The Tutor

by Peter Abrahams

  She called the rec center, where you signed up for the archery classes.

  “Rec center.”

  “Hi. I’m in archery with Jeanette. Is it true she’s missing?”

  “We have no information.”

  “But is it true? Missing where?”

  “I’m sorry.” Click.

  Missing where? What kind of missing? And Zippy was missing too. Ruby sat down at the kitchen table, sat down hard, as though her legs had suddenly forgotten the timing, or lost their strength. She put her head in her hands, tried to think. Was this another case, tied to all the others? That was her first thought, an obvious one, at least in her mind. But didn’t Holmes warn against obvious things? There is nothing more deceptive than the obvious something or other, he told Watson; maybe in “The Boscombe Valley Mystery.” Also it was childish: Jeanette was a person, meaning this was on another level. On the other hand, the levels had been going up and up the whole time: Varsity Jacket, Anonymous Caller, Zippy, Jeanette. Was there something that tied it all together? She had a crazy feeling she knew all she needed to know already, that if she just smacked herself in the head everything would fall into place, neatly unscrambled. Ruby smacked herself in the head, open-handed but pretty hard. Nothing happened.

  She called the pound. “Have you found Zippy yet?”

  “You’re the little girl?”

  “I’m the girl.”

  “Still got your flyer. I said we’d call.”

  “You could have lost it.”

  “Is this the number?” He said their number.

  “Yeah.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Ruby.”

  “We’ll give you a holler, Ruby, moment we know anything.”

  “But where is he?”

  “Lots of possibilities.”

  He’d said that the last time. “Like what?”

  “Specially if you’re a dog. Say you smell something kinda inviting in a backyard shed, you mosey in and then the wind comes up and blows the door shut. Boom, locked in, easy as that. There’s a possibility right there. Had one like that just the other—”

  “Thanks,” said Ruby, hanging up. Moseying in: Zippy to a T. She would have to think like a dog, specifically one very special dog she knew better than anybody.

  Ruby put on outdoor things—blue jacket with yellow trim, yellow hat with blue stars, mittens, boots—shoved her magnifying glass in a pocket, went outside. First stop, the driveway: he’d been out shoveling with Julian. Shoveling usually got Zippy pretty hyper; lots of bounding at shovelfuls of flying snow, lots of that crazy starting-and-stopping thing he did, lots of barking. So he’d have been practically out of his mind already when the car went by and the dog in it barked at him. Or maybe Zippy barked first, that would be it, began the whole thing. Then he took off. In what direction? She thought back, remembered Julian’s voice cracking: I ran after him, of course, calling and calling—Ruby could practically see it—but he just kept going and I finally lost sight of him on Indian Ridge. She could practically see it, but not quite: had Julian been smoking at the time, or not? A little detail that couldn’t possibly matter, but it blurred things just the same.

  Ruby walked down Robin Road, turned onto Indian Ridge. She kept going, around the curve where Julian must have lost sight of Zippy, and over the hill where the woods came back in view. There were some nice houses on this part of Indian Ridge, like this one with new shingles and green shutters. Wouldn’t Zippy have been getting a little pooped by now? Besides, the car would have been long gone. So what would Zippy do? He’d stop.

  Ruby stopped. And then what? He’d just stand there in the middle of the road, tongue hanging out and panting, waiting for some thought to come into his head. Ruby moved out to the middle of the road. She closed her eyes, made her mind a blank—did that by picturing a squeegee sliding across a window—and waited for a thought, the first random thought, whatever it was. She skipped the tongue-hanging-out and panting part—that would have been ridiculous.

  The first thought came, and it was pizza. She opened her eyes—good thing, because the mail truck was just coming over the hill—and stepped to the side of the road. Pizza! Singularity, Holmes said, was almost invariably a clue, and Zippy was singularly interested in pizza. And what specific pizza had recently entered his life, would be the first thing he thought of, now that he was out and free? Thick-crust sausage and pepperoni. But there was more—after that slice, Sergeant D’Amario had brought him a whole box of the Hawaiian kind with pineapple and ham. A pizza bonanza, in Zippy’s mind: he’d be able to hold that thought for days and days, the knowledge of a pizza motherlode, out there in the woods. What would he do? Get to the woods by the shortest route possible, maybe not running, wiped as he was from the car chase, but possibly in that purposeful trot he had, even when there was no purpose whatever. Ruby walked toward the nice house with the new shingles and green shutters.

  Two newspapers in plastic bags lay halfway up the driveway. Ruby stepped over them, kept going around the side. The house backed onto the woods just like hers, had a feeder just like hers, with a cardinal watching from the perch—she hadn’t seen her own cardinal in ages—but unlike hers also had a shed. A cute shed, with new shingles and a little green door, closed, that matched the shutters of the house.

  “Zippy?” Ruby’s heart started pounding and she was on the run. There was one of those metal pieces for a lock on the door—rasp, clasp, hasp, something—but no lock. She could see how the whole thing happened, just like the animal control officer said. Ruby turned the knob, pushed the door open.

  “Zippy?” But no Zippy, no sign of Zippy, no life of any kind. It was still inside the shed, and smelled like a library. Cardboard boxes were stacked neatly in rows along the back, floor to ceiling. They all said Income Tax on the side, and then a year, the earliest one, down at the bottom left, being 1949. That gave Ruby a creepy feeling. She got out and shut the door.

  No Zippy. That didn’t mean the shed idea was wrong. It didn’t mean the pizza idea was wrong either. Pizza was right. She knew Zippy. Pizza was one of those links in the chain—so many links now, so many chains, she felt like Jacob Marley dragging them around—a link that thoroughly understood would reveal all the befores and afters. Pizza had drawn Zippy into the woods.

  Ruby went in after him. No actual trail led from the shed into the woods—if the people in the house were paying taxes in 1949, they’d probably been in wheelchairs for years—so Ruby just wandered through the trees, bearing sort of left, which she thought was the direction of the pond. She saw tracks in the snow, small shallow ones like brush strokes, probably made by squirrels, bigger sloppy dog ones—but she had no idea what Zippy’s looked like specifically—and once those neat precise triangular kind that meant deer. She’d seen deer several times out here, but not for a long time; nice to know they were still around, now that the woods had been turned into a crack house.

  Ruby came to a path, followed it to another path that seemed familiar, took that, went up and around a bend and presto: the pond. A born tracker. Cortès and Pizarro must have had trackers, but Ms. Freleng had left that out. Either they’d been local trackers, in which case the native people had helped cause their own downfall, or they’d been Spanish, in which case the Conquistadors had at least been good at something. She walked around the shore of the pond, completely unfrozen today, pale under a cloudy sky, toward the big rock where Zippy had found that first slice of sausage and pepperoni.

  No pizza now, all cleaned up, but Zippy couldn’t have anticipated that. He’d be puzzled. There’d be some clawing around, although she didn’t see any signs of it, but snow came and went, changing everything, and he’d be making that whiny noise he made when he’d reached his wit’s end, which wasn’t a long distance, and then—

  Ruby saw something a few yards ahead, a shiny little blue thing, wedged into the bark of a tree root that crossed the path, sticking out of the snow. She knelt, took off her mitten, picked it up: a
dog tag in the shape of a heart. On one side, under the year, it said: West Mill Vet, Rabies Vacc. On the other side, it said: Zippy.

  Ruby looked around. The tag felt cold in her hand. Zippy had been here, no doubt about it, here at ground zero. But then what? She gazed at the pond. Zippy didn’t like the pond, would hardly ever fetch anything, except on the hottest days of summer, or that one time she’d tried tossing in Cheez-Its. He’d gone in dozens of times for the Cheez-Its—they floated on the surface, making it easy—finishing the whole pack. A tiny memory, just a trifle, but that was her method, the observation of trifles leading to a conclusion. The conclusion: Zippy would go in the pond for food any old time.

  Suppose the pond had been frozen, which made sense since it was partly frozen yesterday and ice-free today, and the DPW guys had maybe missed a pizza slice, or a whole box, that the wind had blown out onto the ice. The wind: a factor, as the animal control officer had predicted. What would Zippy do? Pretty obvious. Easy to visualize the scene: Zippy out on the ice, falling through somewhere out in the middle where the ice was thin, paws scrabbling frantically, panic; the effort came in trying not to see it. But she had to know. Ruby walked home, Zippy’s tag warming in her fist.

  Ruby returned to the pond dragging her SnoTube, the round fat one big enough for two, inflated as full as she could get it with the bike pump. On the SnoTube lay her mask and snorkel, faded a little from the Bahamian sun. She had no intention of going in, nothing crazy—the water was much too cold—but going on was different. She knew where to draw the line.

  Ruby took off her jacket, laid it by the rock. She took off her mittens, rolled up the sleeves of her lone Abercrombie sweater—she was still too small for Abercrombie, but she’d had to have it—and pushed the SnoTube down to the edge of the water. Then she spat in her mask—a nice man called Moxie at the Junkanoo Beach Hut had shown her the whole routine—swished it around in the water, yes, very cold, and put it on top of her head, snorkel hanging down the side. After that, she lay prone on the SnoTube, shoved off with her legs, and whoosh—she was skimming across the pond.

  Ruby paddled a little, but not too much because the water was so cold, steering toward the middle of the pond. When she got there, she lowered the mask, stuck the snorkel in her mouth, wriggled forward to the front of the SnoTube and lowered her face into the water.

  Wow. That woke her up. But the mask stayed on tight, just her cheeks and chin going numb. She breathed through the snorkel, peered down into the depths of the pond, saw nothing except stuff that looked like dust motes. No sign of the bottom. How deep was the pond, anyway? Funny how she’d never brought her snorkeling stuff in the summer, only thinking of it when they went to the ocean.

  Ruby paddled a little bit one way, a little bit another, didn’t see the bottom or anything else, except for the dust mote things. All of a sudden something moved, way down there. The SnoTube passed over before she could get a good look. Ruby wriggled a little farther forward, got her face in a little deeper, better for looking back, and there it was: a fish, on its way up. A brown fish—in the winter!—with delicate fins, sort of blue, not the electric blue she’d seen in the Bahamian—

  Then she was in the water. So fast: like a giant wave roared up and tipped her over. Down she went, jolted through and through with cold so shocking she couldn’t move a muscle, do anything but gasp. Gasping meant swallowing water. She swallowed water, coughed, swallowed more, sank, boots filling up, clothes so heavy. On the way down, Ruby caught a glimpse of the bottom, a jumble of beer cans, bottles, tires, weeds, tree trunks, a ski pole. Then another jolt went through her, this a desperate one from inside. Ruby’s arms and legs started moving, thrashing around; sounds of struggle bubbled past her ears. She came to the surface, coughing and gasping, glanced wildly around for the SnoTube, spotted it on the far side of the pond, bobbing by the shore. The wind again: she was no smarter than Zippy, maybe dumber.

  Ruby thrashed. Mask and snorkel gone, boots gone, socks gone, Abercrombie sweater gone, she thrashed herself to shore, pulled her practically naked body up in the snow. She reached for her jacket, shivering, teeth clacking together like those Spanish dancer things, dropped it, picked it up with both numb hands, tried to put it on. Wouldn’t go on. She wrapped it around her and got herself home, running, stumbling, crying a little, barefoot in the snow.

  No one home. She had a long hot bath, climbed into bed, turned on her TV. Snowy parking lot; yellow tape; Jeanette’s pickup.

  Reporter: “. . . an excellent skier. Police are working on the theory that some time over the weekend, she skied into a gladed area, possibly out of bounds, and came to grief. Searchers are now combing every inch of Killington’s six mountains, as well as neighboring Pico and unmarked terrain, but as another cold night descends on ski country, the hope for a successful outcome to this winter drama dims.” Shots of searchers in the woods, on skis, on snowmobiles, with dogs. Sound of the dogs barking.

  “Ruby?”

  Ruby opened her eyes. It was dark in her room. Mom was there, her face lit by the blue-white glow of the TV.

  “Are you okay?” Mom said.

  “Must have fallen asleep.” Her head was all fuzzy. “Have you heard about Jeanette?”

  “It’s terrible,” said Mom. “But there’s every reason to hope—she’s such a strong woman.”

  “How long does it take to freeze to death?”

  “It depends.”

  “What if she hit her head on a tree?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do they keep searching at night?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  Ruby sat up. “What’s going on, Mom?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Zippy,” Ruby said. “And now Jeanette.”

  Mom came closer, put her hand on Ruby’s forehead, a cool hand, cold, in fact. “You feel a little warm,” Mom said. “Why don’t you come downstairs? It’s a Blue Dragon night, but I can heat some chicken soup.”

  “Not hungry.”

  “I’ll bring something up.”

  “Don’t want anything.”

  Mom bent over, kissed her forehead, left the room. Ruby gazed at the TV. They were showing the pickup again but it was the exact same report as before, shot in the daytime. Now it was night. It got cold in the mountains at night, way below zero. She’d been up at Uncle Tom and Aunt Deborah’s ski place once, had stepped out at night just to see how way-below-zero felt. Ruby pressed the off button on her remote.

  Dad came in. “Got it pretty dark in here, sweetheart.” He switched on the lights. “I hear you’re not feeling tip-top.” He sat on the bed, put a tray on her bedside table: chicken soup, orange juice, white rice with plum sauce.

  “What’s going on, Dad?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Zippy. Jeanette.”

  Dad shrugged. “Unfortunate things happen sometimes. But lost dogs get found all the time. And Jeanette’s a tough cookie.”

  “Zippy’s not coming back.”

  “We don’t know that,” Dad said.

  Ruby did know it, almost 100 percent, but going into the whole pond episode would mean big trouble. “And what if they don’t find Jeanette in time?”

  Dad sighed, rubbed the back of his neck. “Let’s not worry about that unless we have to. Worrying never helps, Ruby.” He felt her forehead; his hand felt cold too, but not as cold as Mom’s. “Feel okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Try to eat something. Then get a good night’s sleep. You’ll be good as new in the morning.”

  “Thanks, Dad.” He was a great dad and she would have felt a little better just from his gentle tone if he hadn’t said good as new, which led right to Unka Death. Fuck you, good as new, all we do, then it’s through. It was one of the best records she’d ever heard, maybe because the meaning scared her so much.

  Dad gave her a little kiss on the forehead, as Mom had, and started toward the door.

  “Dad? How’s the stock?”

&nb
sp; Dad turned. “Doing just what we want, sweetheart. Try not to worry so much.” He left the room.

  Ruby sat up. Not easy: she was so heavy, all of a sudden. She tried the soup, had to make a big effort to get a single spoonful down. She took a sip of orange juice. Rice was out of the question, despite her love of plum sauce. One of the worst things about getting sick was the way your mind played tricks on you. The plum sauce, for example: it glistened on the rice in a creepy way, like it had some sort of bad plan for the rice, a smothering one. At that point, she forced herself to get out of bed, before things got worse.

  Ruby went into the hall, now feeling very light, like a reed, and very tall, so that every step was dangerous. Julian’s voice drifted up from downstairs.

  “Columbia?” he was saying. “A bit of a reach at this stage, certainly, although not impossible. But if you want my opinion . . .”

  “Of course,” said Dad.

  “I think he preferred NYU.”

  “Do you?” said Mom, in that tone she had when she was getting real interested in something.

  “And it wouldn’t be a bad choice, in my view,” Julian said. His voice faded as Ruby went down the hall, trailed by half-audible snippets: NYU, Columbia, SAT, GPA, community service. She opened Brandon’s door.

  He was at his desk, a textbook in front of him, yellow highlighter in hand. Had she ever actually caught him doing homework before? The animal smell wasn’t as strong as usual, but that might have been because her nose was clogging up. She went in and closed the door. He turned at the sound.

  “Ever heard of knocking?”

  She couldn’t think of anything sharp or biting to say back, didn’t have the strength. “We have to talk.”

  “About what?”

  “Weird things have been happening.”

  “Like?” He was tapping his foot.

  “Let’s start with your jacket.”

  He glanced at the door. “What do you know about my jacket?”

  “A lot.”

  “Did Dewey say something to you? Trish?”