Cries of the Children

by Clare McNally

  I saw no need to waste time.

  Boy, you sure didn’t Are you sure this will work?

  Just tell them the story you told the waitress. The one about your parents working.

  You were awake! Steven’s tone was accusatory.

  Sort of. Go on, they’re calling your flight.

  Steven hurried to find the right gate. He followed a line of passengers, mostly business people, through a safety check-in. He held his breath as he passed the security guard, certain the man would reach out and grab him and make him explain what he was doing there all by himself.

  But as he boarded, the flight attendant gave him the same friendly greeting as everyone else. He found his seat and tucked his bag in the overhead compartment. The big comfortable seat made him realize how tired he was. He took off his jacket and rolled it into a pillow. Lifting the armrest, he laid himself down as best as he could. He felt a tap on his shoulder and sat up to see the stewardess smiling at him.

  “Here’s a pillow, honey,” she said. “Is your seat belt fastened?”

  “Uh-huh,” Steven said groggily.

  The stewardess smiled again. If she had any questions about him traveling alone, she didn’t voice them. Steven didn’t know if it was because she’d seen many children travel alone or if it was Marty’s influence.

  He closed his eyes and listened as the captain welcomed them aboard Mattituck Airlines flight 6072 to Newark. By the time the plane was taxiing into position, he was nearly asleep.

  But he came awake very suddenly.

  Marty!

  I’m here! Why are you yelling?

  Steven quieted the voice in his mind.

  Marty, you made Tatiana see something in the woods, didn’t you?

  Go back to sleep, Steven.

  Didn’t you?

  But either Marty wasn’t answering or Steven really did fall asleep, because there were no more thoughts in his head.

  27

  SAMANTHA AND JULIE were playing Scrabble when the sound of a car’s engine made Julie jump from her chair and run to the window.

  “There’s a red car outside,” she said. “A man’s getting out.”

  Samantha went to the window herself. Wil Sherer had parked his sixty-nine Firebird at the end of the driveway. As they watched, he stopped halfway to the house and called to the dogs. They bounded up to him, wagging their tails in the friendly manner typical of Labs. Wil rubbed their heads briskly, then picked up a stick and threw it. True to their second name, “retriever,” the dogs bounded after the stick. Lady brought it back.

  Samantha went to the back door and opened it.

  “I hadn’t expected to see you so soon,” she said.

  “Hadn’t expected to have information this fast,” Wil replied.

  He came inside. He’d shaved that morning, and Samantha thought he looked much nicer without the beard. From the front, his short haircut made him look conservative. It wasn’t until he turned profile that you saw the longer tresses dangling down his back.

  His smile was genuine when he looked at Julie. Samantha could tell at once he was a man who really liked children. Julie warmed to him immediately. Like the dogs, she seemed to know he was someone she could trust.

  “Hi, pretty,” he said. “You must be Julie.”

  Julie giggled. “Uh-huh.”

  “I’m Wil Sherer,” the detective said, holding out a hand. Julie took it shyly, then let go. “I’m a detective. Do you know about me?”

  “I told her you were helping us find her family,” Samantha said.

  “That’s exactly what I intend to do,” Wil said.

  Julie put her arms around Samantha. Wil watched the gesture, then looked at Samantha.

  “She really likes you,” he said. To Julie: “Samantha’s a special person to you, isn’t she?”

  “Yeah,” Julie said. “I love her.”

  “But you’ve only known her for a few days,” Wil pointed out in a gentle tone.

  “I still love her,” Julie insisted.

  “That’s nice,” Wil said. “Julie, I’d like to talk privately with Samantha, okay? For just a few minutes?”

  “Okay,” Julie said, letting go of Samantha. “I’ll go upstairs and draw.”

  Samantha led Wil to her office. He sat down in an armchair, tossing a throw pillow to the rug. Samantha took the seat behind her desk.

  “Something happened last night,” she said. “When I went to pick up Julie at my friend’s house, she was drawing pictures of that yellow house I told you about.”

  “Did you remember anything new?”

  “No,” Samantha said in a disappointed tone. “I just had a stronger feeling that it was a place I had been once, a long time ago.”

  “Might be some kind of vacation home,” Wil suggested. “I’ll see if I can locate this Haybrook’s place.”

  Samantha reminded him that he’d come with information.

  “I found Mr. Henley,” Wil said without prelude.

  “What!”

  “It was easy enough,” Wil said. “Just a matter of going back to that hotel in Durango. Raoul Henley used a credit card to pay in advance for your room. I traced his home to an address in Union Fort.”

  Samantha thought about this.

  “That’s about halfway between here and Durango,” she said.

  “Right,” Wil answered. “I’m going to be checking into Mr. Henley. So far I know he’s single, drives a 1981 Reliant, and rents a house at 358 Maple Avenue in Union Fort.”

  “How do you know all that?”

  “It’s a matter of public record,” Wil said. “People think there’s a great deal of mystery to detective work, but mostly it’s just knowing where to find information that’s available to anyone who wants it. Raoul Henley is listed, as is everyone else, in the Union Fort city directory.”

  “The phone book?”

  “It’s a little more detailed than that,” Wil said. “You can find one in the library. All I had to do was take a ride to Henley’s town and look him up.”

  “But we still don’t know anything more,” Samantha said. “Did you talk to him?”

  “Not yet,” Wil said. “I’m sure he’ll deny everything anyway. I need more solid information before confronting him.”

  Samantha got up and went to look out the window. A crow was attacking a caterpillar just outside.

  “What about Julie?” she asked. “Did you find an orphanage?”

  “Sorry,” Wil said. “So far, I’ve only come up with dead ends.”

  Samantha turned to face him with a concerned expression. Wil held up a hand, the silver-and-turquoise ring he wore flashing under the track lights.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “Henley will be more than happy to talk to me.”

  There was a menacing quality to his tone that suggested he wouldn’t stop until Henley did talk.

  “I want to come with you,” Samantha said.

  “I can’t allow that,” Wil replied. “You hired me because you need help. Don’t play amateur detective. It’s dangerous.”

  “You made it sound rather mundane a few minutes ago,” Samantha pointed out.

  “It is, to a degree,” Wil said. “But there’s a lot of danger too. If I feel I need you, you’ll know right away. At the moment, I’d rather handle things myself.”

  He rolled up the cuff of his pants to reveal an ugly red scar that ran from his knee around to the back of his ankle.

  “That’s a bite from a pit bull,” Wil said. “One of the people I was trying to interview for a case sicced him on me.”

  Samantha made a face, although she’d seen plenty of gore in the emergency room. Most of those incidents had been accidental. But someone had purposely turned his vicious dog on this man!

  Wil pushed the pants leg back down again.

  “I’ve been driven away at gunpoint too,” he said. “Fortunately for me, no one ever fired a shot.”

  “Do you carry a weapon?”

  Wil shook his head. “On
ly on certain cases, under special circumstances. Guns aren’t the protection they’re cracked up to be. Of course, as an ex-cop I’m licensed, and in my early days as a detective I did carry one at all times. But I found that one of two things usually happened: some bully would try to provoke me into using it or would try to wrestle it away from me. I had a few close calls before realizing it wasn’t worth it. To tell you the truth, people are a lot more cooperative than you realize. Most of them are good citizens who want to help. And I can handle myself well enough without a gun.”

  Samantha did a quick, almost unconscious scan of his body. His muscular build told her he wasn’t kidding.

  “All right,” she said. “I’ll leave it up to you.”

  She remembered the picture just then, and picked it up from the pile of papers on her desk. She handed it to Wil. He studied it, not speaking for such a long time that Samantha wondered what he was thinking. Finally he put it into his file.

  “It’s a good shot,” he said. “I’ll put it through Missing Persons.”

  “You seemed very interested in it,” Samantha said.

  “A thought had occurred to me when I met Julie in the kitchen,” Wil said. “I was studying the picture to see if it happened again.”

  “Did it?”

  “Yes,” Wil replied. “You haven’t mentioned this, so I’m sure it never crossed your mind. Julie looks a little bit like you.”

  Samantha leaned back, a look of surprise on her face.

  “Really?”

  “Especially around the eyes and nose,” Wil went on. “The eye color isn’t the same, but the shape is. And you both have very straight brows. It’s almost as if you’re related.”

  Samantha brought a hand to her forehead, shaking her head. This new revelation was almost too much to consider on top of everything else.

  “Coincidence,” she said. “I don’t have any relatives. I’m an orphan myself.”

  “Then you don’t have any relatives you know about,” Wil said thoughtfully. “But it isn’t impossible they know about you.”

  Samantha closed her eyes and rubbed them.

  “I hope you’re wrong,” she said. “The idea of having lost relatives is more than I can bear right now. I don’t think I could handle another shock like that.”

  “Fine,” Wil said to appease her, although he intended to keep the idea in his own mind.

  He stood up.

  “I have some other avenues to go down on this case,” he said. “I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, maybe you should let up on the kid a little. It’s possible that something will come back to her if she isn’t pressured.”

  “You’re right,” Samantha said. “I have been pushing her.”

  “Why don’t you take her someplace special?” Wil asked. “I hear there’s a great new water ride at Rocky Point Park.”

  Samantha smiled. “What a great idea! A day of fun is just what that little girl needs.”

  Wil returned the smile. “Seems to me she isn’t the only one who needs it.”

  He and Samantha walked to his car together. When he turned to her, there was so much concern in his deep blue eyes that Samantha half-expected him to put his arms around her. And she wanted him to, wanted to feel affection from a virtual stranger, because right now she needed someone as much as Julie needed her. But theirs was a business relationship, barely a few hours old, and she had no right to expect such a thing. Unconsciously she backed up a step.

  “Please, trust that I’ll do my best for you,” Wil said. “Put your worries out of your mind. Whatever’s going on here, I promise I’ll find some answers.”

  Samantha nodded. “Thanks. I really feel good about having hired you.”

  “Remind me to thank John Brightman for the referral.”

  They exchanged good-byes. As Wil drove away, Julie came running up to Samantha.

  “I like him,” she said. “He’s a nice man.”

  “He sure is,” Samantha said, watching the car disappear down the road.

  “Do you like him?”

  Samantha laughed. “You mean, like a boyfriend? For heaven’s sake, Julie, I just met him.”

  But she had also noticed a strange stirring inside herself when Wil was there. Embarrassed to think she had a crush at her age, she turned the topic away from the detective.

  “Would you like to do something extra special today?”

  “What?” Julie asked eagerly.

  “Wil says there’s a new water ride at Rocky Point Park,” Samantha said. “It’s just a half-hour’s drive from here. Why don’t we spend the afternoon there?”

  “It sounds great!” Julie said.

  Twenty minutes later the dogs were kenneled and Samantha and Julie were on their way to the amusement park. Samantha was determined not to think for a moment about the strange things that were happening. She would follow Wil’s suggestion and give Julie an afternoon that was pure fun.

  28

  LORRAINE WAS THE first to be awakened as sunlight broke through the clouds and seeped through the wooden planks overhead. She sat up slowly, one elbow resting on the makeshift bed Donny and Sandy had made out of their jackets. Donny had a protective, warming arm around his girlfriend. Lorraine thought it would be nice to have someone to hug her too. She thought of Bettina, but for now there was only a vague sense of longing.

  She rubbed her eyes with the backs of her hands. Then she stood up and felt an urgent pressure in her bladder. She reached down and shook Sandy.

  “Sandy? Sandy, I have to go!”

  Sandy bolted upright, jerked out of a dream. For a moment she gazed at her surroundings as if she didn’t know where she was.

  “Sandy,” Lorraine whined, “I need to go.”

  She held herself between the legs. Sandy yawned.

  “Don’t do that, kid,” she said. She turned onto her knees and shook Donny. He grumbled at her. “I’m taking Lorraine to a bathroom. It’s morning. You better get up.”

  Donny sat up and grimaced. He spit sand from his mouth.

  “My back hurts,” he complained, after a night on the soft beach.

  Sandy stood up, brushing sand from her jeans. Then she took Lorraine by the hand and headed for the nearest staircase up to the boardwalk. At this early hour, it was virtually deserted. The concession stands were boarded up, and only a few early-morning joggers passed them by.

  They found a bathroom in a nearby hotel, ignoring the hard stares of the concierge. There was a separate powder room, with a gilt-edged mirror and three gleaming white sinks. Sandy pulled a clip from her pocket and tied back her red hair. Then she made a face at her reflection, sticking out her tongue.

  “Gawd,” she said. “Worst case of moose-mouth I ever had! I wish I had brought my toothbrush in here.”

  “I’m hungry, Sandy,” Lorraine said.

  Sandy looked down at the child. In the light of day it suddenly dawned on her how ironic it was that she had been “assigned” to care for this strange small girl. Little kids were precisely the reason she left home in Pennsylvania, making her way first to Manhattan and now Atlantic City. She’d been sick and tired of her nagging parents making her baby-sit her bratty seven little brothers and sisters.

  I’m seventeen! she’d cried. I have a right to a social life, you know!

  But they’d only laughed at her, asking what kind of social life a kid could have.

  She looked into Lorraine’s gray-green eyes and sighed.

  “Yeah, kid,” she said. “You and me both.”

  They went outside again, passing through an ornate lobby, all glass and gilt with a central fountain and thousands of hanging plants. Through an archway they could see a dining room set up with white linen tablecloths and fresh flowers. Breakfast was being cooked for the hotel guests and for those in the neighborhood who could afford it. Sandy pulled on Lorraine’s hand, hurrying from the hotel before the smells of bacon, sausage, pancakes, and the like could make her drool like a rabid dog.

  Donny was waiti
ng for them, burdened with all three suitcases and the jackets. His dark hair flipped wildly in the ocean breeze.

  “We’re hungry,” Sandy said. “I can’t think until I eat. Look, there’s a little coffee shop over there. Let’s have breakfast.”

  “Sandy,” Donny said in a warning tone, “we don’t have a heck of a lot of money.”

  Lorraine looked from one teen to the other.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’ll take care of it.”

  “No, kid,” Sandy said. “You bought me a bus ticket last night. That’s enough.”

  “It’s okay!” Lorraine insisted. “I don’t want to argue, do you?”

  “ ’Course not,” Donny said.

  “Then let’s go have breakfast,” Lorraine said, leading the way.

  Donny leaned closer to Sandy and whispered, “Did she say she was eight, or forty-eight?”

  Sandy giggled.

  In the coffee shop Lorraine remembered Marty’s warning not to flash her money around. She wondered where he was now. She waited until they were given a booth, then excused herself.

  “Didn’t you just use the potty?” Sandy asked, talking to Lorraine as she would speak to one of her younger siblings.

  “I have more inside me,” Lorraine said, picking up her bag.

  “You can leave that here,” Donny said.

  Lorraine shook her head vehemently and walked away.

  “I wonder what she has in that thing?” Sandy said.

  “We won’t be around long enough to find out,” Donny said. “As soon as breakfast is done, we find a place to clean ourselves up real good so we can start job-hunting.”

  “Oh, Donny,” Sandy said, “you can’t mean we’re gonna leave that baby on her own?”

  Donny leaned back as a waitress put glasses of water in front of them.

  “Seems she did pretty well on her own before she ran into us,” Donny said. “I don’t know what her case is. It isn’t my business, and I don’t want to get wrapped up in it. It could get us in a hell of a lot of trouble, Sandy.”

  Sandy stared out the window. A ship appeared over the horizon, moving slowly along the water.

  “We’re already in trouble, Donny,” she said.