by Kathi Daley
Chapter 12
Cass picked me up just over an hour after I’d spoken to him. He’d already gone home and changed, so Milo wasn’t with him. He suggested a nearby steakhouse, which was fine with me. Although the restaurant served food that was good enough to be considered fine dining, it was really more of a casual, if somewhat expensive, option.
“So let’s start off by you filling me in on your conversation with Larry,” Cass jumped in after we’d ordered scampi with rice and vegetables.
“You mean my conversation with my anonymous informant,” I reminded him.
“Yeah, okay, if that’s how we need to play it. What exactly did this informant tell you about the night Austin disappeared?”
I filled him in on the details of the conversation Dex and I’d had with Larry, including the fact that Colin had slipped Austin a drug which had caused him to see things and that Colin had also threatened the other boys to keep their mouths shut about what went on or else.
“Seems like a big lie to keep given the situation,” Cass said.
“I agree. My informant agreed. He told Dex and me that in the beginning, he was certain that the police would find Austin, and everything would be okay, so he wasn’t overly worried about the lie. By the time he realized Austin would not be found, he felt it was too late to contradict the story he and the others had been telling everyone for days.”
“I guess you know that I spoke to Colin today,” Cass said. “He told me a much different story than the one Larry told you.”
“Oh. What did Colin have to say?”
“His story about what happened on the first day of the campout was very similar to the story Toby and Larry told. The one big difference is that while Larry said Colin slipped a hallucinogen into Austin’s drink, which caused him to run away from the campsite in terror, Colin said that he, Josh, and Austin were the last three up after everyone else had gone to bed. He said they were discussing the plan for the following day, and he and Austin had different ideas about how things should go. According to Colin, Josh sided with him, and Austin got mad and stormed off. He then said he and Josh went to bed at that point. He and Josh were sure that Austin would cool down and slip into his own tent once he did. Colin said he was as surprised as anyone was when they woke up, and Austin was gone. He shared that even then, he figured the guy was around somewhere, and they’d eventually find him, but they never did.”
“And you never picked up an odd vibe from Colin that he was lying at any point?” I asked.
Cass shrugged. “I won’t go that far. He was definitely lying about something. The question in my mind is which part of the story he was lying about.”
“What do you mean, which part?” I asked.
“It seems that everyone failed to mention the part about the older boys drinking and smoking weed. I suppose that might be the lying vibe I was picking up. There is also the part where Colin drugged Austin. If that did occur, he certainly didn’t admit it, so that might be the lie I was picking up. Then there was the fact that according to Larry, Austin ran away in terror, thinking a monster was after him, whereas Colin told me with a straight face that Austin simply got mad and took off in a huff. That might have been the lie I was picking up.”
“Or they are all lies, and you were picking up on that,” I pointed out.
“Perhaps. It’s a tricky situation mostly because Austin is missing and most likely dead, Josh and Bobby are definitely dead, Toby was too young to be part of what was going on, and Colin and Larry are telling very different stories. One of the two is obviously lying. Heck, maybe they’re both lying. Without some sort of proof one way or the other, all we really have is one witness’s word against the other.”
“How did the part of the interview with Colin relating to Bobby’s death go?” I asked.
Cass shrugged. “Colin said he hadn’t seen Bobby in years. He said that he never really got along with most of the kids in that group, but he was friends with Josh, who was friends with the others, so he hung out with them. He said after Josh was killed in the auto accident, he decided to move on to new friends and stopped hanging around with the others. Larry moved away, Toby was a lot younger, he had never liked Bobby, who he classified as weak and emotional, and, of course, Austin was gone. He did say he liked Dex okay, but Dex had other friends as well. Basically, he felt that the group as a whole broke up after Josh died.”
I supposed that made sense. There were a lot of groups where the glue that held them together really did come down to a single person within the group.
I turned my attention to something I felt was a bit more tangible at this point. “So back to my idea that Austin might have chosen to hide in a cave or mine that he’d previously located and knew would be a good hiding place from the monster chasing him.” I held up the map I’d brought to the restaurant with me from the magazine Alastair had found. “I really have no idea if we will find any small openings the search and rescue team might have missed in the area of Logan Pond, but it seems like it might be worth taking a look around.”
“I agree. I guess Milo and I can take some time tomorrow. I’ve sort of hit a dead-end in the Bobby Brighton murder case. I’m waiting for some test results on a few hairs and fibers I found at the crime scene. They probably won’t amount to much, but at this point, they’re all I have. Of course, if a new lead comes in, that will have to take precedence.”
“Of course. We can go out to the pond any time that works for you. We’ll bring the map and hike around and see what we can find.”
“Did you talk to Larry about Bobby’s death?” Cass asked.
I nodded. “He said that he hadn’t seen Bobby since he moved away from Foxtail Lake shortly after the campout where Austin disappeared. He was sorry to hear about his death, but he didn’t seem overly upset about what had occurred. Do you know if kidnapping was ever seriously considered in the disappearance of Austin Brady?” I asked.
“Based on the reports I’ve been able to dig up, it appears every angle was explored. The theory at the time was that whoever had been camping along the river had been hiding in the woods, watching the boys until one of them wandered off on their own, and they were able to nab him without the others noticing.”
“Are you suggesting the person camping by the river was a pedophile?”
“Unfortunately, that’s exactly what I am suggesting.”
I wrinkled my nose. This possibility was not one I wanted to consider. “So why Austin? Why not one of the others?”
“In this scenario, Austin was chosen randomly simply because he was the one who was the easiest to nab. The fact that no body or any sort of evidence of an assault was ever found made the theory hard to prove, plus they never did identify the camper by the river.”
I took a sip of my water. “When Dex assigned this story to me, I was excited to have a piece with some meat to focus my attention on. I guess I really didn’t stop to think how hard it would be to investigate what most likely resulted in the terrible death of a twelve-year-old.”
“I guess you can ask him to reassign the article to Brock.”
“No. I want to do it. I guess I just need to work on toughening up my emotions.”
The conversation paused as the waiter brought our food. We ate for a few minutes before picking up the conversation with a new topic.
“I ran into Tom at the hardware store,” Cass jumped in. “He told me he fixed up his fishing boat and that you’d asked him to get the old rowboat lake worthy as well.”
“Yes.” I nodded. “I ran into him while he was working on that old fishing boat of his, and it reminded me about the fun I had paddling around on the lake when I was a kid. I thought I’d teach Paisley how to row this summer.”
“You and I had a lot of fun on the lake. Do you remember that really dark night when we rowed out to the middle of the lake, put down some sleeping bags for comfort, and just laid there looking up at the stars?”
“There sure were a lot of them. It seemed like mil
lions of tiny diamonds in the sky.”
“I’m sure there were more than millions.”
“I remember that you were really into astronomy, and knew the names of all the constellations,” I reminded Cass.
“Still do, although I have to admit it’s been a while since I’ve gone stargazing.”
“You and I should go. Soon. If the boat isn’t ready, we can go up to Lookout Point. I remember doing that with you when we got a bit older.”
Cass smiled and winked. “Yeah, we did.”
“To stargaze,” I clarified. “If you were doing something else up there, then it was with someone other than me.”
He didn’t answer, but he did grin, so I threw a green bean at his head.
“So, what time are you going to pick me up tomorrow?” I asked, deciding that I most definitely didn’t want to think about Cass and someone other than me up at Lookout Point.
“I’ll text you. I’ll probably go into the office first thing to check on things, so it could be as late as noon. I’ll just have to wait and see what I’m greeted with when I go in.”
“Do you think it’s even possible to figure out what happened to Austin Brady after all these years?”
Cass shrugged. “I don’t know. But I do know it doesn’t hurt to try.”
Chapter 13
Thursday
By the time Cass picked me up, it was close to lunchtime, so we grabbed sandwiches at the deli and then headed out to Logan Pond. Most years, there would still have been snow on the ground at this time of the year, but between our mild winter and warm spring, the only snow that remained were patches that could be found in crevices and under trees.
“So, where exactly did the boys set up their camp?” I asked Cass after we parked and got out to look around.
“According to the police report, the camp was set up in the southeast corner of the lake. There were six tents since each boy had his own. Someone had built a fire ring, and there were logs set around the ring to sit on while eating, telling ghost stories, or enjoying the fire.”
“Okay. Let’s head over to the southeast corner and start there. We can imagine it dark, and we can imagine Austin being terrified of whatever he was seeing. I guess we can imagine which direction he would have run in, but the reality is that if he was mentally impaired at the time, he really could have done anything.”
Cass, Milo, and I headed toward the southeast corner of the lake. We stood in the center of where the fire pit most likely would have been built and looked around.
“The pond is both in front of us and to the left since it sort of curves here, so Austin probably took off running either in that direction or that one.” I pointed first to the right and then behind me.
“The woods are pretty dense in this area. Either way he ran, he would have had to navigate the brush. If he kept going to the south, he would have eventually run into the river that feeds into the lake. If he continued to head east and then trailed north, he would have eventually hit the range of red rock mountains.”
I paused to consider this. “If my theory was that Austin eventually ran into whoever was camping along the river and that person or persons did something to him, I’d say we should look to the south of our current position. But since my theory has to do with caves or mines in the area, we’re much more likely to find them to the north and to the west once you navigate Logan Pond.” I took out my map and laid it on a large rock. “I think we’re here.” I pointed to a spot on the map. “It looks like the mine runs through this mountain, so the tunnel would most likely be found here along this ridge.” I ran my finger along the ridge. “I say we hike in that direction.” I pointed to a point in the distance.
“Lead the way. I’m going to let Milo wander freely as long as we keep him in sight. Maybe he’ll find the opening we’re looking for.”
The area where we’d chosen to search was made up of thick forest, rambling brooks and streams, and giant cliffs with sharp drop-offs. It was important to know where you were at all times. Cass and I had both visited the area often when we were children, and Cass had continued to fish here even after I left, so I figured that as long as we kept our location firmly in mind, we wouldn’t run the risk of getting lost.
“The shrubbery growing along the edge of the rocky mountain is going to make it hard to find an opening whether it’s natural or manmade,” I said.
“Finding anything is a long shot,” Cass agreed. “Where does your map say the mine entrance is?”
“On the other side of the mountain. There is no way Austin made it all the way over there. I’m hoping, however, that he knew of an air vent and slipped in that way.”
Cass stopped after we’d been walking for about an hour. “There’s an opening up on the wall of that rock face. It would be hard for anyone to get all the way up there in the dark. From here, it looks like a heck of a climb.”
“Yeah, I don’t think Austin would have headed there.” I looked at the map again. “It was dark. He may or may not have had a flashlight. If he saw a monster and ran, he wouldn’t have gone back to his tent for one, but he may have had one on his person if he’d been sitting around the campfire all night.”
“If he was as terrified as Larry said he was, he would have headed somewhere close. I bet if he did find an entrance to a cave or mine, it would have been within a quarter of a mile from the campsite.”
I unfolded the map and looked at it again. “Let’s look over here.” I pointed to a rocky area, not all that far from the pond. Like the area we were currently searching, there were tall cliffs created from layers of rock that had formed over the years, but the cliffs closest to the lake were less severe, and in my opinion, less likely to be home to a cave or mine system. Still, it made sense that Austin wouldn’t have run very far before looking for a place to hide.
Luckily, Cass had thought to bring a daypack with climbing gloves, a rope, water, granola bars, flashlights, and flares for both of us. I wasn’t sure we’d need all that he’d brought, but the gloves were going to come in handy once we decided to hike up onto the first of several ledges to take a look around. Since I wasn’t quite as stable on my feet as Cass, I found myself grabbing onto rocks and shrubs to balance myself as I made the short climb. Milo, of course, found his own way up and beat both Cass and me to the ledge we were heading for.
Once we’d made it to the destination we’d chosen, we both paused to look around.
“Look over there,” I pointed to a small opening in the face of the cliff.
Cass walked over to it and put his face down, so it was level with the opening. “I can feel air like it’s circulating through a cavern.” He took off his pack, took out his flashlight, and shone it inside. “It’s hard to say without going inside.”
“It looks too small to squeeze through.”
Cass stood up. “I brought a chipping tool. We can dig out the rock a bit more, and we should be able to squeeze through.”
Cass worked on the opening for about thirty minutes before it looked large enough to squeeze through. Just barely. He shone his flashlight inside and then stuck his head through. “There’s definitely an open space behind here. I can’t see how far down the floor is. Might be just a few feet, but it might be more.”
“So, do we go inside?” I asked.
“We, no. You wait here. If something happens, one of us should be out here to go for help. I’ll tie the rope around my waist. If something happens, you can pull me out.”
“I won’t be able to pull you out. I should go in. You have a lot better chance of pulling me out than the other way around.”
He looked uncertain.
“You know that’s the best plan,” I insisted.
“Okay. We’ll try it your way, but only because you are correct in the fact that I can support your weight, but you may not be able to support mine. I’m going to feed the rope in slowly. It’s a high-quality climbing rope, and I brought a harness, so you should be fine. If you can’t see what we came to see by t
he time you get to the end of the rope, I’m pulling you out and we’ll come back with better equipment and more supplies.”
“Okay. I’m not looking to be a hero. If I get to the end of the rope, I’ll head back.”
Cass attached the harness and the rope. He made sure my flashlight worked, and then he attached it to a line that was attached to my wrist. Once I was all geared up, he instructed me to climb through legs first. I went through on my belly, so I could control the rate of descent. The floor of the cavern was only about eight feet down from the opening, which was about three feet above my head. There was a ledge to my right that looked like it had been carved into the rock. I suspected that at least one kid or very small adult had found this opening and crawled through, only to have the need to carve the ledge to boost themselves out.
Once my feet were firmly planted, I turned on my flashlight and looked around.
“What do you see?” Cass called down to me from the opening.
“There are tunnels in both directions. They look to be tall enough to walk in, at least for a while. It’s really dark, and even with the flashlight, I can only see maybe ten feet in front of me, so it’s hard to tell.”
“You have about two hundred feet of rope. Go ahead and slowly walk in one direction or the other until the rope ends. Then come back to the center, and we’ll do the other side. Remember to look at what’s at your feet and what’s overhead before you take each step. There are likely steep drop-offs, and it’s impossible to know what sort of objects or rock formations might be hanging down from above.”
“Okay. I’ll take it slowly.”
And I did. One terrifying step at a time. Even with the flashlight, it was so dark. And cold. A lot colder than it was outside the mine. I heard something scampering in the dark and jumped. Luckily, I suppressed the scream that seemed to stick in my throat. The last thing I wanted to do was worry Cass, but this lurking around in the dark was not my idea of fun.
