Deck the Halls

by Mary Higgins Clark

  That part of the plan has worked, C.B. grudgingly admitted to himself, as he looked nervously in the rearview mirror. And the next time I turn onto this road, I’ll have a million bucks in the backseat.

  He made the turn, but drove at a snail’s pace until he was sure there was no one behind him. Then he picked up speed for the remaining stretch to the parking area. Once there, he left the car and walked down the dock to the houseboat. The wind was increasing and the temperature dropping. The weather report he had heard on the radio had indicated there was still a chance the storm would blow out to sea.

  I don’t care where it blows, as long as by then, I’ve blown out of here with the money, he thought.

  The footing was tricky getting on the houseboat. The current was pulling the vessel out, then slapping it back, hard against the dock. Who could possibly want one of these torture chambers? he asked himself as he tried to hoist his out-of-shape body from the pier onto the deck. There was one frightening moment when his legs were pulled into a near-perfect split, one leg on the pier, the other headed out to sea with the boat.

  “You’d have to be Gumby to do this as a steady diet,” C.B. wailed aloud as he finally got both feet planted on the deck. But this nightmare is almost over, he promised himself as he unlocked the door to the cabin.

  Ten minutes later, at precisely 6:00 P.M., he dialed Regan’s cell phone. When she answered, in his rehearsed, guttural tone he ordered, “Keep driving north. Your father and Rosita are fine. As a matter of fact, they even listened to your mother on Imus this morning . . . Isn’t that right, Luke?” He held the phone up to Luke’s mouth.

  “I did hear your mother this morning, Regan.” Let her get what I’m trying to tell her, Luke prayed. “I can just see myself reading your favorite book to you when you were little.”

  “That’s enough!” C.B. said. “Here’s Rosita.”

  “Regan, who’s with my boys?”

  Before Regan could answer, C.B. pulled the phone back. “Circle the park, Regan. I’ll call you back.”

  He broke the connection. “I’m out of here,” he told Luke and Rosita. “Wish me luck.”

  Her father and Rosita were still alive. The kidnappers were going to collect the ransom. Regan had not realized just how desperately she had feared that something would cause them to panic, and there would be no further word from them.

  Circle the park. That was what he had told her to do. There was heavy traffic on the winding park road as far as the Seventy-second Street exit, where a steady stream of cars turned onto Fifth Avenue. Many others veered left to the West Side. Far fewer continued driving north.

  Not good, Regan thought. With so little traffic, it will be easier to spot that I’m being followed. Near 110th Street the road curved west, then headed back south. The caller hadn’t given her a time limit for the drive through the park, but neither had he said to hurry. He’s probably smart enough to know that the cops can fix a location on a cell phone if it’s on for more than a minute or so, she thought. That’s why he barely let them say anything to me.

  Dad heard Mom on Imus this morning, she thought. They had talked about the children’s books Mom had sent to Imus for his son. But why did Dad talk about reading to me as a child? He must have known he only had a few seconds. And he mentioned my favorite book. Which one was it? I can’t even remember myself.

  She was passing the exit to Ninety-sixth Street on the West Side. The traffic was picking up.

  Last night Mom told me she kept thinking about the days when she and Dad were just starting out. She mentioned their first apartment and selling her first short story. Dad’s obviously doing that same kind of reminiscing.

  Regan blinked back the tears that started to well in her eyes.

  She was passing Tavern on the Green. The restaurant, always brilliantly illuminated, was particularly festive with Christmas lights. When she was little, it had been a special treat to ride the carousel near the Central Park Zoo and then have lunch there.

  She was at the southern end of the park, on a strip of road running parallel to Central Park South. She had made almost a complete circle.

  The cell phone rang again.

  “Sailing, sailing, over the bounty Maine,” a goggled Petey sang as he steered his boat north under the George Washington Bridge. But then as the cold, wet air stung his exposed cheeks, he switched to the song he remembered from his first-grade play: “Oh, it’s so thrilly when it’s chilly in the winter—”

  Clunk!

  “Iceberg alert!” Petey yelled as the boat bounced up and down. Once again he switched tunes. “ . . . my heart will go onnnnn.” He had seen Titanic three times. If I’d been steering that baby, we’d have made it, he thought.

  Petey felt free as a bird. It seemed as if he had the whole river to himself, and he was making great time. He patted the side of the boat. “I’m going to miss you when I’m in Brazil. We’ve had a lot of fun together. I sure hope the cops find you a good home.”

  He was almost at the top of Manhattan. “Spuyten Duyvil, here I come,” he called as he veered off to enter the narrow tidal strait that connected the Hudson and the Harlem Rivers.

  “Feels like I’m in a washing machine,” he muttered as the swirling currents fought to twist and turn his aging craft.

  “I made it!” he said triumphantly fifteen minutes later, as he tied the boat to the seawall at 127th Street, well hidden under the Triborough Bridge.

  Where do all these people think they’re going? C.B. fumed as he waited in a line to pay the toll at the George Washington Bridge. They should be home wrapping their presents. Of course, I’ll be unwrapping mine in a couple of hours, he mused. The thought cheered him up.

  He had written out the instructions he intended to give Regan Reilly. I hope you like to zigzag, he thought, because that’s what you’ll be doing until seven o’clock.

  He checked his watch. It was 6:20. Time to call Regan again, but not until he was out of the vicinity of the bridge. He wanted to be sure to get a clear connection.

  As soon as he reached the Harlem River Drive, C.B. pulled out the cell phone. “Time to see the pretty trees on Park Avenue, Regan,” he said when she answered.

  “What do you think they’re up to, Jack?” Joe Azzolino asked his boss as the kidnappers’ instruction to Regan to head to Park Avenue was relayed to them from the eavesdropping base at headquarters. “Eagle” was the code name assigned to the operation.

  “The obvious answer would be that one of them is tailing her and is trying to spot our cars,” Jack said. So why do I have a gut feeling that they’ve got something up their sleeves that we haven’t figured out? he asked himself. They were never going to be able to pinpoint the location of the cell phone. Both calls had been much too brief.

  The next call came at 6:35. Regan was told to leave Park Avenue, go up Third Avenue, pull over at 116th Street, and wait.

  Jack keyed his transmitter. “Eagle one to all units. Lay back. Give her a little room, but keep her in sight.”

  Ensconced in the backseat, Alvirah had been remarkably quiet so far, mainly because she had been trying to figure out something that had been bothering her for the last half hour. Finally it came to her, and suddenly she knew why it had struck a chord this morning when she listened to the tape of the kidnappers’ first call. One of Nora Regan Reilly’s early books had dealt with a kidnapping in Manhattan. In that story, the victim’s wife was told to drive up Sixth Avenue from Greenwich Village and enter the park at Central Park South. It’s the coincidence of the Central Park South entrance that’s been jiggling in my mind, she thought.

  When she reached 116th Street, Regan pulled over and double-parked. Azzolino stopped their car at 115th Street and usurped the spot another driver was about to claim. They waited silently.

  As more of the plot of Nora’s book came back to her, Alvirah realized that in that story, the kidnapper had the wife driving back and forth from the East Side to the West Side. What he really had been doing, howev
er, was maneuvering her farther and farther north, and nearer and nearer to the Harlem River, Alvirah remembered.

  In the novel there was something about leaving the ransom money near the river. Then what? she wondered. She had read the book so long ago, it was difficult to remember the details. Alvirah frowned in concentration. I’ve got to put my thinking cap on. But first she thought she should at least say something about the similarity of what had happened in Nora Regan Reilly’s novel and what was happening now.

  “Don’t the police have a boat unit on Randall’s Island?” she asked.

  “Yes, we have a Harbor Unit there,” Jack said without turning his head. “Why?”

  “Well, it’s just that Randall’s Island is right next to the Triborough Bridge. It would only take one of your boats a few minutes to travel across the river.”

  “That’s right.” There was a hint of impatience in his voice.

  “You see, in one of Nora’s books that I read a long time ago, the ransom drop was . . .”

  At the same moment they heard, “Eagle base to all units. She’s been instructed to continue north on Third.”

  “In Nora’s book,” Alvirah continued, “the victim’s wife drove down a dock or a pier or something and put the money on a seawall. Somebody was waiting in a boat and reached up and grabbed it.”

  A trailer truck had been racing the light and was now caught in gridlock halfway across Third Avenue. Regan had just cleared the intersection before the truck crossed. Now they were blocked by the truck and could no longer see her. “Eagle one to all units,” Jack snapped into the transmitter, “we’re locked in. Don’t lose her.”

  “Jack . . .”

  “Alvirah, not now, please.”

  The trailer truck was moving slowly past. Azzolino floored the accelerator. Even running the light, they were now a full block behind Regan.

  They were passing 123rd Street.

  Somehow Alvirah was absolutely sure of what would happen next. Dollars to donuts, Regan would be instructed to drive on a lonely road along a dock on the Harlem River. They’ll tell her to leave the money on a seawall.

  “Jack, I know you’ll think I’m crazy, but you’ve got to listen to me,” she said. “Those kidnappers have read Nora’s books, and they’re following one of her plots. You’ve got to get some of your men over to the river around the Triborough Bridge right away. There’s a boat there waiting to make the pickup.”

  We need this, Joe Azzolino thought.

  “Eagle base to all units. She’s been told to take a right on 127th Street.”

  Marginal Street, Alvirah thought. That’s the road she’ll be told to take.

  “Jack, listen to me. You’ve got to get a boat on the river or you’ll lose them.”

  “Alvirah, for God’s sake—”

  “Eagle base to all units. She’s been told to drive east and take the exit . . .”

  “ . . . to Marginal Street,” Alvirah finished with him.

  Marginal Street appeared to be not so much a road as a long, bumpy, desolate dock. Regan drove along it slowly, not sure how far to go.

  The phone rang again. “Drive as far as the Triborough Bridge and stop.” Again the connection was broken.

  Wild with tension, C.B. phoned Petey. “She’ll be there in thirty seconds!”

  Petey squealed with delight, then lowered his voice until it seemed to be coming from somewhere deep in his toes. “Ready, partner.” He was proud of himself that, even in this moment of great stress, he remembered to disguise his voice.

  Regan’s eyes darted from one side to the other, but she saw no sign of anyone nearby. She reached the underspan of the bridge and stopped. Overhead she knew hundreds of cars were passing to and from the three boroughs, but this place felt so removed from all that activity that it might have been on another planet.

  She looked to either side of her car, then in the rearview mirror. This road was so isolated that the appearance of any other vehicle would make it apparent to the kidnappers that she was being followed. Don’t come too close, Jack, she thought, you’ll scare them off. I can handle myself.

  The cell phone rang and she grabbed it. “I’m here,” she said.

  “Get out of the car. Take the duffel bag to the seawall and put it down on the edge. Return to your car. Back up slowly. When all the money is safely in our hands, you will learn the whereabouts of your father and Rosita. If it is not . . .”

  The phone went dead.

  Regan got out of the car, walked around it, and opened the passenger door. Jack had told her the duffel bag weighed twenty-two pounds. She grabbed it by the handle, lifted it in her arms, and carried it to the seawall. As she leaned over to lay it down, she realized that there was a boat tied to the wall only a few feet away.

  A boat, she thought with dismay. They’re making the pickup in a boat! The mobile unit from the Major Case Squad would be useless.

  But the duffel bag was bugged, and the overhead aircraft would follow it to its destination. Pray God that that was where they were keeping Dad and Rosita.

  Wanting desperately to see anything that might later help her identify the kidnappers, Regan allowed herself a fleeting sideward glance toward the boat as she straightened up. The only thing she could discern was that whoever was on the vessel was wearing a wet suit.

  Before she could get back in the car, she heard a voice from the boat call out, “Thank you very much, Regan.”

  “Eagle one to all units. Stay back. Pickup is probably by boat.” They could see Regan’s car roll to a halt nearly two blocks down the dock.

  “She’s been told to get out of the car and leave the money on the seawall,” Eagle base reported.

  “Hook me up to the Harbor Unit,” Jack snapped.

  Alvirah listened as in terse, urgent phrases, Jack told the commander there what he needed. “Follow the boat they’re in . . . no running lights . . . do not apprehend . . .”

  “Jack, Regan is backing up. She must have made the drop.” Azzolino pointed to the BMW, which was slowly coming toward them.

  Jack jumped out and was opening Regan’s door before the wheels stopped rolling. “They were on a boat.” It was not a question.

  “There appeared to be just one of them. He was wearing a wet suit,” Regan said, shaking her head. “I couldn’t believe it. That weirdo called out to me by name to say thank you. It was chilling. He sounded almost like a little kid.”

  “He’s a little kid who is very familiar with your mother’s books,” Jack said grimly. He looked out at the water. A Harbor Unit boat, its running lights off, could be seen heading down the river.

  By now that guy’s probably a mile away and ditching the boat, Jack thought. Our only hope now is the tracer in the duffel bag.

  I should have listened to Alvirah.

  Petey the Painter had never experienced such excitement. His head was pounding, his brain was throbbing, his ears were ringing, his hands were trembling. He had never been so deliriously happy in his life.

  There was a million dollars at his feet! A million dollars for him and C.B. to have a good time with. He wished they were going to Brazil tonight. He really deserved a vacation. The Copacabana, he thought. Beautiful girls! He heard that a lot of them went topless on the beaches down there. Woo-woo!

  Inside his gloves his fingers were freezing. They’d warm up when he was counting the money.

  The river’s current was going north. But bucking against it didn’t slow him down. The pier at 111th Street was right ahead. And so was the pedestrian bridge he would use to cross over the FDR Drive.

  C.B. would be waiting there for him in the car. He would jump in with the money, and off they’d go.

  He pulled up to the pier and quickly tied the boat to it. Now for the tricky part, he thought. He stood up, his feet parted, and braced himself to pick up the bag and hoist it to the pier. He reached down and cradled the bag lovingly in his arms. No mother had ever held her newborn with more tenderness.

  It was time
to go. Whenever God closes a door he opens a window, Petey thought sadly as he looked at his boat for the last time. Overwhelmed, he bent over to kiss the bow. As his lips touched the briny surface, a wind-whipped wave slapped against the boat. Petey felt himself toppling forward.

  SPLASH!

  As Petey belly-flopped into the water, his precious cargo went flying out of his hands, landing a few feet beyond his reach. The swirling current of the East River now claimed it as its own and began to whisk it northward.

  Desperately, Petey began a furious dog-paddle in an effort to retrieve it but within seconds realized it was hopeless. The current was trying to suck him under. He managed to get back to the boat, which he no longer felt like kissing, and grabbed onto the side for dear life.

  What can I do? What can I do?! he thought, his mind a jumble of confusion.

  There was only one thing he could do, he thought, gasping for breath. Drag himself up to the pier, cross the pedestrian bridge, and meet C.B. He’ll get over it, he kept telling himself. After all, it’s only money, and I could have drowned.

  Five minutes later, a soggy Petey was tapping on the window of C.B.’s rental car. “I’ve got good news and bad news,” he began.

  “You’ve done everything you can,” Alvirah assured Regan as they drove from Marginal Street to the hospital. “And you said the guy in the boat sounded polite and even thanked you. That’s a good sign.”

  “I hope so. Alvirah, I just can’t believe these people got the idea for the location of the ransom drop from one of my mother’s books. I read that book so long ago, I’d forgotten all about it.”

  “You’d have been just a kid when it came out.”

  Regan sighed. “My mother has written so many books, even she forgets the details of plots from twenty years ago. I’m trying to think how that one ended.”