Stone Cold Dead (22 page)

“You want to have a look?” he mumbled as he read.

“Not really,” I said. “I mean, what’s there to see? Just the messy leftovers of a girl who ran away.”

“That might sound good in your story. The human angle, you know.”

I stepped up to the locker and peered inside. There were school books, a pencil box, and a sweater dangling from a hook. A small vanity mirror hung on the inside of the door, alongside black-and-white pictures of Ricky Nelson, Bobby Rydell, and Fabian, clipped from teen magazines and pasted to the metal. Darleen had scrawled love notes to each of them.

“Ricky, my darling! Marry me!”

“Fabian, I’m yours forever!”

“Bobby, take me away!”

Lots of exclamation points.

Sticking out from behind Fabian was a small black-and-white snapshot. I plucked it from its perch and examined it. It was a blurred photograph of Joey Figlio standing next to an old car. I didn’t believe he had any connection to the car; it was just there. Joey looked witless and unimportant, common and unremarkable, even more so when compared to the practiced poses of the heartthrobs with whom he shared Darleen’s wall of fame. Scrawled across the back of the photo in a rough hand, Joey had written, “You’re mine forever. If I can’t have you, no one else will.”

I showed it to Frank, who gave me a knowing look.

“If I wasn’t sure she’d run off to Arizona,” he said, stuffing the photograph into the breast pocket of his shirt, “I’d arrest that kid on suspicion of murder.”

I turned back to my search. At the bottom of the locker, a pair of white sneakers and a crumpled, sweaty gym suit lay in a tangle on the floor. Black Jack gum wrappers, folded into long chains, hung from the shelf, stretching three-quarters of the way down to the floor of the locker. On the underside of the shelf, Darleen had left gobs of black gum stuck to the metal. Disgusting.

At the back of the locker, a light-weather jacket sagged from a hook. Going through the motions, I frisked it. There was something weighing down the right-side pocket. I reach inside and pulled out a pint bottle. It was Dewar’s White Label, not quite empty, and I was sure it was the one stolen from my purse the night of the basketball game. Darleen and her friends hadn’t yet acquired a taste for the stuff, it seemed, judging by the amount left in the bottle after three and a half weeks. But then I remembered that Darleen had disappeared on the twenty-first, just five days after the game. It looked as though she’d been sneaking slugs of whiskey between classes. I had done the same at Riverdale Country School. Janey Silverman was in the habit of pocketing the odd bottle of booze from her uncle’s shop on Fifteenth Street and Fifth Avenue, Paramount Liquors. Whatever was closest to the door, she told me years later. I had assumed she was taking it from her father. The selection was a bit of a grab bag; never the same liquor twice. But Janey didn’t particularly like drinking and hardly ever touched the stuff. She ended up giving it to me, and I put it away, one sip at a time between classes, just as Darleen Hicks had done.

“What’s that you got there?” asked Frank. I pushed aside the memory.

“Whiskey,” I said, handing him the bottle.

Frank harrumphed. “Wonder where she got that.”

“How should I know?” I said a mite too insistently.

I stood on my toes and reached deep inside the locker to retrieve a small cosmetics bag from the back of the shelf. Lipsticks, eyelashes, pimple cream, Midol, and blush. There was some talcum powder and a hairbrush as well. I dived in again, this time fishing out a canvas pouch, the kind banks and businesses used to carry money. I opened it up and dug inside. The first thing I found was a well-worn envelope with unused hall passes, unpunched lunch tickets, and excuse slips for a variety of absences, from influenza to menstrual cramps, all with Irene Metzger’s name and signature at the bottom. But there wasn’t a date on any of them. Darleen Hicks was a fair hand at forgery.

I found some simple jewelry: earrings, a couple of friendship rings, a pendant, and a charm bracelet. Then I pulled a large coin purse from the bottom of the pouch. It was heavy in my hand.

“Find anything?” asked Frank.

I uttered a short gasp.

“What is it?” he said, joining me to see.

I opened the purse for him to see. “It’s money, Frank. A lot of money.”

He glowered at the wad of bills in the purse; he knew as well as I what it meant.

“There’s no way a girl would run away and leave all this money behind, is there?” I asked, dreading the conclusion that was dawning on me.

“I don’t think so,” said Frank. “I’d better count it; this has to be official now.”

He pulled the wad of bills from the purse with his meaty fingers, clamped the money under his arm, and retrieved one last item from inside the bank pouch: a stamped envelope from Fort Huachuca, Arizona. It was addressed to Darleen Hicks, general delivery, New Holland, NY. Inside there was a short letter, a small blue square of paper, and a third sheet of thin paper.

“This is a New York State driver’s license,” said Frank, giving it close scrutiny. “Forged. Says she’s seventeen years old.” He handed the license and the purse back to me to hold while he dug into the wad of cash.

“These things look pretty easy to fake,” I said, referring to the driver’s license. “All you need is an eraser and a black pen.” I slipped it back into the envelope and pulled out the thin piece of paper instead.

Frank grunted agreement as he counted the money. “There’s ninety-seven dollars here,” he said once he’d thumbed through the bills twice. “Where does a fifteen-year-old girl get that kind of money?”

“Probably the same place she got this,” I said, handing him the paper from the pouch.

“What’s that?” he asked.

I sighed. “It’s Darleen’s bus ticket.”

Besides the unused bus ticket, there was a short letter in the envelope, written in a clumsy chicken scratch, dated November 20, 1960.

Dear Darleen
,

I saved up enough to buy the ticket. With the hundred dollars I wired you and this ticket, there’s no reason we can’t be together and get married right away. A hundred dollars! If you got the fake driver’s license like you said, we’re set now, baby girl. I’ll meet you in Tucson in four weeks. Don’t miss that bus!

Yours always
,
Wilbur

Frank procured a new padlock from the janitor and slapped it on Darleen’s locker to secure its contents. Then he hustled me down to the principal’s office along with the new evidence. This was my chance to have a word with Brossard about Ted Russell. I got lucky; Frank needed to make a phone call to the jail to bark some orders at Pat Halvey. The sheriff plunked himself down at Mrs. Worth’s desk, and I slipped behind him and knocked on Brossard’s door.

“Come in,” he called from inside. He looked up at me quizzically when I entered. “Miss Stone. What is it?”

“I need to speak to you about Mr. Russell,” I said, taking the seat before him. Brossard waited. My face felt flush. “I have reason to believe he was behaving badly with Darleen Hicks. Perhaps other students as well.”

Brossard let loose a short laugh. He stared at me, brandishing a half-cracked smile for several beats. Finally he asked me what reason I had to believe such a thing.

“I’ve come into possession of a note. A handwritten note from Ted Russell to Darleen Hicks. A love note.”

Brossard’s smile fell, and he leaned forward in his seat. “Now that’s a very serious accusation, Miss Stone. I’ve already told you that I investigated the allegations and found them to be false. Both Mr. Russell and the girl insisted there was nothing.”

“I’ve got the note.”

“Did you find it in her locker just now? May I see it?” he asked.

I shook my head. “I don’t have it with me.”

“And you’re certain it was written by Ted Russell?”

“Yes,” I said. “It was signed by him.”

Brossard looked troubled. He eased back into his seat and frowned at something out the window. “What did the note say?” he asked, his voice slow and gruff. Suddenly, he sounded as if he had smoker’s cough.

“It said, ‘Darleen. Each time I see your bright face, my heart leaps.’ And it went on for a bit after that.”

Brossard banged the table with his hand and shot out of his chair. He paced back and forth at the window for about thirty seconds before drawing a restorative breath and turning to me.

“I just can’t believe it,” he said, dismissing my evidence. It had sure looked as though he believed it a moment before. “It’s not possible,” he continued. “I’ve known Ted—Mr. Russell—for two years. We socialize. We’ve bowled together. He took me under his wing and showed me around town when I arrived here from Hudson. I interviewed Ted and the girl, and I tell you I’m sure there was nothing between them. There must be some mistake.”

“Hudson?” I asked, veering off course. “Are you from Hudson?”

“No,” he said. “I’m from Yonkers originally, but I was deputy headmaster at a small denominational boarding school in Hudson. St. Winifred’s.”

“Why did you leave? I’m always interested to know how people end up here in New Holland.”

He shrugged. “It was a good opportunity. I would like to be a principal or superintendent one day. St. Winifred’s was a bit of a dead end.”

“Do you have a sample of Mr. Russell’s handwriting?” I asked, returning to the subject at hand.

“I think this has gone far enough. I’m not going to give any handwriting samples. Not Mr. Russell’s and not mine.”

“I didn’t ask for yours.”

He stared at me. His nose twitched just ever so, then Frank Olney walked in.

“I meant I would no sooner give my handwriting sample than I would Mr. Russell’s,” he said.

“There you are, Ellie,” said Frank. “What’s all this about handwriting samples?”

“Miss Stone is under the mistaken impression that Mr. Russell misbehaved with Darleen Hicks,” said Brossard.

“Her and me both,” said the sheriff deadpan. “It does look suspicious.”

“Nevertheless, it’s false,” insisted Brossard. “You must be mistaken, Miss Stone. That love note is surely from someone else.”

“What love note?” asked Frank.

“Frankie Ralston gave it to me,” I said through my teeth. “I forgot to mention it to you.”

“All right,” said the sheriff, lips pursed, exhaling through his nose. He wasn’t happy to learn about the note this way. “Let’s go, Ellie.”

“What about Darleen Hicks’s locker?” asked Brossard. “Did you find anything new?”

Frank stared at him long and hard. “Nothing at all. Just girl stuff.”

Frank zoomed up Market Hill, heading for Route 40 and the jail. “Ellie, I’ve got to ask you nicely not to mention anything about this money and bus ticket for now,” he said. “Nothing in the paper, please. Sometimes we have to withhold information from the public so as not to tip off the bad guys. This proof satisfies me that Darleen Hicks did not run off to Arizona, or anywhere else for that matter. And I don’t want anyone who might have been involved with her disappearance to know that we know that. I’m happy to share information with you when I can, and you can print it when it’s time. But for now, I’m asking you to play ball. Is that clear?”

I wasn’t sure what to say. The sheriff had been cooperative with me—a true gem—ever since the Jordan Shaw murder investigation got under way, but my job was to bring in the story. Should I—could I—put my responsibility aside and do the right thing? It was the right thing, after all. If a few days of silence from my side could help nab a kidnapper or a murderer, then it was my duty as a citizen to go along with the law. Why, then, did I feel that I was betraying my profession? Torpedoing my own career? I wanted to break this story.