by Tom McNeal
He wiped the table clean, and as he passed by the baker’s table, he tipped his head and said, “How are you, Sten?”
“Hallå, Mr. Johnson,” the baker replied. “It’s good to see you out and about.”
Over his lowered newspaper, his cheerful face might have seemed as comforting as the rising sun.
“Good to be out,” Jeremy’s father said, and he cast a glance across the room to Jenny Applegarth, who gave him a quick smile in return.
“And how’s that boy of yours?” the baker asked. “Getting into trouble or staying out of it?”
“Oh, mostly staying out of it, I guess. Wish he’d get out more, though.”
The baker nodded. “It’s the game-show disappointment, I suppose.”
“That’s part of it, sure,” Jeremy’s father said. “But it’s also what went on … there at your house.”
The baker waved his hand dismissively. “That was nothing. Some mischief by”—he winked—“whoever it was.”
“Yeah, well, I wish everyone was as forgiving as you are,” Mr. Johnson said.
As Jenny Applegarth set a steaming beef pie in front of the baker, he smiled and said, “You have an unusual boy there, Mr. Johnson. Very bright, very bright, indeed.” He cut into his pie. “I just hope this town doesn’t drive him away.”
Jeremy’s father, clearing the next table, stopped abruptly. “How’s that?”
“Oh, it’s just that I’ve seen it before.” The baker blew softly on his forkful of steaming food. “And there have been so many runaways lately.”
Jeremy’s father stiffened. “Jeremy’s no runner. That’s just not his way.”
“I’m sure you’re right, Mr. Johnson. Though, of course”—he cast a twinkling eye toward Jenny Applegarth—“you can’t underestimate the power of female persuasion.”
Mr. Johnson, blushing slightly, brought his curled fingers to his cheek as if to rake them through his beard but then realized the beard was gone. He took up his cleaning with renewed industry, and the baker continued his leisurely meal.
I hastened back to the van and drew close to the covered bodies.
Jeremy, can you hear me? Are you there? Listen, if you will! My voice rose. Wake up, Jeremy! You must wake up and scream and shout!
He did not stir. There was only the occasional rise and fall of the coverlet. The time between each breath stretched almost beyond my endurance.
Back and forth I shuttled between the café and the van, between assuring myself that Jeremy and Ginger were still alive and seeking to effect their rescue. Twice more I tried to gain the attention of Jenny Applegarth and Mr. Johnson and even, with every decibel I might muster, Elbow Adkins himself.
Nothing.
No one heard me.
Once Jenny Applegarth stopped at the baker’s table and stood smiling down at him. “So, Sten, maybe you’ll tell me the secret of the Prince Cakes.”
The baker seemed startled. “What do you mean, the secret?”
Jenny Applegarth chuckled. “How you get them perfectly, identically scrumptious time after time.”
The baker’s cheerful manner recomposed itself. “Ah, well. I’m afraid even a woman of your beauty cannot coax that from me. Otherwise, you would soon be making my own Prince Cakes as well as I make them!”
“Or maybe better!” Jenny Applegarth said with a laugh, and moved on to another table. Finally, the baker paid his bill—along with a generous tip—and then, with a wave to Jenny and a nod to Jeremy’s father, he strolled out to the van. When he pulled himself into his seat, he did not so much as glance at the rear cargo area but instead stared into the café with a strange, satisfied smile.
Then, almost without moving his lips, he whispered in Swedish, “With Prince Cakes, my dear Jenny Applegarth, as with all baking, the secret is the proper recipe, the proper ingredients, and the proper oven.”
The next moment, we were moving again, along Main Street, then around two corners to the baker’s house. Once inside the garage, he pulled down the door behind him, turned on the lights, and set about his business. Though he grunted and sweated, he worked with surprising efficiency, talking to Jeremy and Ginger as if they could hear him.
“There, now,” he whispered as he eased Jeremy onto a cart and wheeled him through a door to a shadowy landing. “One step closer to your destination.”
The baker stood above the same spiral chute that they had used a few weeks before, but now, instead of sacks of flour, the baker dragged Jeremy to its lip, talking all the while. “Sorry, my dear boy,” he said. “Sorry. Just a few inches more now.” And then, with a small grunt: “Off you go.”
Down Jeremy spiraled to the dark chamber below.
The baker followed by way of the stairs and, at the bottom, switched on a light. Jeremy lay half off and half on a cushioned cart set at the bottom of the twirling slide. “Almost there,” the baker murmured. He pulled Jeremy’s body all the way onto the cart and then wheeled the cart across the great chamber. The squeak of the wheels was loud in the cavernous room—almost a shriek or a squeal—and, well, I cannot tell you how wretched and fearful I felt.
“Not far now, dear boy,” the baker crooned. “Not far at all.”
But the baker did not go to either of the two doors leading to the storerooms that Jeremy and Ginger had cleaned and stocked.
He went to the third door, the one that Jeremy had asked to look behind.
The baker pushed the door open and rolled the cart inside. The room was just as it was before—the shelves neatly stacked with baking supplies.
What I next witnessed I could scarcely believe.
By touching a hidden control, the baker caused the entire rear wall to moan and swing away. Yes, the whole wall was a secret door, through which the baker now rolled the cart. When the wall closed behind us, we stood in darkest darkness.
The baker pushed the cart forward into the blackness. I saw nothing and heard only the squealing wheels, but I sensed something else: the presence of someone or something, alive, shrouded in darkness, poised in waiting silence.
The wheels stopped squealing. I heard a metallic clank and the creak of hinges. The baker grunted, and it sounded as if Jeremy’s body was being placed on a bed, for I heard the squeaking of springs.
“There, dear boy,” the baker whispered. “Sleep, just sleep.”
The hinge again creaked and the wheels again squealed—once more the baker was moving off through the pitch-black darkness.
I stayed with Jeremy. He still breathed.
Somewhere in the quiet of the room, it seemed that something else breathed. Breathed and waited. I stayed close to Jeremy, to be present if he awoke, or to be present if he were to stop …
Who knows how many minutes passed before I again heard the groaning wall, followed by the cart’s shrieking wheels. I could not see the baker, but I smelled him. His scent, which had always favored sugar and baked goods, was now smoky and sour.
“Almost there,” he whispered, and then I again heard the clank of metal, creak of hinges, screech of springs. “There you are, my dear girl,” he said gently. “Isn’t that soft and snug?”
In the darkness, I sensed a kind of fence separating Jeremy from Ginger, but it was easy enough for me to slip through, and as I bent close and waited, she at last took a breath of air. So she, too, was alive. Barely alive, perhaps, but still alive.
The baker stood quietly in the darkness for a few moments—thinking what, I could not guess—and then he began to move away. My choice was to stay with Jeremy and Ginger or to follow the baker out of this place in search of help.
I thought that I should not stay but found that I could not leave.
I hovered close to Jeremy and Ginger in the pitch-darkness, taking in the acrid, metallic smell of their bodies, listening for the faint movement of air from their lips—and, also, from some other being in the darkness. For there was some other creature hidden there in the darkness, I was sure of it.
Finally, with terrible trep
idation, I eased through the impenetrable blackness toward the breathing that was neither Jeremy’s nor Ginger’s. I moved slowly, seeing nothing, listening, pulling odors toward me. The scent, I was almost certain, was human.
A person of unknown identity.
Who sat breathing and listening.
Listen, if you will, I said, and said again, but there was no response.
I darted close, to stir the air around the creature.
Then, softly, uncertainly, a male whisper touched itself to the silence.
“Hello?”
The silence and darkness was total.
“Hello,” the voice said again, a little louder, and when it was met with silence, it became a whimper: “Oh no, oh no,” the voice said, and there followed a soft, prolonged weeping so miserable that it would squeeze pity from stones. Eventually, the crying subsided and the breathing of this wretched creature, whoever it was, fell into the slow measures of sleep.
Time in that darkness passed with unbearable slowness. I endured not from one minute to the next but from one breath to the next—a breath from Jeremy, a breath from Ginger. As a ghost, I had grown used to the elastic nature of time and had learned to abide it with patience, but here, in this darkest darkness, I felt the minutes pressing in and thought I might be getting my first glimpse of what might prove a lasting madness, until, finally—oh, the relief of it!—I heard the only sound that could deliver me: the stirring of a human body.
It was Jeremy. He moved, and then he groaned.
He was in pain, but he was alive.
And, listen!—a murmur from Ginger!
A few long seconds passed.
Then: “That you?”
“Yeah.”
Their voices sounded molten and thick.
“Oh my gosh,” Ginger said. “Headache from hell.”
“Yeah, me too. And it’s so dark—I can’t even see my own hand. Where are we, do you think? Is there anybody else here?”
Suddenly, another voice came from somewhere else in the darkness.
“I am.”
Ginger and Jeremy drew themselves into utter stillness.
Several silent moments passed.
Then the voice said, “It’s me. Frank Bailey.”
“Where are we?” Jeremy asked through the darkness. “And what are you doing here? I thought you were going off to some fancy cooking school.”
“Yeah, so did I. All I remember is driving down the highway with Mr. Blix, heading for the airport, eating these amazing homemade sweet-potato chips of his, and then I got thirsty and drank this strawberry stuff he’d brought along. That’s the last I remember. When I woke up, I was here.”
“Where’s here, though?” Ginger asked. “Is this an old bomb shelter or something?”
“More like an underground motel room with bars,” Frank Bailey said. “You’ll see when the light comes up.”
“When’s that?”
“Whenever it does. You lose track of time.”
All of them were silent for a moment or two. Then Jeremy said, “He did the same thing with us—salty pretzels and stuff, then strawberry nectar.”
“Laced with something brain-numbing,” Ginger said.
“It’s not all bad here,” Frank Bailey said. “The food’s good. And there’s a bathroom that has hot water and soap and stuff. Mine does, anyhow. Sten makes the food and brings it in. He’s the only person you ever see.”
“So he drugs us and puts us in his underground motel room—what does he get out of it?”
“Not sure,” Frank Bailey said. He paused, and then, as if embarrassed, he said, “It’s like he wants you to be his friend or something.”
Ginger’s voice filled with alarm. “What do you mean? What kind of friend?”
“I don’t know. Maybe friend isn’t the right word. It’s more that he just wants you to hang out with him.”
“Sounds kind of creepy,” Ginger said.
Frank Bailey’s voice was low: “I wouldn’t say creepy, exactly. It changes. Sometimes he’s in a good mood, sometimes he’s not. Sometimes it’s like you’ve disappointed him, but you don’t know why. At least that’s how it is with me.”
“What exactly happens when he comes in?” Jeremy asked.
“He brings food and sometimes clean clothes. In the morning, he leaves right away, but after supper he’ll usually stay and talk. There’s a space between your rooms and mine and there’s a rocking chair he sits in.”
“Our rooms?”
“Yeah,” Frank Bailey said. “There are two rooms over there. I mean, they’re cells, actually. They’re separated by bars and they’re a little smaller than mine. They’ve always been empty before.”
“What is he going to do with us?”
“No idea.” He paused. “I don’t think anything really bad, though.”
“Why not?” Ginger asked.
“I don’t know. It’s just that I don’t believe Mr. Blix would ever do anything really bad to us.”
Another short silence, and then Jeremy said, “You said he tells stories—what kind of stories?”
“Anything. Sweden comes up a lot, and his childhood, but it can be anything. He just likes it if you’re polite and listen.” They fell quiet for a time, and then Frank Bailey said, “It’s so weird here. When the light’s on, it’s not so bad, but when the place gets dark …”
I detected the shuffle of feet. In the darkness Ginger could be heard exploring her cell. “There are iron bars,” she said. “Concrete wall … and another room.”
“Bathroom,” Frank Bailey said.
“Small wooden table,” Ginger said. She seemed to be feeling her way. “Plastic vase or something … one wooden chair … concrete floor.” Then: “Okay, end of tour. Back on my bed.” She paused. “This headache is like total annihilation.”
“I had one, too,” Frank Bailey said. “Must be from the knockout potion.”
After a while, Jeremy said, “What if he’s the one responsible for all these missing kids and stuff?”
Nobody said anything.
He said, “Most of those kids never show up again, do they?”
Silence. Silence and darkest darkness.
Jeremy said, “Are we out in the woods near his cabin someplace?”
I wondered suddenly if he was talking to me. I said, You are in the basement of his house behind the bakery.
“So you’re here,” Jeremy said. He sounded relieved. “And you won’t leave?”
Yes, I am here, and no, I will not leave.
“So who’s here?” Ginger asked. “And who won’t leave?”
“Oh,” Jeremy said. “You. So you’re here. But I knew you were, didn’t I, so I don’t know why I said it. I guess I’m still not thinking right.” He let a moment pass. “But I would just love someone to tell us how Sten got us here.”
He gave you the potion. Then he wrapped you up and brought you to town. While you lay in the back of his van, he ate heartily in the café and chatted with your father and Jenny Applegarth as if nothing was wrong. And then he brought you to the garage of his house and slid you down the spiraling chute and carted you through a swinging wall in the third storeroom and put you in this darkness that is beyond even my penetration. He is the Finder of Occasions, Jeremy. The villain whom it was my duty to see but did not see.
Again it was quiet.
“It’s okay,” Jeremy said in a small voice. Then slightly louder, “Everything will be okay.”
The darkness and silence again settled over them. “When?” Ginger said.
“When what?”
“When will everything be okay?”
At longest last, after what seemed an unending night, the blackness began to lighten. It was not the rising of the sun, but it suggested it. From the darkness, forms materialized. In their separate chambers, Jeremy and Ginger could finally see each other lying on narrow cots along opposite walls and separated by an iron-barred partition. They wore the stiff, disheveled looks of hospital patients.
Their bed coverings were a deep blue, the bars of their cells had been painted Swedish red, and the stone floors were painted pastel yellow. A vase stood on a small antique table in the middle of each room. For a prison, the effect was strangely cheerful. Cut within each cell door was a very much smaller door with a fixed shelf just below it on each side. This, I supposed, was where food might be left.
Frank Bailey sat staring through the bars from within his own cell on the opposite side of the chamber. At first glance, he seemed little altered. Though his fingernails and hair had grown long, his clothes were clean, and his face was round. Fearfulness, however, had made a home in his eyes. His cell was similar to Jeremy’s and Ginger’s, though somewhat larger, and the vase on his table was filled with a bouquet of blue irises.
“Wow, Frank,” Ginger said. “You get flowers?”
“Yeah. Mr. Blix brings them every couple of days. I think they’re from his garden.” He shrugged. “It’s weird, but you kind of begin to look forward to it.”
Between Frank Bailey’s large cell and the smaller ones of Jeremy and Ginger, an open area had been made homey by a rocking chair and a braided oval rug in reds and yellows. Behind the rocking chair hung a comforting painting of a family staring into a fire while, out of doors, snow gathered on the windowpanes.
“So that rocking chair is where he sits and tells stories?” Ginger asked.
Frank Bailey nodded. He was about to say something more, but he suddenly cocked his head.
I had heard it, too: the locking mechanism, and now the groaning wall.
“Shh,” Frank Bailey said. “It’s him. And don’t forget to play nice.”
The baker entered, pushing a cloth-covered cart before him and looking as he had always looked—portly, cheery, hearty, and harmless.
“Hallå!” he said. “Is it not a great day to be alive?”
Ginger and Jeremy said nothing, but Frank Bailey smiled and said, “Yes, Mr. Blix, it is.”
“Yes, yes, a great day, indeed,” the baker said with a cheerful laugh. “And, for my dear young newcomers, be assured that the service here is excellent!”
“Where is here?” Ginger said, but the baker acted as if he had not heard. Behind him, Frank Bailey frantically gestured to Ginger to be quiet, but she paid him no mind.
