THE LAST BOY

by ROBERT H. LIEBERMAN

  Molly didn’t realize she was crying until she saw the wet splotches on the snapshots. She dabbed at the spots, trying to blot up her tears and ended up marring the photos, leaving indelible blotches on the shiny surfaces.

  Marge Tillson was a busy woman. She had two showings of a new listing, an open house in the afternoon and a late-day closing.

  “Like I told your detective,” said Marge when Tripoli called her at home in the morning,“I’d love to help you, but there's no way I can reschedule. Is it life-threatening or could we just do this around dinnertime?”

  Tripoli relented and agreed to meet her at dinnertime on the Comfort Road Extension where the dirt road hit the Danby Forest. At the appointed time, he was sitting on the hood of his car sipping from a can of Sprite when Marge pulled up.

  She was a big-breasted woman in her late forties, bristling with energy. “I’ve got to warn you that I don’t know how much help I can be.” She sat with the door open, changing out of her heels into a pair of hiking boots. She took off her realtor's jacket and tossed it onto the passenger seat. “In fact, I’m not sure I can even quite remember where…”

  They climbed a series of ridges. The horseflies were unbearable, and Tripoli kept crushing them on his neck. They didn’t seem half as interested in Marge.

  “I was following a pair of pilleated woodpeckers. They had a nest right down there and…let me see…I was walking.”

  “You’re now sure it was this creek?”

  “Well, pretty sure…Wait! There. I found it right over there.”

  Tripoli went over. The stream was now but a trickle. He could see that someone had moved rocks: there was still a deep hole in the dried silt.

  “When I dug it out, I thought it was really old and valuable. That's why I took it over to the Hinkley,” she explained as Tripoli's eyes scanned up the sloping waterway. From the looks of things, it seemed to Tripoli that the pitchfork had washed down while the water was high. Maybe in the late fall or early spring.

  “I’m going to follow this stream,” he said turning back to her. “Think you can make it back out on your own?”

  “No problem. I’m used to hiking. Hey, do you think this is connected with that missing boy and the old hermit?”

  “Who said that?”

  “You kidding?” Marge let out a loud guffaw that echoed through the woods. “Everybody is talking about it. It's the biggest thing to happen since that Cessna crashed into that house in Lansing. And that was one of my listings!”

  Molly finished work late that day. There wasn’t much time for the usual hike, so she took Danny out to the ornithology lab at nearby Sapsucker Woods. They parked at the entrance near the pond and walked in along the looping trails. Dusk was approaching, and the air was filled with a cacophony of sounds as the waterfowl on the pond chased each other, flapping wings and screeching. Overhead, the tree dwellers busily chirped and fluttered back and forth in the woodland canopy, utilizing the last remnants of daylight for feeding and breeding and nest building.

  Molly clutched Danny's hand as they walked along the path. His head was tilted back, his eyes searching the high branches. He made an odd noise, “Eeeerk-Eeeerk-Eeeerk,” and the birds actually seemed to be answering him.

  By the time they neared the pavilion, the sun was resting just on the lip of the horizon, flooding the landscape in a shower of yellowish-red. Everything glowed with warmth. They stood together on the deck overlooking the water. The evening was soft, and a faint wind was soughing out of the west, singing through the pines and deciduous trees.

  “Funny,” said Molly,“I’ve always been so busy doing the laundry and trying to make a living that I never really stopped to see how beautiful all this is.” She felt a chill run up her spine and couldn’t resist kissing Danny. He looked up at her with love brimming in his eyes and squeezed her hand.

  They shared a long moment of silence. Molly observed him as he peacefully gazed down into the water, intently watching a dense school of baby fish moving like a cloud below them. Finally Molly broke the silence.“What else did the old man tell you, besides about listening?”

  “Oh, I don’t know.” He shook his head and then looked up at her.“Stuff like you shouldn’t hurt people or other living things.”

  “That sounds nice.”

  “He talked about footsteps on the forest floor.”

  “Footsteps,” she echoed.

  “Yes. How you shouldn’t use things up. Or wear things out. Like the bunny rabbit that leaves footprints in the snow. And then, when the snow melts, it's just like the rabbit wasn’t ever there.”

  “That's a beautiful thought,” she said, genuinely touched.

  She began to walk on, but Danny remained behind, standing where they had stopped.

  “Come on,” she gently urged and noticed how Danny seemed to be staring off into the distance. He seemed fixed on some memory of pleasure, something that moved him to longing, she thought, with regret.

  Upstream, the creek seemed to go on forever. Tripoli struggled to trace its path as it meandered through tangled brush and under-growth. With the light in the dense forest quickly failing, he decided finally to give up. Breaking off branches to mark the trail as he left, he made his way back to his car. Immersed in thought, he slowly drove back down into the valley and then, for no apparent reason, took a detour to Sapsucker Woods.

  Molly's old car stood alone in the parking lot and Tripoli pulled up beside it. He got out and waited. A bank of clouds had moved in and a few light drops started to fall. Tripoli felt grungy and tired, and the cool rain felt soothing on his hot, bug-bitten skin.

  A few minutes later Molly and Danny came wandering back toward the car.

  “Hi, Trip!” exclaimed Danny. He ran up to greet him, wrapping his arms around Tripoli's waist.“Did you see my garden?”

  “Yeah, the last time I was there I was really impressed.”

  “No, I meant now. All the plants. Everything's much bigger!”

  “Well, I’m coming over,” He ruffled the boy's hair and glanced over at Molly, who looked surprised to see him.

  “How’d you know we were here?”

  “Intuition,” he said, though the truth was that he didn’t know, couldn’t have known. It must have been sheer coincidence.

  “Boy, you look a mess.” She began pulling burrs and nettles from his sleeve; ran her fingers through his hair, combing out fragments of leaves.“Where on God's earth have you been?”

  “Oh, playing in the woods,” said Tripoli. Danny laughed.“And I found something really neat. Take a look.” He popped the trunk of his car.

  Danny came around the back of the car, but when he saw the pitchfork his head jerked sharply, and almost immediately he looked away. His face flushed and he started nervously licking his lips. Tripoli watched him through the corner of his eye. One look and Molly knew where it had come from.

  “Pretty nice, isn’t it, Daniel?” Tripoli persisted, hefting it in his hand.

  “I suppose so,” Danny said, drifting steadily away from the car.

  Molly waited, still staring at the tool.

  “So,” she whispered sharply when Danny was finally out of earshot,“you know where he is?”

  “Not quite.” He hedged and could see from her expression that she was let down. “But this takes us right to his doorstep.”

  He explained how Sisler turned up this lead at the Hinkley Museum, about Marge Tillson finding it, and his own search up the stream in the Danby Forest.

  “Don’t you see,” he put his arm around her.“I’m so close I can almost feel the guy's breath. Please,” he said. “Try to trust me. Danny's safe. We’ve still got a guy posted at your place.”

  She pulled away.“You going to post someone at work, too? And someone trailing us in the supermarket when I go shopping?”

  “If need be.”

  “Oh, yeah. Sure. And how much longer before they pull your guys off that detail?”

  “Then I’ll sleep over.”


  “Thanks but no thanks.”

  “I don’t get it,” he said looking hurt.“What's come between us?”

  “Nothing. Nothing but this guy who sunk his claws in my kid. He may have done Danny some good. I’d have to be completely blind not to see that. But that old bastard stole his innocence. Put all this end-of-the-world crap into his head.” She balled her right hand into a fist. “And for that I really resent him. For what he put me through. And keeps putting me through.”

  Tripoli put the pitchfork back into his car as Danny wandered to the other car.

  “I just want you to get him,” she said under her breath.“Just get him before he gets Danny.”

  chapter fourteen

  On the morning that Mildred Oltz and her husband were killed in a head-on crash, Wally Schuman called Tripoli at his office.

  “I heard about the pitchfork,”Wally said.

  “You and half the county.” It was a lousy, hot day, and Tripoli was in a foul mood.

  “You know it's been almost two months now.”

  “So, you’re keeping score, too? We’ll get the old man, don’t worry. It's just a matter of—”

  “That's not the only thing that interests us.”

  “Us?”

  “The paper. We’re thinking of another piece. A feature, really. It's a pretty incredible story.”

  Tripoli didn’t like the direction the conversation was going. He was thinking of Danny and Molly. Schuman's article had been full of conjecture and wild speculation. Molly didn’t need more people bugging her about Danny. The last thing she needed was more public attention.“Whatta you say we just leave it alone for a while? Cut the mother and kid some slack.”

  “Come on, Lou, we can’t just sit on a story like this. The whole town's buzzing about it. You can’t even go in and get a burger without hearing about it.”

  “About what?”

  “The boy, of course. Danny. I’m telling you, the kid can do all kinds of amazing things.

  “Hey, just hold on!”

  “And the old man—”

  Tripoli cut him short.“You mean the kidnapper.”

  “I talked to Danny myself,” Schuman pushed on.“He's extraordinary. That little boy can read like an adult. And when you speak to him…well, you have the strange sense that he's in touch with life in a way that we never are.”

  “I think you’re getting a little carried away.” Absently, Tripoli picked up a cold cup of coffee sitting on his desk; the cream had already gone sour. Not knowing what to do with the mouthful, he ended up swallowing it.

  “I heard about that meteor.”

  For an instant, Tripoli was stunned into silence. Was Molly foolishly talking about it at work? Or was it Rosie? Yeah, had to be Rosie, who was something of a motor mouth. Damn!

  “How’d you know about that?”Tripoli blurted out the question before he realized he was simply confirming the story.

  “Oh, we have our sources,” Wally chuckled. “Listen, the main reason I called is…you know that picture Danny drew for the juvie shrink? We heard you’re still holding it in evidence.”

  Tripoli thought about the Troopers and Matlin and the slugs working in the Sheriff's office. None of them were any help.“And you want to run it, is that it?”

  “Well…yes.”

  Tripoli weighed the matter. It was obvious the Journal was going to publish their story regardless of what he did or said.

  “Okay. Sure.” Well, he thought, if it helps catch the Hermit. “Yeah, why not? The deal is, however, that you stop playing up the business about Danny's gifts—or whatever you want to call them.”

  “We’ll just stick to the facts,” said Schuman.

  Tripoli wasn’t sure what that really meant.

  “By the way,” asked the journalist,“what's the story on the Oltz woman?”

  The story was the Oltzes’ car had gone out of its lane and slammed head-on into a pickup. Pellegrino was still out there picking up the pieces. Orson Oltz, the driver, had been drunk, way above the limit, as was the driver of the other vehicle. Mrs. Oltz, who wasn’t wearing a seat belt, had been catapulted through the windshield and landed on the crumpled hood of the truck, killed upon impact.

  “As far as I’m concerned, it's all pretty straightforward.” Tripoli tossed the remains of his coffee at the garbage can and missed.“Two drunks hit each other. Bad luck. Or good luck, depending on how you figure it. And please don’t quote me on that!”

  More than a few people in town, however, felt that there was more to the story, much more.

  “If you ask me,” said Nadine Warren, who worked in the law office next to the courthouse (she had bumped into Tripoli as he was going up the front steps to make an appearance),“this was punishment, pure and simple. Retribution. God doesn’t fuck around.”

  “That Driscoll boy,” said Barry Hollenbeck, the paunched old guard recognizing Tripoli and waving him around the metal detector in the courthouse lobby. “I hear he can hold his breath under water for an hour. And he talks to the animals. And they talk to—”

  “Give me a break, Barry, willya.”

  “No. No. This is serious shit,” he said, pulling his bulldog face so close that Tripoli could smell the garlic on his breath. “And that crash with the Oltzes.” He dropped his voice.“That didn’t just happen by chance.”

  “No, it didn’t,” answered Tripoli, raising his voice so loud in the marbled halls it caused heads to turn. “Both idiot drivers went out and first got falling down, stinking drunk. Then they arranged to meet on Route 13. In a head-on. Just as Venus and Mars were aligning. Come on, Barry, get real,” he shouted, storming off down the corridor, “I wish everybody in town would stop gossiping and get a life!”

  As coincidence would have it, though, the crash did occur at precisely the same moment that Rosie Lopez Green was giving birth to the first of her twin sons. By the time Mrs. Oltz's mangled body was slid into a morgue locker in the hospital basement, Rosie was already settled into the maternity ward, a squawking boy tucked under each arm. According to old Dr. Wozniak, the infants were healthy and well.

  “Are you sure?” pleaded Rosie, shedding tears of relief and exhaustion. Ed kept stroking her arm, blinking his own misty eyes.

  “I’ve been doing this for forty years,” said Dr. Wozniak, “And they’re perfectly healthy. Believe me. What do you want, that I should guarantee they’re going to win a Nobel Prize?”

  chapter fifteen

  “Will you look at who's here!” exclaimed Ed, opening the door to his house on Spencer Street to discover Molly and Danny. “Our local TV star!” Danny flew into Ed's arms, and Ed swung him up into the air.

  “Uncle Ed!” cried Danny, gripping him with both arms and legs.

  “So, you missed old Uncle Eddie, huh?”

  “Of course!” Danny giggled and waggled his head.

  Ed leaned to one side to give Molly a kiss. “We were wondering when you guys were gonna come by.”

  “I’m just on a lunch break and we thought we’d say a quick hello. Maybe take a peek at the twins?”

  He showed them in and Molly could hear the babies wailing above the rattle of Rosie's old washer dancing on the kitchen floor.

  The Greens’ house on the south side of town was a clapboard affair that sat squeezed against the road. The foundation was sagging, causing the floors to slant in all directions, and there was still plastic on the windows left over from the winter. An old refrigerator and a broken sofa stood on the front porch as they had for as long as Molly could remember.

  “Rosie!” called Ed, as he moved down the hallway, Danny still in his arms.“We’ve got company!”

  Rosie came out of the bedroom, dark circles under her eyes, the top of her dress soaked with milk. “Danny, sweetheart!” she exclaimed with a big smile.

  Danny reached out from his perch on Ed's hip and grabbed Rosie around the neck, pulling her close. She smothered him with wet kisses.

  “Yuck!” he laughed, wiping his
face.

  Molly gave her a hug. “Hey, how are things?”The babies were still crying.

  “They’re a couple of handfuls,” she heaved a long sigh, “but we’re happy.”

  “How about something to eat?” asked Ed. “I just made this great, big, scrumptious chocolate cake.”

  Molly shook her head.“We really can’t stay that long—just wanted to take a look at the little guys. Sounds to me like they’re awake.”

  “They’re always awake!” Rosie laughed. “I think they’re on speed. Come on,” she led the way, shuffling slowly in her bedroom slippers.“Follow me to the menagerie.”

  The twins were lying in the same crib, loudly protesting, their faces scrunched up and red with fury.

  Danny went to the crib and bent over to take a closer look. “Ooooh, they’re so tiny.”

  “They’re only two weeks old. You were little like that once, too,” said Rosie, resting her hand on his shoulder.

  “Before you became an adult,” added Molly with a laugh. The babies kept going full blast, and Molly noticed that Danny didn’t seem in the least bothered by it. “Oh, they’re lovely. Perfect,” she said, cooing over them. Their skin was a smooth, dark olive, and Molly could see in them Rosie's even features and Ed's long lashes.

  “Yeah, but I just don’t know what it is with them. Since I got back from the hospital it's been solid crying.” Rosie checked their diapers. “They’re both perfectly dry, see? And I just fed them. I just don’t know what gives.” She picked up an infant in each arm and rocked them, but the twins kept crying. Danny watched, intrigued, as Rosie placed them back down on their stomachs and patted their backs. Finally, she turned them over. “This is Fernando,” said Rosie above the racket,“and this other troublemaker here, this is Alonso.”