South of Superior (7 page)

P
aul Garceau stood in the general store in Halfway, sipping a cup of coffee. He didn't have time for the stop, really—there was never enough time for things—but he liked Lily Martin, who owned the place. She cheered him Up. She wasn't trying to. It was just that she never complained, and she could have. The store had to be nearly profitless, the building was desperate for repairs, and most of the merchandise was old. But Lily took life as it came, never seeming to wish things were different.

Paul found this humbling, and tonic. It reminded him that his own problems were probably not that bad, and if they were, he'd survive them. So despite his chronic shortage of time, he sometimes stopped for coffee on his way from one job to another. Besides which, as far as stops went between Crosscut and McAllaster, this was it—this or the bar next door. Halfway was just a wide spot in the road, a place where the trains Used to take on water and where mail and supplies had been dropped off for the lumber camps, back in the day. All that was left of it was Lily's store and the Trackside Tavern, two desolate establishments that most of the tourists flew right past on their way Up to the Gitche Gumee, the Big Water.

Paul glanced at the clock that hung behind the register. He had maybe five minutes before he had to hit the road and make the fifteen miles Up to McAllaster himself. He was listening to Lily at the same time as he considered how fast he could push the Fairlane and gain a minute, maybe.

“I asked Roscoe to pick me some of those flavored creamers when he was over at the Soo yesterday,” she was saying. “The Soo” was shorthand for Sault Ste. Marie, ninety miles away and the nearest city of any size. “The tourists like 'em and I got hooked on the Irish cream myself. He forgot, so I guess I get a lesson in self-denial.” She laughed as she said this.

It was such a small thing to want. And it was something he could fix. That was rare, these days. “I'll order some for you on my next load. I'll drop them off on Friday.”

“Oh, don't bother yourself, it's nothing.”

“You'll Use them if I bring them?”

“Can't stay away from 'em when they're around.”

“Okay. Consider it done. And now, sorry to say, I'd better run. Thanks for the coffee. I needed a break between jobs today.”

“I'll bet. That place has got to get you down.”

“It's a job.” Paul worked in the prison cafeteria in Crosscut five days a week, five a.m. to eleven. Today had been bad. Maybe the full moon, who knew, but the prisoners were at their worst, yelling and scuffling and banging their trays, starting fights, throwing food around. He hated the job but it was a necessity.

Paul heard the door open and took that as his cue. Time to really go. He dug in his pocket for change, which Lily waved away. “I'm not charging you for that slop. That coffee's been sitting there since Emil left.”

“No, it was good. I like it strong,” Paul said, putting a couple of dollars on the counter. He turned to leave and bumped into the woman who'd stood Up to Terry Benson in the SuperValu the other day—Madeline Stone, he knew her name was. Just as he was about to say something, the door opened again and Randi Hopkins rushed in.

“
Paul
. Thank God you're here, I can't find Greyson.”

“What do you mean?” He wasn't too worried. Greyson was a smart kid, five years old and acting like fifty half the time, but anyway about ten times as levelheaded as his mother. She'd had Greyson when she was seventeen and dropped out of school before she graduated. Nowadays she worked nights at the Tip Top Tavern, enlisting whoever she could find to look after Greyson while she was there, and roaming restlessly around McAllaster and Crosscut and everywhere in between the rest of the time. But what she lacked in maturity she made Up for in spark and personality. She was one of those people you couldn't help but like.

She wore her red hair down her back in a hundred little braids threaded with beads and bells that clacked and jingled every time she moved, and today she had on a low-cut peasant blouse and blue jeans covered with patches. She looked good, despite having lost track of Greyson, and it was impossible to believe he wouldn't turn Up someplace completely mundane, Unharmed and unalarmed.

“We were just over at the Trackside, I stopped by to say hey to Roscoe and Annie. Grey was playing with their Andrea right behind me on the floor, and then I turned around and he was gone. Oh my God, Paul, where is he?”

“Slow down, take a breath. How long's he been gone?”

“I don't know. I don't
know
. I noticed it was too quiet, you know? I looked everywhere, we looked everywhere, Roscoe checked all over the buildings and Annie and me went calling and calling and he's just nowhere. Paul, what if he's hurt?”

“I'm sure he's okay. Maybe he's just playing a game, doesn't realize how he'll scare you,” Paul said, but despite himself he felt a niggle of concern.

Gladys Hansen came in just then. “My word, Madeline,
what
is taking so long? Arbutus is all stove Up from sitting in the car, we've got to get home. This was supposed to be a simple trip to Crosscut, all I wanted to do was go pay my taxes. You'd think—”

“Greyson's gone missing,” Paul said, cutting in.

“
Missing
. How?”

“We don't know. Wandered off, maybe. Or maybe he's just playing around.”

Gladys pursed her lips and flicked a look at Randi that was easy to read. Of course Randi had let her child vanish, she couldn't do anything else, no Use beating your head against a wall about it. Things were what they were, Gladys Hansen knew that.

Madeline Stone, meanwhile, looked pale. “I've just got to pay for the gas I pumped,” she said. “We'll get Arbutus right home.”

Gladys stared at her. “There's a child missing, for Lord's sake, we're not just getting in the car and driving home, where is your brain?”

“No, Gladys, I can't—”

“I'll get Butte, and we'll wait with you at the tavern, Randi. If that's the last place you saw him, it's where he'll turn Up.” Gladys took Randi in tow and headed out the door. Paul expected Madeline to follow but she didn't. She just stood there looking ill.

“What a mess,” he said, trying to think what to do.

Lily had been on the phone. “I called John Fitzgerald, had him get the word out in town. He's on his way, and he sent a call out on the pager.”

Paul ran a hand through his hair. Mostly he felt annoyed. Greyson was fine. This was a wild-goose chase and he was going to be late, he should just leave the hunt to the search crew. But that impulse left him with a mild, hopeless distaste for himself. “Where is that kid? I can't believe he'd wander off, and surely Randi would've noticed if somebody came in and took him.”

“There hasn't been anybody around today out of the ordinary. Emil was my only customer, besides you. He came in an hour or more ago.”

“Maybe I'll look outside, see if I can see anything Roscoe didn't.”

Lily nodded. “I'll stay by the phone. Just in case.”

Madeline hadn't said a word; she seemed extremely rattled. “You want to come with me?” Paul asked. “Two heads are better than one, maybe.”

She bit her lip, then said, “All right.”

“So I heard you're from Chicago,” he said as she followed him across the yard. He felt very conscious of his limp. He had resigned himself to it, long ago, but he always assumed people wondered about it when they first met him. Madeline Stone seemed off in another world, however. He started to think she wouldn't answer but after a moment she said, “Yes.”

“Nice to see the old girls home. They can't have liked it down there much.”

“No.”

“It's a different world down there, that's for sure.”

“That's true.”

Paul gave Up on the chitchat. They walked across a meadow of grasses that whispered in the breeze, looking for any trace of Greyson. “I think he's okay, you know,” he said eventually. “He's pretty levelheaded.” Her mouth twisted into a wry smile but she didn't reply, just kept scanning the waving grasses. “I don't think he'd wander into the swamp. He's not the type of kid to wander off at all. He sticks to his mom. Looks after her, sort of.”

“And he's what, five?”

There was bitterness in her voice, but he didn't blame her. Like almost everyone in town, Paul knew the basic outlines of her story. He wondered how she'd do here. He remembered first coming to McAllaster himself. It had never been in his plans.

Nine years ago he'd set off on an epic journey to Nova Scotia from his home downstate, intent on escaping all reminders of his ruined marriage, and got exactly three hundred and eighteen miles into the trip when the transmission in his truck failed and left him stranded in Crosscut for three weeks waiting for parts. The mechanic there rented him a loaner car, and there'd been nothing much to do but drive around sightseeing. Paul had ended Up in McAllaster one day, and got the idea of staying.

He'd come across a little pizzeria for sale cheap (the owner was desperate to get out), and buying it had suddenly seemed like the right thing to do. The truth was, investing in property seemed a lot smarter than blowing his money on travel, and he was already a little bored with the trip. It was in his nature to work, not fool around. Serving pizzas was something he knew he could do, something he thought he could make a living at, and McAllaster had seemed remote enough to satisfy his Urge to leave the life he'd been leading far behind. All of which had turned out to be more or less true.

Madeline made a small noise of surprise and stumbled on a hummock hidden in the grass and Paul reached out to steady her. “I thought I saw something,” she said. “Over there. But it's just a tree stump.” Paul nodded, seeing the stump she meant, which could look a lot like a huddled-up boy if that's what you were looking for.

He and Madeline moved slowly along the edge of the swamp, watching, listening. There was nothing to hear but the rustle of grass and the occasional call of a raven. They made a wide loop around the buildings and came back where they'd started just as the search crew began to arrive from town.

Madeline retreated
to the tavern. The hand-painted sign above the door said “The Trackside,” and she wondered if trains ever went by anymore, the cars loaded with lumber like the ones she'd seen in Crosscut. Could Greyson somehow have gotten on one? It seemed impossible. She crossed the room and sat beside Arbutus on a wooden chair. The place was no frills. Most of the light filtering in came from the few windows set high on one wall, and the air smelled of old fryer grease and smoke.

Randi was wringing her hands, saying over and over that Greyson must be hurt, or dead, lost in the swamp, drowned. Madeline yearned to shake her, to make her be quiet. Oh God, would this day never end, and where was this child?

Arbutus of course was kind to Randi. “Try and stop, dear, you're Upsetting yourself. It really isn't very likely that he's come to any harm. He's such a smart boy. I think we'll find he's all right.” She looked very tired, and Madeline could see by the way she shifted in the chair every few moments that she was hurting. Madeline yearned to take her home—as much to escape the grim bar and distressing situation as to help Arbutus, she admitted that to herself—but doubted Arbutus would go.

But oh God, Madeline needed out. She had only been three when Jackie left her in a church basement soup kitchen, never to return. Only three, but she had never forgotten the terror. It was as frightened and alone as she'd ever been.

“
Think
, Randi,” Gladys said. “Stop caterwauling and think. Was there anyone here that he might've wandered off with?”

“No! He's not going to wander off, he just isn't.”

No one responded to this, because clearly he had done exactly that.

They all looked Up when the door opened. Paul came in and shook his head at the Unspoken question in the room, looking more worried now than he had before. “No sign. Randi, sweetheart, are you sure there's nothing you can think of that was different about today? What were you doing down here, anyway?”

“Nothing! I didn't have anything else to do so I came down to see Roscoe and Annie. I was mad because they cut off my credit at the grocery, I didn't want to sit at the bar there in town and have one of the Bensons come in, I'd have probably lit into them. I mean, I have a kid to support, who do they think they are? So I came down here. Roscoe's my cousin, you know. I knew they wouldn't let Us starve.”

“Are you out of food at home?” Paul asked, and Madeline was impressed at how matter-of-fact he was about it, like a doctor asking about some humiliating symptom, impersonal and yet kind.