They Never Came Home

by Lois Duncan

  And, of course, on the bedside table stood a picture of Dan. It was the one that had been taken for the yearbook, and it showed him looking very solemn, his chin set, his eyes straight ahead. It was not her favorite picture of him, but it was the most recent, and he had given it to her only a week before he left to go camping.

  “A rogue’s gallery,” her father referred to the array teasingly. “How do you ever get to sleep with all those faces staring out at you?”

  “I manage.” Joan had laughed. “I like mobs.”

  But Larry had had only one picture to gaze at him at night—his own.

  Larry, Larry, I wish we had been closer! I wish I could feel I’d really known you!

  Joan picked up the photograph, turning it in her hands so that the eyes smiled into her own. Unlike Dan’s, which was solemn and posed, Larry’s yearbook picture was a good one. It had caught the illusive, elfin quality of the quicksilver grin, the suggestion of dimples, still faint in the childlike curve of the recently thinner cheeks. The face was beautiful, but the boy behind the face—who had he been, really? What had he thought and felt? What was he laughing about?

  We’ll never know. It’s too late. I should have tried harder, talked to him more, asked his opinions of things. Other sisters manage to be close to their brothers. Anne Tonjes’ brother is only thirteen, but they talk about everything together. If only I’d made more effort …

  Well, it’s too late now.

  Regretfully, she set the picture back into place and drew open the top drawer of the bureau.

  The insides of Larry’s drawers echoed the compulsive neatness of the rest of his room, and a complete exploration took only a matter of minutes. Socks, pajamas, and underwear lay in separate piles, needing only to be lifted and dropped back into place. In the second drawer, shirts were arranged in careful order; in the third were piles of precisely folded sweaters.

  One by one, Joan lifted and checked each item, feeling through the soft cotton of T-shirts, running her fingers inquiringly into the folds of socks. Everything was exactly as it appeared on the surface. There were no hidden papers of any kind, no bankbooks, and certainly no money.

  The next step was the closet. Again, when she opened the door, Larry’s neatness stared back at her. His shirts, slacks and jeans hung neatly on their hangers, folded with care so that their creases fell in exact alignment. Nothing was mussed or crowded. In the bag on the door, Larry’s shoes were arranged in correct compartments.

  Carefully, Joan thumbed her way through the clothing, feeling in the pockets of slacks and shirts and in the compartments of the shoe bag. There was nothing.

  From the closet she went to the bed, folded back the bedclothes, and searched under the mattress.

  By this time the whole procedure was beginning to seem ridiculous. Where next, she asked herself contemptuously. Under the rug? Inside the pillowcase? Behind the books in the bookcase?

  Absurd, completely absurd—and yet …

  “Receipt for merchandise received. Paid in full, $50,000. Signed—Lawrence Drayfus, Jr.”

  Absurd or not, the signature on the receipt had been Larry’s. Somewhere fifty thousand dollars existed.

  Drawing a long breath, Joan squared her shoulders and continued the search. Yes, she would look under the rug, in the pillow case, anywhere, everywhere. If the money was in this room, she would find it. She had to.

  It was almost a full hour later when she permitted herself to admit defeat. With a sigh, she sank to a sitting position on the foot of Larry’s bed. She had covered every corner of the room, not once but several times. She could swear that there was not an inch—under things, within things, on closet shelves, in drawers—that she had not searched thoroughly. There was nothing in the room that should not have been there. There was nothing suspicious in any way. And there was definitely no fifty thousand dollars.

  Where else would he have put it, if not in his room?

  She turned her eyes, once more, to the photograph on the dresser, as though in that smiling face she might find an answer.

  “Where?” she asked silently. “Where is it, Larry? You must have put it someplace for safekeeping.”

  The eyes smiled back at her, inscrutable behind their veil of laughter.

  If she herself had not known Larry, was there anyone who had? The very lack of pictures in the sterile room seemed to indicate that there had not been. She had always taken for granted, without much thought, the fact that Larry, like herself, had numerous friends scattered about through his classes at school. It was strange how few of his classmates had phoned or come by with concern and condolences when he was reported missing. The telephone had rung constantly, yes. Her mother’s words sprang again to her mind: “Larry must have a lot of friends. There have been so many calls.” But now, when she thought back upon it, she realized with surprise that almost all the calls had been from her own friends or friends of her parents.

  Had Larry had any close friends? With whom had he spent his time when he was not at home? Try though she would, Joan could not come up with a single name. Her parents’ friends, she knew, had doted upon him; he had always known, better than she, exactly what to do to charm older people. But as far as his own contemporaries were concerned, he had never seemed to consider them important enough to be worth the effort. As far as she knew, that disastrous party at the Brownings’, at which the police had intervened, was the first social event he had taken the trouble to attend all year.

  It was a strange, almost frightening realization, coming now, as it did, with Larry gone. How alone he had been, always! To have grown up with him, to have lived in the same house with him, and not to have realized—

  “Joan!” Her mother’s voice broke through her consciousness. “Joan, where are you?”

  Hurriedly, Joan got up from the bed and crossed the room. She was just stepping through the door when her mother appeared at the far end of the hallway. She stood there, frozen, as though unable to believe her eyes.

  “What …?” She brought out the question in a croaking voice. “What have you been doing in your brother’s room?”

  “Nothing. Just—just looking over his things.” Joan was amazed at her own quick flush of guilt. “It’s something that will have to be done, Mother. We can’t just leave everything there indefinitely.”

  “You know Larry doesn’t allow people to go into his room,” Mrs. Drayfus said accusingly. “You know how he loves his privacy.”

  “Larry’s gone,” Joan said gently.

  “He’ll be back soon. He’ll be furious if he finds that you’ve been rummaging through his things, Joan. I’m surprised at you.”

  She really believes it—that he will be coming home again! Joan stared at the woman who was her mother, pity swelling in her heart.

  You have me! she ached to cry to her. Mother—look at me—please! Remember, you have me still!

  But she knew that if she spoke the words aloud, her mother would not hear them. Mrs. Drayfus was not with her now. She was staring past her through the open doorway into the empty room beyond. Her eyes held that lost, glazed look as they did so often lately, as though she had withdrawn from them all into a world where Larry’s shadow was stronger, brighter than the reality of either her daughter or husband.

  For a moment, last Saturday night, Joan had thought that she might have broken through to her. She had come downstairs in the long white gown with the odd, square cap on her head, to find her parents sitting in the living room.

  Giving them both a bright smile, she had asked, “How do I look?”

  “Like a sweet, Girl Graduate,” her father had said with an answering smile. It was a tired smile, but there was warmth in his eyes. “I’m proud of you, honey. Look, Margaret—look at Joan in her cap and gown! Remember when she was in diapers? Lord—how many millions of years ago that seems! And now, she’s graduating!”

  “Joan—graduating?” Mrs. Drayfus had repeated the words, as though trying to grasp their meaning. “When?”r />
  “Tonight, Mother!” Joan had gone over to her, speaking gently, as one might to a bewildered child. “This is graduation night. Don’t you want to come and see me get my diploma?”

  “Of course she does!” Mr. Drayfus had turned to his wife hopefully. “This is the biggest night in Joanie’s life. We wouldn’t miss it for anything, would we, Margaret?”

  “I’m not dressed,” Mrs. Drayfus had said slowly, her eyes dropping to her housecoat. It was the first time in weeks that she had seemed to take notice of what she was wearing.

  Joan’s heart lifted.

  “That’s all right. There’s plenty of time. You’ll have time to change.”

  “All right,” Mrs. Drayfus said. “If Larry gets home in time.”

  She spoke so naturally, so matter-of-factly, that Joan could not believe she had understood the words.

  She repeated them slowly.

  “If Larry …”

  “I can’t go without Larry,” her mother said stubbornly. “What if he should call while we are all gone? Or if he should come home and find nobody here?”

  “But, Mother!” She could not answer. She turned her face away, and her father got up wearily and came over and put an arm around her shoulders.

  “I’m sorry, honey,” he said softly. “I hoped, for a minute there …”

  “I know. So did I.”

  “I’ll be there.” He tightened his arm around her. “I may be a little late, but I’ll be there. I’ll call around, see if I can get somebody to come over and stay here while I’m gone. I don’t like leaving her alone in the evening, but I’m sure I can work things out somehow.”

  “That’s all right. I understand.” Joan had kept the disappointment from showing in her voice. “You stay right here and look after Mother. I’ll know you’re there in spirit. That’s what matters.”

  “Well, if you’re sure you won’t mind.” He sounded relieved. “Do you have a way to get to the auditorium?”

  “Oh yes. The graduates have to get there early. Anne and her folks are coming by for me. They’ll bring me home afterward.” She had even managed to smile at him. “Don’t expect a whole bunch of honors like Anne’s going to get, but I will have that precious piece of parchment that says I made it through twelve glorious years!”

  So she had gone with the Tonjeses to receive her diploma. It had been good to be with the Tonjes family, who were so happy and excited about Anne’s triumphs as valedictorian and winner of one of the top scholarships. In the fall she was to start classes at U.C.L.A.

  “What are your plans, dear?” Mrs. Tonjes asked kindly, and Joan shook her head.

  “I don’t know. The university, I suppose.” The whole idea of college seemed to belong to another world, a normal, happy, promise-filled world that had existed a long time ago.

  There were parties scheduled for the hours after the graduation ceremony. Anne, who had taken it for granted that Joan would attend them, was concerned at her refusal.

  “You don’t need a date, if that’s what’s worrying you. A lot of people won’t have them. The whole class will be going, just as a final farewell get-together. Come on, Joanie. My date will drive you home afterward.”

  “Thanks, but I can’t,” Joan said. “Really.”

  Anne regarded her with sympathy. “Dan was a wonderful guy. I know how it was with the two of you. But you can’t just lock yourself away from everything, hon. He wouldn’t have wanted you to miss out on graduation night. He’d have wanted you to go with us, you know that.”

  “I do know that,” Joan said. “That’s not the reason. It’s Mother. You’ve seen her, Anne. She’s just … not like herself. I don’t like to be away from home for very long at a time.”

  “I thought she was getting better,” Anne said. “At least, that’s what your father told me the last time I called.”

  “I know. He says that to everyone. I think he’s trying to convince himself. He thinks it’s just a matter of adjustment, that once the initial shock is over she’ll be her old self again.”

  “But you don’t think so?” Anne asked worriedly.

  “I don’t know. I hope so. Sometimes she does seem better.” She had spoken the words in a kind of desperation, but now, standing in the hallway, gazing at the woman before her, she knew that they were just that—words. No matter what she and her father told each other in love and hope, Mrs. Drayfus was not improving. Many people suffered from shock following a tragedy, but the numbness did not last—it wore off, gradually, bit by bit as they began to accept the pain of reality. With her mother, this acceptance had not come. She was, rather, slipping further and further away with each passing day into some far place where Larry lived still, laughing and beautiful, and it was her husband and daughter who were shadows.

  “Mother …”

  Joan did not know what she would have said if, at that moment, the door bell had not rung.

  For a moment it seemed that Mrs. Drayfus had not heard it. Then, abruptly, she cocked her head to one side.

  “The bell,” she said, “he must have forgotten his key.”

  “Who?” Joan asked, uncomprehending.

  “Larry, of course. He must have forgotten it.”

  “It’s the middle of the day, Mother,” Joan said gently, her heart flooded with pity. “The door isn’t locked in the daytime. It’s somebody calling—a salesman, perhaps. I’ll get it.”

  She turned and hurried down the stairs, hopeful that her mother was not following her.

  This can’t go on, she thought miserably. She can’t continue this way. There must be something we can do. Perhaps, if we talk to a doctor …

  When she was at the foot of the stairs the door bell rang again. Joan opened the door quickly and stopped in surprise.

  Frank Cotwell was standing on the doorstep.

  “Why, Frank—hello.”

  “Hi.”

  There in the bright sunlight, his hair a cinnamon bristle, the freckles standing out in dark spots against his nose, he looked for an instant so much like Dan that her heart gave a painful leap and then settled again, heavily, in her chest. It was not Dan, steady and sure of himself, his blue eyes twinkling. It was only Frank, his face flushed with a combination of heat and embarrassment, his eyes dropping from hers as he fumbled for words.

  “It’s so hot,” he said awkwardly, “I thought … well, the guys were telling me the other day, the public pool is open. I thought I’d go over and take a swim and … well, I was thinking, if you were hot too, you might want to go.”

  “Thanks, Frank. That’s nice of you, but I—”

  She had the answer half spoken when suddenly from the hall behind her she heard a startled gasp.

  “Dan! Dan Cotwell! It’s Dan!”

  “Mother, no! It isn’t Dan, it’s his brother!”

  Joan turned, but her mother was already rushing forward, crowding into the doorway beside her.

  “Where’s Larry? Where’s my son? Dan, what have you done with my boy?”

  “Larry?” Frank stared at her in bewilderment. “Larry’s gone, Mrs. Drayfus, you know that. Larry and Dan, both. The police said—”

  “Where is he? Don’t pretend to me. How could you have come back without Larry? You’ve left him up there in the mountains—sick—maybe hurt! Where is he? Tell me this minute!”

  Mrs. Drayfus’ voice rose, high and painful, on a note Joan had not heard before. If she had not held out an arm to restrain her, her mother would have thrown herself on top of the confused boy.

  “Mother, no! He isn’t—really”—Joan threw Frank a pleading glance—“tell her …”

  But he misinterpreted.

  “Larry’s dead, Mrs. Drayfus. After all this time, there isn’t any hope for them. The police say so—the rangers—everybody. He and Dan are dead.”

  He faltered and fell into silence, his eyes widening at the sight of the woman’s face.

  “Joan,” he whispered, “didn’t she know?”

  A long scream broke t
he air, and Joan’s arms went tight around her mother, catching her as she fell.

  “Help me,” she said, “Frank, help me. We’ve got to get her into her room and call my father—and a doctor!”

  SEVEN

  AS SPRING SLID INTO summer, so did June slip past and become the first hot days of July.

  Mrs. Drayfus’ roses bloomed and drooped and bloomed again and hung at last, heavy and brown on their tired stems, as though asking to be allowed to fall to the ground in peace.

  The Cotwells’ small house gathered the morning heat and held it close within itself while the sun moved in a high arch above its roof. Daylight clung to the sky for long hours after dinner was over, and the cool of the evening settled, finally, like a happy surprise, with the first stars shining steady and pale in the slowly darkening sky.

  “What will we do on the Fourth?” Eddie asked.

  Frank, who was sprawled on the chaise longue in the back yard, did not bother to answer. He had come outside to be alone, to escape from the bustle of family and the need to make conversation. Now, here was Eddie, crouched in the grass at his feet, asking his usual string of inane questions.

  “Do you want to have a cookout like we did last year?”

  “No,” Frank said shortly, “I don’t want to have a cookout.”

  “We could get some fireworks and shoot them off in the canyon. Chris Bryant has some his uncle brought back from their vacation trip.”

  “It’s against the law,” Frank said, “to shoot fireworks in New Mexico.”

  “I know, but we did it last year anyway. Last,year you thought it was great! Nobody’s going to catch us in the canyon. We could take some hot dogs and—”

  “Scram, will you, Eddie? Just scram.” The words came out so vehemently that his own voice frightened him. “Just go somewhere, won’t you?”

  “Where?” Eddie lifted a hurt face.

  “Anywhere. I don’t care. Go take a walk, go visit somebody, go read a book or watch television. Hell, go anywhere, but just let me be! Can’t a guy ever be alone around here?”