Blind School (17 page)

As on-screen Ryan’s car swung into the car park, Frank Lyle peeped his head into the monitoring room. The day-guard looked towards him.

‘I'll just see what these guys want, then I'm outta here.’

   ‘Okay. I’ll hang on.’

‘This what you’re looking for?’ the day guard asked as he took the inhaler out of the locker. It had taken only a minute to check what had been handed in that day.

‘Yes... yes. Thank you.’ Jessica took the inhaler and put it in her pocket.

‘Cleaner found it just an hour ago.’

Jessica nodded and Ryan echoed, ‘Yeah, thanks.’

‘Not a problem. Just press the green button by the main door and I'll buzz you out from here.’

He closed the locker as they headed out.

But as Ryan and Jessica turned into the next corridor along, Frank Lyle was towards its end.

It took Jessica a moment to realize what she was seeing, slot the image into place as again she got a mind's eye flashback. Though it wasn’t until Lyle half-turned towards them, as he had that day by her school, that she was sure.

She gripped Ryan's arm to hold him back, and they slipped back round the corner out of sight.

‘It's
him
!’ she hissed under her breath.

‘Who?’

‘The guy I told you about that I saw by his van that day.’

They were both whispering urgently now. Ryan's eyes shifted between the guard's direction and Jessica as he tried to make some sense of it.

‘Did you see any apparition in him now?’

   Jessica applied thought for a moment, looked perplexed.

‘No.’

‘And neither did I.’

Ryan saw her still battling to comprehend. He put a calming hand on her shoulder.

‘Relax. Just someone who looks like him. Otherwise you'd have seen something now as well.’

‘Yeah, yeah. Suppose you’re right. It’s nothing.’ Her expression eased and she gave a tight smile. ‘Starting to see demons where they don’t exist.’

It took the ATF operator three plays of the same section of tape before he realized he’d hit something significant. He beckoned Brent Cohburn over.

‘Think you should hear this.’ He hit play as Cohburn approached. John Culverton's came over on the tape:

‘Hi, Tom... yeah. You're in the marquee now?’

‘Sorry. I can't hear you with all this jet noise. Meet me in the marquee.’

   ‘You’re there now?’

  
Nothing but static and the sound of jets overhead came over.

   Cohburn looked at the recorder blankly for a second, and the operator prompted, ‘I think it’s a standard response. I don’t think Collard was ever there.’

Cohburn nodded after a second, his face stony.
He picked up the phone.

‘
Yeah... okay. Difficult to hear with all this going on. I'm on my way...’

After hearing Cohburn’s theory on the phone, Ellis Kendell had the sound-file e-mailed over and listened to it with Josh Eskovitz. Ellis gestured towards Josh.

‘Play it from the beginning again.’

Josh brought the sound loop up again on screen, clicked ‘play’. The first part was an automated message, then Tom Collard’s voice.

‘
Incoming call from Tom Collard.
Press button one to receive it.’

Bleep.

‘Hi, John. I'm at the air show. Can you meet me in the marquee?’

‘Hi, Tom... yeah. You’re in the marquee now?’

Ellis nodded and Josh stopped it again.

‘Okay. John hits button one and activates whatever bag of tricks Alex has set up to control the aircraft.’

Josh nodded. ‘Presumably why the last part mocked up as Tom Collard is a 'fit anything' response.’

   ‘Yeah. He says he can’t hear because of all the noise from the air-show, so it wouldn’t have mattered what was said the other end.’ Ellis lapsed into thought. ‘And where did Cohburn get hold of the recording?’

‘Sent in anonymously. He reckons it came from a competitor. Though they don't like to admit it, they scan calls at events like this to pick up what the competition might be up to.’

   Ellis smiled thinly. ‘And aside from the usual dirty tricks with arms dealing, one of them finally developed a conscience.’

TWENTY-TWO

Jessica looked in the bathroom mirror as she swilled back the two pills with some water. She picked up the eye-drops and read the label, reminding herself of the sequence and timing, then slipped the bottle into her bag.

   Her thoughts were still on what lay ahead at the doctors through breakfast. Her and Ben sat at the dining table and their mom in her armchair at the side of the room.

Jessica brought herself out of a half-daze as she noticed Ben look up from his bowl of
Cocoa Krispies
towards his school-bag.

‘It’s okay,’ she said. ‘I already packed everything in the there: lunch and a chocolate bar, coke...’

‘... Dragonoid?’

Jessica rolled her eyes. ‘Yeah, yeah – dragonoid too.’ She checked her watch and knocked back the last of her coffee. ‘Sorry. Got to leave twenty minutes early today for something.’

Their mom looked over, cut in: ‘You got everything and know where it is?’

‘Yeah, yeah.
Belmont Street
. Catch the 371 just a few blocks away.’ She looked back at Ben. ‘And don't forget, wait for Errol to come by. Don't walk to school on your own.’

Ben nodded as Jessica grabbed her bag.

‘Good luck!’ Mrs Werner called out.

‘Yeah. Good luck,’ Ben echoed.

Said as if he had no idea what was going on, but felt he should well-wish in any case. Jessica felt something tug inside her as she was reminded of the duplicitous game she was playing with her family. She stepped over and Ben a quick goodbye hug.

But as his head nestled in her shoulder, he whispered: ‘It's okay. I know the secret. You don't have to keep it to yourself any more.’

‘
What
?’ A sharp jolt ran through her as she pulled back and stared at Ben.

But her mom was approaching, she couldn’t pursue it. Her eyes shifted uncomfortably between Ben and her mom, then with a quick forced smile to hopefully cover, she headed out.

‘Bye y'all.’

Frank Lyle sat in his grey van and watched Jessica shut the door behind her as she left her home a hundred yards ahead.

But she seemed oblivious to all else, her eyes set dead ahead as she headed away from him along the road.

He edged out and started following.

Jessica's head span with Ben's last words:
I know the secret
.

Her thoughts pounded in time with her step: surely he couldn’t have found out. And if he had,
how
? She’d been so careful to keep everything from him.

She knew that she should wait until after the doctor’s appointment to talk to Ben, could do without the agitation beforehand – but in the end it was burning too hot through her mind. At the next cross-street, she memory-dialled her home number.

After three rings her mother answered: ‘Hello.’

‘Mom. Is Ben still there?’

‘Uh... yes.’

Jessica picked up the questioning tone:
you walked out the door only a moment ago
?

‘Can you put him on? Just some toy he asked me to get – I forgot its name now.

A faint rustling as her mom lifted the phone away, then:

‘Ben! It's Jessica. Something about a toy.’

The sound of Ben scampering across the room and more rustling as he took the phone from his mom.

‘Yeah?’

‘Is mom still close by?’

‘Uh... yes.’

‘Can you move away from her a bit?’

‘Why?

‘There... there's something I need to talk to you privately about. Okay?’

‘What's that?’

‘Just
do it
?’

At the other end, Ben was unnerved by his sister's tone, hadn't heard her like this before – but he did as told and moved away. Though picking up on his expression, his mom's eyes stayed on him as he shifted into the hallway.

Realizing she’d been snappy, Jessica's tone instantly softened.

‘I'm sorry Ben – it's just that...’ She was slightly out of breath now – walking and talking at the same time, along with the agitation of what Ben might know. ‘That secret you mentioned earlier. What secret did you mean, Ben?
What
secret
?’

Ben paused for a second, seemed slightly flustered.

‘Uh... The fact that you're bunking off from your real school – you know, to go to this other school with these other kids that might also be going blind.’

A wave of relief swept over Jessica. ‘Oh... Ben.’

‘But you're going to be okay... I know it!’

‘Ben... whatever would I do without you?’ She bit at her lip, holding back the tears as her eyes welled up. ‘And, yeah - I'm going to be okay. See ya later.’

She was still riding that wave of elation as she clicked off, so was a second slow seeing the van swing in behind her. She caught only a faint flicker of movement, half-turning towards it as a cloth was clamped over her mouth.

The smell of ammonia hit high in her synapses, darkness swilling in like a rapid tide.

Tommy Rawlton had slightly more warning as he walked along a
Cedar Falls
sidewalk, because the approaching car screeched to an abrupt halt as it swept in alongside him.  

‘
Shiiit
.... what the?’

He caught only a half glimpse of his assailant as he was grabbed from behind. One hand went across his face partly obscuring his vision, but he then realized there were two of them as he felt himself being lifted and carried.

He saw the trunk lid opening in his side vision, then he was swung inside and the trunk lid slammed back down.

Darkness.

TWENTY-THREE

Jules Mentinck had decided on an extra study session in the
Blind
School
study after his last lecture of the day.

Something was troubling him, and he wasn’t one to give up easily on puzzles. A fifteen foot square room, it’s walls were lined with leather-bound books. Five tomes were on his desk, two of them open at set pages.