Hear the Children Calling (26 page)

Something had happened at the Blair house. Lou hurried down to his squad car and got on the radio to headquarters. They not only had a double murder on their hands, but unless he found that woman and child there would be two more victims.

34

J
ILL WANTED TO DRIVE UP TO THE GATES OF THE
LaMane Center, to barge through them and demand the return of her son. But her training as a scientist slowed her down, making her follow every lead. After reading the paper given to her by Professor Juárez, she understood fully what Jeffrey’s colleagues had wanted from her son. Those late-night meetings, the times he had insisted Ryan join his “friends” at their club, his almost-fanatical concern about Ryan’s health—they were all indicative of the sick plans Jeff had for their baby boy.

Jill realized that she had been an unwitting human guinea pig, a woman so desperate to have a baby that she’d agreed to try a drug newly introduced to the market. Jill knew that all drugs had years of testing behind them before they appeared at the prescription level, and she had trusted her ob/gyn. In truth, Neolamane had not given her any troubles during pregnancy. Everything was normal, right up to the birth. And then, from the time Ryan was able to crawl, he began to show signs of being different.

Jill could remember him scooting over to the front door every evening, a few minutes before Jeff’s car
turned the corner to their home. It was as if the baby had a built-in clock and knew when his father was going to arrive. Once Jeff had told a friend a joke, and the baby had laughed out loud before the grown-ups did, as if he understood. Then there was the extraordinary part—the stuffed animals that seemed to come to life, dolls Ryan had made dance by themselves, and a leather puppy dog with a sewn mouth who began to bark. Ryan had had the ability to bring inanimate objects to life.

And Neolamane had given him the power.

Jill ran over the words of the medical report as she drove back toward the mountains. It hadn’t said a word about psychic abilities, but it did lambast LaMane for not pulling the drug off the market at the very first signs of trouble. The trouble these doctors were talking about was physical—minor birth defects like sixth and seventh toes, bones already fused in adult formations, missing eyebrows. Nothing life-threatening, but the writers had said continued use of Neolamane might very well lead to other, more tragic incidents. The article had been written eleven years ago, and according to further research, the drug had been removed from pharmacists’ shelves a year later. Which meant that Jeffrey had given her an illegal drug to help her conceive.

Jill remembered the cold way Jeff had behaved toward her after Ryan’s birth. He’d doted on the child, panicking at the slightest sniffle, insisting Jill was either nursing too little or too much. Many nights, he was off at his club, having secret meetings with his colleagues. Jill knew what the bastards had been up to, now. They’d realized that, in some cases, Neolamane affected the brain and caused it to develop superpowers. That’s why they’d taken Ryan away, killing Jeff in the process. They’d wanted to study him, like some specimen under a microscope.

And from the size of the LaMane Center, Jill was certain there were many other children in the same predicament.

Jill glanced into her rearview mirror, planning to
change lanes. There was a car behind her, and when she crossed over the avenue, it followed her. Her fingers tightened around the steering wheel and her foot depressed the accelerator. That man was following her again.

She exited the main highway. The car behind her followed. At the first opportunity, Jill pulled to the side of the road and pretended to be busy with a map. The car passed her, and she sighed with relief. If the car was following her, the driver didn’t have the nerve to make himself obvious by stopping when she did. If she tried, she could lose him again and make it safely back to the mountains without her lookout being discovered.

But as soon as she’d driven two blocks, the same car turned the corner and began following her again from about a half-block distance. Realizing there was no use in driving up to the Sandias now, she looked around for a way out. Then she saw a sign that read O
LD
T
OWN
. She decided she’d park her car, pretend to browse through a few stores, and leave the major tourist attraction of Albuquerque as soon as she felt it was safe.

Jill’s mind was not so occupied that she missed the quaint charm of Old Town. There was a Spanish feeling everywhere, from the Church of San Felipe de Neri to shops selling everything from turquoise jewelry to rattlesnake eggs. On impulse, Jill went into a store and browsed through the souvenirs. She wanted to buy something for Ryan, something to celebrate their reunion. Jill reached for a set of hand-carved building blocks, each with a design of Mexican origin. Ryan had always loved building blocks . . .

She stopped herself. Somehow, she’d forgotten Ryan was ten years old now. Ten! The shock of seeing the change in him, when her mind was fixed with an image of a three-year-old, might be almost too much to bear. But she’d know Ryan when she saw him. She was sure of that. What would Ryan be interested in now? There would be so much to learn about him. Then she remembered
how, even as a little kid, he loved building things. She spotted a kit for a model Conestoga wagon and took it to the sales counter. After paying for it, she walked across the road to the plaza that centered Old Town. She looked around and found no sign of the man who had been following her. Still, she couldn’t take a chance. This was so damned frustrating. Every moment that went by was another moment without Ryan.

The aromas wafting from a nearby Mexican restaurant reminded her of how little she’d eaten since that morning. She left the plaza and went to have a late lunch. The restaurant was small, each table set with a terra-cotta candle molded in the shape of a dove. Jill ordered and sat looking out the window. In a few moments, she spotted the man who’d been looking for her. And he was headed straight for the restaurant.

She gazed at him through the wrought-iron gates that surrounded the windows. He stood on the sidewalk for a few moments, as if considering whether or not he would dine here.

Jill set her teeth hard. If he did come in, she’d confront him. She couldn’t play the victim forever.

The waitress brought her order. “Are you Jill Sheldon?”

Jill’s heart leapt. “Yes—yes I am. How—?”

“There was a message for you,” the waitress said. “It was left at the front desk just a few minutes after you came in.”

The woman handed her a folded piece of paper.

“Who left it?” Jill asked. “Do you know what he looked like?”

“I’m sorry,” the waitress said. “The waiter who took the note just went off-duty.”

Jill thanked her and tore open the envelope:

We know you are here. Stay away from the center and Ryan will be safe. You must give up your search, for your efforts will only result in the death of your son. And this time, it won’t be a trick.

Jill crumpled up the note. When she looked out the window again, the man was gone.

Suddenly, she had lost her appetite. Asking the waitress to wrap the dinner for her, Jill paid her bill and quickly left the restaurant. Now was the time to get out of here, when her follower was certain she was still eating lunch. Maybe he was watching her right now, but he’d never get to his own car fast enough to catch up to her.

As she left Old Town and turned onto the highway again, Jill realized to her relief that she was right. No one was following her. She made her way back up into the Sandias again, ready to continue her vigil.

Upon arriving at her campsite, Jill hoisted the telescope from the trunk of her car and began to spread the legs of its tripod. Though there hadn’t been much to see this morning, she hoped the aging day would bring more activity down in the center. She looked down into the valley, then trained the lens of the telescope in its direction. For a few moments, she gazed through the lens at a woman working in a desert garden. She was removing debris from the blanket of rocks surrounding her cactus plants, bits of feathers and twigs and dust that had rolled into her yard. Momentarily, the woman looked over her shoulder. Slowly, Jill moved the telescope. There was a child, at last! A girl with long, dark hair and a rather plain expression. When she came near to the woman, Jill saw she was as tall as her mother, but bore no resemblance at all to her. Jill wished she could read lips, aching to know what was being said. The telescope revealed two books held tightly in the child’s arms.

“School,” Jill cried, her voice sending a flutter of birds up out of a nearby juniper.

That was why she hadn’t seen any children earlier. They were in school. Was it possible that the LaMane people were actually educating their victims?

“Educating them to do what?” Jill asked, speaking softly.

Jill took her viewing position again and began a
slow survey. Indeed, there were more and more children appearing on the streets. Some alone, some in pairs or clusters, just like normal schoolchildren at the end of a long day of classes. But there was something wrong here . . . Jill immediately saw that none of the children was running, that they moved in an orderly fashion down the main road of the center, branching off onto side streets to approach their homes.

Their homes. Did Ryan think of a house down there as his home? Did he remember at all that there had been another place, a farm in the Midwest? Was there even the vaguest memory of a mother who had loved him dearly?

Something suddenly occurred to her, and she sat back so abruptly that she sent the telescope swinging on the tripod in a wide arc. Ryan had been an active boy, and as talkative as any three-year-old. He wouldn’t have just gone off with someone without a fight. The fact that they’d been successful in taking him suggested something so horrible that Jill thought she could feel her flesh icing over. Brainwashing! They must have done something to make Ryan completely forget his home and family. And Jill had no doubt Jeffrey had just handed their son over to these bastards—probably walked away from them, thinking he was home free, unaware they’d booby-trapped his car.

But there was another question, one more on a pile of questions reaching sky high. Witnesses to Jeffrey’s accident said they had seen a child in the car. Jill knew now that the child wasn’t Ryan. Then who was it?

Or had there ever even been a child at all? Craig Dylan had said the whole investigation was suspicious to him. If only she could have spoken further with him! Everything he’d said had been true. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to get Ryan. How many people had accepted bribes to look the other way? How many witnesses changed their story about what they saw in Jeffrey’s car after unclean money entered their pockets? It was unfathomable to Jill that anyone could be so full of hatred toward an innocent little boy.

She looked up at the sky, fighting angry tears. A silent vow was made under the majestic pines: no matter what it took, she would get Ryan back.

35

J
ENNY
, M
ICHAEL, AND
T
OMMY HUDDLED TOGETHER
in a small cave, listening to the sounds of shouts and running footsteps. They were hidden by more than the darkness of the alcove. Their own special talents went to work for them now, in a way they never could when each was trapped in the green chair at the clinic.

Tommy rustled bushes to make their pursuers move in certain directions.

Michael woke a sleeping lizard and sent him scurrying, so that the grown-ups would think someone frightened it.

And Jenny, recognizing voices outside, put her mind to picturing exactly where everyone was. But she’d been doing it for several hours now, and she was exhausted. Her head hurt, she was cold and hungry, and she really wanted to go back home. She stretched a little in the darkness, accidentally kicking Michael.

“Hey!”

“Shh!”

Jenny mumbled an apology. “How long do we have to stay here?” she asked in a whisper.

“Until my dad comes to get us,” Michael said. “He knows I ran away, so he’ll be looking for me.”

“Sure, so he can take you back to the center,” Tommy grumbled. “Just like those other grown-ups out there.”

“Not my dad,” Michael insisted. “He was trying
to get me out of that place. He said there was a lot of stuff he had to tell me, but before he could, Dr. Adams got him.”

Jenny shivered. She could just barely make out the outlines of the boys’ faces. There was an odd shape behind Michael’s head, and it took her a moment to realize he was using his backpack like a pillow.

“Maybe Dr. Adams locked him up,” she suggested worriedly. “Maybe he can’t come to us. You said they were really fighting.”

“My dad’s strong,” Michael insisted, though there was a hint of doubt in his voice. “He can get out of anything. And he’ll come for us. I know he will.”

“But he doesn’t know where we are,” Jenny said.

There was a long silence, almost heavy enough to mask the sounds outside—a coyote howling, wind blowing, human shouts.

“Did you try calling him with your mind?” Jenny finally asked.

Michael nodded, the movement of his head making the backpack rustle. “He didn’t answer me,” he said. “I don’t know why. I never called him like that before, so maybe he can’t answer me. I mean, not like that lady with the brown hair always answered you.”

“I wish she was here now,” Jenny said. “I’m sure she’d help us.”

“She is an Outsider,” Tommy pointed out.

“Big deal,” Michael cried. The other two shushed him in unison. He whispered, “So, what’s an Outsider? Something Dr. Adams made up. We know the guy’s a creep, so why should we believe anything he said to us? Jenny, even if I can’t find my dad, maybe you can get that lady. Maybe she can help us.”

“I don’t know—”

“We sure can’t stay here forever,” Tommy insisted. “Listen, they’re moving farther away. I say we make a run for it. Head through the mountains and head for the city.”