Kissing the Beehive

by Jonathan Carroll

  We spoke for a few minutes and then he handed the phone back to my ex-wife. I tried to reassure her but the hitch in my own voice said I didn't have any faith in what I was saying.

  Cass was gone. She was the most dependable, trustworthy person I knew. She kept not one but two pocket calendars with her day's business printed in careful block letters in both. She promptly wrote thank-you notes for everything. You could always set your watch by hers because it was never off.

  The moment I hung up, I called McCabe and then Durant to ask their advice. Frannie said to sit tight because even the police didn't start looking into a disappearance until twenty-four hours had passed.

  "I don't give a shit what procedure is, Frannie! It's my daughter. She's disappeared. The girl doesn't do things like this. Don't say sit tight. Tell me what I can do."

  "Take it easy, Sam. You want me to come over and sit with you?"

  I almost lost it. I had to lick my lips a few times and swallow repeatedly, or else I would have reached through the phone and torn his head off. "You're a cop, help me on this. Will you, Frannie? Just do whatever you can."

  "Gotcha. Hold on and I'll get to work. Give me some time. I'll get back to you as soon as I can."

  I hung up and rubbed both hands over my face. I had to calm down if I was going to accomplish anything. It was so hard. A ghastly picture grabbed hold of my shivering mind and refused to let go: an anchorman on the six o'clock TV news. Projected behind him is a huge photograph of Cassandra. He is solemnly describing what terrible thing has happened to her. Only later did I realize part of that vision came from having spent so much time thinking about the life of Pauline Ostrova, another young woman who went out one night and never came back. I have always hated those news photographs. Invariably TV chooses pictures that portray the victims as either beautiful or doing something festive or domestic – decorating the Christmas tree or eating a chicken wing at a picnic.

  In contrast to McCabe, Edward Durant reacted like a guardian angel. When I described what had happened, he got off the phone quickly, saying he had to talk to certain people. He called back half an hour later, having mobilized every troop he knew and, reading between the lines of what he said, calling in many favors from professional people who could help. I could imagine how great he must have been in court. His voice was calming and authoritative. You felt he was a man who would take care of everything. Here was the man who knew exactly what to do.

  Later Cassandra's mother called, indignantly asking who was this Edward Durant, and who the hell did he think he was, giving her the third degree? I tried to explain, but she was so tied in knots that only some of what I said seeped through to her. Once again, I had to ask for Ivan. I told him to tell her about Durant and that he was one of the few people who could actually help us in this situation. While we spoke, she kept shouting in the background.

  "Why are you talking? Ask him why he's not out there looking for her? Why aren't you doing something, Sam?"

  When my mother was in the hospital for the last time in her futile battle against cancer, she developed a certain pattern of behavior that is common among seriously ill people. I cannot remember the formal name of it now but that isn't important. In essence, what happens is because the patient's world has narrowed down to only that room and a daily schedule, the few things left take on tremendous importance. Where is my orange juice? The nurse promised me a glass of orange juice half an hour ago but it still isn't here! Fury, frustration, real bitterness. Did you move my Time magazine? I know I put it on that table but now it's gone! Frequently I saw that good-hearted, forgiving woman fly into a tearful rage at the lateness of a doctor, or the fact they had had green Jell-O for dessert two days in a row.

  It makes complete sense because they know their world is evaporating and the only thing they can do about it is to hold fast to their few remaining objects and events with the tenacity of a person clutching a life preserver a thousand miles out to sea. That doesn't make it any less searing to witness, however.

  In the two days we waited for news of Cass, I found myself acting exactly the same way my mother had. The house became my hospital room, the smallest detail my largest concern.

  At the beginning I was able to do some work. Writing has always been both my shelter and escape. When things went wrong in the past, I would scurry to my room, close the door and hide behind whatever work was in progress. The great thing about writing is it enables you to cast aside your own world for a while and live in the one you are creating. Raise the drawbridge against the outside world, pick up a pen and go to work.

  But not when your child is missing. Not when you know that outside your safe little study, inches beyond the glow of the green lamp and the drying ink on the half-filled page, the worst thing in the world might be happening while you are powerless to do anything about it. There was no way on earth I could either write my way through this nightmare or ignore the growing stillness around my heart.

  On that first day, I tried to cling to the writing. As long as words came out sounding right, as long as something familiar stayed logical and fixed, I was still in control; life still made some sense. But Pauline's story only made matters worse. Not very surprising.

  I desperately needed something concrete to do while waiting for the telephone to ring. I decided to clean the house. I think I vacuumed the large living room rug in forty-five seconds. But I mean thoroughly, not just a couple of quick shoves into the curled corners. I was the Road Runner moving through the house at such speed that if it had been a cartoon, smoke clouds would have been wafting up behind me. I sprinted from room to room wiping, mopping, polishing, scrubbing. I stepped on the fleeing dog twice in my crazed assault on the house. For once, his bad temper didn't put me off or shame me. His resentment was nothing compared to my frenzy, the maniacal need to keep moving, working, busy hands, not thinking. Trying so hard not to think. I was crazed, scared and enraged in equal measure, but helpless above all. Jesus God, I felt helpless.

  The first time I finished cleaning, the house shone. The second time I finished, it was in shock. I had taken a toothbrush to the cracks in the wooden floors, a steel brush to the stones in the fireplace. The blades on the exhaust fan above the stove shone, the dog's food bowls had been exorcised with liquid bleach. I realized things were on the verge of going too far when I decided to wash all my hats.

  I took a shower and two hours later a long bath, the telephone always within arm's reach. I watched television until there was nothing left but midnight-hour evangelists. I wept at what they said. I prayed whenever they told me to. Please God, let Cass come home. That first night I fell asleep on the floor, the TV remote still in my hand.

  The next day I would have taken the dog for a walk around the United States but was petrified to leave the house in case the call came. One moment the silent telephone was the monster ready to strike; the next, the only angel that could bring deliverance.

  For all her seriousness and good habits, Cass's secret vice was playing video games. Nintendo, Play Station, Sega . . . the brand name didn't matter. She loved them all – chest-pounding monkeys jumping over barrels, Ninja fighters throwing death punches, or knights weaving their way through mazes. I couldn't stand them. To make things worse, the noises they made were as annoying as anything ever heard on planet earth. I had bought Cass these games, but begged her to wear earphones whenever she played because half an hour of listening to the saccharine music from, say, Final Fantasy 3 drove me close to the border of dangerously unhinged.

  The second day, I had been playing Final Fantasy 3 since five in the morning when the telephone rang. I was so upset both by the ring and what the call might mean that suddenly I couldn't put down the controls for the game. For some seconds while the phone rang, I kept pressing the buttons to keep Super Mario alive. I was terrified, frozen in place.

  "Sam? It's Edward Durant. Veronica Lake has your daughter. That's for certain."

  "Veronica? What is she doing with Cass? Is she all
right?"

  As always, Durant's voice was composed and even. "We don't know yet. She picked her up outside your ex-wife's apartment in New York. Two witnesses saw it happen. Veronica got out of a yellow cab just as Cassandra was about to enter the building. I assume she had a convincing story to lure her into the car. Didn't you say they don't like each other?"

  I was about to say no, but then remembered with ice-cold clarity Veronica mentioning how they'd spent an afternoon together and that Cass wanted her to meet Ivan. I told him that.

  "Yes, well, then she convinced Cass to go with her. That's all I know now, Sam. But it's a beginning and it's concrete. The police know who to look for now. They've already checked Veronica's apartment but didn't find anything that could help. One last thing, and it's a difficult but necessary question: Do you think Veronica would hurt her?"

  "Normally I'd say no, Edward. This doesn't have anything to do with Cass. But now? I don't know. It's another way for Veronica to get to me."

  "Then we must assume she will be in touch with you about it. All right, let me get off now. I'll call as soon as anything new comes up. And you do the same."

  I called McCabe and told him. He sounded both surprised and irritated. "How the fuck did he find out? I pulled every string I know, but nobody came up with dick."

  "Frannie, Durant was a federal prosecutor for thirty years. He must know hundreds of people who could help. And you said yourself, cops always wait a day before they go into action. Durant started as soon as I talked to him."

  "So did I. I'm just being a cop, Sam. Anything that makes me wonder, I ask about. Try to understand that, and if I come across as a jerk it's only 'cause I care. That's all, nothin' more."

  My brain and soul were spinning in a centrifuge, getting the full flap and flop. The worst part was I didn't know if it would ever end.

  The doorbell rang. I hoped when I opened it there would be Cass, smiling, already assuring me all was okay. She was back, the nightmare was over. Instead, a boy in a Mohawk haircut wearing a brilliant lilac parka stood on the porch holding a flashy bouquet of flowers. "Mr. Bayer?"

  "Yes."

  "Flowers for you."

  "Who are they from?"

  "Dunno."

  Back inside, I unwrapped the flowers and searched inside the arrangement until I found the card.

  "Hi, Sam! Don't worry about Cassandra. I know where they are and will take care of everything. Just keep working on my book."

  First I called the store and asked where the flowers had come from. I was given the number of a New York florist. After much hemming and hawing, New York admitted the sender – a young, nice-looking Indian man – had paid in cash, given his name as David Cadmus, and used Veronica's address.

  When I called and told McCabe, he gave a long whistle. "I would not want to be Veronica Lake today. The killer's probably been watching her a long time. And now she pissed him off. Taking Cass keeps you from concentrating on his book. Notice how he called it 'my'? We gotta find them fast."

  Durant went ballistic. I'd never heard him so angry. "She should have known he'd have her watched! Didn't she understand that after being beaten up?"

  "How does it change things, Edward?"

  "I don't know. Maybe it's good. But I don't like unpredictables and now we've got two of them to deal with."

  Because there was nothing else to do while waiting, I paced the house. I wanted to leave so badly. Get up and walk out into the world where I might be able to do something. Not stay stuck and helpless in a stale house that exuded only tension and fear. But the damned phone was there and I didn't dare stray from it.

  I ended up back in the study, staring at the manuscript. I didn't touch it; I didn't want to touch it.

  If I had never begun the book, David Cadmus would still be alive. Cassandra would not be in danger now. The trouble between Veronica and me began when she decided we should collaborate on the story. From that point, everything went bad.

  While I was zoned out thinking about all this, the phone rang again. I picked it up but wasn't really clearheaded when I said hello.

  "Hi, Sam!"

  "Where is my daughter?"

  "She's with me. She's safe."

  "Where is she, Veronica, God damn it! Don't tell me she's safe. You kidnapped her. If you have problems with me, okay, but let her go. Tell me right now where she is and don't fuck around anymore." I was horrified at my demanding voice and wished to God I could have taken it all back the moment I said it.

  "I will, I promise you I will. But there are things I have to tell you first. They're so important! I know you don't believe me, but just even for a few minutes . . . Sam, this is so important for you."

  "I don't want to hear it! Just tell me where Cass is and then get away from us."

  There was a silence followed by a scraping sound. Cassandra came on the line. "Dad?"

  My body froze with joy and relief. "Cass! Honey, are you all right?"

  "Yes, I'm fine. Dad, don't worry. Everything is okay. Please do what Veronica asks. She won't tell me what it is, but I know it's important. She says there was no other way you'd talk to her and that's why she took me. But I'm okay. I'm fine. Really!

  "Dad, we've been talking and talking. I was so wrong about her! She's led the most incredible life! I mean, I've been sitting here the whole time, listening, with my jaw hanging down. She's made documentaries, she's lived all over the world, she was in the Malda Vale awhile . . . She's done so much. She knows so much. It's amazing.

  "I was really mad at her at first, but not anymore. And she loves you, she loves you so much. You've got to do this one thing for her. If not for her, then do it for me. She wasn't going to call you yet because she's so afraid, but I made her. Please meet her and then everything will be all right. I know it. I'm sure of it."

  "Cass? One two three?"

  "Yes, absolutely. One two three."

  It was our secret code. We had worked it out when she was a child. It was our way of asking if everything was all right without having to say it, in case the wrong ears were listening.

  "I'll meet her. But you don't know what she wants to talk about?"

  She giggled. It was the most extraordinary thing. In the middle of all that anxiety and dread came the holy sound of my daughter's silly laugh. I knew then for sure she really was okay.

  "Veronica won't tell me! You still won't tell, will you?" From somewhere nearby, I heard Veronica say, "Nope," and both of them laughed. Like two girls jammed into a phone booth together sharing the phone while talking to some boys.

  "All right, put her back on. But Cass, for God's sake be careful. No matter how much you like her, she gets unbalanced sometimes. I love you. More than life. I'm so glad to know you're all right."

  "I'm fine, Dad. I swear! One two three."

  The phone changed hands again on their side, wherever the hell that was. "Sam?"

  "Where do you want to meet?"

  "At the Tyndall house in Crane's View. Can you make it in two hours?"

  "Yes. Veronica, don't you dare do anything to her."

  "Never. She's a special girl. But don't bring anyone, Sam. Don't tell anyone." Abruptly the phone went dead. That was all right though because I couldn't catch my breath.

  Snow began to fall ten minutes after I got on the road. Luckily most of the drive to Crane's View was on the parkway because the stuff was beginning to stick with a vengeance.

  Clutching the steering wheel as tightly as I could, my head locked in one position, I glared through the windshield and tried not to crash into everything. A mighty sixteen-wheel trailer truck bombed by in the fast lane, the jolt from its airstream slamming my car. I wanted to be that truck driver then. Oblivious to the weather, sure that my tons of truck and cargo would keep me glued to any road. The guy probably had country-and-western music howling from ten cranked-up speakers in his cab. He was probably singing "Goodnight Irene" and steering with only one hand.

  I hated Veronica for seducing a young, trustin
g woman into believing her love, that foul black soup, was really ambrosia she would willingly fill my cup with until she died. I pictured the two of them sitting in a grimy roadside diner somewhere, working on their fourth cups of thin coffee while Veronica hung her head and spun magnificent lies about what went wrong with our love. Cass, the great listener, would sit very still, but there would be tears in her eyes. When Veronica finished on some triumphantly tragic note, my converted daughter would reach over and tightly squeeze the other's lifeless hand.

  Luckily my car hit a patch of ice and for a few blood-freezing seconds slid left, right, back to center. My mind burned clean of all Veronica thoughts. First get there. Concentrate on the road. Get there.

  Snow was flying wildly all around when I drove into Crane's View. The scene would have been beautiful, worth a stop and a long look round, if the day had been different. As it was, I barely kept control of the car. Every few minutes it decided to ice-skate, so I had to keep the speed down to a crawl.

  The day was already full of too many highs and lows but looking back now, one of the images that stays most firmly in my mind was driving down Elizabeth Street. A mile or so from the Tyndall house, I saw a lone figure trudging through the snow like a soldier on winter maneuvers. Hup hup hup. There was nothing else around – no cars, no people, the only sign of life a traffic light forlornly blinking its yellow warning to no one. Just this one person and what the hell was he doing, out walking in this blizzard? I couldn't help slowing even further to have a look at the hearty goof. Johnny Petangles. Wearing only a white dress shirt and black trousers, bare hands and a Boston Red Sox baseball cap pulled down low. I loved him. Thank God for something normal today. Loony Johnny out on his daily rounds in the middle of a Yukon blow. His mouth was moving. I wondered what television advertisement he was repeating, what song he was singing to the wind and snow and arctic emptiness around us. Just Johnny and me out in the swirl. If I stopped to offer him a ride he would only look at me blankly and shake his head.