THE LAST BOY

by ROBERT H. LIEBERMAN

  “Seven months is a long time in a kid's life.”

  “You know, I’ll turn to Danny and sometimes he's got this faraway look in his eyes. Or he's pulled into himself as if he were unconscious, or dead. And it's scary. Creepy. All this time now, and I still can’t really break through. Oh, Trip,” she said, plaintively,“I don’t dare turn my back for an instant. I’m always afraid somebody is going to snatch him away again. Everybody wants something from him. Oh, I want people to just leave us alone already. I just want Danny to have a normal life. Play Little League or just hang out with friends his own age. Is that so unreasonable?”

  Tripoli swallowed, cleared his throat.“This thing with Daniel is really wearing you out,” he said, the implication clear.

  “Nah. It's not just Danny. It's the job, too. And Larry. And the people who keep…”

  “But no one is forcing you to stay there.”

  “You mean quit and move out with you, is that it?”

  “Well, that's a reasonable option,” he said and could feel her stiffen.

  “I’m paying my own way in life, thank you.”

  Though Tripoli had her in his arms, he could feel her slipping away. He took a long breath and slowly exhaled.“You know, I don’t quite understand how things between us have gotten so…”

  “Sour?”

  “I just can’t get it straight in my head. We were so close, so intimate. Then, bang, it's like we’re almost strangers.”

  She pulled away.“Ever think that maybe you’re putting pressure on me?”

  “I am? I thought I’m trying to help.”

  “You are helping, but you don’t quite understand where I’m coming from.”

  Tripoli hesitated, thought about it. “Maybe,” he ventured, “maybe the problem is that you’re trying to force him into a mold he can’t fit.”

  “Force him?” She jerked upright and immediately he knew he had misspoken. “Everybody has got plans for him. But remember, I’m his mother.”

  “Of course you are.”

  “And I just want what's best for him.”

  “Well, then you’ve got to take into account who he is.”

  “Oh, no,” she groaned, turning away from him. “You’re not going to start that crap with me. All day I’ve been beating away people who—”

  “Folks aren’t blind. They can see that Daniel's very special.”

  “Oh, Trip! Please, not you, too.” She thought back on the night of the vigil. The way that crowd had craved Danny. That morning of the storm. Those angry faces directed at him. It still gave her goose bumps. In her mind's eye, she saw Danny pointing towards the sky, illuminated by a blazing meteor.

  “Okay,” she said into the dark. “I see. He's different. But that's not necessarily going to make him a happy person. Which is all that I ever wanted him to be. Or us. The two of us. Don’t you see?”

  “I see what you want. Yes.”

  “For his own selfish purposes, that old Hermit stole Danny's childhood. I’m telling you right now, I can’t and won’t allow it. I’m not going to permit every fool in this town to get their grubby hands on my boy! Poor Danny's been through enough already.”

  He waited for her rage to subside. “Molly…the Hermit…I don’t think he was just some crazy old geezer who kept him captive. I believe Daniel was being prepared for something incredibly important.”

  “Prepared? All he did was fill poor Danny's head with this doomsday shit.”

  Tripoli stared out into the darkness. He was thinking about the books, those elaborate volumes he had found in the hut. Those sheaves of parchment touched by the hands of unknown scribes.

  “I don’t want my boy being taken for a messiah and nailed up on any cross!” Molly all but spat out.“Prophets get killed. Even false ones. And I don’t want Danny dying for someone else's sins.” She kept seeing those hungry faces of the vigil, hearing their beseeching voices. “The world's going to pot. Okay. But is my little boy supposed to be the answer to everybody's problems? For God's sake,” she cried out, “he's not even six years old yet! Can’t people just leave us alone?!”

  Disentangling herself from Tripoli, she got up, went to the bedroom, and got her robe. Slipping it on, she tied it tightly at the waist and stood glaring down at him as he lay there exposed in his nakedness.

  “I really wish that you—you of all people—would stop. You’re feeding this thing like all the rest. And Danny’ll never have a chance for a normal life unless this ceases. He's just a regular…little! Boy!” she said, her hand slicing the air with each word. “Yes, he can read. And he's smart—damn smart! And he knows big words. And he can talk bird talk. Or squirrel talk—or whatever. But he's going to have to live like the rest of us cruddy human beings in this shitty world. And his name is Danny, do you hear me, DANNY! NOT Daniel! Not yet at least. He's still just a little kid.”

  “I didn’t mean to upset you,” he mumbled as he hunted for his clothes. She snapped on the lamp, and Tripoli winced in the brightness. “Where are my shorts?” he asked, still searching for them.

  They were behind the sofa, and Molly tossed them at him.

  “This is all crazy. Everyone is going totally nuts—including me,” she said, holding out his trousers in her clenched fist. “You’re guilt-stricken and depressed about the old man dying. Half the town thinks he's risen from the grave and that my little Danny is the next Mohammed or Francis of Assisi or God knows what. I’m tiptoeing around, trying to hold a job with Larry breathing down my neck and Danny whining about the noise of the fluorescent lights. I can’t even step into McDonald's anymore and have a lousy hamburger without being condemned as a flesh-eating murderer by my own son!” Molly was on the verge of hysterics. She knew she was being unreasonable, but she could no longer hold herself back.

  “I think I’d better go,” said Tripoli, buttoning up his shirt.

  “Look, I’m sorry,” she murmured as he reached for the front door of the trailer.

  He pulled the door shut behind him and a moment later could hear Molly turning the lock.

  The night was sultry, still beastly hot. The crickets and peepers and toads in the nearby swamp were going full blast. A half moon had risen over the Dolphs’ trailer, and the park was quiet. The only sounds were the buzz of overhead lamps, vast clouds of moths flocking in their white aura.

  In the light he could make out Danny's garden. Despite the drought, the tomatoes were swollen and red and looked luscious. Gingerly, he twisted one until it came free of the vine. It was the smallest of the lot, yet it was so large that he could barely contain it in his hand. When he bit into its supple flesh, the juices running down his hand and chin, he was suddenly overcome, the intensity of sweetness and tartness assaulting him.

  chapter eighteen

  In the early hours of daylight, Tripoli set off on the journey to Watertown. It was a straight shot directly north on Route 81, almost to the Canadian border. He hadn’t been there since he was a kid, and the only thing he remembered about it was that it was one godforsaken place in winter with deep, drifting snow, blinding whiteouts, and temperatures that plunged a good twenty degrees lower than even those in Ithaca. Whenever the weather reports were citing the lows for the state, it was always Massena or Watertown that won the booby prize.

  Yet now, in the middle of August, the sky was blazing blue with not a cloud in sight. The heat from outside was pouring in his window and the fields he glided past were all parched and brown. The corn was stunted, less than knee high, and it looked spindly and wilted. The trees, stressed by the heat and lack of moisture, had prematurely turned color and some were already shedding their leaves. Apparently, the drought was more severe here in the north.

  With traffic zipping past, Tripoli hugged the right lane, driving slowly as he continued to observe the countryside. Twice he ended up on the gravel shoulder and once he almost went off the road.

  Watertown was smaller than Ithaca, and it was easy for Tripoli to find the offices of the Jefferson County
Sheriff.

  “Well, well. The Ithaca Police Department?” said the sheriff, getting to his feet when Tripoli was shown in.“Not often we get to see you people up here.”

  The sheriff held out his hand. He was a big, beefy man with a bulbous nose and eyes so small they were little more than slits. In his polished boots and uniform, he looked more the image of a southern sheriff than an upstate cop. When they shook, his hand was twice the size of Tripoli's.

  “Take a load off your feet,” he said, showing Tripoli a seat. The sheriff put his feet up on his desk and leaned far back; the springs in his chair creaked.

  “So, what brings you here?” he asked, knotting his huge hands behind his head and revealing stains of sweat under his arms.

  “I’m looking for some information,” explained Tripoli. He told the sheriff how, on a kidnapping warrant, they had raided a hut on state lands. An old man was dead, and they had taken prints.

  “Yeah, I heard something about that. You had the troopers and Feds down there, right?”

  Tripoli nodded.

  “I don’t get it. What's this got to do with Watertown?” The sheriff offered him a cigarette and, when Tripoli refused, lit one up himself.

  “The old man's prints,” said Tripoli,“they came back as a missing person from Watertown.”

  “Missing?”The sheriff took a long, thoughtful drag. The smoke oozed slowly out his nostrils. Tripoli could see he was searching his memory.

  “It's not exactly recent.” Tripoli handed across the desk the report that Sisler had obtained.

  The sheriff studied it. “Nineteen thirty-eight?” he exclaimed, sitting up and looking straight at Tripoli.“You must be joking.”

  “I know it was a long time ago, but I was hoping you guys might have some sort of record.”

  “No way,” said the sheriff waving away the notion. He handed back the papers.“Nowadays all our files are computerized. We’ve got stuff that goes back to the seventies if you want. But this, this is way before the advent of—”

  “I realize that,” said Tripoli patiently.

  “We could try and dig, I suppose,” admitted the sheriff begrudgingly. “But those old files down there in the basement are a regular mess. Chances are you’d never find.…Hey, wait,” he said, interrupting himself. He rubbed his chin. “Thirty-eight it says, huh?”

  “Yes.”

  “That was the time when…” he got up and went to the outer office.

  Tripoli jumped to his feet and hurried behind.

  “Hey, Emery,” he called out, addressing a uniformed man old enough to be Tripoli's father. He sat at a cluttered desk in the corner, doing paper work.“Nineteen thirty-eight.”

  “Yeah?” asked the Deputy, slowly looking up.“What about it?”

  “Who was sheriff, then? Your Dad was on the force in l938, right?”

  Tripoli stood observing the exchange.

  “Thirty-eight?” the old Deputy scratched his head. “Must have been Denny Holbrow was sheriff. I think Dad worked for him before Frank Chapman took over. Yeah, yeah. It's gotta be Denny.”

  “That's what I thought,” said the Sheriff, nodding to himself. “Denny Holbrow,” he repeated, turning to Tripoli.

  “So?” said Tripoli.

  “He's still alive and kicking—well, sort of.”

  Molly didn’t hear it from Larry. She got the news from Ben. Which is what worried her.

  “We’re taking on two new people,” explained Ben as she rinsed some grapes for Danny in the office kitchen. “Somebody in marketing and another person in editorial.”

  “But we can handle the editorial.” Her heart was fluttering in her chest.

  “Larry says we’re growing and we’re going to need the extra staff.” Ben shrugged, avoiding her eyes.

  “Couldn’t I just take the grapes down in the courtyard and eat them there?” asked Danny, watching as the forgotten faucet continued to gush.

  “What?” said Molly, distracted.

  “The grapes. Can I eat them outside?”

  “No. No. You’ve got to…Ben?” she turned, but he was already gone.

  Molly took Danny back into the office.“Now read one of your books. You’ve got plenty of new books.” She slumped down into her chair, stared blankly at the pattern of multicolored helixes intertwining on her screen.

  “But I’ll just sit down there, and you can watch me from here. I promise I’ll be good. I’ll just stay really close.”

  “The answer is no!” said Molly loudly.“And I want you to stop nagging me. I’ve got tons of work to do and I can’t keep getting disturbed.” What was Larry up to? Was he positioning himself so he could get rid of her? In the pinch, when he needed her, she had always come through for him. Why was he doing this?

  Hunched over his desk, Danny looked to her like a whipped dog. “Oh, Honey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell at you like that. But I’ve got something serious on my mind and…”

  He got up and edged close to her, put his arm around her neck. “Can’t I help you?” he offered.

  “Honey, if you could just occupy yourself for a couple of minutes so I could think, that would be the biggest help of all.”

  Danny slunk off.

  Molly sat at her terminal, tried to concentrate on the screen, but her mind was still in turmoil. Her first impulse was to walk right into Larry's office and confront him, ask him what he really was up to. The business was growing, that was true, but where was the money for the new salaries? Was he contemplating growth or protecting himself for the time when he would have to let her go? Marketing and editorial. That's what she did.

  Molly just couldn’t get a decent night's sleep. She couldn’t get to sleep until late, and she was up early in the morning just after dawn. While Danny slept, she waxed the floors, cleaned windows, took out the recyclables, and emptied the trash. Outside, the sun was already up and a hot, dry wind was blowing, gathering up small vortices of dust.

  On her way back from the dumpster, the beefsteak tomatoes in Danny's garden caught her eye. Nearly ripe, they were enormous, not only for the time of year, but double the size of any she had ever seen. As she stepped among the plants to take a closer look, something caught her eye, something dangling from one of the trellised vines. It was a kind of earth-colored pouch, and when she opened it she discovered inside a piece of coarse paper. Unfolding it, she discovered a diagram with arrows and strange markings, what appeared to be geometric contours. Finally, she recognized what it was: a map.

  The others!

  “Leave him alone!” she cried and in a frenzy she tore it all into little bits and threw them into the air. Watching as the hot wind scattered the pieces across the park, she realized her mistake and regretted it.

  Tripoli found the old sheriff in the Hillview Nursing Home on the outskirts of Watertown. It was a long, low complex that looked more like a motel than an old age home.

  Denny Holbrow appeared to be in his late nineties. He was a shriveled piece of humanity, little more than a shroud of leathery skin hung on a long frame of bones. Holbrow had severe emphysema and sat in a chair with an oxygen cannula hooked into his nostrils. When he spoke, he did so in short bursts, needing to pause repeatedly to catch his breath. Tripoli pulled a chair close, facing him. He introduced himself. Asked the man how he was feeling. The old sheriff gave his bony shoulders a heave and stared back at Tripoli with rheumy eyes.

  “I understand,”Tripoli went on,“that you were sheriff in 1938.”

  The old man suddenly seemed to take interest.“Yeah. Yeah.” His features became animated and his eyes turned bright. “Nineteen thirty-six to 1952. To be exact,” he said.“Right through…the war.”

  Tripoli could hear the oxygen hissing from the tube; when the old sheriff spoke, his voice was gravelly. Although his physical condition was poor, his mind was obviously sharp.

  “There was a case in October of 1938,” Tripoli prompted, becoming hopeful.“A boy was missing.”

  “Matthew Roland,”
retorted the old guy, not missing a beat.

  Tripoli smiled.“So you remember.”

  “Hell, yes!” He sat up at attention.“Damnedest thing!”

  “Tell me,” said Tripoli eagerly.

  “Boy just disappeared. Into thin air.”

  “And?”

  “Wasn’t the first time, though.”

  “Oh?”Tripoli couldn’t hide his surprise.

  “First time was the big news,” he said, shaking his head at the recollection.“I was just a young fella then. Full of piss and vinegar.” Holbrow gave a raspy laugh and, staring out the window, he seemed to drift off into a reverie.

  “Go on, please. How old was he? I mean the first time he disappeared?”

  The old sheriff turned back. His eyes, Tripoli noticed, were actually a light green, just like his own. “I think Matthew was five. Six? Something…like that.”

  “And?”

  The old man took a couple of slow breaths, then continued. “Vanished. The boy lived…right in town…with the mother. Nice woman. Mary, I think it was. Yeah. Mary. Died ’bout three years after Matthew disappeared.”

  “And the father?”

  “Died. When the boy was little. Accident with a tractor or something. I can’t remember so well…anymore.”

  “You’re doing great. Really. Please, go on.”

  “Well…”The old man started coughing violently. It took him a good minute to clear his chest.