"She's not home." James bent down to stroke Familiar. "She would be with him if she was in her room."
"Now what?" Jennifer knew already. They had to go back to Crush Bonbon's house. That's where they would find Judy Luno— if she wasn't already kidnapped.
* * *
HOT AND JITTERY with worry, James, Jennifer and Familiar had spent the next half hour covertly working their way to the open window of Crush Bonbon's sitting room. Peering over the sill, James and Jennifer suppressed a gasp of surprise as Familiar crouched, ready to rush to the young girl's aid. Judy Luno sat comfortably on a hassock, a tall glass in one hand.
"No, thank you, Mr. Bonbon." Judy covered the top of her glass with her hand as he held up a pitcher. "One chocolate milk was plenty. I just had dinner not long before I came here."
"Do your parents often allow you to go gallivanting around the streets at night?" Crush sat back in his chair and sipped his own glass of chocolate milk. As he spoke, he helped himself to a chocolate pinwheel off a plate on the coffee table. "This nocturnal behavior must be some influence from that Eugene Legander." He pointed to a glass jar of silver-wrapped chocolate candy. "Help yourself."
Judy shook her head. "My parents understand that I'm in training for the future." She gave him a bold grin. "I'm going to be an ace reporter."
"And you're here to get the scoop on me?" For a moment, displeasure creased the talk show host's features. "Don't you think that's a little presumptuous, especially since I caught you red-handed trying to sneak in my dining room window? I could call the juvenile authorities, and you'd spend an adventurous evening at juvy hall."
"Why don't you show me around your house?" Judy got up and went to an end table beside the sofa. "In particular, where did you get this copy of Eugene's manuscript for A Pinch of Curiosity? It's a very valuable manuscript, you know. And it was stolen from his house."
"You're a bold little thing, aren't you?" Crush rose. "There is one room I want to show you. One in particular."
Outside the house, Jennifer grabbed James's arm and squeezed. "He drugged her milk, and now he's going to take her into that horrible children's bedroom. Oh, God, James, we have to stop this."
James was coiled as tightly as a steel spring. Crush was standing right beside Judy. If they tried to get in the window, he'd have too much time to grab her and possibly hurt her.
"Wait until he leaves the room with her. We'll sneak in and then I'll clobber him from behind. Not very gallant, but we can't risk Judy."
Jennifer transferred her death grip to the windowsill, ready at the first moment to boost herself into the room with a little help from James. It was torture to watch the small, dark-haired girl leave the room chatting so determinedly with the big man. "I'm sure you have some interesting rooms," Judy said as she turned the corner. Crush loomed behind her, his shadow a sinister black shape shifting uneasily down the hallway.
Jennifer was right on Familiar's heels as soon as the room was empty. James boosted her from behind, then leapt up after her.
Moving as swiftly as they could without making noise, they hurried to the bedroom that contained the bizarre collection of toys.
Jennifer's mouth was dry and her ears roaring with blood. She should have reported Crush. She should have done a million things differently. Now another child was at risk, and they would have to confront Crush. Once forced into a corner, he might or might not tell them where the other children were being held.
"Step right inside here." Crush pushed open the bedroom door, a tiny smile on his face as he gave Judy a courtly bow.
"Hold it, Bonbon!" James stepped out of the darkness and smashed into the talk show host's face with a strong right followed by an upper punch to the jaw with his left. For a big man, Crush sank to the floor like a balloon slowly deflated of air.
Once seated, he looked up at James with surprise and then anger. "You, sir, have just initiated a lawsuit that is going to leave you without a job, without money, and without any hopes for a future!"
"You're going to prison, Bonbon. We know you were trying to abduct this girl." Jennifer pulled Judy into her arms. "I'm going to strangle you when I get you outside," she whispered to the girl. "You'll wish Crush had you prisoner." Judy didn't bother to reply; she just rolled her eyes in complete disgust.
It had taken a few seconds for James's accusations to sink in, but Crush had finally caught the gist. "I was going to abduct her? You're in the wrong house. It's Eugene you have to worry about."
"Give it up, Crush." James hit the light switch on the wall. "Look at this room. You're some kind of sicko child abductor, and we've got the evidence to prove it."
Crush looked around the room as if seeing it for the first time. "There's nothing here but toys."
"And you stole this manuscript!" Judy pulled a page from inside her blouse. "I lifted this from the stack beside his chair, and he never even knew I took it!" She proudly gave it to Jennifer.
As her fingers closed over the page, Jennifer knew it was wrong. It was a page from Eugene's missing manuscript, but it wasn't right. She held it a moment, then her fingers slid over the page. There were none of the indentations caused by the keys of his typewriter. "It's a photocopy."
James, Crush and Judy looked at her as if she had lost her mind. "So?" Crush was the first to speak. "I got that in the mail from an admirer. Someone sent it to me with a warning that another child would be abducted. I had intended to spend the evening trying to figure out the clue, but I was interrupted by a young burglar."
"But it's a photocopy," Jennifer repeated. "Not the original manuscript that was stolen. Whoever took the manuscript from Eugene's has the original." She looked around the room again. The stuffed animals filled the bed and lined the walls. The bookshelf was there, filled with the finest stories of childhood. Everything was just as she remembered it, but now it didn't seem so wrong.
"What is all of this, Crush?" She swept her hand around the room.
"I had this room built for my fiancée's daughter." Crush slowly got to his feet. "This is none of your business, but I'm going to tell you." He glared at James. "It's going to give me great pleasure telling you, because you've created some warped fantasy in your mind about me and this room. Once I tell you the truth, you're going to be really sorry about coming here tonight. All of you."
He took a breath. "When Arlene Mason agreed to marry me, I wanted her child to feel loved and welcomed when she moved here." He looked away as he shrugged. "Things didn't work out and the marriage was called off. By then, the room was decorated and filled with toys."
Jennifer wanted to ask why the marriage was called off, but she couldn't. Her gaze wandered around the room, taking in each toy that had been bought with the idea of pleasing a little girl, of making her feel welcome in a strange home. Damn Crush Bonbon to Hades. He was making her feel sorry for him, and he wasn't even trying.
"Meow!"
Familiar saved her from embarrassing herself with a few tears when he swatted her leg and demanded her attention. As soon as she looked, he hurried back to the den.
"How did that cat get in here?" Crush asked, following James, who followed Jennifer, who was right on the heels of the cat.
"Look." Jennifer pointed to the small end table where Familiar swatted the stack of manuscript pages to the floor.
"Stop that beast." Crush started forward, but Judy grabbed his hand.
"Hold on. He's showing us something."
"Right. And next he'll sing 'The Star Spangled Banner."'
Judy went to the manuscript and began to pick it up.
Remembering Familiar's last stunt with the manuscript pages, Jennifer bent down. "I'll bet a page is missing."
"Yeah, the one little Miss Sticky Fingers had tucked in her blouse." Crush was standing in the doorway with a glare focused on the entire lot of them.
"No, the kidnapper always leaves a page of one of Eugene's books." Jennifer spoke without thinking. She felt James's gaze on her and looked up to see th
e warning in his eyes. But it was too late. Crush had heard the tidbit of fact and was ready to run with it.
"Has that been reported to the police? I know they found something when Mimi was kidnapped. But the other children, as well? It wasn't in any of the evidence reports, and Bixley never mentioned it to me." He stepped into the room. "Ah-a. You've been hiding evidence, haven't you? Things that would incriminate Eugene!"
It was too late to distract Crush now. He had a competitive gleam in his eyes as he silently dared Jennifer to lie.
She met his gaze with her own glance of sheer blue willpower. "Let's check the pages and see." She sat on the floor beside Judy, and James sat down beside them and took a third of the pages.
Crush eased himself down into an overstuffed chair and gently began to rub his jaw, which had begun to swell. "After a visit to my dentist, I'm going to see a lawyer." But he made no effort to put them out of his house.
"Look!" Jennifer held up a bundle of pages. "It's page ninety-eight, the exact page that's been written— " She stopped.
James watched Crush during the entire exchange. "You really don't know where the children are, do you?" He took a manuscript page from Jennifer's hand and held it a moment, as if deciding whether to give it to Crush or not.
"Of course, I don't know. You think I actually kidnapped those children? For what purpose?" He looked at James, then at Jennifer, and finally at Judy.
"Because you hate Eugene," Judy said simply. "You're jealous of him."
"Of Eugene?" Crush was incensed. "Jealous of what?"
"His success," Jennifer said quietly. "Of the fact that the children love him."
"And we don't like you." Judy was matter-of-fact. "You're always saying mean things about everyone. You try to start trouble. You don't think anyone else has a right to have a say about anything. And when they try, you make them look stupid. Eugene makes everyone feel good. Especially kids."
When Judy stopped speaking, there was a long silence. Jennifer peeked at Crush and saw the redness of his face. James was staring at the manuscript page. Familiar was licking his back leg, oblivious to the entire scene.
"Is that how the children really see me?" Crush addressed his question to Judy.
"You make my parents argue with each other. Especially when you talk about women. My mother wants to get a job. She's tired of staying home. But my dad says her job is to stay home and cook. That's not fair. And he uses what you say as if it came from the Bible. It makes my mother cry." Judy's temper was on the rise. "What you do is wrong. It hurts people."
"I see."
"I think you've made your point, Judy," Jennifer said as she shifted to her knees. "I think I owe Crush an apology. Not so much for what I've said, but for what I've thought." She handed him the page. "This is ninety-nine. The one after the missing one. It's about a little girl who gets turned to a pillar of salt for being nosy." She smiled, a sad, weary smile. "I honestly thought you'd taken the children. I even broke into your house and— the telephone!" Her eyes widened and her voice rose. "Who put the portable phone in your house?" She didn't give him a chance to answer. "Eugene has been neatly framed in this whole mess, but so has Crush. Someone went to a lot of trouble to set him up, hoping that we would put the pieces of the puzzle together. Look— the phone, the attacks, now this manuscript!" She turned to James.
His dark eyes were blazing. "You're right. Someone has just as neatly drawn the noose around Crush's neck. And we've played right into their hands. We've spent all of our time trying to convict Crush, when we've been sniffing a false trail."
"What are you talking about? What telephone? And someone owes me for a very unpleasant cleaning task. How did you manage to get that blood all over the bedroom floor upstairs?"
"Someone knocked me out," James said, and then explained the portable telephone that belonged to Mimi Frost's father. And the fact that they'd found it in his washing machine.
"Is Frost involved?" Crush asked.
James and Jennifer both shook their heads. "I don't believe so. At first I thought it was surely him. You know, one of those custody battle things. But I don't believe he'd do such a thing. And he's as worried about Mimi as we are."
Judy gave them a disgusted look. "Mr. Frost would never do anything to frighten Mimi or Mrs. Frost. He's not a dork."
"Thank you, Judy, for that astute observation." James got to his feet and gave the manuscript page to Crush. "You might as well hear it all. But I'm going to ask you, on your word of honor, not to broadcast any of this information until we've found the children."
"James!" Jennifer shot to her feet. She might have misjudged Crush's involvement in the kidnapping, but he wasn't to be trusted. He was still a loudmouthed blowhard who made his show spicy by devastating other people's reputations and opinions.
Crush had started to take the page that James held out, but Jennifer's objection made him stop. "You don't think I have any honor, do you?"
"Not where Eugene is involved. I think you'd do whatever you could to destroy him."
Crush took the page. "I'm going to prove you wrong." He looked at Judy. "And you, too. Now, what is all of this about?"
James ignored the hand that Jennifer put on his arm. He told Crush the clues they had pieced together. Crush nodded as James talked.
"I can see why you suspected me. So, pages of manuscript, page ninety-eight." Crush sat forward and automatically picked up his milk. He held the plate of cookies and offered them to James and Jennifer, then Judy.
"What about Familiar?" Judy's look was meant to intimidate, and it worked beautifully.
"Oh, okay." He held the plate to the cat who swatted a single cookie onto the floor and began delicately eating the chocolate shell around the cake filling. "I haven't really thought this thing through, but it would appear that whoever is out to get Eugene is also out to get me. The question we have to answer is, who is our mutual enemy?"
"Any possibilities?" James asked.
Crush smiled, one of genuine amusement. "Not the first. Eugene and I are, philosophically, intellectually, and socially, in opposite camps. It would seem that his enemies would be my friends. This doesn't make an ounce of sense."
"No, it doesn't." Jennifer picked up another cookie and began munching it. "I haven't a single— "
The shrill of the telephone interrupted them.
Crush automatically checked his watch. "It's only ten o'clock, but…still." He got to his feet, a worried frown on his face. "Who could this be?"
Jennifer watched closely as Crush picked up the telephone on the far end table. His face showed first annoyance, then disbelief, and finally concern. "I see," he said, but he made no mention of his uninvited guests. "Was it an original or a copy?"
After a pause, he spoke again. "I'll go to the station immediately. We can coordinate television and radio, and I'm sure the newspaper will agree to help." He gave James a look. "Yes, I'm leaving momentarily. Tell Anna to meet me at the station." He replaced the receiver.
"What's going on?" Judy asked. She hadn't missed a moment.
Crush hesitated. "That was Chief Bixley. Anna Green's young daughter has been kidnapped. They found a page of Eugene's manuscript in her bed. She was abducted from her own home while the baby-sitter was watching television. Anna was making a speech in Chickasaw."
"What page of what manuscript?"
"Page ninety-eight of Pinch of Curiosity." Crush stared at the manuscript page he held. "Exactly the one that is missing from this manuscript. And Chief Bixley said it was indeed a photocopied page." Crush pointed to the manuscript. "Both Eugene and I have been perfectly framed."
Chapter Eighteen
Anna Green arrived at the radio station in a swirl of red and blue lights. Craig Bixley, all arrogance replaced by dread and helplessness, stood beside her. Bixley didn't even cast a curious glance at James and Jennifer sitting on a couch beside the young girl and a black cat.
"I can't believe they've taken Amber." Anna covered her face. "It's those cra
zy, liberal, book people. They've taken my child in retaliation for the strong stand I've taken against violence. They're punishing me because I dared to confront them."
"I don't think so, Anna." Crush walked up to her. "Maybe you should stop this foolishness. The person who took Amber isn't some vengeful bookworm. There's someone out there kidnapping children, and it isn't about books."
"What are you saying? Who else could have taken her?" Anna looked around the room, her anger finally settling on Jennifer. "Are you here to gloat?"
"Hardly." Jennifer rose slowly. "I'm here to help you find your daughter, and the other missing children. But we're going to have to put our differences aside to try to put this puzzle together."
"She's right. We've been wrong about Eugene. I don't think he has anything to do with these children. And I don't think it has a thing to do with his books. There's something else at work here. Some type of revenge. Against Eugene, and me, and possibly you. Maybe against several different people. That's what we have to figure out."
"But— "
"No buts, Anna. This has gone far beyond a platform to launch your political campaign."
"You're scaring me, Crush."
Bixley stepped up to Anna's side. "Do you know something, Bonbon?" His tone grew threatening. "If you know something about Amber— "
"Can the threats, Bixley." Crush's voice was suddenly tired. "Let's get Anna on the air to make a plea to the kidnappers and then we'll talk about what we need to do. In the meantime, I suggest you listen to James and Jennifer, and the half-pint. They have a few clues and some evidence that may help us find those children. Whoever the abductor is, they aren't afraid of political or police power. And that's frightening in and of itself." He saw the technician in the control room give him the wave. "Come along, Anna. Let's get started."
Craig Bixley gave Anna's hand a supportive squeeze, then he motioned to James and Jennifer to follow him into a private office. "Hey!" Judy stood. "What about me and Familiar?"
Bixley gave them a long look and realized it was easier to acquiesce. "Come along, then," he said, opening the door. "I can't believe that blasted cat goes everywhere you do."
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