling the matter, and opened the door. “You hang tight now, Doc.” He left, and Travis heard the lock engage.
Travis settled back on the cot and looked around at the bare walls.
“Spiders and flies,” he said.
4
There was a rented Ford Mustang parked in front of Emmaline’s house and a man was sitting on the porch next to Maddy. It took Skottie a long minute to recognize him, and when she did the brief spike of alarm at seeing a strange man with her daughter was replaced by a different sort of worry.
“How did I not recognize that man right off?”
Bear shifted in the seat next to her and looked up as if trying to figure out what she was asking.
“Talking to myself, boy,” she said. “Great. How often do I do that?” About as often, she thought, as I mistake my husband for a total stranger.
When she pulled into the driveway, Brandon Foster stood and stepped down off the porch. He wasn’t smiling, but he didn’t have his angry face on. While Skottie took that as a promising sign, her own expression didn’t change.
Skottie jammed on the brake and put the Subaru in park. Maddy was hanging back on the porch. She looked tense and ran down the steps close behind her father.
“Mom, Dad’s here. He even picked me up early and we got ice cream.” Her face brightened when she saw Bear. “Is that our dog?”
“No,” Skottie said. “Maddy, go in the house.”
“She can hear us,” Brandon said. “It’s healthy for kids to know that their parents argue.”
Brandon was big and blond, with freckles dusted across the bridge of his nose, solid under a layer of fat that he called his “bulletproof belly.” Skottie had once liked that softness that hid his strength. They had met nearly a dozen years ago. Brandon was a beat cop then, and Skottie was in the academy. There had been a string of drive-by shootings, and Skottie had spotted the perpetrator’s car and called it in. Brandon had been the first responder, and they had both been excited and proud of their roles in the case. They had gone for a drink at the end of their shift to wind down and had woken up next to each other the next morning. Three weeks later they were married, and ten months after that Maddy had joined them. She favored her mother in nearly every way, but she had her father’s freckles.
“Maddy, I told you to go in the house.”
“Grandma wouldn’t let him inside,” Maddy said. She was ignoring Skottie, too keyed up and distracted. “Whose dog is that, Mom?”
“A friend’s. We’re taking care of him for tonight. Just for tonight.”
“What’s his name? Can I pet him?”
“No.” Next to her daughter, Bear was as big as a horse. Maddy could probably ride the dog around the front yard if he let her, and Skottie knew that thought had already occurred to Maddy. “I mean, try not to surprise him.”
Brandon was watching them, patiently waiting, maybe even hoping Skottie was as distracted as Maddy was, that his presence would be accepted along with the dog’s. Skottie felt jangled and uptight and wanted to get her husband off Emmaline’s property. But she didn’t want to upset Maddy.
“His name’s Bear, baby. Hold out your hand and say amiko, okay? Amiko.”
“What does that mean?”
“Just do it!” Skottie immediately regretted raising her voice. Why had Brandon forced them into an adversarial situation by showing up with no notice? How could that help anything? “Please, Maddy, it means friend.”
“Where did you get that dog?” Brandon said. “Is it dangerous?”
“Amiko,” Maddy said. “Hi, Bear. Amiko.” She held out her tiny hand for Bear to sniff while Skottie held her breath.
Bear licked Maddy’s palm and sat down in the snow. Maddy approached and ran her fingers through the dog’s thick black mane. Bear looked up at Skottie, and she could swear he was smiling. She let out a sigh of relief.
“Honey, he’s been out at the lake all day,” Skottie said. “He’s probably dirty.”
“I don’t mind, Mom. Does he know other words?”
“I think so, but most of them are in another language, honey, and I don’t remember what it is. Portuguese, maybe?”
“I can look it up,” Maddy said. Now that she had a task, she had forgotten that she didn’t want to go inside the house and leave her father and mother to face off against each other. “Come on, Bear!”
She turned and ran up the porch steps and Bear stood up.
“Wait, baby,” Skottie said. She put a hand on Bear’s head, wondering if she’d be able to hold him back if he decided to chase Maddy. “Don’t run, okay, Maddy? That might make Bear excited. And why don’t you leave Bear with me for a minute. I’ll bring him in when I’m done out here.”
“You’re not gonna leave him outside all night?”
“No, I think we’d need a fence or a little house for him. It’s gonna get cold tonight.”
“You do what your mama says,” Brandon said.
Maddy nodded and trudged the rest of the way across the porch. As soon as the screen door shut behind her, Skottie could hear Emmaline scolding the girl. There was no love lost between Skottie’s mother and Brandon.
When Brandon had moved up to detective and then to homicide, Skottie had opted for the Illinois Highway Patrol. This division in their careers had led to divisions in their marriage. Brandon had belittled the IHP, had told her once that her whole job was to sit in her car all day and pass out tickets while he was out there risking his life to make the world a better place. She had not forgotten the comment and had not accepted his many apologies. Brandon had begun to drink more, had stopped coming home after his shifts. And Skottie had been fine with that. When he did come home, there was usually a fight.
“You didn’t need to back me up,” Skottie said. “I told her to go inside, she was gonna go inside.”
“I know that,” Brandon said. “That wasn’t disrespect. I was helping.”
“I don’t need your help.”
“It’s good for kids to see parents back each other up. So Maddy can’t play us off each other.”
“What, did you just read a book about raising kids?”
“As a matter of fact, yeah. Look, Skottie, I’m trying to be better. It’s been six months. That’s a long time for my family to be apart from me, but I stayed outta your way, gave you space like you asked. You have any idea how hard that was for me?”
“You waited six months to see your daughter.”
“Can we just talk? I know I screwed up, and I’m doing my best here to show you respect.”
“I don’t have anything to talk about,” Skottie said.
Brandon took a step toward her and Bear nudged her aside, moved closer to Brandon. The dog’s mane was crackling as if a wave of static electricity were moving through it. Skottie was struck again by how eerie the dog’s silence was, and Brandon apparently felt it, too, because he stepped back and raised his hands.
“Call the damn dog off,” he said.
“He can feel the tension. Nothing I can do about that, so maybe it’s safer for you if you keep your distance.”
“You know I’m not gonna hurt you, Skottie.”
“Do I?”
“That was one time.”
“You don’t get two chances.”
Brandon looked away. He ran his hand through his hair and sighed. “You got no idea how sorry I am for that. You gotta know I’d do anything to make it up to you and Maddy. You know me. You know …” His voice trailed off, and Skottie almost felt sorry for him. Then she remembered.
During a
particularly vicious argument one night, Brandon had hit her. They had stood there for a moment, both of them stunned, then Skottie tried to hit him back. He blocked her fist and she swung again. He blocked her blow again, but when she raised her hand the third time she saw something in his eyes, a subtle change in his expression. He left his hands down at his sides and let her hit him.
He had apologized then, had cried and begged her, had reminded her that it was the first time and promised it was the last. But Skottie had quietly packed a suitcase, put Maddy in the car, and driven away.
Six months gone by.
Brandon sat down on the porch steps. He kept his eye on Bear, but the dog was relaxed again. It seemed as long as Brandon kept his distance, Bear would leave him alone.
“I got the papers you sent,” Brandon said. “But I don’t think you want that. You don’t want to put Maddy through that.”
“No,” Skottie said, “I don’t. But it’s the next step, and I’ve got to move forward with my life. I don’t wanna go back to Chicago, and I don’t wanna be with you anymore, Brandon.”
“I waited too long. I should have come before now.”
“It wouldn’t have made any difference.” I didn’t even recognize you at first, she thought. I moved on whether I really meant to or not.
Brandon folded his arms across his knees and watched a shaggy V of geese migrate across the sky, a month later than all the others and with no hope of catching up. Finally he nodded. “Okay. I’ll give you more time. But I want Maddy. You can’t keep her from me.”
“I won’t let you take her back to Chicago.”
“You want her to grow up in Hays? What’s she gonna do here? At least in—”
“Hey, I grew up here.”
“You were the only black girl in your graduating class. You told me yourself.”
“So more black people is what I needed? More than my mother?”
“You got out of this town the first chance you got.”
“And the last person who hurt me was you.”
He blushed. “I found a good divorce attorney, Skottie. He’s expensive and I’d rather not—”
“I thought you were worried about putting Maddy through this stuff.”
“Just … Dammit, just let me have her for the weekend. I’m at a hotel here. That big one down the road. I took some vacation days. Let me have some time with her and I promise I’ll bring her back after. Not playing games with you, Skott.”
“No.”
The screen door opened again and Maddy took the porch like an invading army. “It’s Esperanto, Mom. I looked it up. Amiko!”
“Esperanto,” Skottie said. “That’s right.”
“Bear,” Maddy said. “Bear, venu ĉi tien. Is that right, boy? Venu ĉi tien?”
Bear pulled himself to his feet and shambled up the porch steps to Maddy, knocking Brandon into a snow-covered hedge, seemingly by accident, but Skottie wondered whether it was a purposeful snub. The dog seemed to pick up on physical cues like a second language. Esperanto and body language. He pushed against Maddy, nearly knocking her over, and she squealed in delight.
“How did you …”
“The computer has a recording of how to say things. All you have to do is put in what you wanna say and it says it for you.”
“Even in Esperanto?”
“We can talk to him, Mom! I bet he knows lots and lots of words. He’s like a code dog! Bear, amiko!”
The dog obligingly licked Maddy’s face, covering her from chin to forehead in slobber. Maddy laughed and fell down and Bear lay next to her. The dog was so big that Skottie couldn’t see any trace of her daughter behind him.
Brandon regained his feet and brushed the snow off his jeans. He shot the dog a nasty look, but let it go at that. “What do you say, Skottie?”
Maddy’s head popped up from behind the mass of black fur on the porch. “Mom, can I go? Dad’ll bring me home in time for school Monday, right Dad?”
She’d been listening. Skottie shook her head, not turning her daughter down, but registering the fact that she couldn’t win this fight without hurting both Maddy and Brandon. And maybe herself, too.
Brandon looked at her and raised his eyebrows. He pressed his lips together in a half smile, an expression of questioning innocence that had always worked with her.
“Come back Friday, after lunch,” Skottie said. “Can you do that?”
“I’ll be here,” Brandon said.
“Yay! Thanks, Mom!”
“Don’t be early,” Skottie said. “I’ll have her ready at two o’clock.”
“You’ll see me then,” Brandon said. “And Skottie, pack a bag for yourself, too, if you decide you wanna come along.”
He didn’t wait to see how she might respond to his suggestion. He walked away across the top of the snow to a rental car parked across the street. Skottie noticed that Bear’s eyes followed Brandon until the car pulled away from the curb.
February 1977
The frequency of Rudy’s seizures had decreased over the years to a point where they occurred at regular intervals every few months and rarely interfered with his routine. He associated them, correctly or not, with the perfectly round smooth scars that skipped down his chest and abdomen and ended at his groin. The lightning had affected both his brain and his body in unexpected ways. Neither his hair nor his toenails had grown back, and he had lost all the hearing in one ear, but he had learned to read lips, so he appeared at all times to be thoughtful and attentive, carefully watching people’s faces when they talked. Yet he often heard disembodied voices and saw strange people and objects in the corners of his vision.
Magda had died giving birth to their third child, a girl, and Rudy subsequently spent less time at home on the ranch. The life he had once craved as an American family man he now looked back on as an interlude between the more crucial periods of his work. His children were looked after by a succession of nannies, and Rudy had moved most of his personal belongings to a small house on the border of the churchyard.
His flock had grown steadily over the years, lost souls attracted by rumors that Reverend Rudy of the Purity First Church had the power to heal sickness and dispel doubt. Lightning had infused him with the electric mastery of Divine Will. He had not just seen the light, it had moved through him, His wonders to perform.
In Sunday school the children of his parish were taught that Reverend Rudy had spoken directly with God during that fateful storm, and they learned that his spells were holy messages from on high, were clarifications of the Word. A depiction of the red pattern of his scars had been painted from ceiling to floor in every room of the church, and each livid circle represented the first letter of one of the tenets of the faith: “Power Resides in Us,” “Unity Brings Strength,” “Rebirth, Not Death,” “Invest in Ourselves,” “Treat Others as They Deserve to Be Treated,” “A Yielding Nature Is Divine.” Taken together, the letters spelled the word PURITY, which his congregation chanted at the start of morning and evening masses.
The same red dots also festooned the sides of a Volkswagen minibus, bought as a tax write-off and used for church outings. From a distance, the bus strongly resembled an ice-cream truck, and when the church’s youth group wasn’t away on a picnic or visiting a museum, Reverend Rudy enjoyed driving his bus through neighboring towns, taking pleasure in the inevitable disappointment of small children who followed along behind him, quarters clutched in their little hands.
These excursions also served a second, more satisfying, purpose.
Twelve teenagers had disappeared from western Kansas over a period of seven years. All of them had been girls between the ages of ten and eighteen, but investigators had not found a single connection among them. Two of them had attended the same school, but none of the twelve had known one another, so far as anyone was aware. Three of them had been black, two Jewish, six Hispanic, and one had been visiting from an American Indian college in eastern Kansas. No bodies had been found, and the police departments of
three counties had concluded that the girls were runaways. Flyers were handed out, appeals for information were made on the local television and radio stations, photographs were stapled to telephone poles, but no new leads were uncovered.
Had anyone ventured down the stairs to the subbasement of the Purity First Church, down beneath the shuffleboard court, the communal hall, and the cozy kitchen, they might have uncovered some sign of those twelve missing girls. They might have found evidence of other men, women, and children who had been there, had spent their last moments on Earth staring at six red scars before moving on. Reverend Rudy had put a great deal of work into renovating that cold room, with its concrete-block walls and its hulking furnace. The walls had been soundproofed, covered with thick insulation and another layer of concrete. The ceiling had been stripped to the joists and reinforced, gaps filled, and the whole thing replastered, then carpeted. This had the unfortunate effect of making the room smaller, but Rudy had convinced himself that sacrificing some space was worth it in the long run.
Two stainless steel tables had been brought in and bolted to the floor. The tables were heavy and awkward, and the stairs leading down to the subbasement were steep and narrow. No one could see Rudy’s secret room, no one could know it even existed, and so he and Jacob had done all the work themselves. It took them a year and a half. When they had finished with the heavy work, Jacob had traveled alone to Boston with a shopping list provided by Rudy. He returned four days later with a trunk full of surgical equipment. Scalpels, shears, rib spreaders, clamps, specula, drills, and a variety of bits. Rudy unpacked the trunk with little gasps of excitement, setting each new tool in its preordained place on the aluminum racks against the walls.
The doctor’s mission had become a holy mission.
They were careful. After finishing the room, they waited. It was important to establish the church, as both an alibi and a safe haven, and that took a lot of work. It was another six months before Rudy took his own shopping trip and, when he went, he did not take the colorful Purity First bus. He paid four hundred dollars cash for a 1964 Buick Skylark and parked it in an abandoned barn on overgrown farmland adjacent to his Third R Ranch. He removed the station wagon’s back seat and welded a dog cage into the cargo compartment.
