"Sad, sad business," the principal said, settling his bulk into his own chair behind his desk. "I'm Marv Brown, by the way. Read all about you. I'm really sorry about Nora West. Honestly, we didn't even know she'd attended here until … well, you know the story better than us. What can I do you for?"
There were ocean-themed photos on all the walls—not professional ones, but still quite nice. One of the largest, and best, was a picture of Heceta Head Lighthouse at dusk.
"Ironic," Gage said.
"Excuse me?"
"Nothing. I just like your picture there."
"Oh, thank you. My wife took it, actually. Oh, right … Heceta Head. That's the place where her father … Um, yes, it's a nice photo. My wife does like to take her pictures."
"She's very talented. Actually, that's the reason I'm here. It has to do with photography."
"Oh?"
Gage had to be careful. It was only the hint of a theory that had led him here, after all, something that might be nothing, and the last thing he wanted to do was get the rumor mill started.
"I'm wrapping up some notes about the case," Gage said. "I'm kind of here on a whim, really. I just thought it might be nice to see any photos you might have of her. She did mention at one point that she was in her middle school yearbook a bunch."
"Oh!"
"Do you have any of them?"
"Oh, yes! We have a full run in the library, plus another set in storage. I like to page through them myself, sometimes, especially the older ones."
"Would it be possible to go to the library and see them?"
"Certainly, but there's no need."
"Excuse me?"
Marv searched for one of the keys on his ring—the whole thing was attached to some kind of retractable string—until he found the one he was looking for and unlocked one of his desk's side drawers. He pulled out two slim yearbooks, both glossy blue leather with worn corners and heavily scratched laminated covers that pictured the whole school gathered in the field, shaping themselves like a giant D. He deposited them on a stack of file folders at the edge of his desk.
"Seventh and eighth grade," he said. "That's before the restructuring and we started doing sixth at Deering. She's in both of them. A lot more in the bottom one there, eighth grade. She was right about that. Don't know why. It wasn't like she was involved in much, from the looks of it. Just lucky, I guess. Happens sometimes, and kids who aren't in the yearbooks a lot like to complain. Why is Mary Sue in all these photos and not me? Well, because Mary Sue happened to be walking by when the photo was taken, that's why." He chuckled. "Go ahead, take a look. I just locked them up because I was afraid they might get stolen."
Reaching for the yearbooks, Gage felt his hands trembling and hoped it didn't show. He wanted to seem nonchalant. He was just taking a look for curiosity's sake, after all. But in his mind, he heard Nora's comment to him very clearly. She'd been trying to convince him that she might be of some help, and she'd mentioned seeing the Boone boys in her middle school yearbook.
So much of my childhood is shaky, but the yearbook is solid. My picture's in here a bunch, too. Which is strange, considering how little I went to school. I actually look happy in them. Maybe that's what I like about it. The pictures make me look like a normal, happy kid.
That was what had been nagging him the past few weeks, though it wasn't until the previous night that he'd finally realized it. Photos. She'd said she'd been in her a yearbook a bunch, more than she should have been. Gage had nodded at the time and, just like Principal Brown now, figured it was nothing but luck.
But what if it wasn't?
What if someone had wanted her in those photos?
The thing about photography: there was always someone behind the camera, meaning that photography was in some sense a record of the moments the photographer noticed. Some photographers may be drawn to lighthouses, others to particular people, even if they were not consciously aware of it. Someone on the yearbook staff may have been particularly taken with young Nora Storm-Tree.
Perhaps even obsessed.
As he flipped to the index in the eighth-grade yearbook, Gage knew there was a distinct possibility that if his theory proved true, that person might turn out to be either Denny or Elliott Younger—or Denny or Elliott Boone, as they were known at the time. For the police and the press, that would only confirm a theory they were determined to believe. Gage hoped that wasn't the case. No matter what he found in the yearbook, he still couldn't believe that Denny and Elliott were behind all this. It didn't add up.
Nora was right. The index listed her in a bunch of places. Page three, seven, eleven, fifteen … A dozen in all. Gage skipped the official portrait. There was Nora singing in the choir—though in the background, because the subject of the picture was the retiring choir director. There was Nora in the art room—though off to the side, the photo about two girls in front of her, sisters, apparently, who were painting a picture of their mother to give to her on Mother's Day. There was Nora walking in the hall; the bespectacled boy in the foreground holding a blue ribbon for first place in the Oregon State Science Fair was clearly the intended target. On and on they went, none of the photos seeming to focus on Nora directly, though she was always pictured in a very flattering light. Unlike a lot of middle school kids, she didn't have that awkward, haven't-grown-into-my-body way about her; she was beautiful even then.
Gage had been hoping that the photographer would be credited under the photos, but was disappointed. Then he realized that the whole yearbook staff was probably listed at the front of the book. How many photographers could there possibly be? Sure enough, there was a page that listed the staff: an editor in chief, four writers, two graphic designers … and three photographers.
The first two names were girls he didn't know. The third, however, jumped off the page at him, so much so that the book slipped from his hand and he barely prevented it from falling to the floor.
It wasn't Denny.
It wasn't Elliott either.
It was someone Gage should have been paying more attention to all along, and he finally had some hope that Nora was alive—and where, exactly, she was.
Chapter 27
Less than an hour later, Gage waited in a van for the second time that day.
This time it wasn't his van, the Volkswagen being a little too loud and distinctive for this particular stakeout, but Alex's green Toyota Sienna. It was possible that the owner of the house Gage was watching—a big two-story at the end of a quiet residential street near Big Dipper Lake—would recognize Alex's van too, but Gage was willing to take that risk. He certainly wasn't going to involve the police. Nora's life could be in danger, and he wasn't going to let them bungle the rescue.
After the lightning bolt in the principal's office, Gage had gone straight to Books and Oddities, discovered Alex not there yet, then raced across town to the Turret House, where he found Alex enjoying his morning coffee and the New York Times.
He didn't just go for the van. To be safe, Gage also wanted someone else to know his theory. Alex was appropriately skeptical. But he said he'd watch Lady, insisted that Gage take his van, and also forced Gage to take Alex's cell phone—with instructions to call him in one hour no matter what happened. Otherwise, Alex would call the police.
The only question was where this person lived, but it didn't turn out to be too difficult. It wouldn't be, of course, given the man's occupation. It wasn't the sort of job that lent itself to a desire for anonymity. Five minutes on Alex's laptop, without any help from the FBI, and they'd found the address all over the Internet. In this day and age, unless someone tried very hard to keep that information private, the same was true for almost everybody, especially a person who'd lived in the same house for a decade and wanted to be seen as a pillar of the community.
Howie Meyer.
That was the name that jumped out at Gage from the three photographers listed in the Deering Middle School yearbook. Howie Meyer, the big, pear-shaped insurance salesman wh
o could have passed for Edgar Allan Poe, at least from the neck up. Howie Meyer, the son of Ronnie, Ed's waitress and close friend, who'd apparently lived down the road from Nora when they were teenagers and most likely watched her, fondly, from afar. Howie Meyer, who'd gone through a recent divorce and also lost his secretary, showing signs of a man whose life may be coming apart at the seams.
Howie Meyer, who somehow found out that Ed Boone, a father figure he probably wished he had, was actually Nora's father … and snapped.
But why? Obsession was a strange animal, causing people to behave in all kinds of unpredictable ways. And Gage didn't even know that Howie was obsessed. Conjecture, theory, possibilities—that was all he had, which was why Gage still sat in the van and watched the house through his rearview mirror even though everything inside him was screaming to get into that house. Every second that passed might mean he was too late.
Yet making his move now also might get Nora killed.
That was because Gage not only didn't know where Nora was in the house, if she was there at all, but also if Howie was inside. Before coming there, Gage had visited the insurance office and found it dark. There were no cars parked in the driveway or on the street in front of the house, but that didn't mean anything; there was a detached two-car garage.
So Gage had spent the last fifteen minutes studying the house and the neighborhood. It was quite a house—not a mansion, by any means, but still large and very impressive in a somewhat Victorian style, a trend that had cropped up for a brief time in pockets around Barnacle Bluffs during the thirties, with wraparound porches, dormered windows on the second floor, and high-arched roofs. Some of these homes, Gage had seen around town, had fallen into disrepair, but this one had been well cared for: blue paint and yellow trim fresh and new, boxwood bushes lining the sidewalk to the front door well trimmed, ivy growing on the white picket fence kept neatly in line.
It was probably the nicest house on the street, with the biggest sweep of property around it. The undeveloped valley on the other side likely gave the owner a view of the lake, or at least a glimpse of it, though Gage could not tell for certain with the fences, oak trees, and arbor vitae hedges blocking his way. Judging by the small, mostly ranch-style homes that lined the street around it, Gage guessed that Howie Meyer's house had predated the others by a few decades at least. Maybe business had tightened enough that Howie had been forced to let his secretary go, but, like any good insurance salesman, he certainly wasn't making this fact obvious.
If Howie was crazy, he was hiding his crazy from the world well.
The curtains on the bottom floor were closed. The ones on the top were open, though covered with some kind of sheer curtain. Gage saw no activity. Except for a yard service mowing the lawn at the first house on the street, the rest of the houses were equally sedate. There were some cars in the driveways but no people. A German shepherd in the backyard to Gage's left, probably annoyed at the lawnmower, occasionally showed his annoyance by poking his head through the gap in the chain link fence and barking, but otherwise it was just another peaceful residential street.
Gage tapped the Beretta on his knee. If Nora was alive, Howie could be doing awful things to her right now. Could Gage really just sit here? If he was afraid of going at the house directly, maybe he should drive around to the bottom of that undeveloped valley and look for a way to hike to the house from that side, giving him the element of surprise. He was pretty sure that the valley bordered Big Dipper Road, though he'd need to drive down there to be sure.
In the end, he was glad he hadn't moved, because it was only a few minutes later that he saw Howie Meyer, the man himself, emerge from a side door and enter the garage. He was dressed in a navy-blue suit and carried a briefcase, walking briskly but not really in a hurry. A minute later, the garage opened and a silver Lexus backed out.
Gage ducked low in his seat. That Howie was apparently headed to the office was, on one hand, exactly what Gage wanted; he was hoping to get a crack at the inside of the house without having to confront Howie just yet. On the other hand, Howie's dress and manner had seemed so … normal that Gage couldn't help but feel a pang of disappointment. Was this really a man who had Nora West locked in his house? Was this chatty insurance salesman really the sort of person who had somehow orchestrated a complicated charade that involved duping not only Gage but two professional hit men, as well as blowing up Nora's yacht while somehow ferreting her away in another boat without being seen?
Impossible.
That was what Chief Quinn would say, and Gage knew he would think the same thing if their positions were reversed. He partly thought it even now. And yet …
Hunched in the seat, making sure to keep his head away from the window, he heard the Lexus drive past.
The dog, angered by this apparent transgression into his space, barked even louder. Gage waited until he was sure the Lexus was gone, then peeked up over the dashboard to make certain. No Lexus. Still, even though he was itching to get out of the van, he waited. He knew from hard-won experience that the time people were likeliest to return was in the first twenty minutes—when they remembered they'd forgotten something and weren't yet far enough away to convince themselves it wasn't worth going back.
Gage made it ten before he said to hell with it.
He slipped the Beretta into the shoulder holster under his leather jacket. No cane. He'd just have to tough it out. When he got out of the van, the German shepherd went crazy, and went on going crazy until Gage was out sight. Gage reached the end of the cul-de-sac and crossed into Howie's driveway. He didn't hesitate. The key was to always act like you belonged.
A few gray clouds had crept in from the west, but otherwise the sky was clear. The breeze, cool and only faintly smelling of the ocean, was just strong enough to make the bamboo wind chime hanging from the end of Howie's porch knock softly.
His hand inside his jacket and gripping the Beretta, Gage circled to the back of the house, passing through the ivy-laden arbor and the unlocked gate. His right knee, still recovering from his ordeal a few weeks earlier, ached. The house's location at the end of the street, and the tall hedge of arbor vitae that separated the property from the neighbor's, meant Gage was quickly out of view.
He'd only taken a single step through the gate when he saw the red lava rock.
His heart kicked up a couple of gears. The lava rock formed a walking path that led to the back of the house, plush grass on either side.
If it was just a coincidence, it was a hell of a one.
Still, even though the discovery fueled his hopes, it meant nothing by itself. Either Nora was here or she wasn't. There was a kitchen window immediately to his left but high enough that he couldn't see more than the top of the refrigerator: very plain, no magnets, no notes. Gage pushed himself to keep moving. If someone had seen him and called the police, he might have two minutes, maybe less.
The first incongruity was apparent to Gage when he passed through the cozy area just behind the gate, where there was a tidy area for the garbage, recycling, and yard bins all harbored inside a red plastic enclosure, to the back of the house. The path sloped to a third floor, a daylight basement hidden from the front. There the grass could hardly even be called grass; it was so high and unkempt that it was more of a jungle. The cracked concrete patio was almost invisible underneath all the weeds.
If there was a view, it was obscured by a wall of blackberry bushes at least ten feet high, much higher than what was left of the wooden fence that was trying, and mostly failing, to hold back the bushes. The few remaining gray and crumbling boards, positioned under all those crazy, tangled vines, resembled rotten teeth in the mouth of a witch with frizzy hair. The bushes were so overgrown that he almost missed the gate at the end, which seemed to lead to a path through the bushes.
Probably to the street below. Good. Now he had a backup means of escape, if Howie should come home.
A pile of debris at least as tall as Gage leaned against the side of the house—
mostly branches and leaves, but he also saw a milk jug, wrinkled magazines, and other random garbage, the odor of rot and mildew strong. There was a rusted old barbecue, a blue plastic cooler full of empty beer bottles, and a cast iron bench stacked with what appeared to be flower boxes. Mold and moss pervaded everything. There was also a sliding glass door, what lay beyond hidden by sun-bleached drapes.
So there was a side of Howie Meyer that he presented to the world and another part he kept hidden away. It bolstered Gage's spirits even more. This was the sort of man who might have kidnapped Nora West.
He tried the screen door. Locked. He tried the two windows behind the refuse pile, the blinds shut tight. Also locked.
The hard way, then. He searched the yard, found nothing that satisfied him, then spotted a big rock under the blackberry bushes. It wasn't a rock after all. It was a chunk of concrete half coated with red clay, large enough that Gage could hardly hold it in his hand.
Perfect.
He would have liked to wait until there was another sound to cover him, even the barking dog, but the neighborhood stayed stubbornly silent. No matter. After a good wind-up, he really let the window feel the full force of all his pent-up frustration.
The shattering glass was just as loud as he feared, but at least the window yielded. Glass rained down on the curtains and clattered to the concrete patio. Now the clock—since no doubt someone would have heard—was really ticking. After pulling out the Beretta, he kicked through the remaining shards and yanked the curtains aside.
It was so dark he couldn't see much but the edge of a plaid couch and a couple of green plastic totes. He felt inside for a light switch and found it.
A Lighthouse for the Lonely Heart: An Oregon Coast Mystery (Garrison Gage Series Book 5) Page 30
