THE LAST BOY (11 page)

Molly was baffled. Why is he taking me here? thought Molly, as the hostess led them to their table. Larry caught a glimpse of himself
in the mirror and straightened his tie. For him, diners and fast food places apparently didn’t exist.

“Give us that table in the corner,” ordered Larry, who seemed to know the woman.

Molly sank down into the chair that he held for her. She could feel the heavy trucks roaring past, setting the crystal and mirrors to rattling. She had once thought this place the height of elegance and sophistication. Yet now all this glitter meant nothing. Everything felt off kilter. Even the smile of the approaching waitress felt patently false.

Molly had not been here in years. In fact, the last time was before Danny was born. Chuck was about to get a contract for a huge renovation job, and they were celebrating with a champagne dinner. Nothing was too good for Chuck.“Money was meant to be spent!” he used to say, and to the very end he had remained true to his word. Of course, the contract had fallen through—some minor contingency about city approval he had overlooked. But dinner had been fun. They had gone out dancing afterwards and made passionate love that night. That, in fact, was the night that Danny had been conceived.

It was odd to be here now, coming full circle. Molly picked up the menu, but couldn’t seem to focus on what was there.

“Could you order, please. I’m a wreck. I just can’t concentrate.”

“Of course,” he said and called back the smiling waitress.“We’re in a rush,” he uttered, and started ordering as Molly's mind drifted.

“Tell me about my Daddy,” Danny used to ask. She let her mind play over these exchanges that were always the same.

“Well, he was a very big and strong man,” she would say.

“And what did he do?”

“He built houses.”

“Big houses?”

“Yes. Very big.”

“How big?”

“Big as you can imagine.”

“Like to the sky?”

“Almost. When you get older, I’ll show you some he built.”

“Why did he leave?”

“I think maybe things were too much for him.”

“Too much building?”

“Yeah. Among other things. I think maybe he just got tired of working. And scared of having a family to worry about.”

“You mean
me?
” He looked at her wide-eyed and suddenly she had felt so sorry for him.

“No, no. It was me. He never knew you, Sweetie. If he had, he
never
would have left.”

When the soup arrived, Molly lingered over it, still lost in her reverie. Larry took a taste.“Hmmm, it's good,” he said,“Go on, give it a try.”

Molly took a spoonful and put it to her lips. And then she started crying. She used the napkin to muffle her sobs, but they kept coming.

People began staring at her.

“I’m sorry,” she gasped. “So sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologize,” he whispered. “I think you’re very brave and…and…and the way you’re standing up to this, why…” Larry reached across the table and took hold of her hand.

“Soup reminds me…of Danny,” and again she dissolved into tears.“He likes soup so much, and when he went off to Kute Kids I had to pack his lunch and it was lousy peanut butter and…” the sobs convulsed her.“I’m so sorry…”

“Come on, try to eat,” he urged.“You need strength.”

Between sniffles, Molly took a few spoonfuls. The liquid, though warm, seemed to have little taste. Her stomach started to churn. Through the veil of tears, she kept staring around the ornate room.

“I can’t!” she said finally. “This is all wrong. I really appreciate your bringing me here, but…I’ve got to go back.” Molly pushed back her chair and stumbled to her feet.

Larry was already up when the waitress came rushing over. “Is something—”

“Just let me pay for the lunch,” said Larry handing her the magazine's AmEx card.“Please hurry.”

Molly was already out the door. By the time Larry reached her, she was hanging on to the fender of his car, doubled over and retching. He took hold of Molly and held her by the waist as her body convulsed.

“Oh, God,” she uttered, wiping her lips with a tissue. Her knees were trembling, and she was too weak and embarrassed to even offer an apology. Larry got her into the car and drove her quickly back towards town.

“Better now?” he inquired solicitously.

“Much. Sorry to waste the soup,” she said with a wan smile.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have taken you there. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

They drove further in silence, ascending the highway that overlooked the lake. Molly kept staring down at the water, it looked cold and deep and foreboding. When they neared the trailer park, Larry broke the silence.“I want you to know that the last thing you have to worry about is your job. It's waiting for you. Whatever it takes.”

Molly started to cry again.

“And your salary keeps coming, too.”

Molly shook her head, though not very strenuously.

“Come on, the people in the office wouldn’t have it any other way. And they’re the ones who really run the show. They wanted me to tell you that you can call
any
of us—me, Doreen, Sally, or Ben— day or night.”

The road curved around the first doublewides that hid the
smaller trailers in the rear.

“Danny’ll turn up safe,” she said, hunting for a fresh tissue.“I just know it.”

“Of course.”

“They’ve got his picture in the newspaper,” she said as he pulled up.“And someone will see it and—”

“Good idea,” he turned off the engine and sat there.“I was just thinking of that.”

“
What?
” Molly turned to him in surprise.

“I mean aside from the police, that would be the logical—”

“I figured that's how you knew?”

Larry looked at her baffled. “Oh no, I didn’t see that.”

“Then how did you find out?”

Larry hesitated.

Molly wiped the tears from her eyes and blew her nose. The color was back in her face, this time beet red.“Well?” she persisted.

“This detective came around.”

“Detective?” Molly's jaw tightened.“You mean Tripoli?”

The police were canvassing the trailer park, too. As Larry drove off, Molly spotted a uniform at the Dolphs’ trailer. Old lady Dolph, in frayed pink bathrobe with matching curlers, opened the door a crack. Her mongrel squeezed out, growling and baring his teeth.

The cop had a hand on his can of mace. “You wanna put that dog back inside?”

By the time the dog was locked away, Molly was already in her car.

“Just want to ask you a few questions,” Molly heard before she started the engine. She could guess what the questions were. Tripoli, that two-faced bastard of a cop, suspected
her.

At the police station on Clinton Street, she was directed to the command post on Green. When she got to the firehouse, she finally
found the right door and stormed in, brushing past a guy with pony tail and puffy sideburns. A real dirt bag, she thought.

“Well, excuse me,” he chimed, smiling a snaggled, missing-toothed smile as he looked her up and down. “Hmmmm,” said Charley Paul admiringly; Molly could feel her skin crawl.

There were cops and troopers milling about, men and women sitting at phones set up on a long table. She recognized Dianne Lifsey off to one side. Her boy Stevie was in an adjacent room, sitting with a police woman. There were maps of the downtown city blocks taped up on the walls, marked block by block with different colors and pins. A uniformed cop was sitting in front of a television screen watching what looked like a tape from a surveillance camera. Molly recognized the view of the area around the Green Street Mini Mart.

“Where's Tripoli?” she demanded of one of the female officers.

“He's probably over in…” she began to motion, but Molly was already off.

She found him in the kitchen. His back was turned to her and he was pouring a cup of coffee.

“You sonofabitch!” she shouted.

Tripoli whirled around on his feet, nearly knocking over his cup. His hand was already instinctively reaching for his gun.

When he spotted her, he looked almost relieved.“Oh…” was all he said.

“I may not be the world's brightest individual, but I certainly know what you’re up to. You think
I
did something to Danny.”

“Look—”

“Look my ass!”

“It's my job to follow every—”

“If you guys had been doing your job, this might never have happened. Instead, you’re out giving parking tickets and chasing people with missing taillights when you’ve got all these crazies roaming town!”

“Calm down!” he said.

“If you think for one instant I’d do anything to my baby—well, then…” and she turned on her heels and marched out of the fire-house without finishing her sentence because she knew she would start crying again.

Tripoli started to pursue her, but she jumped into her car, slammed the door, and drove off.

The phone was ringing when she got back to the trailer. She fumbled with her keys, and by the time she got the door open her machine was already squawking the taped announcement.

She leaped for the phone and shouted “Wait!” into the mouthpiece while she groped for the button to kill the machine.

“Okay,” she said breathlessly when it stopped. “Are you still there? Hello?”

“I saw your little boy,” said a creaky old woman's voice.

“
What?
”

“I saw Danny.”

“What?” Her heart felt as if it had stopped.“Who is this?”

“My name is…” the woman paused as if having to recall. “My name…is…Edna.”

“Edna who?”

“Poyer.”

“Edna Poyer,” repeated Molly. Her heart had now kicked in full speed.

“Yup.”

“You said you saw Danny?”

“Yup! Yesterday.”

“Where?”

There was a voice in the background.

“Can’t you see, I’m having a conversation?” said Mrs. Poyer indignantly.

“Mrs. Poyer? Edna?” said Molly.

“Give me that phone back!” demanded Mrs. Poyer.

And then the phone was hung up, the connection severed.

“Hello?” cried Molly into the silence.“Hello?”

Molly hung up and ran for the phone book. There was not a single Poyer in the Ithaca directory. She called Syracuse information. Then Elmira and Binghamton.

She called the Ithaca City Police and was switched over to the command post.

After a long wait, she got Tripoli on the phone.

“Oh, you,” was all he said.

“I’m sorry. I know you’re trying to help,” said Molly without a hint of apology in her voice.

“I’m glad you realize that.” He sounded a little offended.

“I just got a call. Some old lady says she saw Danny.”

“When?”

“Yesterday.”

“Where?”

“That's just it. The connection got broken. Someone took the phone away from her.”

“Got any idea who it was?”

“She said her name was Edna. Edna Poyer.”

“Oh, her,” said Tripoli. “Wait, hang on a sec.” He covered the mouth piece and she could hear him talking to someone.“Oh, yeah. Sorry,” said Tripoli, coming back.“Where were we?”

Molly tried to control her rising anger. “Edna Poyer. You said you know her?”

“Edna? Sure, she's one of our regulars.”

“What does
that
mean?”

“She's up at Oak Hill Manor.”

“Oak Hill? You mean the nursing home?”

“Edna's got a tendency to take unauthorized walks. Also, she
likes to call us. She sees a lot of things. Suspicious people. Her dead husband. President Truman.”

Molly thought for a moment.“Okay. So maybe she's a little nuts. But maybe she did see something.”

“Sure. Always a possibility.”

“You gonna check it out?”

“We’re covering every single base—as you’ve discovered.”

“Yeah…Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to blow up like that,” said Molly finally.

Tripoli didn’t say anything.

“But I don’t give a damn about your feelings,” she said softly.“I just need to find my boy.”

Tripoli hung up the phone, wrote down the name Edna Poyer, and then went over to Jerry Sisler, who had asked to join the Driscoll team. Sisler was at one of the computers doing background checks on the daycare staff as well as running criminal histories on likely suspects. Among other leads, he was compiling a preliminary list of men who had a predilection for very young boys. Sisler had joined the force only three years ago. He was young and still bright-eyed, a fair-haired, pug-nosed kid whose father had been a cop, too. The older Sisler had been killed in a freakish accident. A tanker carrying septic waste had jack-knifed on the highway near Dryden, swinging around and crushing Cliff Sisler's cruiser. Tripoli had taken the young Jerry under his wing, and to the rest of the department it was clear that he was grooming him to be a detective.

“There are a lot of nuts here in Tompkins County,” said Sisler, punching the ENTER key. The printer spewed out the file of known offenders. “Flashers. Pedophiles and perverts. Rapists. Kiddy diddlers,” Sisler scanned his list. “Run-of-the-mill sexual offenders. Guys accused of molesting their little stepsons and nephews. This should be pretty complete, I think.”

“We’ll get Jack Knuutila and his troopers to run them down and establish their whereabouts for yesterday afternoon. And what about Oltz?”

“She's clean, but her husband was up on tax evasion charges a couple of years back. Louella, one of their help, had her license pulled for DWI and her husband did a little time for B&E.”

“Oh?”

“Small time shit. The asshole broke into someone's garage and stole a VCR that didn’t even work.”

“And Sylvia?”

“Sweet old grandmotherly type. Not even a parking violation.”

“What about Cheryl?”

“Nothing much. She got snagged for shoplifting over at Kmart two years ago. Some cosmetics and crap. Her father flew in with a bigshot lawyer from New York, and the case was dismissed.”

“What's the story on Charley Paul?”

“He's a wife beater, but other than that not much. His ex just got a protection order.”

“Who's the ex?”

Sisler pulled a file and shuffled through it. “Austin. Sheila Austin.”